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- [00:01]
A
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B
So go ahead, show off a little.
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A
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B
DSW.
- [00:29]
A
Let us surprise you. When the person who has captured their attention or their heart sometimes responds and sometimes doesn't, that is the thing that sucks them in. I think that's the hardest because that's the one that we all relate to. We've all been there, and we've experienced it, and it feels the most.
- [01:01]
B
Hi, Cara.
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A
Oh, hello, Vanessa.
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B
We're gonna have some fun today. We've covered romantic relationships from a few different angles. We've had our interns come on to talk about all the lingo and vocab around romantic relationships. We've had a young woman who started a dating app for teens and an advice column in quotes on TikTok. We've had a professor and writer, Lisa Phillips, who wrote a beautiful book about teen romance. But we've never just had a conversation between the two of us.
- [01:41]
A
So, yes, there is a current dating culture that dominates this conversation. But, Vanessa, I think what gets confusing about this conversation just to, like, kind of lay it out so that people feel seen, is that dating and romantic relationships, these are huge pieces of coming of age. Right. Like, we talk all the time about puberty and about adolescence, and then there's this third leg of that stool called coming of age, and it's really like coming of age movies. What does that mean? It's really about romance and about those budding relationships. And, you know, we're so big on not bringing our own baggage, but this is a place where our baggage is very much a part of the conversation because it's not necessarily heavy, cumbersome baggage. It's like it's the really important, special baggage, too. It's like the story value baggage. And when we talk about tweens and teens and romance, I think, you know, unlike a lot of the topics that feel scary or third rail ish, this is like the thing we want for the kids in our lives.
- [03:01]
B
Yeah. And top line, what I will say is the worry I hear very often from parents when we speak to audiences is, my kid's not in a relationship. My Kid has never been in a relationship. And I hear from a lot of parents of teens who feel concerned. You know, I was in. This is the parent speaking. I was in a romantic relationship where I had a boyfriend or girlfriend when I was this age and my kids never had one before. And that worries me. So what we want to say up top is that's actually pretty common. Some of you may have serial monogamous in your households. My kids are like, mom, that's like your favorite phrase. And it is because I'm so fascinated by the kids who are in a series of committed relationships.
- [03:49]
A
Totally.
- [03:50]
B
So it's not to say that doesn't exist. We both know lots of kids who've had lots of romantic relationships through the teen years. But it's really common these days for kids not to be in, you know, committed relationships, but to be physically involved with people anyways, sexually involved. It's also common for kids to do neither of those things, not to be romantically involved and not to be sexually involved. So if you're worried about it, you're not alone. This is a really common phenomenon. I will also say that if you're worried about your kids future romantic reality, we can talk about some of the research that actually tells us that it's not their romantic experience that dictates later in life, healthy romantic relationships. It's actually the quality of their friendships. So take a deep breath around that. But Cara, let's do the sort of hookup culture overview for folks.
- [04:50]
A
Yeah. Because in the in between zero relationships and serial monogamy is of course this Newfoundland of hookup culture and situationships which we've covered on episodes past. And we talk endlessly with kids about. Because it's interesting. It's really interesting. And for those who need a quick refresher, hookup culture, this concept has been around for a long time. This is not new. Right. I mean, hookup culture. Our parents experienced a version of hookup culture. They just called it something different. But in today's world, it's really framed in this language of situationships like relationships that defy these very clear boundaries of I am a boyfriend or I am a girlfriend, and these are the things that I do when I fit in that role. And there is an order of operations that looked like I asked someone out on a date. I went or I was asked out on a date, went on said date, maybe went on a few more dates, maybe held hands, maybe kissed, maybe progressed through the bases, right. And then ended up getting pinned like, do you want to be my significant Other girlfriend, boyfriend, whatnot. You had a line from an episode we did probably a couple of years ago, Vanessa, and I don't even remember what I ate for breakfast, but I remember this line and it. The Mr. Potato Head of it all, which is that, you know, no, that order does not exist anymore. But now maybe for some kids, that's how it happens. And for others, there might be emotional intimacy or physical intimacy before there is any kind of labeling. Someone might be physically, extremely intimate with another person before they ever go out on anything that resembles a date. This is very confusing to many adults. It is not confusing to kids.
