Moms, Get Ready for the Teen Years Now

Moms, are you dreading those teen years? You’ve gone from 2 to 6 to 10 years old at lightning speed, which makes you know  those terrifying years in a child’s life will be on you before you finish fixing dinner.

There are books on handling this age and podcasts that help parents navigate this season, and while those are helpful, the best way to deal with your teenager is what you do before they get there. What you’ve instilled before that season and the relationship you’ve built will see you through these wonderful, albeit challenging, years.

Before I step into the list of things you must do now, I want to assure every parent of this: While ages 13-18 create many unique problems, it also offers a delightful season of seeing your little one transform into a magnificent, almost-adult. So, fear should not be running through your very being; rather, getting ready for a new adventure should be.

But if you want to traverse those years with the best setup, here’s what you need to do now.

6 Ways to Get Ready for the Teen Years

1. Make sure they feel seen.
So, you say, “I see them every day. They are underfoot, chattering constantly, making a mess, and some days making me crazy.” While that is entirely true, do you stop to really see them? Take the time to observe what they are doing. If preoccupied, they may not even notice. That’s not the point. What you are doing is learning who your child is. And each one of them is different. Do they love art, building, sports, or music? They will tell you by the activities they enjoy. Knowledge is invaluable in the teen years.

See them when they are looking too. I recently heard of a father at his child’s sports event who was looking at his phone when his battery died. Putting it aside, he started watching the game. In doing so, he realized his child often looked at him to see if he was watching. His child and every other child on the court did the same. As he looked around the room, almost every other parent was looking at their phone.

Our children are looking for our approval. They want our cheering, encouragement, our support. When we don’t see them, they don’t have it. So, to whom do they look next to get that? It may not be someone you want to influence in their life. Put that phone down and be the one they know is paying attention.

2. Say what you mean; mean what you say.

You are the authority in their lives from the moment they enter your home. You protect them by making rules: “don’t touch”, “don’t run into the street”, and “don’t talk to strangers”. There is a plethora of rules that protect. But those aren’t the only rules; some lead to correction.

These are more difficult because they are subjective. You aim to raise a healthy, emotionally stable, and responsible adult. So, what rules lead to achieving that goal? These are found by doing two things:

The first is understanding your child. Each child is unique, even in behavior struggles, as well as in the ability to communicate. They may be hurting or experiencing issues you are not privy to. Instead of talking it out, they act out. Sometimes the hostility and disobedience indicate something other than mere defiance. Time will help you identify which one you’re dealing with. So, don’t panic about this; get to know your child.

Our children are looking for our approval. They want our cheering, encouragement, our support.

The second is setting reasonable rules. Everything that irritates is not a call for punishment. Your creative child may drive you crazy with their drama or desire to avoid math with all their will. Your engineer-brained child may disassemble instead of build. It looks like breaking toys, but it’s an attempt to figure something out.

Some learned behaviors will serve your child well throughout life but will require ongoing reminders. Honesty, so no lying. Empathy, so no selfishness. Responsibility, so complete what is expected. These and others like them have absolute rules regardless of the catalyst.

Once you establish what corrective rules are, make them and mean them. If you threaten something, you need to do it. So don’t threaten anything, and I mean anything, you are unwilling to follow through on. Here’s what you need to remember: If your 6-year-old knows you don’t mean it, your 16-year-old will know the same thing.

3. Be willing to join your kids in their world.  

Hate video games? Not any good at them? It doesn’t matter; play them. Are you terrified of the roller coaster? Try riding with them or find a reasonable alternative. Hate getting dirty? Don’t want to add another load of laundry to your workload? It doesn’t matter; get in the mud with them.

They need to know you want to be part of their lives. They want to be part of yours. This is also true in the teen years, even though it may not seem like they do. Establishing life-sharing when they are young enables life-sharing as they grow. It also creates an excellent opportunity for communication. If they know you are terrified of that roller coaster but willing to go for them, there is a perfect opportunity to discuss overcoming fear. 

