Get Your Teenager Off the Emotional Rollercoaster

The Emotional Rollercoaster   Last week we talked about some foundational beliefs that are keeping you from really connecting with your teen. You learned how important it is to know your job as a parent and how the way you think about your teen changes your experience of them.   Today we are going to continue that conversation and talk about your emotions and your teen’s emotions and how they are both getting in the way of your connection.   Have you been on any rollercoasters this summer? I am a total rollercoaster junkie! I love them so much. They always make me laugh. I get so excited when we go up and then I giggle the whole time as we go down, loop around, take sudden turns and drastic falls. It is so unexpected, surprising, thrilling and exciting.   I bet you have heard the term emotional rollercoaster…and if you have a teen or tween at home, you can probably relate to the emotional rollercoaster that is their life. It probably isn’t the kind of rollercoaster you find thrilling, surprising, or exciting.   And yet, it kind of is. You never know from day to day or even minute to minute what you are going to get. It is like a surprise around every corner…you just aren’t sure if it will be a fun surprise or a not-so-fun surprise. You might offer your child eggs for breakfast one day and be dubbed the best mom in the world and the next day when you offer eggs for breakfast they can’t even believe you would do something so utterly offensive.   So what is the deal with the emotional rollercoaster? Why are our teens so erratic and unpredictable?   A lot of it is hormones, a lot of it is undeveloped self-regulation skills and a lot of it is just their response to everything going on around them.   We don’t usually give them enough credit for it, but teenagers have a lot going on. Between school and life skills and social skills they are in a constant state of learning, failing and trying new things.   Their bodies are surging with hormones doing exactly what they were meant to do: which is to help your teen’s body and mind grow rapidly so that they will be emotionally and physically able to survive, thrive and reproduce.   By divine design, the teen years are a time when your child moves from being completely dependent on you to manage and fulfill all of their needs to being completely independent with the ability to take care of all their own needs. For a species that thrives on safety and security, love and belonging, it is no wonder our teens are riding the emotional rollercoaster during their teen years.   Our teens are being entrusted with more responsibility, higher expectations, and decisions to make that will affect the rest of their lives. They are expected to learn about the world around them and start to form their own opinions and ideas. They are expected to be respectful and obedient, but also become independent and responsible.   Take responsibility for your own emotions   With everything they are managing, the last thing they need is responsibility for your emotions in addition to their own.   Moody, unpredictable, hormonal teens are the worst possible people to put in charge of your emotions. And yet, so often as parents, that is what we do.   We blame our teens for making us worry when they don’t get home on time. We blame them for making us defensive when they constantly push back on everything we say. We blame them for making us frustrated because they leave their stuff all over the house. We blame them for making us feel like a bad parent because they aren’t living up to the expectations we had in our mind of how this was supposed to go. We blame them for making us angry when they don’t do what we ask.   One of my biggest pet peeves as a parent is when my kids are on their cell phones. I want them to experience the world in real life, not through a phone screen.   So when I walk in my living room and see all three of my teenagers sitting on the couch looking at their phones, I get annoyed.   But the truth is: Nobody can make me annoyed but me.   My thoughts are what create the feeling of being annoyed.   I am not annoyed because my kids are sitting on the couch looking at their phones. I am annoyed because I am thinking they shouldn’t be doing that. I am annoyed because I think it is rotting their brains. I am annoyed because I think it might lead to an addiction to their phone. I am annoyed because I think they should be doing other things instead.   I would have a totally different experience if I walked in the room and thought, “How cool is it that my kids can be talking to their friends via text message while they are sitting next to their siblings in the livingroom.”   Or if I had been curious, “I wonder what is so interesting about the game they are playing on their phone? I wonder why they are texting that friend instead of hanging out with them in person? I wonder if this is what they want to be doing or if this is a way of avoiding something else, like it so often is for me?”   Some of those thoughts feel like a stretch for me, because I am used to thinking “they shouldn’t be on their phones.” And while I know I could choose some thoughts that create more positive feelings, I may just choose to keep thinking, “they shouldn’t be on their phones,” but the fact remains, that the thoughts I choose determine my feelings…not what my child is doing…or not doing.   I don’t want you to get discouraged or use this information to beat yourself up when you choose thoughts that create negative emotions. You aren’t always going to have lovely thoughts that produce lovely emotions, especially when your child isn’t turning out exactly the way you thought they would. But, as the adult, you get to be the one to take responsibility for how you feel.   This is going to require you to feel your emotions. You might need to mourn the life you thought you would have. You might need to be sad that your kid doesn’t have the same values you do. You might need to be worried that their choices could lead them down a path you didn’t want for them. BUT, it is your job to process those emotions. It is not your child’s job to behave differently so that you can feel better!   The truth is, most of us are pretty terrible at feeling our emotions. We avoid them by distracting ourselves with something else. We resist them and try to pretend they aren’t there. We react to them by yelling and crying which ultimately just makes us feel even worse. But every one of those things is preventing you from actually processing your emotion…it’s true: yelling and crying and lashing out are NOT actually processing emotion.   So how do you process your emotions?   When you are first trying this process, I recommend sitting down somewhere where you can be alone for a few minutes.   1.     Name the emotion – what is it that you are feeling? We are looking for a one word emotion like sad, mad, happy, frustrated. If you have more than one word, you are probably describing the thought that is producing the emotion. 2.     Identify it in your body – where do you feel it? Don’t let yourself stay in your head here…we aren’t trying to figure out why we feel it, just allow yourself to find the emotion in your body. Is it in your stomach, your shoulders, the tips of your fingers? 3.     