Listen to the Podcast Episode Because every teen is different and every family is different, it's tough to suggest hard and fast rules. For almost every tip I offer, I can usually think of several teens and families who don’t fit in that category or for whom that [...]
Listen to the Podcast "I don't know what to do about my teenager and his video games. It's like he's addicted to them." I hear this nearly once a day from worried parents. The truth is that the number of teens who play video games is staggering. One [...]
When I was a high school teacher and campus minister, I invited Alex, a faith filled man with incredible depth, to give a talk at an upcoming retreat. Unlike me, he was very soft spoken and not very dynamic. I worried he wouldn’t be able to grab and hold the teens’ attention. [...]
Listen to the Podcast Remind Yourself that Your Teenager is a Teenager As simple as this sounds, its one of the most important aspects of parenting and relating to teenagers. Most adults suffer from projection bias when it comes to teens, in that they project onto teens their [...]
Listen to the Podcast Once I heard a teen call another teen in the classroom “fat.” Because of my own painful experience of being picked on for being obese, I over reacted and verbally berated that teen in front of the whole class. And, as painful as this [...]
If there was one thing that would improve your parenting, it would be this: stop comparing yourself to others. Easier said than done, right? As parents, we compare ourselves and our kids to others. I naturally see the ways my friends are better parents than me. One is a better financial provider, [...]
Today's teenagers expect and demand authenticity from parents and other adults who want to be in relationship with them. This principle, like so many things in my life, I learned the hard way. One Summer while in grad school, I taught catechism classes to a group of 13 year old [...]
Listen to the Podcast Roughly 34% of today's teenagers today are raised by single parents/guardians. As a child of a single parent, I was able to watch and experience, some of the challenges single parents face. Not having the support of a spouse emotionally or financially was tough on my mom. [...]
Parents ask me: "Roy, how do I know if what my son is doing is a 'normal teenager thing' or if it's something more serious? How do I know when I'm at the point where I should get my teenager some help?" One of the hardest aspects for parents raising [...]
Teenagers can be intimidating. Their facial expressions, tone of voice and body language often suggest that they want to be left alone. And sometimes that is what they want. But more often, being left alone is not what they want. Those dirty looks, rolling eyes and standoffish body language are [...]
