What Your High School Senior Needs From You

Show Notes: Learn some specific ways parents can support high school seniors as they transition to the next leg of their journey. Understand & normalize touch point feelings: lots of emotions arrive with any change, transition, and leap in development. Help your daughter become aware of these feelings, reframe them as normal, and find healthy ways to express them. Encourage girls to focus on all of the emotions they are feeling, not just anxiety; i.e. excitement, adventure, freedom. Link to Previous podcast on touch points Listen without solving their problems, fixing, or rescuing. Listen, mirror, get in her shoes, empathize, don’t jump to problem-solving & fix-it mode; share your stories so she knows you can relate. Link to Previous podcast on listening Link to Previous podcast: why teens don’t want to grow up Let go of knowing what’s best for them; it’s their life & path now; Let go of the teacher role; become a consultant vs. a manager or micromanager Girls need to cultivate quiet, alone time to reflect, process thru issues, become aware of intuition & gut & what their heart says; take long walks, journal, art to open up creative parts of brain Reframe belief that 1 mistake or “bad” decision will derail their whole life, tell your stories of mistakes & your zig-zagging path Dot Theory: be open to dots, follow heart & urges, life will connect dots, life unfolds; Link to previous podcast on Dr. Jordan’s dot theory: Ask how they want you to support them with process of transition: Ps responsibility is to ask what they need, respect it, set boundaries Girl’s responsibility is to continually educate parents about what they need, how they want parents to support them, be specific, set boundaries Learn to connect in different ways: Relationship will change, will never be the same: grieve the loss Can be better, kids on more equal footing, can watch fruits of your labors come to fruition Even high school seniors need a safe base: like when they were toddlers, just be there in the way they want you to be there Take care of yourself: Easier for kids to move on if not pulled back by struggling parents Importance of investing time in marriage all along the way so not strangers when kids leave the nest If ever there is tomorrow when we’re not together…there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is, even if we’re apart…I’ll always be with you.   A.A. Milne To access the links Dr. Jordan referred to in this podcast, go to his website at www.drtimjordan.com or click on the links above.