“You Don’t Understand Me!”
How often have we heard the phrases ‘You just don’t get it!’, ‘You don’t understand me!’, and ‘You have no idea what I’m going through!’? Having been a teenage girl, and working with young people as an adult, I can assure you that I have both said and heard all of those phrases regularly!
Teenage feelings and thoughts are intense, and without validation or understanding these feelings and thoughts can become intensely bad for young people and their adults. Helping young people to understand the whys and hows of their thoughts, emotions, and behaviours benefits everyone. Dr Tara Porter’s book ‘You Don’t Understand Me’ is written [as the subtitle suggests] as a ‘young woman’s guide to life’ - written directly for teenage girls. It can also be useful for those working with young women both to empathise and to understand.
The book is broken down into 9 themes/chapters. Each chapter has relatable stories that stem from Porter’s years as a clinical psychologist; she states clearly that these are not individual stories but examples brought together to illustrate each theme. I’m sure many young girls can find pieces of themselves within these stories [as can adults!]. The stories are interwoven with scientific research and practical advice, all with the aim of helping girls to understand themselves more and to make good choices based on that understanding.
The entire book is worth your [and your young person’s] time, but I wanted to explore a few aspects that I found particularly helpful.
One chapter deals entirely with friendships, in which Porter talks about different types of friendships young people experience. Her comments on ‘trio’ friendships really resonated with what I have heard from young people. She states that trio friendships ‘typically involve three roles, each with a varying amount of power: a leader, a best friend, and someone who is being left out.’ As the ‘best friend’ and ‘left out’ friend roles often switch, this creates instability which is often unsettling. Instability is also a key theme in ‘on/off friendships’, which Porter links to the psychology of partial reinforcement schedules often associated with addiction. This is the friend who is caring sometimes, but not every time, despite the consistency of your own actions. As a result, we keep chasing the ‘on/off’ friend because, as Porter states, ‘you try to resolve the confusion of being left out or ignored… trying to make it right again.’ These themes of friendship are linked to other aspects that Porter writes about in her book, including familial relationships and the way emotions, thoughts, and behaviours interact.
Another chapter focuses on food and body image, something Porter seems to specialise in with her clinical work. She talks through the cultural and social issues surrounding food, and also the science of why body image is often problematic for young people. For example, she discusses how the word ‘fat’ is too general, and that this ambiguity causes confusion and distress. She differentiates between lipids, adipose tissue and obesity - this change in language is a useful way to break down unhealthy thoughts and cultural messages around food and our bodies. She also looks at several reasons why our own body image is never entirely accurate. She explains this with stories and science related to three different views - ‘You are likely to be viewing your body in one of three different ways: either by looking down at it, using a mirror, or using a photograph.’ Throughout the book, Porter includes useful diagrams to illustrate her points, and her use of the Ebbinghaus Illusion [circle diagram] really helps to show how our minds do not accurately see the shapes of our bodies in a mirror or in photographs. She sums up this chapter with 7 helpful tips on how to maintain a more healthy relationship with food and your body.
If you are interested in learning more about the research relating to the themes of the book, Porter includes a whole ‘Want to Know More?’ section at the end of the book. It is also available online via her website https://www.taraporterpsychologist.com/