Helping Your Newly Discovered HSP Teen

Guest Article by Andrea Weber

If you’re like me, you may have only recently discovered that you identify with the HSP trait and that your teenager does as well.  Navigating the teenage years can be challenging enough and if your teenager is HSP, it’s so important to recognize where additional patience, support, and understanding may be needed.

Discovering your teenager is HSP will also bring a few ‘aha’ moments when looking back on previous scenarios and memorable situations.  You will suddenly see and understand why your teenager reacted or responded in a certain way and you’ll no doubt wish you’d responded differently as well. 

I think the important thing to remember here is that we do the best we can with the knowledge and understanding we have at the time.  This can be said for both parents and teenagers alike.  It’s about non-judgmental observation and recognition rather than being hard on ourselves and placing blame.  When we learn and show ourselves compassion as parents, we’re much more likely to pass these skills on to our children.

The teenage years - we can all remember them!  Relationships, school, licenses, paperwork & red tape, individuality, sexuality, politics, social pressures just to name a few, and of course today, there’s the ever-present influence of social media.  To say there’s a lot going on is an understatement! 

Knowing your teenager is HSP can go a long way towards helping you as a parent know how to help your child. 

After taking the Sensitivity Quiz myself, I encouraged my daughter to take the quiz and she also scored quite high on the sensitivity scale.  Discovering this was like a weight had lifted and in that moment of knowing, I also knew that I had the tools right here to offer the support she needed.

I’ve been able to use tools and techniques I’ve learned from HSP Brain Training to defuse situations of stress and overwhelm and give my daughter important insight and learning.  Although teenagers are great at non-committal communication, I knew she’d take it in and file it away if it was important.  She’s shown me this time and time again which I also believe to be part of the HSP trait in being able to intuitively know the difference.

As teenagers become young adults and start to complete paperwork from government departments, banks, and other institutions and businesses they need to process a lot of information that is often beyond their level of understanding and certainly beyond their level of real-life experience.  They learn that writing their signature is a big deal and that they need to know and understand what they are signing. 

The busyness of today’s society doesn’t seem to allow for this easily, nor does it have the tolerance for additional questioning that’s often needed.  Life experience has a way of teaching us to be assertive so for a teenager, this is a whole new experience.  

The advice I’ve shared with my daughter has been to always give herself the time she needs to read through things, process the information, and ask questions where further clarification is needed.  If she needs to take paperwork home and submit it online or at a later stage, that’s perfectly fine.  As she learns the importance of doing this, she’ll also develop a healthy sense of self-respect in advocating for her needs.

I recall a recent conversation about responding to an unexpected stressful situation.  I talked her through some of the steps in the HSP training for recognizing and responding, to which she replied, “That’s not me, Mum.  I can’t do that.”  I answered that none of us can really do this until we learn. If she can become familiar with and practice these skills, she’ll be able to build the confidence and resilience to feel self-assured. 

Teenagers certainly don’t need the weight of being pressured into making decisions they don’t understand or the weight of extra judgment.  Discovering your teen has the HSP trait is both liberating and empowering, helping both of you meet daily challenges in a positive and constructive way.  This is my wish for all parents and HSP teens.

Andrea Weber created Expansive Happiness to inspire and encourage those managing environmental sensitivities and to create much needed public awareness around these conditions. Although environmentally sensitive for some time, Andrea has only recently discovered she also has the HSP trait which has helped bring personal understanding, compassion and acceptance.