- [07:02]
B
Right. I mean, to be even more specific about it, when we were in high school, you know, you were sort of expected to wait a certain amount of time if you were dating someone exclusively, to even consider having sex with them, for example. And then, for example, you know, and there was not like a national standard of a duration of waiting. But, like, you didn't just, like, start dating someone and then like, immediately typically go have sex. It was sort of generally understood you were going to wait a period of time. Nowadays, kids might have sex with each other and they're. They've never been on a date. They maybe don't even know each other that well. They might not even talk to each other in school. And listen, this is not to say this didn't happen, but it wasn't public. Right. So it might have happened when we were in high school, but, like, it's
- [07:52]
A
a really important distinguishing teacher. That's right.
- [07:56]
B
If it happened, it was kept quiet, and if it was made public by other people, it became the source of real harassment, bullying, demeaning. It was not something that was sort of celebrated like, oh, hey, these. These folks are now having sex. It was like, became a real source of shame from the sort of larger community. And frankly, it really became a source of shame for girls that they were labeled with a series of really demeaning terminology.
- [08:26]
A
Sluts.
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B
They were labeled sluts?
- [08:28]
A
Yes.
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B
Less so. The guys who were participating in this, in this dynamic.
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A
And, you know, the concept of slut shaming comes from that which is really like, you know, exactly what it sounds like. There was. I mean, maybe I'm dating timestamping myself. There was a very clear rule that emerged when I was in my young adulthood that seemed pretty standard to our generation, which was the third date rule. You're a little younger than I am, Vanessa. But was it still around the third date?
- [09:04]
B
Yeah, the third. I mean, not when you were in, you know, in high school, but when you were in the working world or grad school. Yeah. You didn't have sex before the third date. I don't remember.
- [09:16]
A
And you did have sex on the third date. Like, if you didn't have sex on the third date, there was a question mark placed on the relationship. Is it ever going to happen?
- [09:25]
B
Oh, very interesting. That's really interesting. So those are like, as Cara talks about, there's kind of the emotional stuff which we're going to get to, but there were sort of rules and expectations and parameters that we had. And you know what's interesting, Cara? I'm not sure except in using the phrase slut shaming, like, stop slut shaming her or me or whomever. I have not heard my kids refer to another person as a slut. Like, it's actually not a phrase I've heard my kids.
- [10:00]
A
I agree with you. It's not a today phrase.
- [10:02]
B
And I have heard people use the term male slut. So there is a sort of. Like, when I've heard. When it's come up, I've heard it used both regarding females and males. There's a sort of like equal opportunity offensiveness.
- [10:19]
A
And there's a restaurant in LA called Egg Slut. Just saying. I mean it. Yes, it is used as the back half of many phrases, but as a standalone term, it does feel like it has expired, that phrase. Yeah, I would agree. But you know, this brings up. So that's the framing. Right. Like, and we've done a lot of content on that. And I mean, if you haven't listened to it, go back in time and listen to our episode with our interns, who were all in late high school and college when we did this episode about their experiences with the whole world of situationships and hookup culture. Great episode from early days in the podcast. That's sort of the framing. And so now, now let's get into, you've got a kid, maybe they live in your house, maybe they don't. Maybe they're in college, maybe they've moved out into the work world, maybe they're at boarding school. Maybe, you know, there are. There are a bunch of different scenarios and sort of, how do you begin to put your toe into this water and get in conversation with them when you have no idea what's going on.
- [11:29]
B
Right. So I want to start with a sort of inclusive plea, which is, if you have a kid who maybe is dating or has never dated, don't assume, you know, the gender of the other person they're dating. Oh, so correct. Like, you may have A kid who is very open with you and it says, you know, I'm pan and I am attracted to all different kinds of people. Great. You may have a kid who does not say a peep about who they're attracted to or the kind of person they want to date. I'm just saying don't make any assumptions. I mean, hopefully everyone has now watched he did Rivalry Car. Have you watched he rivalry?
