One of the most common complaints from parents of kids entering the “terrible tweens” is that they wake up one day to find their outgoing, open child replaced with a brick wall telling them they’re “too tired to talk” and “just need space.” And when kids place distance between themselves and their parents, it’s understandable that anxiety comes up for Mom or Dad.
But this distancing phase isn’t personal; conversely, it’s crucial to kids’ development that they practice operating on their own.
Still, humans are social creatures. We all want to communicate and be accepted by others — even if your stubborn 12-year-old claims otherwise. Kids can be covert and ashamed about their need for connection. But Melinda Wenner Moyer, author of How to Raise Kids Who Aren’t Assholes, offers a roadmap to parents who need help reading their middle schooler’s social signaling cues. Below are her five best pieces of advice on supporting, connecting, and deepening your relationship your middle-schooler.
Notice “hovering” behavior and subtle invitations to connect.
Often, tweens’ behavior will tell you more about their need to connect than what they say to you. Wenner Moyer notes that young people who are still finding themselves and their voices are hesitant to open up — not because they don’t want to, but because they don’t know how to start vulnerable conversations.
The surest sign that they’d like to, Wenner Moyer says, is “hovering” behavior: that is, when your child enters a room you’re in and lingers for longer than normal, seemingly aimlessly. These moments are signs that your child has something to say but feels scared or ashamed to say it. This is your cue to prompt emotional vulnerability by opening a conversation — just not a direct confrontation, as it can be counterproductive and overwhelming to them if you overtly ask, “Is everything OK?” Instead, a simple, “How was your day?” can suffice as a bridge to connect.
Have mundane conversations.
Establishing a conversation with your child is often the biggest hurdle to mount in connecting, but there is still more work to be done. The next step? Let the small talk roll. On this, Wenner Moyer says that even surface-level conversations can help build the foundations of an emotionally vulnerable relationship and can be a foot in the door for talking about harder emotions. In fact, by respecting your child’s wishes to start communicating in seemingly superficial ways, you lay a foundation of trust to build a deeper relationship on — just like you would with any other person with whom you’re trying to connect.
Ask curious, open-ended questions.
The best way to learn what’s going on in your child’s life is to ask. Once a conversation has been established, you can broach the gap between small talk and vulnerability by keeping your questions vague and allowing your child to fill in the gaps. If they feel ambushed or interrogated, they learn to shut down when confronted about their emotions.
Instead, lead with genuine curiosity. Wenner Moyer suggests trying open-ended, judgment-free conversation prompts when approaching an intimate conversation with your kids. Examples: “How do you feel about that?” “What’s contributing to that feeling?” and “What do you need from me now?”
Validate emotions, not false logic.
Wenner Moyer is reticent about validating your kids. Too much validation and you risk entertaining harmful thought patterns; too little, and you’re met with emotional blockage. They key, she says, is to validate the hard emotions while challenging any false logic behind them. For instance, if your child is stressed about an upcoming exam because they think they need to get a perfect score on it, you can respond with something like, “That sounds stressful. I’d feel anxious in your shoes, too. Things will be OK if you don’t get 100%, though.”
Responses like these that balance emotional intelligence and logic teach kids that multiple truths can exist at once, providing them space to both experience their emotions and make smart choices rather than falling too far on either end of the rashness-robotic spectrum. The easiest way to make your child feel seen is to see them; that is, accept that they will feel the way they’re going to feel while offering compassionate guidance in the practical matters.
Let your kid struggle.
While this may seem counterintuitive, allowing your kids to sit in their emotions and bear the consequences of the actions they choose to take is integral to their development into a resilient adult. Many of the red flags parents cite as their reason for taking more restrictive roles as monitors rather than supporters in their kids’ lives are actually signs of appropriate development. Wenner Moyer cites, for example, kids saying they don’t want to talk when they get home from school; verbally “snapping” at parents; failing a class assignment or otherwise getting a poor grade. These are all clear signs of struggle, yes, but that doesn’t mean you should swoop in and turn on “help and rescue” mode: the struggle is good for them. Challenging experiences give kids the chance to practice healthy coping skills and learn what works for them. Not wanting to talk is an assertion of a boundary; snapping may be a knee-jerk reaction to their boundaries being crossed. Frustration and disappointment are essential to practicing emotional resilience in kids, and you can respond to these emotions with empathy rather than.
Bottom line, says Wenner Moyer: Communication problems are developmentally appropriate. As tweens start to discover who they are, their relationship with themselves and the world around them changes. It’s a confusing landscape to navigate, and often they will run into roadblocks requiring trial-and-error to learn how to cope effectively.
So, the next time your 11-year-old sasses you, remember how you were acting at their age: the pressures you felt going into middle school, the pumping hormones clouding your judgment, and the constant labor that comes with forming an identity for oneself. Lead with curiosity and compassion and carve out space for your kid to assert their needs — it might just be the thing that preserves your relationship long past the teenage years.
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