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How to Counsel Adolescents in Today’s Day and Age

Posted By : Administrator Monday 10 Oct, 2016
How to Counsel Adolescents in Today’s Day and Age


Written by Rupalim Patgiri


Adolescents constitute more than one-fifth of the global population . They are the future of our society, and hence, their physical and mental health is of paramount importance. As adolescence is a period when individuals undergo rapid physical and psychological changes, stress is a characteristic of it. During this time, children often display irritability, anger, aggression (including bullying), sadness, lack of concentration and interest, hopelessness, apprehensions, low self-esteem, etc. Add to this never-ending list more recent issues, such as anorexia nervosa, bulimia, cyber-crime and misconception, and internet addiction.

As a result, alcohol and substance abuse, and suicide attempts often become easy means of escape from the real or perceived problems and misfortune.


Need for Intervention

Since mood swings and all of the above mentioned signals are a part and parcel of adolescence, they only become warning signs when they are extremely disruptive and harmful to the children themselves and people around them, and they persist for a long time. There is no need for parents to be hassled at every change. But parents should never ignore suicide threats as ‘drama’ or ‘attention-seeking behaviour’. There may really be some underlying need that needs to be addressed at the earliest.



Rapid urbanization, competition in all spheres of life and nuclear families with more income but fewer children have given rise to over-ambitious and overzealous parenting. It is ironic that earlier parents hardly had any time to give attention to their children, but either in spite of that or because of that, the children developed all sorts of life skills. On the other hand, parents of today, though busier than earlier, focus all their attention on a single child, making it difficult for the child to grow up naturally, with some amount of age-appropriate freedom to make mistakes and face challenges. In their attempts to create ‘the best opportunities’ for their children, parents today have started treating their children as one more project. In this rat race, some people forget that children are not art that can be created by us, rather they are seeds that need the right environment to grow and we can never be sure what kind of fruit it will bear. As good gardeners, we can only offer our children the best possible nourishment.

But what is considered ‘best’ by parents may not be so for their children. Since we are never trained to deal with human beings, parents and teachers keep making well-meaning mistakes. Here, the need for professional counselling arises. Today’s parents and children of nuclear families in cosmopolitan cities are often in need of professional guidance in family dynamics. Even rural communities have not remained untouched by the changes in culture and ways of life because of rapid developments in transport and communications. The pressure to perform and become ‘successful’ in life can create a lot of stress in children. This is not to say that the world needs to regress to where it was fifty years ago. The problem is we have not been able to keep pace with technology and consumerism. Healthy pastimes and family time have taken a backseat.

Lifestyle disorders are on the rise. Lack of time to invest in quality relationships and our inability to deal with real human beings have resulted in more and more conflicts between parents and children, divorces, abandoning of parents, suicides and premature stress-related deaths among the youth. In today’s world, we seek services of specialists in every field. It is time we turned to mental health professionals. 

Catex Health is a large network of mental health experts who are available 24x7 for your support and will ensure confidential, dignified and empowering support for any sort of emotional distress. Ms. Rupalim Patgiri is a member of our network. Click here to reach out to her or call +91 9911775626.

About the Author

Ms. Rupalim Patgiri has over 15 years of experience as an Educator and has been working with adolescents extensively during the course of her career. Working closely with children and adolescents as a teacher, she often found herself guiding and counselling children as well as parents on issues like Lack of Concentration, Adjustment in School, Exam Stress, Career Planning and so on. Her desire and drive to serve the children better lead her to go back to being a student and attain qualifications as a counsellor as well. Ms. Rupalim is well versed with handling Behavioural, Academic and Emotional Issues common to the Adolescent population.