- [12:13]
A
Yes, I have, Vanessa. So aside, I'm in the target demo, right?
- [12:18]
B
Aside from like the graphic gay male sex, which some people will feel comfortable with with and some won't, there's a lot of really interesting, beautiful, complicated stuff around relationships, situationships, hookups, and a lot of really beautiful parent child stuff around romantic relationships. And so don't assume you know anything about your kid and unless they have like explicitly and openly shared with you. I try to keep gender out of the conversation. Hey, is there anyone you're like, interested in or anyone you're hanging out with? I really try to keep it up. My father, on the other hand, is decidedly not inclusive and old school and is perennially making heterosexual assumptions about kids, which my kids laugh with me about because I've made it clear to them and separately, without shaming my dad. Hey, I know grandpa always says, like, any girls, any guys, but like, just so you know, whoever you're interested in, whoever you're attracted to is great. And like, don't feel hamstrung by those parameters. So you know, there's always the lessons about extended family. But just try to be as inclusive as possible because you don't really know and kids may not know. And even if they told you last week, hey, I think I'm this. Don't keep asking them to define themselves. If you need a lot more on that, go to. This is so awkward. To our book. Go to our chapters on gender identity and sexual orientation. There's so much great content in there, so I'll refer you to that. But just general plea to keep things inclusive.
- [14:03]
A
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- [15:02]
B
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- [15:30]
A
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- [16:07]
B
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- [16:33]
A
we're obviously going to be twinning. Refresh your spring wardrobe with quince. Go to quince.com awkward for free shipping and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. Go to quinc. Com awkward for free shipping and 365 Day returns. Quince.com awkward and here's another world in which you know you may have no clue about what's going on. Separate from the gender and sexual orientation stuff is just you have no clue what's going on. You have no clue if your kid is dating, is putting themselves out there, is being asked out, is experienced. I tend not to tell stories about my own kids, but I'm going to share one Little snippet because it's so funny. So when my kids went to college, one of the things that I said to them was, it's as important to me that you explore academics and what you want to do and what you're interested in studying and all those things as it is that you go out socially, that you get to have new relationships, friendships, but also romances. And you, like, I want you to approach that like a priority. You know, carve out the time for that in addition to carving out the time to cram for a test or whatever it is. And at first my kids were like, okay, that's a little weird, that advice. But very quickly they both were like, oh, I get it. Like, you know, time is fleeting and you have to make choices and. And it's become sort of a trope for us and a running joke where I'm like, okay, like, how's your week? This week on the weekly check in, you know, and, you know, did you go out on any dates or whatever? Okay, fine. So my son is great about communicating and answering questions. As he's gotten older, he, you know, he's my silent one who's become not silent. It can happen for you. And we started saying, you know, have you been going out on any dates? And finally he's like, yeah, no, it's just like, there's just, there's just not enough time. And I hear you. And we know, I know you think it's important, but I'll get there. And I was like, okay, you can use the family credit card for any dates. Like, that's how much I want it to be a priority. Like, it's a skill, it's a muscle you need to flex. And he's like, haha, okay, mom, whatever. So last month he calls me up and he says, you're going to see a charge. Have I told you this? You're going to see a charge on the credit card. I went on a date and I was like, oh my gosh, I'm so excited. I get the credit card bill and the charge is for $11. Vanessa, it's $11. And I. I literally took a picture of that part of the credit card bill. I circled the charge and I sent him a text and I was like, hey, big spender. He's like, I will cover more. Like, you could actually.
- [19:52]
B
You don't have to share a slice of pizza.
