HOW TO MANAGE THE ANXIETY OF PARENTING TEENS: 4 STEPS TO LET GO WITHOUT LOSING CONTROL | EP. 163
How to manage the anxiety of parenting teens. Four steps to feel more in control, even when you're not.
Welcome to the Almost Empty Nest Podcast, where we moms of teens and college kids reframe what letting go really means to feel more connected, confident, and at peace. I'm your host, Master Coach Jennifer Collins.
If you've ever felt overwhelmed by anxiety about your teen, lying awake at night, replaying conversations, imagining worst case scenarios, you are so not alone. In this episode, I'm sharing four mindset shifts that will completely change how you respond to anxiety as a mom.
You'll learn how to slow down and interrupt the worst case scenario spiral, and how to shift from reacting out of fear to responding with clarity. This conversation will also teach you how to reconnect to that version of you who leads with trust and love, even when things feel uncertain. If you feel powerless over your anxiety, this episode will help you take your power back, without needing anything about your teen to change.
Hello, my friend. I wonder if you can relate to this. I'm guessing that you can. I have to say that I have never in my life experienced anxiety as overwhelming and all-consuming as the anxiety I experience with my boys. I mean, I've faced plenty of stressful moments in my life. I've presented huge presentations in front of hundreds of people.
I've had to fire people. My family has faced serious health challenges. I've been through breakups and fights with friends, and even really stressful times when I haven't had money.
It's not at all that the other areas of my life haven't been stressful. But somehow, none of that stress has ever reached the level of anxiety I felt when something's going wrong with one of my boys. There's something different about the kind of anxiety that feels like it takes over your body when your child is struggling or in danger, or even when you just think they might be struggling or in danger.
It's like your nervous system goes into crisis mode. Your heart is racing, your chest is tight, it feels hard to breathe. It's bad enough when it happens during the day, but then you find yourself lying awake at night imagining those worst-case scenarios.
Why do our minds do that? I think of it like a churning, replaying those terrible moments over and over again. Kind of like you're in one of those CSI shows and you're replaying hours of video footage, trying to find that one moment that solves the case, that makes everything okay. No matter how much you tell yourself to calm down in those moments, it can feel impossible.
You can't just let it go. This is your child, their safety, their happiness, their life. Look, in these moments, your brain isn't just responding passively to whatever's going on with your kid.
It's actually going on high alert to solve a problem. Your mind thinks that anxiety is the only thing keeping you and your child from absolute disaster. That if you let your guard down, even for a second, that something terrible might happen, and it really will be your fault.
Imagine the weight of this for a moment. Something terrible happening and then thinking, I could have prevented this. I should have seen the signs.
I shouldn't have allowed that. This fear isn't deep when it comes to our kids. So it's like vigilance is our last line of defense.
So of course, we stay anxious. Of course, we keep scanning our kids for signs of possible danger, replaying those conversations again and again, trying to avoid those worst case scenarios. Just think for a minute about how long that list of possible worries is.
We worry about our kids' physical safety. Are they being careful when they drive? Are they drinking or using drugs? We also worry about our kids' mental and emotional health. Are they lonely or depressed? Are they struggling and just not opening up to me about it? Then we worry about our kids' social lives.
Do they have close friends? Are they being included? If they're dating, are they in a healthy relationship? Are they using protection? Then there's academic stress and what they're going to do with the rest of their lives. Are they ever going to be able to do this on their own without me reminding them? So maybe now that we're in the middle of summer, we're seeing less of this academic stress, but we're also spending more time with our kids. And so we might be seeing a lot of less than optimal habits.
Then we start asking ourselves, will they ever be capable of being productive on their own? Am I allowing them to develop these bad habits? On top of all of this, we worry about the relationship they have with us. We see them becoming distant or not opening up to us as much as they used to. We start worrying about how to approach them.
And it definitely doesn't feel good when our kids actually seem to push us away. This is a lot to worry about, my friend. And for each of our kids, we're worrying about all of it in different ways.
