June 26, 2025 • 21 mins
“Having your heart right towards your child is probably the most important thing you can do... but how you communicate is right up there too.”
In this episode of I’ll Do Better Tomorrow, we share two powerful parenting wins from our own family this week. From navigating bedtime battles with our youngest to having a meaningful (and sometimes hilarious) conversation about consent and relationships with our teens, this is real-life parenting in action.
These are the conversations that create connection, foster trust, and build resilience — and we’re sharing exactly how we did it.
KEY POINTS:
- A Bedtime Breakthrough: How revisiting the basics (routines, rituals, and conversations) transformed bedtime struggles with our youngest daughter.
- The Power of the 3 E’s: Explore, Explain, Empower — a simple yet profound communication framework that creates buy-in, not battles.
- Tricky Talks That Stick: Why our once-a-month ‘tough talks’ with our teens have become weekly — and how they’re building confidence and safety around topics like consent, relationships, pressure, and boundaries.
- Start Early, Talk Often: Even our 11-year-old stayed engaged in a complex conversation about consent, showing that these conversations are never too early (or too late).
- It’s Not About Perfection: Success comes from showing up, leaning in, and keeping the conversations going — not from getting it right every time.
QUOTE OF THE EPISODE:
“When kids understand the rationale, things go so much better.”
RESOURCES MENTIONED:
- Happy Families – Resources for a happier family.
- Consent.gov.au – Consent resources and the Consent Can’t Wait campaign.
- Parental Guidance TV Show – Channel 9 and 9Now.
ACTION STEPS FOR PARENTS:
- Use the 3 E’s: Next time you face a challenge, pause and ask yourself — have I explored their perspective, explained mine, and empowered them to help solve it?
- Rethink Bedtime: If routines are breaking down, revisit rituals that worked when they were younger — and involve your child in creating the new plan.
- Schedule Tricky Talks: Don’t wait for problems to arise. Make space for regular conversations about emotions, consent, relationships, and boundaries.
- Make It Fun (and Safe): Keep these talks light, warm, and open — banter, laughter, and snacks help!
- Remember the Timing: Big conversations are most effective when emotions are calm — not in the middle of conflict.
- Share This Episode: Know someone struggling with bedtime battles or tricky teen conversations? Flick this episode their way.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
Having your heart right towards your child is probably the
most important thing you can do when it comes to
your parenting. Right up beside it, though, is how you communicate.
And today we're going to share with you a couple
of communication wins that we've been having in our family today.
Welcome to the Happy Families podcast. So good to have
you along real parenting solutions every day. This is Australia's
(00:26):
most downloaded parenting podcast. We are Justin and Kylie Coulson.
Hun Just before we get into today's pod, got an
email the other day from a fifteen year old who said,
don't mention my name, don't tell anyone even what state
I'm from, but he really wanted me to know some
stuff about how the work that we're doing is impacting
not just parents, but teenagers. You ready for this, Okay?
(00:49):
I almost intrigue. I almost told you what this teenager's
name was, but I'm just going to read the email.
I'm a fifteen year old and I totally agree with
what you're saying about social media. I've had apps like
Snapchat and Instagram for two years and honestly I regret it.
How often do you hear fifteen year old say that
they regret their screen usage. You know what a more
interesting conversation is, how often do you hear fifteen year
(01:11):
olds or anyone say I'm really glad I've got this.
It's making a positive difference in my life. Anyway, this
person says, I regret it. It's addictive, waste time. I
dropped grades in school because of social media and it's
messed with mental health. One of my mates wasn't meant
to get Instagram until sixteen, but he just installed it anyway,
shows how easy it is for teams to ignore their
parents and get sucked in. I found I got Instagram
(01:33):
due to feeling like I was missing out with all
my mates having it. Giving you kids social media is
like handing them a weapon. It's also killing real life confidence.
I've lost confidence talking to girls in a normal conversation.
Like It's like I have social anxiety and another one
hundred percent I don't have it as I'm a really
confident person who's very popular at school. And because of
all the fake stuff online, especially from guys like Andrew Tate,
(01:53):
I've lost a lot of confidence. But I've started turning
things around. People like David Goggins helped me focus and
build discipline. Thanks for your time. Please don't say where
I'm from or my name. Really appreciate what you do.
Cheers and Kylie. I just thought it's worth sharing it
because sometimes as parents we feel like we are banging
our head against the wall, especially with teens and social media,
(02:15):
and then you get a fifteen year old who sends
an email like that.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
If only more of them were like that.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah, we've had this experiment in our home for the
last three weeks with our fifteen year old. And the
other day she accidentally slipped up and said that not
having a phone for the last few weeks has been
one of the best things that's happened to her. Did
she She kind of didn't mean to say. She was
talking to her sisters and it just kind of came
out of her mouth. And then she looked at me
and went, oh oh. I put a hand over her
(02:42):
mouth and said, I didn't really mean it like that.
I must really think. I think I heard something really
cool there.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
That's awesome.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
All right, I'll do better tomorrow. This is where we
have a look at what's happened in the last week.
We talk about what's working and what's not working. I've
got a big success story today. What about you?
