Help your teen do better in school with more sleep Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Improving Teen Sleep
Teenagers are notorious for not sleeping enough during the school week, and then sleeping very late on the weekends; proper sleep has great importance for a teen. This disrupts their sleep quality and patterns. However, I truly understand why they do it; most teens are exhausted by the end of the week.
Consequences of Poor Sleep
The importance of teen sleep is paramount. Not sleeping enough causes irritability, poor memory, depressed mood, affects eating patterns, is linked with use of caffeine and nicotine, and lowers immunity. The average teenager needs 9 hours and 15 minutes of sleep every single night. Most are lucky if they get 8 hours. Part of the struggle is that in adolescence it is normal for the circadian rhythm (the body’s natural sleeping and waking pattern) to shift. Adolescents often cannot fall asleep until close to 11pm. However, most schools start around 8am. That means there isn’t even enough time to get proper sleep.
Ways to Improve Sleep
This will seem obvious, but it is worth mentioning. Things that can help your teen fall asleep earlier are keeping their room very dark at night, finishing dinner by 7pm, stopping homework and phone use by 8:30pm, and using the last half hour of the day to wind down. Do not let your teenager have a TV in their room, or let them play video games in their room. Those are two activities associated with mental alertness; their room needs to be associated with rest. Also, their bed should only be used for sleeping. A lot of teens like to do their homework on their bed, text while sitting on their bed, read on their bed, etc. Again, you want your child to mentally associate their bed with sleep. These are all things that can help you get your teen to bed by 9pm.
Why Improving Teen Sleep is Important
Initially you may experience resistance on the idea of an earlier bedtime. Try and explain the benefits. Tell your teenager that school becomes easier with more sleep. Tell them also that they will be healthier, have more energy, and get along better with family. For teens who struggle with their weight, explain to them that the proper amount of sleep links to a healthier body weight.
What Do We Do About Teen Sleep In Counseling
When a parent brings their teenager into counseling with me, one of the first things I check on is how much sleep the teen is getting because of the importance of good teen sleep. Many adolescents come for depressed moods, irritability and low self-worth. Most of the kids who feel this way also are very short on sleep. Many of these kids sleep about 6 hours per night during the school week.
Right away we agree on improving their sleep schedule. We move up their bedtime by a half hour each week until they are in bed with the lights out for 9 hours per night. In about 25% of cases, this is all the adolescent needs to feel completely better. In almost 100% of cases it helps the adolescent feel somewhat better.
After you read this take a few minutes to examine the sleep patterns in your family. Is everyone watching TV before bed? Do some members of the family texting until they fall asleep? Are your kids doing homework until 11pm? Do you have to wake your teenagers up two or three times every morning before they start getting ready for school? These are all signs of bad sleep hygiene (yes, that’s an actual term). Maybe if everyone works on it, the whole household will get along better.
Helping teens grow and families improve connection,
Responsible teens are much happier than entitled ones. Photo courtesy of Marin and freedigitalphotos.net.
Entitlement in Adolescents
A while ago, I was fortunate enough to hear John Townsend speak. He is witty, engaging and above all, wise. He had really good things to say about adolescent entitlement.
One of the key points he made was that we should not say, “I deserve” this or that. That verbage causes us to actually lose power. When we think we deserve something, we assume it’s due us. That means we’re upset when we don’t have it, and we don’t see how to go and get it for ourselves.
What To Do If Your Teen Is Entitled
If your teenager tells you, “I deserve an iPhone,” it means they’ve given you all the power to control when and how they get it. They are completely relying on you to provide this for them. Instead it’s much better to teach your children (and yourselves) to use the words, “I’m responsible” to get the thing you want. If your adolescents learn to say this, they then believe it’s within their power to earn things. I agree with Dr. Townsend on this point completely because it teaches your teens motivation, and goal setting. Those two things can be hard to teach a teen, but they help to end entitlement in adolescents.
