raising teenagers.

Since I’ve neglected the blog so often in 2022, I realize that I never documented Judah’s 15th birthday. I’m kicking myself for deleting my Instagram account before copying what I posted about him on September 8th, but here it is to the best of my memory:

Judah is 15 years old today. He loves listening to classic rock on his record player, running, paddle-boarding, Mr. Blackwell’s high school co-op, Stranger Things, and reading. He’s working on his second novel. He has a gift for noticing people others don’t notice and welcoming them in. He tells his little brothers a bedtime story every single night, and prays aloud for me when I’m struggling. I’m truly honored to be his mom and his friend.

 

(Our youth staff leaders, Devin and Mike, surprised Judah with Five Guys burgers and fries on his co-op lunch break.)

Man, I have so many thoughts about what the last three years have been like, raising teens, but as I look at the above photo, I first of all feel a welling-up sense of gratitude for all the adults — but especially the men — in Judah’s life who influence him, challenge him, and point him to Jesus. These include our church staff, his co-op teacher Chris Blackwell, and the myriad men at Cola Pres who are fun, cool, interesting, and love Jesus.

It’s always been important for David and me to make sure our kids have friends of all ages — younger, older, and much, much older. 🙂 But during this season I’m grateful in a new way for the guy college students and young adults Judah and Amie get to spend time with. They have no idea how much my kids look up to them and learn from them about what it looks like to follow Jesus as an older teen and young adult, — even on a godless university campus or workplace — how God wants to use them to love others and share His good news, find friends who love the Lord and will keep them accountable, invest in their local church, serve their community, and look for a godly spouse (or learn to be content without one).

 

 

So no matter what the Lord leads David and I to do in our home, I feel firmly that we couldn’t parent well without this godly community that we lean on, seek advice from, and give thanks for as we all do life together.

I’ve been chewing on this blog post awhile, trying to find the words to what parenting in this new season feels like. Firstly, I tell people unequivocally that it’s my favorite parenting season.

I love teenagers!

They are so interesting and fun. I love catching glimpses of the new depth in their hearts, especially coming out of middle school and into high school, they way they wrestle with things on a deeper level and start to learn who they really are. I love their developing sense of humor. I love their questions.

There are lots of different directions I could go with this post, but for today I’ll talk about two unique aspects to parenting teens: respect and fun.

 

 

First of all: treating people with respect, which at this point in our family life, largely involves practicing conflict.

Parenting in general has taught David and me not to take ourselves too seriously, but especially parenting teenagers. We joke that David couldn’t possibly get “the big head” pastoring our growing church because he comes right home and our kids cut him down to size. Of course, it’s his own fault because every shred of sarcasm they know they learned from their dad.

While joking in our house abounds, we also have plenty of conversations about appropriate joking and cruel joking. Sarcasm is such a fine line and it takes maturity to navigate (maturity that many adults have not yet learned!). The line is crossed many a time these days in our household, but it’s the perfect time to practice and fail and grow in this sort of discernment together. I often have to ask the kids, “Is it just funny to you or is it funny to everyone?” I don’t care about their intent — if the person they’re teasing doesn’t find it funny, then it’s not a joke; it’s mean.

So the bottom line in our home (and truly in all our relationships): we treat people with respect. We talk about them with respect, both in their presence and their absence.

That actually doesn’t mean we don’t have real feelings. It’s okay to be frustrated or hurt. It’s okay to disagree. It’s okay to get angry (even at Mom and Dad). We should dig deep enough to name those feelings. But we must treat each other respectfully.

 

 

Respect and conflict are huge life lessons, as you well know!

We daily — often hourly — navigate conflict with one another. Several big personalities and strong opinions in a small house with homeschooling giving us lots of hours in each other’s space.

That’s a difference I’ve noticed in parenting preteens and teens. We’ve always made our kids apologize to each other, or us, but now it goes a step further. It’s naming, very specifically, the thing you did wrong. Not just “Sorry for being mean,” but “I’m sorry for ganging up on you and making fun of you with ____ (another sibling).”

We’re learning to own the specific sin or mistake. Here’s an example of my own: “I snapped at you when you forgot to start the dishwasher and I shouldn’t speak to you in that tone of voice, ever. I’m sorry.” An example of owning a mistake: “I was playing with your Lego tower and accidentally broke it. I’m sorry.”

We look the person in the eyes when we apologize, and if the apology doesn’t sound genuine, we go back and try it again.

We learn to pause before rushing the “I’m sorry,” “I forgive you” moments, and let the injured party describe how they feel and what they wish the other person would’ve done instead, or what they can do to make things right. We learn to keep our mouths shut rather than interrupting and defending ourselves, or pointing the finger back at them.

