College Acceptance and Rejections: It's That Time Of Year

Tis the season.....For all of you who have high school seniors, the college acceptance and rejection season is upon you. You are in high anxiety, and your teen is in higher anxiety. This feels like a defining moment for everyone, even though truly....it is not. Admission to college is a little like a shell game these days. Sometimes kids get into the colleges they did not expect, and sometimes they get rejected from a school they thought was a sure thing.  Sometimes kids get into what they thought was their dream school, and by the end of the first semester they are miserable, disillusioned, and can't wait to transfer somewhere else.

Your first job is to monitor your own emotional temperature, and manage your own expectations. Where your senior gets in or doesn't get in does not define him or her or YOU. It does does not make them a genius or a loser. It is a moment in time. I have seen kids go to the school of their dreams and fail miserably, and I have seen kids go to their bottom of the list choice and end up happy, and very successful. Once the initial shock, excitement, or disappointment wears off, as it does by summer when you are in buying for the dorm mode, all will be forgotten except for the excitement of starting college...any college!  If you are more excited than, or more disappointed then your teen, you need to tone it down. Your teen is not in the business of having to meet or not meet your expectations and dreams for them. They have enough to contend with dealing with their own feelings. Talk to your partner, talk to your mother, talk to your friends, but don't impose your emotional agenda on your child. That will truly be the best gift you can give them for graduation!

What you can do is that will be helpful to your perspective college freshman is validate whatever feelings they are having. You don't need to try to make it all better, or tell them what you think they should do or go, you just need to understand and be in THEIR moment with them. As In: "I get this must be exciting for you, or disappointing for you,or frustrating for you, etc, etc" Remember that your teen lives in the emotional part of their brain. So whatever the outcome of this college decision process is, your teen will feel first, think later. Give them the time to do that. There are alot of factors that weigh in on the college decision, $$, location, course offerings, distance from home, but there is time to think about all those things later. Give your teen the time to process, and sit with the results. Maybe even a few weeks before you even start talking about it. You might say;" I get how hard this decision will be for you, I know you have a lot to think about. I want to give you time to just digest before we have to really get on the decision making stick. I am happy to talk with you anytime, but I want you to know that I respect your need to think on it. Let me know how I can help."

And finally, please respect your teen's privacy when it comes to sharing the acceptances or rejections. Maybe your teen could care less who knows and will give you permission to tell the world. But some kids are VERY sensitive about this whole process and absolutely do not want their business shared with the masses. Case in point: I was at my gym last week and over heard a discussion between two moms who were spin class acquaintances, not best friends. Both were going down their teen's list of where they were accepted or rejected. I wondered why that seemed so important to two women who didn't even know or care about each other's kids. I know parents are proud when their kids get into schools that make them proud. Often I see those parents starting off the conversation, just so someone will ask them about their kids. Try not to get into the " My kids better than your kid" state of mind. All of our kids are wonderful, and where they get in or don't get in will not change that!

This is a wonderful op-ed Frank Bruni wrote about this subject:

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/15/opinion/sunday/frank-bruni-how-to-survive-the-college-admissions-madness.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=c-column-top-span-region&region=c-column-top-span-region&WT.nav=c-column-top-span-region&_r=0

The Top Three Stressors According To Teens

Results from a new Pew Research Center poll that surveyed over 900 teens from across the country show these as the top three issues that stress teens out:

 1. "About 70 percent of U.S. teens reported anxiety and depression as a "major problem" among people their age." 

2. "Bullying was the second-highest concern, with about 90 percent of U.S teens aged 13 to 17 saying it was at least a minor problem in their lives." 

3. "Stress about academic performance, concerns about "looking good" physically and trying to fit in socially topped the list of pressures teens said they face each day." 

If you are a parent of a teen, this is not new news!! This is what you see and hear every day in different ways with both your teen and their friends. But it does reinforce just how hard life feels for teens today, and I think that is the new news here. How many of you, looking back on your own teen years would say you were depressed, and anxious on a regular basis, or felt bullied on a regular basis? I certainly had bad days, and had even lost my dad suddenly as a 13 year old, but I think if someone had asked me if I felt depressed or anxious regularly, I have would have looked at them like they were crazy!!!

