You can help your child through this crucial period of great physical and emotional development. By Christina Viegas

Adolescents aren’t out to ‘get’ their parents (though yes, it may often seem that way!); they’re just trying to assert their own identity.

Take It In Your Stride
Adolescence is a good time for both children and parents to let go, while still understanding that they are there for each other. It is a little before this stage that children attain puberty.

“Parents have to realise that their attitude towards puberty will influence how their young children will experience it. Both parents and kids should realise that puberty is nothing to be scared of and should not be viewed with fear,” states Dr Madhavi Raiker, MD, Raiker Nursing Home, Goa.

She continues, “It is just another, but very important milestone in child development.”

Communication Is Crucial
Create an atmosphere of trust, which will be conducive to healthy communication. Disciplining techniques will have to change around this time. The rules that applied when your child was a precocious 10-year-old are certainly not likely to yield results now. Respect is the key word now.

Talking down to adolescents will not help. This is not to say backslapping will be received too well either — there’s nothing more embarrassing for a teenager than having a parent barge into a teen zone, pretending to be one too.

Somewhere in-between the two extremes will more likely work best. When parents are able to guide and befriend their adolescent children, they feel uninhibited in expressing their feelings and doubts. And this is just the environment conducive to building trust and dialogue.