Can you TRUST YOUR teenager?

DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEY GET UP TO WHEN THEY GO OUT WITH THEIR FRIENDS?

Trust is an important part of any relationship, and it can be tricky balancing your teenager’s need for privacy and independence with your need to know what is going on so you can make sure your child is safe.

Important things to remember include:

Teens go through a very normal phase of wanting to be able to make their own decisions, without having to consult you. This is something you’ll need to let them do, but with boundaries. As time passes, and they prove they can be relied on to meet the conditions you have set, you can extend those boundaries.

Try to keep the lines of communication open. It’s easier to trust your child if they can talk to you openly about what’s going on in their life, bearing in mind that they won’t want to share every little detail with you. Make a point of having a daily conversation to catch up with what’s happening, perhaps when you’re eating dinner (turn the TV off!) or driving them to school/sport practice etc. Give them your undivided attention.

Set some ground rules, depending on their age and level of maturity. With younger teens, driving them to their destination and picking them up may be part of the deal when it comes to them going out with their friends. But as they get older – and if they have earned your trust – you can give them more freedom to make their own way. Be very clear about your rules, so there are no grey areas they can dispute.

Get to know their friends, and also their friends’ parents. Their friends may be less likely to egg your teen on to do things they shouldn’t if they know they will have to face you (and your disapproval) next time they come to your house. And communicating with the parents of your teen’s friends can help to create a safe environment for all your kids.

If you find out they have betrayed your trust, make sure that they face some kind of consequence. If you let them get away with breaking your trust, they are more likely to keep doing it.

There’s a difference between monitoring what your teen is up to, and spying on them. Getting them to text you to let you know that they’ve reached their destination safely is reasonable; secretly tracking their phone online might be going a bit too far – unless they’ve given you cause for concern and you need to make sure they are not somewhere they shouldn’t be.