Podcast Episode 413: Why Teens Want Deep Talks at Midnight (and How to Survive It) Transcripts

Please note: Transcripts for the No Guilt Mom Podcast were created using AI. As a result, there may be some minor errors.

JoAnn Crohn (00:00)

Welcome to the No Guilt Mom podcast. am your host, JoAnn Crone, joined here by the brilliant Brie talker.

Brie Tucker (00:07)

Why hello everybody how are you?

JoAnn Crohn (00:09)

We’re talking about something today that really, really affects me more than it affects Brie. And it is when teens want to talk to you late at night and all you want to do is sleep. Huge problem for me.

Brie Tucker (00:21)

Well, I will admit it’s becoming more of an issue as I’ve gotten older. I do like going to bed earlier, but in the previous years, and I want to say like just in the last year probably trying to go to bed at like nine, like a responsible adult, I used to go to bed at like midnight. So my kids would come and talk. I’d be like, Hey, what’s up? Come join the night party. you bring me any Taco Bell?

JoAnn Crohn (00:44)

I know. See, I love my bedtime. I’ve always loved my bedtime. Even in high school, like I went to bed at 10 p.m. because I’ve always had this anxiety about getting enough sleep from the time I was a teen. And I know like I work the best on a lot of good sleep. So I have my routine. I usually go in my bed at like nine, nine thirty to read and then I just conk out. It’s my whole nighttime routine. So when my daughter started coming in my bedroom at 10, 10, 15, it was a real issue.

Brie Tucker (01:14)

Yeah. my gosh. Because the other thing too is like, and we’ve done episodes about like how your teens give you the slip. Like once they start to hit just over the tween and into the teen, the chattiness kind of goes away. So like when you get it, it’s almost like you’ve got this like scared little rabbit and you’re like, don’t scare the rabbit. Don’t scare. Be gentle. They might hop away. I don’t know why I made my kids a rabbit.

JoAnn Crohn (01:38)

No, but I know what you’re talking about. You’re like, I don’t get this behavior all the time. They’re usually not this nice and open. Usually they’re a bit cagey and don’t want to tell me anything. So I just need to be quiet, but also sleep. And so in this episode, we are talking for you. If you feel guilty saying not now when your teen finally opens up and you struggle to balance your teen’s emotional needs with your own rest, This is the episode for you. We have some tips to help you out and some personal experience too, because hi, I’m JoAnn and I like to go to bed early and Brie is going to bed earlier these days as well.

Brie Tucker (02:18)

Yes, Brie’s attempting to be an adult. We’ll see how it goes. We’ll see how it goes.

JoAnn Crohn (02:24)

So let’s get on with the show.

So teens, they come in, they wanna talk at night. Let’s talk about why this happens. Because I find that when you understand things from a parent, especially when you understand your kid’s behavior, psychologically, developmentally, it’s a lot easier for you to function without letting your emotions take over. That’s why I think it’s so important to know why teens talk at night.

Brie Tucker (02:55)

Yeah, and I think an important factor because we as adults, we know the schedule of the day, right? And we know what’s considered late and what isn’t considered late. I may stay up to midnight, but I’m not gonna text somebody at like, know, 11 o’clock at night. I know most normal people are in bed and asleep. And so I think sometimes we think our kids have the same thought process we do. They know we go to bed.

So if they’re choosing to come in late at night, they’re choosing to disturb us, but that’s not it. It’s not it. No, not at all.

JoAnn Crohn (03:30)

They’re wired to open up at night because when you get to the adolescent phase, the melatonin production, that chemical that tells your body to sleep and wind down, is actually delayed by a few hours. It gets pushed to later and later at night. So this is why teens are up later at night. This is why teens have a really, really hard time waking up in the morning because their bodies aren’t telling them to sleep on time, regardless of anything that we do like saying, ⁓ you know, it’s the screen time. It’s like all the stimulation. Yes, that could be a factor, but also they’re wired to stay up late. It’s just a fact of adolescence.