Speaker 2 (03:00):
I think I'm going to chalk my one up to
success too.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Okay, well, your first, ladies, four gents, off you go.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Oh you're so kind. Well.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
I read an article the other day on one of
those news websites, and they were making the argument that
chivalry has died.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Chivalry has died.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Yeah, I mean some people are saying that chivalry was
just sort of some benevolent sexism or whatever. I don't care.
You go first, thank you, You're welcome. Let's sear the story.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
So the other day I had a consult with Emily's
OT and we were talking about some of the challenges
we've been experienced, I think over the last little while,
especially within the homeschooling space, and trying to work out
how I can be more supportive of her.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
We're highlighting for those who are knew to the pod,
Emily is our youngest. She is eleven and being homeschool.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
And what frustrates me more times than not when we
engage with professionals is that more times than not, they
actually don't share anything new, but they bring to the
forefront things that we already know. Yeah, and it feels
frustrating because you're spending this money so that somebody can
tell you something that you already know.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
I just want the pill, I want the secret sauce.
I want the silver bullet.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
And as we were talking, we were discussing bedtime because
this has been a really, really big struggle with Emily.
She is such an engaged kid and absolutely loves working
on different little projects that bedtime seems like such a
bane in her existence. She just doesn't have a desire
(04:31):
to go to bed. She doesn't and she doesn't show
any signs of being tired or frustrated until you ask
her to go to bed.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Yeah, so she's not playing up, she's not being rambunctious
or obnoxious. She's not doing anything wrong. She's just reading
or doing lego or painting, or she's been creative and productive,
like she's always doing a good thing. When you say, hey, kid,
time for bed, it's getting late, and it's just.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
It causes friction. Not all the time, but from time
to time it causes significant friction.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
There are a couple of things that make it. I
know I'm interrupting, but it's worth highlighting why this is
such a challenge Number one, I travel a lot, so
your capacity to be fully available is reduced because I'm
often not home, and so there's inconsistency and routine. Number two.
She's the youngest of six girls, so all of her
sisters are in their mid to late teens and beyond,
(05:19):
and they're all staying up way later than she's supposed
to stay up as an eleven year old, so it's
really easy for her to just sort of hang out
with everybody else and.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Well, and there's almost five years between her and her
next sister, so she in a half years. She's young
by a long stretch, and so she's watching what everyone
else is able to do, and she just doesn't understand
why she can't be a part of it. Not that
she wants to be a part of what they're doing,
she just wants to continue doing what she's doing. And
if they're allowed to do it, why can't I?
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Yeah, I want to be up.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
She has a real thing with social justice, and right
now she doesn't feel like it's it's in her best
interest to go to bed when everyone else gets to
have an extra few hours of time, two hours to
work with the things that they love. But as we talked.
It just occurred to me, and it wasn't so much
that she told me. It was that as we discussed
(06:07):
it and just talked through things, she actually said when
she was younger, what worked with Emily. And I thought
about it, and I thought about our circumstances, which were
very different to what we're dealing with now, and I said, well,
we'd usually did in the lights. I'd put some oils
on her, the diffusial would come out, we'd sing some songs,
we'd read some stories. Obviously there was a bath in there,
(06:29):
like all of the things, a.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Bit a soft music or a song together or whatever.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
And as I said that, it was like, oh, yeah,
we don't do any of that anymore, Like literally, we
don't do any of that at all. And part of
that is because the house is a busy house. There
were there are so many moving parts all the time,
and she kind of just gets dragged along with it all,
which she's really happy to be dragged along. But as
(06:56):
we continued the discussion, I just thought, you know what,
I probably need to refocus on what a structured bedtime
would look like for her to help her through this process.
And so a few days later I sat down with
Emily and we had a conversation and I explained to
her that i'd been speaking with her OT and we'd
had a conversation about some of the struggles we were
(07:17):
having at home, and one of them was bedtime. And
I said, how do you feel about bedtime? And she said,
I just think it's really unnecessary.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
Bedtime is unnecessary.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
I said, yeah, you really don't like going to bed,
do you? And she said, no, Mum, I'm not tired.
She's like, I'm not tired. And I'm like, yeah, I know.
You could read. Like put a book in front of
me and I'll read for about I don't know, half
a page and I'm gone. She can read pages like chapters,
just keeps going. So, as we talked about things, I said,
(07:50):
do you remember some of the things we used to
do when you were little? And so she listed them
all of them and she said, oh, yeah, I really
liked it when we did that. And so I said
to her, do you think maybe we could have a
discussion around what bed time would look like? What time
do you think you should go to bed? This is
gonna blow you right.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
What did she say?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
She told me that she should be lights out and
asleep by eight thirty.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
That's I mean, that's perfectly reasonable. But if you'd tell
her that at eight thirty, yes, it's World War three.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
I looked at her and I was like, you think
that's that's a really fair time to go to bed,
and she said, yeah, it is, but once I'm twelve,
it needs to go to nine.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
All right, okay, all right?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
And I said, okay, so if eight point thirty is
lights out, what other things do you like to do
before you go to bed? And there was an acknowledgment
she loves to read, and so I said, okay, so
if you're going to read, you usually would love to
have a good half an hour, so you actually need
to be in bed by eight o'clock. And I said,
but to get to that point, what do we need
(08:50):
to do? And so she listed a few things that
she needed to do, and so we talked through it.