Just take a moment to appreciate the weight of all of that, the worries that you carry for your kids. It's truly no wonder that we feel anxious. On top of all of this, as our kids grow up, we start to feel this sense of powerlessness.
Like we're worried about all these things, but are also starting to realize we have almost no power to avert all of these possible dangers. I mean, I've had some moments of sheer terror with my boys. We've rushed to the emergency room.
There was one time where I thought I lost my son while he was traveling alone in Europe. And there have been many times where I've worried about my youngest son's diabetes. There were also those moments when I feared the total loss of my relationship with my oldest.
The truth is, when I look back, those situations were real. They weren't just stories I made up in my head. They weren't overreactions.
I don't look back and think, oh, I shouldn't have gotten so worried. There was nothing to worry about. If anything, my son came home from Europe and told me I probably shouldn't have let him go.
But of course, there have also been those times too when I grossly overreacted or felt anxious about something that ended up working out just fine. But that's what happens, right? Some of the fears we fear never happen. But then there are other times when the worst case scenario does happen.
And then you have to learn to live with it. So when I talk about anxiety, I'm not just talking about the imagined problems or exaggerated fears. I'm talking about real life, life-altering things.
Our kids' physical health, mental well-being, their sense of belonging and connection, their ability to function in the world, and the strength of our relationship with them. These aren't little things. They're not nice-to-haves.
This is everything. And yet we realize increasingly as our kids grow up that these mission-critical desires we have for our kids are no longer in our control. I remember there was one situation that really made me come to grips with this when my youngest was still pretty young.
He's the one with diabetes and he decided to spend a summer at a program in Eleuthera, Bahamas for six weeks. It was the first time he was going to be responsible for managing his diabetes entirely on his own. I should say that at the time, he was already pretty independent when it came to his own care during the day.
He knew how to change his insulin pump and set his continuous glucose monitor and he had no problem giving himself shots if there was an issue with his equipment. But what he wasn't entirely independent doing was waking up in the middle of the night to treat a blood sugar high or low. That had been my job since he was diagnosed at three years old.
Thankfully, as technologies to manage diabetes have improved over the years, we now get alerts on our phone if there's any issue. And this is life-saving when it comes to a blood sugar low that happens in the middle of the night. The problem was that at the time, my son was and actually had always been a very deep sleeper.
So at the time he was headed off to the Bahamas, he actually never woke up on his own to these alarms. And of course it was never a problem as long as I was there to wake him up and bring him juice. But it happened pretty regularly.
I wanna say I was in his room doing something to correct his blood sugar at least three nights a week. And the danger of a critically low blood sugar is very serious. So here I was sending him away for six weeks and I had to trust that he was going to figure it out on his own.
To top it all off, I'd been told that cell service on this island was almost non-existent and that even the wifi was iffy. So it was highly likely that I would have no information about his blood sugar levels throughout the night. And even if I did, it wasn't clear how I was going to get ahold of someone to go take care of him.
As I tell this story, I'm actually in a bit of shock that I let him go. But then I was going to have to let go and trust him sometime, right? I remember still so clearly that drive to the airport. I remember just taking him in throughout the drive.
And then I remember standing at the airport hugging him goodbye and then waiting out on a balcony outside of TSA until that very last minute when he cleared security and he waved goodbye from across the terminal and then he walked out of sight. It felt like my heart was going with him. I honestly had the thought that I might not ever see him again.
I was so scared and I felt irresponsible. How could I have let him do this? But at that point it was done and I was left with a choice. I could either spend the next six weeks gripped in panic or I could try to figure out how to trust and let go.
For a long time in my life, I thought the only way to get rid of anxiety was to solve it, to fix the problem or control of risk. When it came to my kids, that meant to do whatever I had to do to protect them and keep them safe. But as my boys grew up, I realized that this strategy wasn't working anymore.
Because no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't control the circumstances they faced. I couldn't guarantee their safety. I couldn't make sure they made the right choices.
I definitely couldn't protect them from pain. And so in those moments of anxiety, even when I did try to do something, it was never enough to get rid of the anxiety entirely. Because I always knew there were things that were just out of my control.