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A
It was so funny. And he calls me up and he goes, you know, we went out for coffee and I said, that's great. And he goes, And I don't drink coffee. And I just thought it was so funny and so sweet. So to those of you who really don't know what's going on and are dying to know what's going on, there are ways in. And in our family, the way in that I have found is this way. It's the path of this feels important enough to me that I actually want to support it. So I'm just telling you this option is out there. And he didn't have to put it on the credit card. His $11 charge.
- [20:39]
B
Right. He could swing the $11.
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A
He could have figured it out. But he wanted me to know.
- [20:44]
B
Right. It was his way of letting you know. Yeah. And some kids, you can say, you hanging out with anybody? Is there anyone you're interested in? You know, my kids, I would say, as they. My older kids, my college kids, as they're exploring people they're interested in. The dating came much later. I would say they were hanging out with people and interested in people in a way that wasn't going to show up as a. As a date, as a charge on my credit card. And I often wouldn't hear about it for a while. Sometimes I wouldn't hear about it until it was. That was no longer a person of interest.
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A
Poi.
- [21:24]
B
Yes. Sometimes I would hear about it because it became something more than a person of interest. But one of the things they told me is that in college at least, and I haven't heard the same in high school, that there's like a pressure, that if you've been hooking up with someone for more than a couple weeks, there is social pressure. So peer influence, peer pressure to kind of make a decision about the future of that relationship that you are not. It's not socially accepted, susceptible to just be hooking up with someone for a long period of time without sort of making a commitment or deciding it wasn't. It's not gonna go any further. Which I think is a very interesting thing, because when we talk about hookup culture, it sounds like it's just like a melee, and there are no rules and no expectations. But the kids themselves have created often, not always, because there is confusion, particularly with terms like situationship, which means everything and nothing. There are some sort of, like, within their. Their culture, some rules about what's acceptable, what's not acceptable. When do you need to kind of make a decision? When do you need to commit? And then here's what's super interesting. Cara and I was so struck by this. When they commit, there's Like a formal.
- [22:50]
A
Right.
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B
Asking out. There's like almost like a proposal of sorts.
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A
Oh, it's that it's very formal.
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B
That's like you take someone out to dinner, to a nice dinner. Your credit card charge would have looked a lot different. And you've like formally asked somebody out and.
- [23:08]
A
And it can be weeks or months. Correct. Or the relationship is rolling. Like this might be someone you have met. Your child might have brought this person home and introduced you. There's like y. And yes, it's really interesting.
- [23:23]
B
It's somewhere interesting. Like it's like, oh, this is also casual and chaotic. But in fact there are rules to this game and some of those rules are actually pretty strict and there's expectations. And related to that, making it formal is what kids call the hard launch.
- [23:45]
A
And then I'm just going to jump to the other end.
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B
Wait. I just want to define what a hard launch is.
- [23:51]
A
Go for it, Go for it.
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B
Because for people it actually has no play on words and nothing like, oh yeah, nothing. It's not like dirty. A hard launch is when you formally on social media announce someone as your girlfriend or boyfriend or significant other. And there's. You post a picture of you and this other person either in a dump with several photos or just a photo.
- [24:19]
A
Not a picture of you in a dump. In a photo dump.
- [24:23]
B
In a physical dump. In a physical dump. Right. In a photo. Several photos. And you know, the photo they choose, they get permission from the other person where the photo lives and the series of photos that are.
- [24:37]
A
It's fascinating.
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B
Put we had something so interesting happen. I posted a series of pictures from Parents Weekend this year and it was the first time my son's girlfriend. I had permission, I got permission to post the specific picture. I had permission to post a picture of her with us. Right. I went through all appropriate channels and I posted it. And the my photo, middle aged, boring me. The post got shared, shared like a hundred times because it was the first time my son's girlfriend was like pictured with our family. It was. So I had like hard launched his relationship in my Instagram account. Not on purpose and with permission, but it was like ostensibly I was then involved in a quote, hard launch.
