[What Boys Need Series] How To Talk To Boys - Joanna Schroeder

24:58And that is a conversation to have when they come home or when they settle down in the car after school because sometimes they do that because they're overwhelmed. There's so much their brains are trying to take in during adolescence. Sometimes they do need to get in the car and close it all off. Sometimes I need to get in the car. Wish I had a hoodie that I could tighten around and put in my AirPods and forget the world. But then it's like, it's like, hey, tell me about your day. I'm curious, like making a snack and sitting down together or even better, start a relatively easy video game together and talk while you're playing the video game and just be like, what's going on at school?

25:32Like, what's new? What's overwhelming? Who's getting in trouble these days? You know, there's a lot of, we have a million questions and prompts in our book, but, or if what he likes to do is play tennis, you can go hit tennis balls together, just loosely down to the public courts and get them moving. And if they don't naturally want to move, you can say to them, we're going to take a walk. We're going to take a walk around the block Monday, Wednesday, Friday at 6 p.m. or something instead of time when they can walk with you. Because when they're moving and they're not eye to eye and so intense, a lot of times they do start opening up.

26:08And ultimately, it's just about, hey, I'm more relaxed when I've had a little walk before dinner. I feel like it'd be good for us. It'd be a good chance to talk or just walk. That kind of little thing feels very foreign with boys because we think they don't want to talk to us. And they may even think it's weird to talk to us. But we just give them the opportunity. And then the key when they start talking is to do our very best not to judge them. Because they're going to say stuff that's weird to you because they're teenagers. They're going to have opinions that are different from yours. They're going to observe stuff that doesn't fall within your value system.

26:53And that's literally why we wrote the book, because what do you do then? What do you do at that moment when you don't know what to say? And even when you're getting like a little bit irritated and got to have tools.

27:06Hunter Clarke-Fields:Yeah, I guess I would think, you know, what you're saying, I've often said like you, you kind of have to date your teenagers, whether they're boys or girls, you know, like kind of like you have to date your spouse, right? Like if you want to be in this long-term relationship that is connected, right? You kind of have to reach out to them and date them. And that means like kind of see what they like to do and do some of the things they like to do. And you're describing this essential attitude of mindfulness, which is like to practice non-judgment, practice curiosity, right, to kind of notice, oh, these judgmental thoughts are arising, and instead try to get curious, you know, listening and reflecting back to them what they're saying, kind of, you know, wow, it sounds like, as if you might with a friend, oh, that sounds frustrating, or it sounds like you guys really, you know, disagreed on that, or whatever you know it is that they're saying kind of have this reflection back and kind of hold your tongue a little on the opinion.

28:17Yeah, and that can be so hard. I'm so glad that you said that about mindfulness and being aware of your internal narrative because if your Generation X are older or millennial, you may have grown up in a time when you didn't feel comfortable around the boys in your school, probably middle school and high school. You may have grown up in a time when you had to be very protective of adolescent, you know, from adolescent boys. You had to have your guard up. And sometimes when we slow down and we pay attention to what we're feeling when we're interacting as moms with our teen and tween boys, sometimes something can come up.

29:00Oh, I remember when these types of boys made me really uncomfortable. I remember feeling really unsafe with the way that they roughhouse next to me or the way that they shouted really loud. Like, whatever it is, when we start listening to ourselves in those moments instead of jumping to they're doing it wrong or jumping to I got to get away from this kid. Sometimes it can be, oh, this is something from my past that I'm bringing forward or this is a prejudice that I have that I'm bringing forward. That mindfulness is so key with tweens and teens, and you do need to be curious about it. Not just curious to them.

29:40One of Christopher's great lines is get curious, not furious. Just so cute, and it works so well. But also curious about ourselves.

29:50Hunter Clarke-Fields:Why is this making me so mad right now? Yeah, we have a framed piece of calligraphy in our stairwell that says, are you sure? Oh, I like that. It's really, really helpful. And I think that that's a great way to kind of think about this. But you're saying, I just want to summarize for the listener because you're saying like, make it a point to have these conversations, even if you're not joining them in something they're liking to do. Say, let's go for a walk three times a week. Like, be a persistent, be pleasantly persistent in dating your kid and connecting with them. and don't just kind of give up on talking to them.

30:33Hunter Clarke-Fields:That's kind of like an underlying thing that I'm hearing here. Well, there wasn't a lot of research into how to communicate with tweens and teens, right? Little kids, toddlers, how to use language, that's pretty well covered. But we went looking for it. What's the best way? And what we found was there wasn't a lot of framing for that. So we actually turned to the relationship experts. So it's great that you said that about dating. So we looked at what the Gottmans said. And a big thing is you have to watch for bids. So the way that the Gottmans from the Gottman Institute framed it was when you're married to somebody and you say your partner's looking out the window and they say, oh, what an interesting bird.

