Brainy Moms
Brainy Moms is a parenting podcast with smart ideas to help moms and kids thrive! Hosted by cognitive psychologist Dr. Amy Moore along with rotating co-hosts Sandy Zamalis, Teri Miller, and Dr. Jody Jedlicka, this weekly show features conversations and guest experts in parenting, psychology, child development, education, and medicine with practical tips to help moms navigate the ups and downs of parenthood. We're smart moms helping make moms smarter...one episode at a time!
Brainy Moms
ENCORE EPISODE! The Parent-Teen Partnership: 5 Steps to Create Calm and Reduce Conflict | Jeanine Mouchawar
Want more calm and less conflict with your teen? What if transforming your family's communication dynamic could be as simple as a shift in mindset? Join Dr. Amy and Sandy for an engaging episode with guest Jeanine Mouchawar, a seasoned life coach for parents, as she shares her journey from conflict to connection with teenagers. Jeanine's personal parenting experiences with academic stress, social media pressures, and ADHD challenges led her to embrace new strategies for parenting teens. In this conversation, you'll gain insights into how these techniques can restore harmony and foster open communication within your own family.
Discover new tips for effective communication in parenting teens, rooted in the principles of Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) and cognitive behavioral concepts. We discuss the pivotal role of understanding the teenage transition to adulthood and adapting communication styles to support them rather than solving their problems for them. Jeanine shares how maintaining core values while fostering curiosity and encouraging teens to discover their own insights can lead to healthier relationships. By learning to manage emotions and use non-judgmental language, parents can create a supportive environment that empowers their teens.
Explore practical strategies for setting boundaries that respect and engage teenagers without resorting to control or punishment. Jeanine emphasizes the importance of validating emotions to strengthen connection and communication, helping teens process feelings like stress and embarrassment. By involving them in boundary-setting conversations, parents can guide them towards better decision-making and independence. This episode promises valuable insights for nurturing confidence and self-assurance in your teens, ultimately leading to a more harmonious home life.
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Hi, smart moms and dads. We're so happy you're here with us for another episode of the Brainy Moms podcast, brought to you today by LearningRx Brain Training Centers. I'm your host, dr Amy Moore, coming to you today from Colorado Springs, colorado, and I am joined by my co-host, sandy Zimalis, coming to us from Virginia, and Sandy and I are super excited to welcome our guest today, janine Mouchoir. Janine is a life coach for parents of teenagers. She helps make parenting easier by teaching new communication strategies that reduce conflict and create calm. Parents learn how to teach their teens cooperation, responsibility and critical life skills to empower them for success. In the process, they create the positive, meaningful relationship they've always imagined. Janine earned her BA from Stanford University and is a certified professional life coach. She's married and has three adult children. Welcome, janine.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Thank you, amy and Sandy, it's great to be here. Thanks for having me on. Yeah, we're excited that you're with us.
Sandy Zamalis:Janine, we're so glad to talk to you today because parenting teens is really a difficult topic in general, and we're ready to jump in. In fact, we started a little bit, so I want to keep that continuation of the conversation going. So tell us about yourself so everybody can join us, about how you got interested in coaching parents and specifically about raising teens.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, yeah. Well, like you said, I have three adult children, so I've been through as I've been through being a parent of the teenage years. I'm just to share my experience. I felt like, as the kids were little and growing up, I parented intuitively and you know there's lots of resources out there in addition and so things went pretty smooth. And then we got to the teenage years and I just felt like conflict and tension and chaos set in. I felt like I was really faced with a lot of different parenting challenges that I wasn't equipped to handle effectively.
Jeanine Mouchawar:So, like my daughter was my oldest, you know she was an overachieving student who loved to do well and participate in everything and consequently, it was challenging to try to help her navigate the overwhelm, the stress that she put on herself, the anxiety that would be created because she was so focused on doing well on a test. She also started, you know she was a middle schooler when phones first came out and in high school as social media apps started to come out and that you know, as many of us know, we didn't grow up with and we don't have a lot of tools in our toolbox or skills on how to navigate that and help our kids like feeling good and confident about ourselves. So those were sort of the challenges I was dealing with her, my middle one. He was diagnosed with ADD and a learning disability at a very young age and I found when we got to the teenage years his thinking became more exaggerated in terms of black and white thinking, struggling to take responsibility, more blaming others. There was riskier behavior going on and all those things were again very challenging to parent and to navigate where I could keep the calm in the house and the connection going.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And then my youngest, who's 21 now he's actually in Texas, like yours, sandy, or one of yours, sandy, or one of yours. He was a very different child as well. He was very emotionally sensitive, emotionally in touch, which was super fun to parent that, but also can be challenging to help him navigate those big emotions. He sort of came up in the ramping up of the time of video games and so I remember looking at him playing video games all the time and noticing I was having thoughts of you're lazy, do your homework, you know, get off those games. All those common parenting thoughts I think that come up when we see our kids on video games or apps or their phone all the time and also he just never really found his people in high school. So helping him navigate that as well and also just being the younger sibling of, you know, a brother who has ADD and the challenges that come with that, that was hard for him to navigate as well and hard for me to help and support him.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And so what I was noticing is that what had been a calm and peaceful home was now we were butting heads and there were battles going on and we were arguing and I just didn't like how I was showing up. You know, I found myself tracking them on the phone because I was scared or worried, because I thought they had lied and punishing and that felt bad, the whole dynamic that was going on. I just felt like there's just got to be a better way, and so I ended up going to a parenting program that was taught a lot of dialectical behavioral therapy skills and as I transformed my way of communicating to my kids with some of these skills, I started seeing this amazing change in our dynamic and we just the connection came back. The calm came back. We were able to talk about these topics that were really felt so difficult to talk about before we had.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Like, these tools and strategies gave us a structure to be able to have these conversations where my kids felt good. I felt good and you know we were able to bring some of that joy back in the house that we used to have. And so I guess at that point I just thought this is crazy. Every parent should know these skills. It's more important than calculus or geometry, for that matter and you know this should really be taught to everybody. And I just thought, you know I want to try to get this information into as many hands of parents as possible, and so I take my 26 years of parenting experience, combined with some of these new strategies I learned and coaching techniques and strategies, and that's kind of how that led me to being a life coach for parents of teens.
