Ep 94: Empowering Your Daughter: Navigating Tween Relationships & Influences

In this episode, we explore how your daughter is being influenced by the world around her, and why it's critical to have valuable conversations about early dating… even if the rule is “no dating until you're 18!” We discuss the impact of early romances on lifelong attitudes toward love and self-worth, the importance of teaching bodily autonomy, and the role of parents in modeling healthy relationships. Learn how to navigate your child's experiences with dating, risky behaviors, and social media responsibly, ensuring they develop a strong moral compass and emotional resilience.

In This Episode:

• Introduction: The Influence on Your Daughter
• Impact of Early Relationships on Self-Worth
• Parental Guidance and Open Dialogue
• Empowering Your Daughter in Relationships
• Navigating Social Media and Online Risks
• The Importance of Open Conversations
• Building Trust and Communication

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Transcript

0:01

Hey Barrett. And welcome back to the peaceful home podcast. My name is Pam and I am your host. And today we are diving into the dreaded dating timeframe for our growing kids. This is that early dating stuff and how to handle it with your pre-teens. Middle school age, as well as some things that you can do to help keep them safe. So let's dive in.

Pamela: 1:27

From makeup to current fashion trends. To what is happening on social media. Your daughter is already being influenced. She's already being led in a direction. And if you're not having conversations with her about bodily autonomy about her relationships with people in her life like dating and friendships. If you're not already speaking with her about whatever your values are around. Her the way she's dressing. Or how she's behaving when you're not around. Then she's learning these things from other people. She's learning these things from influencers on social media and from her peers. And neither of those are places where you want your child to develop her own moral compass from. This is what we're talking about today, right? This is what we're diving into. And so often as moms, we think. You know, my 11 year old, my 12 year old. Is not dating. There's no dating happening, but I just want you to understand that this middle school timeframe, fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth grade. Is when they're starting to explore these romantic relationships. Now it doesn't look anything like the romantic relationships that you and I have. These relationships tend to be fast and furious. They tend to be like, I have a boyfriend or I have a girlfriend we've been dating for three days and I'm madly in love with them. And I want to spend every moment with them and I want to interact with them all the time. But the truth of the matter is that that relationship is only a week or two weeks or three weeks long at that. This developmental phase. Now this doesn't mean they won't come back to this relationship later on. What we tend to do what our daughters tend to do, and maybe what you did as a kid, too, if you can remember back is you kind of test the waters with different people, right? But if we get into a pattern where we're dating or interacting with, or spending time with, or friends with the same type of people, I eat people that don't treat us well. This is going to impact our relationships ongoing. This is going to impact your daughter's relationships. Ongoing so early. Relationships or early romances in particular influence our lifelong attitudes about love. And value of self. So if your daughter, let's say she's dating boys, dates three boys in seventh grade and all of them treat her like crap. Guess what. She's going to start to believe that that's how you get treated in relationships and she's going to make decisions based on that. And those decisions might be. I never want to need anyone ever again. And as a mom, you I'd be like, woo, good hope. That's the hope. That's what she takes away from it. But it might also be this understanding or this view that, Hey. There's something wrong with me, or this is how I deserve to be treated. Now, if you've seen inside out to which we watched last night. Maybe you saw from a third person perspective, like this inner turmoil that's happening in Riley, right? That as a 13 year old. Going into puberty. She was like, I'm a good person. And then all this turmoil happened in a very short window of time. Of course it's an animated movie. So it was a very short window of time. But understanding there's a lot of turmoil that happens in there and all it takes is a couple of interactions with people in her life. That say you're not a good person or you're not a value to have her start going down the road of low self-esteem and self-deprecating thoughts and statements and behaviors. And eventual mental health issues. Which is what we're trying to avoid. Right. That's like first and foremost, what we want to avoid in the work that we're doing here. So understanding that when we're talking dating, we're not, it's not the same as adult dating. Sometimes we freak out because. Our daughters tell us that they're madly in love. And you're like, you've known that person for three seconds. You started school two days ago and you just met them. What do you mean you're madly in love? It's okay. It's an opportunity to have conversations. It's an opportunity to talk about. How she's being treated, how she wants to be treated. What's important to her. Why she's letting people treat her the way she's letting them treat her. Right. So often we'll hear moms. I had a mom say to me recently, reached out and was like, I have, my daughter is, this is so out of character for her. She's. I think she said 13 years old and has started dating this boy that been dating for two weeks. I had told her that she couldn't date until she was in high school, but she's dating anyway. So I've bandit and, you know, done all the things that we do as moms to try to gain control. And she said, I'm really concerned because. I saw her in her text messages that they were like kissing at school. And the things that he's saying I'm just not real comfortable with. And I don't understand why she's okay with it. I