71. Struggling With Your Teenage Son? 5 Parenting Skills That Build Connection

If raising your teenage boy feels harder than you expected, welcome to the club. Today, we are talking about five super skills every mom of a teenage boy needs. And here's the best part. You already have more of these than you think. We are going to talk about how to parent with more confidence, more calm, more connection, even on the really hard days. It's going to be a fun, lighthearted episode because one of the super skills is my favorite to talk about. I think you're going to love this episode. I'm so glad you're here. Let's get started. Welcome to Raising Boys Building Men, the podcast for moms raising sons from middle school to manhood. I'm your host Heidi Elsob, mom of five boys, social worker and certified life coach on a mission to help moms raise good men. I know you're exhausted, worried about his future and missing that sweet little boy who used to snuggle on the couch. Most of all, you're afraid you're getting it all wrong. But here's the truth. It doesn't have to be this way. You can be a calm, confident and capable mom and I'm here to help. Each week we'll tackle parenting strategies, mindset shifts and the real life challenges of raising boys. So you can enjoy your son now while helping him become the man you know he can be. Let's dive in. Welcome back to Raising Boys Building Men. I am so, so glad that you're here. Today's going to be a fun episode because I think we need a little bit of lightness. We talk about heavy subjects on this podcast. We talk about the hard, which I want you to feel like you can come here and hear about the hard so that you don't feel so alone. But today we're going to talk about five super skills that every mom of a teenage boy needs because when things get tough, oftentimes we go looking for like this magic script, the perfect consequence, the right rule that is going to finally make everything click for him and for you. And we think if I just, if I can just say it the right way, he's going to get it. And then when he doesn't, well, moms, we have this amazing way of turning it on ourselves. I must be doing a terrible job. It must be me. And that's just simply not true. So we're going to develop these super skills that we need as moms and we're just going to show up and do our best every day. And let me tell you, that's enough. That's enough. Here's what I've learned after raising five sons and years of coaching moms is that teenage parenting is less about what you say and more about who you are when you're saying it. Let that sink in for just a minute. Not the right words. It's who you are. How you are showing up. There is research that backs this up studies show time and time again that your ability to regulate your own emotions has a direct impact on your sense mental health and behavior. And listen, moms, before you put that in your backpack of heavy things that you're carrying around, this is really good news because we are capable of managing and regulating our emotions. This is one thing that we can work on. And when we do, it makes a direct impact on our sons. So when you stay calm, when he's not, you're literally teaching his brain how to do the same thing. Research calls this co-regulation. We talk about it often on the podcast. It's one of the most powerful tools that you have as a mom. And it's just biology and it's actually super cool that your nervous system can set the tone for the whole house. That doesn't mean that you have to be on all the time and happy and go lucky. It means you get to be human like every other member of your family. So let's talk about these five super skills. They are not going to make your parenting easier because if you're looking for a shortcut in parenting, let me know if you find one because I just have found that the reason parenting can become so rewarding that we love these kids so much is because it's not easy. It's hard. It's an investment of our time and our energy. And that's why the payout is so great. And you may be thinking right now, Heidi, there is no payout. I feel no payout right now. But trust me, you will. When you've strengthened that relationship with that boy and he becomes an adult and he walks into your house, gives you a big bear hug, tells you how much he loves you, and you can see that he just calms down when he enters your house. That's payout. For years and years and years of effort and relationship building. So the first super skill that we're going to talk about and we're going to spend a little more time on the first one than the other state because it's my very favorite. For me, it has been the one that when things are really tense and really hard, we can use this and remember that there's still a lot of love and that everything is going to be okay. And that super skill, my friends, is a sense of humor. This is just funny. You can either laugh or you can cry. Like I just want to choose laughter. It's your ability to laugh at yourself. It's your ability to laugh with him at ridiculous situations that teenage boys get themselves into. We don't want to laugh to embarrass him, but laughing because sometimes the stuff that you end up saying that you end up seeing is just so out there. It's like nothing you ever thought you would encounter as a mother and it's funny. But it'd be funny. So some things that I laugh at sometimes when I'm