Why slow parenting is a good idea?

Hey everyone! We connected with Slowparentingteens.com to give you another resource to use while parenting your teenage son. We interviewed the founders and thought it would be a great idea to let you in on the interview and read what they said. We hope you enjoy it!

Tell us about yourselves?

Molly Wingate and Marti Woodward want change how parents think about their teenagers. As authors of Slow Parenting Teens, they have worked with thousands of teenagers and parents. They believe that adolescence is not the problem and urge parents to stop looking at their teenagers’ behavior and focus on their relationship with their teenagers instead. Molly comes from a teaching background, Marti has a therapy background, and they have raised five teenagers between them. They have translated their professional and personal experience into a process so parents can choose to start changing their relationships with their teenagers right now.

What makes your parenting model unique?

In a nutshell, it focuses on the relationship between parents and teenagers instead of on techniques for managing a teenager’s behavior. We believe that the most important job a parent has is to be the emotionally safe place for their teenager. Before you can be that emotionally safe place, you must understand what motivates your parenting.

If you could ask parents one thing and get an answer from all of them, what would that question be and why?

We would ask parents, “What are you afraid of? For your teen? But more importantly, for yourself?” When you can answer that question, it alters your perspective on parenting and you can respond rather than react to a situation.

Some parents have a hard time understanding why their teens won’t open up to them. What are your thoughts on why and what to do?

Teens don’t open up when they don’t feel safe. They don’t feel safe when they feel judged. They also don’t feel safe when they feel responsible for their parents’ feelings. If the parent doesn’t own what he is afraid of, most likely he is projecting his fears onto his teen. So we suggest that parents investigate and own their fears and create a safe place for their teens.

How can parents stay focused on the relationship when dealing with a challenging teen?

Slow parenting Teens has five specific attitudes for parents to adopt. These are the “how” of slow parenting teens. Any one of the five attitudes can greatly benefit parents when they ....

To read the rest of the interview click Teenage Sons!