Dr. Amy Moore:I love that, and I love that so many parents get through the teen years and they're like, hallelujah, we are done, right, done, and you never want to look back right. Those were the hardest five, six, seven years of your life so far. And so, instead of having that mentality, you said, oh my gosh, let's lean in and help other parents. And then you have to sit in that space right Again and again and again now with more parents, but knowing what you know and are excited to share it.
Dr. Amy Moore:I love that. You said that your coaching program was based on DBT and, like I talk all the time about the importance of that. You know increasing our tolerance for stress, and so we can't do that if we're in Hulk brain, right. And so when we're upset and our amygdala hijacks our prefrontal cortex and we're in this Hulk brain, we can't think clearly, we can't think clearly, we can't communicate clearly, and so we have to figure out ways to keep ourselves in Bruce Banner brain, help our kids co-regulate and stay in Bruce Banner brain so that we can all communicate effectively, right. When instead, what's really happening out there is everybody's screaming at everybody else because it's just a bunch of hulks running around our house, us included.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, totally. Oh, I love your analogy. I love the Hulk. Bruce Banner versus the Hulk. That one's going to stick with me, amy, I love it. That's so true though.
Dr. Amy Moore:For that. I learned that in my trauma therapist certification training, but still it stuck with me too, which is why I continue to share that.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, and I'm sure that resonates Sorry, sandy, I just know that resonates with so much of you, so many of your audience who are parents of teens, because you know just that visual of being the Hulk and the anger that comes out and the frustration right Like. I think we all feel that quite often with our teenagers. You know they know how to push our buttons.
Sandy Zamalis:Yeah, so can we give our listeners kind of a generic definition of what DBT is, in case they're hearing us for the first time? And Amy, I don't know if you want to jump in.
Dr. Amy Moore:and Janine, can share your side too. No, Janine, go for it. This is your hour.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Oh gosh, amy, I don't know about that. My definition of DBT skills is very layman. I am not an expert in DBT, so you feel free to expand on whatever I say. My knowledge is basically sort of this.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Well, there's a few things that go on. There's some principles, like two things can be true at the same time. That is a powerful principle to use when I'm coaching parents, because we tend to think it's an all or nothing kind of way of thinking which can really keep us stuck. There are four pillars. There's mindfulness, emotion regulation, interpersonal communication and what's the fourth, walking the middle path? Is that the fourth one, if you remember? Or those? That's how it was taught to me and the program I went through.
Jeanine Mouchawar:But I think the takeaways for me with the DBT skills a couple of things. One, the huge thing, which is also a piece of cognitive behavioral therapy, right, is that our thoughts impact our feelings and emotions and it's really that's what happens before we take action. And that concept alone most people aren't familiar with or even aware of, that, at least I come in contact with. And so, talking about that concept that your thoughts create your feelings and that creates your actions, and understanding that one for ourselves and two when we look at our children and think about what's motivating them to make certain choices. If we can back it up and realize, gosh, let's get to the root cause of the problem, which is what are they thinking or feeling that's causing that action? You're, in a way, more effective and powerful position to help them and for your relationship. So again, I know components of DBT. Um, please feel, please enlighten everyone more than that.
Dr. Amy Moore:No, absolutely. And so I think, um, emotion regulation and distress tolerance are very are are very similar, right? And so we look, because mindfulness actually, which is one of the pillars, actually helps us with distress tolerance. It actually increases our capacity for distress. But it also helps with emotion regulation too, because those mindfulness practices that we can learn and teach as part of a DBT program actually help break that fight, flight or freeze cycle and kind of reduce the amount of cortisol coursing through our veins so that we can regulate our emotions. And that isn't something that we can do again if we're in Hulk brain. And so DBT sort of builds on the cognitive behavioral therapy movement by saying wait a minute, it's not just about thoughts, feelings and behaviors, it's also about the interpersonal neurobiology that's going on in the brain, and so we have to be able to harness some of that as well. So I love hearing that a coaching program is adopting that as well, because it should be. These should be practices that are accessible to everyone, not just available through a clinician's office.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I love that. I love that and, honestly, when I went through coach certification, I was just amazed at how much crossover there was between the things I was learning to become a coach and DBT skills. It was very synergistic and it was why I think I'm able to integrate all of that into my practice today. I love how there's a lot of crossover there.