Describe what it feels like – is it moving fast or slow? Is it sharp or soft or slippery? Heavy? Light? Hot or cold? What color is it? Describe it in detail as if you are telling someone who has never felt the emotion before how it feels. 4.     Allow it – Just stay still, feel it, keep identifying it in your body and describing it while you allow it to feel terrible until it subsides. Remind yourself that this is just a vibration in your body caused by the thoughts you are thinking.   When I first discovered this process and started to actually feel my emotions, I was shocked! In less than a minute, the feeling would pass right through me. Gone! Feelings I spent hours and even days resisting, avoiding and reacting to, were gone in a matter of seconds.   Sometimes the feelings do come back in waves. Especially if you are still thinking the thoughts that created them in the first place, but then you just process them again.   The amazing thing about this is when you learn to feel your emotions, you stop needing your child to change so you can feel better.   When you learn how to process and allow any emotion, you won’t constantly need to control your child because you know that their behavior isn’t the reason you are feeling bad. This is great news because, as it turns out, teenagers are not really fond of being controlled. When you stop trying to control them, you will be able to connect with them.   When you have done the work to take responsibility for and process your own emotions you will show up differently. When your teen is riding the emotional rollercoaster – when they are angry, worried or out of control – you will be able to stay calm and show up for them with love, interest and curiousity.   That is when you will realize the power of your influence. Your teens want connection with you. They want the security and safety and love you are offering them. They are doing their best during a time of life that is understandably challenging…and sometimes their best is kind of crappy, which makes total sense. When they feel safe to be themselves with you, that is where the magic will happen.   Once you take responsibility for your own emotions, you can be a safe place for your child to experience their own emotions   As parents we don’t want our kids to experience negative emotion because we don’t want to experience the negative emotion that comes up for us when they do.   But, our kids are going to experience hard things. In fact, that is how they grow. That is how they learn. That is how they become resilient.   The most important skill we can teach our kids is how to allow and experience any emotion.   Have you ever thought about what it feels like to be brave? Vulnerable? What does discomfort feel like?   Crap, that’s what. None of those emotions feel good! And yet…those are the emotions that produce the best results in my life. They are the ones that help me learn new skills, do hard things and have meaningful relationships.   In addition to these helpful negative emotions, the teen years are going to produce a lot of other negative emotions for our kids, and we need to be the safe place where they can come to feel all their feelings when they do.   Emotion is like a beach ball. On top of the water it is light and easy to move, but as we try and push it down under the water it gets more and more difficult to control and eventually so much pressure builds that it pops back up.   That is how emotions work too. Your teen is probably trying to push down their emotions all the time. They feel lonely or overwhelmed or inadequate and they don’t want to lose it at school or with their friends.  But at some point they can’t hold the beach ball under the water anymore and it comes out in all those outburst reactions.   So you, as the parent, can help them by being the safe place where they don’t have to hold the ball under the water. Where they know that it is ok to feel their emotions and process them in whatever way they need to without judgement.   We don’t need to fix things so they can avoid negative emotions.   We don’t want them to feel like they need to resist the negative emotions because it makes us worried or uncomfortable.   We don’t need to distract them to make them feel better so they can avoid negative emotions.   We don’t want them to yell and slam doors and fight and punch holes in the wall because they are reacting to their negative emotions.   Instead of trying to get them to stop feeling sad/bad/mad, what if we were willing to sit with them while they feel sad/mad/bad?   What a gift it would be for our children if we were the safe place for them to experience their emotions. So how do we do it?   1.     The most important thing we can do is everything I taught you at the beginning of the podcast. Practice taking responsibility for and processing emotion yourself. Not only does this help you be in a place where you can handle their big emotions, but it gives you the experience and tools to guide them through the process. 2.     Share your experience processing your own emotions with them. When big emotions come up for you, name your emotion for them and let them know that you need a minute to go process the emotion. This might sound like, “Hey, I’m actually feeling really frustrated right now and I’m going to need a minute to go process that emotion so I don’t take it out on you.” Watching you experience emotion will be more effective than anything you say. 3.     Check in with them often about how they are feeling. Acknowledge their feelings and listen without trying to fix it or change it or talk them out of it. (I know it is hard) The key here is that you maintain calm. Don’t freak out because they are freaking out. 4.     Talk them through the process when they seem open to it. Ask them, what are you feeling? Where do you feel it in your body? Describe it to me? How does it make you want to react? Remind them that whatever they are feeling is ok. Sit with them until it subsides. Again, the key is that you remain calm while they process their emotion. You are their safe place. 5.     Keep reinforcing the idea that all emotions are ok throughout your every-day interactions with your child. Share your confidence in them to be able to handle whatever emotion comes up for them.   As you process your own emotions, you will show up with a clean slate to connect with your teen. Your example will teach them how to process their own emotions and they will know that you are a safe place to feel and share. When you take responsibility for your own emotions, you will lift the burden off your teen’s shoulders and give them room to take responsibility for their own emotions instead.   I hope these tools will help you connect with your teen on a deeper level than you ever have before. If you want even more help creating authentic connection with your teen, I invite you to join my free Challenge to help you connect with your teen at the link in the show notes https://client.jenbelltate.com/10for10-connect-challenge. This challenge was designed to help you think, feel and see your teen differently so that you will be able to connect with them more effectively. Each day for 10 days, I will send you an idea that takes 10 minutes or less to help you connect with your teen. These ideas are teen-approved and include practical tips, mindset coaching and support to help you make those deep connections. By the end of the 10 days, I promise you will feel more connected to your teens!