Excessive Talking About Problems Leads to Teen Depression and Anxiety by Iris Fanning

A recent study of 1,600 teen boys and girls linked excessive talking about problems with anxiety and depression. The research was conducted by Amanda Rose Ph.D. at the University of Missouri. Excessive talking is considered as: "When teens hash and rehash every detail, talk about problems when they could be doing something else, and spend the vast majority of their time together talking about problems," according to Rose.

While it's important to talk over our problems, it's equally important to learn either to let go or find solutionsand move on. There is a book, Molecules of Emotion,written by Candace Pert Ph.D. Dr. Pert demonstrates that as we think certain thoughts, our brain/body release chemicals that either makes us feel good or bad. Over focusing on problems release the chemicals of anxiety and depression.

So as your teens experience certain problems be sure to be supportive yet optimistic. It's a delicate balance between listening enough, but not so much as to contribute to the problem vs. being dismissive. You won't always do this right.

Here are a few tools. Don't contribute to the emotional negativity with your own fears or upset. Don't over focus on a problem. Help your teen learn how to come up with solutions. It's their problem; you don't need to solve it for them. You can ask open ended questions like:


I bet that feels pretty bad. How are you going to handle this?
Is there another way to look at this?
If you could waive your magic wand, how would you fix this?
Is there something you can learn from this?
What do you suppose would happen if you made a choice to feel happy now and let this go?
Usually there are two sides to a problem. Is there something you did or said that made this more difficult? What are you willing to do now to make things better?
Is there a deeper lesson or meaning you can find in this?

Part of growing up and becoming a happy adult is to develop optimism, problem solving and learn to let go of things we can't control. Now is a good time to begin!

Iris Fanning is an award winning Life Coach, Family Therapist, Author & Speaker with a specialty in helping people discover and live from their strengths. She is the author of Change Your Life Right Now, Do What You Love & Get Rich and the Teen Girls Guide to Sex, Drugs & Self Esteem. She has written thousands of articles and been the guest expert on radio and on the platform. You're invited to visit her website & sign up for a FREE Newsletter: http://www.irisfanning.com/

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