Tag Archives: family

What are they thinking?

What are they thinking, we wonder. It’s a question we toss about in conversation. It frequently comes up with someone is doing something that seems self-destructive, or bizarre, or just unexpected.  For psychotherapists, like myself, a lot of people seem to believe we have a secret insight into what some particular person is thinking. Of course, I don’t. I have theories, sometimes, based on study and thirty-plus years of experience in mental health and sixty-plus years of experience being human, most of that as a voracious reader. But even with all that, I am often stymied and stumped as to what someone is thinking.

I recently dropped off art for a show and met another artist. We were introduced, we shook hands. He is a tall man with big, baseball mitt-sized hands. At least, compared to mine. And my small hands are twisted up and deformed with arthritis, with many joints completely failed, such that my ability to hold a brush or a pastel stick is pretty much a miracle. What was this man, a visual artist whose attention to detail is apparent in his work, thinking when he squeezed my hand as if I were a big man with whom he was about to enter an arm-wrestling contest? I don’t know, but what comes to mind is unkind. So, I try to assure myself it was a moment of oblivion.

We have many people in our neighborhood who walk their dogs and assiduously clean up after them. There is one person (I hope and pray it is only one because it is almost unbearable to think there are more) who very carefully picks up after their dog with proper little dark plastic bags, knots the bags carefully … and then leaves them behind. On the sidewalk, on someone’s driveway and once on the table at the end of our driveway where we had set out the abundant crop from our starfruit tree to give away. What was this person thinking as they left their little present next to the box of starfruit and the big sign announcing, Free Fruit? I hope I never figure it out. My husband, who is better-hearted person than I am, suggested that perhaps it was dark and they thought they were just adding to the trash pile. Hmmm.

What are they thinking when … we all wonder. And I am sure people wonder it about me. Certainly, my little adventures such as hiking up and down canyon walls and white-water rafting when I don’t even know how to swim generate some of that. Then there are the times when I nervously blurt out something stupid, awkward but well-intended when a friend shares difficult news, such as a scary health diagnosis. Being a professional is not a vaccine against that. And perhaps about you, too, sometimes, inspire people to wonder, what were they thinking? Reminding myself of this helps me give a little grace to other people’s weirdness or inconsideration, because I definitely have my moments of being weird, inconsiderate or just plain oblivious.  And at those times, no doubt someone is wondering, “My gosh, what is she thinking…?”

Riding the Rapids

We recently spent a few days hiking up mountains, camping and white-water rafting in Wyoming and Montana, because isn’t that what people who are afraid of heights (me) and can’t swim (yeah, me, again) do for fun? And it was fun. It’s good to push out of the comfort zone.

Most parents and the other adults who care for and work with children are quite serious about helping them get out of their supposed comfort zones and into a healthier lifestyle. Recently, I was speaking to a group of adults about the topic, “Raising Mentally Healthy Children.” We spent our time focused on what we can do.

One problem that arises in these conversations – whether in a group, one-on-one, or with a family, is that making time for change seems impossible. The days are packed, and nothing on the schedule seems negotiable. Yet, in reality, what’s not negotiable is what humans need to be healthy and thriving.

What most kids need, and what we need, too, is more appropriately divvied-up time. For example, children and teens benefit from a solid two hours or more of physical activity every day. They need time outdoors, in nature, for their immune systems, Vitamin D, circadian rhythms and even their eyesight development. The near-and-far variation in focus that being outdoors elicits promotes healthy eyesight in young children; kids are supposed to go from crouching down to study a beetle to peering across the field to see if that’s a hawk in the tree and then taking off running to make sure. Optimally, they’re outside for at least two or so hours every day – more on weekends.

Kids need enough sleep – probably 9 or 10 hours a night, with an absence of screens. Recent research links high levels of artificial light at night (ALAN) with increased rates of cancer due to disruption of the circadian rhythm. An immediate risk with insufficient sleep is the attention system. Sleep-deprived people are irritable, inattentive, forgetful, disorganized and generally not fun to be around. Sleep-deprived drivers test as impaired, much like those with alcohol and/or drugs in their system. Think about inexperienced and sleep-deprived teenagers driving to and from school and work, often in the dark.