- [25:30]
A
And I just want to jump to the end of the relationship for a second and put the that sort of bookend on it as well, which is the formality of the breakup, which can be as timed, coordinated and formalized as the launch. This is endlessly surprising to me. I don't know why I'm still surprised by it, but especially at moments of transition, end of high school, for instance, everyone's graduating, people are moving on and doing other things. There will be kids who have been informal relationships or informal relationships, but the ones who have labels, and you are my boyfriend or girlfriend or whatever you're calling each other. And they will set a time and a date for their breakup. So you can like, literally, it is calendared. We are, we're going to stay together until July 15th at 9am and then we're gonna break up and we're moving on. And I have asked countless kids who do this. Explain it to me again, explain it
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B
to me one more time.
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A
Like I just don't get it. And to them it's extraordinarily rational. It's as rational as the hard launch. It's very interesting.
- [26:51]
B
And the counter to that is ghosting.
- [26:55]
A
Oh yeah.
- [26:56]
B
Which is, I mean, I would say typically does not happen in a committed long term relationship, but could happen in, you know, a flirtation, in a hookup relationship where basically one person just disappears from the other person online. They stop responding to DMS or texts or snaps or any of that. Maybe they even block them on social media. So this is a moment, Cara, where we've talked about like nice, different on ramping and the rules amongst the kids and our, you know, some of our expectations on parents and our sort of our confusion. This is a place I want to talk for a minute about how we transmit our values to our kids and how we communicate with them even in a world we don't totally understand about how to treat someone else with respect and dignity and how to stand up for themselves or manage it when they don't feel like they're being treated with respect and dignity.
- [27:56]
A
And let me say this goes back to like, you could start this with third and fourth graders who have their first crush. Okay? We're not talking about mature or semi mature relationships here. This is, this is sort of a fundamental. And I think one of the important bridges here going from ghosting to this conversation in particular, is that we know, when you look at behavioral science, we know that intermittent reinforcers are the things that work the most effectively. What does that mean? Goes back to rat in a cage pushing a lever for a pellet. And if every time you push the lever you get a pellet, that is a predictable reinforcer. I know I push the lever, I get a pellet versus pushing the lever and sometimes getting a pellet and sometimes not getting a pellet. And I don't know when it's going to happen. That is an intermittent reinforcer. And we know intermittent reinforcement is the most powerful kind. When you don't know what the outcome is going to be, it's the most powerful kind. In fact, you know, very interestingly, when I was reading through a lot of the articles written about transcripts of the big social media trials that have been happening recently, one of the big claims against the social media companies is that they are built, their algorithms are built on intermittent reinforcement. That is what keeps people going back. That's the argument against social media companies that is being used the most consistently. That is what happens with intermittent ghosting. So when kids, whether they're in fourth grade or in eighth grade or they're 40 years old, when the person who has captured their attention or their heart sometimes responds and sometimes doesn't that and there's no through line, that is the thing that sucks them in. Right? And as the parent who is trying to support a kid, if you're looking at a spectrum of this is easy to this is hard, I think that's the hardest because that's the one that we all relate to. We've all been there and we've experienced it and it feels the worst.
- [30:18]
B
So I will share that I've had a witnessed with kids in my own house sort of exploring, you know, quote talking to someone. In this case, they were actually talking on the phone or facetiming and then the phone call stopped or the noise stopped. And so I said to one of my kids, hey, you know, I know you were talking to this person for a while, like what happened? And he said, oh yeah, I just, I, you know, I just realized I wasn't interested in her that way. And I said, okay. I said, how did you let her know that you weren't interested? And you know, he said, I, well, I texted her and I, and I told her and I have no idea if that's true or not. What I said next was, sweetie, it's up to you. You should be with or not with people. Like, that's your call. My responsibility is to make sure that you know that when you decide someone isn't for you, that you end things respectfully, that you don't just disappear, that you let them know, hey, you know, it was great to talk to you, but like I'm, I just want to be friends. Whatever it is, you have to treat other people with respect. I didn't litigate with him exactly what he did or didn't do in this case, but I did reiterate to him the values that I hope he will live. Because here's the thing. Car. When our kids become teenagers and college students and young adults, we don't control what they do. All we can do is continue to communicate with them about how we hope they treat other people. And on the flip side, and let's explore this for a little bit, you know, make sure that they themselves are being treated in a way that feels good. And the big question here is, what is our role as parents when we're concerned about a relationship, its dynamics, how are kids being treated sometimes how they're treating someone else? Like, because we don't know what exactly what's on. Going, going on. And we. If we get any of the story, we only get a piece of the story. So how do we, like, what's our job here as parents of. Of kids this age?