Entitlement to Special Treatment
Another point Dr. Townsend made that was fantastic is essentially to be very careful about believing you’re “exempt from responsibility,” and therefore, “owed special treatment.” When you read that sentence, I’m sure you don’t think you’re guilty of this. Afterall, at first I didn’t. Then he went on to explain that ALL of us do this from time to time. We think it’s fine to share our opinions without being careful of someone else’s feelings. We can be particularly guilty of this on social media. However, we don’t want to hear opinions contrary to our own; that’s deemed offensive.
The Most Common Area of Teen Entitlement
When it comes to teens, I hear the problem of being “exempt from responsibility” and “owed special treatment” in one particular area all the time. This is with their teachers and coaches. I hear teens’ parents tell me their child had a bad teacher or bad coach. They say this in front of their teenager. This causes entitlement in your adolescent. Some parents even go as far as to change their teenager’s schedule at school in order to get a particular teacher and avoid others. My question to you if you do this is: Why does your child deserve the best teacher? It’s nice when it happens, but does anybody deserve that? And, there’s that word “deserve” again.
Responsibility in Adolescents is the Opposite of Entitlement
The better thing to teach your child is to be responsible for finding a way to learn and earn a good grade even with the less engaging teachers. There’s that other word, “responsible.” Besides, learning to function with less than optimum learning conditions is more important than learning the subject matter. How many times in your life have you used your 11th grade trigonometry from that class with the great math teacher? Compare this with how many situations you’ve been in where your boss or client was less than great. Aren’t you glad you learned to cope with “bad” teachers after all?
What Can Parents Do?
Firstly, you have the ability to model good behavior. Show a lot of gratitude for all the things in your life. Understand that God gives and takes away as He wills. We aren’t owed anything in this life. Your kids will greatly benefit from that outlook too. They’ll work hard and enjoy what they have, but they won’t be destroyed every time they don’t get their way.
At Teen Therapy OC, combatting entitlement in adolescents towards parents is a key goal in nearly every counseling relationship. Many, many adolescents who come in struggle with entitlement. They are angry with parents for “taking away my phone,” or “not letting me go out with my friends.” Of course this doesn’t describe everyone, but for those it does, we work on adolescent entitlement reduction. Everyone ends up happier.
Helping teens grow and families improve connection,
Sleep is vital to your teen. Image courtesy of imagerymajestic at FreeDigitalPhotos.net.
Importance of Good Sleep
I’m bringing up teen sleeping habits because I hear parents express concern over this in my therapy office all the time. I have to admit, how well and how consistently your adolescent sleeps is a really big deal.
Good sleep has very strong links to happiness, immune functioning, ability to perform in school, memory, safe driving, and the list goes on.
Why Are Teens Short on Sleep?
Teenagers are notorious for foregoing sleep in order to complete homework assignments, text their friends, play video games, and go on TikTok. However, none of these are a good excuse not to get about eight hours of sleep per night. If your teen is occasionally staying up late to finish an assignment that’s one thing, but if they do this night after night, this is a problem.
Surprisingly, adolescents still need a hard and fast bedtime. Furthermore, you have to enforce it. It’s essential for their health and well-being. If they have trouble waking up in the morning for school, then it means they aren’t sleeping enough. That’s their body telling them to get to bed earlier.
The Family’s Role in Good Teen Sleep
Interestingly, there’s a good chance if your teen has poor sleep habits you do too. So what steps can you take? Firstly, get yourself on a good sleep schedule, and stop watching late night TV. Your sleep is absolutely more important! As a result, you will be more productive at work, nicer to your family, a more enjoyable friend, and you will quite possibly shed those few extra pounds that have been nagging at you. Essentially, people who sleep well actually crave healthier foods and exercise more easily (they are more energized).
Secondly, prioritize this aspect of health in your family culture. There is a tremendous emphasis on the foods we eat and the amount we exercise in today’s culture. Obviously that’s reasonable. On the contrary, there’s not nearly enough discussion about the value of sleep in one’s overall health. Getting enough sleep improves immunity, thought clarity, lowers disease risk, and prevents injuries. And, it feels good!
What if My Teen Sleeps Too Much?
