October 13, 2011
Top ten Parenting Teens sites in Alaska
Focus Adolescent Services is the largest and most comprehensive internet site of information and resources on teen and family issues to help and support families with troubled and at-risk teens.
Teen Discipline 101provides a wealth of information regarding parenting and behaviour management issues.
Troubled Teen Search provides professional help in finding the right school or programme for your troubled teen.
Alaska Court system has set up a Family Law self-help center, a free, statewide service to help people represent themselves in family law cases.
Catholic Community Service (CCS) supports healthy lifestyle choices and all pregnant and parenting teens.
The Crossett Fund's overall purpose is to improve the health of children living in southeast Alaska
Alaska family services provides education and training to strengthen and support families.
Fathers.com provides information on teen therapy.
Rural assistance center provides information and help with teenage pregnancy.
Wikipedia defines parenting styles
October 7, 2011
Top ten Parenting Teens sites in Alabama
Alabama.gov is Alabama's government site for child services.
Restore Teens provides detailed information on teen boarding schools that specialise in providing emotional and physical growth in troubled youths. It also contains other useful parenting resources.
ACES (Alabama Cooperative Extension System) helps people and communities improve their quality of life and economic well being.
Partners-in-Parenting's gathers as much relevant information as possible about the child and them plans for educational, therapeutic, and placement options appropriate to the child's family needs.
Struggling Teen is a website which aims to help parents and their troubled teens by sharing various experiences gathered from troubled teens and parents.
Mobile Teen Center offers health education, job preparation classes, individualised case management, counselling services, parenting education and family support.
Teen Discipline 101 is an Alabama directory of teen parenting resources and information.
Parenting Assistance Line (PAL) is part of the University of Alabama and offers a wealth of child development resources.
Attachment Parenting International (API) is a non profit organisation with a mission to educate and support all parents in raising secure, joyful and empathic children in order to strengthen families and create a more compassionate world.
October 4, 2010
Teen Drug Abuse – Club Drugs
We all know the stories about night clubs and night club drugs, some of them are unfortunately true. Teens tend to be gullible when it comes to drugs, especially club drugs, as they are easy to carry, they leave no visible side effects after the effects wear off and they are supposedly meant to increase our fun. It’s easy to see why teens fall for them and use them more often.
Most teens think that club drugs are harmless, most of them at least. The fact is that there isn’t a single drug in the world that can be called harmless. Most of these drugs can cause a large range of unwanted effects like paranoia, hallucinations, and even amnesia. The worst part about club drugs is that most teens combine them with alcohol, which causes them to be even more harmful for our body.
One of the major disputes that appear when the effect of club drugs is mentioned is the actual harmful effect. The reason why many believe that club drugs have no harmful effect is because the drugs affect each person differently, some may react to the harmful side of these drugs while some will not. No one can predict the actual effects of club drugs. Some may have an extreme reaction when they first use a certain drug, and the fact that most of these drugs are not in their pure form raises the level of danger.
One of the most notorious club drugs is rohypnol or also known as date rape drug. These drugs are odorless, colorless and tasteless, and can easily be slipped into someone’s drink. They are usually connected with sexual assaults.
The most commonly used club drugs by teens are:
- GHB
- Rohypnol
- Ketamine
- MDMA
- Ecstasy
- Methamphetamine
- LSD
Each of these drugs has different effects. Ketamine will distort a person’s perception and will produce a feeling of detachment from the environment. GHB and Rohypnol act in a sedating way. All of these drugs can cause coma and various types of seizures, in some cases delirium and amnesia. Rohypnol mixed with alcohol in large quantities will not only cause amnesia, but it may also be lethal.
If you think your teen may be having a drug abuse problem or you especially suspect teen club drug abuse you should act immediately and seek professional help. Try talking to your local drug treatment facilities and try to work out a session in order to investigate and come up with a proper treatment for your teen.
September 7, 2010
Improving Your Self-Esteem
Every one of us has a picture of who we are, what we are good at and what we are bad at. This is something that develops over time. Self image is our mental image of ourselves, our mental portrait. Most of our self-portraying comes from our interactions with others, so does our self-esteem. Basically self esteem is how much we feel that we are loved, valued and appreciated by others, and more importantly how much we love, value and appreciate ourselves. People with healthy self esteem appreciate themselves and almost everything they do, while people with low self esteem think of their actions and deeds as not worthy most of the time.
That leads teens not to believe in themselves, to be afraid of trying, to be afraid of giving things to chance, to be afraid to live in some cases. But, we all experience good and bad things in our life, that especially goes for teenagers and the time we were teenagers. Teens are just finding themselves and it can become quite confusing, but when you look at it from the bright side, self esteem is not a fixed value; it is something that changes over time with your picture of the world and you growing experiences.
There are plenty of ways for anyone to improve self esteem, so let’s go over a few and see if we can make things look more positive.
- The first and basic step is to stop thinking negative about yourself in any possible way. People often get overwhelmed by their shortcomings instead of thinking about the positive sides of their personality and their achievements, so when you start being over critical of yourself, stop, say something positive and keep on. Think about the things that make you happy all the time, never allow the negative to take over.
- One of the common mistakes most people make, teens especially, but that sometimes comes from being pushed too hard, is that all of us tend to go for perfection instead of achievements. Never think about doing something perfect, think about achieving a goal and doing it so it will count, if you wait for perfection the ship might sail away.
- Count every mistake you make not as a let down, but as a learning opportunity, learn from your mistakes and correct them. Everyone makes mistakes, accept that and move on, mistakes are part of learning process, no one can give their best the first time, some things take practice and experience, life is one of them.
- Change the things you don’t like about yourself if you can, there are certain things however that we can never change, so learn to love yourself the way you are.
- Set goals for yourself and go for them. Take pride in what you do, never second guess your motives for wanting to achieve something.
- Help others, which always brings the best out of people, that makes them feel better, because helping others is a good thing for both you and the person you are helping.
- Exercise as that will help you relieve stress and negative energy and it will make you healthier and in some cases it will make you feel better about yourself.
All in all, just try to have fun, life is not that hard if you are motivated and have a positive way of looking at things, but if you bury yourself in depression and low self esteem life will always look hard, no matter how easy or hard it is in reality.