I was actually just recently having this conversation with a client as we were talking through her anxiety over a situation with her son. I asked her, if you could look into the future and know that this all turns out okay, would that make you feel better now? And she said, yes, I feel like I would feel better knowing that. But of course, the truth is that you can never really know that.
And so our brains create these worst case scenarios so that we can try to find a way to avoid them. It's honestly our brain's way of trying to be helpful. But then we get stuck in the cycle of fear that we can't break free from.
What I've come to understand, and this is really the heart of what I want to share with you today, is that anxiety isn't something to solve. It's something to get curious about. Look, on one level, anxiety is truly your brain and body's way of protecting you.
We often refer to it as going into fight or flight, and that's truly what anxiety is. Your brain senses something uncertain or potentially dangerous, and it triggers your body to get ready to respond. This process is truly automatic.
You release adrenaline and cortisol, and your heart starts to race, your muscles tense. Essentially, your body is literally getting you ready to do something to keep you safe. And think about it.
If you were truly in danger, this is an invaluable automatic response. The challenge is we're no longer living in an environment where we're constantly facing real imminent danger, and yet our bodies are still designed this way. And so now that the dangers we're facing with our kids are potentially very real, but also not entirely in our control, or even something that if we could control it, that it's a matter of just fixing one thing.
Because these issues are often complicated. We're worried about their future, their choices, that we're not in a position to change or even be in the room with when they make them. We're talking about their well-being and our connection with them.
We can't just solve these problems by fighting or running away. But ultimately, our brain is responding in that same way it's biologically designed to respond. And that's true whether the danger in front of us is real, imagined, or even completely out of our control.
All this to say, it's no wonder we can feel like we're living in this constant state of anxiety, always on high alert, feeling like we have to be on just in case. But at the same time, we can't change our biological wiring. This is just how our bodies respond to danger, any danger, even perceived or emotional danger.
So if we can't change our bodies, and we often can't change or control the circumstances triggering our anxiety, this is where many of us get stuck. Because the worry doesn't feel optional. You can't just tell yourself to calm down.
So today I want to offer you a new way to relate to your anxiety. One that starts with understanding what it is and then gives you some practical tools to respond to that anxiety. This isn't about totally getting rid of that feeling.
It's about changing how you experience it and respond to it. So let's get into it. I'm going to offer you four steps to help you relate to anxiety differently in those moments when you're feeling triggered.
The first step is simple, and that's just to name the emotion. Do it the moment you start to feel those physical signs of anxiety. For me, it's always when my chest feels tight.
I notice it's hard to take a breath. I often notice that I'm totally distracted or restless. Your heart might start pounding, or you might feel like you have a pit in your stomach.
You probably know exactly what anxiety feels like for you. We all have our own version of what it feels like in our body. Maybe it could be a lump in your throat, or your face could feel flushed.
Maybe your ears start ringing. Take a moment to reflect on what those physical sensations are for you and recognize that this is just a physical vibration of anxiety, a series of sensations in your body. This is simply how your body responds to that emotion.
This is something you can practice. The moment that anxiety comes on, you feel those physical sensations, then just say to yourself, this is anxiety. This is what it feels like in my body.
First, just acknowledge it. And when you do this, you create this small space between you and the feeling. It gives you just a little bit of space to acknowledge that you're just experiencing an emotion that is a normal human reaction.
The second step is to make space for this emotion. Now, this is something we don't do because the moment we feel anxiety coming on, almost before you've recognized or even experiencing this feeling, you're responding to the instinct to do something. And of course, this is by design.
Our body is raring to go to keep us safe. So without creating a pause here, we're typically already halfway toward going to try to fix whatever triggered that anxiety. And look, if fixing the feeling is a matter of putting out a fire or getting out of the way of oncoming traffic, by all means do that.
But when the danger is related to something going on with your kid or some fear about something that might happen in the future, then doing something looks more like replaying the situation in your mind or spiraling down the worst case scenario, nagging or reminding your kid one more time, basically doing anything you can to try to get rid of that feeling. And look, I get it. This feels like it's so automatic, but that's why with these steps, we're practicing slowing down.