Conversations with your child in a completely comfortable setting (of their choosing) become more authentic and frequent. They are inclined to share their thoughts when you’re sharing their interests. So, get in there and join them.

4. Teach them to lead, not follow.

In reality, not everyone is a leader, at least not in the traditional terms. Heads of business, government, and even parent groups or committee heads are all considered leaders. But every one of us leads in our own lives. Making choices like who we’ll pursue relationships with, what we want to do, and how we want to live.

Teaching our children to lead their lives independently of other people’s influence and ideas is essential. We want to raise children into adults who can think for themselves. There is a part of this that’s uncomfortable as a parent. As your child heads into adulthood, some of their ideas will not mirror yours. You may not be prepared for the reality that they may be right in their divergent opinion. But whether correct or not, you must learn the art of no emotion. Nothing is more effective in a child’s digging into a theory than a parent’s reaction. And that gets more apparent in the teen years.

5. Let them experience what is needed to develop resilience.

One of the most needed traits we need in life is resilience. It is essential for you, for me, and for our children. This is not built by living a painless existence. It is through facing hard things, problems, and defeats that resilience is gained.

As parents, we never want to see our kids hurt. Their pain is our pain; we feel their disappointment deeply. But keeping them shielded from all hurt is not only a disservice to them—it is also handicapping them for the rest of their life.

Your child’s reactions to life challenges will go from internal to external. Much like our own. Internal is the feeling that you can’t get through whatever you face. External is blaming someone else. Neither are successful ways of coping, but they often must be worked through before taking the next step, which is making an effort to move forward and finding a way through to the other side successfully. It doesn’t help for us to fix it for them. Instead, we need to be ready to step aside and let them work through this process on their own. It will ensure they develop a much-needed quality: resilience.

6. Teach them they are exactly who they need to be.

Every human is a bundle of unique abilities, talents, and ways of thinking. The same is true of that child entrusted to you. And it is good. If you believe that to be true about your child, they will too.

Take the time to let them know what you treasure in them. Make a list, read it to them, and hang it on their wall. Remind them when they need it and when they don’t. Let them know you love them, but let them know you like them too. Every part of who they are.

If you build a relationship with them before the teen years, your chance of maintaining it through the teen years is exponentially greater. 

If you teach them individual thinking, how to believe in themselves, and how to be resilient, every one of those traits will carry them through those years.

The teen years are not without turbulence. They are pulling away, as they should. They are forming their thoughts, as they should. But they need you now and will trust me—they will need you then. 

Are Women being Marginalized - Again?

What is a woman?

It’s a simple question, but our culture tells us that an irrefutable definition no longer exists. Common responses to this question are currently broad, often changing, and entirely confusing. When the definition of a woman is skewed by those who wish to replicate our gender, all the strides women have achieved suddenly become meaningless. The beauty of God’s creation is diminished. Women are being forced to the sidelines, marginalized, and asked to accept a caricature of who we are.

Are Women Being Marginalized — Again?

It’s not only the adult women who have fought for equal opportunity who experience harm. Our daughters will suffer as well. Our original battles—career opportunities and sports competitions—allowed us to pursue a place in life without leaving our gender behind. Positions of success and acceptance in many arenas became ours in the same way as our male counterparts.

We strove for confidence as women, embracing and celebrating our unique nature. But girls today are being told their nature is not unique; it is not treasured, because that nature can be easily replicated, no matter the information on the birth certificate.

The problem with this thinking is that a woman cannot be replicated. When hormones, surgeries, and clothing determine what a woman is, what do we have left? No longer celebrated or allowed to compete with only those of our biological sex, we are unable to rise to the top of what our gender can accomplish. We become marginalized—something I cannot accept.

Gender Dysphoria—Is it the End All, Be All?