Dr. Amy Moore:Yeah, well, that's fantastic, all right. I love how there's a lot of crossover there. Yeah, oh, that's fantastic, all right. So let's talk about just let's go to the basics. Why is it so difficult to parent teens what is happening that changes on their 13th birthday, where, all of a sudden, everything we've been doing for the last 12 years and three, four days no longer works?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, right.
Jeanine Mouchawar:How does that happen? I believe there's a few things contributing to that. I think one is that we all know our teens are in a massive transition, right when they hit 13,. Like, we're all aware of that. We see it in front of our very eyes. Where I noticed the gap was, for me and in helping my clients, is that we don't recognize that that means we need to transition as well. Right, because our teens now they need something different from us than they needed when they were little, right? Sometimes I think about it as like.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I think about how curious your younger child was asking you all these questions, right, wanting to know your thoughts about things and your advice and relishing your life lessons as you taught them about the world.
Jeanine Mouchawar:They were so curious and you got to provide your wisdom and in return, we were, in essence, rewarded with smiles and appreciation and snuggles and love, and appreciation and snuggles and love.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And I think the real challenge here is when they become a teenager is we really need to flip that around, and it's time for us to get curious about what's going on from them, and they want to come up with their own wisdom, and so the question is how can we come to them from a place of curiosity and support them in coming up with their own solutions to things, because that's really what they want. And so the breakdown that I think that happens for a lot of us is that we don't realize that their needs, what they need from us, has transitioned, and so we kind of stay stuck in our old ways and our old patterns, because that's what felt good, so it got wired into our nervous system right, and so, of course, we want to keep doing it. And so when we show up right explaining, hey, you should really do this, or you need to do this, or here's the right way to do things right, or trying to fix something that you think might be broken, when we do these, we're doing it with such beautiful intention and also because it always worked in the past. But what happens now? When we do that is right?
Jeanine Mouchawar:The battles ensue, the fighting, the conflict, the butting heads.
Dr. Amy Moore:So then, do we change our values or do we change our communication style? How do we need to make? What adaptations do we have to make?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, I believe that what we need to do is change our communication style. I mean, I think that for most of us, probably, you know our values. Our big picture values are safety right. For most of us, again, generalizing trust, honesty, responsibility, family right, and I'm not sure if those I mean for me, at least those didn't change. But what needed to change is how I communicated with my teens. Right, it was time to communicate in a new way, in a different way, where they could actually hear what I was saying and be receptive to the guidance that I wanted to give.
Dr. Amy Moore:So what does that look like?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, well, that's for. What I do when I'm working with clients is I start with teaching a five step process, and the first step is getting calm ourselves, right. So we see this behavior that's really scary or really worrisome, or aggravating, or disappointing, right, maybe they're disrespectful, or we think they're lazy because of their video games, or they're being promiscuous, or drinking, or smoking or lying I mean name any of the behaviors that all of us, as parents of teens, right Like red flag, red flag. And so what happens is, when we see these behaviors and we start feeling worried and scared or angry, we just can't resist the urge to have a conversation with them. Right then, right there.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And the thing to be aware of is, like, when we enter a conversation with those real heated emotions, our teen is going to feel that energy from us and it's going to repel them.
Jeanine Mouchawar:It's very uncomfortable for them to feel that, and so that tends to be right away they either shut down, you know, they push you away, they yell go away, get out of my room, other kids might pay lip service to you, but you know they're not really listening. And so the first thing that I work on with clients is learning how, what works for you to calm your emotions down what are you thinking that's sparking all the worry and the fear or the anger? And really to take the time so that you are responding with intention, calmly, from your wise mind, instead of like reacting emotionally. You know from the hip, and that's really the first step, before you know slow things down because you want to engage them in a conversation, and it's impossible to engage them in a conversation if they're feeling your anger, your worry, your stress, your frustration, if they're feeling your anger, your worry, your stress, your frustration.
Dr. Amy Moore:There's nothing magical about the type of ways that you are teaching parents to calm down right Like any breathing exercises, grounding exercises, mindfulness is that what you're referring to?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, I mean, I've got a whole host of you know options to share with people. You know, just real briefly, with your audience, a real quick thing you can do is think about your five senses, right? So touch, what calms you down with touch, like is does petting your dog or your cat calm you down? Is that soothing? Right? What calms you down? Listening? Is there certain music, you know, that feels calming to you? So you can think about your five cents. If something doesn't come to your mind right away of how to calm yourself down, right, you can think about those five senses.
Jeanine Mouchawar:You know, when I'm working with clients, you know, sometimes people will say they want to take a walk outside or go for a quick run, or even, like on my window right now, like, just look at nature, look at the trees. That can be calming. Obviously, like what you said, breathing exercises can be calming. And then, as we work together for a longer period of time, we go deeper in terms of what exactly are you thinking that's causing these feelings to come up? And you know, what do you want to do? Excuse me, you know, with those thoughts, you know.