What if in this moment, after you recognize that you're experiencing anxiety, you could just stop and make space for it? What if you trusted that that feeling of anxiety, those sensations in your body, that they're not dangerous or painful, maybe just uncomfortable? Because here's the part our brains get wrong. Our brains interpret the discomfort of this emotion as danger. It's like it interprets these physical sensations as proof that there's something wrong, so you have to fix it.
But in fact, those physical sensations of anxiety, the tight chest and the shallow breathing, they aren't actually hurting you. These are all just your body's way of trying to respond to something it doesn't know how to control. Here's what happens.
The more you fight against it, the more you panic about your panic, the worse it gets. So what if instead, you could just acknowledge that this is a feeling, an emotion that won't last forever, and make space for it? Instead of rushing to fix it or giving in to that urge to react, just stop, make space, close your eyes, slow down your breathing. You can even take a moment to scan your body and observe what's physically happening in my body right now.
Acknowledge that you're not in pain, just uncomfortable, sometimes not even that. As you pause, keep directing your attention inward to what's happening physically to you rather than what's happening out there that triggered your emotions. What's happening is you're not currently in danger.
There might be something that you can do about the circumstances in front of you, but give yourself space to regulate your emotions first, to calm down so you can see the situation more clearly. Taking this pause gives you the peace of mind to respond to the situation from a place of strength and clarity, rather than panic, which is ultimately going to be more effective no matter what's happening. So the first step I talked about is to notice.
The minute you start to sense those familiar physical signs of anxiety, just stop and say, this is anxiety. The second step is to make space for that emotion. You could even put a hand on your heart or on your belly and just say to yourself, this is anxiety.
This is what it feels like in my body. I am safe. I am okay.
Sounds simple, but this is a powerful form of emotional regulation. You're telling your nervous system, you're okay. We don't need to fight.
What's amazing is how the anxiety often passes so much more quickly than you expect, especially when you stop fighting it. But the problem is most of us are so used to fighting against or resisting the feeling. We try to push it down or problem solve our way out of it, but that keeps us in a heightened and continued state of fight or flight.
And then when we experience those prolonged periods of anxiety, then we start to fear the anxiety itself. You feel like I don't want this. I can't live like this.
So then you experience fear on top of fear. And now we're not just anxious about the situation. We're anxious about being anxious.
My friend, this is truly a practice. But over time, as you learn to make space for the emotion of anxiety without judgment, without immediately trying to fix it, the intensity of the feeling begins to soften. It's not like you'll never experience anxiety again.
But what happens is that the feeling loses its grip on you. It starts to feel like less of an emergency and more of a natural reaction your body has that you can find compassion for, almost like having a cold or experiencing allergies. Okay, so now you've created space.
You've given yourself a moment to regulate the physical sensations of anxiety. Maybe they haven't gone away entirely, but you've created just a bit of space to be able to breathe. And then we turn our attention to the next step.
And that is to take a look at what your brain is telling you about the situation in front of you. So again, this is why this pause, slowing things down, is so important. Because what we typically do is we feel the fight or flight response kick in.
And then we're already halfway down the path of reacting. We're texting, we're lecturing, we're fixing, we're trying to control the situation so the anxiety will go away. But we haven't even stopped to ask ourselves, what am I really afraid of here? And look, very often the fears we have are coming from a very rational place.
As I mentioned in the beginning, we have so many legitimate reasons to worry. Our kids' physical and mental health, their safety, their choices, their future. These aren't small things.
They're actually what matter most to us in this world. The goal here isn't to dismiss your fear or gaslight yourself into thinking you're overreacting. It's to remind yourself that even when the fear makes sense, you still have a choice in how you respond to it.
In fact, there are sometimes the facts of the situation are real and serious. We're not making this stuff up. Maybe your child is struggling with their mental health or they're making decisions that are truly risky and dangerous.
