Teen relationships can be highly intense. Some kids feel as though they have met their soul mate at the age of 14, only to move on to find their next soul mates six months later. Because teenagers live in the very intense, very confusing world between almost grown up and grown up, their feelings can often be confusing as they are exciting. When someone gives us that extra special attention that makes us feel attractive, sexy, or alluring, we want to feel it all the time, and thus we may find ourselves professing our love to someone that in reality (if we stopped to think about it) we hardly even know.
There have been cases of teen relationships developing and lasting into life long relationships. However, these are very few and very far between. Few relationships, even those that last the duration of high school, can survive the changes brought on by completely growing up—which by the way doesn’t happen at the ripe old age of eighteen. There are plenty of thirty year olds still trying to complete the process of growing up.
Recognizing the difference between love and the intoxicating combination of lust and infatuation can make the relationships throughout the teenage years go much smoother. If you feel like you are absolutely in love, you might want to take a step back and ask yourself what that really means, and why you think you feel that way. Being in lust and feeling infatuated can confuse even seasoned adults. Love, real honest to God in love for a lifetime type of love, takes time to develop. It also takes work and a commitment to work through the more difficult times. While there are some kids out there who can manage to muster the commitment, during these highly demanding years it is not logistically possible for most to find the time necessary to develop that type of relationship.
Developing a good strong relationship while you are a teenager might rib you of some of the vital other teenage needs you have. Sports, extracurricular activities, family time, grades, school, worries about the future, and every day issues revolving around drugs, huffing, and drinking are just as prevalent in your day to day life. You must be tired.
The great beauty of teen relationships is that they help you to grow. If you’re lucky, your relationships will grow with you and become a static force in your life. However, most kids find that they outgrow the relationship sooner rather than later and feel the need to find another one to take the place of the one that just crumbled. That is a fallacy. There is no reason why you need to develop one relationship after another in order to continue to grow or to be a complete person. Over 50% of high school kids in a recent survey admitted that they maintained relationships on a consistent basis to make sure that they already had a date to the important events like prom and Friday night football games and dances.
During the teenage years, you’re going to learn a lot about what doesn’t work in a relationship. Girls are going to meet guys that border on violent, guys are going to meet girls who want to move way too fast, and with each challenge, there are real emotions involved in trying to determine the best course of action. Just because your feelings are strong and seemingly even a bit crazy, that doesn’t mean they aren’t real.
It can be hard for adults to take your feelings seriously. Often you will find adults, whether they intend to or not, will belittle your feelings or try to reason with you, that you are too young to have the feelings you believe that you have. While there may be a note of truth in the fact that you probably have not found your lifetime partner, your feelings are intense and feel very real to you. You need to learn, as everyone does, how to handle such intense feelings while still maintaining a balance in your life.
There are numerous variables that can become terribly confusing while you’re growing into the relationships that mark this very important time in your life. You are trying to deal with very adult feelings without all the perks of being an adult. Sometimes it’s good just to step back, take a breather, and then come back to the relationship with a new approach. This might be necessary from time to time to prevent the potential loss your sense of self in the relationship.
When you are experience a teen relationship, there are times you will feel on top of the world and times you will feel as though your whole world just bottomed out. It’s okay to admit your feelings, talk about your feelings, and deal with your feelings. If you can learn this precious gift now while you’re young, you will be heads above the rest of the crowd as you continue to mature.
