Psychology Today published a post about rising rates of suicide and depression rates and how to help teens, with an emphasis on young women, cope with their struggles. Although one might not always work with depresesd or anxious teens, they have some good suggestions for working with youth in any scenario, such as:
-Make no assumptions that you know what is really going on. Recognize that you are ignorant even though you'd love to believe you're not. Teenagers represent the most classic case of what you see is not what you get.
-Appreciate how different their world is from ours, and expose yourself to the culture your kids are immersed in. Look on it as an anthropological exploration. Ask kids what's hip and what they are paying attention to. Watch a half hour of MTV for a couple of weeks.
-Engage in activities together, which then tend to open up opportunities for communication and connection, rather than sitting down eyeball to eyeball.
Although many times it seems like common sense, sometimes while dealing with youth I get lost in the thought that since I am older and more mature I know what is best. Empathy and understanding are the two most important qualities to embrace when it comes to connecting with peope of any age.
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