86. Just Blame Me === As moms of teenagers, we get blamed for stuff all the time, sometimes legitimately, and sometimes not so much. But it is very normal for our teenagers to blame us for things, whether or not they are our fault, because it takes a lot of emotional maturity to take responsibility for your own feelings. And that is something that our teenagers are still developing, and to be totally honest, most adults don't have that emotional maturity their entire lives. But what I want to talk about today is why there might be situations that come up where you might actually want to encourage your teen to blame you. Recently, one of my kids, through no fault of their own, ended up in a situation that was kind of uncomfortable for them with some friends. Some plans had fallen through at the last minute and it left this child in a situation that was not really in their best interest, but at the same time they were really concerned about ruffling feathers and hurting feelings and backing out in a way that might inconvenience other people. Now, when it comes to my kids facing challenges, I am not the kind of mom that jumps in and solves problems for my kids. I am there for them. I am happy to be a sounding board. I am happy to help them work through things, and I always have their back. But I also think it's so important that they work through challenges on their own. That they learn to speak up for themselves, that they learn to advocate for themselves, and really to develop the tools they need to solve problems on their own. The reality is that these skills take time to develop, and the more our kids have opportunities to practice advocating for themselves, resolving conflicts, and solving their own problems, the better they get at doing that. So while I want them to solve their own problems and navigate their own conflicts and challenges, I also want them to be able to do that when the stakes are low. With lots of life and experience under our belts, sometimes we as adults look at the challenges that our teens are facing and the conflicts that feel like such a big deal to them, and we think, the stakes on those are pretty low. The truth of the matter is, most of the things that we thought were such a big deal when we were teenagers, we don't even think about ever again, because they really didn't matter in the grand scheme of our lives. But I think it's helpful to remember that in the moment when we were in it, the stakes felt very high. And that's where I think we as parents come in as supporters and helpers. In the example I shared earlier about my child, as I was talking to them, I could tell they knew exactly what they wanted to do. They knew the situation they were in was not going to be good for them, and they knew they needed to get out of it. But the idea of disappointing their peers, their friends, felt like really high stakes. This is almost universally true for all teenagers, because social acceptance is a biological need as you go through adolescence. Because in order to be safe, in order to be able to survive as an adult, you need to have the ability to get other people to like you. You need to be able to form healthy, safe relationships outside of your family. In fact, brain researchers have found that social rejection is processed in the same part of the brain in the same way as physical pain. So when your kids are very averse to the idea of disappointing their peers, it is because they are trying to avoid what feels like very physical, real pain to them. Situations like this are the perfect opportunity for us to help our kids have a way to make advocating for themselves easier by placing the blame on us. Truth be told, in this situation, I was willing to go either way. I, of course, didn't want my child to be in a situation that wasn't ideal for them, but understanding the importance of social relationships to them, I also was okay if they decided not to ruffle feathers. This was not a life and death situation and it was not at the expense of their health or well being, it just was not going to be ideal. So I let my child know that I supported them either way in whatever decision they wanted to make. But if they needed a reason to give their friends, that they could use me as an excuse. Now, there's a part of me that feels like this is a little bit counterintuitive because isn't the whole point that we are trying to help our kids develop the skills to be able to advocate for themselves, to be able to stand up for themselves, to be able to express their needs to other people. I want to teach my kids about honesty and that they don't have to justify their decisions because they get to decide what is best for them, whether or not other people like it. I do not want my kids to feel like it is their job to manage other people's emotions. Of course I want them to be thoughtful and considerate and to think about how other people might perceive what they're doing, but I know that they cannot control how other people respond to their decisions, and so they just have to be willing to do what they know is right and what is best for them. But here's what else is true. If my child feels like they are in a situation that is not in their best interest, that is not good for them, I absolutely want them out of that situation. So when they use me as an excuse to get themselves out of a situation that doesn't feel like it is the best situation for them to be in, they are absolutely 100 percent telling the truth. They can say, my mom wouldn't want me to be here, or my mom won't let me go, or my mom needs to come pick me up right now. Earlier today, I was talking to my oldest son and asking him if he had ever blamed me so that he could get out of a situation. And he said he only had ever done that once. Really early in his teen years, he had a friend that wasn't always very nice to him. And they had a lot of the same interests, and we went to church together, and they were in the same school. And so they interacted a lot, and he wanted to maintain the friendship. And sometimes they would have a really great time together. But other times it was just miserable for him to hang out with this friend. So I told him that any time he wasn't feeling up to hanging out with this friend, he could blame me and say that I wouldn't let him go. Until he told me this, I had completely forgotten about this situation and definitely forgotten that I had told him he could blame me any time. But I love that he remembered that moment so many years ago because he felt safe. He felt cared for. He felt like my mom has my back, no matter what. She's going to make sure that my best interests are served. So I want to encourage you to give this gift to your teenagers. Let them know that you want what's best for them. And when they are struggling to stand up for themselves and do what they know is best for them in a situation, that they can always blame you. Now there are a couple of caveats when I extend this invitation to my children. First is that anytime they want to use this resource and blame me to get out of a situation that is not in their best interest, they need to tell me. This helps both of us to maintain our integrity and make sure that we're being honest. Again, it is the truth that I want them to get out of situations that are not in their best interest, but I need to know what those are. Also, we need to be on the same page and there needs to be open communication because if their friend asks me a question or their friend's mom asks me a question or it comes up in conversation, I don't ever want there to be a situation where it feels like it was a lie. I really will back my kids up, but I need to know about it. The second caveat is that in order for them to be open and honest with me, I need to make sure that when they tell me about these situations, That they aren't getting in trouble for telling me. I would much rather my kids be honest with me and tell me what situations they were getting out of and when they blamed me and why they needed to get out of that situation than, for them to ever feel like they can't tell me because they're worried about how I'm going to respond. Well, the examples that I have shared today haven't been life altering or dangerous, sometimes our kids are in situations that would be life altering and may be dangerous. And we want to make it as easy as possible for them to get themselves out of those situations. And if there's a risk that they might get in trouble for being in the situation in the first place, they are going to have a harder time getting out of it. There are a lot of great ideas for how you can communicate this to your teenager. Some families have a code emoji that if the child texts the emoji to the parent, the parent will immediately come and get them. No questions asked. No punishment. Other families have code words or code phrases. In our family, this has just been a lot of conversation and discussion to establish a culture where our kids know and understand that we anticipate that they will make mistakes. We would like them to avoid making mistakes, but we know they're going to do dumb stuff. We know they're going to get themselves in situations that they shouldn't be in. And that we are there to help them get out of those situations as quickly as possible. As challenging as it is, this means that when our kids tell us about dumb stuff that they've done, we have to make sure that our response to knowing that doesn't make it so they don't want to tell us again in the future. I hope this episode has given you a lot to think about when it comes to your family and your teenager. If you have felt a tug to have a conversation with your kids and let them know that they can blame you anytime they need to get out of a situation that isn't in their best interest, have that conversation. If you have felt the nudge to create a code phrase or an emoji that your teen can send you anytime, and you will come and get them from where they are, set that up with your teen today. Talk to them about it. Establish it. So that they have that as a tool moving forward. And if you have felt like you might need to do some work on your responses to the things your team tells you about, I would love to support you in learning the tools and skills that you need to do that inside of my Enjoy coaching community.
