When parenting teens, it often seems easier (and more fun) to forge a close relationship with kids by playing the role of best pal instead of parent. But, while taking the cool route may make you the most popular parent around, “teenagers don’t want parents who are buddies,” says Marybeth Hicks, author of Bringing up Geeks: How to Protect Your Kid’s Childhood in a Grow-Up-Too-Fast World. “They’ve got plenty of buddies. They need parents who are parents. When we step up to the plate and really behave the way we’re supposed to, our kids will treasure and respect us even more.”

Adds Dr. Neil I. Bernstein, author of How to Keep Your Teenager Out of Trouble and What to Do If You Can't and There When He Needs You: How to Be an Available, Involved, and Emotionally Connected Father to Your Son, "it's not cool to put our kids in harm's way." Some examples of extreme parenting pal behavior include allowing teens to drink alcohol in your home, giving teens permission to hang out at your house, unsupervised, while you're out of town, or smoking cigarettes or pot with your teen.

When parenting teens, parents should think "parent first, pal second, always," says Bernstein. "That doesn't mean we shouldn't be a pal to our teens. That just means there is a certain amount of distance and boundaries necessary for effective parenting."

There's no need to swing 180 degrees in the other direction and play the role of dictator, either. Bernstein encourages parents to be friendly with their kids, to interact and share activities and ideas. "But the key to [parenting teens] is that certain amount of distance," he says. "A parent has to clearly be a parent. When those boundaries get obscured, that's when kids start taking advantage."

Some parents try too hard to be their kid’s friend and even go so far as to smoke or drink with them, or try to impress them with stories of past drug and alcohol use. That behavior gives kids harmful, unhealthy messages. Parents should only fill kids in on their own drug or alcohol past if there’s a lesson to be learned from the story. “I think it’s important that we remember our job as parents is to share our wisdom, not necessarily all of our experiences,” say Hicks. While they don’t always show it, teens need and want boundaries.

But make sure you don't pull back too far. "It's that sharing, that allowing for vulnerability that fuels intimacy and trust and respect and all those things we want with our kids," says Bernstein. "Not the because I said so, that's why and what I did doesn't matter and all this kind of stuff."