Brie Tucker (04:12)

Yeah, I was gonna say like, it’s their biology. It’s their biology. And we have like quite a few episodes that we’ve talked about this with multiple experts on too. So, but there’s a few things that we have found. So first of all, they are wired to stay up at night. That is their biology. What are some other things that we found when we were researching? ⁓

JoAnn Crohn (04:33)

It’s funny, there’s lower pressure at night and there’s fewer distractions and more openness. I was reading a Washington Post article that was using advice from one of our favorites here on the No Guilt Mom podcast, Dr. Lisa DeVore. And she said that at night when teens come and talk to you as a parent, you’re tired. And that’s actually what they’re looking for. Because when you’re tired, you tend to question less and listen more. And that kind of hit me hard because I’m a very curious person. like to ask all the questions. I want to know all the things. And when I’m tired, all I want to do is just lay there and do nothing. So I agree with this statement. I do question less.

Brie Tucker (05:14)

Yeah, totally. Like I’m thinking right now when the few times since I started going to bed earlier, my daughter comes in to talk to me normally like after work or something. And I’m fighting just to stay conscious. So yeah, there’s no, there’s no thought process going on in my head of being curious. I’m only curious when it’ll end. That’s the only curiosity.

JoAnn Crohn (05:37)

And it’s interesting in this whole like listening more because it shows that we don’t have to have the right answers all the time to talk with our teens. We could just be there, be present, if not sleepy. And it’s almost better.

Brie Tucker (05:50)

Yeah, they enjoy the fact that they can share without feeling like they have to back up all the things that they’re saying with facts and reasons, because I do run into this a lot with my daughter, because tear, tear, my oldest is off at college. So with my daughter, sometimes I’ll be curious about something and she will immediately go on the defense.

So like the other day, she was telling me how she did really well on her pre-calc test. And I was like, ⁓ great. How did that affect your grade? And she’s like, mom, I have a good grade in the class. And I’m like, I was literally just curious. And no way was that a judgment. And I think sometimes teens are waiting for that, having to defend their answer.

JoAnn Crohn (06:36)

I would say a lot of people are in that boat.

Brie Tucker (06:39)

It’s up for me, what? What?

JoAnn Crohn (06:43)

Because I think as parents we tend to question when we don’t need a question at all. Like we think our questioning is helpful. Sometimes if I really get self-reflective on the questioning, it’s to alleviate my own anxiety about a situation rather than actually help them through their situation. So for instance, if I am worried about them taking on too much, I might ask a question, be like, do you feel like you have time for other things? And it’s a leading question. It’s like, a question that’s telling my opinion in this question unknowingly and putting this judgment on them that they don’t know how to handle their schedule, that they don’t know how to do all the things. So I totally see how as a parent, we ask questions that offend our kids and they become defensive again.

Brie Tucker (07:32)

Yeah, I can totally see that for sure. Thinking about other things on why they do this, like first of all, like we already said, it’s biology. So if you’re tween, and they start this as their tweens. So if you’re tween or your teen is doing this, I want you to know, again, we already talked about brain development, but another big thing is that at this age, they tend to have some time blindness. So like they’re not entirely aware of your schedule versus their schedule and they also are very impulsive at this age. I have said before, ⁓ my gosh, I haven’t even told you this, JoAnn. My husband went to a conference last week and I need to look up who the specialist was, but one of them did share that teens are toddlers with better vocabulary. ⁓ my gosh.

JoAnn Crohn (08:18)

they stole it, they listened to the No Guilt Mom podcast and they took it right from you. They took it right from you.

Brie Tucker (08:23)

He started laughing so hard and he’s like, he was like, I couldn’t wait to come home and tell you this because they are. So they’re very impulsive. They want to do things that when they think of it, they’re excited and they want to share it. So it doesn’t matter to them that it’s 10 o’clock at night. So again, they’re not trying to be tricky with you on it. They just don’t necessarily understand the timeframes. Their body certainly doesn’t.

