The Talk

Hello everyone, I’m going to be honest with you, working on Couple’s Therapy has been almost a two year process and while I had plenty of ups and downs with this book I am proud mother of my third book.

I got my inspiration for Couple’s Therapy from my own experience of going through marriage counseling with my supportive and loving husband, Kerri. We have been married for almost eleven years and I would be less than honest in saying that we have the perfect marriage because we don’t. Kerri and I married young, we have a large family and we are two very strong-minded individuals who don’t always see eye-to-eye. He and I sought therapy because we were having a serious issue communicating with one another on top of the fact that we went through a very stressful time after the birth of our sixth child, Januari. Therapy gave us the tools that we needed to communicate with one another rather than at one another and ultimately helped us overcome our issues. Even though Kerri and I are in a much better place in our marriage, we wouldn't hesitate to go back to therapy if the water turned murky.

Speaking of professional help we thought that we were going to need it when we had to have the dreaded talk with our fourteen-year-old daughter recently. Now don’t get me wrong, we have had the talk with our now nineteen-year-old and our now sixteen-year-old, but I cannot stress to parents the importance of treating your children as individuals and approaching them in ways that are suited for them. The approach that we used with our two older children would not have worked for our fourteen year old daughter because she is a totally different type of kid.

Peaceful is a very bright and brilliant young girl who is the epitome of a Disney kid. She has a personality that lights up a room and trust me once people meet her she is hard to forget. My great-grandmother was in her late 90’s before she passed and when I came to visit her she asked about Peaceful. Not many kids get the opportunity to meet their great-great-grandmother, but not only did PJ get to meet Grandma, but she was also the only one out of six of my children that she remembered!

Now that PJ is headed to high school in August and we've noticed a few not so subtle changes that have been occurring. First, this tall kid walked into my bedroom and began to talk and all that I noticed were legs that seemed to go on for miles then I noticed that she has hips, a definite waist line and BOOBS! My Disney baby now has a body! While I noticed the changes in her body my husband saw that she has begun to take an interest in boys and have even caught her chatting and texting a few boys from time-to-time. With our new findings we decided that it was time to have the talk with our sweetheart.

We consider ourselves experts being that we have been on the emotional roller coaster of raising a teenager a few times and have had the talk with our other kids, but then again our two older kids aren't as quirky as the fourteen-year-old so this talk was somewhat challenging and we were prepared.

The thing to remember when discussing sex with your teenagers is that you have to be comfortable and honest. The worse thing that a parent can do when discussing sex with their kids is simply telling them not to have sex. Trust me parents that does NOT work. . My parents told me not to do it, I did it and I have a nineteen-year-old to prove that simply telling your kid not to have sex does not work. We all know that when a child hears the word no they are more drawn to what it is they are being told not to do.  

Also, parents try not to make a big to-do about the talk. It is just sex; you aren't giving them the nuclear launch codes.  I have a friend who found a condom in her sixteen-year-old son’s bedroom and they decided that it was time to have the talk with him by her husband taking him on a drive. It felt as if he were a rabid dog about to be put out of his misery. Parents the big production is not necessary!

In my opinion it is best to approach the talk by having a glass of wine beforehand so that you are nice and relaxed as possible. While you and the kid are alone I suggest just approaching the conversation as light hearted as possible and simply ask him/her if they’d thought about sex. This can be done while running errands, while eating pizza or even while lounging around the house doing nothing. The point is to make an already uncomfortable situation slightly more comfortable. One simple question will get the ball rolling, “Hey honey, have you thought about sex?” I know that it sounds kind of weird because it is a weird question coming from your parent, but it is an open question that will probably turn a few faces red, but once you get the conversation started your embarrassment will go away. Let them know that sex is a normal part of life and that while you don’t condone teenage sex you want to make sure that they are responsible.

The key word here is RESPONSIBILITY.

I am not condoning teenage sex, but I do condone RESPONSIBILITY and that means that if my kids are going to be sexually active they are going to be responsible. Yes we talk to them about STDs, teenage pregnancy, gaining a bad reputation or having their heartbroken, but by teaching them how to be responsible they can almost eliminate all of those problems.  What we wanted them to understand was that we understood what they were going through because we were not born adults and we went through the same feelings at one point. We want our children to understand that while it is uncomfortable we want them to come to us when they felt that they were ready to have sex. I would rather my children come to me than to learn from their friends.

I can’t police my teenager’s bodies because I cannot be around them 24/7 and I want to be comfortable in knowing that I taught my kids how to make their own decisions in life by making the right choices. We showed my son and daughter the proper way to open and put on a condom (bananas make for a great prop). We advised him on the proper method of flushing the used condom. My husband drilled into my son’s head that if a girl says no that means NO. My girls know about birth control and how no matter how much a guy tells you that he loves you those feeling can change after he gets what he wants and that babies have the magical ability to change minds almost immediately.

