Helping teens and adults navigate stress and uncertainty with more confidence | Training practitioners to join the mission
Working with Teens with Extreme Behaviors: Making Sense of them instead of Reacting to them
I recently trained a therapist who’s worried about her teen client. This client spends most waking hours under her covers. She dropped out of the school play, two sports, and stopped going out with friends.
She mentioned another young client that gets so angry playing video games he’s broken two Xbox controllers, a tv, and 4 iphone screens.
I could tell she was intimidated and insecure about the behaviors she saw in them, in part because those behaviors don’t often show up in her adult clients or friends.
And nervous that maybe she’s not experienced enough to help them.
At first glance, teens can look like an entirely different species than adults. In fact most teens worry that they’re broken, they’re weird, they’re from another planet.
But the truth is, teens are EXACTLY like adults.
If you’re a practitioner that works with teens (or you live with them) chances are you see some form of extreme behaviors on a regular basis.
What I’m calling extreme behaviors are things like chronic or instant rage, debilitating social anxiety, obsessive thoughts or behaviors, sadness that stretches over days at a time, often with no explanation.
Other examples include emotional outbursts that are all-consuming, frequent, and sudden, self-harm, suicidal thoughts, eating disorders, behavior that’s destructive or risky, or chronic or excessive drug-use.
Since I spend most of my days working with teens and parents, extreme behaviors are part of the normal landscape of my conversations.
In the world of tweens, teens, and young adults, some form of extreme behavior is so common it’s normal.
If you slow things down and look at the moments before a human behavior, you see a mood or a feeling.
When people get tense on the inside, they often get hostile on the outside. When they feel overwhelmed inside, you’ll often see them get scattered and distracted on the outside.
The more extreme the mood, the more extreme the behavior.
Teens just need the reassurance that they’re not weird or broken. They often scare themselves. So if you’re insecure too, that comes across.
Teens experience more growth and change than any other age group besides infants. Their chemistry and hormones are all over the place.
As a result, their mood states often become chaotic and unpredictable.
So when they get upset, they don’t just get a little upset, they get REALLY upset.
And just like adults, they find a way to release that pressure that’s built up.
Adults build tension, then explode by snapping at their spouse. When adults get overwhelmed, they’ll have a melt-down or fall apart.
That’s exactly what teens do. But because teens have bigger, louder mood states, and have no life experience around how to handle them, they release that pressure through extreme behaviors as a way of resetting.
This may sound obvious to some of you.
But if you’re a therapist, practitioner, or personal development coach, seeing extreme behavior in a young client might be unsettling or catch you off-guard. Especially if you’re in charge of helping them and feeling like you’re on the spot.
Having some understanding around the fact that teens are normal and work the same way adults do, just with more intensity, can put your mind at ease and give you your confidence back. And pass that confidence onto your flailing clients.
Teens just need the reassurance that they’re not weird or broken. They often scare themselves. So if you’re insecure too, that comes across.
Teens are intuitive. They pick up on those things.
Fortunately, because they’re intuitive, they also pick up on my certainty that they’re perfectly healthy, normal and intact. They get lost in the heat of the moment of their moods, just like adults, and that extreme behavior is the human mind’s best attempt to survive and reset.
So a teen’s extreme behaviors are direct evidence of their psychology’s natural drive toward stability. It’s a form of wisdom designed to help them. Could they find a better way to stabilize themselves that involves less shame and damage-control? Certainly.
But the point is they’re not malfunctioning. Their minds are working EXACTLY the way it was designed to. And that’s often the pivotal moment for troubled teens: understanding that they’re not damaged.
Once that fear is gone, teens are much likely to get open to self-reflection, common sense, accountability, and support.
If you work with teens, today’s video offers insight around extreme behavior in a way that will give you a level of hope and confidence that will find its way into the hearts of all your struggling young clients.
erika bugbee
I’m a global coach who works with teens, individuals, couples, and practitioners that are open and motivated to change.