Maybe we just didn't have the feeling language that kids have now, which by the way is good thing. And maybe some of us were just in denial.  We also lived in a culture that was free from technology, which meant we didn't look in a virtual mirror 24/7. Sure we were self-conscious about they way we looked, but we didn't have to expose ourselves for public consumption and for a wide audience!

So yes, teens do have it harder these days. How about sharing this study/article with your kids and see what else they might add to that list. It might give you some new insight into what makes them tick. When you know what's making them feeling bad, then you have a head start into what might help you make them feel better! https://www.newsweek.com/mental-health-american-teens-anxiety-depression-suicide-bullying-drug-1337772

I just watched this very moving TEDX talk by a dad who recently lost his son to suicide. He honestly shares what he missed. This is a must watch for you and your partner.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8FGzsFLCm0

Vacation Week Movies To Watch With Your Teen

I love a week with no plans. I love a day with no plans. Today is Presidents day and I find myself wrapped in a blanket watching a riveting documentary about boys growing up in inner city Baltimore being given the opportunity to go to a  boarding school in Kenya, getting them out of an environment that offers failing schools so overcrowded to notice learning challenges and serious mental health issues, and a community that too often, offers little in employment opportunities except gangs and drug dealers. A year in the bush with caring adults and teachers does wonders, until unrest in Africa forces the school to close, and back they must go to their dysfunctional homes/communities and school having had just a small taste of success. The film is called The Boys Of Baracka.  I love being reminded of how little, kids need to flourish. Really, their needs are so simple; love, attachment, structure, security, caring adults, safe streets and safe schools, healthy food and exercise and time to be a child. How lucky most of us and and our children are to have these things.

So that's my idea of a fun afternoon, a little heavy, but unstructured time on a winter's day can become an impromptu hang day with your teen. Make some popcorn, a fire in the fireplace, and turn on that dusty old big screen TV hanging idly on the wall while your teen usually watches tv and movies in their room on their devices, and invite them to a home movie party.

Go old school and watch some of the wonderful 80's movies you grew up with: Pretty in Pink, Sixteen Candles, Can't But Me Love, The Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off to name a few. If you want to watch recent movies. 8th Grade is just spectacular!!!! Your Kids will love it. Also The Way Way Back, Without A Trace, Hearts Beat Loud, and if they are fans of superhero movies, Black Panther, All Iron Man movies, etc. What does your teen like, what kind of movie might get him/her out of their room and onto your couch. Bribe them with food and treats and just relax together doing nothing!! Happy Vacation Week!

Do You Know About The App VPN...YOU SHOULD!!!!

Staying ahead of social networking is certainly a challenge. You think you've got it under your belt and then WHAM you get hit with some new ingenious way that kids are outsmarting their parents.  VPN stands for Virtual Private Network. In its most basic terms it allows teens to get around all the Parental Controls I have been suggesting you use, making them able to use the apps you don't want them to use, and use them during the times you have blocked them from using if you've put time restrictions on through the parental controls. It allows them to access to Netflix, Hulu and other streaming sites no password needed anytime anywhere!. Damn those kids for being so smart!!!!Truthfully, it's pretty genius from a techie point of view, and certainly from a teen's point of view, but for parents it's an arch enemy!!!

How do you know if you teen is using a VPN. Here are a few ways to find out. On an iPhone if you look on your teen's phone you will see the VPN initials in upper left corner of their phone next to the cell signal thingy! On a droid swipe down on the home screen and there will be a notification that VPN is running. 

Also you can go the app store on your teen's iphone or google play on android.  In the app search engine put in VPN. Many options will be listed. If any of the apps say OPEN your teen has VPN up and running. If it says GET you're good, then it has not been downloaded! 

Funny story, last year I was at a school to do my presentation on Social Networking. Just before I got there they had discovered a big problem. This school had distributed Chrome Books to all their students, and had dutifully thought they had done a good job of blocking social networking sites and streaming sites, so that students would be using their chrome books at school solely for school related projects. Well don'tcha know those smart kids had VPN's running and were enjoying Netflix during lunch and study periods! I know this now, but last year, it seemed a mystery to everyone just how these kids were accessing these supposedly blocked sites. Thank you VPN.

