Parents have been advised to be good role model and ensure that their children are fully aware that they love them. This was stated by eminent psychiatrist Dr Sa'ad B. Malik while delivering a lecture on "Dealing With Teenagers In Today's World" at the Anarkali lounge of the Sukh Cha'n Wellness Club in Gulberg.
Women health care specialist Dr Noreen Zafar also spoke on the occasion. He said that perhaps the parents would enjoy their children more if they stopped to realise the childhood film can never run through for a second showing.
The well-known psychiatrist while listing the possible sources of stress among the teenagers and the usual areas of conflict between parents and adolescents said "We spend the first half of our lives trying to understand the older generation, and the second half trying to understand the younger generation".
According to him, possible sources of stress among the teenagers could be school pressure, parental hassles, peer pressure, boredom, acne/physical appearance, menstruation, money problems, sexual arousal, spiritual and religious among others.
He said the usual areas of conflict between parents and adolescents are parental authority, personal hygiene and dress, curfew like timings what time to be home, choice of friends, chores, homework, room tidiness, practice of religion, relationship with other family members as the important ones.
Continuing, Dr Sa'ad Malik said that tension between the parents and teenaged children at time could also arise due to negative approach while talking to them. He advised the parents to learn how to argue with their children and went on to point out that they should be brief and specific, avoid accusations and insults as well as dubbing them with some labels, use appropriate language avoiding 'always' and 'never' and try to state things positively to the maximum extent possible.
Elaborating all these points with the help of slides, he concluded saying that parents should be good role model, alter their pattern of communication, watch for their own emotional problems, be consistent in their approach, ensure their children know they love them, given their children the attention they deserve, ensure they criticise the act and not the child, learn how to argue, stop expecting perfection and avoid drawing ill-advisable comparisons between them and their children.
Earlier, women health care specialist Dr Noreen Zafar while delivering the lecture on the same subject with the help of charts and slides dealt with different aspects such as adolescence puberty, teenaged eating habits, changing body pattern, feeling fresh myths, emotional changes, abuse of teenagers, sex education and exposure, sexual violence.
She asked the parents to be open to their teenaged children, talk to them quite often and try to understand and appreciate their problems. Afterwards, audience members asked some pertinent questions to which Dr Sa'ad B. Malik and Dr Noreen Zafar responded in a satisfactory manner. Later hostess Ms Nina Akbar thanked the guests.