I remember getting a lot of criticism for putting my daughter on birth control at the age of thirteen, but six years later I am not a grandmother so I think that I made the right decision. Some said that by putting my daughter on birth control I was giving her permission to have sex. I said what a load of bullshit because these kids are going to have sex regardless if we put them on birth control or not. We were elated when our son came to us and told us that he and his girlfriend were thinking about having sex and asked if we could purchase him a package of condoms. No we were not happy that he was having sex and we told him that we didn't condone teenagers being sexually active, but we were happy that he trusted us enough to come to us when he was ready.

OMG TEENAGERS DO LISTEN!

Let’s be real, we cannot stop our teenagers from being sexually active any more than our parents did to stop us. Where there is a will

teenagers will find a way. I know it is a hard pill to swallow, but its best that you gulp real hard and get it out of the way. You will save yourself a whole lot of headache. Parents I implore you to talk to your kids like they are human beings and remember that you were once in the same place no matter how long ago.

Nothing Can Prepare You

Hello all, I’m back once again after a pretty lengthy hiatus from blogging and while I have missed you all I have learned that as write you have to actually life some sort of life in order to have something to write about!

 

Today's topic is: Nothing Can Prepare You

I remember when I was pregnant with my first born at the age of seventeen (yes I was a teen mom) I asked my mother how could I prepare for giving birth. I remember this moment pretty vividly because my mother had this look on her face that spoke volumes yet didn't say quite enough when she said, “Listen honey, can’t nothing prepare you for child birth.” Now you have to remember that from the age of fifteen to around twenty-one we all thought that we knew it all and that our parents were just trying to scare us, so I blew off her words and began to read every book that I could on the miracle of child birth. When my water broke and I finally got into the delivery room and the first real painful contraction hit me all of the breathing techniques and birthing positions that I’d read about flew right out of the window.

 Mom was right.

Nothing on Earth prepared me for giving birth.

Nineteen years later when I look at my gorgeous daughter I can honestly say that every moment of mind altering pain was worth it. I love her more than words can express, but while my mother warned me that nothing could prepare me for bringing a child into the world, she’d forgotten to let me know that nothing can prepare me to let that same child out into the world.

Nothing.  

Seeing my first born saunter across that stage was the most gratifying experience that I have ever felt having almost lost her thirteen years prior in a horrific car accident. During graduation there were a lot of tears that were shed, but none were more meaningful that those of my own. She did it even after all of her surgeons said that she wouldn't live, even after they said that she’d lose her arm, even after they said that she would be permanently brain damaged, she proved them all wrong. She did it. Not only did she walk across the stage, but she walked on time with her graduating class.

Proud mommy moment is putting it politely.

While I was prepared for graduation as well as the graduation party that followed soon after, what I wasn't prepared for was having an adult child. After enduring nine months of my teenage body going through changes that I didn't understand, after countless sleepless nights of teething, potty training, shoe tying, fussing and fighting over curfew and worry and exhaustion no one told me that letting go was the hardest part of raising children.

How do you let go of your baby?

Shortly after graduation my baby girl decided that she wanted to come from underneath mom’s wings and fly out in the world on her own.

I was not prepared.

After many attempts of trying to persuade her to stay home I tearfully watched as my baby packed her car and drive off into the sunset. Well, it was not actually the sunset; she decided to move in with her boyfriend against our wishes.

And like that she was gone.

How do you prepare for when you baby leaves home?

I went through the 5 stages of grief that I spoke about in a previous post:

1.       Denial – No she is not moving out, she is just trying to pull my bluff

2.       Anger—How could she move out after all that I have done for her all of these years!

3.       Bargaining—Hey daughter, if you move back home you can still have all of your freedom and I’ll increase your allowance.

4.       Depression—My baby is gone

5.       Acceptance—Well I've done all that I could do.

The day that my daughter moved out was the hardest day of my life and while nothing could have prepared me for, I can say that I understand. I remember moving out when I was her age and while I thought that I was an ‘adult’ I was only a kid and I was not prepared to live in the real world. The one thing that I was always grateful for was the fact that my parents gave me the tools that I needed to navigate throughout life and they allowed me the freedom to make my own choices and to live with the consequences of those choices.  

They allowed me to be me.

While I was not prepared for my daughter to move out I can say that I am confident in the knowledge and values that I have instilled into my daughter and that I prepared her for life. I will always be there for my daughter, but I have had to learn how to pull back from Smothering and just be there for her.

Now that she is in college and living life on her own my husband and I laugh at the things that she tells us because we remember being there and we are more than confident that she will be able to guide herself out and anytime that she needs Smothering she knows that our door is always open.

No, nothing could have prepared me for the moment when my little birdie left the nest, but I am glad that I was not prepared because no amount of words that I could have read or advise that I could have considered would have given me the feeling that my own experience did.

To my beautiful, talented and creative daughter always and forever I love you.

One down……five more to go!