Teens · A short read
Teens · a short read · 22 pages
Your Teenage Stranger
When you can’t read them anymore, and what to do the moment it worries you
You don’t have to read them to lead them.
For the night you looked across the dinner table and wondered who this is: you don’t have to read them to lead them.
What it’s costing you
It was something they said at dinner, or only the way they said “Mom.” You looked at a face you’ve seen every day of its life and a quiet question came up: who is this? After years of knowing what every pause meant, there’s a particular loneliness in not knowing.
The one move
Stop trying to decode them, and ask a smaller question instead. Of anything that’s changed: does this surprise me, or does it worry me?
- Surprise gets room. You say what you think once, then let them try it on.
- Worry means you go toward them, without waiting to be sure.
- When it’s both, the worry wins.
- Underneath both, the house stays the same house: the few lines you hold, the ordinary day, and your warmth.
Use it tonight
“We don’t have to agree about any of that. I still need you home by eleven.”
If they say “You don’t even know me.”
“Maybe not all of you, right now. I’m still learning, and I’m not going anywhere while I do.”
from Your Teenage Stranger
Where it helps you begin
One question to ask of anything that’s changed, the part of your house that doesn’t change, and the words for the surprise, the line, and the worry.
It also tells you plainly where these pages stop and your worry takes over.
What you’ll have
The words for the change that only surprises you, for the line that still holds, and for the worry you can’t explain.
Answers for “You don’t even know me,” “I’m not a kid anymore,” and “This is just who I am now.”
What not to do: the habits that make a stranger stranger.
Surprised, or Worried?: a page for what doesn’t change in your house. Keep it somewhere private.
What’s inside
If Your Teen Isn’t Okay Right Now
Who Is This Kid?
You Don’t Have to Read Them to Lead Them
What to Say
If It’s More Than a Change
What Not to Do, and What to Come Back To
Surprised, or Worried?
Who it’s for
For the parent of a teenager who’s suddenly harder to read.
If something about them has you worried for their safety, the page at the front comes first, and you don’t need to be sure.
There’s no checklist of warning signs in these pages, and that’s deliberate. Your worry is reason enough to ask.
Your Teenage Stranger
- A short read, as a digital PDF, [page count confirmed at the sweep] pages
- Read it in one sitting
- Sent to your email straight away
- A gift from Dear Momma World
“You know what holds in your house, and you know what to do with worry.”