don't understand. Why she's tolerating him, treating her the way that, that he is. And it just doesn't seem like her. Right. It's so out of character for her. And this is a great opportunity. When you see something that seems out of character for your daughter. To open the dialogue. Right. Because as I said, early romances, big influence. The other thing is they're watching you all the time. So when you open a dialogue, You can have conversations about where are you, why are you thinking this is okay. You know, how do you, do you want someone treating you this way? Do you want a boy? I'm forcing you to kiss him when you don't really want to, you know, what's going on there. Are you afraid of being rejected? Are you afraid of being made fun of you? Afraid of abandoned me afraid of being alone and afraid of him. Dating someone else and talking badly about you behind your back, because maybe he's done that before, right? This happens in middle school. So understanding that these are real things that your daughter is experiencing because she's witnessed them. And that starts to sh to kind of become the lens at which she views. These romantic relationships in the early dating years. So, as I said, she's watching you, she's also watching you in your relationships. So how are you with your partner? If you have a partner in your life, maybe that's a co-parent maybe it's your, you know, the, your daughter's other parent. Maybe your single and dating maybe it's a relationship with your boss or your coworkers or your parents or your in-laws right. Looking at how your allowing people to treat you and how you're showing up and how you keep showing up in relationships, because she will start to internalize. Your struggles. So for instance, if you're feeling like you're not being heard, like your boss is not hearing you. Your significant other is not hearing you're. You're trying to put a boundary and pace plays or communicate a need. And they're just not meeting that need. And you just kind of throw your hands up and you go, oh, well, I'll just do it myself. There's nothing wrong with, oh, well, I'll just do it myself. And what you're teaching your daughter in that. Story is that she has to be self-reliant in order to move forward in life. Now there's nothing wrong with being self-reliant right. But the other side of self-reliance is you can't count on anyone to have your back. So it's really important that not just what she's witnessing, but how you're showing up for her that you're saying, and that you're demonstrating. Hey, I've got your back. Right. I'm here for you. I'm in your corner. I'm going to fight this fight with you, whatever it might be instead of fighting against her, which is sometimes as moms, what we do with our daughters. Right. They're real good at pushing those buttons. And it's very easy to kind of fall into this pattern. The other thing or another thing to be aware of. In this kind of dating world. And how do you help your child navigate it? Is how empowering you are or allow them to feel in their relationship. With you, how empowered they feel in their relationship with use, or are you asking them questions? Are you asking them to help you solve problems? Are you letting them make their own decisions and mistakes and then supporting them through the, kind of the fallout of it? Or are you making decisions for them because you think, you know, better. And I'm not saying you haven't lived on this planet longer and you probably have some more ideas than they do, but I'm saying it's your daughter's life. And she needs to feel like she can make some decisions. And this is why when our kids are real young, we say things like, do you want to wear the pink Pitt? Pants or the yellow pants, right? Like. W do you want to wear these shoes? No shoes, a or shoes? B do you want to case a DIA or a taco for dinner, right? Like these are the things we're already making. Here are your two choices, right? This is that's empowering your kid to make a choice. And as they get older, we need to give them more space to make choices, to make decisions, and then to experience the natural consequences of those decisions. And that doesn't mean your kid goes out, does something dumb, gets in trouble, maybe gets picked up by the police and you go. Oh, well, that's natural consequence. Yes, you go pick them up at the police station or whatever, and you support them through that journey and you say, okay, what did we learn from this? How can we grow from this experience? Because. Every mistake is an opportunity for growth. Right. The other thing is that in the timeframe that we're living right now, Misogyny is a thing, right? Misogyny is a thing. And so women are being treated poorly spoken about poorly because it's been kind of, It's become acceptable again in our current climate. And it's in the U S anyway. I've kind of cycled back into like it's popular for like men to think that they're better than women. And It's we're seeing it kind of seep into young boys. If you're parenting sons. Please help them navigate this journey so that they don't become someone who treats women poorly. And if you're parenting daughters help them navigate so that they know that they have. Strength and they're capable, but this also means. It's really important. Did he mindful of how you talk about successful women? And I mean stars like, you know, Beyonce and Taylor swift. But I also mean people in politics or anyone that's in the limelight. Right. If you have, and I'm not, it doesn't matter to me who you're voting for what your political beliefs are. But if you say I don't like that political person, or I don't like that actor star or, you know, I don't like Kardashians because of something that you wouldn't say about their male counterpart. We have within us because of the timeframe that we grew up in. Internalized misogyny. Which is this belief that women can't do the things that men can do. Simply because they're women. And when you allow that messaging to seep into your daughters, This is going to impact her dating relationships. It's going to impact her safety within dating relationships, because it can leave her vulnerable to a male or female partner who comes in and says, I'm better than you. You're terrible because you're