Teens in Balance - Tara Cousineau, PhD

Gearing Up for Ceremonies & Celebrations: Substance Use Prevention and... Prayer

I brace myself every spring for the end of school year festivities: proms, graduations, senior pranks, and the beginning of summer concert series.  Every spring there is a headline or two of the latest teen tragedy related to alcohol use. Indeed, the leading cause of death among teens is alcohol related injuries, followed by suicide.  Kinda depressing. But if you consider the larger context, most teens survive adolescence.  Few die of natural causes and disease, so that pretty much leaves the unnatural incidents to account for why young people die. Even though every season the press and local papers post stories, memorials or updates from last year’s losses with prevention messages for this year, it’s just a matter of time.

For me it’s a low grade, visceral feeling.  We lost a member of our graduating class when I was a high school senior – on the night of our graduation. I’ll spare the details but the losses were deep. (This was in the 80s and efforts were just beginning to draw attention to safety and prevention.)  The following year the boy who crashed into our fellow classmate driving full speed – and on speed – from another party, committed suicide.  They had been friends.

The father, who held the graduation party – the coolest, most lovable dad around town – who thought through how to best serve us kids (and parents), created a gated party, took everyone’s keys, and provided kegs of beer.  In fact, it was a very civil affair on a beautiful June evening. Didn’t matter. MADD sued him for providing alcohol to minors. Let’s say quite a number of lives were affected and our class was forever fractured. Reunions occurred on off years and there were half-hearted attempts at gatherings. Mostly, we simply dispersed across the nation harvesting our new adult lives.   (Facebook reunited many of us 25 years later – as we parent our own teens.)

Prevention has come a long way since then.  Students sleep over in auditoriums, are asked to take educational classes, hear parents and peer advocates tell their traumatic stories, or view displays of mangled cars on the school lawn.  Tons of prevention, fear-engendering videos are on uTube. You’d think it would work a bit better. 

The hope (and prayer) here is that people still keep on trying to get the message out.

The Children’s Hospital in Boston has just launched a new program for parents of teens. “Fifteen Minutes to Save Your Teen’s Life” is sponsored by the Center for Adolescent Substance Abuse Research.  Dr. John Knight founded the program and appears as the avucular medical expert on www.teen-safe.org.  It is an interactive tutorial for parents intended to help them engage with their teens about substance use.  A certificate is received at the end the program. The local high school in the town where I live is requiring all parents of graduating students to take it.  This is a good idea. 

In fact, all parents of incoming freshman should take it, too.  There is, of course, Parents:The AntiDrug –  a terrific organization, but I’m not sure parents are all that aware of it or even seek out information. (It’s called denial and disassociation from one’s own adolescent years.)  

A number of years ago a colleague of mine created a computer game called Crash Site. This was intended for teens getting their driver’s license. The program is a virtual environment of a car crash scene. The players gather clues about the crash from a doctor, a lawyer, a peer, and a policeman as they answer questions about their own risk factors for substance abuse. Clever.

But year after year the tragedies still occur.  One parent recently said to me that it's like “a weird survival of the fittest.” Some teens live, some die.  Easy to say until it’s your kid or the child of a friend.

Yet, there is something to be said about “survival.” The teen brain is wired to take risks and yet not be totally aware of the risks.  That’s how early tribal people catapulted themselves into future generations. The youth of the group took the most risks to defend and to provide for the group.  If one actually thought about the risk at hand, like the herd of buffalo kicking up the dust at foot of your dwelling – well one might duck for cover and everyone would be wiped out.  The irony of it is that these are not the dangers that face humankind today.  The muddled, growing brain of the contemporary teen might just have too much time, too cushioned a life – where experimenting with alcohol or drugs might just seem like the cool yet dicey thing to do on a Friday evening with pals.  No safe-guarding of caves to be had these days.

We have the knowledge today but not necessarily the wherewithal. Substance abuse changes the brain… why can’t we wrap our head around that?

