| There are many teenagers and young adults in | | | | work in a troubled youth's life. Maybe his parents don't |
| treatment facilities and troubled youth camps across | | | | really know how to listen to him, so he feels |
| the nation who come from terrible home lives where | | | | misunderstood and lashes out by picking fights and |
| one or both parents are drug addicts, alcoholics, or | | | | making rash decisions. Now, his choices are still his |
| abusers, but there are just as many troubled youths | | | | own choices, and he's old enough to know better, but, |
| who come from families who seem perfectly normal | | | | on the other hand, if his parents learn how to really |
| and stable. Many troubled youths actually come from | | | | listen, they might alleviate some of the emotional |
| families who, on the surface, seem pretty much | | | | pressure that is causing him to act out, solving the |
| perfect - the parents have been married for decades, | | | | problem before it reaches the next stage of |
| make plenty of money, and seem interested in what | | | | escalation. |
| their kids do and who they are becoming. Sometimes | | | | Some youth workers and counselors think family |
| appearances are deceiving, but as often as not, | | | | intervention is so important, in fact, that they require it |
| people who really want to have a good, stable family | | | | of the families who enroll children in their residential |
| and to raise well-adjusted children just don't know how. | | | | treatment facilities for troubled youth. If parents want |
| This is where family intervention comes in. Family | | | | their children to complete the program, they, too, must |
| intervention can take many forms. Maybe mom and | | | | work to fix the problems at home that might be |
| dad just need to read a couple of parenting and | | | | causing some of the child's pain and frustration. Family |
| relationship books that will really help them understand | | | | intervention can improve the family dynamic even in |
| how they can improve the boundaries in their home | | | | divorced or separated families, teaching parents to |
| and their relationships with and between their children. It | | | | work as a team to understand their child and to build |
| could also look like a trusted friend or pastor coming | | | | her up instead of tearing her down. |
| into the home and talking to the family as a whole | | | | So if your son or daughter is struggling with problems |
| about their dynamic and what could be changed or | | | | that go above and beyond normal teenage angst, |
| improved. In its most drastic form, family intervention | | | | consider seeing a family therapist who may be able to |
| involves professional family counseling in which the | | | | give you insight into how your family can change to |
| entire family sees a counselor separately and together. | | | | help your teenager through the roughest years of his |
| You may think that this is just an attempt to blame a | | | | or her life. It might just be the best parenting decision |
| child's choices on the parent's prior decision, but that's | | | | you ever make. |
| not the case at all. The truth is that both factors are at | | | | |