Tips for Parents

  1. When talking about past events, focus on more positive events (eg, exams passed, good stories re child/friends, achievements, human qualities)
  2. Remember that we are all better and worse at some things and none of us can be good at everything all the time, keeping trying is more important
  3. Responding to events (eg, problems with friends, bullying, disappointments) is more important than the events themselves as we can sometimes only respond or tolerate a situation, try to model this for your child in how you respond to and/or tolerate situations
  4. Help the young person see that there is very rarely only one explanation for any event
  5. Distraction techniques can be useful….often keeping trying at the task is more important than doing it perfectly
  6. Think about what is Good Enough in any given task, and break tasks down into smaller do-able stages (eg, “ladder” & studying for exams)
  7. Help your child see that we can always dispute positive and negative causes, it can be helpful to do this out loud or on paper or even through music.
  8. If a thought or situation is threatening to overwhelm the teenager, encourage them not to continue to focus on it by some of these techniques, if this persists, seek help
  9. Keep talking to them about the future and ask questions about the future and what they would desire, even if these are only pipe dreams
  10. Encourage them to do activities that are future focused
  11. Focus on effort rather than achievement when praising
  12. Be constructive with comments….remember there is rarely only one explanation for anything !
  13. If you are stuck, how would their heroes cope in a difficult situation or deal with setbacks/disappointments?
  14. Can you think of examples of the power of hope and optimism in life to explain this to young people?
  15. What kept you going at this stage in your life?
  16. Give the child opportunities to do activities they enjoy and are good at…remember no child is good at or enjoys everything
  17. Believe it or not, sometimes just spending time with the children doing nothing in particular is good for them, and good for you
  18. Always tell you child what you want them to do, not what you don’t want them to do
  19. Be patient with them and with yourself
  20. Practice forgiveness with them and with yourself, we will all make mistakes and get things wrong
  21. If you are parenting by yourself, take extra care of yourself and if there are two parents, disagreements are not to be avoided as long as you resolve these