12 Tips for Parents of Teenagers with Mental Health Concerns
Mental health concerns affect 1 in 5 teenagers, so you are not alone if your teen is struggling. Parenting a teenager with mental health concerns can be difficult. You want to do everything you can to support them, but sometimes it feels overwhelming. It can be scary and frustrating trying to figure out how to help your child, but there are things you can do to make it a little bit easier. You’re trying to support your teen the best you can, but also manage the stress in all the other areas of your life. As a therapist who’s worked with both struggling teens and their parents, I know it’s not easy. But you are vital to your teenager’s wellbeing and we want to support you in that role.
In this blog post, we will discuss 12 tips for parents of teenagers with mental health concerns. We hope that these tips will help you feel supported and loved as you navigate this difficult time!
1. Focus On Your Own Mental Health
One of the best pieces of advice for parents of teenagers doesn't directly involve your teen. The first tip is to take care of your own mental health. This can be a difficult time for you as well, and it is important to make sure that you are taking care of yourself. If you are feeling overwhelmed, consider talking to a therapist or counselor who can help you manage your stress and anxiety.
If you neglect your mental health, you won't be doing your child any favors. Instead, prioritize your health by seeing a counselor, implementing self-care, and openly discussing your feelings. This has the dual benefits of helping you have the emotional and physical energy to continue supporting your teen AND models for your teenager the importance and value of caring for mental health.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been talking to a teenager and they’ve pointed out to me that if they need counseling, surely their mom or father does as well. And they’re not wrong. Your mental health as a parent matters too.
On the other side of things, as I’ve progressed through my career I’m seeing more and more moms of teenagers on my own personal caseload. And it’s been amazing to watch the powerful conversations they’ve had with their teenagers when they’ve told them that they too are going to counseling. In fact, it often leads to the teens themselves going to counseling even if they were resistant to doing so in the past.
Some simple ways you can start focusing on your mental health are eating healthy, regularly exercising, spending time in nature, and practicing gratitude. It doesn't have to take up your whole day. Instead, start small with ten to fifteen minutes dedicated to just you.
2. Let Your Teen Choose Their Counselor
You can encourage therapy with your teen through open and honest discussions, but you should try and let your child pick their therapist. Why?
Your child has a better chance of success if they feel they have a good relationship with a counselor or therapist. I often say that a parent can “require” a teenager to attend therapy, but it’s hard to require them to engage with a specific therapist. In fact, I tell teens that if they decide they’d rather work with someone else, I’ll personally tell their parents that they’re better served by seeing another clinician.
So, let your teen help choose their own therapist. This way, they can feel empowered and involved in their own treatment. If they feel like they have a say in their therapy, they may be more likely to engage in the process and benefit from it.
We know from research that the relationship between the client and therapist is vital to the outcome of therapy. In fact, the therapeutic relationship is one of the best predictors of if therapy will “work.” In other words, if your teen feels like their therapist understands them, has some useful tools for them and that they connect, your teen is much more likely to get better over the course of therapy.
3. Pick Your Battles
You aren't solving all your child's mental health concerns in one sitting. Instead, focus on addressing the most pressing issues. Often, this starts with any safety concerns. So, things like suicidal thoughts, cutting, unprotected sex and substance use should probably be first targets as you focus on the most pressing issues and work on those first. You can always come back to the other issues later.
Humans in general can only work on changing a couple behaviors at a time. So, expecting your child to go from barely functioning to meeting all your expectations in a month, or even a couple months, is probably unrealistic.
If you celebrate your teen making progress with those first treatment targets, you can then move on to other concerns.
4. Show Unconditional Love for Your Teen
One of the best things you can do is show your child unconditional love. They need to know that you love them no matter what. Let them know that you will always be there for them, no matter what they are going through. Tell them that even if they make a mistake or do something you don’t approve of, you still love them and want to help. This way, they feel safe coming to you no matter what.
If they know you love them for who they are as a person, they can cope with disappointments more easily. They know that no matter how hopeless things seem, you are still a safe space. And no matter what mistakes they make, you still love them.
5. Value Your Child's Opinions
Your teen has valuable opinions on their health and wellbeing. Try not to dismiss their viewpoints and spend time celebrating achievements. If you talk down to your child, you may drive them further away from you and harm your relationship. Rather than talking to your teen, implement an environment where teens feel safe and comfortable discussing their concerns.
There are times where your teenager’s opinions about what will “help” their mental health look very different than your own. That is ok. It’s still worth listening to them and hearing their thoughts before automatically jumping in with solutions of your own.
One of the main ways you can cope with mental health issues in teens is by working together. Spend time researching therapists or counselors, working on schoolwork, and setting goals.
If your teen knows that you are with them, they will be more likely to follow through with healthy changes. You can create goal and aspiration boards that let your child see progress and give a sense of achievement.
6. Develop Healthy Habits
Daily healthy habits can improve mental health for you and your teen. View mental and physical health as wholistic and recognize that they impact one another. Then, encourage your teenager develop health habits and to find healthy coping mechanisms. This could include things like exercise, journaling, or spending time outdoors. Help them find what works for them and offer support along the way.
