Teenagers, like all of us, get angry.  Often, while they are angry, they do things that hurt, disappoint and frustrate us.  And so sometimes our response is to try to reduce and diminish their anger.  It is understandable that we do this – but mostly it doesn’t work.  Anger is in-built into our brains.  At a biological level, human beings are designed to get angry.  Trying to stop anger is like trying to stop breathing.

The clear message we need to send teens about anger is this:  it’s okay to be angry, it is normal to get angry, and we can’t stop ourselves getting angry.  Let’s live with that, and let’s accept it.  Now, what can we control?  One simple thing:  what we do while we are angry.  In other words, we accept the emotion, the thoughts and the feelings - but not necessarily the behaviour. 

I've been asked by several people over the last few weeks about my views about the popular Netflix show - 13 Reasons Why.  If you haven't come across it yet, this show is a Netflix series about a girl (Hannah) who suicides by cutting her wrists in a bath-tub.  The show follows the audio tapes she has made prior to her death which explain her reasons for doing so (primarily related to bullying, conflict and rejection by her peers).  I read the book version of this show a year ago, and found it sad and confronting.  I haven't watched the full series, but have seen snippets of it, and read through the plot of each episode (which varies a little from the book).

There has been much written about these series.  

Some people (including, not surprisingly, the producers and psychologist consultant for the show itself) say that it is a valuable mental health awareness raising exercise.  Others are highly critical of the series and say it may increase suicidality in teens (clearly it's intended audience).  As with so many issues, I find myself in the middle of the road about it.  Here are my thoughts!

UK based research group Child Wise conducted research last year showed that children are watching an average of 3 hours a day watching youtube videos.  Most commonly, they are watching music videos, gaming videos, “funny” real life content, videos showing pets and animals, “how to” videos and sport.    

This raises the question of how appropriate these videos are for children.  It's hard to tell.  None of this content is “rated” as G, PG, M etc in the same way that commercially produced television has been in the past.  And with more than 300 hours of video being uploaded to youtube every minute, my guess is that external ratings guides like this are going the way of the dinosaur.

This means that as a society and as parents we are going to have to find new ways of monitoring, discussing and - when appropriate - restricting video content for children.  Here are four questions for parents and carers to ask children to help start that process.

John and Judy* came in to see me a few months ago now, directly after dropping their daughter Sally (9) off at school.  I could tell by their faces that the morning had not gone well.  Sure enough, as soon as they sat down they told me about how Sally had "got in trouble" the day before and they'd just spoken to the teacher about it that morning.  It wasn't a helpful conversation.  John was furious and believed the teacher had made many mistakes over the year, and this was "the last straw" for him.  Judy was devastated and in tears, feeling as though she personally was a failure - as well as being worried for her daughter.  

We discussed their options, how to manage their emotions and what to say and do with Sally and her teacher.  It was a difficult session, but they emailed me later to say the next day had been better for them, and they had made a plan for getting through the next week.

Last week I ran a seminar for parents at a local primary school.  I had almost got to the end of the night and we were discussing rules for kids.

As parents, we know that part of our job is to set, monitor and enforce rules for our children.  We have to do this to help them manage life, stay safe, build relationships with others, cope with school and learn skills.

But doing this rule setting, monitoring and enforcing work as a parent is sometimes exhausting and difficult. 

At the end of this seminar last week, with just minutes to go, a parent put up their hand and said something like this:  "I've really tried to set rules, but I just can't seem to make them work.  Any ideas?".

My brain went into overdrive as I started trying to think about what I could say in 3 minutes which would be useful.  Which concepts, reassurance, advice could I give quickly to give her something to go away with? I decided to skip the theory and go straight to what I think is the heart of this stuff.

I started with reminding her that she was entirely normal.  We all feel the same.  It's a lonely job as parents, but it's a mistake to think that we are alone in our struggles.

Second - I asked her to take a minute to reflect on what was the hardest aspect for her personally in setting up, monitoring or enforcing rules with her kids.

I told her that in my experience there are three very good reasons as parents we fail to either set, monitor and enforce rules. Here they are.