Jeanine Mouchawar:So we'd work on maybe some mantras you can say to yourself, like a few that I love, are this is just for today, or this is just for today, not forever, right? Or maybe it's something that say they are addicted to the. You think they're addicted to an app? Right, you can look at this as well. It's hard to resist and control yourself when something's very compelling, and so this is just a life skill that we need to learn, and my child hasn't learned this skill yet. So there's a few things we can say to ourselves as well that can be calming. So there's just a few examples, but ultimately, amy, it's really I like to talk to clients and ask them like well, what works for you? Right? We're all different, different human beings, and somebody who meditates might not work for somebody else who needs to go take a run.
Sandy Zamalis:So it sounds like what you're saying is that you know, really, at the root, a large percentage of the time it's a parent's fear that's, you know, manifesting, and then it's being received by the child or the teenager as a lack of trust. So you're in this constant state of you know, especially in the teenage years, because you've spent, you know, up until 13, your whole your parent life protecting them from all things and then all of a sudden that shift has to happen and you know it's like giving a child who's never had a driving lesson the keys to the car right. You're just letting them go out in the world and make mistakes and the stakes are so much higher if there's any mistakes along the way. So I would think helping them identify, helping a parent identify that fear and how that kind of can manifest in you know, control or anger or other things down the road, is just super beneficial. At least on that you know, just acknowledging that one little piece. What are you afraid of?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yes, yeah, no, that's so true, and I love how you said when we approach them with these high emotions, you know you said that they feel like we don't trust them. I think that was what you said. And, yeah, it's like we are. We're sending a message like we don't think you're capable, Right, we don't think you're smart enough fall into the pattern of telling them what they should do or they need to do, or trying to fix the problem.
Jeanine Mouchawar:That's the message that they're getting, that you know you don't believe in me, you don't trust me, you don't think I'm capable enough, and so, of course, none of us want to intentionally send that message, and so it's just recognizing that, oh wait, when I talk to them the way I used to, that's not what they were taking in, that wasn't the message they were receiving, but now that is the message that they're receiving. And so how can I talk to them in a way where they feel empowered to make their own choices and they feel like we believe in them and we trust them, that they are capable, and also, like you were saying with the driver's example, right, it's like they're still in the safety of your home. It's just your role in terms of how much you're involved in keeping them safe needs to evolve as they're evolving.
Dr. Amy Moore:Yeah, all right, so first step get calm ourselves.
Jeanine Mouchawar:All right, step number two yeah, so step two is based in the DBT skills I learned, which is basically just stating your observation. Right, so let's say you find out they got a D on the test, you know. You say something like, hey, I noticed you got a D on the test versus what you know, what are you doing? You got a D on the test that's because you were, you know, on your phone late at night and right, that's how it. That was old me, that's how I would say. Right, so it's, it's such a great powerful skill. That's not easy, but I try to make these steps simple and doable, and the and the, the reasoning behind just trying to state your observation is that the idea is to put yourself in a position that eliminates tone and judgment from your words and from your voice. Right, so, for that's hard, so hard so hard.
Dr. Amy Moore:Well, so you can't just observation without paying attention to your tone. Then right, like you can't go. So I see you got a D on a test right, which is very different than so. I noticed that you got a D on your test 100%.
Jeanine Mouchawar:So it is a combination right. So I gave you a script that you can use which is, I noticed, blank, fill in the blank. But it also comes with step one right, which is calming your own emotions. So you're not launching into a conversation with making assumptions, right, about why they got a D on the test. That's when we get stuck judging them and they feel that judgment from us, right. So we want to try to really tone down the tone and the judgment and what we're saying, because the whole idea here is we're trying to engage them in a conversation and invite them into a conversation. They're not going to want to engage and feel invited if they think you're judging them. So you know, I help clients with scripts and I just love the phrase starting with I noticed, because it helps keep some of the tone out and well, maybe not the tone, but the judgment of your words.
Dr. Amy Moore:So we know, having raised our teenagers that many times, their response will be one word, one word, that's all we get. So let's say that I approach my teenager in a very calm myself manner and I say hey, I noticed that you got a D on your test. And they go yep, okay, yeah, where's?
Jeanine Mouchawar:the rest of the conversation.
Dr. Amy Moore:So what do I say next?
Jeanine Mouchawar:You just introduced step three, amy. So step three is to come to the conversation with curiosity, right? You want to ask a curious question and that might sound something. Again, you want to keep it simple, super simple, so you don't start layering in your opinion on the whole thing. It can be as simple.
Jeanine Mouchawar:As I noticed, you got a D on the test. What happened? Now, sometimes you might get an I don't know shrug, right. But when you ask a what question?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Really, from truly being curious, like I wonder what happened they're more apt to be a little more forthcoming about what is going on. Right? What's going on inside of them that they got a D? I mean, maybe it was because they were feeling overwhelmed, because they had a ton of difficult classes and they had tests that they took, and then they went to soccer practice and then they had to go jump over to the theater and go do their role in that and community service.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I mean, these kids have so much on their plates that maybe they got a D on a test because they were feeling overwhelmed or feeling pressure, and so we want to try to get at what's going on underneath the behavior that's concerning us, right? What's going on in their head and how are they feeling that's causing the D right? Or causing them to drink or smoke or whatever, just be disrespectful, be mean to their brother? There's something going on underneath that and that's what we're trying to get to, and we do that through coming from a place of compassion because we've quieted our own fears and worries and a place of curiosity. So what I will say is you will get trapped if you ask a why question most likely right.