I am also grieved about what is happening to those who are confused about their gender, both genders. I wonder what the consequences will be for some of their decisions. Those who feel so dissatisfied with themselves that they participate in gender fluidity or total gender dysphoria, where they are willing to surgically remove breasts, shave bone structure from faces, and take hormones the body cannot produce. Some even choose to begin a regimen of the same drugs used for the chemical castration of sex offenders. Our bodies are amazingly resilient, but we have yet to see the long-term consequences of these steps—physically and emotionally.

I genuinely believe we have the right to make life decisions and live with the consequences, good or bad. But I cannot accept or even understand the damage being done to the entire population by the insistence that gender is an identity or a choice, not an identification at birth based upon biology. Nor can I believe that the only answer to depression or thoughts of suicide is these drastic medical alterations that are encouraged, often by creating fear that the only alternative is suicide.

I have personally experienced the loss of someone I loved to suicide. It’s a complex problem that requires more than what appears to be a definitive medical and identity fix. It includes challenging mental health, feelings of worthlessness, and a destroyed heart.

Beauty in Original Creation

I know that God made the genders perfectly and wonderfully—each special, meaningful, and created to fulfill roles by the nature He has placed within them. It is breathtaking and wonderful. When embraced, we become stronger, more confident, and able to accomplish our place in life.

When denied, we lose our identity and question our worth. Like many others, slipping down this road that denies God’s intent on His unique creation leads to more significant consequences than physical change. It leads to a change of heart for those who follow that path and those who encourage it.

History has shown that sidelining women, as this new sexual confusion does, leads to more profound hurt and harm to our gender. Once again, our gender is being subjugated to a cultural “lesser than” status, easily replicated with the same value and rights.

As a woman of faith, I adamantly believe and know there is no lesser than in humanity. Every human is beautifully and wonderfully created as we are, not to be divided and pitted against one another but celebrated in our original beauty.

But here we are now; what should we do?

So, What Should We Do?

I would start by protecting our children. Many of our daughters are encouraged to question their gender identity, many times through a hidden system—entities and individuals who refuse to include parents in the discussion.

These girls often suffer feelings of dissatisfaction, believing they are not enough. Not pretty enough, not female enough. In many ways, “not enough.” Let’s remind our daughters that females are not monolithic. They are not to be valued by their appearance or others perceptions. Nor are we alike in what we can accomplish. But capable in all ways, we are.

When hormones, surgeries, and clothing determine what a woman is, what do we have left?

May we teach our children the beauty and distinction of our genders. Exactly as God made us. Without limitations. May we also teach each daughter her worth. Every girl (and boy) is wonderfully made with talents, abilities, traits, and a nature that has a place to fulfill. Holding to the characteristics of the gender they are truly blessed with.

Then, can we stand with and love those who are hurting? Of course. We can and we must. There is another answer we can offer to these broken hearts. That is embracing the beauty of exactly who they already are, realizing it’s not a mistake to be rectified. Presenting them with Christ who treasures them, understands them—every thought and doubt—and, right where they are, offers His unfailing love.

I understand it’s not a simple path to quiet this confusion—to help individuals gain confidence and self-worth. It’s not easy to speak into this conversation. But would we consider the surgical, hormonal road simple or easy? Not at all. So we must do all that we can, with love.

Finally, we will stand on a platform of truth. That’s all we have of value in this world. God’s truth has never been a platform of harm or hurt, nor is it today. It is a place of refuge, hope, and freedom. He loves us exactly where we are and exactly who we were made to be. And so should we.

The Beauty of The Declaration of Independence

I want to take this opportunity to share the document that paved the road to the formation of The United States of America. The Declaration of Independence was written in July of 1776 by a group of men who fought valiantly against rulers who wanted to usurp authority over the forming nation. This document is worthy of review, and we do so in remembrance of the sacrifices made and challenges overcome by the brave husbands, women, and children of that day…

The Declaration of Independence

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.

Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

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For more information on the Declaration of Independence, visit www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration.html