Power Your Parenting: Moms With Teens

What do I mean by a hard conversation? Basically it's any conversation your teen doesn't want to have with you---and there are a-lot of those. In this episode I give you 5 key elements to help you have a (successful) hard conversation with your teen. 1. You want to balance the hard conversations with intentionally having positive conversations/experiences with your teen. 2. Timing has to be right....

Every mom worries. You can't eliminate worry. Parenting a teen gives you endless things to worry about. Worry can be useful if it leads to effective action.  But too often worry is just wasted energy. It doesn't lead to solutions it just leads to more worry and before you know it the worry grows exponentially like a wildfire.  You don't want worry dominating your life and your parenting. Don't let...

Power Your Parenting: Moms with Teens is back.  This is going to be an exciting year. I have lined up some great guests and of course I will be sharing some practical parenting tips and sharing current research on teens. One of my primary goals is to raise the bar on what's possible for moms and teens. You don't have to dread these years. You can actually enjoy them. In this podcast I first answer...

Do your teens need better communication skills—especially when they are wanting something from you? In this podcast I interview Laura Lyles Reagan who is a family sociologist with more than 30 years of experience in practical youth development and parenting coaching. She holds a Masters in Sociology specializing in interactionism and communication dynamics. She is the author of her new book, “How...

Do you feel like you worry about your teen 24/7? Does your son and daughter seem to always be stressed? Ready to dial down the worry and the stress! In this episode I interview Jodi Aman, who has been a psychotherapist for over 20 years. Jodi is also the author of You 1 Anxiety 0 Win your freedom back from fear and panic. Besides being a seasoned therapist, Jodi is also a mom of teens and can rela...

Has your daughter ever eaten a big bag of Cheetos and then fifteen minutes later run out of the room and screamed, “I’m so fat.” Monitoring teenage girls and their food choices can be tough for moms. You can tell your daughter is struggling with her body image and you try to calm her down and she gets angry. You try to hold your daughter accountable by asking her if she really wants that second Cr...

Why do you need a long-term perspective when parenting a teenager? The answer comes from the final Chapter in my book, Dial Down the Drama: Reducing Conflict and Reconnecting with Your Teenage Daughter. It’s important to remember that we were once teenagers and we did a lot of crazy stuff too. Despite our secrets and mistakes we made it safely into adulthood. When you are mired down in the daily d...

“How to be your daughter’s (or son’s) dream maker” is a complicated question.  Your daughter or son may not know what they want to be when they grow up. Your son is set to get a scholarship for baseball in college but he decides his... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Have you ever felt like everyone in your family is driving your life? I had one mom tell me, “I feel like I’m my daughter’s personal assistant. I wish I had one!” This episode is the practical “how to’s” on how to recapture your life which comes from the eleventh chapter in my book Dial Down the Drama. The first episode of the Dial Down the Drama series was “Are you all Mothered Out?” We examined...

What does your son or daughter need to thrive? This is an important question for both you and your teen. The answer is sometimes personal to your own taste, but often it is applicable to all of us. This is especially true for teens. One frequent mistake mom’s make, is becoming hyper-focused on the teen’s crises of the day, which causes us to miss important information. The episode today comes from...

Let’s face it disciplining a defiant teen is challenging. Because parents often feel powerless when it’s two hours past curfew,  we can be flooded with a whole array of emotions. At this point we are not thinking clearly. This is why it’s so easy to” lose it”, but “losing it” is not an effective discipline. We may be “letting them have it” but there will be no lesson learned, except how to lose co...

How Good Moms Become Drama Mamas is the title of Chapter 8 in my book Dial Down the Drama: Reducing Conflict and Reconnecting with Your Teenage Daughter. In the previous podcast (which comes from Chapter 7) I discuss why teens are hardwired for drama. However,... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It’s easy to see why moms and teens can fight more during the month of May. Neha Gupta, Founder of Elite Private Tutors, gives us tips and tricks on surviving the month of May with our overwhelmed, stressed out teens with finals and how to... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

 Have you ever had a “What was she thinking moment?” If you have then you are going to want to listen to this podcast and see why her dramatic flair ups and disrespect aren't personal. This is the seventh episode in my Dial Down the Drama series. It comes from the seventh chapter, Why Your Daughter is Hard-Wired for Drama. Scientists in the past have blamed crazy teenage behavior on raging hormone...

