I Have a Teen Daughter and I Am Scared

It was Friday evening and our 19-year-old daughter Eden talked again about going to dance Salsa in the city. She had been talking about it for over two months and had never gone. None of her friends had wanted to join and she had not wanted to go by herself. Gal and I decided to go with her (aren’t we the greatest parents?).

It was a feel-good party. There was a band on stage and many dancers on the floor, dancing beautifully. We could watch them for hours. Many people sat on the floor around the dancers and watched with us. Eden was invited to dance with others and we were very happy to see her dancing and shining.

We looked at each other and said, “It was worth coming”, but was it?

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Would You Say "No" to Violence Against Children?

In one of my parenting workshops, I had a discussion with one of the fathers about the use of negative words and we talked about the slogan “Australia says ‘no’ to violence against children”. I explained that the brain records “Australia says to violence against children”, omits the “no” and focuses on “Australia”, “violence” and “children”. Paul thought it was a great slogan (and he did not work for the copywriting company who came up with the slogan).

At that stage, all the other participants already understood that “no smoking” only promoted smoking by focusing on the smoking, so pretty quickly, there was a lively group interaction going on.

This week, I got a video made by a great organisation, which presented the answer we were looking for in our discussion at that parenting workshop. What would you want people to focus on? We want them to focus on creating a child-friendly environment for our kids. We want them to be happy, to feel safe and to have good relationships with others.

The answer to (the pink elephant) “Australia says no to violence against children” is now “Australia says yes to a child-friendly environment for our children” and I love this new focus.

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Teen Birthday Parties: Who Needs Them Anyway?

Teen girl blowing out candles on a cake at a birthday party

It was the third birthday our daughter had refused to celebrate with friends. For her 17th birthday, she invited a couple of girls to go out for a movie. For her 18th birthday, she spent the day crying because it was her grandmother’s funeral (and her dad was away to attend).

When she approached her 19th birthday, we had the same discussions about a party all over again.

When I was kid, most of the kids wanted to have a party, at least on their birthdays. Only the “rich” kids could have parties every year. Some rare kids had parties more than once a year and those were obviously the most popular.

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What Are You Saying to Your Teens?

A couple of clients came to me for parent coaching because of a problem they had with their teen boy, and were very surprised when we went through Pink Elephants. They said, “We tell him every day NOT to hang around bad kids, but saying it only puts the focus on those kids we want him to stay away from”.

The day after our session, the mother sent me this email:

“Dear Ronit, You won’t believe what happened after we left our session last night. I was home for 3 minutes and so many Pink Elephants came out of my mouth… It’s so hard!”

It is hard. I agree.

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Four Blessings from the Fairies

Once upon a time, in a faraway land, the king and the queen had a welcoming party for their newborn daughter. All the fairies were invited to the party to bless the baby with all the goodness in life.

In a glorious ceremony, each fairy approached the beautiful, gorgeous baby and blessed her. The Blue Fairy gave her happiness, the Green Fairy gave her health, the Red Fairy gave her love, the Pink Fairy gave her friendship, the White Fairy gave her confidence and the Yellow Fairy gave her…

This is a fairy tale, right? Well, no, not really.

When our kids are born, we are just like fairies standing beside their beds every night and blessing them with all the goodness of life. As parents, we all want our kids to be happy and successful. Though many of us dedicate too much energy to the less important things in life, we do, inside of us, deep inside, want the best of our kids.

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Be a Good Sport! (part 2)

This is the second part of yesterday’s Be a Good Sport!, which includes the last 5 things we need to do as parents to make sure our kids take the positive out of sports rather than the negative.

Excitement vs. Anxiety

When kids are excited about their sport, they are pumped up and ready to conquer the world. There is a positive outcome to this excitement and many coaches dedicate much energy to create this excitement in their players.

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Be a Good Sport! (part 1)

On the weekend, when all the sport teams are on the field are kicking or passing a ball, it is easy to see that they are not the only ones sweating.

From the bench, a group of anxious parents try to give instructions that can hardly be heard on the field. The quieter ones try using the power of their thoughts to push the ball to the left.

It is funny to watch. Parents move their bodies as if they can help their kids move the ball straight into the basket or the goal.

Well, the truth is that parents can help a lot in directing their kids, but the playing filed is the last place to do that.

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Teens Today Aren’t Like We Used to Be

In my work with parents and teens, I here many times the phrase “Teens today aren’t like we used to be”.

Really?

I remember this from a friend of mine from high school and his dad when we were 18. Every time when we came to visit my friend, his dad gave us the spiel about how motivated, well mannered, hard working and respectful his generation was and how horrible, suffering from peer pressure, disrespectful and lazy we were.

I remember asking him one day if his parents did not say the same thing about him when he was 18.

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Proud as a Peacock

My daughter is celebrating her 19th birthday this week. It is an exciting time for us both. Can you imagine? 19 years!

Sometimes, when I try to remember her crawling on the floor or saying her first words (which was early, very early), I have only vague memories.

She is so big now (she is taller than me, but that is easy), yet she is still young and acts like a child. She is so mature, yet she is naïve.

Our kids’ birthdays are a wonderful way for us to take stock of our parenting. Every year, they grow and mature and learn about themselves, we do too. We learn about our achievements or our challenges and it makes us better people, better parents.

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