5 Tools to Reduce Conflict With Your Teen
Are you tired of having the same arguments again and again with your teen?
Maybe you’re sick of walking on eggshells because they flip out every time you bring something up. Or they’re always saying they don’t want to talk about it or to leave them alone.
Thankfully this negative cycle can be interrupted and changed for the better! If you’re looking for ways to improve communication with your teen, you’re in the right place.
Let’s dive into some helpful tools that will not only help reduce unnecessary conflict, but are foundational for creating an environment where it’s easy to talk about difficult stuff.
Your Brain On Conflict
Conflict is inevitable, but in order to be productive, you have to be in the right head space to get anywhere.
To keep things brief and not too science-y, I’ll give you a basic rundown of what happens when you feel threatened (which is when you get angry, defensive, or panic) and how that affects conflict.
Humans have a downstairs brain and an upstairs brain.
The downstairs brain is primitive and controls basic functions like breathing, emotions, and our threat system (fight-flight-freeze)
The upstairs brain controls thinking, planning, and higher functioning. It’s where we make decisions and use our imagination
The upstairs brain isn’t fully formed until you’re in our 20’s. So remember: your teen’s upstairs brain is not yet fully developed.
That upstairs brain is built on top of the downstairs portion, covering it like a lid. When you’re overstimulated or threatened, that downstairs threat system hijacks your brain and you can lose access to your upstairs brain.
We call this flipping your lid.
When your lid flips, you temporarily lose access to higher thinking capabilities. You’ve probably experienced this as getting so angry you said something you didn’t mean. Or maybe your teen had a complete meltdown and acted like a toddler. That was their lid flipping!
Why does your brain work this way?
Imagine your ancestor is roaming the plains and suddenly a tiger appears in their peripheral. They don’t have time to consider their options!
Their threat system has already engaged, bypassing reasoning and critical thinking, and they’ve now entered fight-flight-freeze mode.
Their body is poised for action before their brain even realizes it. This is what kept them alive, so it’s a pretty important mechanism.
Unfortunately for us, your brain doesn’t know the difference between a physical threat and an emotional threat (Ex: my parents are mad at me, I’m going to get in trouble, I’m going to fail this class). That threat system will engage and without the necessary tools, higher thinking gets cut off.
So consider that your teen is likely having a fight-flight-freeze response whenever you’re arguing or upset.
How to Stay calm during a Fight
The first step is awareness.
It’s really important to notice when your kid’s lid has flipped and when yours is about to flip as well. Once someone’s lid has flipped, conflict becomes unhelpful and fruitless.
It’s like trying to reason with a toddler throwing a tantrum.
You can’t tell a toddler to calm down and expect them to think rationally because it’s not possible. You’d need to help them calm down first by making soothing sounds and using soothing touch before engaging them rationally.
Here are some tools to help your brain calm down during conflict.
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Tool #1: Nervous system reset
If your kid is upset and essentially throwing a tantrum, they’ll need to calm down first before they’ll be able to hear you. That fight-flight-freeze reaction has already hijacked their upstairs brain and cut off their ability to reason.
Help them calm down through deep belly breathing (breathing from your diaphragm), soothing touch, or playing music (or nature sounds).
Soothing breathing, touch, and sounds are like a nervous system reset. It lets your threat system know that everything is OK and to stand down. Once they’re calm, their upstairs brain will come back online.
While it’s important to set limits around behavior that’s not OK, there’s no use in doing it while they’re upset. This is because they can’t fully absorb what you’re saying.
Once their upstairs brain is back online, that’s when you can set limits around inappropriate behavior like slamming doors, throwing things, or making threats. Doing it before they’re calm won’t help them change their behavior.
Tool #2: Name it to tame it
If your lid is going to flip, begin to acknowledge what’s going on for you. When you say out loud what you’re experiencing, you engage the upstairs part of your brain to help keep it online.
We call this: Name it to Tame it.
It’s a really simple way to prevent yourself from going over the edge. Try saying something as simple as, “Wow, I’m starting to feel agitated” or “I’m noticing I’m about to flip my lid.”
Try to avoid statements like, “You’re making me feel agitated” or “You need to stop because I’m getting agitated” because this can come off as criticism and engage your teen’s threat system.
You also want to model taking responsibility for your own internal state.
Although they may be doing something that agitates you, it’s best to keep any statements simple and focused on how you’re feeling. This will keep the focus on yourself so that you can remain calm and engaged.
You can also encourage your teen to say out loud what they’re experiencing to keep their upstairs brain online.
Know when to walk away and regroup
If you notice you’re about to lose it or really can’t hear what your kid is saying, try saying something like, “I really want to hear what you’re saying, so I’ll need a few minutes. I’m going to take a quick walk or a deep breath and then come back and talk to you.”
Just like your kid can’t be reasoned with when their lid is flipped, you can’t think clearly when yours is flipped.
Take a few deep breaths to calm down so you can come back and have a reasonable discussion. This is also a really awesome way to model healthy coping skills.
Try this the next time you’re angry, frustrated, anxious, or even sad. Taking a few breaths and grounding yourself is the best way to ensure you remain productive, even if you feel upset.
Related: How To Calm Down When You’re Anxious
Tool #3: Validation to reduce conflict
Validation is one of my favorite tools! It’s a great way to foster connection and one of the best ways to reduce unnecessary conflict with your teen.
Validation is the recognition of someone else’s feelings. That’s it!
There are a few things that validation isn’t:
It does not mean you agree with or approve
It does not mean you give up or are resigned
It’s purely an expression of understanding and it’s the best way to help kids feel heard and understood. You don’t have to agree with your kid – in fact, you can silently think they’re being ridiculous! But outwardly, try to hear and understand why they might be feeling a certain way, even if it doesn’t make sense to you.
