Handling teenagers is not the most trouble-free job for parents, and sometimes you’ll wonder whether it’s typical teenage behavior when your child is acting up. You’ll often wonder whether you’ve raised the child right, whether you need to be stricter or slack on the rules. 

Teenagers go through a difficult phase and usually distance themselves from family as they try to understand the changes they’re dealing with and at the same time explore their independence.

However, you’ll quickly learn what’s normal teen behavior from what’s not. To deal with teenagers, have realistic expectations, analyze every situation differently, and have solutions that strengthen the parent-teen bond.

As you will realize, you’re not the only one complaining about teenagers spending a lot of time in their room, on their cell phones, or avoiding family activities. However, when this behavior is moderate, there’s no cause of alarm. 

Still, when teenagers repeatedly distance themselves physically and emotionally from family members, it’s a sign of underlying issues bothering them. Failure to address the behavior will hinder communication and magnify the problem. How do you deal with teenage problems?

Find Out the Reason

The first thing to do is try to find out the issue at hand. Because it’s not always easy to get a teenager to open up, use other methods such as monitoring their phone, checking their online activities, and the type of friends they hang out with. 

Get a phone hacker for hire to easily track the messages, calls, and online activities. With this information, you can quickly know what is disturbing the child. However, when you detect teenagers’ problems, don’t ask repetitive questions, threaten with punishment or display resentment and anger towards them. 

You’ll only worsen the situation, causing them to distance even more. Problems that can cause this behavior can be drug and alcohol abuse, intense bullying, depression, relationship issues, and low self-esteem. However, even when you try to monitor the child’s activities, create a balance where you also respect their privacy. You only breach this when there’re concerns to address. 

Strengthen Your Bond

Many teenagers going through issues don’t know who to trust or open up to, and they end up wallowing in pain and getting more stressed. When your teenager is having problems, the best thing you can do is to strengthen your bond and assure them that they can always come to you no matter the issue.

Many parents opt to back off when dealing with a sullen teen but understand your presence is needed now more than ever. Also, realize the teen has more options, some not healthy. They need a lot of assurance and help from parents and other older adults to make the right decisions. Additionally, stand your ground and don’t bend the house rules but opt for low-conflict chats.

Ensure They’re Busy

Too much time on your teenager’s hands can be disastrous and one way to control their behavior and make sure that they’re doing the right thing all the time is to give them responsibilities. Ensure that they have chores around the house to attend to, hobbies, and extracurricular activities that keep them busy after school. 

When your child is engaged, they’ll have little time to think about harmful activities or get into the wrong company. Also, let your children socialize but monitor the type of friends they keep. 

Encourage them to take safe but thrilling activities in groups such as hiking, rock climbing, scuba diving, mountain biking, snowboarding, skiing, and surfing. They can also volunteer at the local ambulance or firefighters’ department.

Link Your Teen with a Mentor

Most often, your child might be afraid to come to you when in trouble because they know there are consequences such as punishment. However, when they have an older adult they trust and look up to, they will be more willing to share their problems with them. It can be an older relative, a teacher, a family friend, or even a church mentor.

Encourage the teenager to spend time with the mentor, and in so doing, they’ll talk about the issues and find solutions. Also, the mentor will guide your child in the right direction and help them avoid bad company and behavior.

Alert the mentor on issues you’re concerned about, such as spending lots of time on the phone or in their room.

Spend Meaningful Time Together

When you spend time with your children, you detect wrong behavior, stress, or signs of distress. Because many teens will be comfortable spending time away from the rest of the family, create activities that enable you to spend more time together.

For instance, have a set time when you all share a meal. It can be in the evening when you’re all relaxed and at home. Also have activities for the weekends and holidays such as preparing meals together, going for a walk, picnic or playing games.

A relaxed atmosphere might even help the teenager overcome some of the issues or get enough courage to share with you the problems.  Also, realize that the more you spend time together, the easier it will be to detect issues.

Don’t Overreact

Most often, parents do everything right to make their children trust and open up about the issues they are facing. Sometimes teenagers make mistakes they are sorry about, and when they open up, how you deal with the situation will determine whether they will trust you again with such information. 

Handle the situation calmly and offer solutions even when you need to reinforce house rules. At this stage, talking to the child is more effective than punishment or yelling. Create time to talk to your child about the issue, understand what led to the mistakes, and help them get over the situation. 

Some problems such as drug use may need professional assistance and counseling; therefore, find qualified professionals to work with while at the same time showing love and support to the child.

As you will realize, no one solution fits all wayward teen behavior. It all depends on the issues at hand and the type of relationship you have with the child. However, it’s proven that parents can significantly influence their children to stop bad behavior and become better and more responsible adults.