Why is this important? Because as I have talked about many times too much time spent on technology is NOT a good thing for young developing brains. Parental controls are the only real way of controlling time and opportunity, the two things you as parents really have control over. VPN challenges that power. You still need to protect the very vulnerable mental health of your teen as they navigate this new stage of life.  

You have got to stay smarter than your teen!!! For more specific tech knowledge on VPNs go to protectyoungeyes.com and put VPN in their search engine.

Happy sleuthing!

Not Porn Again!!!!

Read and then we'll talk!
https://www.bostonglobe.com/magazine/2019/01/29/what-kids-aren-telling-parents-about-porn-instagram-and-snapchat/z12WPJFUGYt0vm1fDOndDP/story.html

I know this is not a fun topic. But it is a topic that must be discussed. In the olden days (when I was a teen) boys coveted their Playboys, and Penthouses, usually retrieved from their dad's trash. In today's world, those magazines seem so sweet; nude, beautiful, airbrushed, large breasted women..perfection personified. Ah, the days of yore.

Today's porn is live and in-person. As you will see on the video below, 25% of Internet searches are for porn, and I'm sure many of those searches are conducted by teenage boys. Unfortunately, the porn they are watching is not sweet. It is full of women being taunted by men,  and the sex is violent and disrespectful. These video images can shape a young boy into thinking that this is the way girls like sex, demeaning, humiliating and forceful. The number of calls I get from parents of girls who are being harassed sexually by boys is scary. And even scarier is the world we now live in with daily accusations of sexual assault and harassment about the people in our lives who are supposed to be our role models!!Because of teen's easy access to porn on smartphones, IPADs, and laptops, parents are very much out of the loop. It used to be parents could check the history on their teen's laptop and see what they were up to, at least giving them the opportunity to have a discussion with their teen about the dangers of porn. Masturbation is not one of them. Thinking that women liked to be controlled is one of them. And in the link I have included, porn addiction is another.

Let's not leave girls out of this. A new favorite pass time at sleepovers is to go on sites like chatroullette and the app Monkey to watch live, men masturbating. I know, icky!  This is a video social networking site in which you live chat with someone you do not know. Many men are on this site trolling for girls to have video sex with. I have had a number of calls from parents who go down to the basement to bring the girls some food, and lo and behold there is some guy on the computer screen moaning and groaning, and a gaggle of girls egging him on.

If there was ever a time for a sex talk, this is the time. Teens need to hear another side! It is not OK to be exploited, it is not OK to expect a girl to do whatever you want her to do, or for a girl to think she has to do whatever a boy wants. College campus's, high schools AND middle schools are now awash in sexual harrassment cases and date rape. The research is showing that this onslaught of easily accessed porn, unsupervised by parents is behind some of this behavior. This is an uncomfortable topic. But in our current culture we are now learning that respect for women is not something that is a given. It needs to start being taught at a young age, and never stop. It is modeling what goes on your own home, and with your friends, and it is using the daily barrage of news stories as teaching lessons. It is talking and talking and talking until maybe you are blue in the face.

The Boston Globe article above is authored by Gail Dines who developed a program called Culture Reframed. This website should be a must bookmark for you. There is a parent toolkit (free) to help you understand and talk to your kids about porn. It is an amazing resource for parents!
https://www.culturereframed.org/parents-of-teens/

Watch this video with your boys. Talk with them again and again and again.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Ya67aLaaCc&feature=player_embedded

Teen Depression and Suicide

It's never easy to think or talk about teen depression and suicide, but talk about it we must. I have experienced the loss of two very special boys in my life to teen suicide who were the sons of very close friends of mine.  Recently the data of a new study on teens and suicide was presented. The results were published after surveying 5000 teens and their parents from the Philadelphia area. One of the most important findings is that 50 % of  parents whose teen had reported suicidal thoughts on the survey had absolutely no idea their teen was depressed. 

