Just as there are no cookie-cutter kids, parenting methods aren't one-size fits all.
The prevalence of parenting books that offer advice and techniques, coupled with the reality that what works for one child doesn't with another, proves this point.
Still, when a national news story broke in June about a segment of American parents who allow their teenagers to have sex at home, public outrage was widespread. In televised interviews, several parents insisted that allowing their teens to have intercourse in their bedrooms was safer than leaving them to choose unsavory locations.
Many believe this stance is permissive parenting gone too far.
Laura Ramirez, a parenting coach and author of "Keepers of the Children," says a too-relaxed stance can backfire, especially in regard to teens and sex.
"These parents are setting these kids up," said Ramirez, who lives in Reno, Nev., with her husband and two sons, ages 17 and 15. "Pregnancy can forever change the course of a child's life, both the boy and the girl. With freedom comes responsibility; these teens need to understand that."
Yet Ramirez and other experts don't advise veering to the polar opposite position, into the land of over-protectiveness or helicopter parenting, where youths never learn to make important decisions for themselves.
Parents of tweens (ages 9 to 12) and teens must strike a balance in how and when to grant freedoms, Ramirez said, and base those freedoms on their family's value system and the teen's maturity rather than age.
It's also important for parents to remember the consequence of youthful actions, she said, recalling her high school's "golden boy" drinking one night and being killed as a passenger in a car driven by an intoxicated classmate.
Ramirez insists that parents can't stop parenting when a child enters middle or high school.
"You have to be willing to teach and push past your tiredness or your need for downtime," she said. "Kids don't have the development of consciousness to make appropriate choices. During the teen years is when they fall apart."
According to Ramirez, who has a degree in psychology, the cortex of the brain reshapes itself in the teenage period of development, in effect reducing youths' brains "to mush."
"Parents often talk about their children going through the terrible 2's. Who is it terrible for? The parents," she said. "For the child, it's the birth of his will. The terrible 2's can be likened to what happens in the teen years, just in a bigger, stronger body.
"Parents think their kid looks so grown up, but they need you just as much in the teen years."
Research shows that despite their balking, youths actually want parents to set boundaries, Ramirez said. "The children are secretly thrilled, because they get to be kids. Kids raised by permissive parents often feel insecure because they believe their parents don't care enough to set limits."
Parents must shed self-consciousness and do right by the youths they're fortunate to be guiding, Ramirez said.
"We can't be concerned with how others view us as parents," she said. "If we aren't inspired by raising children who will do well in this world, we should be inspired by what could happen if we don't do our job."
Email
Facebook
Google
Twitter
Favorites
More
Advertisement