On the other hand, if your worries about your teenager’s sleep come from the other side of the spectrum, there are different concerns. For example, if your teen naps often and also sleeps eight plus hours per night, then I have a different set of concerns. Excessive sleep is a symptom, but there are many differing problems that cause hypersomnia in adolescents. Here are a few: depression, drug use, endocrine issues, and physical illness. It’s very important to talk with your doctor in this situation. Your doctor might recommend psychiatry or therapy, but your doctor might also catch something else that’s wrong. In any case, for your teenager to need a total of more than 10 hours of sleep per 24 hour stretch warrants a conversation with a doctor.
Once you get the family back on a good sleeping schedule, everyone’s life will be better, and everyone in your household will be happier. Our therapists at TTOC love to talk about sleep! We want to help everyone in your family sleep more and sleep better. We especially believe in its importance for your developing teenager.
Helping teens grow and families improve connection,
Having a good parent-child relationship with a teenager is an achievable goal. Image courtesy of photostock at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Improving relationships with our teens is effort well spent. To some, the idea seems daunting. “How will I ever get my teen to respect and like me?” you wonder. Still, teenagers who have one caring adult in their life fare far better as adults than those who don’t (see developingchild.harvard.edu article). Hopefully, this means the interactions have an element of friendship underneath; this gives you more permission to have the parental interactions when they are needed.
Steps for Improving Our Relationship with Our Teens
Tracking The Improvement in Your Relationship with Your Child
That said, if you decide improving your relationship with your teenager is one of your new goals, then it’s time to plan. Firstly, let’s figure out a few reasonable ways you can track yourself to see how you’re doing. For example, if you yell when you’re frustrated, try writing a quick note on a calendar at the end of each day: “Good today,” or “Yelled too much today.” While it’s simple, holding yourself accountable is the key to changed behavior. The other key is sticking with it. It supposedly takes 7 weeks to change a habit. That’s 49 days. In theory, tracking behavior every day for a month and a half elicits change.
Be Patient with the Process of Improving Your Relationship with Your Adolescent
Secondly, you must be patient. When you become nicer to people in your family, they won’t even notice at first. They will go on reacting towards you the way they always have. Keep in mind, you probably have to give it about three weeks before you notice them starting to be kinder in return. For their part, your adolescents won’t even realize they are being nicer in return. It eventually just starts to happen. Sadly, many parents I work with lose patience with this process because it is hard to make a huge effort for three weeks. Also, it’s very challenging not to get caught up in the garbage your teen can dish out.
Give Yourself Grace When Learning to Get Along with Your Teen
Thirdly, have grace towards yourself. Unlike a New Year’s Resolution to run 4 days a week, you can’t measure your behavior and emotions in the same way. You can resolve to do 4 nice things for your teenager per week that you wouldn’t normally do, but you can’t decide to be kind 4 times per week and then have a perfect relationship. We have to be trying ALL the time to improve our relationship with our teens, while constantly forgiving ourselves for returning to our old ways. In essence, you have to push the reset button in your mind 20 times a day. When you do speak harshly to your teenager, or allow them to push you around, or whatever you’re trying to change, just take a deep breath and get back on the path. Eventually, this gets easier. I promise!
Eyes on the Prize (Getting Closer to Your Teen)
Finally, don’t lose sight of the reward at the end. You need to consistently visualize what things will be like once you’ve achieved the goal of an improved relationship. To this end, maybe you imagine hugging your son each morning when he’s on his way out the door to school. Similarly, perhaps you picture your daughter wanting to take a walk with you on a Saturday morning. Or, maybe you see yourselves sending funny little text messages to one another throughout the day. Whatever it is, don’t lose track of where you’re headed. Dave Ramsey always says, “If you aim at nothing, you’ll hit it every time.” While he’s a money guy and I’m a psychology lady, I wholeheartedly agree.
To put it another way, you need a tangible goal to achieve. Don’t try and picture being best friends with your teenager. That’s not likely to happen anyhow (And you want them to have their own friends). Just keep your focus on things looking a little better than they do right now.