Jeanine Mouchawar:So we want to steer clear of a why question, right, why'd you get a D on the test right? Those why questions tend to be laced with judgment. If you think about you know, whatever your kid coming in, why didn't you make dinner? Or why didn't you do my laundry, right it tends to come with judgment and tone, a why question. So you want to try to stick with what questions. Again, we're trying to invite them into a conversation and really connect with them and find out, like what's going on with you that's causing this behavior. So we're trying to figure out why, without asking why.
Sandy Zamalis:Do you get to ask how questions?
Jeanine Mouchawar:How works too? I love that, Sandy. How are we going?
Sandy Zamalis:to remedy this situation. What's your plan?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, right, okay, so that's step five. You're jumping ahead. Oh sorry, right, okay, so that's step five. You're jumping ahead. Oh sorry, that's okay, I love it. Yeah, right, and just notice like we, as parents, we do always want to judge. We always tend to jump to how are you going to remedy the situation? And just to know, okay, we got to slow that urge down, right, because we want to first engage them and connect with them. Like, if we don't start there and really understand what they're feeling, what the root cause is of the behavior, they're not going to be able to tell you how they're going to do something differently.
Sandy Zamalis:Right and you want to engage that executive functioning building for them too, because this is now their problem, and you want to be there to kind of help guide the process, but not maybe necessarily, you know, run the process, help have them think those things through.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Exactly that's. That's what we're going for, right? So they, like you said, they build that executive functioning, or I call it life skills. They build those life skills, those problem solving skills. You know, that's my layman's term because I am not a therapist.
Dr. Amy Moore:So what about the child? What about the teen who runs on high emotion all the time and immediately responds with why are you yelling at me, right? Are you yelling at me? Right? You're not yelling, but any type of interrogation, even if it's just perceived, particularly with you know, teens with ADHD. We know that 98% of adolescents with ADHD have rejection sensitive dysphoria, right, so they cannot regulate their emotions well. They automatically think that they're being judged, rejected or they've let you down. So how do you respond and lower the temperature on that?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, you just described my relationship with one of my children, so that really hits home with me and I'll say, out of the gates, it's challenging, you know, it is really tough. But when you can stay calm and reflect back what you're seeing, which is basically a version of step two, you know, in a calm manner, and say something like you know, you seem angry, right, that's it like you seem angry, right, that's it Like you seem angry. What's going on? Because I have been in your exact shoes where I was not yelling, right, and they say stop yelling at me and you're, you know, a natural reaction as a parent is to say I'm not yelling at you and all of a sudden you're yelling, I'm not yelling at you, right, we get defensive because it feels so unjust, like wait, I wasn't yelling, I was calm, right.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And so it's just to again take a minute, take a beat, take a breath, because it doesn't feel good when somebody accuses you of yelling and you know you're not, but just to realize, like you said, they're experiencing some emotions that they're having trouble coping with and dealing with and their coping mechanism is to throw it back on you, right, to deflect, and so to realize okay, wait, really the opportunity here is try to help get at what are they feeling and help them feel like, listen, nothing is wrong with you for feeling that way, like it's okay.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I understand, I get it, you know nothing's wrong with you. So, yeah, we come back kind of with that. Step two of just another way of you know I think I said stating an observation. This is another form of observing where you're just reflecting back calmly what you see, so they gives them a beat to realize oh wait, mom didn't get pissed off that, I said that and it allows, like you were saying, their brain to calm down so they can use their frontal cortex and access some of what's going on for them and inside of them.
Sandy Zamalis:It's beautiful. So what's the next step after the what questions? So we asked our what questions, yeah.
Jeanine Mouchawar:We want to get to that fourth step. Yeah, the fourth step is I teach clients how to validate a child's feelings. I mean, most of us didn't have parents who did that. I think they didn't even know what it was and you know. Therefore, I didn't know what that was and I think sometimes we think we're validating, but we tend to validate situations and not someone's feelings situations and not someone's feelings. So I teach them how to validate what your child is feeling and experiencing with the point of the concept.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Here is right. Your kid wants to feel like you understand them, right, that you hear them, that you get what they're saying, that you're on their side, you're on their team, like we said before, like nothing is wrong with them. And when you can normalize the big feelings they're having you know, in the case of the child with the ADD, if they're feeling, you know, angry or overwhelmed, or stressed, when you can normalize that and they feel like you get it and nothing's wrong with me they connect to you, which is what we want, and it allows their brain and their body to settle their emotions. So step five, which we're getting to Sandy right, is like what do you want to do differently here? How do you want? What might a better choice look like? Right, but we have to start with engaging them in a conversation and connecting with them before we leap to trying to help them change their behavior.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And what I noticed with myself, and what's very common, is we like to just jump to the behavior and change that. But with a teenager that doesn't work right. That's when the battles ensue. So we have to first. That's what steps one through four are doing is like first trying to engage them in a conversation and connecting with them so they really feel like you understand them and you get them and they can let those feelings go through them and realize nothing's wrong with me for feeling overwhelmed, for feeling pressure, for being angry in the moment.