just by myself and remember there's no judgment here. I actually text my sisters and my sister in laws and I said, what are some things that you have found yourself saying to your sons that you just never thought you were going to say? So I have some, I'm going to repeat some of the ones that they said because I told you this is going to be a light and a fun episode. But I want you to think about if these are statements that you've ever said because there are some that I just never thought would come out of my mouth and they do and they have on repeat. The first one is, did you brush your teeth, followed up with, did you use toothpaste? Like who would think you'd need to ask that, but you do? Here are some more. If the cut is not on your face, we're going to super glue it closed. Remember, no judgment. Stop touching your brother. When I went in to buy a carpet for our house, I said to the salesperson, listen, I need carpet the color of dirt. This is my only requirement. And then when I went to get hardwood for our house, I said, I need the hardest hardwood that they make. I really don't even care what it looks like. Just needs to be scratch resistant. Everyone, how hard is it to pee in the toilet? What made you think that was a good idea? It's 10 degrees outside. Why are you wearing shorts? Just because you say no offense doesn't mean I'm not offended. How about this one? You'll think me one day. Just not today. Or there's no such thing as nice sweatshorts. Your kids wear shorts everywhere. You tell them to dress up and they come out in their nicest sweatshorts. There's just no such thing as nice sweatshorts. Here's another one. You can't date the whole volleyball team at once. It won't end well for you. If you would just listen to me, your life would be so much easier. Get your hands out of your pants. Stop touching yourself. I've probably repeated that three million times in the last 30 years. The hot tub and the swimming pool don't count as a shower. And then here's one that I'm sure everyone if you have repeated. You have clean underwear on. This is funny. It's funny and fun to be a mom. Boys because we end up saying things. We just never thought we'd come out of our mouth. Humor is like the most amazing pressure release valve. And when you can find something funny, especially in a tense moment, you just diffuse the whole situation, the whole power struggle. Before it gets any more tense. It reminds both of you that listen, this is stressful and what we're going through is hard, but it's going to be okay. And if we're honest, these teenage boys can be kind of funny. The stuff that comes out of their mouth, the random questions when they come home at midnight, want a bowl of cereal, the comments they say, or the things they did with their friends that night, it's kind of funny. The way that they eat dinner and then 10 minutes later grab a bowl of cereal. Once again, we want humor to be a super power. Your brain right now, during those teenage years, it's just wired for conflict. And our brain is wired to look for danger. And it's just not a great combination. But when you refuse to get so deep and so serious and you can stay lighthearted sometimes, you're showing him a different way to handle frustration, to handle conflict. What a gift. So before you respond to the next frustrating thing, just ask yourself, is this going to matter in a year? And if the answer's no, make a joke, let it go, save your energy for the things that really matter. You can't die on every hill. A sense of humor is one of the super skills that if you don't feel like you're strong, there, that's the one I would work on, if I were you. I would work on laughing a little more and crying a little less. And you may be saying, Heidi, there's really nothing to laugh at right now. I bet you could find something. I bet there is something worth laughing at, even if it's just silly memes that you can sit and watch with your son. The second super skill that we want to develop as moms is the super skill of perspective. And perspective is our ability, your ability, my ability as moms to see what your son, my son, what they can't see. We understand brain development. We know that his brain is not developed all the way. It doesn't mean he's not smart. He's super smart. But their brain is not developed in a way that they can see perspective the same way that we can. Which oftentimes causes conflict, right? We can see the potential for danger if they can't see it. But if we use this as a super skill and be able to zoom out when he's stuck in the weeds, then we can start to articulate in a better way why our perspective matters. Then he will start to understand why our influence matters, why our opinion matters. And when you have perspective, you can pause instead of react. You can respond with intention instead of all that bubble-double emotion because you can see more clearly. You remember that his behavior is information. It's information. It's not a personal attack against you. His behavior is information. That alone can be a mindset, adjustment that really benefits your relationship. These teenage boys, they're designed to live moment by moment. They really have a hard time seeing past Friday night. They're not being difficult on purpose. They're learning how to think long-term. And we have a front row seat to that. Which is hard. I'm not going to lie. It's