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Resource for Teens: The Science Behind Drug Abuse

Trouble Teens take on Shakespeare

Every once in while there is a program or project that comes across my radar that makes me brim with hope and delight. This week it is a story in the Boston Globe with the intriguing title, Caught in the act: Juveniles sentenced to Shakespeare by Louise Kennedy. Yes, ’tis true.  Teens who have been arrested and subjected to probation are required to act roles in Shakespeare. This innovative program has been around for 10 years, and of course, it is situated in the Massachusetts Berkshires, home to Tanglewood and Jacob’s Pillow. Such programs are novel but not new.  This American Life showcased a story of convicted criminals with life sentences performing Hamlet. Over 6-months a group of high security inmates were transformed. Listen to this story – it is one of humility and humanity. (It’s worth the 99¢ download.) 

The story of the troubled teens describes just how resistant these youth are. Some have very low literacy and most have bad attitudes. Rehearsals are four hours on a Friday afternoon. Yet, over time, the majority of the kids come around.  Having to learn a bit part in Shakespeare for high school English often feels like punishment for the average teen, let alone tough teens. How can one utter phrases of old English that seem to go on forever?  I recall having to recite Brutus for Mrs. Rhodes English class.  Somehow the lines coming from a scrawny teen like myself seemed out of place – I remember not having the physicality to channel his lament. But I blustered through it. 

These days, when the word “like” seems to launch many kids’ utterances the thought of Shakespeare is quite refreshing.  The common chatter among some young teens I get to hang with falls along these lines: “Like, you know, she’s such a mean teacher. Like, why give us extra homework because she’s obviously having a bad day. It’s not fair.”  What about, “Oh, woe is she that dares drag her apprentices through the dredge of language arts.”

While the Berkshire program doesn’t fix all the problems in these teens’ lives, the program manager quoted in the article remarked “…the beauty of the program, too, is that learning the words, and learning the meaning of the words, is something that they’ll have forever. Nothing can take it away from them, which unfortunately is not always the case in life.’’

The following day there was an editorial on the sorry state of American students' written proficiency.  Kara Miller, whose teaches English to Babson College students, laments: “Why do so many students come to college without a command of the fundamentals?” (At Babson, no less.) She cites a statistic that is alarming: The National Assessment of Educational Progress found just 24% of high school seniors are proficient or better in English. What? That means 75% of the rest do not meet basic standards! 

Maybe, it’s time we are all – youth and adults alike – sentenced to Shakespeare.

Mothers & Daughters: Can both be fans, groupies and admirers?

I had to chuckle when I read an article in the Boston Globe this week, It’s never to late to swoon, by Beth Teitell. The piece describes how moms and their teenage daughters go gaga over the same cultural icons, especially the young male talents, hunks and vampires.  The issue presented was that moms are vocal about it, leaving their girls mortified. 

Wasn’t it just the night before, sitting with my 10 and 12-year-olds watching the elimination of American Idol contestants that I remarked, “Well, that Casey sure is cute!” 

“Mom!” Both my daughters admonished. ”Well, I don’t think he should be in top 3! I’m sure it’s the teeny bops all over a America who are keeping him in the running because they think he’s cute, too!”  (All three of us wanted to see native Massachusetts contestant, Siobhan Magnus, on there instead.)

Teitell writes, ”A variety of cultural forces are turning women with crow’s feet into lovesick post-post adolescents.  For starters, the societal fixation with youth leads some people to believe they are still, in fact, young.” 

Not. 

 It’s not that moms are reliving their youth – although it is fun to recall those moments at times. I confess to buying some of my clothes in the junior sections of various retailers. It’s that parents and kids today are experiencing what youth expert Don Tapscott calls a “generation lap” in his book, Grown Up Digital.  This “overlap” is in part due to exposure to the technology, media and information available to kids that easily transcend generational lines.  In fact, in the digital medium, it’s kids who are the experts. “The implications are huge,” he writes. ”In some families, members have begun to respect each other as the authorities they actually are. This has created a more engaged dynamic within families. If managed well by the parents, this dynamic can create a more open, consensual and effective family unit.”  One good example of the convergence is how kids and parents alike appreciate songs by The Beatles. And, hey, didn’t American Idol have Bon Jovi perform last week as well?  (“They look as old as Dad,” was one remark). Or how about the resurgence of the Peace sign inspired by the 40^th anniversary of Woodstock that has infiltrated the fashion industry over the last year. (What comes around goes around?)