Kids, and we adults, need unstructured time. Most of the adults present had a creative hobby or two, and we all agreed that it takes time to shift gears into that hobby. It’s hard to walk in the door after work and immediately pick up a paintbrush, or guitar, or journal, or woodworking tools, and be in flow. The segue into creativity requires a sort of almost boring downtime – something many adults and children avoid compulsively through electronics. 

I can’t tell people what sacrifices have to be made for their family to have a healthier life. It varies from family to family, and it is never easy. It might be simple or quite complex, but it is never easy. However – after the white-water part, when you aren’t on nature’s roller coaster, there are always some smooth, easy times ahead. Thank you to all the parents who go for it – who strive to be sure their children to have the range of experiences they need to grow up resilient, curious and confident.

Hard Changes

Most of us have some changes to make. And most changes are not so easy. That’s why people postpone them, or poke at the edges, or just pretend the problem will go away by itself. Sometimes people convince themselves there isn’t even a problem, really; that it just depends how you look at it. Maybe so. But maybe there’s something that needs changing.

Let’s say you have a teenage child, or a child approaching the teens. S/he is cranky, sullen, uncooperative with chores, sulks during family meals and resists being on time for school and other appointments. S/he wants to spend time alone, in the bedroom, with electronics. The child is depressed and/or anxious and/or obsessive and/or perpetually angry. You know the situation will change, one way or the other. Everything changes. If you do nothing, you are gambling that your child will continue down this road and somehow, at 18 or 19 or 20, wake up, shake themselves off like a wet Golden Retriever and come out of their bedroom, smile and say, “Wow! How could I have been so wrong?!”

Yeah, I doubt it, too.

If you have this situation and need to take it on, it can be hard to know where to start. Here’s a suggestion: if the situation is not a crisis, then the most practical first step may be to start with yourself.

You will have to change. Perhaps you have to start the change process by being sure that all the adults in the house are on the same page in your expectations. Perhaps you need to get yourself on the right path.

You go first. You get enough fresh air, and time in nature, and sleep, and healthy nutrition, and balanced physical activity. You strive to do interesting and challenging things in what little free time you have. You will, quite naturally and incidentally, spend less passive screen time. You’ll be leading from strength rather than being a target for adolescents’ favorite criticism: that we adults are hypocrites. You’ll be in a much better stance to steer positive changes for your tween or teen.  

Mom Wisdom: See, I wouldn’t like that

My mom has much wisdom, and it is often compressed into a succinct statement. One such statement is the beautifully versatile, “See, I wouldn’t like that.”

It is a thoughtful, personally disclosing and completely nonjudgmental response to all sorts of statements and behaviors. 

A distant relative has gotten an uncomfortable looking piercing. See, I wouldn’t like that, having a hole in my lip. But it’s not my lip.

Another family member is an avid hunter, while she is a vegetarian. See, I wouldn’t like that. But I’m sure it’s good to save money on food and of course the poor animal had at least a better quality of life while it lasted than those poor animals trapped in commercial stalls.

An elderly family member is planning a hiking and camping trip in the mountains. Well, good for her, but I wouldn’t like that. I’m sure she’ll have fun.

She will not pretend to agree with an opinion to keep the peace; she will not be abrasive or confrontational about it, either. She will not pretend that she, too, would want to skydive or travel someplace with large insects or otherwise engage in activities that she finds unappealing. She will listen, ask lots of questions, show genuine interest in the topic, seek to understand the other person’s enthusiasm, be encouraging and may also remark, well, see, I wouldn’t like that.

We have, to some extent, adopted this expression. Even when making an observation about something, such whether to go to the local First-Friday concert when the music is not a genre we enjoy, no criticism is necessary, just the agreement that lots of people will really enjoy it but, see, we wouldn’t like that.

