Puberty brings with it many gifts.

Of course, some of them are great—the first signal that maturity is (hopefully) outpacing childishness. Your humor gets a bit more nuanced and sophisticated. I mean, sure, bathroom jokes and dirty words are still hysterically funny. But some of the things you laugh at now are things that have a chance of making your parents laugh too—which is pretty great for everyone else to watch as it unfolds.

You're also capable of more complex thinking—Algebra, Biology, Geometry, Chemistry, Physics, Calculus. You start reading books that have a bit more ambiguity and subtlety, a bit more heft than Frog and Toad or The Berenstain Bears.

You're responsible enough that the adults begin to worry less and less that when they leave the house, you'll somehow find a way to burn it down or drink the Draino under the kitchen sink.

And obviously, there's the whole sexual awakening thing that shows up uninvited but mostly not unappreciated. Yeah, that part’s kind of a mixed bag for most people.

Beginning the journey down the long road of adolescence comes with a certain promise attached: Keep your nose clean and your head on straight. Don't play in traffic, eat ice cream for breakfast, or forget to lift the toilet seat. And in a few years, you get to graduate to adulthood.

But there are a few downsides to the magic maturity clock striking puberty. There are zits, of course.

There's a lot of sweat, bad breath, and funky stuff, all of which can range from mildly off-putting … to unbearably gross … to just plain confusing.

The hormones thing, as I said, is a mixed bag. Their emergence in the throne room of an adolescent's life comes with a great deal of euphoria and promise. But it also comes with its own share of unrequited yearnings and frustrations.

They tell you that the new freedoms you now enjoy come with a proportional increase in responsibility. Yes, you can stay up later—but often, that freedom gets annexed to such drudgeries as homework and chores—neither of which seemed like a huge part of your life only a few short years before.

But another gift that comes with one's burgeoning maturity is primarily for the adults in the young person's life. Now, I call it a "gift," but most adults don't necessarily see it that way. If you asked them on the sly, most adults would tell you that they'd just as soon this present wasn't on the inexorable puberty gift registry. It's just so dang inconvenient.

What am I talking about?

Well, for lack of a more elegant term, I'll just call it the “B.S Detector” or maybe the "Early Alternative Fact Threat Detection system." I'm trademarking that one. Dr. Spock or whoever’s the Child-rearing expert du jour can run with it.

But the truth of it is this: Young people going through puberty can smell pretense and twaddle at a hundred paces.

Whoooo-boy! But what they’re really good at, what they're fully trained ninjas at, what adults hate to be the target of is their ability to zero in on hypocrisy—like a heat-seeking missile.

Man, they're good at it.

I know. Believe me. I know.

Here's a pro tip: Do you want to know one of the ways they sharpen this hypocrisy-hunting sixth sense?

It goes like this (this part is free, no extra charge):

“Hey, Dad, what kind of stuff did you do when you were my age?”