This lap is evident in our household.  Dad is a baby boomer, me (Mom) is Gen X, elder tween is Gen Y (a Millennial or Generation Net) and the youngest is Gen Z (also called Generation Next). That sort of covers a lot of ground.  When I heard my daughter crooning Journey’s big 80s hit, “Don’t Stop Believing” throughout the house for days on end, I just quietly giggled until it got unbearable. (I had to ask her to stop! That was a prom song in my high school days.) When you consider that the cast of Glee performed it on the season opener last year, what do you expect?

But here’s the thing about mothers and daughters today (or fathers and sons). It's not that moms are pining for their youthful days. Our daughters are enjoying and repurposing many of the same, classic cultural fodder we grew up with. I kind of like it. We don’t have to be “friends” or chum around – we can keep appropriate boundaries.  But we can also value certain styles and sentiments that make for a strong bond – and keep us youthful in spirit.

Mother’s Day: Ode to Lipstick

These days I’m on a quest to find my favorite lipstick, Clinique No. 83, Double Truffle.  I fear it has been discontinued after at least 12 years of using it.  I hold out hope that some Clinique counter may still have one or two left.  My daughters have experienced near sideswipes as I dart into various malls during treks to and from soccer’s fields.  “Mom. Jeez. Just find another color!” They have understood my attachment to Double Truffle for a while now.  In fact, I’ve been using it longer than their lifetimes.  I tell them lipstick is the only make up a girl ever really needs, because she can also dab a few fingerprints on her cheeks for blush.  It’s handy that way. Once you find that perfect color that suits all seasons and skin tones – especially in New England – well, it’s compulsive sort of connection.

My relationship to lipstick goes back to age 3. My mother, the Avon Lady, had hundreds of 2-inch samples pressed into a nifty brief case, much like color pencils snap into coloring kits. I’d tag along with her on her house calls, watching women gently draw lines – crimson, cherry, rose – on back heir hands and then appraise at arm’s length the subtleties of tone and sheen in the light of a kitchen window.  My mother, with her authoritarian German accent, would confidently suggest which color suited one’s complexion. “Ya, Marta. Zis is the one for you!’ 

All my baby dolls were smeared with lipstick stains over the years.  My friends and I would sneak samples to our forts and play dress up for hours. And while my mother wouldn’t allow us to wear a smidge of makeup in public until we were 16 (oh, the contradiction of it all!), we were well supplied with plenty of chap stick and flavored lip gloss over the years.

So when the NYT commentary on tweens and the rise in make-up use crossed my radar, I thought, this guy does not understand girls and the art of adornment. It’s genetic, man.

Douglas Quenqua comes to an odd conclusion based on a marketing study. The data revealed that from 2006 to 2008 there was a significant increase of girls, ages 8-12, who used make-up regularly. According to the report, the usage of eyeliner and mascara almost doubled (from roughly 10 to 18%) while lipstick use rose as well (from 10 to 15%). 

Quenqua suggests that the increase in make-up use is akin to the increase of other harmful substances among youth. OMG. Call in the make-up cops. 

I must quote him:  “The choice between prohibition and harm-reduction has long divided parents on prickly issues: forbid alcohol or supervise the inevitable kegger? Preach abstinence or buy condoms? Now, the struggle shows signs of coming to a new front: the cosmetics counter.”  

He also blames the mothers – the ones with the purse strings buying the stash. (But what else is new?) The report from the NPD group also showed that makeup use decreases in older teens and young women.  So how about this as an alternative interpretation:  Tween girls like to experiment with make-up. They may use too much now and then, but it makes them feel grown-up and in control while their bodies are morphing out of their control. Then later, as they understand cultural shifts like the green movement and natural beauty, or come into their own sort of acceptance about their looks and bodies and sense of style, they tend to use less of it. 

Take it from a Recovering Daughter of an Avon Lady.