By the end of it, we had number one total compliant.
She was one hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I would go beyond that. This is not about compliance.
This is about commitment. You've moved from compulsion in compliance
to commitment to compliance.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Even down to we do all in after dinner.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
So for those of you who have missed the memo.
All In is we finished dinner and everyone comes into
the kitchen and we're all in the kitchen tidying things
up and resetting the house for the morning.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
And so I just said, in relation to all in,
what job would you like to do? I said, do
you want to pack away the table? And she said no,
because I've done that in the past and it's a
really quick job. And then everyone gets me in trouble
because they're still doing work and I don't have to.
She said, can I put the dishes away?
Speaker 1 (09:38):
The dish dryers are going to be so happy about that,
because they always complain about having to dry and put away.
I don't understand why it's such a big deal. Why
is that such a big deal? Like, if it's already
in your hand, take two steps to the cupboard and
put it in the cupboard. No, I just want to
put on the bench, like seriously.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
So another thing she really hates is having a bath
every night. She hates it. I said, you know what
I said, Actually I'm thinking about it. I brought that
lavender bubble b stuff. I think that that would be
a really good way to signal to your body that
it's time to slow down. How do you feel about
having a bath every night? And she went, yeah, that
sounds really good. So we are yet to actually put
(10:15):
this into action.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yeah, we've had a busy time since you had the conversation,
but tonight.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Tonight's the night, and I'm actually really excited about it.
We even talked about no TV after dinner and she's
like totally on board. I can't tell you how big
of a deal this conversation was and how amazing it was.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
So success comes from the three e's explore explain in power,
You've developed a structure by providing a rational for white
matters and then getting her buy in, getting her commitment,
getting her contribution towards making evenings work. It's a win.
It's a win all the way round.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
There is one cave here.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
I promised her that Thursdays was actually a night off
from the routine and structure. And I have a class
that we teach, so we're not here and she usually
gets to watch the TV while we're gone, and I
said that that was okay.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
Thursdays is a play, play as much as you want night.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
Yeah, she has one night.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
Well, that probably makes it feel really good about life
as well. Yeah, okay, after the break the big win
that I've had in a conversation with our.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Kids, Colie, I didn't ask you, what is the central
take home message from your big win with Emily in
terms of putting together an evening structure to get nighttimes working.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
It seems ridiculously simple, and it seems like it's literally
what we come back to every time. But the three e's, Explore, Explain,
empower are the answer to nearly every challenge that we
have with our kids, literally.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Of effective discipline, hence the name.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
It is just so profoundly simple when we get the
timing right and when we have emotions in check. Okay,
if I had have tried to have that conversation with
her at night time when we're trying to put her
to bed, it would have been a disaster. But I
picked at the right time to sit down with her, explore, explain,
(12:15):
and empower. And I'm really looking forward to next week's
I'll do bead tomorrow because we're going to have a
great week.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
I hope that it works. I just want to emphasize
how important is that when kids understand the rationale, things
go so much better. Okay, let's move on to my
older better tomorrow. I'm going to make my one fairly quick.
We have made quite a big deal on this podcast,
and I make a deal on parental guidance. I can't
say much, but I do emphasize that in our family,
(12:41):
on the first Sunday of every month, we sit down
with the kids. We have tough talks. We talk about tricky,
tricky and sticky situations and what our children can do
to be safe and healthy and make wise choices. We've
realized that once a month isn't enough. We have a
lot of kids, there's a lot of challenges, there's a
lot going on, and so what we've done is we've
decided that we're going to every week. So for the
last few weeks on Sundays, we sit down with the
(13:04):
kids for well. We promise them that if they will
contribute and participate and keep it tight and focus, that
will be done in what fifteen or twenty minutes. That's
the promise. I'm laughing. I'm laughing because not at you, No, because.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
We can't keep it tight and it's.
Speaker 1 (13:21):
Not our fault. No, they can't stay focused. But here's
the it's not even that.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
They can't stay focused. What they actually love is the
banter that results from this time together. Yeah, and it's
really frustrating because you want to get to the point.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Yeah, let's get this done. We said twenty minutes, you're
going to complain.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
But it's also really nice, totally to have them sit
there and just be grateful for the time that we
have together.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
And so a lot of parents will say to me,
I don't know how you get to sit my kids.
If I say we're going to sit down and have
a tricky talk, they won't even show up. And what
you're going to do is you've got to give them
good experiences. You've got to make this work for them.
And so we absolutely play on the fact that it's
only going to be ten or twenty minutes if the
kids play along, and whenever they talk for too long, like, well,
you were the one that made it go for too long,
(14:04):
not us. But they are actually enjoying it. So a
couple of weeks ago, I made a big deal here
on the podcast about how we talked about emotions and
how emotions work. Last week we talked about turning towards
one another rather than turning against and turning away from
one another. This week just gone as a result of
a I would say, a negative experience that one of
our daughters had with a guy who could not seem
(14:27):
to understand what no meant and provided a whole lot
of unwonted attention. That there was nothing catastrophic that occurred,
he just provided. He just would not stop putting pressure
on our daughter because he has a crush on her,
and he's clumsy and doesn't understand that no actually means no.
So we decided that we would have a consent conversation.