Dr. Amy Moore:So you said something super interesting that a lot of times will validate the situation but we aren't validating feelings. Can you give us examples to differentiate what that sounds like?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Sure, yeah, so let's stick with the you got a D on the test example where we started with before. So when you say, hey, I noticed you got a D on the test, what happened? And let's say they said, well, I was just, I was so busy, I didn't have any time. I went from school to soccer to this, to that, right. It's like if you take a minute and you think about it, you're like, okay, I get that. I would probably feel overwhelmed or pressure if I was in that situation, right. So a validation, where you're validating their feelings, might sound something like hey, you know, it makes sense that you'd feel a lot of pressure or overwhelmed when your day was packed and you felt like, because of that, you were just felt too overwhelmed to even take the time to study for your test.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Anybody in your shoes would feel that that way, right. Or let let's say, they're, you know, constantly on an app, on social media. They're, you know, following somebody and they're really focused on their appearance, right. And so when you go to question about that, oftentimes you know you might hear something like I just need to be on the app, I need to know how to do my makeup that way, you know, leave me alone. I got right there.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And so, if you think about it, like what's going on for them? Like you know, to me it's like they want to feel like they fit in right. They're feeling they don't want to be embarrassed or humiliated, that they don't know the latest trend, and so validating that would be like, hey, you know, of course you want to avoid feeling embarrassed or humiliated. If you feel like, if you don't have this knowledge, that's what's going to happen. Anybody in your shoes would feel that way. So we're not condoning the behavior, we're not saying like, oh, no, big deal, you got a D right, or I don't care that you're on this social media app all the time, but what we are doing is just connecting with them in a way that, like where they feel, like what they're feeling you understand and that there's nothing wrong with them for feeling that way.
Dr. Amy Moore:And can you contrast that with what it would sound like to just be validating the situation?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Gosh, validating the situation might sound something more like hey, you know, it's okay, you got a D, you know we all struggle sometimes, or something to that effect, where you the emphasis is on the situation and not how they feel Does that make sense.
Dr. Amy Moore:Yeah, I was just super intrigued by that kind of juxtaposition there, so I wanted to kind of let our listeners hear the difference.
Sandy Zamalis:Yeah. So in all of this discussion, there's always going to be a time where, as a parent, you need to set a boundary, an expectation, for you know, a rule for your family that you know in our family we behave this way. Can you kind of help me, kind of see how you would help a parent figure that process out? Because it's really easy as a parent to react with rules right, come down with the hammer when we've gotten D's, or you're on your apps too much, or you know you were out with friends and didn't call, or you know a litany of things. So what's the best way to then engage with your teen and kind of instill some healthy boundaries that your teens would be more inclined to maybe bounce up against but not step over as easily, without thinking that through?
Jeanine Mouchawar:Yeah, yeah, I love this. This is a very nuanced conversation, right, it's hard to just like wrap it up in a bow, but I will share that. You know, my philosophy is not real big on punishing or rewarding, for that matter. I, you know, I think that that tends to be a way to control our kids. That tends to be a way to control our kids, and when we do offer a reward or a punishment, they it's usually if, if they're avoiding a punishment or they want the reward, it's usually an external motivation and we're missing all of the goodness of like, the why behind everything, right, like why is your behavior a problem? Not, yeah, I'm going to take the phone away. You don't get your phone or you're grounded, and then they're just going to do whatever it takes to get it back. So I like to talk about it, like you said, sandy, in terms of boundaries and for your listeners who aren't familiar with the nuances, you know, boundaries is what you're going to do in a situation where a limit has been broken. And so I think, regarding boundaries, a couple of traps I think happen for parents. One is, I think happen for parents. One is we're not clear on what the boundary is ourselves, and so I would just suggest the first best place to start is figuring out what is your boundary right? Is it? The curfew is midnight? You know what's your boundary around tech? Do they have to leave it in a common room or whatever it is? There's no right or wrong here. It's more you as the parent, identifying what you're comfortable with or you and your partner, and what that boundary is, and then communicating that to your child when you do go to communicate it.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I would fall back onto some of the five steps we talked about. Right, we want to engage them in a conversation about it. We want to say, hey, this is what I'm comfortable with. What do you think about that? I'm thinking like you know, midnight seems like a reasonable curfew. What do you think? Or you can even ask them even better what do you think? Or you can even ask them even better. You can have in your mind that midnight is the curfew that you want to target right. And you can say to them hey, you're a junior now. You're going to parties, you're driving, you know curfew is one thing. What do you think is a reasonable curfew? And sometimes we're lucky and hit the jackpot and what they offer is exactly what you wanted or, even better, right you had to say, you know, you didn't have to say anything and you got this amazing result right. And then sometimes, if they come back with something like one in the morning, you know, I would suggest, well, try to come up with a compromise, right, where you're giving a little, they're giving a little and you're coming up with like a middle path. And then I would just add to that it's really helpful to teens when you like, cap that with a time, almost like a timestamp, like hey, let's try this for one week and then let's regroup and talk about it. We can reevaluate it and see how I feel about it, how you feel about it, you know, and if we should move, whatever the boundary or limit is and I find that it's you avoid a lot of confrontation and arguments from them when they feel like, okay, I can deal with this for a week, you know, and you give them a little hope that maybe there's some negotiation room down the road. So that's how I would offer that you approach negotiation it as a boundary and a limit instead of a rule, and then just be willing to be flexible if what they're sharing with you is reasonable.