You're not going to pretend that everything's fine or give up and do nothing. But my friend, even when your fear is perfectly valid, panic and the need to control are never the most effective emotions to take action from. Okay, so this step is about asking, what am I really afraid of here? What you find when exploring this step is that while we often have very real and valid fears, our minds are also creating an alternate reality of what the circumstances in front of us mean.
Sometimes this looks like spinning in worst case scenarios that have an incredibly small chance of actually happening. Other times, it looks like attaching a lot of meaning to one moment, like deciding that one failed class means your teen doesn't care about their future, or that their silence means that your relationship is broken. Our brains spin in these mindset traps, and I've been covering all of them in the Mindset Traps of the Emptiness series recently.
Catastrophizing, all or nothing thinking, perfectionism. Our minds do this because they're trying to keep us safe, trying to make sense of uncertainty. But more often than not, what our minds come up with isn't the truth.
It's essentially a perspective based in fear. And when you don't slow down enough to recognize this, you react as if the worst case scenario is already happening. This step, understanding the story your brain is spinning, doesn't mean your fear isn't valid.
It just helps you see whether the narrative you're running in your head is actually serving you, whether it's helping you show up the way you want to, or spiraling you deeper into anxiety. So, so far we've talked about step one, name the feeling. Step two, make space for that emotion.
And this third step is to step back and ask, what is the story I'm believing right now? And is it helping me or hurting me? This step opens the door to help you consider the difference between what it looks like to parent from fear versus intention. And this brings us to step four, and that is to decide how you want to show up. So now you've created a space for your anxiety without resisting or fighting against it.
And you've taken an honest and calm look at the story your mind is spinning, understanding what you're really afraid of, and maybe bringing some awareness to where there's real danger and where there's simply a story about future danger that you want to avoid. The next question you get to ask is, now that I understand this, who do I want to be in this moment? How do I want to respond with intention? Look, you already know that anxiety makes you react in ways that don't feel great. They're almost never as effective as you'd want them to be.
You say or do things that you regret. After you yell or nag or try without success to control your kids' choices, you feel terrible. You might even notice this type of reaction can push your teen further away.
The bottom line is that reacting to anxiety doesn't necessarily do anything to fix the situation, but it often leaves you feeling more powerless and anxious. My friend, if this resonates, it's not because there's something wrong with you. It's simply because you're reacting to your fears, believing that they are true, and that if you don't do something, they will come true.
And my friend, we all do this. I know I have done this a lot in the past, but with these tools, you can start practicing a different set of habits around your response to anxiety. The question, who do I want to be here, is so powerful.
And here's what I've noticed. When I'm talking to my clients and they're typically, when we're talking, not in a triggered space as we're having our conversation, and then I ask them this question, they're feeling calm and reflective, and I ask, how do you ideally want to show up in this situation? They almost always answer with a very reasonable strategy that comes from love. They want to be patient, compassionate.
They want to set boundaries, but calmly, not from a place of panic. They want to listen. They want to guide their kid, but not from a place of control.
They ultimately want to learn to trust their teen and give them the space to learn and grow, to be that independent, trustworthy, responsible person we all want our kids to grow into. This is what they want. I'm guessing it's also what you want.
And in your heart, this is the kind of mom you already are. Look, it's actually pretty easy for all of us to be this version of ourselves when we're calm and feeling in control. When we're not triggered by situations where we feel afraid and powerless.
So the question is, how can you learn to tap into that wise, calm, and loving version of yourself, even in the face of fear and uncertainty? This is a skill you can master, my friend. Learning how to act from that wise, powerful, calm version of yourself, even when you feel anxious. We can't ultimately control what our kids do or the choices that they make when we're not around.
But you can decide how you want to show up for your team in any situation, no matter what they do. This, my friend, is where your power is. Not in controlling your team, or even in controlling your body's physical response to situations you don't want, but in learning how to understand how to tap into that highest version of yourself, no matter what.
What I've seen so many times in my life is that when I'm able to connect to that version of myself who is calm, patient, and trusting, loving my boys and myself unconditionally, to be honest, the answer of what to do is almost always obvious to me. Sometimes that means setting a boundary and letting my boys feel what they need to feel about it. Sometimes it's saying that hard thing I think they need to hear, even if they don't want to hear it.