Other healthy habits you can work toward implementing as a family that will have a positive impact on both physical and mental health include:
Fixing health meals
Encouraging exercise
Spending time outdoors
Setting regular sleep schedules
Studies found that high-quality sleep was one of the main predictors of mental health wellbeing. Eating raw fruits and vegetables and exercising also topped the list for improving mental and physical health.
7. Regular Check-ins
Teen depression and anxiety don't have to be a one-size-fits-all approach. In some instances, your teen is doing great for months and then suddenly they aren’t.
Try to regularly check in with your teen in middle school and high school and develop creative ideas if your child deals with increased depression at specific periods. Regularly talking with your teen can help them build trust and give you a good sense of how your teen is doing.
8. Practice Validating and Empathizing
Every single day well meaning parents invalidate their teenager. This leaves the teen feeling misunderstood, unsupported and often angry.
So, early in conversations, start by validating your teenager's emotions. Validation shows that you "get" it. You understand where they're coming from. This doesn't mean that you agree with everything they are feeling, but it does mean that you understand and acknowledge where they are coming from. This can be a difficult task, but it is an important one. Here’s a popular blog post I wrote a couple years ago with specific ways you can validate your teenager.
If you can successfully validate your teenager (you’ll know you’ve been successful when their emotions start to calm or when they start saying acknowledging that yes you are hearing them correctly), you can now start to recommend solutions or changes. But you’ll be able to be that team in finding solutions and they’ll be more likely to listen to you.
9. Take any mention of suicide seriously….without being punitive
Suicide ideation can arise from mild depression and anxiety if left untreated. These seemingly minor mental health concerns can spiral as teens develop and grow. Here are some signs that your teen is at risk of attempting suicide:
Discussing dying
Recent trauma or loss
Personality changes
Behavior changes
Sleep disturbances
Unusual eating habits
Declining self-esteem
How can you help? For starters, if you suspect your teen might commit suicide, you should connect with the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.
You can also contact local mental health services and hospitals for immediate concerns. Here are some other tips for reducing self-harm in the home:
Lock pills
Remove or secure knives
Secure all firearms
By taking additional measures, you can reduce your teen's access to items that can be used for self-harm or suicide. Unfortunately, suicide accounts for the second leading cause of death in teenagers and young adults. If your child deals with depression and anxiety, you should not neglect this concern.
10. Consider Disclosing Your Own Mental Health Struggles
Be honest with your teen about your own mental health struggles. It can be helpful for your teenager to see that you are also working on your own mental health. This can help them feel less alone and encourage them to seek treatment themselves. Make sure to stress that they aren't to blame for your own mental health problems. But rather, use this self disclosure to normalize mental health.
11. Learn About Mental Health
Educate yourself about mental health, and specifically about whatever your teenager is struggling with. Consider asking their therapist for book recommendations or websites they would recommend you look at to learn more about how to support your teenagers. Read books, talk to experts, and attend workshops or seminars. The more knowledge you have, the better!
The more you know about mental health, the better equipped you will be to help your teenager. At the same time, don’t assume that your teenager fits any one profile exactly. Every human is unique. So, consider talking to your teenager and asking how what you’re learning applies to them specifically.
For example if your teen has OCD and you’ve been researching it, you might say, “I’ve read that teenagers with OCD sometimes have specific fears or obsessive thoughts that they can’t stop thinking about. I know your therapist said you have OCD and you’re working on that with her and that you’re trying to stop washing your hands so often. But I was just wondering, do you have any of those specific fears or thoughts? If so, would you feel comfortable talking to me about it so I can understand and maybe be able to better support you?” Your teen may choose not to engage in further discussion with you, but at least they hear that you care so much that you’re trying to learn more about their struggle and attempting to implement what you’re learning.
12. Mental Health Services
Teen counseling services can help various mental health concerns such as depression and anxiety. It’s common for teenagers to go through a rough time where it makes sense to seek professional help. This is where Aspire Counseling steps in.
Aspire Counseling focuses on helping teens grow, develop, and become empowered. Some of the key aspects that Aspire Counseling emphasizes are:
Developing positive self-esteem
Control response to anxious thoughts
View life more positively
Identify goals and aspirations
Improve relationships
As a parent, you are your teenagers biggest supporter. We know this. And counseling doesn’t replace the vital role you play. Rather, counseling for you as a parent helps you be the best you can be for your child. And counseling for your teenager gives them another support as well.
We help teenagers with various mental illnesses such as OCD, depression, social anxiety, PTSD and more. Just as importantly, we support parents of teenagers. Our therapists work with teenagers and their parents all over Missouri through our online counseling services. So, in a single day one therapist might meet with an anxious teenager from Blue Springs before school, then meet with a mom from Springfield trying to balance work & parenting over her lunch hour and end the day seeing a couple teenagers local to the Mid Missouri area in person.
How Parents of Teenagers Can Find Help
Being parents of teenagers is no easy task, and it is made harder when you have mental health concerns. At Aspire Counseling, we specialize in providing effective counseling and trauma services that get to the heart of the problem and truly help our clients find healing.
What are you waiting for? Check out our website and learn how to begin therapy for yourself and/or your teen today.
