Adult, Couple and Child Counselors
Barbara Handelman, M.Ed.
Bob Handelman, ACSW
Norwich, VT 05055
Flexible Hours
e-mail: Bob.Handelman@Valley.Net
(802) 649-1030

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LIVING WITH CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS

As children emerge from infancy they are in an ever-changing evolutionary process. They are developing from totally dependent infants and evolving into adults. They do not start out as babies and one day when the calendar says they are 15 or 18 or 21 years old, suddenly achieve adulthood. The process is subtle but continuous; there are many stumbling blocks, challenges and setbacks, but progress is almost inevitable. The influences on the emerging child are infinite.

Parents and other family members are most certainly the primary influences in their children's lives. Factors such as health, school, religion, neighborhood, cultural heritage, economic status, hardships and success all have definite effects on the developing child. These effects are not always within the control of the most caring and protective parents. The unpredictable, and often unpreventable, events that affect children’s lives are many and range from joyous to tragic.

A family's sudden financial windfall, that comes with winning the lottery or inheriting a large amount of money, can change a child's life as profoundly as a parent's tragic accidental death. Parents and their children mature together,
receiving the impact of the world outside as individuals and as a unit. The threads of communication that bind the family members to each other are often fragile.

As the children reach their teens and approach adulthood, compromise and accommodation of differences become the keys to a family's survival.

The Evolutionary Process of Child Development Begins at Birth

As Infants: (0-15 Months) Children require...

...that all their needs be met for them. They must be fed and clothed; someone else must attend to their bodily functions. They can make no choices nor take any responsibility for their actions. They cannot even offer much affection in return for the care they require.

As Toddlers: (15-36 Months) Children require...

...opportunities to explore their world, but also need total protection from environmental hazards. They continue to be totally dependent for their basic needs, but now are able to make a few limited choices, communicate some of their needs, and offer some affection and recognition to those who care for them.

As Pre-Schoolers (3-6 Years Old) Children...

...are developing independent self-help skills, and basic concepts such as color, shape and size. They are capable of making choices in a wide range of situations, can employ judgement when faced with familiar hazards, but they lack judgement and generally cannot weigh their choices in terms of past experience or future consequences. They can communicate clearly about their basic needs and some feelings. They are able to offer affection and recognition to those who care for them. They are also able to display some empathetic capacity to recognize the needs and feelings of others. Their parents are their primary and often exclusive role models for developing gender role identity, socially appropriate behavior and relationship capacities.

As Elementary Schoolers (6-12 Years Old) Children...

...are rapidly increasing their competency, learning to read and attaining other academic skills. They are building their confidence in their own capacity to try new ventures and tolerate modest failures. They have some capacity to make judgments about their own behavior, taking into consideration past experience, but they generally are not yet able to gauge their behavior in terms of future possibilities. They are generally focused on the interests and activities of their peers, in terms of dress codes, behavior codes and play activities. They focus not only on their own parents as role models, but also on scout leaders, athletic coaches, teachers, clergy and others who have particular importance in their lives. Fantasy super-heroes (superman, spider woman, Star Wars characters) also profoundly influence children's interests and behavior at this stage.

As Adolescents (12-19) - Children ...

...are achieving adult levels of competency in a wide range of skill areas. Their bodies are making the transition to maturity and the biological capacity for procreation. Hormones influence sexual energy and sexual interest, while the changes in the teenager's body cause physical and emotional stress. They are focused almost exclusively on the interests and behavior codes of their peers; current entertainment, folk and political heroes are their primary role models. They swing from intense infantile dependency on their parents to vehement independence and rebellion. Although they now have the intellectual capacity to be aware of past experiences as they relate to present hazards and future consequences, they are impulsive and very often act without thinking. They are unsure of themselves, their values, their competency and their own identities. They are involved in a complex and confusing struggle to sort out their own values from their parents and to weigh their values in terms of pressure from their peers and the tendency to go along with the group. Teenagers are vulnerable to the whimsy of fashion and group pressure to explore sex, drugs and alcohol.