(14:47):
You can go to consent dot gov. Dou I'm an
ambassador for the Consent Can't Wait campaign the federal government's running,
and you can get a whole lot of resources from that.
In this instance, rather than using the resources, we just
had a fairly informal chat and I said to the girls,
based on the experience of one of your sisters. They
all knew what the experience was and what had happened
because we talked about it previously. They'd all sort of
(15:09):
shared their ideas about it. I said, let's talk about
the different ways that things can go wrong here. And
I just said, you shout out what you can think
of they said unwanted attention. They said, how do you
respond to pressure? I said, what do you owe somebody
when you go out with them? We talked about you
(15:30):
brought up the importance of letting guys take the lead,
and then one of the girls said, what are the
signs of interest in? What are the red flags? And
we just had, oh my goodness, the best conversation about
consent and dating and boys and relationships. It was just
so delightful. On unwanted attention. I said, well, what kind
of unwanted attention have you experienced or do your friends
(15:52):
talk about? And they said, physical touch, invading personal space,
getting spammed like just one one of them said when
people send root and inappropriate messages. One of them talked
about the male gaze being stared at, checked out. There
was harassing friends, there was ignoring requests for space, pressuring,
(16:13):
emotional manipulation. Like I'm sitting there going we're raising these
girls in a world where boys all too often don't
get it. If we had sons, I'd be reading this listen,
I'd be saying, mate, what are you going to do
about this? If a girl says she doesn't want your attention,
you need to actually honor that. You've got to respect that,
and she may actually want your attention more because you've
shown her that you know how to honor what she
asks for. Anyway, we talked all about all of those
(16:36):
things in terms of responding to pressure. Got a great
discussion about how boys generally tend to be the accelerated
girls are typically the break and we talked about how
that works and why, rightly or wrongly. I know a
lot of people will hear that and be really quite
upset and put out by it, but it's the reality
is what's going on. I brought up the idea that
if you go on a date with a guy, you
(16:58):
need to be really clear that you do not owe
him anything. You don't owe him a handhold or a hug,
a kiss, nothing like that. And that's just vitally important
that girls know they don't owe a guy anything just
because they're on a date. You talked about letting boys
take the lead, which I thought was kind of funny
(17:18):
because I'm the guy, and yet I'm really happy to
chime in and say, guys actually want to chase. If
it's too easy for a guy he is not that interested,
like there has to be some kind of chase and
he's got to be taking the lead. And we got
to talk about those signs of interest and the red flags.
It was just so inspiring. It was such a great conversation.
I just want to emphasize, if you've got kids, start
these conversations early. I can't believe I just said, if
(17:39):
you've got kids. Of course you've got kids, you listen
to the podcast seriously, start the conversations early, have them
often first Sunday of them, the first time of the
month might be enough. We've discovered that it's not enough.
We've got so much. We've got so much that we
want to explicitly teach our children that they're not just
going to absorb from the ether or from hanging around us.
I'm a professional speaker, and it's to me that I
(18:00):
give other people better content than I give my own kids.
And that's got to change. And so by doing this
every Sunday, the kids seem to be really enjoying it.
We're enjoying it. And the conversation is how long do
you reckon? That one went hour and twenty Yeah, it
was nearly ninety minutes.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
You know what I loved about that conversation. When you
think about the content of what we were talking about,
it would be very easy to suggest that an eleven
year old doesn't need to be a part of that,
that it's completely irrelevant to her, and that it's going
to go over ahead. But number one, not only did
(18:37):
our eleven year old stay involved in the conversation, she
actually provided quite a lot of comic relief as we
went through.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
She said some funny stuff.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
She wanted to be involved, and she had an answer
to a lot of the questions. And while they were
an eleven year old's viewpoint, they were appropriate.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
For an eleven year old, it was great.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
They were appropriate. That's right. But secondly, it means now
that as she does move into that space where that
becomes an issue.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
In seventeen years.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
She's comfortable having these conversations because we're having them regularly. Right,
This isn't something that we kind of you know, we
end up with a child who has a bad experience
when we go actually we probably should have this conversation
with you. This is about pre arming them so that
they don't find themselves in that position, and if they do,
they're empowered to know how to get.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Out and come and talk to us about it as well.
So we had an eleven year old, a fifteen year old,
a seveneen year old, a twenty two year old, and
a friend as well just happened to be here.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
Well, she's been to a few and she actually loves them.
That's her plan. She wants to be there every week.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
She's been the last couple and she's like, I just
want to keep on coming to these chats. I love
them how much.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
Fun Well, and the great thing about that is just
the acknowledgment for her, She's never had that. She hasn't
been in a home where her parents have sat down
have that conversation with her. And so while it's in
some ways null and void, it, she's past those experiences.
She's loving the fact that she's watching this unfold in
our home and just enjoying being a part of it.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
We need to wrap this up. We've talked for way
too long. A quick remind A Parental Guidance kicks off
on Monday night, Channel nine and nine, now seven thirty.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
I'm stocked up on popcorn.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
Yeah, yeah, We're going to have a bunch of people
around to our place for a parental Guidance part. Hey,
I can't believe I said it like that. Oh my goodness,
I'm so sorry. We really hope you have a great weekend.
