Lifelines: Rosjke Hasseldine on teenage daughters

Parenting programmes on TV tend to focus on what the mother is doing wrong when her daughter is angry, in trouble or acting out, without considering how important the father is. Yes, mothers and daughters can experience conflict, but fathers have just as much of an influence on a daughter's development.

Fathers need to understand the important role they play in helping a daughter through adolescence and supporting and encouraging her to make positive choices, as well as keeping family communication channels open. Conflict can erupt with both parents around the choices daughters make, including what job or career she wants, the friends or boyfriend she chooses, how she dresses, etc.

The truth is that you can't make someone listen if they don't want to. You can, however, increase the odds that your adolescent daughter will listen to you by how you approach her and how well you listen to her in return.

Anxious parent

My daughter is going out with a boy I don't like. What do I do?

I always think honest communication is the best policy. Sit down with your daughter and share your concerns. Keep the lines of communication open and ask her how she feels about him, how he treats her and other people, and whether he is the kind of boyfriend she wants? If you keep listening to your daughter, you increase the chance that she will listen to you and start to see what your concerns are.

Not talking

My daughter has shut herself away and won't talk to me. How do I get her to talk?

Teenagers are prone to giving parents the silent treatment when they feel they won't be heard or as a way of gaining power and attention in the relationship. My first job as a psychotherapist is to check this behaviour isn't a sign of drug or alcohol abuse. It's also important to get to the bottom of what your daughter is trying to say through her silence. I usually start with understanding the dynamics in the family, checking if anything has changed recently. A parent's new partner, for example, can make a daughter feel displaced or insecure. I check how things are at school and with her friends. Girls can be very nasty at that age and it's important parents keep talking to their daughter about her friends and giving her feedback about what is friendly behaviour and what is abusive and aggressive.

Late home

My 15-year-old daughter refuses to follow my rules. She comes home at all hours and won't tell me where she is going. I'm completely at a loss about what to do.

Rules are difficult to deal with, especially when your children are flexing their independence muscles. Talking it through and really listening to how your child is feeling can help restore harmony. One particular case stands out for me because it illustrates how rules are rarely the real problem. A father and daughter came to see me because the daughter was refusing to obey a curfew. As they talked, the father discovered his daughter thought of him as a "control freak". This upset him because he had tried hard not to be controlling since growing up with a "control freak" father. He was also sad because his father had died before he got a chance to know him as a person. Suddenly, the issue was less about a curfew and more about a relationship. And what usually happens, when the daughter feels more known and heard by her father, she no longer has to communicate through rebellion.

Rosjke Hasseldine is author of The Silent Female Scream, director of Women's Power Circles and a psychotherapist. You can contact her on www.thesilentfemalescream.com and www.womenspowercircles.com.

This article was first published in Scotland on Sunday, August 15, 2010