31:16If you just sit there silently, that's an unmet bid. It's unanswered. But if you just say something is like, oh, what kind is it? Or you have noticed a lot more birds lately. or what color is it? Just any kind of answer, you have met their bid for attention. And the Gottmans discovered that marriages tend to fall apart when people aren't meeting each other's bids. We were like, ding, ding, ding, Christopher students, the boys that I've worked with, they're making bids for their parents' attention that the parents are often not answering. Because we don't kind of speak necessarily the same language.

31:53So when we start looking for like, What is my kid doing when he wants to talk? He lingers in the living room longer. Normally, he would have gone upstairs and started homework. What's that about? Or he's come and he's sat in the couch in my bedroom while I'm folding clothes instead of going to his own room. My own son tends to be very rough with the silverware drawer when he's got something going on. He opens it loud.

32:19Hunter Clarke-Fields:He wrestles around. He closes it loud. And that was where I had to be mindful of my own reactions. like, oh, this is allowing you to set. It's like, okay, what's going on? Something's up. That's a bit. And, you know, another thing like you said, reflective listening. Like, oh, I, you know, I heard that someone said something about how you play soccer, man. I can imagine that might have been really upsetting. How did you feel? You know, reflecting what you heard and then making sure that you've got it right. That's the imago therapy model for relationships. And And we talked to Harville Hendricks, who invented that model.

32:57And I was like, what do you think of using this for kids? And Harville's like, I use it with my kids all the time. I still use it with my daughter, and she's 40. So it's great to have these sort of tried and tested tools. And that's what goes through our book. You do need to keep making the effort to understand this person. And maybe you understood them so well five years ago, but they still want to be understood.

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35:11Hunter Clarke-Fields:That's an additional$50 off bundles, and they already have some discounts, people. An additional$50 off bundles with the code hunter at whisker.com slash hunter. Yeah, they want to be seen and heard and understood and accepted. Yeah, and so that's a good segue to even thinking about all those different big emotions that come up. You've written about anger. You start to buy your son of the silver. And when a boy's angry, he's slamming doors or snapping at siblings or whatever. What do you recommend parents do in that moment to help him regulate and then reconnect? Well, if you're listening and you have little kids, there are a few things you can do right now to start helping your kids handle anger.

35:59So my favorite thing to do is to model how I handle anger. And I have found that this works best. I live in Los Angeles when I'm driving and someone cuts me off and I start to feel road rage. I am observing myself and I say it out loud, man, that guy cut me off and I'm so mad right now. I'm so mad and I am so tempted to flip this guy the bird. You would say that with an older kid. So tempted to yell at this guy. And I'm not going to because it doesn't get anywhere so take a breath okay feeling less angry we should put on a fun song so it's like we do those things every time you're driving that you don't flip some on the bird it's because you felt the anger you observed it in yourself you processed through it and you went on with your day so when something like that comes up in our lives no matter how old our kids are we can age appropriately tell them how we're processing it so that they have a model That's a great thing to do.

37:02If your kid is making you angry. Absolutely. I second that. You can say. Fully endorse that. Yeah. Oh, good. Good, good, good. We start modeling that. And it is important for dads, men, to model this for their kids too, not just us. Yeah. So that, and then with teenagers, we need to recognize anger is a very normal part of being a human being. They are feeling more anger now as they get older, and that is normal. what is missing with teenagers is often the guidance for how to handle their anger oftentimes they feel anger and then they feel ashamed of their anger because they don't know what to do with it it doesn't seem right they don't want to be doing that they don't want to yell at you they may see that you're afraid or you're pushing them away and there's shame that comes and shame is one of the worst emotions that we can let our kids sit in because often that just turns into more anger and more aggression.

37:57So recognizing the anger, letting them feel angry, it's okay for them to be angry at you. You can't go to that concert on a Thursday night. I'm sorry, you have a test on Friday. And they're angry. You never let me do anything. And they may say things that if a partner or a fellow adult said, you might be like, you know, that's unkind. take a breath i totally get why you're angry it must i can imagine it is so frustrating to have something that's so important to you and then just have someone else tell you you can't do it and recognizing that and see if they can come down with you and like let's just take a breath i totally get that you're angry and i understand and sometimes just having someone say that to them is like, oh, I'm met.

38:45Yeah. Yeah. It turns the emotional temperature, I mean, down.