I wonder what changes would ripple out if more people, instead of criticizing others for thinking or doing differently, the first stance was that respectful curiosity followed by a personal reflection that has nothing to do with whether the other party is “right” or “wrong.”  The alternative is a world where people fight or even cut one another out of their lives for matters that are more personal opinions than principles and too often, too little effort is made to find some common ground. And, see, I wouldn’t like that.

Cutting off Mom and Dad, Part 3



…and now we come to the final installment (so far) in my
wonderings about this strange phenomenon of parent rejection by adult children.
So far, I have tried to spread the responsibility around: the infantilization
of young adults by many institutions, the culture at large, and parents.  Now it is the young people’s turn.


It is my observation (granted, limited to some review of the
literature, professional trainings and clinical experience – over a quarter
century) that it is not usually the abused children who grow up and cut off
their parents. This seems odd, doesn’t it? If a child who was tortured decided
to cut off contact, we could understand, even support the healthy distancing.



It is much more typical for the young person who simply does
not want to be bothered to cut off the parent or parents. Quite often it seems
to be one parent; a widowed mother, typically, which makes me suspicious that
the possibility of some sort of responsibility drives the distancing.  I am sorry to be that cynical, but so it
sometimes seems.  Other themes seem to be
that the parent doesn’t just pat the child on the head for every decision, or
the parent has different political opinions, or religious beliefs.



If you are an adult, then surely you have developed the
capacity to tolerate the presence of people different than you; it appears to
be a matter of pride to young adults, especially, to be open-minded about
people’s differences, to refuse to allow even stunningly foundational
differences in values to be barriers to mutual respect. If that is the case, if
you think of yourself as tolerant, then surely you can tolerate the fact that
your parents, or grandparents, or aunts or uncles or other relatives, no doubt
have different ideas than you (and from one another). It may come as a surprise
to you that your parents, whom you may see as some monolith of monotony,
actually disagree with one another. A lot. The research indicates married
couples disagree on about two thirds of the stuff of life, or more; they just
have figured out, I hope, how to live and let live on these disagreements and
how to work with the few that are pretty significant areas. 



Are you afraid? Afraid that you cannot properly defend your
own positions, operationalizing your terms and pointing to data, rather than
feelings, and that interacting with your parent(s) will be an exercise in
losing an argument and feeling like a fool? 



Are you afraid to simply listen to try to understand more of
their opinion, meaning the information and experiences that support that
stance?



Are you afraid that staying close to aging parents will mean
being stuck with them, having to take care of them, when you are carefully
curating your life to minimize responsibility?



Are you afraid you will die of boredom if you have to listen
one more time to their ramblings about the events of their lives, which may
actually not be any more ennui-producing than your own (have you wasted a chunk
of your life bingeing a fictional series lately or playing video games?).



Are you afraid that they will keep trying to get you to
change and you are tired of explaining to them that your
job/partner/reproduction plans are not up for discussion?



Are you afraid to set boundaries, including the boundaries
of discretion? Surely you do not talk about everything with every friend; in
the same way, it can be very wise to discern what topics to discuss with whom.
If your definition of family means “people who have to accept and agree with
everything about me,” then even something as simple as dietary differences (the
omnivore and vegan siblings, for example) will necessitate cutting off a family
member when all you had to do was not rave on and on about the great steak you
grilled last weekend or stop talking about murder when you are sharing a meal.



Cutting off family without very strong grounds to do so is a
red flag. If your friends have done so, consider their reasons; if this is how
they treat the people who sacrificed for them in ways they may not yet
understand, exactly how solid is the rock you stand on with these friends? Can
you really count on them to be there, helping to clean up after you have
vomited, for the zillionth time, during chemo? To show up for you when there is
a death, or a birth, and in the long months of change and bewilderment
afterwards? To take a day off and drive you to and from having your wisdom
teeth out, or a colonoscopy, or whatever else has to happen – and the medical
office will not release you to a ride share service?



The family cut-off is a tragedy, under the best and most
reasonable of circumstances. The dangerous parents might need to be cut off,
for the sake of their children and grandchildren. It is heartbreaking that life
had to come to this, but it may be necessary. That is not something to be done
lightly, indifferently, or without serious reflection of how this decision will
play out in the decades to come.