- [32:20]
A
And you know, it's funny, Vanessa is. I don't think it's that complicated. I think it's the same as our job in every other corner of their life. It's to keep them safe and healthy. It's just that this elicits some sort of real emotional reaction from us consistently in a way that maybe other issues don't. Maybe getting a pimple might elicit that emotional response for some people, but not everyone. This relationship, one, it's like a trigger for most, which is interesting, but I think our role is literally to keep them safe and healthy. And what does that look like? It looks like no judgment, sitting and listening, layering on our own values where we feel that it's important. Recognizing our kids hopefully will share our values, but they won't always. And then I think, personally, I think most importantly is making sure that they understand what a healthy, safe relationship looks like. We'll be right back, but first, a word from our sponsors.
- [33:35]
B
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- [34:06]
A
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- [34:37]
B
So we did an episode now a while ago with Bella Oneh on healthy and unhealthy relationships. At the time, she was at One Love foundation, which is a great organization. We also in our hub and the Less Awkward hub, have a few lessons on healthy and unhealthy relationships for kids of different ages. So if you're a member, go check those out. If you're not a member, go to our website, Less awkward dot com. Become a member. It is worth every penny. And kids themselves are having lots and lots of conversations about whether relationships are healthy or unhealthy. They talk about it, they see stuff on social media. They're learning about it in school. If they are learning our health and sex ed curriculum, they're really learning about it in school. So this is not a foreign conversation for them. I've heard teenagers say to me, oh, this is unhealthy relationship. It's very controlling. Oh, you know, I think this relationship is verging on emotionally abusive. I mean, they have a lot of language and you might say, oh, they're over pathologizing in this case. I actually love that they're going deep on this stuff, that they're thinking about it. They're looking out for friends. As parents, we want to make ourselves available, as you said. Cara, listening. We want to make ourselves available. We want to remind our kids, hey, I have no agenda here. I am just available as your parent. I love you. I want you to feel valued and happy. Like, if you ever need to talk, I am here. And you say that one week. And then if you are having concerns and you've got some spidey sense, offer it up again. Hey, just wanted you to know I'm here. That's if you have a sense if things are not going well, if you have a kid who is in a breakup. I mean, one of my kids early in high school had a breakup. It turned out he was cheated on. And he didn't tell me for a few days and he was really down. And then I sort of was like, hey, you don't seem like yourself. And then he let me know and I was just like, I am so sorry. I didn't rail against the other kid. I didn't badmouth anyone else. My whole job was to be there as emotional support for my kid. And. And he was like, I'm really sad and I Said, I bet you are. And then, you know, a week later, he'd say, I'm so surprised. Like, I'm still feeling really bummed about it. And I said, yeah, I bet. Like, I'm here if you want to talk, right? It was just like. It was just like the training wheels. I was just acting as the training wheels as he was going off riding. Sometimes they have fights. They have big fights, and you're like, you want to be like, oh, yeah, I never liked that kid anyways. And then they get back together, and you're like, oh, my God, I've totally. So you want to. You really want to measure, not, like, say what you need if you're worried about your kid's health and safety, but be aware that this fight may not be ending the relationship, and they may be back together, and that kid may be back in your house and all of that stuff. So just keep that in mind.
- [37:42]
A
But one of the issues is that our kids will often dump on us, right?
- [37:47]
B
The bad stuff.
