Help Your Teen Deal with Pressure in a Healthy Way

By Leslie Davis

The pressures of being a teenager are infinite - or at least they seem so to a teenager. Teens have a tendency to become overwhelmed by their social lives, schoolwork, family obligations and extracurricular activities, and they don’t always know the best way to handle all of the pressures put on them.

In fact, many teens turn to prescription medication to help them manage their daily lives. According to the 2007 Partnership Attitude Tracking Study by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America, dealing with pressures is one of the top reasons teens say they use prescription drugs. Teens also abuse prescription drugs for other reasons:

• Prescription drugs are easy to get, and can often be found in your medicine cabinet or at the house of a friend.
• Teens see their friends using prescription medications, and they may feel pressured to join in.
• To escape their problems or self-medicate.
• A lack of self-esteem.
• Prescription drugs are seen as a "safe" alternative to illegal drugs, and with fewer side effects.
• There is less stigma attached to using prescription medications.
• Parents are less likely to disapprove.
• To experiment.

Casual use of prescription drugs to deal with stress and pressure can lead to an addiction that can cause many more problems than teenage pressures ever could. Helping your teens manage the pressures of adolescence can ensure that they don’t turn to prescription medications to help them cope.

Make Conversation

If you don’t know what is causing your teens to feel pressured, you can’t help. Keep the lines of communication open by engaging in a daily conversation with your teens so that you know what is going on in their lives. The more you talk to them, the better chance you have of finding out why they are feeling stressed or anxious.

Don’t confuse a passing "hello" in the hallway or a reminder to wash the dishes as actual time spent conversing with your teens. Make a point to sit down, either at dinner or another time, to focus on your teens and what went on in their day. This will not only make your teens more comfortable talking to you about issues they otherwise wouldn’t, but it will clue you in to any problems your teens may be having.

Teach Them to Resist Peer Pressure

Few teenagers can escape peer pressure to engage in risky behaviors without feeling like they are letting their friends down. Teach your teens that resisting peer pressure should feel more like a success to them than a failure. Explain that they should never engage in behaviors that they don’t feel comfortable with, especially if they do so just because their friends are.

Peer pressure may not always be obvious to your teenagers. They may suddenly find themselves in a situation they hadn’t planned on and not know how to remove themselves from it. Help your teens plan ahead so they know what to do in those situations, and how to resist feeling bad about doing it.

Take the Pressure Off

A lot times, the pressures felt by teens come from their parents. Teenagers may feel a lot of pressure to get good grades, excel at sports, take on leadership positions in organizations and get into top colleges - and they often feel this pressure all at once. Take note of the expectations you have of your teens and reframe them to be realistic. You can’t expect your teens to do it all without feeling overwhelmed and as though they are disappointing you if they don’t succeed.

Let your teens know that you only want them to do as well as they can, and to take on only as much as they feel they can handle. Once you remove this extra pressure, you’ll be surprised at how much they will be able to accomplish.

Remove Temptation

Teens who have access to substances such as prescription drugs and alcohol in their homes are more likely to try them. In addition to talking to your teens about the dangers of using substances, especially those that aren’t prescribed to them, be sure to keep any prescription medications or alcohol somewhere your teens can’t access them. Lock your medicine or liquor cabinet, and be sure to throw away expired prescriptions.

Making it inconvenient or impossible for your teens to access alcohol or other drugs in your home reduces the chance that they will turn to them out of curiosity when feeling pressure.

Seek Help

If daily pressures are too much for your teens to handle, or if they have already turned to prescription drugs to help them cope, seeking professional help may be your best option. A therapist can help your teens talk through why they are feeling pressured and learn better ways to cope.

If talk therapy on its own is not working for your teens, or if substance abuse has become a problem, you may want to enroll your teens in a boarding school, therapeutic school or wilderness therapy program. Each of these environments can take your teenagers away from their daily pressures and encourage them to develop healthy coping skills.