What Makes Us Stronger - Reflections on Teenage Life

I’ve been reflecting on my teenage experience. Not my homelife, that’s a whole other conversation, but my experiences in the world. What it was like to be an independent person in the world as a teenager. For me. Obviously, all our experiences will be wildly different.

I was lucky enough to attend what would now be considered a relatively small secondary school. About 800 students, I think. What this meant was that pretty much all the teachers knew pretty much all the students and vice versa (that seems to be a luxury that most teachers and students don’t get to experience anymore). Now, that’s not to say that all interactions were good. Of course, there were some teachers who liked me and some who didn’t. I was very independent, strong willed, determined that I be allowed to make my own decisions and hold my own views, and ultimately, I wanted to be treated as a person rather than ‘just a child’. Some teachers thought these were great skills for life, others saw it as defiant and uncontrollable.

My experience was that some adults in the world felt that young people shouldn’t have a voice, that it was ok for us to be spoken down to, shut down, patronised, and controlled simply because of our age.

Definitely not all adults though! Some adults were happy to engage with me on a more level playing field, they gave me space to express myself and ask questions and were happy to answer those questions with care and consideration. We could joke and laugh as well as be serious. I respected them, and when it was time to hold me accountable, I listened to them as they had listened to me.

I have to admit, the teachers who had no time or space for me received no time or space in return. 

Outside of school, I often think of my driving instructor, who listened to all my crazy thoughts, dreams, and opinions as we drove. He took me seriously, he believed in me, he understood me. He saw my life as real and important, he never suggested I was just a kid who didn’t really know anything yet, he saw me as a valid person doing life and he listened to and cared about everything. 

So, my experience of the world as a teenager was a mixed bag, I could see that there were some adults who wanted young people to just be quiet and do as they were told without question, and some adults who celebrated us for all that we had to offer. I was annoyed by the people who wanted to shut young people down, but I also experienced the opposite, making it a ‘them’ issue that I was happy to call out. I am grateful to have had that lovely driving instructor Bob. I am grateful to have had Miss D, my amazing drama teacher who supported me through school and well beyond. I am so grateful to have had Mrs Walsh, the nurse who dropped into school a couple times a week and always had the time for me to sit in her office and just talk. 

As a professional now, I would call these people ‘external adults’, as in adults not in my family. Adults who do not carry the complexity of relationship that comes with being a parent, grandparent, sibling, aunt etc. Family adults can of course be hugely influential, for better or worse, but family life is a microcosm, and rarely reflective of how teenagers are received and perceived in the wider world. External adult relationships offer something different because there is no pressure on these relationships, no deeper expectations, no generational baggage, and no need for the young person to protect them.

But it’s not just about being external. For these relationships to have been so important and grounding for me, these adults needed to be Emotionally Available (a term coined by Dr Margot Sunderland of Trauma Informed Schools UK). They needed to feel safe, and they needed to really hear me, they needed to recognise the emotion and importance in what I talked about, and most of all they needed to take me seriously.

I am struck by the huge difference that those emotionally available external adults made to my life.

Let’s imagine a world where I thought that ALL adults wanted to shut me down, and ALL adults would dismiss me and my thoughts/feelings/contributions. What if I lived in a world where I felt no one believed in me? Where ALL adults controlled me without any acknowledgement of my individuality. Where I knew that the second I walked into a room I would be reprimanded, shouted at, or just generally disrespected. What if I felt that everyone expected me to fail, every day? What if I felt that none of the external adults in my life actually even liked me? What if they sent me away all the time? Or they kept me around, but my best was never good enough, they always wanted more from me than I felt able to give?

 I can only imagine what an upsetting, frustrating, depressing, and soul-destroying life that would be. 

I didn’t have to feel that way because of the adults who held space for me and did treat me as an individual. They didn’t even have to do much to make this huge difference, just see me and acknowledge me as a person. I strive in my work to be an emotionally available external adult for my young people. What a joyous privilege it is for all of us to be external adults in young people’s lives. 



I invite you to reflect on your teenage experience. What made it harder and what made it easier? Who were the people that supported you through that confusing and frustrating period of life? How did you feel the world at large viewed you as a teenager?