Thanks for reading –



Cutting off Mom and Dad, Part 2

As previously explored, the culture undermines parent-child relationships. One way is the manipulation of expectations of normalcy. Young adults are frequently told to believe that anything less than absolute, craven praise and approval, of anything, is some sort of miserable toxicity and not to be borne. The relationship must be severed, even with parents.

On the flip side, many parents feel that their position as parent gives them license to offer criticism, advice, and endless commentary on their adult child’s habits, clothes, parenting, etc.  If you are financing an adult child, then I would suggest you tell your child what you will do – not what the adult child will do. You can’t make them do anything, but you can control yourself.  A self-sufficient adult who lives on their own, paying their own way, and raising a healthy, well-adjusted child does not need unsolicited advice or undermining, either.

If you’re thinking, reading this, that you jolly well can make them do something – well, actually, no, not without force.  We parents specialize in saying things that can’t be enforced, silly things like yelling at a toddler, “You’re going to get in there and go to sleep right now!” The average three-year-old has figured out you can’t make her go to sleep; and if you do anything that forces sleep, and I find out, I will report you to Child Protective Services. A three-year-old is portable:  you can pick them up and transport them to their bed, over and over, but the command to sleep is just a waste of syllables.

Sometimes, fellow parents, you may be grieving. You had your child, and you had dreams. You imagined a long future, that child’s adulthood, and the ideal fantasy of whatever your engagement with that child’s future life would be.  I was hoping for a shared private practice (we had discussed this, to be fair!) and lots of hands-on times with grandchildren and spent a couple of decades amassing cookie cutters and art supplies that seldom needed, and given away with much grief, grief not for the things but for the unfulfilled dreams. Instead, I have an adult child of whom I am immensely proud who lives many hours away, and that means her husband and their lovely child are far away, too.  I don’t get to impose my dream, or a guilt trip about my unfulfilled dream, on them. Doing so would be foolish and unfair, and reduce the likelihood I can enjoy what I have, which is far more than many people have, and a situation that those who are involuntarily childless would envy.

So…this set of posts on family cut-offs doesn’t solve anything. I don’t have any big, smart solutions or a therapy intervention that will take away the pain of alienation from the very people for whom you would willingly die. Perhaps it can open up some ideas for reflection, or conversation. If you are an adult who has cut off a parent, please reconsider, seriously and prayerfully, on whether their behavior warrants that wall of silence. If you are a parent, wondering what you have done, perhaps there is room to change the ways in which you try to influence or even make demands on someone who does not belong to you.  Perhaps there is nothing to be done except wait and pray, which comprise tremendous power in the long run.  What to pray? I do not know. I can tell you how I pray, across all relationships: family, friends, clients, students, our leaders, our enemies…that both the other party, and I, be open to becoming who God wants us to be. Amen.

Cutting off Mom and Dad, Part 1

We were talking about families, generally, over breakfast.

“I don’t know why family therapy isn’t held in greater esteem,” my husband commented. “Look at what things are like for families…people are really struggling.”

I agreed with the struggling. And, yes, it would be nice if family therapy were more respected. It is rich with the integration of lifespan development, evolutionary psychology, personality, temperament, and culture. Family psychology and family therapy seem to be the neglected child in the world of mental health. Yet every theory of development, and most personality theories, see the family and early life experiences as foundational to the development of the adult person.  How we attach to others, the ease of trust, our expectations of the world, are all rooted in life experiences, particularly those early life experiences most often lived in the context of family.

Well, of course, if we emphasize family then we are saying family is important, pivotal, vital. And that, it seems, flies in the face of much of the mainline culture.

I will take one small slice for now: the bizarre movement to cut off parents who were not, and are not, abusive, neglectful, cruel, or so otherwise dysfunctional that remaining in active relationship with them would be endangering to one’s safety and/or sanity. There seems to have been, over the past few years, a growing movement in this regard. I have spoken with people, and read books by professionals, on both sides of these issues: the grieving parent and the disgruntled adult child; the professionals who attempt to help parents bridge the gap or, if that is impossible, to heal from the grief, and the therapists whose main lens is the toxic relationship that will only hurt you until you extricate yourself.