You can validate their emotions without agreeing with them or condoning any unhelpful or dangerous behavior.
Imagine you’re feeling disappointed about something and you tell a loved one. Which response would you rather receive?
“That’s ridiculous! There’s no need to feel disappointed.”
“Wow, I’m sorry to hear you feel disappointed! It’s hard to feel that way.”
The first is invalidating and leaves the door wide open for defensiveness and unproductive conflict. The second response validates the feeling without even agreeing with it!
How validation reduces conflict
This is a helpful tool when communicating with your teen because it can promote a sense of working together, rather than against each other.
Whenever we enter conflict, we want to try to get on the same side because that’s how we find a mutually beneficial solution. That won’t happen when you’re just butting heads or remaining on opposite sides of a problem.
The next time you interact with your teen (whether positively or negatively), take a guess as to how they’re feeling and reflect it back to them.
Validating Examples:
Kid: “This sucks! You’re so unfair!”
Parent: “I can see how upset you are and that this feels unfair. Let’s take a couple deep breaths and come back to talk about it.”
Kid: “I’ll never understand this, it’s hopeless!”
Parent: “It sounds like you’re really frustrated you don’t understand this assignment. It’s hard to feel like you’ll never get it.”
Validating Don’ts
When you’re trying to validate your kid, don’t do the following:
Follow your validation with a “but” or “however” since this cancels it out. Let your validation stand on its own.
Don’t personalize! Sometimes parents will try to validate by sharing a story from their own life or relating the teen’s experience to their own. This can actually be invalidating. Keep the focus on your kid.
Don’t redirect bad behavior just yet! Connect with them through validation first, then redirect bad behavior when they’re calm.
Remember that kids are more open to influence when they feel heard and understood. They won’t hear anything after being invalidated.
Whenever you don’t know what to do, try validating how they feel! Try to validate the underlying emotion even if you don’t agree with it or understand why, or if they’re expressing that emotion in an unhelpful way (like yelling).
Related: How to Break Bad News to Your Teen
Tool #4: Turn negative into positive
Slow down and notice where you’re having a lot of conflict and what are your complaints.
Ask yourself, what is the wish under my complaint? What do I want my kid to do? Why is this important to me?
This line of questioning can help you turn a negative complaint into a positive request. When I say positive and negative, I don’t mean good or bad. In this context, negative means to remove or take away, and positive means to add.
Here are some examples:
Negative complaint: “Stop leaving your socks on the floor! I can’t tell what’s dirty!”
Positive request: “Please put your socks in the laundry hamper before bed. It makes it easier for me to know what is dirty and needs to be washed.”
The positive request gives your kid something specific to do, and gives them context for why you’d like them to do it. Teens are much more likely to respond to a positive request, rather than a negative complaint that sounds like criticism.
Negative complaint: “You never bring your dishes out of your room. Stop leaving your dishes in there.”
Positive request: “I need you to put your dirty dishes in the sink as soon as you’re done eating. Otherwise we run out of clean dishes.”
You can see how a simple change to the way you’re communicating with your teen can reduce unnecessary conflict. Instead of feeling blamed, they’ll understand why you’re asking for something and are more likely to do it.
What to do if your kid doesn’t listen to you
If you’ve made your request and your kid doesn’t follow through, bring it up the next time you notice they’re in a good mood.
Ask them, “I asked you to (specific request). What’s getting in the way of you being able to do this?” Reiterate why you made that request in the first place and find out their reasons for not following through. Problem solve together as needed.
Here’s an example:
Parent: “Remember when I asked you to put your clothes in the laundry hamper before bed? What’s getting in the way of you being able to do this?”
Kid: “I don’t know, I forgot I guess.”
Parent: “Oh, you forgot, hmm. What would help you remember?”
Kid: “I don’t know…maybe if it was in my room instead of the hallway. I get changed in my room and I don’t want to carry everything out there.”
Parent: “Great, let’s move it into your room!”
Not every conversation will go this smoothly, but hopefully you can see how this process becomes easier when you’re open to hearing your kid’s perspective and problem solving together.
In this scenario, the parent didn’t get upset or shame the kid for not meeting their expectations. Instead, they got curious and asked what got in the way, then found a mutually beneficial solution.
Tool #5: Coffee Talk
All of the above tools are designed to create an environment where you can talk about stuff and have productive, healthy conflict.
It’s best to take a proactive approach whenever you can so you can actually solve the problems that keep popping up.
Here’s a helpful tool to start conversations.
If it never feels like the right time, or seems like your kid flips anytime you bring something up, try scheduling a weekly coffee talk to problem solve whatever is going on.
Make your favorite warm drinks and set a timer to keep things moving along. Pick a time that your kid is typically in a good mood and be flexible as schedules can change.
It’s much more productive to set up a time to talk with your kid rather than communicating at unpredictable or stressful times. When kids feel blindsided or panicked, they’re way more likely to flip out or brush it off.
When the timer goes off, thank them for their willingness to participate and schedule the next coffee talk.
When it comes to reducing unnecessary conflict, the key is working on improving communication. Remember that communication with your teen should be clear, consistent, and predictable. Try to focus on positive behaviors and requests, rather than only what they’re doing wrong.
When your relationship feels combative, teens will feel like you’re trying to control them, rather than guide them. You’ll want them to be in a mental state that’s receptive to your influence (not control).
Your kid will be open to influence when they believe you’re on their side, not against them or trying to control them.
Hopefully these tools will help you get on the same side and start solving problems together!
