April 18, 2011
Delene Cole

Listen to the show: Taming Parental Anxiety while Parenting Teens

Change Thrivers Tips

• Although understanding teens is very important, it is also important to realize that a parent’s 
• anxiety comes from within them, and although the teen may be the stimulus, the cause seeds within the parent. Thus is the need for parents to learn to calm their own anxiety in order to effectively deal with the multitude of challenges parenting teens brings up.
• Learn to be more responsive than reactive with your children. Ask yourself, “What’s going on for me and how am I responding?”
• Write down the core values that are most important to you and that you want to pass along to your kids. Keep them visible where you see them repeatedly. Let those values guide your behaviors and serve as the boundaries for your children.
• Keep a picture of your children when they were very young and they were sleeping. Remember that the tender heart of the child still beats within your teen.
• Have someone outside of your parenting relationship like a parenting buddy to process and bounce things off of because we all need guidance and support.

By Delene Cole

Resources Recommended by Delene

Redirecting Children’s Behavior by Kathryn J. Kvols

About Delene Cole:

Delene is a Marriage and Family Therapist, Certified Family Life Educator (CFLE), a Certified Parent Educator. She talks to us about having healthy relationships with ourselves and with our loved ones. Delene specializes in collaborative healthy family relationships, and healthy adolescent transitions. She has been teaching parenting classes (Redirecting Children’s Behavior) and facilitating psycho-educational seminars for couples, individuals and adolescents for over fifteen years and has been training and certifying new parenting instructors since 2000. Visit Delene Cole’s Website