- [37:48]
A
The bad stuff. And that is a privilege to be the person who they unload on. And yet sometimes you do get all the negative stuff, and you don't know when things are going well, or you don't know when things are resolved. And you are left holding this morass of really uncomfortable facts that your kid has shared with you. Something that has been said to them, something that has been done to them, and you're sitting in your seat trying to make sense of all that, and they've moved on. Maybe they. They've resolved it all and they're back together. Maybe they've literally moved on, and they're like, I'm done with this. And I'm so. I do think it is really important that we communicate with the kids who trust us enough to share with us. Hey, you gotta give me a full circle here. You gotta tell me when things get better. I'm thrilled. You'll dump on me. But, like, I'm carrying this. You know, I'm carrying this, right?
- [38:47]
B
And on the flip side, sometimes these kids become really significant. Others become big parts of our families, right? They spend a lot of time. We get to see how loving and caring their relationship is.
- [38:59]
A
They're awesome.
- [39:01]
B
They're awesome. We get close to them. We hope the relationship never ends. Right? That is one of the things I think about all the time, particularly now that I have older kids who are moving into young adulthood. I think a lot about, how can I be a warm, welcoming person and keep to the boundary that this is, you know, my Kids relationship, not my relationship. This is my kids relationship. I can support it and foster it and create a welcoming space without inserting myself into the relationship, without making it so that my kid is worried about breaking up with or not staying with or whatever because they're worried how I'm gonna feel. That's something we hear from kids all the time. I stayed with them longer because I was worried my mom was gonna be upset or my dad was gonna be upset.
- [39:54]
A
Okay, but wait a second.
- [39:56]
B
Yes.
- [39:56]
A
What do you do when you know it's the wrong person? What do you do when you conceive, Vanessa? That it's not just like it's not the person I would choose, but it's like, oh, it is not the person I would choose.
- [40:12]
B
So I would divide that into am I concerned about my kids health and safety? In which case I would have a direct conversation about my concerns and I would enlist the help of mental health provider or another mentor or another trusted adult who my kid might feel more comfortable talking to. So that's if I'm really concerned, if I'm like, this isn't the right person for them. We all had relationships who weren't the right people for us. We all had to go through that journey and figure it out. And again, I would just make myself available. I would maybe if I had spent time with them and observed some stuff that may be a little bit concerning, I might say, you know, I was so struck by what happened this past weekend, I'm just like wondering, I couldn't tell from your face what you were thinking. I'm wondering like what your reaction was because it, it just seems surprising to me. Right. I would ask open ended questions, I would share my observations, I would try to elicit things. But again, the more we judge, the more we say to them, oh, dude, you got to get out of this relationship. Which I've never obviously said to one of my kids. The more they're going to cleave to that person, the longer they're going to stay in that relationship.
- [41:27]
A
I'm going to, I'm going to throw up a big but here, which is. You said. I've never obviously said it. It's not obvious because there are people who are listening right now who have kids who are in relationships where you have to say that.
- [41:42]
B
When do you have to say it? If you're not worried about their health and safety?
- [41:46]
A
No, no, no. When you're worried about the health.
- [41:48]
B
No, health and safety is a different category. That's what I'm saying. That I would say something, I'd be direct. I would enlist other trusted adults. I would enlist mental health providers. I'm saying the other bucket, where I'm just like, it's like, not what I thought. Or like, oh, this kid's kind of mediocre. Right. In that case.
- [42:08]
A
Okay. Clear distinction.
- [42:10]
B
You keep your mouth shut.
- [42:12]
A
Yes.
- [42:12]
B
You let your kid figure out like the journey. And, and when you have self reflection, what you think? That's a really good question. I would probably say, what do you imagine? I think I would turn the question back on them. I'm not sure I would. Whatever you say can't be unsaid.
- [42:34]
A
Yeah. That's a good strategy. I've been asked, I've definitely been asked both by my kids and by kids who are not my kids.
- [42:42]
B
Yeah.