A dad who lost his 15 year old son to suicide says this: “My son Will was afraid to say ‘I’m not OK’ because I didn’t talk about these things with him,” he said. “He didn’t want me to see him as not OK because he worried that would be disappointing to me. And that breaks my heart.:
 "The night before, Will studied hard for a test he was supposed to take that day. He was going to get his driver’s permit that weekend and get his braces off the following week. Those were big events in his life that he was preparing for, and his parents had no inkling that their popular, athletic son was contemplating suicide."
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/parents-teens-suicide_n_5c38dfc4e4b0e0baf53d3748?fbclid=IwAR2c8s6-IuJbcCruDvHXrwd4H0ndvS_Hi-Jn7HebZFqk3u3fjYvV3InmGzc&ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000063&utm_campaign=hp_fb_pages&utm_medium=facebook&utm_source=main_fb

 I have had a number of calls recently from parents worried about their teen, trying to figure out whether their teen is just having growing pains, or is in a real depression. Teens love to dump on their parents, giving them their most angry, their most sad, their most anxious and fearful feelings. This is the good news. Think of it as colic. When the bad stuff gets expelled, then sleep and peace can come...until the next time.

A young comic, Kevin Breel, (see link below) is a young man who has struggled with depression for many years, he is now in his 20's, and no one knew. He describes living a double  life; excellent student, amazing athlete, active in the theater program, had a thousand friends, everyone loved him. And as he describes it, he was a moment away from suicide. His depression was not a result of a bad breakup, or a bad grade, but chemicals in the brain that just couldn't make enough of those feel good chemicals that keep us feeling stable. 

Everyone understands the bad breakup sadness, but depression that is biology based gets short shrift in our culture, but it is the one that has got to be discussed. 

 Teens are feeling their feelings in ways they have never experienced them before. The intensity comes from an adolescent brain that is over activated in the area responsible for emotion, and literally from having some of these feelings for the first time. Without experience and a history that would have given them a game plan to deal with these feelings that are overwhelming, they are vulnerable to feeling like they might never go away. The first break-up, a humiliation on a soccer field, or a stage, the embarrassment of doing something or saying something impulsively stupid in front of your peers, the disappointment that someone you like doesn't like you back, the worry that they are disappointing you in some way, being sexually harassed and feeling powerless to stop it, or any one of a million other things can feel like a catastrophe.

So your kid comes to you in a rage, in a tantrum, sobbing uncontrollably and you feel helpless. But they are coming to you. Like a sponge, you absorb every drop of emotion. You can't sleep, you can't eat, you live with a pit in your stomach that your kid is in pain. But here is the thing, now that they have dumped it all on you and you have so graciously sopped it all up, they are free to go out and enjoy life again. Rinse and repeat!

When is it time to worry? The dumping is a good sign. The emotion is a good sign. They are working it out.  It may be hard on you, but at least they have an outlet. The worry should start, if they are not talking, isolating themselves, and really seem to have lost the up and down nature of teen life. Up and down is good. Staying down is not, or never getting down are both red flags.  If you see your teen spending increasing amounts of time alone, in their room, avoiding family and friends, you might say something like this: " I have noticed recently that you seem more down than usual. You seem to be spending a lot of alone time in your room away from us and your friends. I get life can be complicated and difficult and sometimes overwhelming, and you might like just getting away from it all. I used to do that to sometimes. But I worry that you are not giving yourself a chance to talk about it. If you don't want to talk to us, I understand, maybe it would be helpful to talk to a counselor. I don't want to bug you, but I love you, and want you to work out what seems to be bothering you. I'll check back in with you in a few days, and we can talk about a plan." You will probably get a "leave me alone!" but don't let that deter you. Keep checking in, and letting them know that you are concerned. Eventually, you may just have to make an appointment and make them get in the car.

And conversely, if you have the teen who is almost manic in their ability to manage it all, grades, extra curriculas, friends, etc, make sure you do a check with them as well: " You know honey, you always look like you are so in control of your life, you put a lot of pressure on yourself, I just want to check in to make sure you're OK with it all." Open the door, let them know that that kind of pressure cooker life can mask other feelings, and you just want to let them know you are available and can handle their down moments. 

