Trust is essential
Remember your own adolescence, your need to exist on your own, outside of the family. That your teenager needs the group to thrive is therefore normal. This does not prevent you from keeping an eye on his associates. But put your fears into perspective. Remember that with his friends, he is happy, he feels understood, and that the gaze of the other helps him to love himself better: it is all the same essential! As a group, we can also share a common passion or bring a project, a specific objective, a dream, the time of a few hours or a few months to a successful conclusion. Creative workshops, themed holiday stays, sports club, humanitarian operation, everyone will mobilize their energy, take advantage of the strength of the other to “do together” and “do with”, which makes you proud of yourself.
Don’t protect them too much
An attitude that is too bossy or too protective may instill in your teenager a lack of self-confidence which is the cause of relationship difficulties. Why not remind him instead that the house is wide open to his friends? Not to watch him, but as proof of mutual trust. Taking an interest in his friends does not mean infringing on his private life no matter what, but simply showing interest in him. It is part of the role of parents.
On condition of not making any derogatory comments or reflections, because teenagers’ reluctance often comes from fear of hasty judgments from their parents.
If your teenager is shy or isolated, encourage him to join a sports club, a creative workshop or a themed vacation stay (according to his preferences). At this age, it is the loneliness and withdrawal into oneself that would be rather worrying.
To read
“Voyage to the land of adolescents”, Dr Patrice Huerre and Françoise Huart, Calmann-Lévy editions.
Also to discover:
Teenager: how to stop playing mother hens?
Your teen is leaving the house
Our teenager / daily section
A new form of socialization
For many parents, the gang of buddies means repeated outings, affirmation of autonomy, even bad influences and dubious associates. The teenager comes home late, swears by his friends, adopts their codes and their look. He’s not the same anymore, so he’s worried. To the point that the group can be seen as a rival.
A passion practiced with others can also distance the teenager from his family: theater, skate or rollerblades, sport or music… he spends his time with friends. He forgets the schedules, the studies and the family life …… If only he confided a little, explained what he does, it would be fine, but nothing, this part of his life, the most important to his eyes, he slides over them. So how to react?
Reassure
To exist on his own, the teenager needs to “cut the cord” with his parents, to have his own tastes, his friends, whether they like the parents or not. The group allows both to open up to others and to dive into oneself. We find there the echo to its own mysteries since the friends go through the same uncertainties and ask the same questions. “The identity of the group will serve as a support for the adolescent and in his eyes lessen the heavy burden of the quest for his own identity, explains psychiatrist Patrice Huerre. He obtains the provisional answer to his question” Who am I? I? “:” I am like my friends and different from those who are not in my gang “.”
Also beneficial, the group allows you to be socialized and to make your place in the sun outside the dominant-dominated relationship of adults to children. “The group is beneficial, adds Dr. Patrice Huerre. It teaches children that there is another universe than that of family and school, with rules, tensions, relationships, a whole coded social game where shy and leaders come together, where rivalries and power struggles are created, where roles are played. “
