Helping Teens Transition After The Pandemic

1. Start Small

For many teens, making the jump back into the full swing of school, activities, and friends feels overwhelming after having so much time at home. Help ease them back into being around others by suggesting they try hanging out with just one or two friends to help decrease avoidance and start to feel comfortable again.

Being nervous to jump back into social situations is to be expected right now, if your teen is avoiding social situations altogether, it could be a good time to check in and see if they’re experiencing social anxiety.

Social anxiety affects over 15 million people in the US alone, asking your teen if they’re experiencing symptoms of it and letting them know there’s help for social anxiety (such as exposure therapy) can help them get back into being around others.

2. Validate and Encourage

If your teen is feeling uneasy about change or nervous about getting sick, validate that these are difficult and it makes sense they're nervous.

Then, let them know you're there to support them while encouraging them to transition back into their normal everyday tasks and activities.

Validating your teen’s nervousness won’t make it worse, you can both validate how they feel and help them move forward at the same time.

3. Encourage Flexible Thinking

When certain rules are put in place as with the pandemic, it can be hard for anyone to move into more flexible thinking once the rules have changed.

Help your teen by encouraging more flexible thinking while also helping them set realistic expectations.

Here are some ways you can encourage flexible thinking:

-Offer an alternative perspective (offer other views so they can see there are multiple ways of seeing things)

-Encourage changing one aspect of your teen’s day or routine

-Introduce surprises

-Use humor

-Explain in detail what is happening

-Use a family calendar so they can see ahead and prepare for any changes

4. Help Create New Routines

For many teens during the height of the pandemic, routines were hard to establish and days felt indistinguishable from the last.

They may have developed new ways of scheduling out their days that just aren’t going to work anymore with transitioning to their new schedule.

Help your teen by encouraging new daily routines to get them back into a busier lifestyle. Help create morning and nighttime routines and brainstorm what they could do for breaks and homework/work time. Encourage them to do these around the same time each day to create new rhythms.

Some break ideas could be:

-Getting outside and/or walking around the block after finishing an assignment

-Cooking a meal with you during the day

-Taking a creative break and drawing

-Listening to their favorite song after finishing up their work

Notice when your teen is sticking to parts of their routine and affirm the follow-through.

5. Resiliency

The good news is, teens are resilient and although times are tough, supporting your teen in this time can help them make it through.

If you notice your teen is exhibiting prolonged or excessive worry and/or behavior changes it could be a good time to get in touch with a teen counselor.

Our two new counselors Leah and Braegen both specialize in working with teens and are taking on new clients.

Plug in what you're looking for and get matched with the therapist that works best for you!