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Teenagers & puberty
You got through the teething years and the terrible two’s when your toddler and you had a battle of wills, you got through the tantrums and tears because they couldn’t get what they wanted, or so you thought. Now your child has reached the teenage years and once again you are faced with dealing with tantrums and tears all over again.
Your teenager will have by now hit puberty, most do somewhere around the age of 9 to 16 and this time they are so much harder to deal with than when you could pick them up and put them to bed or sit them down on the sofa.
Now you’re faced with someone who is probably taller than you are, weighs around the same, and who is as strong willed and determined as you, so how do you cope? What is puberty and what changes does the teenager go through?
The physical changes
Between the ages of 9 and 16 your child will enter puberty this is the time for those of you who have forgotten, when hormones start coursing throughout the body and physical changes start happening.
Changes are numerous and include height, weight and the increase in sweat glands, a problem that causes a great deal of concern in your teenager. The oil glands start working overtime and therefore the child breaks out in acne, another big worry for the teenager who is by now becoming increasingly interested in the opposite sex. Boys will also have to deal with an increase in the testosterone levels and the girls with estrogen.
Along with this, girls are blessed with monthly periods and both sexes will have to deal with hair sprouting in places it hadn’t before. This will be a very awkward stage of life for the child as they are rapidly becoming an adult and for the parent too, we have all gone through this of course but do teenagers listen, no, they just think what do we know about what teenagers go through.
A lot of patience and understanding is needed on the parent’s part during this stage of life, it can be a very trying time as your child develops and starts proclaiming their maturity. This is a time when most teenagers become self-conscious about their appearance, more so in the “private” areas and some discretion on the parent’s part is needed.
Round about this time boys will be faced with “wet dreams” and can be very embarrassed, however this is a normal occurrence and just another change that is happening to the body and one area where discretion will be needed from mum on sheet changing day. Of course, once boys reach puberty and girls for that matter the talk that most parents dread should be made now if it hasn’t already been. Boys should be made aware that they can get a girl pregnant and girls should be aware they can become pregnant and the risks and safe sex procedures should be talked about openly.
The emotional changes
As well as having to cope with physical changes to the body teenagers are also faced with changes to emotions, in girls this can show more due to the changes in hormone levels and they can have mood swings and feel weepy at the drop of a pin. Boys can start to show defiance and changes to their emotions too and while again the hormone changes are to blame, you will have to be firm at times and establish that you are still the parents.
Copyright Clipp.org
Further Reading
http://www.noputdowns.org/
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