Are there cruel, abusive and destructively manipulative parents? Yup. And, likewise, selfish, cold and manipulative adult children, too.  And my somewhat limited professional experience (I’ve been in this field about 30 years) is that sometimes children who cut off parents did not have abusive, cruel parents. Sometimes, people cut off parents who did not do what the child wished, did not read their minds, did not feel obliged to agree and praise everything their child did.

And here we come to a piece of the culture guaranteed to undermine the family: the demand that people validate and accept whatever one thinks, feels, and does as indisputably “okay” because it is how we “feel,” etc. Well, now we have a problem that any family therapist could easily explain.

Mommies, generally, give children the majority of early care.  They provide unconditional love and approval because, as Dr. Jordan Peterson often points out, infants are “always right.” If the baby is crying, the baby is right: something needs attention, swiftly, lovingly and gently! That loving care must come even if baby is colicky, pukey, poopy, or otherwise quite disagreeable.  The baby is, after all, always right. However, this stage of life passes, and then Daddy’s influence increases: Daddies specialize in unconditional love with conditional approval. “I love you, and the room is a mess. Get going on it, kid. Here, I’ll give you a hand.”

This coordinated approach works great: it prepares children for the real world, where people have expectations and you can’t just do “whatever” and then complain it’s how you feel, and have everyone act shame-faced, shrug and say, Oh, OK. If that’s how you feel. Whatever.  Children benefit from the solid backing of both parents’ love, and the experience that disapproval of how I behave does not mean I am not loved. It means my behavior probably needs improvement.

The world, or the part of it to which children and young adults are often exposed, plays another tune. The modern message is that the relentlessly approving gaze of a nursing mother ought to be the perspective of parents forever, across all circumstances. That is a set-up to disrupt and undermine the family.

And it appears to be working terrifically.

A child goes off to college and is enlightened about…it matters not.  Politics, nutrition, whatever. They realize their parents are abject idiots. Worse, their parents may be bad and ill-intentioned because, look! A younger sibling is being raised in a religious/liberal/conservative/omnivore/vegetarian/whatever home. Big sibling becomes disrespectful towards the parents, dismissive, and undercuts them in an attempt to rescue little sibling from the fate of growing up in the same family.

Or, a young adult who is apparently sliding along, perhaps in perpetual adolescence, shifting from goal to goal, engaged with street pharmacology or alcohol, resents the parent who dares express concern and perhaps even the intent to turn off the money tap. Anger, resentment, and accusations flare; the young person demands parental fealty, blames the parents, and the parents, afraid of losing the relationship, are tempted to cave and pretend that a ten-year cycle of major changes in undergraduate school is just okay. It wouldn’t be okay even if the young person was the one financing it with their series of so-not-serious jobs; it would still be a waste of talent and youth.

In short, the mainstream culture offers the illusion that new-mommy bottomless approval is what is normal for adults. Do parents contribute to the problem of parent/child alienation? Absolutely; and that will be a story for another day.

Take a Break: A Shabbat Habit

I was asked to give a talk to a women’s faith group about finding peace in this busy, stressful world. The direction I chose was to invite each person to consider how they keep Sabbath. Beyond attending worship, Sabbath includes truly connecting with God, with family and friends, with creation, and a deliberate disconnection from the usual routine of life. Perhaps you don’t practice a religion and feel that some sort of mandatory day of sitting around doing nothing sounds boring and stupid.  “Sitting around doing nothing” is a corruption of what the day of rest was meant to be; think of it as a day to step away from your usual routine and focus on what is most important. If you’re having trouble figuring out what that might be, think about the people you’ve known who were dying, or what you focused on most when you lost someone you love.  The great existential crises of life tend to make some things stunningly clear.

There are entire books written about the importance of Sabbath time, of that weekly stepping back from rushing, overstimulation and noisiness.  This short column is just a little memo, to me as much as to anyone who might happen to read it and could use the reminder.

