The Parenting Pair Podcast

Teens' Stress Explained: Healthy vs. Unhealthy Stress (and how parents can help)

08.27.2025

In this episode of The Parenting Pair Podcast, Dr. Suzanne Allen and Dr. Annalise Caron unpack how parents and teens experience stress—both healthy and unhealthy—offering practical insights and actionable advice for families who want to build resilience and balance at home.

0:00

29:04

Together, they explore:

How the way we think about stress shapes how we manage it
Why some stress is healthy and helps kids grow
When stress tips into overload and becomes unhealthy
The warning signs of burnout in teens
The role of comparison and perfectionism in fueling stress
Practical tools to prioritise and scale back commitments
How parents can model healthy stress management

If you’ve ever worried about your teen being overbooked, anxious, or struggling to keep up with unrealistic expectations, this episode will give you tools to reframe stress, set healthy boundaries, and support your teen’s well-being.

🎧 Listen now and discover how to raise more resilient, confident, and balanced teens.

👉 Don’t forget to subscribe and follow us for more parenting tips, expert insights, and real talk about raising teens in today’s world.

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The Parenting Pair podcast is designed for informational and educational purposes only. Do not rely on the information presented in this podcast as a substitute or replacement for professional -- psychological or medical -- advice, diagnosis, or treatment. If you have concerns about you or a family member's well being, please contact a licensed mental health professional or physician

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Chapters:

00:00 – Back-to-school stress for parents and teens
02:14 – The way we think about stress shapes how we manage it
03:41 – Why some stress is healthy and helps kids grow
04:50 – Real-life examples of healthy stress in teens and tweens
06:40 – How parents can reframe stress for their kids
08:30 – Temporary healthy stress vs. unhealthy stress
10:05 – Unhealthy stress and achievement overload
11:33 – Comparison, Perfectionism and Unhealthy Stress
15:30 – Warning signs of unhealthy stress: sleep, irritability, burnout
18:20 – Tool: The 24-hour reality check for overloaded schedules
21:00 – Deciding what to scale back and saying no
23:06 – Shifting the community narrative and supporting kids’ well-being
25:50 – Parents modeling healthy stress management

Episode Keywords

back to school stress teens, tween and teen stress management, healthy vs unhealthy stress, teen burnout warning signs, adolescent stress and anxiety, parenting teens back to school, stress management for college students, how parents can support stressed teens, parenting strategies for anxious teens, overloaded teen schedule help, setting healthy boundaries for kids, teaching teens stress management skills, helping kids manage perfectionism, family tools to reduce school stress, practical parenting tips for back to school stress, middle school stress support, how to raise resilient, confident, and balanced teens

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