By Megan Barnes, Daily Breeze
It’s no secret that teens in affluent communities turn to alcohol and drugs to cope with high academic pressures — but wellness experts want parents in the beach cities to stop treating it that way.
This week, the Beach Cities Health District and Manhattan Beach-based nonprofit South Bay Families Connected will kick off a series of monthly workshops aimed at linking parents with resources, and combating stigma.
“Back to School for Parents: Mindfulness Workshop to Help You Be at Your Best” will give parents tools to help overloaded students positively de-stress from the rigors of academics, extracurricular activities and college applications.
The 7 p.m. workshop Wednesday at Pages bookstore in Manhattan Beach will be facilitated by Greg Flaxman and Shiori Lange, social workers at the Beach Cities Health District, a preventive health agency serving Redondo Beach, Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach.
PARENTAL ROLES
CEO Susan Burden said the organization is partnering with South Bay Families Connected because, when it comes to teen mental health and addiction, studies increasingly place importance on the role of parents.
“We’ve known the numbers in Redondo Beach and Manhattan Beach are too high — higher than surrounding areas — and we’ve been struggling for the last 10 years to find out the right strategies to address it,” she said.
According to the California Healthy Kids Survey, 42 percent of 11th-graders in Manhattan Beach Unified and 38 percent in Redondo Unified reported current alcohol and drug use — compared to 30 percent of juniors in the Los Angeles Unified School District and a 35.2 percent state average.
Parents needs to make a better effort to connect with their children, Burden said, but they must also be clear role models.
“It’s very commonly believed that ‘if I let my kids drink in my own home, then it’ll be fine and safe,’ but that strategy actually increases the risk, it doesn’t decrease or delay it,” Burden said. “These kids are very bright, so parents have every reason to trust them with their lives, but if you have no oversight and don’t have a guiding voice in your life, kids are left to their own devices.”
The series will be the second at Pages put on by South Bay Families Connected, which was formed by parents in August 2015 and offers them a hub of resources and shared experiences on its website.
Founder Laura Short McIntire said that although workshops this summer drew a few dozen attendees each, the website has had 9,000 unique visitors, showing that parents are turning to site for expert resources in the comfort of their own homes.
“We want to try to encourage parents to get past that veneer of perfection,” McIntire said. “Everyone’s dealing with some challenge somewhere on the scale and it’s so beneficial to reach out and connect with other parents.”
EMBRACING MISTAKES
Greg Allen, a marriage and family therapist whose nonprofit, Freedom4U, serves South Bay youth, will facilitate a Oct. 27 workshop titled “Grit: Raising Resilient Kids.”
A third workshop Nov. 14, “Forgive for Good: A Proven Prescription for Health and Happiness,” will feature Fred Luskin, director of the Stanford University Forgiveness Projects.
Allen said drinking and drug use are only symptoms of bigger mental health and wellness issues for teens, including feeling disconnected from parents.
“I think in Southern California and the beach cities, we’re basically a culture that is externally focused versus internally,” he said. “Parents are competing with other parents raising these super kids.”
Allowing children to make mistakes, taking a step back and not doing everything for them, and emphasizing character over grades is key, he said.
“It’s about letting them trip and fall and learn,” Allen said. “Mistakes are tremendous learning opportunities.”
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