When to Seek Counseling to Get Along Better with a Teenager
For some of you, improving your relationship with your teenager feels like it’s beyond a simple blog post. In those cases, our counselors at Teen Therapy OC can help. We’re always happy to spend a few minutes free of charge on the phone with you or to answer an email or two. This helps you determine next steps such as whether therapy is the right direction.
In summary, counseling usually helps when there is little to no respect between you and your teenager. Also, some parents come to the point where they cannot trust their adolescent child. If that is you, therapy is a good place to start. And, if you suspect your teen’s mental health is a factor in why things aren’t going as well between you as they used to, therapy becomes vital.
Our Hope for You as You Improve Your Relationship with Your Teen
Our hope and prayer for you is that this is a year filled with joy and blessings in your relationships with your children. We pray also that you learn as much from them as they do from you. Yes we want times of teaching and learning, but we also want you and your teen to have fun and joy!
Helping teens grow and families improve connection,
If you’ve recently discovered your teen is self-harming, you have to be wondering, “Why do teenagers cut themselves?” Cutting seems like a somewhat recent phenomenon. It’s been around for a long time, but it has grown in notoriety and popularity. The majority of teenagers I work with who have tried cutting mostly did so because a friend told them about it, or they hear about it on Tik Tok. They wanted to try and see if it was a helpful way to cope with emotional pain. Most find that it isn’t, and do not continue to cut.
By contrast, the teens who cut more seriously and regularly give us great concern. For example, when I see a teenager in my office who cuts frequently and/or deeply, I worry. Firstly, we immediately begin the discussion of the teenager completing an evaluation with a psychiatrist (We have several referrals we can offer, including Oak Health, Progeny Clinic, and Mind Health Institute, among others) having the teenager see a psychiatrist for an evaluation. This is not cutting for attention as much as a deep emotional disturbance. Oftentimes medications are needed in these situations.
A teen telling her mom about her self-injury.
Credit: freedigitalphotos.net/David Castillo Dominici
Why Do Teenagers Cut Themselves: Where On the Body Tells a Story
When considering why teenagers cut themselevs, it is also important to note is that teens cut in a variety of places. The most common location is the inner forearm of their non-writing hand. So, if they write with their right hand, the cuts are on the soft side of their left forearm. Also, there are other common locations such as the inner thighs, and the stomach. Usually, cutting on the thighs and stomach is done to avoid detection. By contrast, teenagers who cut on their arm often want to be found out. This is particularly true if they cut and then wear short sleeves.
Cutting as a Coping Skill
Importantly, why do teens self-harm? There are of course a variety of reasons. Cutting is not a one size fits all venture. However, the best explanation I’ve ever heard was by Richard Bautzer, MFT. He told me he believes teens cut as a coping skill to control their pain. You would naturally ask, “Why would they inflict more pain on themselves as a way to control pain?” This is because there is some emotional stressor that feels uncontrollable to the teenager. This stressor really could be anything. For example, the teen who is cutting might be managing the stress of parents going through a divorce.
Another Reason Why Teenagers Cut Themselves: Cutting to Control Emotional Pain
Cutting to control pain works like this: A teen can control when they cut, for how long, with what device, and how deeply. This is untrue of emotional pain. For an adolescent, emotional pain often seems random and unmanageable. Also, many teen clients have explained they can see the blood, which represents the inner pain. Somehow, it’s more tolerable to have tangible pain than invisible emotional pain.
Steps to Take if Your Teen is Cutting Themself
What do we hope you take away from this discussion as a parent? The most important thing is that cutting is serious. If your teen is self-injuring, then they might be suicidal. Self-harm, whether done for attention or something deeper, is abnormal. Your teenager needs an evaluation by a professional. Call a therapist, school counselor, pediatrician or psychiatrist. Whatever you do, call someone. While it is tempting to hesitate if your teen tells you they can stop, my experience tells me you cannot assume this is something you should handle on your own.
