When Raising an Already Socially Distanced Teen

By Christine Burke

My husband and I’ve lengthy joked that nobody anticipates the top of the varsity week as a lot as our 14-year-old daughter. For so long as I can bear in mind, Friday afternoons have discovered her barging into the home with a glance of reduction on her face. As she sheds her bookbag and coat, she instantly trudges to her room to placed on her coziest pajamas. She folds up on the sofa with a guide, content material to dive into the world of characters who’ve change into her greatest buddies.

She famously informed me when she was three that she didn’t wish to go to household events or social gatherings as a result of “peopling is simply too onerous.”

She’s an introvert in each sense of the phrase. And, although it typically causes friction between her and her extroverted mom, I’ve principally realized to just accept that my daughter is extra cautious and exacting about how, and with whom, she spends her time.

Socializing in school has been sufficient for her. She has by no means been a teen who must jam her weekend with sleepovers and lengthy journeys to the mall together with her buddies. By no means one for social media, she discovered the right steadiness: socializing face-to-face in the course of the week and taking a break on the weekends to relaxation and rejuvenate her introverted soul. She is ready to greet Mondays with a smile as a result of she’s been capable of nurture that a part of herself.

However, within the wake of social distancing, she’s been feeling remoted and lonely.

I’ve seen many jokes alluding to the truth that introverts have been making ready for quarantine their entire lives. However I’m discovering that it’s the alternative with my daughter.

Now that the remainder of her college yr has been canceled, she’s realizing an increasing number of that she is lacking her buddies deeply. As a shy, introverted child, it has taken her a very long time to domesticate the tight knit friendships she has­—buddies who’ve come to just accept her introverted methods.

As of late, nonetheless, she is painfully conscious that she has misplaced the connections she loved in school. And, just lately, it got here to a head when she sobbed about how a lot she missed sitting at lunch together with her greatest good friend. It broke my coronary heart.

Elevating an Introvert

Right here’s what I’ve realized in terms of elevating a social distanced child within the midst of a quarantine:

1. Different teenagers are in the identical boat. 

As I gently defined to my daughter, quarantine signifies that all of her buddies are at residence, too. She wanted to be reminded that her buddies nonetheless love her and wish to spend time together with her. We talked about her buddies and their good qualities. And I helped her see that this isn’t a state of affairs the place they’re intentionally excluding her. It appears easy, and but she regarded visibly relieved to recollect we’re all in the identical boat proper now.

2. Social media isn’t all the time the reply, but it surely’s a begin.

My daughter has all the time been hesitant to affix Instagram or Snapchat, principally as a result of she prefers one-on-one, face-to-face communication. I reminded her that her buddies could be forgetting to textual content her as a result of she’s not reaching out, both. As of late, as teenagers spend extra time on IG or Snap, it’s nearly an “out of sight, out of thoughts” state of affairs. I defined to her that her buddies may simply be forgetting as a result of she’s not on-line. We’ve explored beginning an IG account for her to really feel slightly extra in tune to what her buddies are as much as throughout quarantine. And she or he’s arrange occasions to FaceTime together with her buddies, which has additionally helped tremendously.

3. Being an introvert isn’t a personality flaw.

As my daughter cried about how a lot she misses her buddies, she lamented that she “hates the shy a part of myself.” I reminded her that being an introvert simply means she is aware of precisely what works for her and what doesn’t. That could be a lesson that some adults haven’t but grasped. I helped her see that, within the absence of spending time together with her buddies within the cafeteria, there are methods for her to really feel related throughout social distancing. We simply wanted to seek out inventive methods for her to attach that felt genuine to her.

4. Speaking about emotions of isolation is critical proper now.

I need my daughter to really feel empowered to speak about her emotions of unhappiness, isolation, and loneliness whereas we’re all at residence collectively. We’ve spent plenty of time speaking by her feelings. The purpose I’ve emphasised is that sure, it’s nice to speak about our completely happy emotions, however the unhappy ones want consideration too. I praised her for coming to her father and me together with her emotional struggles fairly than maintaining them to herself.

Quarantine received’t final without end. However I hope our conversations about navigating life as an introvert will stick with my daughter lengthy after social distancing is a distant reminiscence.