So why should anyone consistently and deliberately take a break from the routine? Here are a handful of the many reasons.

It gives you time to recuperate from overdoing. My car’s tachometer goes much higher than the engine is meant to run to function well.  It’s the same for us. We are not meant to run at “100%” 24/7.  Taking a step back from overdoing gives your body a chance to begin to recuperate from an overstressed state. A lot of people like to think they do their best work under pressure, but at a certain point, the nervous and endocrine systems will conspire to have you functioning in a way that reduces your access to your logical, analytic brain.  You probably won’t notice it’s happening, but other people will.

It gives you time to begin to take a different perspective.  Much of modern life is designed to keep us distracted and in an artificial sense of urgency.  This interferes with reflection, the deeper thinking about what is going on, where our actions are taking us, and what does and does not really matter. Put another way, it can help you figure out what is important, versus what feels urgent but is not as important.

It gives you time to focus on relationships. Whether it’s online contact with family far away, time for a walk with your loved one, a meal with family or friends, or a ruthless, hours-long game of Monopoly, a Sabbath mindset puts aside clocks and schedules and savors the time with the people we love.

It provides time for play, rest, and creative pursuits. These are all important. They are not accessories, nor does their value derive from their contributions to work performance the rest of the week.  They are part of being human and have inherent value without having to be subordinate to our work roles.

…and I, definitely, and you too, perhaps, are far nicer to be around when there’s been enough rest, fresh air, laughter, and time with people who love us.  Sabbath time helps make us whole.

That wholeness is part of holiness.  People who are too rushed and focused on work, on the “next thing,” on the next ping of an electronic device, are not able to tune into other people, to themselves, or to God.  Doing what people most associate with Sabbath – going to worship services – loses something if I show up with a rushed, preoccupied, “Yeah, okay, but what’s next?” mindset.  We need a break, a prolonged pause that lets what is important float to the surface of our attention.

If you think this sounds crazy…try it anyway.  Try to take one day a week and carve it out as a day set apart. Spend time with the people you love.  Read a book; take a nap, play games or work on a puzzle. Savor the music you’ve diligently collected. Make art. Write a poem. Go for a nature walk. Cook and enjoy a meal together.  Put your devices away except for purposeful connection with people not physically present.  Then try it the next week. Try it for four or five weeks, and see what you find.

Shalom. Peace.

Prodigal and in your face

The holy days of fall and winter have begun, with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur behind us and Thanksgiving, Hannukah, Advent and the Christmas holidays closing in fast. The stores overflow with all things green, red and peppermint. This means that one of the dreaded markers of the season is also upon us. You might be thinking about the price of turkeys, or heating bills, or navigating the dynamics of family and politics, but I am thinking in particular of the seasonal outbreak of atheism and related forms of cynicism among adolescents and young adults. Except for the power to disrupt other people’s good times, I’m not sure why so many families experience the angry outburst, arrogant smirks or sullen refusal to participate in the traditional prayers and rituals of life just when it is most likely to hurt.  Other than the week of Passover and Easter, there is no time more likely to cause suffering, than the fall and winter holidays: the season seems to be a favorite target for unleashing pent-up bitterness over having been raised in a tradition of faith and culture.

So, if this has happened to your family, you’re not alone.  Over a quarter-century in the mental health field, I have had to see many families distressed at the verbal attacks, the rebellion, and the apparent determination to be hurtful. Fighting with the young person about it is, of course, useless.  Trying to listen calmly, refusing to participate in conversations that are disrespectful, and suggesting the conversation continue later (and then following up to be sure “later” can happen) are potentially helpful.  Give yourself time to calm down, seek guidance from other people, consider the direction being taken.  If the young person has decided that belief in God is a superstition, something incompatible with science, perhaps they are willing to explore this, including the substantial number of scientists who are convinced that there is a God. Perhaps they are willing to learn about intelligent design from non-biased sources.   When the attitude is not mere cynicism but actual anger, it is very painful. Sometimes the rage is about the perceived lack of choice, the complaint is that they didn’t want to participate in the faith from childhood and that the introduction into the faith, whether bris or baptism, was abusive and unfair.