Seeing your teen be in pain is the worst. Giving them a safe haven to express it is a gift. I would watch this video with your teens, and open the discussion. 

https://www.ted.com/talks/kevin_breel_confessions_of_a_depressed_comic?language=en

Please share this with friends who have teens.  Everybocdy needs help talking with their teens about this difficult subject.

Teaching Our Children To Understand and Respect Differences: Lessons From The Lincoln Memorial

On this frigid winter afternoon, I cozied up under a comforter and read and watched everything I could find about the Friday afternoon events that took place at the Lincoln Memorial where three diverse groups of people faced off and confronted each other. This is what makes America great! In this sacred space there was a group of mostly white privileged boys from a catholic high school in Kentucky wearing MAGA hats, standing opposite a group of black Hebrew Israelites, and bringing up the middle, a group of people representing the Indigenous People's March. Ain't America great!

I watched youtube videos and interviews from the people on the scene. I listened to commentary and opinions from people who initially said the boys were the antagonists, and then it was the black hebrew israelites who instigated with angry comments and then the reports of  what seems like the hero of the story, Indigenous leader Nathan Phillips stepping in to separate and calm these two groups. Honestly, I have no idea, after spending hours of research what exactly happened. And truthfully, the details hardly matter. What matters is the stereotyping that occurred, blaming each and every group. Was it that these boys wearing MAGA hats reportedly acting disrespectfully and chanting Build The Wall, or the Black Israelites shouting profanity at these boys, or the Indigenous group challenging these boys in some way? Or is it that our country is ill-prepared for accepting that we are a melting pot of ideas, cultures, politics, color, and religion. Have we prepared our youth and our communities for our changing country? This is the problem. How have you prepared your child for the world they will live in as adults? Is the school your child attends or the community you live you in representative of the diversity of the country we live in?  Do you get out of your own comfort zone, and get to know people who are completely unlike you? Do you take the time to really get to know people who are completely different than you in sexual orientation, race, religion, culture, or socioeconomic circumstances? Truthfully we probably are all more comfortable with people who most share our values and life.

Some months back I listened to this story on NPR about a small conservative republican coal mining community in Kentucky who teamed up with a liberal democratic community in Leverett, Ma to see if they could find some common ground. These could not have been more divergent groups in politics, and life style, each feeling that the other was wrong. But after spending a week living and talking together, they found friendship. love and shared values. It is possible!!! We don't have to agree to be like each other to respect each other. We just have to commit to understanding and learn about each other. (see article below)

 https://www.handsacrossthehills.org/single-post/2018/11/30/Conservatives-in-Kentucky-Liberals-in-Massachusetts-Try-to-Bridge-Political-Divide

So regardless of what exactly happened on Friday at the Lincoln Memorial, can we agree at least to teach our children to respect the differences that our country has always embraced? Here are some things you can do:

• Challenge teen’s thinking in stereotypes. Provide teens with structured opportunities to get to know people who differ from them. At the 22^ndAnnual Youth Congress, students suggested “mix-it up dinners where students sit with “classmates they don’t know.” As a family, seek out experiences where your children can interact with people from all kinds of backgrounds and beliefs.
• Model inclusion. The adults in children’s lives are the most influential in transmitting values of acceptance. When I was a fresh out of grad school therapist, I was seeing a couple that were experiencing difficulty with their teen. In a predominately catholic town, their daughter had started a relationship with a Jewish boy. The parents used phrases like “those Jews” in describing their worry about this relationship. With fear and anxiety about ruining my tenuous therapeutic connection, I timidly said, “I am one of “those Jews.”
• Anticipate and strategize: Help your teen to be prepared for situations that might challenge them. Because of their inexperience, many teens end up doing the wrong thing because they don’t know what else to. 

Adolescence is a messy stage. Teen behavior is layered. Good kids do bad things; caring and kind kids can be cruel and insensitive; and sensible and smart kids can be impulsive and reckless. As teens move through this stage from childhood to adulthood, they are confronted with new feelings, new thoughts, and new impressions of their world. They are without precedent and experience and often react with emotion, not thought. But teens and adults alike share so many common, human experiences, regardless of class, race, religion, and sexual orientation. Let these be the bridge to mutual respect.

PS. If this post feels helpful to you, please share it with fellow parents. We can change the world, one family at a time!