Adolescence... Blessing or Curse?

"Very Interesting to broaden the panorama and try to understand that blessed stage... Even if you do not have adolescent children, it is important to broaden our vision of this stage, the new context, the new problems, some that will sound familiar and others that we cannot imagine."

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Adolescence... Blessing or Curse?

"Dedicated to all those dream guides, those wonderfully imperfect beings called mom / dad, who with love, courage and fears venture into the formation of a human being."

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The prestigious medical journal, The Lancet, suggests that adolescence is a phase that currently extends from 10 to 24 years, expanding the previous limit of 19 years that was considered the end of this stage.

This reality is evident every day, where young people extend their leisure activities, such as video games, and make intensive use of their smartphones to interact on social networks. Not to mention, there are those who harbor a false illusion of "being an influencer" and having millions of followers on their channel on some of these networks. In addition, they establish emotional and sexual relationships in a way very different from the experiences we had in our adolescence, often making us incapable of engaging in conversations on these topics.

Being a teacher has many advantages when it comes to understanding teenagers and young adults in their twenties. The first advantage is that they are experiencing a transformative stage where they are SCREAMING for help, for attention. These cries are often silent or fall on deaf ears, leading to complications in family relationships, academic performance, and unfortunately, they can critically affect their physical and emotional health for the rest of their lives.

As teachers, students often confide in us perhaps more than they do their own parents. And this is understandable, don't feel bad! The reason is simple: we perhaps spend more time with them and they see us as adults who don't judge them, who won't discriminate or pressure them into making a decision. The truth is that we have hundreds of stories that we live through each school year, many of which leave us with profound moments of reflection about the teamwork that parents, teachers, and administrators should be doing. After all, we share a common mission... to educate and shape your children.

Are we doing enough to aid their development? The answer is clear: No! Unfortunately, the increase in drug use, the rise in suicide rates, and mental illnesses, many of which are caused by stress and anxiety, tell us that we need to do much more for them. We need to study and prepare ourselves more to help them make this stage of life as positive an experience as possible. Not everything will be perfect, and that's okay. It's part of the learning each one will have to live through. Remember, often the greatest growth comes from the mistakes we've made and managed to overcome.

From the bottom of my heart, I hope that the experiences, anecdotes, and cases that I'm going to share with you will be of great help to you and your family in improving the family environment and intergenerational communication. May it be a time of deep reflection on our daily actions with our children, with our students, asking ourselves every night before going to bed if, from our role, we are helping them find their personal identity, their passion... their purpose.