Dialectical Behavioral Therapy is one type of counseling commonly used to help teens who are cutting. It teaches tolerance of uncomfortable emotions as your teen explores why they’ve been using self-injury as a coping skill. DBT helps a teenager recognize emotions, consider their cause, and then permit themselves to have those feelings instead of trying anything to neutralize them (i.e. cutting, lashing out, drugs, etc.). DBT also explores why teenagers cut themselves so that it is easier to find healthy alternatives. While most Teen Therapy OC therapists are comfortable with DBT, Jazmie Albarian has taken the extra step of becoming certified in DBT. It is worth calling her to find out how DBT can help your teen.
A Final Thought on Teen Cutting Behavior
A final thought for parents who have children that self-harm: It is terrifying. I realize that finding out your child, whom you love more than words can ever express, wants to inflict pain on him or herself is one of the scariest things you’ve dealt with. Don’t hide this from everyone because you feel ashamed. Talk to one or two close, trusted people so you can have support. You have to make sure you’re not spending a lot of energy and time blaming yourself. Instead direct that energy toward finding a solution.
Also, don’t blame yourself. You need all your emotional resources available to confront and control the problems your teenager is facing. You will eventually have time to dig in to what you want to change, but that comes a little later.
All in all, finding out your teen is self-harming is beyond overwhelming. From one parent to another, my heart goes out to you. As a therapist, I want to walk alongside you through this incredibly difficult time.
Helping teens grow and families improve connection,
Taking and storing mental health medication properly is extremely important.
Image courtesy of marin at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
With permission, I pass on words of wisdom from a client. This person wants all of you to know that she wasn’t attentive in how she stored her medication, which led to it being ineffective. She said she kept it in her car so she could conveniently take it each morning as she left the house. She said she wants everyone to know that it got too hot in the car, which wasn’t good for her meds. For those of you taking meds, she encourages you to pay attention to the temperatures suggested on the label. She says once she began storing it properly, it worked better.
Now onto comments from two different teenagers dealing with extreme loneliness at school. There are many, many of you reading this who suffer from loneliness. Not having one or two good friends in your life is devastating at any age. For a teen it’s even harder because it’s so noticeable. You walk around your school campus and have nobody to sit with at lunch. You don’t know where to go at break. Even if you have a place to sit at lunch, you’re not included in activities outside of school hours. You might be “okay,” but without friends you’re probably not thriving.
My heart aches for you. We are wired to belong to someone. There are a few of us who genuinely don’t need people, but that is not most of us. Most of us need someone to belong to and we need someone to belong to us. This innate need is deeply ingrained. If you don’t belong to anyone at school and nobody belongs to you, please tell your parents. I know that discussion might be awkward, but your outlook on your entire life can change if you are given some tools to rectify the loneliness.
Sometimes loneliness is really hard to fix. Sometimes you have no insight into why you aren’t building connections with others. We always work on that in therapy because I have come to see it as a basic human need. Not having someone underlies at least half of the cases I see when a teen is refusing to go to school. It is also present in a high percentage of those I see who come in for depression and anxiety.
One of the first things to consider is going where you’re wanted. Some of you who are lonely do have people who like you, they just aren’t the people you have your heart set on. Usually these people are kind but maybe not as “fun.” Trust me when I tell you that these people are worth putting time into. Being in the popular crowd is far less important than having a place where someone is glad to see you each day.
Some of you don’t really have anyone you can identify as a place you can go. This is trickier, but not impossible. It becomes important to start looking around for who else needs a friend instead of who can meet your needs. It’s a change in mindset, but it does start the process of resolving the loneliness.
Finally, there are some of you who have enough social anxiety that you cannot bring yourself to do or say the friendly things necessary to get close to others. Give us a call in that case; counseling and/or group therapy can be of temendous benefit in those cases.
Hello, I’m Lauren! If you notice your teen struggling, you might be feeling helpless, hopeless, frustrated or concerned as a parent. Try to remember, there is hope. I want to help your adolescent feel better. My hope is for them to enjoy their life again. I want them to feel confident they can handle whatever situations arise.