38:48Hunter Clarke-Fields:That's the research by Dr. Den Seals talked about how like how that just recognizing naming the emotions, name it to team, it just turns the all the cortisol, all the emotional temperature down in that. And you're what you're describing, of course, dear listener requires a lot of emotional regulation from you. Yes. And so, yeah, you practice it in that moment. You name it for yourself, you're really upset. I'm feeling a lot. Let's like, yeah, this is a lot right now. You know, maybe it doesn't come out in the perfect words, but you practice with your kid and you show them that. And the gift of tweens and teens is that you can say more about your experience than you might with another younger kid in that if he's slamming that silverware drawer.

39:36And if that is triggering to you, then, you know, unlike a five-year-old, you can say, you know what, dude, I got to tell you, I know you don't mean it this way, but that reminds me a lot of when grandma and grandpa used to fight and throw things. It was really scary for me. And I know that that's not what you're trying to do, but that's the experience I'm having when you do that. Now, I don't have that. So I just laugh when my son does it because I know what it means. But if that is authentic to you and you're having that, with an older kid, you can say, I know you're angry. Let's find another way for you to let me know because this one's really hard on me.

40:12It affects my day.

40:13Hunter Clarke-Fields:Yeah. And that's okay to do with an older kid. That's the gift of older kids. Let them in. Yeah. It gives them an opportunity to show empathy, show compassion, show that they care about you. And they need to have opportunities to show that they care about people. Yes. You talk about ways. There are so many great ways to talk about tricky things in this book. You talk about education, motivation, substances. We started the conversation talking about like sex and consent. If you need to have a difficult conversation with your kid at whatever age with your boy, what are some of the ways that you recommend that parents come in and do this?

40:59Yeah. The number one thing is to, it's so fun you said that it's like emotional regulation for the parents. Our book is basically an emotional regulation book for parents. It's about making a plan for how you want to behave in triggered moments and in tough moments so that you don't just, you know, you're not just acting right from your gut and your instincts and that like we like to call it the crocodile brain. but one of the most important things we discovered from our boys panel and it meets right up with research is that too often we charge into their space and tell them when we're going to have a conversation and with adolescents that is not a good feeling they often feel disrespected and violated now we could argue all day whether they should feel that way or it's your house you can walk into their room whenever you want.

41:49Okay. That's a different conversation. But if we want them to open up to us, the first thing we need to do is respect their time and space and their emotional headspace, how much bandwidth they have. So this is really easy. You do what you would do with a friend. If I'm calling my best friend, I'll say, hey, do you have a second? I need to talk to you about something important. I wouldn't call her in the middle of her workday and be like, you're not going to believe this. I'm so mad about the... Actually, I might do that with my best friend, but with most other people, I probably wouldn't. I don't even do that with my husband, actually, because I know how that affects him at work.

42:27So just knock on that door. Hey, I need to talk to you about something. Do you have a minute? Don't presume that when they have their phone up and they're doing this, and I'm blocking my face on purpose because it feels so closed off, right, when you walk in that they're doing nothing. Yes, they might be scrolling social media, but they also might be texting with a friend who's having a hard time. They also might be checking their assignments on Google Classroom. They also might be flipping through flashcards studying for their history tests. There's so much they do on phones that we did not do.

43:01We would have gone to the library for, you know, we would have made flashcards. My kids look at their flash cards on their phones. So don't presume what they're doing is unimportant. Don't presume they can talk to you right at that moment. And ask, do you have a minute? A lot of times they'll say, what is it? Instead of getting mad about the attitude, just be like, oh, it's not a big deal, but I need to talk to you about and say what it is. I need to talk to you about going away to grandma's this weekend. I need to talk to you how you left your backpack right in front of the door again, and I tripped and it really hurt.

43:32I need to talk, you know, say what it is. Give them a little preview. Or it's nothing. It's a tiny little thing. It'll just take a minute, but let me know when you're done.

43:39Hunter Clarke-Fields:These things are all so simple, but for some reason, we just don't do this with our kids. We just impose our will. I know. I so need this provider right now. Me too. Me too. Yeah. And then if it is something difficult, we say, you know, it's kind of a big deal. It is kind of a big deal. I definitely want to have like 10 minutes to talk to you about this because it's serious and I want to make sure that we neither of us are distracted so if you get news from the from the principal at school that your kid was defacing property yeah that's a big deal and if you are a parent of a middle school boy you should know that happens a lot it's unfortunate but it is a strange thing right now where they deface property and they take the deals of it anyway if you get that call you it will be a serious conversation and your kid does need to be face to face with you and your kid does need to be held accountable for that.