hard. The gap between emotional response and rational thinking is the widest between ages 13 and 15. So if you have a 14-year-old boy right now, that answers a lot of questions. They just, that's the way that their development is. That's completely normal. That's when the reward seeking part of their brain is firing on all cylinders. But they don't really have the brakes or the judgment fully running yet. So our perspective helps everybody. Remember that when he makes a decision that makes no sense to you, he's making it in the weeds. And we want to go to that 30,000 foot level and use our super skill of perspective to help the situation. So when the emotions rise, yours or his, we really want to pause and ask ourselves, what's really going on here? If I pan out to the 30,000 foot level, what do I see? Oftentimes you'll realize you don't have to fix every little thing that's going on. And that's great news. So developing that super skill of perspective and really leaning in and being confident on your ability to see from a different perspective that he does, he will start learning to trust that perspective. He will over the course of time. So perspective is a great super skill. The third super skill is resilience. Oh my goodness, moms, we just have to bounce back. If we don't, we are in for a really long miserable teenage experience. We want to of course hold our boundaries when he pushes them. We want to repair when he messes up when we mess up because you're going to mess up. And so is he. You just want to have the attitude that we're going to wake up tomorrow and we're going to try again. There's a lot of repetition that comes with having a teenage son. You're going to say the same thing over and over again. You're going to explain the boundary over and over again. And that's okay because here's the truth. One hard moment, one mistake, one poor decision. It doesn't define him as a teenager and it quite honestly doesn't define you as parent. One bad day from either one of you, it doesn't erase years of showing up. We just bounce back and try again tomorrow. Maybe you snapped at him because you're exhausted. And later you apologize. Tell him that you're sorry that you yelled. It wasn't about him. It was about you being overwhelmed. And could we both try again? That's resilience. And what a great gift you're giving him to teach him that adults need second chances to. And that it's really important to take responsibility. All of this relationship, frustration and repairing over and over and over again is teaching him great life lessons. So be resilient. Strengthen that superpower of bouncing back, trying again the next day without making it mean these big heavy things about your ability to be a mom. You're already a good mom. That's not up for discussion. And it's not something you want to reevaluate every day. You're a great mom who tries again tomorrow and the next day and the next day. So one thing that will help when you go to bed at night or when you have a quiet moment in the day, it maybe doesn't happen very often. But here's a great question. What went right today? It's really important for us to live in the game. Every night that I go to bed as I fall asleep, I say to myself three wins. What are three wins for my day? Sometimes I have to dig harder than others. Looking for your wins for the day resets your brain that everything's going to be okay. We can get up again tomorrow and try again. We don't just have to replay the same frustrations day after day after day. Really work on the super skill of resilience. It's going to benefit your relationship and it's just going to be more fun. It's going to help you be a better mom. The fourth super skill is emotional regulation. We talk about this so, so much because it's very, very important. It's your ability to stay steady when he's not. It's not about pretending you don't have emotions. I am the first one to say, fill your emotions, express your emotions, acknowledge your emotions. They will move through you so much faster if you're not trying to suppress your emotions and pay attention to when your nervous system is disregulated. If you're offline, you can't sift through your emotions. You can't have a good conversation. That emotional regulation. The more that we can strive for as much steadiness as possible. The more your teenage son is going to feel safe and become more steady too. It's just science. It's not one more thing for you to do. It's just something that you want to start practicing. I want to start paying attention to when I'm online and offline. It's not hard. You don't have to change it. You just want to pay attention. If you're offline, take some breaths. Get back online. Tell your brain that you're safe, that everything's okay. We're not being chased by a bear. They did a meta analysis of 22 studies. So they took 22 different studies. They put them together. Found that parents with effective. This is not perfect. Nobody said perfect. Effective emotional regulation skills. In my mind, that means they're trying. They raise children with better emotional regulation. Your steadiness literally shapes his ability to manage his own emotions, his own nervous system. That's really great news. Not one more thing for you to do. But one more thing for you to just pay attention to. That's going to help every relationship in your life. Everyone of them. You don't have