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  • Q&A with Australian Health Practitioners

    How do I help our teenage daughter choose the right friends?

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    Parenting Parenting Teenagers (13-18)
    I believe my daughter is making friends with girls who are not good influences on her social behaviour and academic life. She seems very distracted from school and parties too much. I am not a fan of her friends but know that I cannot simply take them away from her. What do I do?
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    • Will Dobud
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  • Will Dobud

    Social Worker

    I aim to provide adventure therapy programs to adolescents that are transformational and progressive. With True North Expeditions, my aim is to offer a program … View Profile

    Just to add a little to the excellent advice above, we often find teenagers choosing friends that are going through similar things that they are. If we can get our children to improve self-concept, they will improve their social group. Having a strong social group is a key indicator for happiness and a great anti-depressent. 

    As far as picking the right friends, its a hard battle as the parents of teenagers as they are getting that itch to leave the nest and create their own social networks where before it related heavily on that of parents. We really value signifcant relations and are interested in these. For the beginning of their life these relationships were parent focused. Now they are moving towards their high school aged friends. Its important to help your daughter continue to have significant relationships with adults as she moves to a more interdependent lifestyle. These could incluse aunts, unclues, grandparents, teachers, coaches, psychologists, counsellors, etc. Strong relationships is a fantastic precursor to success and she will use her significant relationships as a measuring stick for future ones.

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