JoAnn Crohn (08:45)

Yeah, I’ve had situations where my daughter comes in and I am barely conscious, barely conscious. And she’s like, Mom, why aren’t you listening to me? And I’m like, I’m so tired right now. One of her favorite things to do is find funny videos. And she likes them on either TikTok or Instagram with the specific intention to come and show us later the funny videos. And this happens a lot late at night where she’s like, OK, time to show funny videos. My attention span is only so good like Big Bray. Yeah, there’s only so many videos I can watch where I’m like, I don’t get it. How can you not get it?

Brie Tucker (09:21)

Even being able to get the humor. mean, most of time I have to think to get the humor. There are a few things that I can be half asleep and still laugh at. That’s all I’m going to say.

JoAnn Crohn (09:24)

Yeah, I don’t get the humor

the humor during the daytime when I have a full capacity. Because what I was told yesterday is, mom, somebody needs to enroll you in an AP Lit class so you know how to like compare material and criticize stuff. I’m like, is like looking at Gen Z humor means that I am somehow not able to comprehend. This is not the case. So knowing that,

JoAnn Crohn (10:05)

from, I can’t do that during the daytime. How am I supposed to do that at night? Yeah.

Brie Tucker (10:09)

Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. And the amount of offense, my son doesn’t care as much. My son makes fun of me if I don’t get the joke, but my daughter gets offended if I don’t get the joke

JoAnn Crohn (10:20)

so offended. So offended. 

Brie Tucker (10:22)

I’m not as cool as you thought I was.

JoAnn Crohn (10:25)

So you’re dealing with this as well as dealing with all of these things that we mentioned. Teens have the time blindness, their melatonin production’s delayed so they’re not even tired. Like you’re not in a fair fight here about the stay awake versus, like you’re both at different chemical levels at that time.

Brie Tucker (10:42)

Two different weight classes. Ha!

JoAnn Crohn (10:46)

So knowing this, coming up, we’re going to talk about how to set the boundaries without pushing your teen away. Yes, it is possible. You don’t have to be afraid that they’re going to be a little scared rabbit and never come to you again. And we’re going to do that right after this. So we talked about why teens do this. Now let’s talk about the what do we do about it? Because I can’t stay up late Brie. I can’t. It’s not working for me.

Brie Tucker (11:12)

It’s not a thing that our bodies are meant to do. I do think it varies on a lot of different things, right? Like if you are a morning person or a night person, that affects your attention. Like if my kids were to come and have a deep conversation with me in the morning before I’ve had coffee, I cannot talk to them. I just know they come near me and I’m almost like a sitcom, like, no, no, stop right there. I am not caffeinated enough for those conversations just yet but I think that sometimes we worry about those scared little rabbits and we’re afraid that if we tell them no, they won’t come back. Right?

JoAnn Crohn (11:48)

They’ll get very offended, which they do. They do get very offended. And they’re like, ⁓ you don’t want to spend time with me. You don’t care about me. You aren’t listening. Ow. I get it all. Yes.

Brie Tucker (11:58)

Yeah, I’d be like, let me do that when I’m talking to you and you are scrolling on your phone and not looking at me and I go, are you even listening? And they’re like, yes, you just said and you’re like,

JoAnn Crohn (12:11)

I do that actually. I’m like, listen, when you come and talk to me at night, this is the same thing that’s going on right now. And I get the reaction, ⁓ no, it’s not. She goes away really, really mad. However, she does come back and she does take it in. So this is just my message to all of you. Even if your teens have a really harsh reaction when you set a boundary, when you tell them what’s going on, know that that’s temporary. Do take in what you say. They really do. They do. Because you could see it later on.

Brie Tucker (12:43)

Yes. Right, and there is a difference. They recognize the difference between don’t talk to me and let’s continue this another time, for sure.

JoAnn Crohn (12:59)

Because the biggest thing my daughter calls me on is if she comes and talks to me and I am preoccupied with other things. So like I am preoccupied with my phone. I am preoccupied with work. Sometimes she’s justified that my attention was taken by something not necessary. Sometimes she’s not, where if I’m in my office and she comes in and she wants to talk right then, she’s like, Mom, you’re not paying attention to me. I’m like, dude, I was just in the middle of a project. You came to me. Right.

