Parents of teenagers are to get a dedicated social networking site to help them to cope with the challenges of older children. Parentline Plus, which runs a 24-hour helpline, is behind the new service that will be funded by the Government.

The charity said there was a myth that parenting became easier as children grew older. Resources were directed according to that theory, meaning that just as the behaviour of some children became more challenging, there was nowhere for anxious parents to turn for help.

Parents of young children have a range of formal and informal sources of support, from health visitors and the Sure Start programme to the school gate and successful online forums such as Mumsnet. Parentline Plus hopes that gotateenager.org.uk will help to fill the void.

Valerie Outram, an area manager for Parentline Plus, who trains counsellors for the helpline, said that half the calls that the charity received were from parents of teenagers who had nowhere else to go to get help.

“After your child turns 13, you are pretty much on your own,” she said. “Parents start to think they are the only ones going through it and the problems seem a lot bigger as a result.”

Added to this, many mothers who had previously stayed at home go back to work, or have elderly parents to care for. Lone parents are now expected to go back to work when their youngest child turns 12.

The website is designed to cover problems from the very serious to the comical. As well as a Mumsnet-style forum, where parents can chat anonymously about what is happening at home, the new site will have e-learning modules to help with problems such as drug or alcohol abuse. They can click on to acted-out storylines covering common scenarios such as teenagers staying out too late or refusing to tidy their bedroom to get ideas on better ways to communicating with their children rather than arguing.

The website will also carry a “jargon buster” so that parents can understand what their teenagers are talking about.

Ms Outram said that the teenage years present some of the most difficult problems in childhood because many parents found it hard to accept that their children are growing up.

“These years are about letting go and adjusting to that. We will try to help them to focus on the fact that much of the behaviour their teens display is perfectly normal and driven by the need to separate,” she said.

Two groups of parents typically have problems with teenage years — those who have been too lax with their children and failed to establish boundaries, and those who believe that children should simply do what they are told.

“One of the things we encourage parents to do is sit down and remember all the awful things they did as teenagers. Many suffer from selective memory loss,” Ms Outram said.

JARGON BUSTER

Suck To steal, eg, “My phone got sucked”

Flossing Showing off material possessions, eg, “I worked all last weekend so now I'm flossing”

Rents Parents, eg, “I have to go on holiday with my rents”

Nang Brilliant, eg, “That music is nang”

Neeky Nerdy or out of fashion, eg, “You are so neeky”

Buff Attractive, eg, “He is buff”

Rinsed Overused, eg, “That excuse is so rinsed”

On your jays On your own

CASE STUDY - I DIDN'T KNOW WHERE TO TURN

Yasmin Allen's son, James, starting playing truant from school at 12. Unlike the supportive primary school he had just left, his secondary school expected her to deal with the problem and the full-time mother from North London didn't know where to turn. “I felt I was totally to blame for not picking up on the warning signs that something was not quite right and not being able to sort it out,” she told The Times.

“I felt was judging me for not being able to stop it immediately. I remember thinking ‘who can I talk to about this?' and couldn't think of anyone. I could really have learnt from other parents.”

James, now 23, has just graduated from university. Ms Allen, 48, is bracing herself for more trouble with her daughter Rosie, 12, and is testing out some of the new gotateenager.org.uk pages.“I think parents now are terrified that they are going to end up in court or forced to do parenting classes if their children get into trouble. This is a far better way to sort out problems.”

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