Melissa Trevathan – författare

"My six-year-old fusses with her hair for hours. Is this normal?" "Yesterday my seventh grader was all sunshine. Today she''s wearing black and won''t leave her room." "I''m worried my teenager may have an eating disorder."

In today''s complex world, parenting a girl is harder than ever. It takes more than love. It takes insight into the things that make your daughter tick as she grows from childhood to young adulthood.

Drawing on the authors'' fifty-plus years of combined counseling experience, Raising Girls takes you inside the mind and soul of your girl. You''ll obtain seasoned, expert insights on

Spiced with stories, humor, and much reassurance, Raising Girls will help you encourage your daughter, challenge her, love her, and help her discover who God is creating her to be.

There was a time, not so long ago, when everything in life seemed pretty simple. You had great friends, you got along with your parents (most of the time!), and you were pretty happy with the way your life was. But suddenly, it seems like everything is changing. Your friends expect way too much from you, and often let you down. You fight with your parents more than you’d like, and they never seem to be happy with you. You just don’t understand why your life seems so chaotic now. Melissa and Sissy, the authors of this book, think they can help you figure out some of the big questions inundating your mind: • Who am I? • What do I want? • What should I do? • Who do I want to be? While they’re no longer teenagers, Melissa and Sissy remember a bit about their entry into teenage life. But more than that, they talk with girls who are a lot like you every day—girls who are feeling pressure from everyone around them, who are feeling like they’re changing in ways they don’t understand—physically, emotionally, and spiritually—and they feel like their lives are out of their own control. If you’ve ever asked yourself any of those questions above, or if you just don’t know why you feel like everything is changing and you miss the “good old days” of Barbies and board games, this book can help you understand who you are and give you hope for who you are becoming.

Pop Quiz: • Have you ever woken up and felt bad about yourself for no reason whatsoever? • Have you spent time trying to figure out how to get into the popular group at school? • Have you ever been embarrassed by your dad singing in the car with your friends? • Have you noticed that things are starting to feel different than ever before? • Do you change your opinion—or even your personality around different friends? • Do you get overwhelmed with all of the thoughts and feelings bouncing around inside of you? If you answered yes to even one of these questions, you passed the quiz. That means you’re a normal girl, who is going through the confusing changes of growing up! Sometimes it might feel like you woke up in a whole new world—kind of like Dorothy, in the Wizard of Oz. The good news is, you’re not alone. Melissa and Sissy, the authors of this book, think they can help you figure out some of the big questions in your life. Even if you haven’t asked them out loud, chances are you’ve started to wonder: • Who am I? • What do I want? • What should I do? • Who do I want to be? While they’re no longer teenagers, Melissa and Sissy remember a bit about what it was like to be 11 or 12—almost a teenager. But more than that, they talk with girls who are a lot like you every day—girls who are feeling confused or overwhelmed, who are feeling like they’re changing in ways they don’t understand—physically, emotionally, and spiritually—and they feel like their lives are out of their own control. In this book, Melissa and Sissy, along with girls your age, will share some insight into what’s going on in your life. You’ll find that you’re not going crazy—you’re just growing up and becoming the person God has created you to be.

What do I do when my son learns phrases in school that he''s not allowed to say at home?How do I teach my daughter caution but not fear?How do I teach my daughter about gratitude when she believes she is entitled to a cell phone and a laptop and everything else that not only she wants, but that all of the kids around her already have?Melissa Trevathan and Sissy Goff hear these types of questions and many other comments from parents on a daily basis in their counseling office and at ministry events. Today, more than ever before, we live in a culture that is at war against our parenting. Between the internet, the media, the sense of entitlement that kids are living with, the disrespect . . . it is almost too much. We often wish we could move back to Mayberry, where our biggest concern was who had set off the firecrackers in the neighbor''s garage. While those aren''t the issues most parents are facing today, Melissa and Sissy believe we can still raise children who value, well, values. They provide a clear and possible path back to cultivating children who have a sense of character and groundedness, who may not be as rampant across playgrounds and parks as they once were. They paint the picture of how to raise children with manners and kindness and with a healthy sense of fear and respect both for their world and the adults around them--and to do so without totally disengaging from the realities of today''s world. In short, they believe it is still possible to instill vintage values in modern kids.Modern Parents, Vintage Values talks about the specific issues facing kids today, helping parents to more fully understand the challenges being faced. Yet Melissa and Sissy don''t stop there. They focus in on nine values that are foundational for the character development of children: kindness, integrity, manners, compassion, forgiveness, responsibility, gratitude, patience and confidence. Each chapter is broken down into a section for children and adolescents, and specific ways to foster the specific value for the particular age. Modern Parents, Vintage Values offers parents timeless truths that can break through the chaos of today''s culture and instill these truly vintage and important values in kids.