Jeanine Mouchawar:You know, like, I had an incident with my child who you know, came home a half hour after curfew and, you know, did not discuss it in the moment because I was pissed off. But once I got calm and I knew these skills at this point, knew me, you know I dove into conversation like, hey, I noticed you, you know we're late for curfew. What happened, hey, from that place of calm energy, using steps one, two and three, and you know, she ended up sharing. Well, you know, everybody was still at the party and I just felt embarrassed to like, leave when nobody had left yet. And you know, so I could do my validation, right.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Well, it makes sense. You might feel humiliated if you're the first person to leave, right, you can understand that. You put yourself in their shoes, right, and then start talking about. You know what you're comfortable with, you know what are they comfortable with, and maybe you want to revisit the boundary, maybe what your teen says is reasonable and you're willing to revisit it, right. So it's all about having these calm conversations where you're engaging and you're connecting and you're working together, where it's you and your teen against the problem versus your teen is the problem. It's very different, yeah.
Dr. Amy Moore:I love that. I always say in counseling that the person is not the problem, the problem is the problem. And so when you can kind of externalize that and say, hey, this is a challenge that we need to work together to solve, as opposed to you need to be fixed right, it's a very different mindset.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Really it's been so powerful, amy.
Sandy Zamalis:Yeah, so you were talking earlier about mantras. Right to try to get to that calm place, and I always had two mantras that I had when my kids were teens, and one you probably heard before I think it's an older one, but I have no idea who said it but it was that rules without relationship lead to rebellion, and I literally wrote it on a post-it note and stuck it on my mirror and I would look at it while I brushed my teeth Rules without relationship lead to rebellion.
Sandy Zamalis:Rules without relationship lead to rebellion, because I was like I'm not going to do that, I'm going to make sure I'm coming from that place of connection. And then the other one that was just a visual. It was like a church sermon one time and it was talking about God's love and they passed out these like chocolate kisses and people were holding them in their hand and basically the theme of the story was that, you know, the perfect love is love in an open hand. So, like I had that visual for myself too, and that's really what you're describing, it's that love in an open hand. I'm not trying to, you know, hold you so tight that I end up crushing the thing that I'm trying to love and protect, but just that, that open hand.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I love that Beautiful. I'm going to. I'm going to take that one.
Sandy Zamalis:It was a good one. Those were my two favorite ones. But yeah, I think, um, yeah, all the stuff you were describing that you know same picturinguring, that kind of thinking, and it really does make a difference because you're building an adult relationship with your child, so you don't want to crush their spirit when they're a teen. You really want to try to get out of that loop, that cycle of battle, because you want to be their mom forever, not just. You know they're ready to get out and, and you know maybe not come home, right, we want to be the safe place to come back to. You want to be the place that they can refuel and come back and fly again.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Oh, 100%. And you know, that's something that I think is can be really helpful to parents is to keep that big picture goal in mind before you start talking to them in any situation. You know, I mean my big picture goal is I want to have a great connection and relationship with my kids for decades to come, right, and so, if you know, I want them to call me from college with their fears and their worries and their wins and their excitement, and I want them to want me to meet their future spouse and be a grandparent and be in their lives. And so, if you can keep kind of your big picture goals in mind, it helps you communicate from a place that's, you know, more calm and maybe get motivated.
Jeanine Mouchawar:You know, these strategies that we're talking about they're doable, but it's not easy, you know. But if you can keep that in the forefront of your mind, like what do I really want here? You know, I think so many of us feel like gosh, we put in all these years when they're younger, and like dedicated our lives to them and did so much for them, and it's like what the heck if? If we can't, then, you know, reap the rewards for years to come. We all. What am I doing here? So I do think your point like keeping that big picture goal in mind of what you want in the long term can help motivate you when you're trying strategies like this, because it's not always easy.
Dr. Amy Moore:So we are running short on time, so we need to let Sandy read a word from our sponsor when we come back. I want to wrap up with the fifth step, which you've alluded to, but I want to just make sure that we've made that clear and given a clear example, using the same story that we've been building on when we come back.
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Dr. Amy Moore:And we are wrapping up our really interesting conversation with Janine Mouchoir. And so, Janine, let's talk about that fifth step in the process.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Great, yeah. So now that we've engaged them in a calm conversation and we've created that connection where they feel like we're on the same team and you're on their side, right? The fifth step is helping and teaching them how to make better choices. Right, because, like we talked about earlier, they've got this innate desire to solve their own challenges and we want them to build that muscle, that life skill, in the safety of our home while they're still with us. And so, you know, that might sound like just asking a simple question, like, hey, you know, what might you want to do differently the next time you're studying for a test, right? Or I remember my teenager was a new driver and he got in an accident, and you know, he came home and we went to talk about it and I used the five steps you know, and after I validated him, like God, that must have been really scary and terrifying for you, and you know.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Then we I went into the fifth step of you know what? What's next Like? What do you think the next thing is to do? Now? I mean, it was obvious to me what to do next. We know, right, we have many years of experience. But the opportunity here is for him to start to think about wait, what do I do next? And to make some suggestions and to get him thinking about it and get him trying to solve it while they still are in the safety of our home.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And that's really the whole magic of step five our home, and that's really the whole magic of step five.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And the thing is, when we ask them for their solutions you know how might they solve for this or what might you want to do differently the message they're getting is oh hey, you know, mom thinks I'm capable enough to solve this, right, mom thinks I'm smart enough, mom believes in me, mom trusts me or dad Right.