Adolescence is a particularly confusing time for parents. It is their last chance to make a significant impression on their child's judgement, values and personality, but it is also a time when parents need to be letting go, by allowing their children to accept, as fledgling adults, the consequences for their own choices and behavior.

In essence, teenagers are a bit like children at every other stage. During the adolescent period they re-experience almost every phase of their development: all the confusions, the explorations, the moods, problems and joys of being little and dependent, and of being mature and independent. In their own individual manner and personal style, each teenager learns to gather together the loose ends of childhood and take on the roles, responsibilities and pleasures of adulthood.

PROBLEMS

Sometimes the developmental process is not smooth. Events outside of everyone's control may negatively affect the child's sense of self-confidence, self-worth or functional capacities. Rarely is it anyone's fault when problems occur, but parents should be aware of the warning signs that all is not well and know how, when and where to get help.

The following warning signs should not be ignored or allowed to continue. These problems are not likely to go away without professional help and may be harmful or even fatal:

1. Pre-occupation (talking about, reading, fantasizing or experimenting) with death, illness, or suicide may themselves be warnings of suicide. The idea that "the ones who talk about suicide don't do it" is a false and dangerous myth. Those who talk about suicide often try it and succeed. Adolescent suicide is startlingly common. A teenager's impulsivity, intense mood swings, and access to the means to kill them selves make any suicidal warnings significant and urgent. Teenagers lack the life experience to recognize that suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

2. Drastic dieting or excessive food bingeing or purging, known as anorexia or bulimia, may serve as warning signs for serious emotional illness, most commonly, but not exclusively, in teenage girls. These conditions can be fatal and require immediate, intensive, professional help.

3. Erratic or unusual behavior, spacieness, changes in the appearance of the eyes, clumsiness or other changes in body movement patterns, disrupted sleep or inattentiveness may all be signs of alcohol or drug abuse.

4. Any of the following symptoms that last for more than a few days at a time, or reoccurs more than twice a month, may be warnings of significant depression that the child will not come out of without professional help:
a) a sudden and sustained drop in school performance.
b) withdrawal from friends, family or school.
c) poor appetite.
d) extreme mood changes, sullenness, or isolation.
e) bouts of prolonged crying or tearfulness.
f) frenetic activity - being overly busy all the time.
g) change in sleep habits - either too much or too little.

5. Depression often precedes suicide attempts, anorexia or substance abuse.

6. Frequent or repeated aggressive outbursts, lying, stealing or other behaviors that are unusual to the child's personality or the family's values and sense of social responsibility. These may be serious warning signs that the child is having difficulty establishing a value system of their own and may need additional parental guidance, more firm (or less rigid) parental limits, as well as professional help.

7. When teenagers are excessively covert or secretive about their sexual interests, or if they brag about their sexual activity or wave it in their parents' faces, they may be having some problems defining their own limits and comfort levels with sexual activity. Sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancy are the most obvious signs that a teenager's sexual activity is out of control, but they are not the only signs - only the most obvious.

8. Cuts, scratches or burns appearing on the child’s body (most often but not exclusively appearing on the child’s arms or legs), that can not be explained by sports or other routine activities, may be signs of self-multilation. These self-destructive behaviors are indicative of emotional pain beyond the young person's tolerance.


WHEN TO GET HELP

When any of the above problems exist, the need for help is urgent.

There are other instances when seeking help is warranted:

a) When you feel that you cannot handle your child's behavior.
b) When you would like to better understand your child's behavior.
c) When you feel that you are likely to lose control of your own anger.
d) When your child will not or cannot be honest with you.
e) When you have tried every form of reasonable limit setting and
constructive problem solving, and the problem still persists.

This material may be reproduced only if proper credit is given the original author.

© Barbara Handelman 2003