Search Results for: blog teen battles

Teen Battles “Sleeping Beauty Syndrome”

Sleep is something that everyone needs a healthy amount of. Parents of young children probably treasure sleep more than anyone else does. Teens tend to sleep a lot, but not as much as a seventeen year old in Pennsylvania. She has been diagnosed with “Sleeping Beauty Syndrome”. Disney made the story of “Sleeping Beauty” well known to many of us when we were children. An angry fairy places a curse on Princess Aurora while she is still a baby. Nothing bad happens until the Princess becomes a teenager. She pricks her finger on a spindle, and this triggers the curse … Continue reading →

Connecting to Your Preteen

The preteen years can be filled with surprises…some good and some not so good. The way a parent chooses to navigate these years could significantly impact the next stage, as they move into the teen years. One of the most important things you can do during this stage is stay connected with your preteen. This won’t always be easy; depending on how much havoc hormones is having on him or her. And your preteen’s personality will also play a role. All I can tell you is that the struggle with be worth it if you can still maintain a connection. … Continue reading →

Enjoying the Teen Years

The past couple of weeks my husband and I have been enjoying a video series at our church, “Running the Rapids” by Dr. Kevin Leman. It is about guiding teenagers through the turbulent waters of adolescence, comparing river rafting to parenting. It is very lighthearted, informational and inspiring. I am one of those moms who can easily admit that I need all the help I can get. One of the things he said early on in the video series was that the teenage years can be the best. Isn’t it more often that we look upon these years with dread? … Continue reading →

Pick Your Battles

I’m a firm believer and I have blogged about picking your battles when it comes to raising teenagers. But I think the same can be said about a marriage. In fact, it seems that we tend to be a bit more nit-picky in our marriages than in any other relationship. Slight irritations can be made into huge deals. Those things we knew about our spouse when we married them suddenly becomes impossible to live with another day. But many of those irritations and frustrations we may experience in a marriage are just not worth the battle. You know the old … Continue reading →

10 Ways to Push Your Teen Away: Criticize Their Style (Part 7)

Today in part 7 of my series, “How to Push Your Teen Away,” we are going to be talking about criticizing their style. This can be a huge problem. It is not enough that society sometimes judges teens by how they look but they don’t need their parents adding to it. I remember the day my daughter was first allowed to wear eyeliner. She started off with applying just a bit. Then as time progressed, she began to look more and more like a raccoon. It drove me nuts. I was constantly telling her to take some off. Then one … Continue reading →

Insurance Blog Week in Review – Week of February 12 – 18, 2012

In a given week, there can be anywhere from twelve to fourteen different blogs appearing here. The Insurance Blog Week in Review brings you a quick and easy way to “ketchup” on the news that you may have missed. Clinic Will Charge Unhealthy Workers Higher Insurance Rates The Cleveland Clinic is going to charge employees that are considered to be unhealthy a 21% higher health insurance premium. To avoid the increase, the worker has to see a doctor and follow the health plan the doctor prescribes. The Insurance Podcast Roundup for the week went up on February 13, 2012. Each … Continue reading →

My Best Advice: Choose Your Battles

If I were allowed to give one only bit of advice to parents who have young children or children on the verge of becoming teenagers, I would tell them this…choose your battles. There is honestly no better advice than this. When our children are younger, we tend to have two schools of thought when it comes to how the teen years will play out. Either we dread it and assume it will be nothing but trouble or we believe that we will never have trouble because we are going to be the kind of parents who lay down the law. … Continue reading →

Don’t Take Teen Attitudes Personally

As much as we may not like it, teen attitude is normal behavior. Almost all teenagers go through a period where we love them but let’s face it; we have a harder time liking them. Rather, I should say that we have a harder time liking their behavior. It’s important that we don’t make things personal when our teenagers are going through those more difficult stages. Expressing to a teen, “I don’t like the way you’re acting” is much better than “I don’t like you.” Even if we don’t come right out and say those words we may be demonstrating … Continue reading →

Tolerating a Teen’s Redecorating

Hair, clothes, and body aren’t the only “canvases” that a teenager has at their disposal. The parent of a teenager may very well find herself facing some interesting interior decorating choices as well. As the parent of three teens, I am having to learn some patience and tolerance around the interior decorating changes that occur in my household… I remember a few years ago, a friend of mine had a teenager who painted the walls of his room dark blue. She had told him he could not paint them black, so he went as dark as he could without actually … Continue reading →

Young Hollywood Battles Depression

Is it just me or have you noticed that this month’s entertainment magazines are all touting “exclusive” interviews with members of Hollywood’s younger set who are going public with their battles with depression? Several weeks ago I read that actor Zach Braff admitted that in real life he resembles the depressed character he plays in the movie “Garden State” more than the engaging doctor he plays on the NBC sitcom “Scrubs.” “I think I suffer from some mild depression,” the 31-year-old actor recently said in Parade magazine. “So to have millions of people go, ‘I watched your movie and related’ … Continue reading →