A rabbi whom I consulted echoed the mental health professional’s perspective: look at what else is going on, what other issues are at hand.  Someone who has found clarity (as they see it) should be more peaceful, not angry. An adolescent or young adult who has decided that religion is just superstition might be annoyed at being expected to participate, but will not be enraged. Anger is the sign that the presenting assertion is merely the top layer. What else is going on? Why the sudden rage?  Is someone smart enough – smarter than Fr. Georges le Maitre, the Jesuit priest and physicist who developed the theory now called the “big bang theory,” apparently, by their own reckoning – simultaneously naïve enough to believe something just because some people who sound convincing said so on some internet platform? What other indoctrination have they absorbed with unquestioning readiness?

Of course, you won’t have this conversation at Thanksgiving, right after the young person drops the bomb of their atheism, or rejection of religion, or rage at you about their Baptism, Bar or Bat Mitzvah, or Confirmation. That’s the time to somehow find the patience to be, or pretend to be, calm, politely curious and willing to discuss this later.  The conversation may happen over weeks, months, or years; it may involve some third party – a religious advisor, a therapist, a wise friend who has been on the same road.

It won’t be a fun conversation, and we can’t control the outcome. By being calm, listening carefully, asking sincere questions and verifying that you understand, you leave the door open for further dialogue as well as for the possibility of a change of heart.

Changes of heart are hard to admit, and even more so in the world of social media.  If a young person adopts a position, there will be a host of online encouragers.  If the young person reports pushback from adults, there will be more voices, criticizing the adults, urging cutting off the relationship, etc.  But, if the young person announces a change of heart, some of these voices of encouragement can become accusing, vindictive, cruel. Backing out of a decision can always be hard; imagine telling your parents you’ve decided to drop out of med school to be a professional surfer.  Consider the people who go through with weddings because they don’t want to disappoint people. Even smart, competent adults foolishly move forward into situations they know are wrong because they don’t want the transient embarrassment and miserable, but also transient, short-term effects. How much harder it is for young people who haven’t finished developing a mature brain.

This means our first job, as adults, is to listen with compassion and find a way to keep the door of communication open.  This way, when the young person is ready to reconsider, or be less vitriolic, or simply have a real dialogue, it will not require they have the desperation of the Prodigal Son to take the first steps. Whenever the child takes those first steps towards dialogue and reconciliation, remember the father in the parable, who ran to meet the returning child.

If this were my kid…

Advice-giving:  some therapists claim it should never be done; therapists-in-training are eager to leap in with advice before they know enough about a situation to offer it.  The stance on advice-giving has its roots in various philosophical approaches to therapy.

For those of a more psychoanalytic bent, it is the role of the therapist to push for deeper self-exploration and understanding, with that “a-ha!” process leading to more responsible, better-informed decision making.  Insight leading to action is a vital part of maturation; the alternative is an adulthood of adolescent reactivity and self-absorption.

Psychoanalytic insight may not do a frustrated parent any good at the moment they are figuring out how to handle the upside-bowl of cranberry sauce on the floor. Again.

In solution-focused brief therapy, the emphasis is on searching for times when a problem is absent or much reduced and breaking down the details of those situations, especially in regard to clients’ behaviors. This process empowers the client to realize that s/he is already equipped to deal with much of the situation(s) at hand and develop plans to do more of what already works.

This is a very helpful process, but sometimes people want a little more guidance.

Psychoeducation – teaching, basically – is different than telling a client specifically what to do. It provides information, refers to scientific data, often linking particular actions to help with problems.  Education is part of holistic counseling approaches to many concerns, including depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and problematic insomnia.

All of which brings us back to the question of advice.  I am not a new therapist, and people are not coming to see a therapist with 25+ years’ experience and some white hair so I can look vaguely concerned and steeple my fingers and murmur, “Hmmm, how do you feel about that?” when they express anger and shame over their inability to get a five year old to comply with bath and bed routines.