to match his intensity to be affected. If he's yelling, you don't have to yell. In fact, if you lower your voice, he will start to lower his voice. And I know that's hard to do. I get it. But start paying attention to it. Start developing this super skill. Pause before you respond. Take a breath. Lower your voice. Walk away for just a minute. That doesn't mean you're being weak. It means you're being wise. You're developing a super skill that you're going to use over and over and over again during these teenage years. Super skill number five. And I love this one. This is one of the best parenting emotions that we compare it from and its curiosity. Develop the super skill of being curious about you about him, about your relationship. It's choosing to ask before you assume. And that's hard because we do a lot of assuming it just comes natural to us mothers. Well, I'll speak for myself. It just comes natural to me. It's easy for me to assume. It's a lot harder and takes a little bit more effort for me to get curious, but the benefits of that curiosity pay out tenfold. It's wondering what's going on for him instead of deciding that I already know what's going on for him. Our brains love to finish stories and if we let them go, they will finish stories. However, they're not always accurate. Then we're parenting from the story that we just made up. So get curious. What is going on for him? Why would he say that? Why would he lash out like that? And ask it. It keeps connection open, not in a judgmental get after him way, but a genuine curiosity. Hey, buddy, what's going on for you? Why would you say that? That makes him think. And anytime we can get those teenage boys to think, it's a win. It's a win. Here are some questions specifically that can help you tap into that curiosity. Help me understand what's going on. You can do this with any relationship. What's happening for you when you do that? That thing, whatever it is. Tell me more about that. Sometimes you're not, well, let me just say most every time in my experience, you're not going to get him to answer with this beautifully curated answer. He's a teenage boy. He's probably going to say nothing or I don't know. But keep getting curious. Keep asking. Maybe you want to give an example of your own teenage experience and that will help him open up a little bit more. Help me understand if we can start the sentence that way, then they really do want you to understand. And so it's going to make him think it's going to make him want to respond in a way that gets you to understand. And that opens up communication. It opens up connection. Try it. Try it this week. Replace one of your lectures with a question. Just one. And see what happens. Test it out. Here are your takeaways from today. Five super skills that you're building as a mom of a teenage boy. Humor. In fact, it would be really fun if you reach out to me and tell me things that you never thought you would say until you had a teenage son. Let me know what they are. The second super skill, perspective, get to that 30,000-foot level, resilience, bounce back. Start the day fresh, emotional regulation, am I online, am I offline, and then curiosity? What's really going on for him and what's really going on for me? What's really going on underneath because I'm a human too with thoughts and feelings and emotions. You don't need every skill as a mom. You don't. But if you can develop these five super skills and you can strengthen them even in the smallest of ways, it's going to make your parenting experience more fun, more enjoyable, more connected. So I don't want you to be listening to this and thinking, "I don't know if I have these skills. I want you to stop right there and recognize that you already have more of these than you think. Every time you've taken a breath before you've responded, that's emotional regulation. Every time you've laughed at something ridiculous, instead of making it a big deal, that's humor. And every time you've tried again after a hard day, that's resilience. You're already doing this. It's just going to benefit you more if you do them with more intention. And celebrate when you use these super skills. If you want more tools to help you stay more connected to your son during these years, come and grab my connection blueprint. This is going to give you eight tips that you can use today to better connect with your son. They work. I promise, and they're free. Just come and grab them. And if you're looking for a community, please come and join our free Facebook community, Raising Boys Building Men. We would love to see you over there. Thank you for being here. You're doing so much better than you think. I promise you are. Take care and I'll see you on the next episode. If this episode inspired you or helped you in any way, I'd love for you to share it with a friend. Your support means the world to me and helps spread our message further. Here are two quick ways that you can support the show. First, subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode. Second, leave a rating and review. It just takes a minute and it helps other moms find us. Listen, moms, the world needs good men now more than ever and change starts at home. For more resources and to connect with me directly, visit us on Instagram or at our website, RaisingBoysBuildingMen.com. Thanks for listening and I'll see you on the next podcast.