Brie Tucker (13:25)

So that’s why it’s important to have a boundary. So like we are going to reframe this. Boundaries are not rejecting our kids. They are not. They are making it so that our relationships can continue to grow in a healthy place. And plus, don’t we want our kids to have healthy boundaries? I don’t want my kid to grow up thinking that they gotta do the stop and drop all the time. They have to stop what they’re doing as soon as somebody else comes and talks to them because that’s not healthy. That’s how you get burnt out.

JoAnn Crohn (13:55)

And there’s kind of like two different ways of looking at the world. And I was just reading this this morning in the book, Surrounded by Idiots by Thomas Erickson, which I highly recommend. There is the first way of looking at the world is thinking that everybody should be harmonious all the time. And when you look at the world this way, you think that all these little problems, all of the small things, just brush it under the rug, brush it under the rug like it doesn’t matter. Just stuff it It’s more important to have this harmony to make sure everybody’s happy. And in that state, we get into a lot of trouble because little things can fester and fester and fester until they explode into big things. The second way of looking at the world though is to confront

JoAnn Crohn (14:46)

conflicts as soon as they happen. If there’s a little thing where your teen is coming in and interrupting you during working, the way to look at that situation from a harmony point of view is being like, they’re only young once and I should just ignore this and it’ll all be fine. The way to look at it with this idea that conflicts are natural, conflicts happen all the time as humans is to confront it right then and say like, hey, I love you. I am working right now and I am not going to be here the best way for you in this conversation. And when you confront all those conflicts, you tend to have harmony long-term, where there’s no big explosions, because everybody’s clearer on what’s expected.

Brie Tucker (15:30)

And nobody’s being pushed into a people pleaser role for starters. I think it’s important too that like there is a time and a place for that isn’t a big deal. I can let this go, but that depends on you. You have to ask yourself, is this something that I can let go or not? And we’re telling you as the ghosts of children in the future, if you don’t have a teen or a tween or you’re just starting this phase, that’s not the way to go.

Brie Tucker (15:59)

You will get yourself in trouble by just constantly pushing yourself to stay awake and meet them at this time. It’s much better to deal with the conflict, like you said, and then your teens know you’re listening. They know that you’re into it. They know that you care. Cause there will be a point where you will snap if you’re shoving stuff down. yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (16:18)

And it’s usually during moments of high stress. you completely stuff things down, when you’re stressed out, when you’re tired, it’s all gonna come out in a way that you can’t control because it’ll be an emotional reaction. And that’ll be a lot more intense and hurtful than you mean for it to be versus talking about it right then. And I think that’s also good to practice non-reactivity when teens talk to you. Yeah.

Brie Tucker (16:34)

Yep Yes, try to cut back on the sarcasm. Try to not be, why are you in here? I’m trying to sleep.

JoAnn Crohn (16:53)

Or even like the information they give you like the, my gosh, I can’t believe that happened or the fear, you know, I think we can all identify with going to talk with our parents and seeing like the fear on their faces when we tell them something. We wanted to protect them. And that’s the reason I know I as a teen didn’t share things because I was protecting my parents and their reaction. They would get worried. I’d be like, yeah, this is happening. What are you going to do about it? For instance, if you’re getting a bad grade, I got an F on my test. Oh my gosh, like what are your plans? What are you going to do about it? Are you going to go in for extra credit? Oh, you should be going in and seeing your teacher after school. Your teacher has Q and A’s and they would get all worked up. And me, when I was already in that state of feeling ashamed of feeling like knowing I should have done things differently, I didn’t want to have someone else’s emotions on top of that. And so I just shut down. didn’t talk.

Brie Tucker (17:50)

And also being asked like rapid fire, what are your solutions? What are you going to do? I was smiling as you were saying that because I think I had that exact conversation with both of my kids when they were in middle school where I didn’t have the anxiety in my voice, but I would be like, so what do think you’re going to do? Do you want me to do this? You want me do that? And you’re right. Like looking back at it now, my kid told me the information and I didn’t even give him time to process it. I didn’t give myself time to process it.

