Between Leading and Letting Go: Tips for Raising Teenagers

Do you want to grow as a parent as your teenager becomes an adult? The personal stories, insightful perspectives, and practical tools in this book will help you maintain and strengthen your relationship with your developing child, and teach you more about your own role.

Adolescence is a turbulent, and sometimes incredibly challenging, time—not just for teenagers, but for their parents too. As young people become more independent, parents often lose touch. Misunderstandings, arguments, and silences accumulate, and the teenager is often blamed. But what we often overlook is that these clashes may reflect and trigger unresolved experiences from the parents' own youth.

In Between Leading and Letting Go, Meloy and Jacob show how raising teenagers is inextricably linked to self-awareness and emotional maturity. They share their own experiences and those of other parents, connecting them to insights drawn from research. This book offers support, understanding, and practical tools for navigating everyday and challenging situations: as a teenager who is withdrawn, lies, fears failure, struggles with sexuality, or experiences depression. The question arises repeatedly: how can you reconnect, create a safe space, and maintain a solid foundation? And how can a rebellious or defiant teenager offer insight into your own past pains? Each chapter concludes with an exercise that helps you recognize and break patterns from your own youth. In this way, you not only grow in understanding your teenager, but also in understanding yourself!