Written by Dr. Cindy Hovington, Ph.D. Founder of Curious Neuron, Host of the Curious Neuron Podcast and Co-Founder of Wondergrade.

Mental health crisis in youth:

Contrary to what parents believe, our pre-teens and teenagers actually want and NEED to spend time with us. According to a study led by Dr. Sophia Frangou, there are aspects of a child’s life that can increase the risk of suicide or protect them from it.

In the US, suicide is the second leading cause of death for children ages 10-14 (Source: MedlinePlus)). I spoke with a 15-year-old teenager (I will call her Stacey to protect her identity) about this and she said “Many of my friends speak about struggling with anxiety, sadness or loneliness. Adults around us tell us about the increasing rates of mental health issues, but no one is telling us what to do about it or how to work through it”. This really marked me both as a mom of 3 and someone having studied mental health. This is why I am starting this new series on Curious Neuron that will include the voice of teenagers. If we, as a society want to help teens, we MUST include them in the conversation.

Risk and protective factors of suicidal behavior

A large study called The Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development (ABCD) looked at the parent-child relationship and lifestyles of 7994 children in grades 3 and 4 (mean age 9 years old). The researchers were interested in looking at both risk and protective factors for suicidal behaviours.

This study found that 8% of youth ages 9-10 had thoughts of suicide and that a high number of their caregivers had not caught on to these signs.

Children in the groups with suicidal thoughts or behaviours reported more hours of screen time on weekends compared to the group of children without any suicidal thoughts or behaviours. On the other hand, protective factors appeared to be greater parental supervision and positive school engagement.

“Many friends I have actually don’t eat dinner with their family and express that they wish they did” mentioned 15-year-old Stacey. “These research findings make sense to me. I enjoy dinner with my family and watching movies with them. It is a time to disconnect and just be with them. As teens, we don’t want dinner time or family time to become about school. We need to disconnect” she adds.

The role of social media in our teens mental health:

“Social media just makes it worse for us and as much as a teen might be mad that a parent is setting a strict rule in the home, we will thank them when we are older”

— 15-year-old Stacey

As parents of teens, we also need to be mindful of the time a child is spending on social media. A recent study showed that when teens reduced their social media use from 3 hours per day to 1 hour pre day (for a duration of 3 weeks) there were significant improvements in their self-esteem and mental health.

I asked Stacey how she felt about these findings given that many teens, including herself are using social media. She looked down at her phone and “This thing causes us lots of problems, but at the end of the day, we are still kids and need rules in our homes” says 15-year-old Stacey. She continued to talk about friends in her environment that are struggling to have a relationship with their parents and feel alone and “stuck in this hole they feel they will never get out of”. “Social media just makes it worse for us and as much as a teen might be mad that a parent is setting a strict rule in the home, we will thank them when we are older”.

What do teens need from parents?

“We don’t want to come home to parents that shame us or judge us, life is already hard as a teenager and we are still learning,” says Stacey. Sometimes adults take the fun away from sports, school or hobbies we have because of the pressure they add on us to be “great”. What if I am not great at math class but I enjoy it? What if I like playing soccer but don’t want to be a pro player? Do I need to feel bad for missing the goal?”

“You would think a teen loves this but some of my friends actually want their parents to act more like parents by setting boundaries and being emotionally connected to them.”

— 15-year-old Stacey

She goes on to say “My teenage friends sometimes question, “Will it always be like this?”. They feel stuck in a world with lots of problems and feel alone. I try to help them move past hard times like divorce but it is too much for me and I am a kid myself, I don’t know how to help them. We need parents that help us calm down and that doesn’t add pressure on us. We need them to acknowledge that it isn’t easy. I also have friends whose parents are more like friends to them rather than parents. There aren’t any rules in their homes and they are pretty much free to do anything they want. You would think a teen loves this but some of my friends actually want their parents to act more like parents by setting boundaries and being emotionally connected to them. These friends have all the material things they need but not the emotional connection they are looking for from their parents.

It is never too late to work on your relationship with your child.

My conversation with 15-year-old Stacey really strengthens the fact that we need to start having more conversations with teens about their mental health and their emotional needs. We can read all the research in the world and use funds to create all the problems we think teens need, but in the end, they to be heard and they need to be part of the conversation because they ARE the conversation.

Special thanks:

Thank you to “Stacey" the 15-year-old contributor for the Q&A section of this blog post. Feel free to ask her questions below or to contribute to this important conversation.