JoAnn Crohn (18:18)

It’s a hard thing to realize when we do it as parents. I feel like I get called out on it all the time by my husband and by my kids, which is incredibly painful at the moment. also looking at it as conflicts happen to humans and as soon as you settle them, you can move on and be harmonious. When you get that feedback about yourself, it is hurtful in the moment, but it’s also necessary to grow and to have really great connected relationships with people because then you’re aware of what you’re doing and you can move forward.

Brie Tucker (18:56)

Yeah. So actually I’m going to share with our audience one of the boundaries that I do with my kids. Now that I’ve started going to bed a little bit earlier, I can’t necessarily entertain their 11 PM chats. So if there’s something that I want to talk to my kids about, I will go in about 30 minutes before I want to start getting ready for bed. And it’s important that I say it that way, getting ready for bed, not 30 minutes before I want to be asleep.

So 30 minutes before I’m getting ready for bed, I will go in their room and I will like, you know, be inquisitive. And it depends on the kid, you know, with my son, I would come in and just kind of be like, Hey, can I hang out while you’re playing your game? And like, sometimes he would chat with me a little bit with my daughter. would come in and I almost always had to ask about what she was watching, whatever she was streaming at the time. And then we would kind of get in the conversation about other things that were going on. And that was my check-in. And once the conversation came to an ending point or I was so tired that I needed to start getting ready to go to bed. It was past my time that I had allotted for it. I would tell them like, I love you so much, gonna go to bed. But if you wanna chat more tomorrow, can certainly, I would love to talk more about this if you’re up for it. Hug, kiss, and I leave. And I’ve never once had my kids tell me that they feel like they can’t talk to me about things. It has worked well for Bri and her family.

JoAnn Crohn (20:15)

Yeah, I think that’s a great thing to give them that space to get everything off. Everything off their chest without having to come in and wake you up, which I have. ⁓

Brie Tucker (20:26)

And it’s not a ton of work on my end. I just gotta be like, all right, I wanna be getting ready for bed at nine, so I’m gonna go upstairs and start talking to them about 8.30. It’s hard when they’re not there. I mean, it’s like I’m talking to a wall, cause I am, but.

JoAnn Crohn (20:37)

Yeah, no, I was going to mention that because for everyone who has a teen who you try to go in and talk to them and they give you one word answers and they roll their eyes, know that that’s a very common response as well. Because I go in for the check ins and I get that from my daughter too. It’s like the, I’m like, oh yeah, like, okay, I just want to say good night. Okay, good night. What is this? It’s a complete emotional reaction. It is nothing to do with me. Something that I even recognize is that when my daughter’s in stressful moments, usually when school is happening, I’m the punching bag.

Brie Tucker (21:15)

Yeah, we’re the safe ones. Yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (21:17)

Yes, that sucks, but also I try not to take it personally. I see she’s emotionally overwhelmed and all I want to do is I want to be that supportive presence and just say, okay, cool. I love you and good night.

Brie Tucker (21:30)

Yeah, and find your way to vent. Have a friend, write it in a journal, whatever it is, find your way to get that out so that you don’t come back to your teen the next day and be like, you were so mean last night, you hurt my feelings.

JoAnn Crohn (21:41)

And I do talk to her about that. Like if it’s a repeated incident, and it’s like, hey, you’ve been really short with me lately. I will bring that up.

Brie Tucker (21:50)

Yeah, we’re here to tell you guys it’s gotta be more than once. Because give us all the grace that we sometimes just don’t have the emotional regulation flip switched.

JoAnn Crohn (22:01)

Yeah. So coming up next, we have three tools to help you respond in the moment without guilt or shutdowns. And it’s coming up right after this.

So far, we’ve talked about why teens come in and talk to you late at night, even though you’re totally tired and just want to go to sleep, and then a few boundaries that you can set. So let’s bring it all together and talk about these three tools, Brie, to stay connected and rested. This first one is something that has helped me. And it actually goes along with Dr. Demore’s advice. It’s figure out how to rest and listen.

