Adolescence : Boundaries and Connection

Topics covered: Adolescence, preteens, parenting, boundaries, connection, communication, friendships, resilience, smartphones, internet access, childhood development and growing independence.For this week's Real Take, I'm dipping into the Ready to Be Real archive and sharing an extract from a conversation I had with psychotherapist Richard Hogan in April 2025.

Richard specialises in working with families and is the author of two brilliant books, Parenting the Screenager and Home Is Where the Start Is. He's also a father of three daughters, so he brings both his professional knowledge and personal experience to the conversation.

As a Mom of a nine-year-old boy and an almost five-year-old girl, this is a subject that's very close to my heart. So far, we've managed to avoid introducing personal smart devices (to our kids!) in our home, but I'm very conscious that there are challenges ahead as our children get older.

In this extract, Richard talks about adolescence, the changes children experience as they grow, and the importance of maintaining a strong connection with them through those years.

He explains why boundaries are so important, shares some lovely personal stories about parenting his own daughters, and talks about helping children navigate friendships and the inevitable challenges of growing up.

One of the things that really stayed with me was his advice around encouraging children to have wide friendship circles and plenty of interests and activities outside the online world. It's such an important reminder of the value of real-world connection and giving our children a strong foundation as they grow.

Following on from my recent conversation with Mick Moran of Hotline.ie about protecting our children online, I thought this was a particularly relevant conversation to revisit.

Listen to the full conversationRichard Hogan: Adolescence – Preteen and Teenager (April 2025)

In the full conversation, we explore adolescence and the preteen years in much greater detail, including communication, parenting boundaries, friendships, healthy habits, masculinity, online influences, pornography and the importance of creating a safe and supportive home environment.

Also highly recommendedMick Moran: Protecting Our Children Online (October 2026)

More conversations from the Ready to Be Real archiveRichard Hogan: Anxiety in Kids and Teenagers (January 2024)

Debbie Cullinane: Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist (March 2024)