The take our message from all of this is really
just if you talk to your kids, you have great
conversations if you can just make the effort be intentional
about it, sit down and talk to your kids. The
Happy Family's podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media.
(20:47):
We get all of our admin and research support from
Mim Hammond's. If you think that your family might be
happier because of this podcast episode, we'd love for you
to share it because it'll probably make other families happier
as well. Think of a friend that you could just
flick this one through to click a couple of buttons.
It'll take ten or twenty seconds, pass along and help
other families to be inspired and find joy and happiness
(21:08):
and flourish. If you like more information and more resources
about making your family happier, you'll find all of it
at Happy families dot com dot a
Having your heart right towards your child is probably the
most important thing you can do when it comes to
your parenting. Right up beside it, though, is how you communicate.
And today we're going to share with you a couple
of communication wins that we've been having in our family today.
Welcome to the Happy Families podcast. So good to have
you along real parenting solutions every day. This is Australia's
(00:26):
most downloaded parenting podcast. We are Justin and Kylie Coulson.
Hun Just before we get into today's pod, got an
email the other day from a fifteen year old who said,
don't mention my name, don't tell anyone even what state
I'm from, but he really wanted me to know some
stuff about how the work that we're doing is impacting
not just parents, but teenagers. You ready for this, Okay?
(00:49):
I almost intrigue. I almost told you what this teenager's
name was, but I'm just going to read the email.
I'm a fifteen year old and I totally agree with
what you're saying about social media. I've had apps like
Snapchat and Instagram for two years and honestly I regret it.
How often do you hear fifteen year old say that
they regret their screen usage. You know what a more
interesting conversation is, how often do you hear fifteen year
(01:11):
olds or anyone say I'm really glad I've got this.
It's making a positive difference in my life. Anyway, this
person says, I regret it. It's addictive, waste time. I
dropped grades in school because of social media and it's
messed with mental health. One of my mates wasn't meant
to get Instagram until sixteen, but he just installed it anyway,
shows how easy it is for teams to ignore their
parents and get sucked in. I found I got Instagram
(01:33):
due to feeling like I was missing out with all
my mates having it. Giving you kids social media is
like handing them a weapon. It's also killing real life confidence.
I've lost confidence talking to girls in a normal conversation.
Like It's like I have social anxiety and another one
hundred percent I don't have it as I'm a really
confident person who's very popular at school. And because of
all the fake stuff online, especially from guys like Andrew Tate,
(01:53):
I've lost a lot of confidence. But I've started turning
things around. People like David Goggins helped me focus and
build discipline. Thanks for your time. Please don't say where
I'm from or my name. Really appreciate what you do.
Cheers and Kylie. I just thought it's worth sharing it
because sometimes as parents we feel like we are banging
our head against the wall, especially with teens and social media,
(02:15):
and then you get a fifteen year old who sends
an email like that.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
If only more of them were like that.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Yeah, we've had this experiment in our home for the
last three weeks with our fifteen year old. And the
other day she accidentally slipped up and said that not
having a phone for the last few weeks has been
one of the best things that's happened to her. Did
she She kind of didn't mean to say. She was
talking to her sisters and it just kind of came
out of her mouth. And then she looked at me
and went, oh oh. I put a hand over her
(02:42):
mouth and said, I didn't really mean it like that.
I must really think. I think I heard something really
cool there.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
That's awesome.
Speaker 1 (02:50):
All right, I'll do better tomorrow. This is where we
have a look at what's happened in the last week.
We talk about what's working and what's not working. I've
got a big success story today. What about you?
Speaker 2 (03:00):
I think I'm going to chalk my one up to
success too.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
Okay, well, your first, ladies, four gents, off you go.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
Oh you're so kind. Well.
Speaker 1 (03:06):
I read an article the other day on one of
those news websites, and they were making the argument that
chivalry has died.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Chivalry has died.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Yeah, I mean some people are saying that chivalry was
just sort of some benevolent sexism or whatever. I don't care.
You go first, thank you, You're welcome. Let's sear the story.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
So the other day I had a consult with Emily's
OT and we were talking about some of the challenges
we've been experienced, I think over the last little while,
especially within the homeschooling space, and trying to work out
how I can be more supportive of her.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
We're highlighting for those who are knew to the pod,
Emily is our youngest. She is eleven and being homeschool.
Speaker 2 (03:43):
And what frustrates me more times than not when we
engage with professionals is that more times than not, they
actually don't share anything new, but they bring to the
forefront things that we already know. Yeah, and it feels
frustrating because you're spending this money so that somebody can
tell you something that you already know.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
I just want the pill, I want the secret sauce.
I want the silver bullet.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
And as we were talking, we were discussing bedtime because
this has been a really, really big struggle with Emily.
She is such an engaged kid and absolutely loves working
on different little projects that bedtime seems like such a
bane in her existence. She just doesn't have a desire
(04:31):
to go to bed. She doesn't and she doesn't show
any signs of being tired or frustrated until you ask
her to go to bed.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
Yeah, so she's not playing up, she's not being rambunctious
or obnoxious. She's not doing anything wrong. She's just reading
or doing lego or painting, or she's been creative and productive,
like she's always doing a good thing. When you say, hey, kid,
time for bed, it's getting late, and it's just.