Jeanine Mouchawar:And so as they start to go through the thought process themselves of how they want to think about and choose to do things differently, that's, in essence, what builds confidence for them. And that's like the number one thing I get from parents. Like I want my kid to be confident. Well, this is a really great pathway to build that confidence. And the cool thing is what happens that I think people or at least kind of blew my mind was as they're offering their solutions to you and you're like, oh, that could work, let's try that idea. All of a sudden you feel more calm and you feel more confident that they do know how to solve problems, they do know how to make better choices and you start trusting that they're going to be okay. I think this is really powerful.
Dr. Amy Moore:So these are critical thinking skills, right, and sometimes that has to be trained. If you're not used to using this type of approach and you're used to just telling your teens here's what I expect, or here's what you have to do, or here's what you need to do, then they're not used to coming up with potential solutions for themselves, right, so there might be a learning curve here A hundred percent.
Jeanine Mouchawar:I wasn't sure how much time we have, but yes. So to add on to that, I mean right, you want to look at this as a teaching moment where you're supporting them, maybe even you're walking side by side with them, them maybe even you're walking side by side with them, so you know, you can offer to. The shift, amy, is that you can offer to brainstorm with them. But we want their buy-in, we want them to say like hey, can you help me solve this? Like I'm not sure, can you help me, mom? Because when they're asking us, then they're open to hearing our suggestions, versus when we tell them they're not open to it. So, absolutely, this is a process, it's a journey and initially they're going to need more help and as time goes by, they'll build those skills and be able to do it on their own.
Jeanine Mouchawar:It makes me think of I was coaching a mom the other day and her daughter is a junior turning senior in high school. She wants to take some classes at the community college and yet she wasn't taking action or moving towards making that happen, and the mom uncovered that she just, which was like, overwhelmed. She didn't know where to start. Which makes sense, right. It is overwhelming process, and so you know she basically had the conversation with her like, look, what do you think you should do? Like, what might your first step be? Like, what might you say to the admissions officer when they pick up the phone? And then sat with her side by side to give her that confidence to take the steps and do it. So you're doing it alongside them instead of for them, and eventually, so they can do it themselves. Love it.
Dr. Amy Moore:Love it. Okay, this has been phenomenal. I wish we could talk for another hour and so, janine, tell our listeners where they can find more information and resources, how they can work with you. Give us that information.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Great. Yeah, you can go to my website, janinemouchoircom, or I'm on Instagram. I try every day to be on there giving some sort of like tip or advice or you know some sort of insight or strategy, either on a video or in a post, and just know it's. Obviously it's hard to give any in-depth help that way, but there will be little nuggets that you can try right away and see, like, what sort of results you get. So I'm on Instagram as Janine Mouchoir Coaching Same with Facebook, if you prefer that platform and my website. Yeah, I work with parents one-on one for a period of six months at a time because, as you can imagine from our conversation today, it takes time, like you've mentioned, to learn these skills, to try them, to build them and to have our teen responding with us. So I love having a six month period of time where we can partner together and work together so that you can have the relationship that you want with your team.
Dr. Amy Moore:And you work with parents all over the country, over Zoom, all over the world. You got to love.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Zoom, it's Zoom and phone. So, yeah, I got a client in Italy and one in New York and, yeah, you got to love the beauty of technology.
Dr. Amy Moore:Absolutely All right. So, listeners, I'm going to spell this for you, but we're also going to put the links in our show notes. So Janine's last name is spelled M-O-U-C-H-A-W-A-R, so her website is JanineMouchoircom. Facebook, instagram are both at Janine Mouchoir Coaching. Linkedin is at Janine Mouchoir and, again, I will put those links in the show notes.
Jeanine Mouchawar:One thing I'll add Amy, the five steps that we talked about today. I actually offer like a free webinar on that. If you want to go to my website or Instagram and you want like more information about what the three of us talked about today, that might be helpful for you as well. I give a lot of scripts and I'm a little more in depth than even we went.
Dr. Amy Moore:So if that's helpful to everybody, absolutely what a great resource.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Provide that link on your show notes as well, if you'd like.
Dr. Amy Moore:Yeah, absolutely, that would be wonderful. Thank you, janine. This has been fantastic. Thank you so much for joining us today and sharing your wisdom and insights and experience and expertise. I just know that if you're parenting teens, or even preteens, and thinking about parenting teens, that you'll have immediate takeaways for sure.
Jeanine Mouchawar:Well, thank you for having me. It's really been my honor, so thank you Absolutely.
Dr. Amy Moore:So, listeners, thanks for being with us today. If you liked us, follow us on Instagram and Facebook at the Brainy Moms. Do it now before you forget. If you liked our show, we would love it if you would leave us a five-star rating and review. On Apple Podcasts, you can find Sandy on TikTok at thebraintrainerlady, and if you'd rather watch us, you can subscribe to our YouTube channel. So that's all the smart stuff that we have for you today. We hope you feel a little brainier than you did an hour ago. Join us next time on the Brainy Moms podcast.
Sandy Zamalis:Have a great week.
