Early adolescence brings parents entirely new situations. Twelve-year-old Josefina stops telling her mother about school and friends, spends hours whispering on the phone behind a closed door, and snaps when her mother walks in without knocking. The author says this is normal.
Privacy and space
Young teens need privacy, not usually because they're hiding something but because they need room away from parental control to develop self-awareness. By 10 or 11 many want their own room and don't want siblings touching their things. This need for individuality should be respected; teens who feel invaded may react angrily.
Clothing
Teens want to choose their own clothes and don't care about their parents' opinion. A boy insists on wearing jeans and a T-shirt to a fancy family party; mothers complain about daughters' short skirts, cheap jewelry and wearing the same clothes all week. The author sees flashy or extreme clothing as covering anxiety: teens care more about how peers see them, and the more insecure they are, the more they rely on appearances to be accepted. Many want a friend along when shopping to see how they look from the outside.
Being different from parents
Young teens reject resembling their parents and look for models elsewhere: friends, actors, singers, athletes, whom they idealize. Still searching for their own identity, they imitate others and want to belong, which is why groups of teens dress alike. Parents often feel hurt when everything they offer is rejected, but it isn't meant to wound; it's a necessary step toward adulthood that every parent went through too.
Parents who try to raise teens exactly as they were raised, or who insist only family values count, will drive their children away. Parents need to keep up with their children and with social change, and meet teens at their level: sometimes still children, sometimes adults, sometimes claiming knowledge they lack, sometimes needing protection. That takes patience, understanding and generosity. Sometimes parents should be quiet companions who make clear they're available; sometimes they must hold firm on limits that prevent disaster. Above all, they must listen, because teens who don't feel heard stop talking.
Rigid vs. permissive parents
Very rigid parents struggle most; they lose control as their children start hiding things and lying. Overly permissive parents also lose control; teens without limits push to extremes to get attention and may feel no one cares. The ideal is a middle path: expand limits as teens show responsibility. For example, if a teen keeps curfew for a year, the next year it can be an hour later. Each family sets limits according to its own values, but they should be neither too tight nor too loose. Her summary: supervision without smothering, communication without excessive pressure.