So, I am, at least for the moment, breaking the invisible fourth wall – the wall first broken in literature by Charlotte Bronte in the final chapter of Jane Eyre – and say, straight out, “If this were my kid…

“I would take away all electronics for at least six weeks.  Maybe longer.  Not even any television/movies unless a responsible adult is with them.”

Yes, they are going to be bored. They will be angry. If they have been playing video games, they may become aggressive and destructive – be prepared for this.  If they have been using pornography, it could be even worse. Fists and feet have gone through drywall over losing access to video games and phones.  If your child becomes hostile and aggressive (not just normally angry), it is evidence you are doing this late in a problematic process.  What are they going to do?  Play other games. Make art. Play the instrument that is gathering dust. Exercise. Do chores.  Read.  Libraries offer books, puzzles and games to borrow: no cost, little effort.  Try a family book club to introduce them to a broader range of reading.  Help them learn how to have a conversation in full sentences, complete with eye contact. The possibilities are boundless.

If they need a device for school, it can be carefully monitored and programs to limit access (such as Covenant Eyes) are available to try to control what is going on. 

“I would have them do chores.  No, ‘school is their job’ is not a good idea.  Do you want to be married to someone who goes to work, comes home, and expects to be waited on, because they did their job?”

By 13, an average, healthy child should be competent at all the basic skills of housekeeping. That means, able to clean any room without having to call in HazMat; sorting, washing, appropriately drying (read the tags), folding and putting away laundry (I give everyone a pass on fitted sheets, and yes, that reflects on my clumsiness); plan, execute, cheerfully serve and thoroughly clean up simple and nutritious meals; do most of the tasks of pet care; be able to handle trash, recycling and compost duties.  Would you want to be roommates or married to someone who can’t do these things as a young adult?  Your future daughter- or son-in-law will appreciate it.

“I would have them get an hour or two more of sleep, every night.”

According to the CDC, children age 6 to 12 need 9 to 12 hours of sleep per night. Teens need 8 to 10.  Odds are, your child is not getting enough sleep and you are already saying this is ridiculous and impossible; how are you supposed to do this?

Insufficient sleep has an almost immediate detrimental effect on brain structures and functions critical for focus, memory and mood:  factors that teachers and parents spend a lot of time complaining are deficient in children.  You know what you’re like when you don’t get enough sleep; foggy-brained, irritable and looking around for caffeine and sugar.  Your children are like that, too, except you are probably keeping the little ones away from triple-shot lattes.  If your teen has to be up for school by 6 AM, then they have to be in their room without electronics sometime between 8 and 10 pm.  The math is easy; accepting that something has to give is the hard part.  Make it an experiment to accompany the electronics question and see what child you meet after a few weeks.

“I would have them learn to use a planner.”

Unlike the early years of school, and even a lot of secondary classes, real life – adult life – requires strategic planning.  By middle school, students should be learning how to break down tasks into manageable, realistic chunks and follow those plans, adjusting as necessary.  That means writing down “Social studies test tomorrow” Thursday night is not good enough.  It means figuring out how much review needs to be done each night of the week to be adequately prepared, and adding that to Monday through Wednesday’s plans.  Even outside of school, the skill of planning is useful.

For example, many people get into power struggles/arguments/endless debates over dinner. The frequency with which this particular power struggle erupts in therapy would astound non-therapists.  I do not understand the surprise that dinner must be had.  Name a date in the future – any date – and if I am not deceased, unconscious or doing colonoscopy prep, I will expect to eat.  The need for a meal at night will never catch me by surprise.  Yet this recurring surprise is apparently part of the annoying texture of life for many families. Model the benefits of planning.  Get the week’s meals worked out, and streamline evenings.  There is an immediate benefit: instead of arguing about “what to do” and wasting two hours around it, have a quick, planned meal and then have time to do something fun, like watch a parent-approved movie together, fold that pesky laundry, and push around more pieces on the 2000-piece puzzle of a Tiffany window that seemed like such a great idea at the time.

I’d make some good memories, I’d say, if this were my kid.