I realized that my daughter coming in at night, it was something I had to work through on my own as well as communicate my boundary to her. So that we were both changing. We were both meeting in the middle versus me saying, okay, no, this is the way it has to be and you have to leave right now.

Brie Tucker (23:00)

Yeah, yeah, like nobody likes the one-sided solution that where one person gets everything they want and the other person gets nothing out of the deal. That’s really what it is when you’re like, go away.

JoAnn Crohn (23:11)

Something I did and I told my daughter is I’m like, hey, I am really tired right now, but I can stay awake for another 15 minutes so we can, you can talk and vent. And usually that was okay. And then at 15 minutes, I would just reassess. I’m like, how am I? Am I good? Am I falling asleep? If I’m falling asleep, I was like, hey, okay, I can’t anymore. I love you so much. Let’s talk tomorrow. But I was able to push myself just a little bit to rest and listen at the time that she wanted to talk.

Brie Tucker (23:44)

And I like the wording that you used in there. And I think that leads us into our next tip. using a pause phrase, something like, I love it, you’re telling me this, and I wanna give it the attention it deserves. Can we chat about this in the morning? Or can we chat about this after school tomorrow? Or can we go get coffee and chat about it? It’s still gonna be like a tomorrow kind of thing. And it might not even be tomorrow, maybe tomorrow’s crazy, but it’s reaffirming that I love you, you are important, what you’re wanting to tell me is important, and I can’t be present. It’s a way to let your kid know we need to pause this conversation, not end it, pause it, and we will pick it back up again later.

JoAnn Crohn (24:30)

And it’s not like this amorphous later time, but you’re setting an exact time to talk about it. And sometimes you do that and they don’t want to talk about the issue anymore because they’ve already resolved it in their minds. And that’s okay. You did not fail. You did not do anything wrong. They were able to process.

Brie Tucker (24:49)

That’s important to say because I think in podcast land, raise your hand if you’ve ever tried to talk to, or your teens ever tried to talk to you about something, you had to pause them. And then when you came back to the conversation, they were like, nevermind. I already figured it out. Yeah. It’s not you. The only time that I would say that we have some responsibility in it is when we totally forget to follow up on it. That’s where I’m like, oh, I could have done better. I could do better next time.

But beating yourself up over what you already did doesn’t help anybody.

JoAnn Crohn (25:20)

Yeah. A lot of times when you have a problem too, you seek out a person to talk through it with. But if that person isn’t available at that time, you find another method to deal with your problem just naturally. Yeah. And so if the problem’s not urgent anymore, that’s okay. You did good. Yeah. You did good.

Brie Tucker (25:39)

Sometimes they just feel chatty. Like I think we’re all like that, right? Sometimes you just wanna chat and then other times you don’t wanna chat. So it’s like, I wanted to tell you about 16 different little things that happened in my day, but now that it’s the next morning, ⁓ I don’t feel like talking about the 16 different things in the day. And when…

JoAnn Crohn (25:57)

Forget those 16 little things that happened to my day now. 16 other things have happened and now.

Brie Tucker (26:03)

 I think that like when we try to come back and we push it and our team has already told us, I don’t want to talk about it anymore. It doesn’t help. So we’re just trying to tell you, don’t worry. You will get your chance again. could, it will come back multiple times. Yes. Another one, like I do tell my kids, like, I’m really happy you’re sharing this with me and I love you so much, but I’m also so tired. So can we do this at another time? And I do have a tendency to say another time, but I would say by being honest, I could do better by saying tomorrow, after school, in the morning, whatever it is, right? That works.

JoAnn Crohn (26:47)

And it’s all up to your own interpretation. I think as parents, we think we have to set boundaries sometime just to like teach our kids about boundaries or we look at our current work and we’re annoyed that they’re interrupting our train of thought. Then we just have to make the decision. Sometimes I don’t even say later because I see like my kids are bursting out of their skins wanting to tell me something and I decide, okay, I’m gonna pause right here. I’m already interrupted. It doesn’t matter. And I’m gonna give you like 15 minutes. I could do 15 minutes until I have to get on a meeting. And having that space is usually enough for them. So I just wanna reaffirm, you don’t have to set a boundary and say later, you can stop what you’re doing and talk to them now. That is okay.

