Do You Have a "Nothing's Wrong" Teen?
Perhaps nothing's wrong or perhaps they're struggling.
Frost on the window pane reflected the morning sun, scattering a chaos of tiny sunbeams across the carpet. I stooped to water the snake plant when a green shoot with 2 rounded orbs caught my eye. That did not look right. I pinched the stem and pulled upward. Clinging dearly to the roots and flecked with soil was the shell of a striped sunflower seed. I frantically checked the other plants crammed by the patio door. As if a conductor had lifted her baton and violin bows followed suit, sunflowers were shooting skywards through all the plants. Uh-oh, Houston, we have a problem!
I was bothered to know our fortress had been breached but equally in awe of the fortitude of the tiny warriors. Each seed had been carried by mouse from bird feeders in the backyard to the front of the house, down the foundation wall, up through the sand crawl space, then across the family room floor to be squirreled away in the potting soil. All that effort left me with a twinge of guilt for plugging the holes to prevent their return.
I didn’t have guilt the year I watched our normally extroverted daughter, Mia, root herself to the sectional with the foster dogs. There was no space in my heart for anything but worry. Summer had come and gone without Mia hosting a single sleepover in the family room or a gaggle of girls for pizza in the screened porch. Fall came with no weekend movie nights and no giggling of girlfriends sneaking past closed doors.
During parent-teacher conferences, Joe and I were shown spreadsheets with rows for assignments and columns for grades and a host of empty boxes where there’d typically be an “A”. Failure was bubbling close to reality in almost every class. Most disturbing was the news that our kid who usually answered questions with questions to dig deeper with teachers had gone silent.
When Joe and I asked Mia to present her side of the story, we got the “nothing” response. “There’s nothing to talk about, Mom.” “There’s nothing wrong at school, Dad.” Our attempts to highlight her shortcomings as a means of motivation (great parenting, right?) were met with more nothing.
“I said nothing’s wrong and nothing’s what I mean,” she’d sigh. With face turned to the back cushion of the sectional, she’d pull the dogs closer and shut us out. Houston, we definitely have a problem!
Joe and I knew better. We’d been teenagers once before. The nothing and the silence were both loaded with a whole lot of something. We just didn’t know what. Nor did we know how to engage a despondent Mia.
What I did know was tension was rising between me and Joe. We couldn’t agree on what to do with Mia’s changing behavior. Joe was an equal partner in our “carrot and stick” model for parenting, but I began to worry about pushing Mia too hard, of eliminating the few things that still engaged her in the world. She’d always relished the attention paid to her by her friends’ mothers. Would she fall from our nest with resentment and run to a different mother for comfort?
Jealousy never looked good on me, but it was a powerful motivator. Not wanting another mother to rise to queen, I contacted our family physician for help. He conducted a thorough physical exam and led Mia through a short mental health questionnaire. He prescribed vitamin D supplements to address the lack in her system and negative impact on energy. He referred us to Dr. Bonnie.
Dr. Bonnie was a behavioral health specialist who focused on children’s mental health needs. She put Mia through a series of cognitive tests while conducting interviews with current and former teachers, coaches, and parents of friends. Joe and I completed surveys and interviews. During our final meeting, we sat in Dr. Bonnie’s office packed with fidget toys and cascading ivies to receive Mia’s diagnosis. She wasn’t lazy or apathetic. She was found to have anxiety and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), inattentive type.
Elation! We finally had an explanation for Mia’s forgetfulness, disengagement, distractibility, and procrastination. She had a neurodevelopment and mental health disorder, not a personal defect.
Deflation. While a diagnosis was welcome, anxiety and ADHD are not “take a pill” and you’re cured type challenges. Yes, medication was something we decided to try, but it was part of the solution, not THE solution. Like the mice who conquered our fortress, she was facing a journey of trial and error.
But Mia wouldn’t be facing that journey alone. The most productive pathway to help Mia thrive would be one with family support. For the first time in a long time, some of the worry in my heart was displaced by hope.
I love to read and research. Why not share what’s compelling with you?! (I am NOT paid to mention any of these resources. There are no affiliate links.)
1. What inattentive ADHD can look like. ADDitude Magazine does a great job of crafting complex science into information that is easily understandable. This article describes nine symptoms of inattentive ADHD and how it differs from hyperactive ADHD.
2. An Introduction to Teen Anxiety. If you’re concerned about your teen’s behavior, begin your research into teen anxiety with this article from Parenting Teens & Tweens. It lists common signs of anxiety, provides a few tools for caregiver and child to manage stress, and lists additional resources to help you move forward.
3. The joy of rescuing elderly dogs. Need to refill your heart? In the news reported in The Doggo Daily comes the story of a man who rescues elderly dogs, 11 in fact, giving them dignity and love in their twilight years.
4. Beautiful blue birds on a birdbath. I keep returning to Diane Porter’s photo of five roly poly birds perched on the icy edge of a heated birdbath. Is it their simplicity of expression, the stretched wings of one bird, or the brilliance of blue feathers against a rusty backdrop that captures my attention? Maybe I’m drawn to the image, as Diane puts it, simply because, “A bird drinking from a birdbath is flood of happiness.”
5. Close encounters in the woods. The world outside my window is a mess of melting snow, salt and sand. It was refreshing to read A curious tale of three birds by “Miscellaneous Adventures Digest” and to enjoy frosty images from a real winter somewhere else.
In a world that often seems chaotic and daunting, there are many people doing good things. I celebrate them here.
Bison are a “keystone” species for prairies and grasslands and the plants and animals that evolved with the movement of the great herds. They remain an integral component of restoring and preserving the most endangered ecosystem on earth. They are also a cultural and ecological keystone for Indigenous Peoples. The work of the InterTribal Buffalo Council (ITBC) and Native Nations partners to restore buffalo to native lands and connection to community is highlighted in this short documentary, Buffalo Homecoming.
Before you go, here are a few more stories readers have enjoyed.