Adolescence
Witnessing the Wave of Emotion
By Friday's Guest, Felicity St John.
If you have an adolescent in your home, perhaps you are familiar with the bouncing emotionality that can often come with this period. It’s hard to remember not to jump on the emotional rollercoaster with them, and instead be there as an empathic, present, authentic witness to their life. I had my daughter at 18 and the age gap seemed almost non-existent. I was the one who didn’t fear her adolescent years as we were so close, and she was mellow, people pleasing, into school and loved sport. I totally underestimated the force of hormones, and a large move, and hence I experienced adolescence as something akin to a thermo-nuclear meltdown.
I think the culture often sets us up to fail with adolescents; we tell them to grow up way too fast, then tell them they can’t do things as they are a child, we infantalise them, externalise their learning and often responsibility, sometimes they look so big we let them go into situations too deep for them, we don’t pay enough attention to the role of meaning at this age, we have no decent initiation into adulthood, and we are blurry about both where the child ends and the adult starts, and where the child ceases and the mother begins. I still think the culture predominantly sees your teenager as a “product” of your parenting, despite them being very much their own person.
I think mothers often base their feelings of wellbeing on how things are going on the home front or for someone else. I think our ability to throw ourselves into this is often culturally prized too; we get raised to be other focused.What if our teenagers are really grieving, struggling, tormented, depressed and even getting into strife - how far do we identify (or over-identify) with their pain? How much should our joy and sense of peace rely on another person’s happiness?
I really resisted the changes I saw in my daughter; the ones I deemed negative.I didn’t want her to feel the immense pain she seemed so stuck in. What I eventually realised was my craving for her to be happy and together was another burden for her. I had to grieve, accept and stop resisting (and repeat this daily).
I have also discovered that when I used where she was at, as the barometer of how I felt or should feel, I was miserable...continually, or at the very least constantly possessed a grey-wash over my life. And sometimes I literally pulled my hair out (it’s funny now). I later realised this greyness didn’t actually make anything better for her, rather it diminished my resources as a parent to my two girls. We are taught worry is a badge of motherhood, but when it doesn’t help, do we actually need to wear it? Is there an alternative? I propose there is and it involves centring yourself and not being the wave of emotion, rather witnessing it with compassion for the other and self.
Molly from the blog
‘First the Egg’ talks about parenting as being like a midwife is with a birthing woman and ‘holding the space’ for them. Molly articulates; ‘the basic idea is that a calm, focused, loving person can protect a space in which the laboring/birthing person can do what she needs to do…and sets aside his or her own baggage in order to be in the moment to protect and honor that person’s present experience.’
Carrie from
"The Parenting Passageway" describes this as being the Queen; one who has ‘a kind way’, ‘a Queenly way’, who acts ‘as a wall a child can bounce off’, ‘who can model being calm, solving the problem, being respectful’, and who can ‘hold the balance when your child cannot’. I desire to be this, yet I also struggle with it, particularly when faced with barbs from someone who physically looks like an adult, possesses adult language and has had 16 years commando training in your weak spots. Yet I recognize as Coloroso (quoted by Carrie) does ‘we can’t keep hooking in to our kids’ adrenaline’.
I hadn’t been holding the space for this beautiful young person, I’d been hitching onto the adrenaline and emotionally crashing with exhaustion. It wasn’t working and I didn’t want to be bald.
When things get dramatic it’s easy to focus on the drama- we forget we can shift our attention from the drama to our resources and the young person’s strengths. I came to understand that my daughter was gaining great qualities and many of these strengths were ones I had dreamed of for her when she was younger. They just looked a little different. It often helps to think ahead of the person you are assisting them to become, and not just making it through what you want for that day – or I might add what another person/institution/agency wants for that day. The baby I had held in my arms was growing stronger, extending her reach, finding the voice (hard to do when you were always a mouse), challenging her own understanding, organising others, and standing up for what she believed to be right even when this cost her greatly. She was often compassionate, regularly offered spontaneous loving gestures, still loved to be hugged, spent time with me, included me in her life and the lives of her friends and she even tucked us into bed each night (she stays up a lot later). Our relationship would never return to earlier years, and it was never meant to. It, like us as individuals, was meant to transition...always.
As a mother of a teenager myself, this article by Felicity is a wonderful reminder that we are two separate people, with our own goals, hopes, dreams and ways of seeing the world. Helps to remember this when they are having a tantrum!
Thank You, Felicity. Once more, your wisdom is beautiful.
THOUGHTS???