It might also mean just giving them space, as much as I want to step in and try to make them talk. Or I might be willing to let them be angry and have big emotions and not feel the need to tell them they're wrong. I might be willing to just let them feel those emotions and be a safe space for that.
Sometimes all I have to do is anchor to who I want to be. And these days, more often than not, the action I choose to take is simply to do nothing, to just love and trust and know that I have my boys back if they need me. This step isn't about being passive or doing nothing, but it is about choosing to take action from love and clarity rather than fear and panic.
This is truly a practice, but one that will empower you to build real trust in yourself. That day, years ago, when I dropped my son off at the airport as he headed to the Bahamas, I was very aware of all of the reasons why it made sense I was anxious. And yet I also knew in that moment that I had a choice.
I could spend the next six weeks spiraling in anxiety, calling every day, trying to check in, reminding my son through text or email that I hoped he would get to take care of his blood sugar, nagging everyone in the program to remind them what was at stake. Or I could practice everything I just shared with you. And I did, over and over again.
I named the anxiety when it showed up, sometimes multiple times a day. And I gave myself permission to just sit with it instead of racing to try to fix it or call someone or to distract myself to make it go away. I noticed all the stories my brain wanted to offer me about worst case scenarios, whether I was being irresponsible for letting him go.
And I separated those stories from what I actually knew to be true. Then I asked myself, who do I want to be right now? I knew I didn't want to be a frantic, panicked mom who regretted her decision to trust her son to be responsible. Instead, I wanted to be the mom who believes in her son's potential to be fully responsible for his care, even in the middle of the night.
I also wanted to believe in the boys who were in the bunk room with him and the medical team on staff who also didn't want anything to happen to my son. Frankly, I just wanted to love and be proud of my son and spend more time thinking about the incredible adventure he was on than about all of those worst case scenarios in my head. Was I perfectly calm the whole time? I was not.
The anxiety would still crop up, but it didn't take over. And this wasn't because the circumstances changed. In fact, I heard very little from my son when he was on that trip.
But although the circumstances didn't change, I did. And the added benefit was, so did my son. Do you know that to this day, since that trip, I have almost never had to wake up my son? And actually, even the few times when I've woken up and gone to his room, I've walked in and he said, Mom, I'm on it.
This is actually what we want for our kids. But sometimes that requires us to let go of the stranglehold of anxiety so that we can give them enough space to prove that they can. My friend, this is available to you too.
If through this conversation, you're realizing how often anxiety drives you to show up as a mom in ways that you don't always want, I want to invite you to take this work deeper with me inside of Mom 2.0. Through this program I teach you a simple, but proven process to empower you to stop reacting from fear, and start creating the power to be that wise, calm, confident mom you already know you can be.
Imagine showing up to the uncertainty of raising your teen being 100% CERTAIN and trusting of yourself and your ability to navigate whatever comes. There’s a link to book a free call with me in the show notes. We can talk about exactly how this program will help you with your specific goals and challenges.
Before I close, let me quickly recap the four shifts I shared today. One, name the emotion. When those sensations come up, simply say, “this is anxiety”.
Two, make space for the emotion. Instead of fighting or resisting, let it simply be there. A series of physical sensations that don’t hurt you.
Three, observe the story you’re telling yourself about the circumstances in front of you. Notice how this story is simply one interpretation of what might be true or what could be possible.
Decide how you want to show up. Even when you feel anxious, you still get to choose how you respond.
My friend, anxiety doesn’t mean you’re doing something wrong or that there’s something wrong with you. It is simply a biological reaction that we often let spiral into something even worse, because we don’t take the time to question the narrative running through our heads.
When this happens, I invite you to notice it, breathe through it, and still choose how you want to show up to the situation. This is what it means to take your power back. Not by controlling what happens, but by owning how you meet whatever comes.
Thanks for being with me, my friend. See you next time.
If you enjoyed this episode, I'd love for you to check out my next free masterclass. There's a link in the show notes. You have more power than you think, my friend.