Speaker 2 (04:53):
It causes friction. Not all the time, but from time
to time it causes significant friction.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
There are a couple of things that make it. I
know I'm interrupting, but it's worth highlighting why this is
such a challenge Number one, I travel a lot, so
your capacity to be fully available is reduced because I'm
often not home, and so there's inconsistency and routine. Number two.
She's the youngest of six girls, so all of her
sisters are in their mid to late teens and beyond,
(05:19):
and they're all staying up way later than she's supposed
to stay up as an eleven year old, so it's
really easy for her to just sort of hang out
with everybody else and.
Speaker 2 (05:27):
Well, and there's almost five years between her and her
next sister, so she in a half years. She's young
by a long stretch, and so she's watching what everyone
else is able to do, and she just doesn't understand
why she can't be a part of it. Not that
she wants to be a part of what they're doing,
she just wants to continue doing what she's doing. And
if they're allowed to do it, why can't I?
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Yeah, I want to be up.
Speaker 2 (05:46):
She has a real thing with social justice, and right
now she doesn't feel like it's it's in her best
interest to go to bed when everyone else gets to
have an extra few hours of time, two hours to
work with the things that they love. But as we talked.
It just occurred to me, and it wasn't so much
that she told me. It was that as we discussed
(06:07):
it and just talked through things, she actually said when
she was younger, what worked with Emily. And I thought
about it, and I thought about our circumstances, which were
very different to what we're dealing with now, and I said, well,
we'd usually did in the lights. I'd put some oils
on her, the diffusial would come out, we'd sing some songs,
we'd read some stories. Obviously there was a bath in there,
(06:29):
like all of the things, a.
Speaker 1 (06:30):
Bit a soft music or a song together or whatever.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
And as I said that, it was like, oh, yeah,
we don't do any of that anymore, Like literally, we
don't do any of that at all. And part of
that is because the house is a busy house. There
were there are so many moving parts all the time,
and she kind of just gets dragged along with it all,
which she's really happy to be dragged along. But as
(06:56):
we continued the discussion, I just thought, you know what,
I probably need to refocus on what a structured bedtime
would look like for her to help her through this process.
And so a few days later I sat down with
Emily and we had a conversation and I explained to
her that i'd been speaking with her OT and we'd
had a conversation about some of the struggles we were
(07:17):
having at home, and one of them was bedtime. And
I said, how do you feel about bedtime? And she said,
I just think it's really unnecessary.
Speaker 1 (07:26):
Bedtime is unnecessary.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
I said, yeah, you really don't like going to bed,
do you? And she said, no, Mum, I'm not tired.
She's like, I'm not tired. And I'm like, yeah, I know.
You could read. Like put a book in front of
me and I'll read for about I don't know, half
a page and I'm gone. She can read pages like chapters,
just keeps going. So, as we talked about things, I said,
(07:50):
do you remember some of the things we used to
do when you were little? And so she listed them
all of them and she said, oh, yeah, I really
liked it when we did that. And so I said
to her, do you think maybe we could have a
discussion around what bed time would look like? What time
do you think you should go to bed? This is
gonna blow you right.
Speaker 1 (08:07):
What did she say?
Speaker 2 (08:08):
She told me that she should be lights out and
asleep by eight thirty.
Speaker 1 (08:14):
That's I mean, that's perfectly reasonable. But if you'd tell
her that at eight thirty, yes, it's World War three.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
I looked at her and I was like, you think
that's that's a really fair time to go to bed,
and she said, yeah, it is, but once I'm twelve,
it needs to go to nine.
Speaker 1 (08:28):
All right, okay, all right?
Speaker 2 (08:29):
And I said, okay, so if eight point thirty is
lights out, what other things do you like to do
before you go to bed? And there was an acknowledgment
she loves to read, and so I said, okay, so
if you're going to read, you usually would love to
have a good half an hour, so you actually need
to be in bed by eight o'clock. And I said,
but to get to that point, what do we need
(08:50):
to do? And so she listed a few things that
she needed to do, and so we talked through it.
By the end of it, we had number one total compliant.
She was one hundred percent.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
I would go beyond that. This is not about compliance.
This is about commitment. You've moved from compulsion in compliance
to commitment to compliance.
Speaker 2 (09:10):
Even down to we do all in after dinner.
Speaker 1 (09:12):
So for those of you who have missed the memo.
All In is we finished dinner and everyone comes into
the kitchen and we're all in the kitchen tidying things
up and resetting the house for the morning.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
And so I just said, in relation to all in,
what job would you like to do? I said, do
you want to pack away the table? And she said no,
because I've done that in the past and it's a
really quick job. And then everyone gets me in trouble
because they're still doing work and I don't have to.
She said, can I put the dishes away?
Speaker 1 (09:38):
The dish dryers are going to be so happy about that,
because they always complain about having to dry and put away.
I don't understand why it's such a big deal. Why
is that such a big deal? Like, if it's already
in your hand, take two steps to the cupboard and
put it in the cupboard. No, I just want to
put on the bench, like seriously.
Speaker 2 (09:52):
So another thing she really hates is having a bath
every night. She hates it. I said, you know what
I said, Actually I'm thinking about it. I brought that
lavender bubble b stuff. I think that that would be
a really good way to signal to your body that
it's time to slow down. How do you feel about
having a bath every night? And she went, yeah, that
sounds really good. So we are yet to actually put
(10:15):
this into action.
Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yeah, we've had a busy time since you had the conversation,
but tonight.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Tonight's the night, and I'm actually really excited about it.
We even talked about no TV after dinner and she's
like totally on board. I can't tell you how big
of a deal this conversation was and how amazing it was.
Speaker 1 (10:33):
So success comes from the three e's explore explain in power,
You've developed a structure by providing a rational for white
matters and then getting her buy in, getting her commitment,
getting her contribution towards making evenings work. It's a win.
It's a win all the way round.
Speaker 2 (10:51):
There is one cave here.
Speaker 1 (10:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:53):
I promised her that Thursdays was actually a night off
from the routine and structure. And I have a class
that we teach, so we're not here and she usually
gets to watch the TV while we're gone, and I
said that that was okay.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
Thursdays is a play, play as much as you want night.
Speaker 2 (11:11):
Yeah, she has one night.
Speaker 1 (11:13):
Well, that probably makes it feel really good about life
as well. Yeah, okay, after the break the big win
that I've had in a conversation with our.
Speaker 3 (11:19):
Kids, Colie, I didn't ask you, what is the central
take home message from your big win with Emily in
terms of putting together an evening structure to get nighttimes working.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
It seems ridiculously simple, and it seems like it's literally
what we come back to every time. But the three e's, Explore, Explain,
empower are the answer to nearly every challenge that we
have with our kids, literally.
Speaker 1 (11:52):
Of effective discipline, hence the name.
Speaker 2 (11:54):
It is just so profoundly simple when we get the
timing right and when we have emotions in check. Okay,
if I had have tried to have that conversation with
her at night time when we're trying to put her
to bed, it would have been a disaster. But I
picked at the right time to sit down with her, explore, explain,
(12:15):
and empower. And I'm really looking forward to next week's
I'll do bead tomorrow because we're going to have a
great week.
Speaker 1 (12:21):
I hope that it works. I just want to emphasize
how important is that when kids understand the rationale, things
go so much better. Okay, let's move on to my
older better tomorrow. I'm going to make my one fairly quick.
We have made quite a big deal on this podcast,
and I make a deal on parental guidance. I can't
say much, but I do emphasize that in our family,
(12:41):
on the first Sunday of every month, we sit down
with the kids. We have tough talks. We talk about tricky,
tricky and sticky situations and what our children can do
to be safe and healthy and make wise choices. We've
realized that once a month isn't enough. We have a
lot of kids, there's a lot of challenges, there's a
lot going on, and so what we've done is we've
decided that we're going to every week. So for the
last few weeks on Sundays, we sit down with the
(13:04):
kids for well. We promise them that if they will
contribute and participate and keep it tight and focus, that
will be done in what fifteen or twenty minutes. That's
the promise. I'm laughing. I'm laughing because not at you, No, because.
Speaker 2 (13:19):
We can't keep it tight and it's.
Speaker 1 (13:21):
Not our fault. No, they can't stay focused. But here's
the it's not even that.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
They can't stay focused. What they actually love is the
banter that results from this time together. Yeah, and it's
really frustrating because you want to get to the point.
Speaker 1 (13:34):
Yeah, let's get this done. We said twenty minutes, you're
going to complain.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
But it's also really nice, totally to have them sit
there and just be grateful for the time that we
have together.
Speaker 1 (13:43):
And so a lot of parents will say to me,
I don't know how you get to sit my kids.
If I say we're going to sit down and have
a tricky talk, they won't even show up. And what
you're going to do is you've got to give them
good experiences. You've got to make this work for them.
And so we absolutely play on the fact that it's
only going to be ten or twenty minutes if the
kids play along, and whenever they talk for too long, like, well,
you were the one that made it go for too long,
(14:04):
not us. But they are actually enjoying it. So a
couple of weeks ago, I made a big deal here
on the podcast about how we talked about emotions and
how emotions work. Last week we talked about turning towards
one another rather than turning against and turning away from
one another. This week just gone as a result of
a I would say, a negative experience that one of
our daughters had with a guy who could not seem
(14:27):
to understand what no meant and provided a whole lot
of unwonted attention. That there was nothing catastrophic that occurred,
he just provided. He just would not stop putting pressure
on our daughter because he has a crush on her,
and he's clumsy and doesn't understand that no actually means no.
So we decided that we would have a consent conversation.
(14:47):
You can go to consent dot gov. Dou I'm an
ambassador for the Consent Can't Wait campaign the federal government's running,
and you can get a whole lot of resources from that.
