Talking To Teens: Expert Tips for Parenting Teenagers

Lindsey Sealey, girl-advocate and author of the new book Rooted, Resilient, and Ready, re-joins us to discuss the tips and tricks from her latest book on raising strong girls, resilient and ready for the path ahead but firmly rooted in who they are!



Full show notes

The hum of the morning is different today. There is a nervous electricity in the air, as everyone around the house rushes through their final checklists. Notebooks and pencils are shoved into backpack pockets, there’s a frantic rush to cut tags off her new top, and last she grabs the new phone she got two weeks ago.

It’s the first day of high school, and your teenage daughter is about to walk into a whole new world of feelings, friendships, and challenges. On the drive to school, your mind races back to everything you’ve done while raising a teenage daughter. What have you done to instill confidence and resilience in your daughter?

Preparing teenagers for this stage of life is no cakewalk. The difference between middle school and high school is massive, and nobody wants their child to walk into a new environment without any preparation. Teens, especially girls, can become so vulnerable if they aren’t ready to adapt to the new situations and challenges of high school. For these reasons, it is crucial that parents are skilled at raising a teenage daughter.

With these thoughts on my mind, I invited Lindsey Sealey back to the show. Previously, she guest starred on Episode 74, where she shared tips and tricks from her book Growing Strong Girls.

If you don’t know Lindsey, let me tell you about her awesome experience. Lindsey is an incredible writer, who regularly contributes to the Huffington Post Canada and Spoke. She has written two books on parenting teen girls, with the newest being Rooted, Resilient, and Ready: Empowering Teen Girls As They Grow.

This week, I’m stoked to hear Lindsey share her tips on raising a teenage daughter. Lindsey is incredibly smart and thoughtful, and the time she has spent working with teen girls in workshop environments has given her expertise on raising a teenage daughter. This week, Lindsey and I discuss everything from the digital world to mental health.

The rise of social media websites can detract from raising a teenage daughter. From Snapchat to Instagram and Facebook, anyone can spend hours on these sites, becoming lost in the digital world. If your daughter falls into the rabbit hole of image-driven social media sites, she could lose focus on what it means to be herself. Raising a teenage daughter who is only driven by image can cause numerous mental health issues because of obsessing about images that are unrealistic for many girls.

There are strategies that parents can use while raising a teenage daughter to prevent her from losing herself to the image culture on social media. A good way for parents to approach excessive social media use by setting limits on apps. While it can be easy to set limits on apps, it might be trickier for parents to get teen daughters to agree to adult supervision.

It’s easier to set limits with your daughter beforehand than to create guidelines after she’s had access to a new phone. One trick, Lindsey tells me, is to create a contract of expectations between you and your daughter before she gets her phone. If you are planning to buy her a new smartphone, have a discussion about time usage and limits beforehand! Having this conversation before buying a new phone can help parents raising a teenage daughter because it is easier to set limits beforehand than to take away privileges.

Raising your teen daughter with limits on digital life can have a positive affect on her mental health. Without limits to the digital frontier, image obsession caused by social media can seriously detract your teen from living her best life. If mental health becomes an issue for your daughter, what can parents do to help?

One day, you go to pick your daughter up from school but she seems a little more distant than usual.

In the back of the car, she quietly scrolls through her phone. You try to engage in conversation, and receive mixed responses. Strangely, though, it appears that she isn’t interested in chatting. Once you get home, she drops her school gear and hides away in her room for the afternoon. What’s going on?

Left alone, thoughts can turn negative, and possibly spiral into greater problems such as anxiety and depression. Lindsey told me that engaging in a dialogue around mental health issues is the best approach a parent can take to improve teen mental health. The specific strategy she mentioned was the idea of taking a positivist approach towards mental health issues.

The positivist approach is a good method for parenting a teen daughter because it allows you the chance to reframe your teen’s emotional response to a problem.

For example, your teen daughter might be distraught because she didn’t make the cuts for the school play. A positivist approach to the situation would be to highlight other opportunities that your teen daughter can explore now that she has extra time.

Trying to have these conversations won’t be easy, but they will help in raising a teenage daughter. Sensitive subjects can be hard to discuss because talking about sadness won’t always make someone feel happier. Don’t give up! It’s better that you try to have these conversations as opposed to letting things go unsaid. In making these attempts, parents can practice raising a daughter who is grounded emotionally with a strong sense of self-worth.

Raising a teenage daughter can be challenging for parents to navigate. At the same time, watching your girl grow into a strong, resilient young woman will be one of the most beautiful and rewarding things you will witness in your entire life. In addition to discussing the digital world and mental health, Lindsey shared her advice with me on a number of other topics related to raising a teenage daughter, including:

Incredible! Lindsey is such a smart, spoken woman with so much great advice about raising a teenage daughter. Check out her book, Rooted, Resilient, and Ready: Empowering Teen Girls As They Grow for more great info on how to raise your teen daughter. Good luck, hope you tune in again soon!

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