My teen son announced, “I’m taking a road trip.” There was no teen negotiation.
I faced him and said, “You are?”
“Yeah,” he said, “but I’ll need gas money.” This fledgling adult wanted to make his own decisions. However, the lingering child expected his father and me to finance his trip.
His words reflect the perspective of many teens caught in the uncomfortable middle ground between childhood and adulthood. According to therapist Rebecca Dowden, this stage of development is called “individuation.” She says the details differ for every teen, but the common denominator is that they are all learning to view themselves as separate from their parents.
My son’s desire to be a carefree child while striking out on his own indicated that he didn’t understand his stage of life. Although he felt like an adult, he wasn’t one because the perks of adulthood carry responsibilities that he hadn’t yet assumed.
Yet he was no longer a child. He had a foot in both worlds but lived fully in neither world. I’ve started referring to this stage of my kids’ lives as “Neither World,” a concept that I’ve since used to help guide my teens into seeing opposing perspectives: childhood whims versus adult responsibilities. I’m finding that it helps my teens recognize the consistency and logic of parental decision making.
Entering Neither World
Neither World is a concept that makes teens more aware of why they feel the way they do. Despite their adolescent desires for adulthood, they often find it hard to say goodbye to the unburdened life they’ve known. Their parents have shouldered the responsibilities of meeting their basic needs — food, clothing and shelter.
In general, there is an expectation for teens to follow house rules and respect parental authority. This includes the understanding that parents have the final decision regarding church attendance, friends, activities and finances. But independence is a fact of a teen’s future, and the Neither World concept helps parents gradually and carefully expose their kids to the adult world they’ll need to live in.
The teen years can be ambiguous for both parents and child, Dowden says. “If the child is restricted too much or given too much freedom, his individuation can be negatively affected.” For children to develop a healthy view of adulthood, they should not receive too many adult perks without also shouldering adult responsibilities. If they are, there can be negative effects on their desire to step fully into adulthood.
In my son’s road-trip scenario, we talked about his decision from a child’s perspective and from an adult’s perspective. He wanted to make the decision to take a road trip but did not have the funds to finance his trip. He wanted the perks of adulthood without the responsibility. To hand him money, as if he were a child, in order for him to fulfill his adult decision, would have been irresponsible.
So my husband and I pointed out which parts of his plan existed in childhood and which in adulthood. He couldn’t have the best of both worlds. We considered his personality, the friends who were going with him, the weather, hotels, finances, etc., in our effort to help him understand that a road-trip decision required weighing several factors.
Although all of those areas had to be reviewed, the financial side of the trip simplistically demonstrates how Neither World works. In this area, we asked our son to choose between financing the road trip himself or continuing to receive gas money by not going on the road trip. Once everything was considered, he was given the parameters of each world and was asked to choose whether he would be a child or an adult in this situation. He chose not to go on the road trip. Neither World helped us strike a healthy balance between the dependent part of our son’s reality and his dream for independence.
Neither World Teens
As teens transition from childhood to adulthood, their responsibilities consist of:
Honoring parents
Accepting parental boundaries
Understanding that parents have their best interests at heart
Asking questions when they don’t understand something
Submitting to parents when necessary
Being willing to make daily decisions on their own
Thinking through decisions
Asking for parental guidance when faced with difficult decisions
Acting responsibly in their pursuits
Dreaming of the day they will launch into a life of independence
Neither World Parents
As you help launch your teens into adulthood, your responsibilities consist of:
Praying for your maturing teens
Inviting God into the process
Walking alongside your teens
Understanding and, within reason, validating your teens’ frustrations in Neither World
Not expecting all your teens’ decisions to mirror those you would make
Allowing teens to make small mistakes so they can learn
Standing firm when big mistakes are at stake
Having reasonable expectations for adult decision-making success, especially in the early years of Neither World
Practicing letting go as your teens launch into independence
Neither World’s Purpose
As my son accepted his place in Neither World, on many occasions life didn’t seem fair to him. He observed his peers being allowed to make adult decisions while enjoying the carefree life of childhood. Some had access to unlimited funds and luxury items, along with vacations and activities that they didn’t earn.
Pam Russom, president of Flyline Search Marketing, suggests that today’s teens already have a measure of freedom that past teen generations haven’t because of their cell phone usage and Internet access. She says, “They can make decisions, judgments and purchases without your knowledge.” Unfortunately, teens seldom have the maturity or financial responsibility to match this illusion of being their own person in other areas of their life.
To balance peer and technological influences, my son and I talked honestly about the freedom his peers enjoyed, and we discussed the failure to launch stories of young adults who hadn’t been given Neither World boundaries. Because acceptance of adult responsibilities is not easy, teens need encouragement to examine how they make decisions. When parents use Neither World as a basis, teens receive the opportunity to make decisions that help them slowly move out of childhood and embrace adulthood.
A Snapshot of Neither World
Here are a few of the day-to-day situations in which we’ve used Neither World to help my family come to decisions for teen negotiations:
Curfew
As a child, my son was given a curfew time. But as an adult, he could call if plans change. At times, he could adjust or discuss if we felt the change was valid. This small negotiation moved our son gradually into the adult arena where his decisions were based on a consideration for others and for those his actions affected. But if curfew was missed without a negotiation, our teen was placed back into his childhood world and lost privileges — which meant his curfew was adjusted.
Cars
There was an expectation for our son to keep $500 in a savings account if he wanted us to provide a car for his transportation needs. He has the adult responsibility of having money available in case something goes wrong with the car. But at the same time, we treated him as a child and provided him with a vehicle, gave him a gas budget and paid for the car’s insurance, maintenance and repairs.
Clothing Choices
As my son took on the adult responsibility of buying his own clothes, he found more freedom in his wardrobe selection. But at the same time, his father and I were still training him in his moral development. So, we did not allow him to wear anything violating the family’s standards.
The years when children are between two worlds don’t last forever, but allowing them to live the adult life under the carefree banner of childhood often kills their desire for independence. Neither World establishes enough freedom, mingled with boundaries, to keep children aiming for total independence. In a person’s early teen years, decisions and negotiations often end up in the childhood arena. As the teen matures and demonstrates good decision-making skills, he receives more adult responsibilities. In this way, parents can walk alongside their teens, guiding them on their journey to adulthood.
Shona Neff is a freelance author and a client advocate/mentor for the HOPE Pregnancy Center.
Validation is safely allowing your spouse to share his or her thoughts and feelings. The message is that it’s okay to think and feel the way he or she does.
