Author: Terri Shearer Trenchard

Tips to Ease the Hormonal Roller Coaster Ride

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So, your preteen is on the hormonal roller coaster of adolescent life. He will want to hang on tight, but then again – so will you. In some ways we wish we could stabilize those hormones for them, steady the days – the moments – for them. In my book, main character Bork gives preteens some tips about being on the roller coaster of puberty. Tips like, “Stay ahead of hunger. Don’t get too hungry before stopping for a snack.” Think about it, how many of us become down-right cranky when we’re hungry. It’s worse for your preteens, so encourage them not to skip meals: breakfast, lunch OR dinner. Having two small, but healthy snacks a day will make them feel better. (But you already know that.) Tip #2 – Get physical. Right now, go ahead – get up. Extend those fingers and the rest of your body beyond that video game. Get your body moving like you are a little kid again. Head outdoors. Ride your bike; kick a ball; skateboard. Can’t go outside? …

The Voice of Her Peers…

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. . . is surely louder than mine. And while I know that during the teenage years the primary shift of orientation goes (normally) from parents to peers, I admit that sometimes (just sometimes) I hate to see that precious family time traded for friend time. Yet trading in family time is not really a rejection of family; it is, again, one of those normal, developmental stages in adolescents attaining some of their independence. According to Walt Mueller of The Center for Parent/Youth Understanding, “parents remain tremendously important and significant in their teenagers’ lives.” Let’s remember that. And for all sakes, embrace that. Yes, they just might take our presence, our love, our attention for granted, but isn’t that the least we can grant them as they muddle through the challenging paths of adolescence?

Does This SMELL Familiar?

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I don’t know about you, but one minute I’m going about my daily business. And the next, I’m stopped…distracted by a SMELL. WHAT is THAT smell? I wonder to myself. And where is it coming from? Over there? No, wait, it’s here. It’s his shoes, and BOY DO THEY STINK!!     So, how do we help our preteens manage their potentially growing stink factor? Let’s start with a shower. While your preteen may not think he is dirty, those adult-like sweat glands are starting to work overtime to produce B.O. So even if a daily shower was not required in the past, your adolescent may have passed that milestone. Now he will need to shower, and shower often. What about deodorant? As our kids near 4th, 5th or 6th grade, our job is to gently introduce them to deodorant – and help them realize they have newly developing odors, and most importantly, that there are social impacts of those odors, especially if unmanaged. Make it a rite of passage. Go down the bath aisle. Open up their …

Allowing Him Room To Fall

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Remember when your toddler fell, and you picked him up? And he fell again, and you picked him up? And then, it was time to stand back and watch while he learned to get up – and stand up on his own.                                           It’s really the same with our big boys. They really do need to pick themselves up after they stumble. That’s how they learn – how they learn to do it themselves, to stand up – and to carry on – on their own. Whether it’s setting their own alarm; suffering the results of the lowered grade for the homework left on the counter; or missing practice because they didn’t manage their time well, we need to step back . . . let them fall . . . and allow them to pick themselves up and do it better the next time – on their own. It’s not easy, and the stakes seem greater than the skinned knee when they were only two. But we taught them to walk and stand on …

The Gym Lock

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Sitting here with my daughter as she practices — and masters — her GYM LOCK (oh, excuse me, P.E. lock).  Takes me right back to 6th grade.  AHHH!  The stress of the number combination — to the right, to the left, past the number to the second number, back exactly to the last number.  Quickly . . . Quickly . . . QUICKLY! . . . because I only have 2 more minutes to change — in front of everyone!  The joys of middle school.  Who can forget them? As our kids transition to middle school, do we actually worry more about it than they do?  I think, perhaps. Remember when we sent them to Kindergarten?  We wondered — we really wondered — we even worried — if they were ready.  They were ready.  It was, dare I say, we that weren’t ready.  But we let them go.  Because we had to.  We waved goodbye to the bus or walked them into school.  We wondered all day if they would survive.  Okay, we wondered just …

Are days with your preteen like a roller coaster?

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I don’t know about you, but some days my preteen comes bouncing down the stairs like he’s ready to soar to the skies. Other days it’s like nobody is at home, with the barely attainable, less-than-interested grunts, mistaken by me to be a “Top-O-The-Morning To You” greeting.  Something about waking up on the wrong side of the bed, perhaps?  Nah, his bed adjoins the wall.  Not enough of that precious shut-eye?  Let’s count.  Ten hours.   I’ll chalk that up to a good  night’s sleep. Perhaps I should just stop trying to make rational sense of these irrational equations of behavior and just blame it on the hormones.  Yep, now let me think.  That’s gotta be it.  Those darn hormones.  They’ll get us every time.  One time he’s up; the next time he’s down, faster than you can type Space Mountain. What’s that you’re thinking?  Kinda makes you feel like you’re on a roller coaster too?  Yeah, not to mention the rest of the family . . . like . . . the sib-lings. Just think about that roller coaster.  …