We’re learning not to allow resentment to fester between each other. We keep short accounts. We don’t talk to the other family members when we’re angry with someone, we go directly to the person (sometimes bringing in a third party for help with the conversation if we need it). We talk it all the way through — leaving the reconciliation conversation without everything said and with bitterness still broiling down deep means we haven’t really reconciled. And that resentment festers and poisons our relationship. So we pause and keep talking until we each feel heard and validated in some way.

We learn how to forgive, to really forgive. Once we’ve talked a conflict out and reconciled we are not allowed to bring it up again — not in a teasing, sarcastic way, and not the next time the person makes us angry.

Hmmm. Does it surprise you that these are all lessons David and I very much need to still be learning?

I’m sure it also doesn’t surprise you that this is very time-consuming. It takes lots of energy on my and David’s parts, and yes, sometimes we blow these opportunities for discipleship due to being too distracted or exhausted or just selfish. But God’s grace is bigger. He convicts us and forgives us and gives us more chances to try again.

Even though it hurts my pride that I need to practice these skills every bit as much as my kids do — there are many, many moments I pray, “Lord, I’m just not mature or godly enough to be parenting all these kids” — I’m truly thankful for all of it.

 

 

Now, on to the fun!

We’ve always pursued fun together as a family, but in the teen years I think it’s even more important, because sometimes life feels so heavy. Our teens are navigating lots of internal changes (physical and emotional), friendship changes, insecurity, new ideas and feelings, and processing all of this, along with the usual grind of living in a house of sinners means we need the balance of regular laughter and light-heartedness.

So we work hard to have fun. Every single day.

David and I each have hobbies we do with Judah and Amie alone. The guys run or go to the movies, or walk the perimeter of the soccer field and talk while Gabe and Noah have practice. The girls go shopping or take care of our plants. Judah and I have our shows — Sherlock and Stranger Things, and Amie and I have our shows  — Fixer Upper and Hometown and Jane Austen movies.

We have fun altogether as a family: breakfast at Soda City, some sort of house show we like to drop in on a couple times a week, fire pits with Coke or s’mores, walking on the river with our dog, and playing games. The three younger kids and I always have a read-aloud going. And we’re currently all six obsessed with the card game Nertz and have been playing daily when we can snatch a few moments.

Finally, we create ways for the four kids to have fun together. The trampoline, chess, Gaga ball, playing with the dog, watching movies, puzzles, baking, listening to records in Judah’s room, and yes, playing video games.

 

 

To me a large part of parenting is helping my children discover their passions in life.

This consists of their skills and gifts for their eventual calling/jobs, of course, but more than that right now, it consists of helping them discover what they’re good at, what energizes and gives them joy.

Teenagers need to develop hobbies to provide a comforting buffer when growing up just feels confusing and hard, and also to grow in self-confidence.

An aside: as David Thomas mentions in the Raising Boys and Girls podcast: screen time is not a hobby! It is an escape. That doesn’t mean it’s all terrible, it just means our kids need other activities to bring them rest and life and energy (we adults do too).

That’s why we chose to remove video games from our home for two years. Awhile ago, we noticed our kids becoming overly obsessed with screen time to the exclusion of growing other interests. We waited to add video games back in (still with lots of boundaries), when we saw all four of them growing in their hobbies and having plenty of interests outside of screen time.

So David and I do what it takes to encourage these hobbies, whether buying audiobooks, trips to the library for science and nature encyclopedias, watercolor notecards, saving to buy Judah his first laptop last summer for his writing, involving them in cooking or house projects, and letting Gabe and Noah try out different sports.

A huge part of that encouragement is honestly just keeping space in our schedule for the kids to get bored sometimes and have to find their own fun.

 

 

I know we’re just at the beginning still, but we’re happy to be learning and growing.

David and I went to individual and marriage counseling for a year and a half, and I’ll never forget what our therapist told us one day: “The biggest transformations in my relationship with each of my children have come when I do my own work — on my past story, emotional health, and healing.”

I immediately knew that to be true, from our experience in our home.

The more I’ve grown emotionally healthy, the better my relationships with David and the kids have become. It’s one of those counter-intuitive things we neglect because it’s human nature to think something or someone else is the problem in my life. The more I’ve realized that I need to be the first heart to soften and change in my family, the freer I’ve become to enjoy them for who they really are, right now.

And so, humbling as it is, I’m committed to this process of continuing to grow and change while my kids are growing up — and I hope for the rest of my life. It has only brought me freedom and joy, and I’m happy to tell you, it’s bringing that same freedom to our whole family.