female and this does happen in an female, female relationships as well. And therefore I get to take advantage of you. Like I get to hold power over you. I'm better than you. I'm stronger than you. I'm more capable than you. And then that starts to. Kind of, Shift the lens at which she sees herself. Right. And finally social media is an easy place for your daughter to get herself into hot water. And yes, there is now. Instagram now has a new Instagram teen. Which is supposed to be for any. Instagram account. Where. The person would be account is between the ages of 13 and 18. But. That is dependent on the date of birth that got put in when the account was really was create originally created. And the SS does go back. So if your daughter has had an Instagram account, since she turned 13 or maybe. You gave her, you know, you let her have be on Instagram when she was 12. And so she adjusted her birth date so that she could be on Instagram. Instagram will automatically make it a teen account, which means that adult content will not be available. But things like Snapchat don't have that filter. And there are a lot of, lot of middle schoolers and high schoolers that are using Snapchat as their primary means of communication with their peers. And the thing about Snapchat is they can take a picture, send a video send words on a screen and it only lasts for a few seconds. And then it's deleted. Or they think it's gone forever. Let people can save this stuff. You can screenshot things. And so helping your daughters understand, cause sometimes this is where. The person that they're dating or that they're connecting with online or in real life, but through Snapchat, Can kind of bumbles of them, right. Can kind of take advantage of them. Or they might say like, send me a nude picture or send me some, send me this information about yourself or, or show me this thing about you. Things that you've maybe safeguarded and told your daughter, like, this is not okay. You can't do these things. It's not safe. And the person on the receiving end can screenshot it and can share it with people. And so oftentimes what they'll say is like a boy that she thinks that she's dating might say, Hey, if you send this to me, I won't tell anyone. I won't show anyone. Then she sends a, a nude picture of herself and he screenshots that and shares it with all of his friends or shares it with the whole school. Right. And now she's being slut-shamed or whatever, because, because she got talked into something because she didn't know how to get herself out of it. So when we're having these conversations, when I talk about like, these are really important things, it's important to have conversations with your daughters. To help them understand how do I step away from how do I get myself out of these situations that I'm in. And when do I know when's the time that I know, like, oh, that's a red flag, right? Have red flag conversations. Talk about different scenarios. Use TV shows, use books, use movies, use real life like stuff that's in the news. How would you know? I remember when Marley was little, little, I say little, probably nine or 10. And we would like be at the park. I would actually have her. I'd be like, what about that guy right there? What do you think. Like, is he, uh, is he sketch? I have a. Sixteen-year-old almost 16 year old, who is like, everyone that I don't know is sketch until otherwise proven. And even if I do know you, if you do these things, these are red flag things and I'm out. And that's because we've been having conversations forever, but that's because I worked in child protection and I've seen all sorts of things and nobody ever wants to have to see with children. So, as a result, I might've been a little bit paranoid and I also know, like sometimes we get caught up in this idea that if, if our child knows about something, it's going to make them want to. Engage in this behavior. So if you talked to your kid about sex, it's going to make them want to have sex. If you talked to your kids about drugs, it's going to make them want to have drugs, but here's the thing. Research tells us that when your child is informed and understands the consequence of their actions. They are much more likely to stay abstinent. They are much more likely to be the friend that is saying to other people like, Hey, you need to make sure that you're using protection. If you're having sex, things like that. He makes sure you have all of these things in place that you, because you've had these conversations with them, right. That they feel safe coming to you and saying, Hey mom, I've got this friend that. I don't know what to do. How do I handle this situation? How do I support them? These are the same friends that I'm in the substance use world are like, yeah, no, I'm not using drugs because I know what drugs do I have. Uh, my husband works in addiction treatment and has my daughter's whole life. And she's had conversations with us at the kitchen table at, I don't know, seven years old about opiate addiction, about what opiate addiction is and what it does and how it tears apart families and the negative impact it has on lives. And when, if you talk to her now, People using substances. She's like, I don't understand. Y you would make that choice when it has so many bad consequences and I'm like, yeah. Right. Because you, because she's informed, right. And the research tells us us. When we teaching our kids that smoking cigarettes is bad. And all the reasons why not just Nancy, Reagan's just say no to drugs, but like, Actually helping them understand the negative consequences that show up as a result of these things and what it can do. Actually safeguards kids. It becomes a protective mechanism. To help our children. Not engage in high risk behaviors. So. Talking to your daughters, talking to your sons. About risky behaviors. About risky people. About red flag. Behaviors things to be on the lookout for. And really kind of understanding. That when you can approach these conversations with empathy and compassion. And understand that, like, if you have a twelve-year-old that started dating at, you know, dating a boy at school and she loves him and they've been dating for two weeks and. You know, they hold hands and he's kind of been