Brie Tucker (27:42)

Yeah, then like the third tool you could use is Realizing that your family might want to do something totally different than what we’ve already talked about, right? This is one thing I learned from you years ago and God I got to tell you like it has come through in a pinch so many times You had told me about having a shared journal or a shared notebook with your kids when there’s stuff that and I Started it when my kids were a little bit younger and I started using it just so happened right before my divorce started, like probably like six months before. And it really helped us out through the divorce. And I think that for some teens, writing is less confrontational as well. Cause like we talked about, they like to come to us late at night because we’re not gonna ask them any questions. We can listen more. So maybe start a shared notebook where they can write things to you. And then they have a place where they leave it in your room when they’re done writing in it, so you know, the notebook’s on my nightstand, that means that my daughter wrote me something, I need to read it. And then you read it and then you write back or you talk to them back, like whatever it was that they wrote in the notebook. Maybe they’d be like, come talk to me about this tomorrow, I really wanna speak with you. So. Yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (28:53)

I think it’s a great thing. It’s a great non-face-to-face communication method that doesn’t disturb your sleep and allows you to be the listener instead of the constant question asker or the interrupter question asker, which I have.

Brie Tucker (29:06)

Yeah,

I was gonna say another one that I have to do with my son when he is around and not at college. I have to bribe him with food, specifically milkshakes. So I know where his favorite milkshake stops are and I’ll be like, let’s go get a milkshake together. And he’ll be like, ⁓

JoAnn Crohn (29:27)

I can’t resist a milkshake.

Brie Tucker (29:28)

Because he knows I’m going to ask him and we can talk. So that’s another thing. Now in that example, I’m the one who wants to talk to him. But if he wanted to talk to me, he could do that. My daughter has a tendency to do this. She’ll be like, mom, I want to go shopping. And I’ll be like, well, where do you want to go? Well, let’s just go to Ross so we can just shop and chat. And I know that means she wants to share things with me. So OK, I can’t go right now, but let’s plan to go at 2 o’clock or let’s plan to go on Saturday at this time.

And I know that’s her cue that I want to talk to you about something. It’s not normally anything heavy. Yeah. It’s the stuff that they come in at 11 o’clock at night. Yeah. And then so-and-so did this and then so-and-so did that. And can you believe this? I’m like, my God, no.

JoAnn Crohn (30:15)

Yeah, all the teenage lore. It’s great. Yeah. I hear it and I’m like, thank goodness. This is not how I operate in the world anymore. It was very stressful. Very stressful.

Brie Tucker (30:24)

They got us.

Thank goodness I’m past it. So yeah.

JoAnn Crohn (30:31)

So we hope in this episode that you have gotten some more understanding about why your teens are doing what they’re doing, or we’ve prepared you a little bit for them to do this so that it’s not a surprise when it happens in your house. You’ve also learned some boundaries that won’t shut them out. You show that their voice matters, but now might not be the right time for you to actually comprehend everything. And you can be a connected mom and a well-rested human. I am all for well-rested. I think I’m more of a connected mom, ⁓

when I am a well-rested human.

Brie Tucker (31:02)

Well, I think we all are. We need to fill that cup. And sometimes that cup is hugs. Sometimes that cup is sleep. Sometimes that cup is food. But, you know, sleep is my big one.

JoAnn Crohn (31:14)

Yes. Yes. So these are all things that we work on in our balance program. So just know, like, if you want a little extra support, if you want some coaching in situations, or maybe you’re having some trouble with your teens or communicating with them, balance is the place to have them. You can go to balanceformoms.com forward slash go to get on the wait list for when balance opens next. And until next time, remember the best mom is a happy mom. Take care of you.

We’ll talk with you later.

Brie Tucker (31:44)

Thanks for stopping by.

JoAnn Crohn (31:48)

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