I’ve spent decades working with struggling teens at Heartlight’s residential counseling center, and many of those teens who fell apart came from good homes with caring, conscientious parents. Why? Because somewhere along the way, their parents over-protected and under-prepared them for real life.

Every parent wants to protect their teen from the ugliness of this world, and that instinct isn’t wrong. But not enough parents know how to prepare their teens to handle the world they will eventually live in. In this article, I’ll take a closer look at the lives of sheltered teens, explain what’s really happening beneath the surface, and give you an effective plan for raising teens who are both protected and prepared for the world they’re about to enter.

The Sheltered Teen: A Closer Look

The Setting. Sheltered teens often come from good homes with hard-working parents who are diligently trying to protect their teens. Their basic needs are met, plus they have access to a good education and extracurricular activities. No one in their life set out to cause harm or create a problem.

The Parents. Parents of sheltered teens have good intentions and high hopes. They want to protect their teens from a harmful culture. They are rightly concerned about drugs, bad influences, and media. The trouble isn’t the concern; it’s the way they have chosen to protect their teen that has left them vulnerable. By simply blocking out anything that seems threatening, these parents have unwittingly set their teens up for failure.

The Problem. Many parents underestimate the power of teen culture. They assume that if they simply keep the outside world at bay long enough, their teen will grow out of their immature desires and avoid any problem. But once a sheltered teen is finally exposed — whether at school, at work, or through a phone, families are shocked to discover how quickly some teens plunge into everything they were protected from.

The Teen. As a teen gets older and longs for freedom, he’ll begin to push back against his parents’ control. The allure of the unknown world beyond their familiar home life causes irresistible curiosity and a desire to experiment. Sometimes a sheltered teen simply wants to fit in, keenly aware that his or her upbringing makes her stand out from her peers.

All teens are created to be relational. If they don’t develop a peer group and learn to relate with people their own age, they’ll find a way to connect with somebody; it just may not be somebody you’d choose. I’ve watched teens do shocking things, moms and dads would have never imagined, all in an effort to belong.

Protection and Preparation

Some parents choose homeschooling as a way to shelter their teens, and I’m not against homeschooling. We homeschool every teen who lives with us at Heartlight Residential. I’m not against protecting teens from the nastiness of a broken world. But I am for preparing teens for survival in that world. There’s a difference between raising teens to live in a zoo and preparing them to live in the jungle. Trust me, you don’t want your teen to stay dependent on you forever.

So how do you know when to hold the reins and when to let them go? Here’s a simple framework: during the teaching years, roughly first grade through sixth grade, you surround your child, protect your child, and build the foundation for his life. But starting before age 13, it’s time to let out the reins a little at a time. The goal is to train your teen to take over his or her own life, and that takes practice. If you don’t prepare your teen to engage with this world, he won’t become the light in dark places you want him to be.

The Cure for Sheltered Pre-Teens

1. Give increasing freedom to your pre-teen. Each year, your pre-teen should be making more of his own decisions and gaining more control over his own life. Freedom isn’t something you hand over all at once at 18. It’s something you release little by little, starting well before the teen years.

2. Stop doing everything for your pre-teen. If you’re still doing his laundry, packing his lunch, and fighting his battles at age 12, it’s time to stop. The only way your teen learns to do something for himself, is if you quit doing it for him. Sure, you can help, but don’t step in all the time and deprive your teen of the experience he needs to handle the next stage of life.

3. Talk about what’s going on in the world. Discuss the uncomfortable and hard-to-discuss topics. Don’t immediately tell your teen what to think. Let him think it through and give his own answers. Listen and make it a real discussion. The goal isn’t to hand him your opinion on every subject; it’s to teach him how to think for himself as you guide the conversation.

4. Let your pre-teen have early doses of bad things. A little rejection, a differing opinion, or a hurtful comment experienced now while you’re close by to help prepares your teen for life far better than sitting on the sidelines watching Mom and Dad play goalie — blocking any negative experiences.

Cure for a Sheltered Teen Who’s Already Out of Control

1. If your teen is in real trouble or a dangerous situation that requires outside help, get it right away. Don’t pretend things are “okay” when they are not. Don’t put your head in the sand and pretend you have the power to prevent all bad things from causing problems in your family. Get professional support to navigate this crisis.

2. Look below the inappropriate actions to find out what’s really causing your teen to act out. Start a conversation, and then listen. The bad behavior is rarely the whole story.

3. Adjust your expectations of your teen. Your teen is living in a different world than the one you grew up in, and her perspective matters as you figure out a new way forward together. Pause and ask her for her input.

4. Keep the communication lines open. Meet with your teen regularly, even when it’s uncomfortable, even when the conversation doesn’t seem to go anywhere. Keep trying again and again. Connection now is what makes correction possible later.

Conclusion

Hey moms and dads … Your teen will be an adult one day and needs to know how to handle what’s coming at them. Your job as a parent is to protect, provide, and prepare teens to handle whatever comes their way. If you’re hesitant to expose your teen to a little more of life, remember: the seed you’ve sown in your teen’s life will come to fruition. Trust that God will remain involved in your teen’s life well beyond your own involvement.