pushing her to like kiss him and maybe start to push her in directions to do more. To engage in more sexual behaviors. It's important that you're having conversations with her and helping her understand. Like, Hey, is this something you want to be doing without judgment? And as moms we want to protect, right? Mama bear comes out. We want to protect our Cubs. And we want to say, hell no, get away from my kids. But when you say hell, no, get away from my kids. You, you're not allowed to date who the hell does that kid think he is? Stay away from PBS bad news. It's not just, you know, some I'll hear from other moms that will say like, oh, that's just making him more enticing. It's not just that it's making him more enticing. It, it definitely does that from our neuro-biological perspective, but the other thing it does is it doesn't help your child your soon to be adult. Right. Your daughter or your son? It does not help them. To make informed decisions. It does not help them to go. Oh, Hey, you know what? It's not okay for somebody to force me or push me, or try to manipulate me into a behavior that I don't feel comfortable with. That's not okay. And it's okay for me to say no. And it's okay for me to say back off and it's okay for me to stand my ground and to get my people involved. It's okay for me to tell my friends that this kid's doing this and I'm not okay with it. Right. But it doesn't have to be a secret there. So often we grew up in a timeframe. I am going to be by the time this podcast. So it comes out 48. And in that 48 years, I still want to have conversations with my mom. There's a lot of things that she whispers and that's like that just that whisper. Things like, does she have her period? And she'll whisper it. Or I have family members that have struggled with addiction. She'll be like, so-and-so relapsed again. And she'll like, whisper it. Or they don't talk about alcohol use. So we don't talk about dating or we don't talk about sex. We don't talk about, we're gonna talk about any of those taboos, right? Teaching your daughters. And your sons. That talking about things. Does not make them true. One. Does not turn people against you to. And allows you to stand in your, like what you're comfortable with. That is what's most important. And if they don't know what they're comfortable with, then you have to help them navigate those roads. And if your, if you grew up in an environment like, mean you haven't learned yet how to have those conversations. Then you need more support that a podcast can give. I love you for being here. Thank you so much, but you need more support than a podcast can give. You're not going to get the answers to how to have these conversations without practicing the conversations and getting feedback on it. And you're not going to get that from a book, from a podcast or from a, you know, a DEO DIY course that you can take out there, a program you can take out there, which I have a program that you can take that would help you with kind of clearing out your own, getting, getting aware of your own thinking and your. Our own attitudes and regulating your own nervous system and then helping your daughter. Uh, specifically that's that course kind of, uh, is targeted at moms and daughters. But it's still really helpful to have feedback from a professional that can help you through this journey. That is what we do inside the online moms society which is a low ticket. Community membership, where we come together and do live group coaching like two or three times a month, just depending on the month. But that tends to be about what we're doing because what we really want to do, what we really want to be teaching our, our kids is you're going to be teaching them bodily autonomy. We want to teach them to have a voice. We want to teach them how to communicate boundaries and put boundaries in place. And we want to teach them how to regulate their nervous system. So they can think on their feet when the situation gets a little dicey. Right. So. All of these things, we can be teaching them from the time that they're very young, all the way through the two 18 years. But where it starts to really present itself as an issue is those middle school years where they start to have a little bit more independence out there in the world. And the more independence they have, the less likely they are to come to you to solve the problem. They're going to turn to whoever's with them at the time. And as I always say to my teenager, I have started saying this to her when she was like 11 and I would say. Your 11 year old friends have not lived on this earth for longer than you have. They don't know any more than you do about this subject. They are not the expert. They are not the resource that you need. Come to me, come to another trusted adult. If you want me to connect you with like a therapist or somebody beyond that, I can do that. And for me, my daughter's always come to me. She's always come to me and I still say the same thing at 16, and now she says it almost 16. She says it. She says my friends, I love them to death. They don't know shit. I'm not asking them for it. I'm not going to them for this. And if they're an expert in something, then I'll go to them. But if they're not, I'm out, I'm not, I'm not asking my peers to help me navigate these difficult situations that I don't yet know how to navigate. I'm coming to somebody that knows what they're talking about. And that's what you want with your kid. That's the dynamic that you want to develop. But this starts by really dialing in and looking at some of these things that we've talked about here today. So. I hope this episode was helpful for you. I would love to hear your feedback. Feel free to leave a review or message me on Instagram. Let me know what you thought. And thank you guys. This season, we are bringing way more episodes with all sorts of, kind of hot topics for parenting the pre-teen and teen years that like fifth or sixth grade and beyond. So we'll be looking at a lot of that stuff. And so if you have a specific concerns that you're struggling with message me, I will do an entire episode on it. I love to answer your questions through the podcast. So thank you so much for being here. I will see you guys soon. Take care.