“My daughter gets super mad whenever she doesn’t get what she wants and avoids us by hiding in her room. Would taking her door off fix her attitude?”

Moody teenagers, slamming doors? That's what we're talking about today on Tips on Teens. My
name is Kent Toussaint. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist here at Teen Therapy Center
in Woodland Hills. I'm also the executive director and founder of the nonprofit organization,
Child and Teen Counseling. So we're gonna jump in today's question. Here we go. Since my daughter
started high school this year, she has been really moody. She blows up on us whenever we say no
and then locks herself in a room. We've been told to take her door off her room. Should we? What
do we do about her behavior? This kind of question comes up a lot. It's understandable because
this dynamic is very prevalent in our society. So we have a teenage girl, 14 or 15, getting upset
when mom dad says no, slams off her room, slams her door, locks herself in. And what do we do about
this? Do we take the door off the hinges and teach her a lesson? Well, what lesson is it going to
teacher. It's going to teach her not

to slam the door. Well, that behavior is going to come across somewhere else. If you take the
door off, you're just dealing with a symptom. You're not dealing with a cause. So, what is the
cause? You know, what is the emotional need she's trying to meet? I'm not saying she's doing
it in a healthy way, but there's got to be some way for us to understand what is the root cause of
this issue. Again, you can take the door off, but then she's going to find another way to lash
out. So, I'm not saying you can't take the door off. I just don't know how effective it's going
to be. It may be temporary. I don't know. So she locks the door, runs off to her room whenever you
say no. Well, let's take a look. And I don't know what you're saying no to. It may be very reasonable
things to say no to, but it may be worth talking to her when she's calm and rational. And when you
are calm and rational, say, hey, let's relook at the boundaries that we're setting here. And
is there wiggle room? Is there room

to negotiate? Is there room for you to earn more privileges? Whether it's going out with friends,
whether it's more screen time, you know, I don't know what it is. There's a big thing called FOMO,
which you probably already know what that stands for. F -O -M -O, fear of missing out. So when
there are limits placed on teenagers and their friends don't have limits and all their friends
are getting together, whether it's online or they're somewhere, you know, getting smoothies
together and that one, your one kid can't go because of homework, or can't log on, or whatever
it is, there's this fear of, oh my gosh, if I'm not there, my friends will hate me, and I'll be the
loser, and it's this highly emotional fear. And it's part of being a teenager. It's what teenagers
do. It's part of the developmental milestone. It's fitting in and finding your connection
with people. It's normal for kids to go through that. So, if that's the case. It's important
to find out how do we find a middle ground where

she is able to connect with her friends in a reasonable way, as long as it's not interfering with
homework, other activities, some family time. But we also have to make sure that there is time
for her to connect with friends. I think that's important. Could be a lot of different things.
We don't know exactly why she's reacting and that's why it's important to find out. Maybe going
to a therapist. If you're not finding any way to negotiate this, going to a therapist who works
with teens that help navigate that who can speak teenager can speak parent and kind of bridge
that together. Another thing could be totally different than behavior than FOMO all stuff
is she's if she's a freshman high school she's 14 or 15 she's developing into a woman going through
puberty her brain is developing and as teenagers go as human biology develops she's going to
have thoughts and feelings that are more sexual nature and that could be run the gamut of a lot
of different things. And that can be very awkward

and uncomfortable. And for some teenagers, they're thinking about this a lot. And they're
trying to work it out. And when you see them, when you're talking to them, as if you can see right
through them and see all those weird thoughts and feelings they're having, it's really uncomfortable.
So what teenagers will do is they'll isolate or they'll attack. They'll pick a big fight. They'll
blow up. They'll slam doors. Or they'll isolate and not say anything. And it's a way to hide from
you seeing them as a sexual being because they're not used to being seen that way and they don't
know understand how to see themselves that way and if they can see themselves that way they can
see you that way and that's kind of creepy you know so and this is normal it's embarrassing for
kids I don't know if you remember being a teenager and feeling this way but it's pretty normal
and I think the way to bridge that gap is start educating your kids on that process on sexual thoughts
and feelings, how they are

normal, they are part of growing up, it's okay, it doesn't make you bad or wrong or weird, it's
just anatomy biology. So I encourage you to educate your kids on these things. There are books
out there that you can read with your kid. If your kid doesn't want to read them with you, you can
just leave them in her room. Robbie Harris, R -O -B -B -I -E, Harris, H -A -R -R -I -S, is an author
who writes many of these books for different ages. I encourage you to go to a bookstore, if you
can find one, and flip through one, see if you feel it's appropriate. Most of the parents I refer
to these books to really like them because they're respectful, they have a little bit of humor,
and they kind of help demystify the situation in a respectful way. and the more you can demystify
it, maybe it creates a little less tension. So that's our question for today. Thanks for your
question. Keep them coming. Your questions can be answered here every Wednesday at noon on
Tips on Teens at Teen Therapy Center.

I'm sorry, it's Tips on Teens at teentherapycenter .com. That's your email address or you can
direct messages here or you can join our Facebook group which is just called Tips on Teens. Feel
free to join us. Anyways, I'll see you next Wednesday at 12 answering your parenting questions.
Talk to you then. Bye -bye.