While young children are sometimes incapable of understanding the reasoning behind parental limits or expectations, teens are capable of higher-order thinking. Perhaps more significant than their mental capacity to understand and assess risks and participate in the decision-making process is the fact that they need to be taught how to make wise choices, since they will soon be legally and practically able to make major decisions for themselves. As you parent your teen through this important transition, it’s absolutely essential that you see your role as shifting from protector and caregiver to trainer and mentor.
Tapering Off Your Caregiver Role
Some parents can hardly wait to leave this stage of parenting behind them, while others have a difficult time letting go of it. Some parents may even feel guilty when they begin to taper off the intensive caregiving with which they provided their children when they were unable to care for themselves. Sometimes teens can intensify such emotions by saying things like, “You don’t love me anymore.”
Sometimes teens can intentionally be trying to emotionally manipulate their parents, but other times, they may truly feel as if their parents are communicating less love by no longer performing certain acts of service. (This may be tied to your child’s love language — you can have them take a “love language” quiz here.) Be assured that even if your teen’s love language is “acts of service,” you can find new ways to communicate love to him or her.
Understanding the Reason for the Shift
Especially if you’ve enjoyed fulfilling the role of caregiver and having children in the dependent stage, you may be hesitant to make the shift. Perhaps your own love language is “acts of service,” so you communicate love by performing tasks for those you love. Regardless of your emotions, your teen has real needs that you, as his or her parent, have to help fulfill. While you once responded to your child’s needs by caring for them, and that responsive care helped create a confident, secure child, you will now have to respond differently in order to nurture your child into a confident, secure adult.
Easing Into the Role of Mentor
This transition is not going to occur overnight. As you continue to teach your teen what he or she needs to know in order to survive independently, there will be some areas where you’ll have to step in and model the activity for a while. You’ll want to progressively hand over more and more responsibilities to your teen, though, allowing a gradual shift from dependent child to independent adult. Your teen must understand that this transition comes with greater responsibility and risk. As small tasks are maturely and responsibly completed, both your teen and you as the parent will grow in your confidence of your teen’s ability to take on greater tasks. This time can be exciting and bonding for both of you.
Continue reading with Part 2.
Especially if your teen is having trouble — spiritually, academically, or even legally — you can easily fall into the trap of comparing his or her failures to other teens’ apparent successes. Be careful, though: that over-achieving athlete or valedictorian might not be the ideal alternative, after all. Not only can comparing our kids to their peers make them feel as if we value them less, it can also send the wrong message about what success in life really means.
Comparing a kid without talent in a certain area to someone who does isn’t fair. But even encouraging a kid to make the most of his or her potential can lead to ignoring what’s really more important: Character counts so much more than performance. Regardless of the outcome of a game, score on a test, or performance in a concert, it’s important to emphasize what kind of person your teen is becoming. Humility, kindness, perseverance, and self-control are more important than any trophies or other awards.
According to a study from decades ago, the faster the pace, the 
Maybe you have a better relationship with your other children — especially your “mini-me” (see 
Sometimes kids find their identity in being the “black sheep” of the family, but even then, they want to feel accepted and included. Hearing your recognition of his differences can make him feel isolated or even ostracized — yes, even if he says he likes being different and embraces his uniqueness.
When you have other kids who like doing what you do, it may be easier to spend time with them and build a relationship. You can be thankful for that easy bridge while putting in extra effort to build a bridge to your other child, the one who needs you just as much.
You had her pegged from the first time she put her hand on her hip the same way you do. “Just like her mama,” everyone said. It was cute when she was a toddler, but now? Not so much. Maybe she’s too much like you, mimicking your weaknesses. Or maybe she’s a bit like you, but she doesn’t seem to be living up to her full potential. There are some pretty predictable ways you may be responding to your mini-me child without intending to — or even realizing it. Consider taking a step back and evaluating whether you may be falling into one of these pitfalls.
As parents, we’re not doing ourselves or our kids any favors by overlooking problem areas in our or their lives. A judgmental, condemning attitude is not needed in order to confess sin (if appropriate), to try harder (if possible), or to seek help (if needed). Maybe it’s something you can even do together, as you grow.