- [42:42]
A
And let's just say my daughter asked me once and then came back and said, why didn't you answer that honestly when the relationship ended? And I said, because you can never, you don't know where it's going. And you can never unsay what you said. I mean, I literally, it was, that was the scenario and the request that I got was, next time, tell me if I can't see it myself next time. And I said, that's really interesting. And I said, I, I won't. I can't.
- [43:20]
B
Right.
- [43:21]
A
I can't. It's not fair to you. Like, it's not my relationship. And it's been an ongoing, very interesting conversation. Right.
- [43:29]
B
I mean, what I would say in response is it's actually not my job to tell you whether relationship is right for you. It's my job to help you build the skill of self reflection and awareness to determine for yourself. So with my kids, I'm more interested in helping them think about it and talk out loud about a relationship with me rather than me telling them. And again, as you said earlier, Cara, this is true of anything we talk to them about.
- [43:57]
A
That's right.
- [43:58]
B
A situation at a party, a situation with a teacher, a romantic relationship. It's all about building their skills of introspection, of emotional intelligence, of self reflection so that they get stronger and stronger in all of those ways in order to determine for themselves. Because we know the answer to so many things. We know the outcome for so many things. And we don't tell them in those because they don't want to hear it. And it doesn't help them for us to just give them the answer or tell them.
- [44:28]
A
I mean, this is where I would go back to the sort of helicopter snowplow parent descriptor And I would say if you ever needed a very clear cut argument for why that doesn't work, romantic relationships, you cannot helicopter through them. You cannot snowplow through them. Kids need to learn for themselves. They need to figure out what makes them them happy. And our goal, our goal is to grow and evolve with the kids in our lives so that the relationships stay connected, so the relationships thrive. Our relationship with them thrives. And how do we do that? My thinking here is we do it in the same way that we advise engaging in conversations around romantic relationships. We do it with love and support and no judgment and our hands off their steering wheel.
- [45:23]
B
And if you're itching with curiosity to ask your kid or to find out from your kid what is going on in their lives, a couple places to start are, I just listen to this podcast episode and it's like, about teen romantic relationships and all this stuff. And I'm just so curious, like, what's happening in your school? What's happening in your friend group? Are people dating? Are they not dating? Are they hooking up? Like, is everybody just friends? Like, I just want to get a sense, right? It's always great to start with the friends, like, what's happening in general. And I personally think you are allowed to sometimes ask, hey, is there anyone you're interested in? I haven't, like, I know you've been out and hanging out with lots of different people. I'm curious if any of them, there's anything like, romantic going on and you may get shut down and that's fine. Or you may get surprised and your kid may share something with you, something new that you, that you didn't know.
- [46:16]
A
I mean, like everything else, the first time we ask, they're probably not going to share as openly or at all if we keep asking and we lean into the curiosity. They know we care. They know we care. So, Vanessa, I think you have inspired me to go ask a whole host of new questions.
- [46:43]
B
Throw me under coffee next.
- [46:45]
A
Yeah, that's the question.
- [46:47]
B
And I just want to make one comment which we didn't cover today, but we will cover another episode, which are the expectations about who pays for what, where they go, the kinds of places they attend. We will do another episode on kind of what the social mores are these days and what happens with young people, because that is a whole other surprising world.
- [47:12]
A
Obviously, I pay for coffee.
- [47:15]
B
Yes. So if your kids are asking if they can go get Starbucks, tell them it's on Cara's credit card.
- [47:23]
A
Bye, Vanessa.
- [47:23]
B
Cara, thank you so much for listening. You can email us with questions, feedback, or episode requests@podcastawkward.com if you want to
- [47:36]
A
learn more about what we do to make this whole stage of life less awkward for everyone involved. Our parent membership, our school health ed curriculum, our keynote talks, and more are
- [47:48]
B
all@lessawkward.com and if you want products that make puberty so much more comfortable, visit myumla.com.
- [48:05]
A
Close your eyes. Listen to Monday.com feel the sensation of an AI work platform so flexible and intuitive it feels like it was built just for you. Now open your eyes, go to Monday.com
- [48:17]
B
start for free, and finally breathe.