It can be hard being a parent with a teen going through what I term the 'I'm ... phase. This is the phase when teens start doing scary and ... things ... to us parents) as a way o
It can be hard being a parent with a teen going through what I term the 'I'm Invincible’ phase. This is the phase when teens start doing scary and dangerous things (according to us parents) as a way of testing out their physical limits.
This is not surprising given that, at adolescence, teenagers are effectively given a new body, one which has many improved features from that of their childhood body. It's no good as parents thinking we can tell them about the limits of this body; just as a toddler needs to work out for themselves how to balance to walk so a teen needs to work out for themselves how to use their changed body.
Pushing themselves that little bit further each time is necessary for the teen to find out what happens. They need to make mistakes so that they can self-adjust. They need to know just how fast, agile and strong their body is so they can use it appropriately in the future. Not knowing their own limits is potentially much more dangerous.
However some teens also use this phase to prove themselves. In today’s competitive society, teens have been brought up to want to be better than someone else at something. For some teens this will be in the classroom, others on the sports field or through the performing arts but for some teens none of these avenues are available.
The only way they can prove themselves to be better is through some daredevil type of physical activity, where they can show they are braver, can bear more pain or can think up some more elaborate plan. This is where these teens get their feelings of success, their sense of achievement, their sense of self-worth.
The 'I'm Invincible' phase is a crucial learning phase; it's all about taking risks and making judgements about risk. As parents, it's hard for us to let our teens take risks, we naturally want to protect them, but in attempting to protect them we are in reality often holding them back.
Taking risks is a necessary part of adult life; leaving one job for another, starting a business, asking someone out on a date all require a certain amount of risk. Although the risks in the 'I'm Invincible' phase are primarily based in the physical, they give a good foundation for taking risks in the emotional and cognitive realms in the future.
How to Handle the 'I'm Invincible' Phase
The Parent Teen Relationship
It was the homework that did it. Each night became a ... in how I was going to get my son, a ... to do his ... I tried ... ... and ... all to no avail. IParenting Teens - Getting Your Point Across
Giving advice to a teenager is very easy; getting a teenager to take that advice is another matter altogether. It's not only a case of the advice 'falling on deaf ears', sometimes the teenager seems to go deliberately out of their way to do the exact opposite, that's when you know you've got a problem. So how do you go about giving advice to a teen?