Adolescence involves something akin to a paradigm change, a bedrock alteration of existential status. Immense feelings are brought up; anxiety, panic and confusion accompanied by, and often in a very real sense, a feeling of having to do “this” alone and that adults won’t or don’t understand!
Despite the best efforts of parents, teachers, extended family, mentors, not to mention of the efforts of therapists, like myself, adolescents choose to do things that seem patently to violate their own self-interest. Why is it that when neutral, well-intentioned adults offer bits of perspective about life’s path, about the probable outcome of dropping out of school, having unprotected sex, or indiscriminately inhaling toxic chemical substances, this wisdom is frequently met with a total lack of interest, even annoyance? In this fabric of troublesome, even dangerous symptomatic behaviour, what we are witnessing is an individual’s best effort in adjusting to the developmental imperative that, somehow, childhood can be left behind and
a sense of viable selfhood be attained. It is important to remember that the adolescent brain is still developing. The prefrontal cortex, responsible for executive function, decision making, impulse control is still largely immature, so it is understandable that on this journey, things can become chaotic, and it is perhaps a valid observation that this can result from the patent irrationality of so much of their behaviour and decision making. However, this kind of judgement operates implicitly from the standpoint of adult culture and common sense, both of which tend to overvalue conventional logic and common sense. It often causes us to miss the hidden logic of the adolescent’s creative, if sometimes “irrational” adjustment to the existential dilemmas of growing up.
For the emerging adult, friendships are more personally and intensely invested so that peers
are no longer playmates but becomes self-mates. Friendships, romances, and rivalries all play
a major role in shaping and defining the adolescent’s experiences of self and sense of
worthiness, attractiveness, acceptability, and so forth.
Fitting in is crucial, not doing so generates a huge amount of anxiety and loss of confidence. This period is also characterised by changing relationships with parents, sometimes dramatically so.
These changes are
instrumental in redefining the adolescent’s existential posture in the world, towards the past,
and towards the future. These relationships may become more distant, more subject to
challenge, and more characterised by conflict and disaffection. Something has happened.
Entirely new themes – rejection, rebellion, abandonment, the struggle for emancipation – may
emerge.
A fifteen-year-old has stormed out of the house in a rage and now refuses to come
home; teachers have noticed the decline of a formerly achieving student’s grades and noted
also the change in peer associates – suspicions of drug use emerge; a sixteen-year-old has
withdrawn deeply from her family and now shorn off most of her hair; now, having broken off
any contact with extra familial adults, she writes desolate poetry about the pointlessness of
living, flirting with romantic visions of suicide and death.
Parents are left with the acutely painful feeling that their child – in soul if not in body – is beyond their reach
In adolescence, modes of interpersonal relatedness undergo dramatic change, and this can be
frightening, particularly if the young person isn’t prepared, doesn’t know who to turn to for support, or often how to ask for help.
If they turn to parents or other adults, there is a fear that some model will be used to impose some neat, rigidly sequential solution on them that bears very little relationship to the actual, messy, real-life case; if they turn to their peers, often this too can be frustrating; a frustration that comes from caring too much and not knowing enough. This can be a challenging age, and adolescent problems are often complex and lacking in obvious symptoms. During this period, the young person is defining who they are and how they fit into the world as an adult. And, as a result, the child’s relationships with friends, family, and particularly their parents, can or will change dramatically. Young people and their families can, however, benefit from professional support and guidance during this critical period of evolution.
I work closely with the young people to make sense of the changes that are occurring, and to help them move on positively into adulthood.
Find out more about me and my approach to counselling.
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The Lots Road Therapy Practice 