In the final part in the Parenting Teens series, you will spend time thinking about both what you have learned and how to move into a rewarding future. This training will help you consider how past relationships and experiences affect everyone in the family, as well as how you can best care for yourself in the present.

     Supporting your youth’s relationships with birth family members (including siblings) and other key individuals can be a path toward helping them develop a healthy sense of connection and attachment, which helps foster those things in their future. You will discuss ways to do this that are respectful of the youth’s history, interest and developmental abilities.

     You will then spend time reviewing trauma-informed parenting techniques that you have learned over the past six sessions, and also talk about the potential for developing secondary trauma. This can develop when you are involved in another’s trauma story, and the training shares tips for recognizing signs and how to prevent or mitigate it. This transitions into a discussion around self-care, which is the cornerstone of success for parenting, the foundation on which all other successes depend. You will be introduced to the “self-care wheel,” a tool that offers many ideas around how to engage in self-care, and you will also participate in a variety of exercises that support reflection around what will work best for you, at the end creating a concrete plan.

     At the close of this training, you will celebrate your success, and reflect on what you have learned and the positive impacts it can have. It is hard work, but just like parenting, the potential rewards are equally great.

The “Parenting Teens” series comprises seven parts for prospective and current foster, adoptive, kinship and guardian parents who are or will be raising older children from foster care who have moderate to severe emotional and behavioral challenges.

Each part should be taken in order.