44:39But we do want to have that conversation in a way where he can hear our words and our intention, which is to help him do better and to create empathy for the people that are impacted by it. So I like to say, this is really serious. I need 10 minutes of your time.

44:55Hunter Clarke-Fields:Then they know is what they're getting into. That's great. Yeah. And they can't avoid it forever, I guess. No, I don't have time right now. Yeah. I need to do it after dinner. Yeah. After dinner, before dinner. We can set a framework and still help them feel like they have a choice. I need to talk to you in the next few hours. I need to talk to you before bedtime. I need to talk to you before you go to Chris's house, whatever it is. So if you're a listener with a boy, what I'm hearing from you, Joanna, is that these are awesome conversations that any parent can have, that moms should have with boys, and things that we should practice and kind of shift our mindset on.

45:33But also, I'm really hoping if

45:35Hunter Clarke-Fields:you're a mom and you're in a partnership with a man who is your child of your parents or stepchild of your parents, like this could be very impactful, I imagine, coming from the adult men. It's so important. And, you know, I had this idea for this book many years ago, and I needed, I knew what I needed in a co-author. I needed a man who's a dad raising boys who works with boys. And that's Christopher Pepper. Thank goodness for him. And Christopher very specifically wanted to write a book that dads can read. And so many times when women are writing books, we subconsciously, we can't avoid it, write a book for moms.

46:19And this, Christopher was very dedicated to that purpose. And it can be hard to listen to a whole podcast about parenting if you are a man because you were raised in a culture where everyone talks about you feel like things are being talked about way too much. But that's how we wrote our book. Simple and clean and clear. And here are some ideas. And we want people to bring their own values. And that's the other thing is some people have said, oh, well, you want. What did someone say? You're trying to raise boys to be defective girls, that boys are seen as defective girls. And I think in a culture, in our culture, that was part of what inspired the boy crisis was the almost like boys are broken and girls are doing great.

47:05So that's not what we wanted to do. Boys are not supposed to be like girls. They're not defective girls. They are their own individual creatures. They're wonderful. We love our teenage sons and we aren't trying to turn them into any type of boy or man. We want them to be who they are. And if that's captain of the football team, that's fantastic. If it's theater club or anything else, wonderful.

47:34Hunter Clarke-Fields:Yeah, I love that attitude. And so I hope the dads are listening. Good for you if you made it to this spot. Yay! and it is such a great book as far as being able to open it up and find what you want to talk about talking about school talking about emotions talking about sexuality and sex stuff it's all there it's all very very direct and like I said I really appreciate that but to close in the spirit of mindful parenting what's kind of one small intentional change parents could make this week to foster more openness and dialogue with their boys. Oh, there's so many different things. It's hard to choose just one.

48:23I think pausing to consider our words before we say them, even as our kids get older,

48:34Hunter Clarke-Fields:even with tween and teenagers who may not do the same for us. I like that. just kind of consider the impact of what you're saying. Yeah, I like that. Well, Joanna Schroeder and Christopher Pepper's book is Talk to Your Boys, 16 Conversations to Help Tweens and Teens Grow into Confident, Caring Young Men. It's out now wherever books are sold. Joanna, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us and for sharing your wonderful direct you know, insightful way of communicating with all of us. I think it's really helpful. And I know all the parents of boys will be appreciating it, making that impact.

49:24Hunter Clarke-Fields:So thank you. Thank you for coming on. Thank you. Anytime.

49:33Hunter Clarke-Fields:I hope you enjoyed this episode. Parents of Boys, join us. And Christopher Pepper's book is really excellent. I highly recommend it. You know I don't always say that about books. I mean, maybe you don't if this is your first episode hearing it, but I don't. And yeah, this is going to be part of a What Boys Need series. In the next couple weeks, we're going to have three episodes on What Boys Need, including talking to Dr. Karen Natterson and Dr. Judy Chu. So if you are a parent of a boy or know some parents of boys, get them to subscribe to the podcast so you don't miss any episodes of this. And there's other episodes, of course, on talking to boys.

50:19Hunter Clarke-Fields:In the past, boys and men issues have come up over the years. In episode 510, we talk about what boys need with Ruth Whitman. And in episode 395, we talk about taking men and boys out of the man box with Todd Adams. So check out those episodes. And I hope this episode has helped you. We'll help you with your boys, boy or child, whatever, you know. And yeah, I'm wishing you a great week. I hope this has helped. And if it has, help us continue to make the podcast by letting people know that just is what we need to spread the word around. So wishing you a great week. So glad you were able to listen.

51:03Hunter Clarke-Fields:And I look forward to talking to you again real soon. Namaste.

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