How to Like Your Daughter Again comes from the sixth chapter in Dial Down the Drama: Reducing Conflict and Reconnecting with Your Teenage Daughter. "Is it possible to have a healthy relationship with your teen?" "And what does that even look like?" This is the million dollar question. You don't want to be your teen's best friend but you don't want to be her enemy either. When you are in a daily ba...

Today's episode comes from the fifth chapter in my new award-winning book Dial Down the Drama. It takes a lot of energy to protect, nurture, and guide your teenager. And this is only one facet of your life. This doesn't include the rest of your family, or your life. Moms are good at pouring out their good energy to their family but typically we are not good at replenishing this energy. It can feel...

This episode comes from the fourth chapter in my book Dial Down the Drama: Reducing Conflict and Reconnecting to Your Teenage Daughter---A Guide for Mothers Everywhere. Today we are going to discuss why your clarity matters. Your clarity is huge. Without it you can't parent effectively or enjoy your life. See your teenage daughter (or son) is clear about what they want. They may not be clear about...

This podcast comes from the third chapter in Dial Down the Drama: Why Moms and Daughter's Can't Get it Right All the Time,which was published at the end of October 2015. No mom or daughter can get it right all the time, but we feel the pressure to do so. This pressure drives us to do more and do it better. I call this the Pressure to be Perfect. Not only do we feel this pressure, but your daughter...

The podcast today comes from the second chapter of my upcoming book Dial Down the Drama. Today we are going to address fear and how this impacts you, your teen, and your parenting. There are no shortage of things that we can worry about. Will your son or daughter turn out okay? Will they make it into college? Will they turn out to be successful adults? And many of you have heard the saying, "keep...

Are you feeling "All Mothered Out"?You are definitely not alone. This has become a cultural phenomenon for women. In this podcast you will learn why so many moms feel "All Mothered Out" and how you can turn that around. This is the first podcast in my Dial Down the Drama series. I can't believe it, but in less than three months my book, Dial Down the Drama: Reducing Conflict and Reconnecting to Yo...

Does your daughter feel like you are the clothing police? Well you are not the only one. This is definitely one of the hot topics for mothers and daughters. (and not in a good way.) You give her constructive criticism. "That dress doesn't look good on you." You just want to protect her. "You can't go out wearing that shirt or that short skirt." Your daughter doesn't see your good intentions and go...

No parent wants to believe their middle school teen (or younger) is sexting. Maybe it's not your teen, but it's the teen culture. One thing that moms don't think about, is that your teen may not be an initiator of the sexting but could easily be the recipient. Sexting has become a huge cultural problem for teens. Here are some statistics from 2009 and the numbers are not getting any better. The pe...

Not only is your teen impacted by hormones, so are many perimenopausal moms. In this episode I interview Dr. Anna Garrett who has been a clinical pharmacist for over 20 years. The goal of her business is to help women who are in the middle of midlife transition. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Your son or daughter is swimming in a teen culture of drugs and alcohol. Because of this you can't help but worry. Today my dear friend Julia Wolf answers your questions about the impact of drugs and alcohol on your teen. Julia is a seasoned Licensed MFT and has a thriving private practice in the Houston area. Julia was the Director of Community and Behavioral Health at the Houston Council of Alco...

I recently talked to a local church about why moms need to feel blessed to be a blessing. Moms frequently feel anything but blessed. They feel stressed, anxious, blah, resentful, and give up on feeling good. This is totally understandable. In fact our brains have a propensity to go to the negative. That's why you can have 55 good things happen in your life and one negative thing seems to erase all...