In this instance, rather than using the resources, we just
had a fairly informal chat and I said to the girls,
based on the experience of one of your sisters. They
all knew what the experience was and what had happened
because we talked about it previously. They'd all sort of
(15:09):
shared their ideas about it. I said, let's talk about
the different ways that things can go wrong here. And
I just said, you shout out what you can think
of they said unwanted attention. They said, how do you
respond to pressure? I said, what do you owe somebody
when you go out with them? We talked about you
(15:30):
brought up the importance of letting guys take the lead,
and then one of the girls said, what are the
signs of interest in? What are the red flags? And
we just had, oh my goodness, the best conversation about
consent and dating and boys and relationships. It was just
so delightful. On unwanted attention. I said, well, what kind
of unwanted attention have you experienced or do your friends
(15:52):
talk about? And they said, physical touch, invading personal space,
getting spammed like just one one of them said when
people send root and inappropriate messages. One of them talked
about the male gaze being stared at, checked out. There
was harassing friends, there was ignoring requests for space, pressuring,
(16:13):
emotional manipulation. Like I'm sitting there going we're raising these
girls in a world where boys all too often don't
get it. If we had sons, I'd be reading this listen,
I'd be saying, mate, what are you going to do
about this? If a girl says she doesn't want your attention,
you need to actually honor that. You've got to respect that,
and she may actually want your attention more because you've
shown her that you know how to honor what she
asks for. Anyway, we talked all about all of those
(16:36):
things in terms of responding to pressure. Got a great
discussion about how boys generally tend to be the accelerated
girls are typically the break and we talked about how
that works and why, rightly or wrongly. I know a
lot of people will hear that and be really quite
upset and put out by it, but it's the reality
is what's going on. I brought up the idea that
if you go on a date with a guy, you
(16:58):
need to be really clear that you do not owe
him anything. You don't owe him a handhold or a hug,
a kiss, nothing like that. And that's just vitally important
that girls know they don't owe a guy anything just
because they're on a date. You talked about letting boys
take the lead, which I thought was kind of funny
(17:18):
because I'm the guy, and yet I'm really happy to
chime in and say, guys actually want to chase. If
it's too easy for a guy he is not that interested,
like there has to be some kind of chase and
he's got to be taking the lead. And we got
to talk about those signs of interest and the red flags.
It was just so inspiring. It was such a great conversation.
I just want to emphasize, if you've got kids, start
these conversations early. I can't believe I just said, if
(17:39):
you've got kids. Of course you've got kids, you listen
to the podcast seriously, start the conversations early, have them
often first Sunday of them, the first time of the
month might be enough. We've discovered that it's not enough.
We've got so much. We've got so much that we
want to explicitly teach our children that they're not just
going to absorb from the ether or from hanging around us.
I'm a professional speaker, and it's to me that I
(18:00):
give other people better content than I give my own kids.
And that's got to change. And so by doing this
every Sunday, the kids seem to be really enjoying it.
We're enjoying it. And the conversation is how long do
you reckon? That one went hour and twenty Yeah, it
was nearly ninety minutes.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
You know what I loved about that conversation. When you
think about the content of what we were talking about,
it would be very easy to suggest that an eleven
year old doesn't need to be a part of that,
that it's completely irrelevant to her, and that it's going
to go over ahead. But number one, not only did
(18:37):
our eleven year old stay involved in the conversation, she
actually provided quite a lot of comic relief as we
went through.
Speaker 1 (18:46):
She said some funny stuff.
Speaker 2 (18:47):
She wanted to be involved, and she had an answer
to a lot of the questions. And while they were
an eleven year old's viewpoint, they were appropriate.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
For an eleven year old, it was great.
Speaker 2 (19:00):
They were appropriate. That's right. But secondly, it means now
that as she does move into that space where that
becomes an issue.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
In seventeen years.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
She's comfortable having these conversations because we're having them regularly. Right,
This isn't something that we kind of you know, we
end up with a child who has a bad experience
when we go actually we probably should have this conversation
with you. This is about pre arming them so that
they don't find themselves in that position, and if they do,
they're empowered to know how to get.
Speaker 1 (19:32):
Out and come and talk to us about it as well.
So we had an eleven year old, a fifteen year old,
a seveneen year old, a twenty two year old, and
a friend as well just happened to be here.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
Well, she's been to a few and she actually loves them.
That's her plan. She wants to be there every week.
Speaker 1 (19:48):
She's been the last couple and she's like, I just
want to keep on coming to these chats. I love
them how much.
Speaker 2 (19:53):
Fun Well, and the great thing about that is just
the acknowledgment for her, She's never had that. She hasn't
been in a home where her parents have sat down
have that conversation with her. And so while it's in
some ways null and void, it, she's past those experiences.
She's loving the fact that she's watching this unfold in
our home and just enjoying being a part of it.
Speaker 1 (20:14):
We need to wrap this up. We've talked for way
too long. A quick remind A Parental Guidance kicks off
on Monday night, Channel nine and nine, now seven thirty.
Speaker 2 (20:23):
I'm stocked up on popcorn.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
Yeah, yeah, We're going to have a bunch of people
around to our place for a parental Guidance part. Hey,
I can't believe I said it like that. Oh my goodness,
I'm so sorry. We really hope you have a great weekend.
The take our message from all of this is really
just if you talk to your kids, you have great
conversations if you can just make the effort be intentional
about it, sit down and talk to your kids. The
Happy Family's podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media.
(20:47):
We get all of our admin and research support from
Mim Hammond's. If you think that your family might be
happier because of this podcast episode, we'd love for you
to share it because it'll probably make other families happier
as well. Think of a friend that you could just
flick this one through to click a couple of buttons.
It'll take ten or twenty seconds, pass along and help
other families to be inspired and find joy and happiness
(21:08):
and flourish. If you like more information and more resources
about making your family happier, you'll find all of it
at Happy families dot com dot a
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