Real Talk with Tina and Ann
Tina and Ann met as journalists covering a capital murder trial, 15 years ago. Tina has been a tv and radio personality and has three children. Ann has a master's in counseling and has worked in the jail system, was a director of a battered woman's shelter/rape crisis center, worked as an assistant director at a school for children with autism, worked with abused kids and is currently raising her three children who have autism. She also is autistic and was told would not graduate high school, but as you can see, she has accomplished so much more. The duo share their stories of overcoming and interview people who are making it, despite what has happened. This is more than just two moms sharing their lives. This is two women who have overcome some of life's hardest obstacles. Join us every Wednesday as we go through life's journey together. There is purpose in the pain and hope in the journey.
Real Talk with Tina and Ann
Building Kids Who Can Stand on Their Own: A Recipe for Raising Today’s Youth
Randi Crawford, certified life coach and TEDx speaker, joins us to share her “Pickleball Parenting” philosophy. It is a fresh, practical approach to raising resilient kids who can face challenges with confidence and independence.
In this episode, Randi talks about the ways modern parenting often misses the mark and how small changes can make a big difference:
- Stop smoothing the path. Over-involvement robs children of the chance to build grit and quietly tells them, “I don’t believe you can handle this on your own.”
- Phones at night are a hard no. Randi explains that devices “let a thousand strangers into your child’s bedroom.”
- When parents step in to solve every conflict, kids learn to feel powerless instead of capable.
- The pandemic left lasting effects of isolation and anxiety, making it even harder for kids to develop social skills.
- Parenting out of fear prioritizes comfort over growth and weakens resilience.
- Create judgment-free zones where children can share their hardest truths without worry.
- Praise effort, not just results, so kids build real confidence.
- Teach kids the idea of a “mental bank account” where they recognize and celebrate their own wins.
- Healthy parent-child relationships are built on both boundaries and trust.
Randi’s approach is not about helicoptering and it is not about being hands-off either. It is about showing up in ways that help kids grow strong, confident, and capable.
Find out more about Randi at randicrawfordcoaching.com or follow her on Instagram and TikTok @RandiCrawfordCoaching. Her upcoming book will dive even deeper into these strategies for parents.
Welcome to Real Talk with Tina and Ann. I am Anne, and today's episode cuts straight to the heart of what so many families are silently struggling with. If you're a parent asking yourself, what happened to accountability? And how did we get here in this world that we live in today, where it is very hard to parent today's youth, and they are feeling completely overwhelmed by expectations, anxiety, and a lot of issues that we simply, we simply didn't have to deal with as a kid. We live in a hyper-connected world where there are people who have access to our kids that we have no knowledge of. The episode is for parents, young adults, teens, anyone who will listen and want to join in this conversation. Joining us today is Randy Crawford, certified life coach, TEDx speaker, and author of the upcoming Pickleball Parenting Playbook. She has been featured on Fox News, MSN, and in the New York Post, and many others. She's not here to sugarcoat. Randy works with teens, young adults, and parents to bridge the gap between intention and reality, teaching emotional resilience, accountability, and how to stop rescuing kids and start raising them. Today we're diving into the real reasons behind rising teen anxiety, the pressures of social media perfection, the silent epidemic of emotional unpreparedness, and how we can start shifting the narrative from blame to action. So let's get real. Let's talk about how to build emotionally strong kids in a world that's constantly telling them that they're not enough, and how we as parents and adults can lead with clarity, consistency, and compassion. Thank you so much for what you are doing, and thank you for being here. I really appreciate what you are doing because this is a very serious issue.
SPEAKER_00:I'm look- I want I appreciate I love everything uh that you just said, and I am so grateful to be on your show. And I was just looking at my phone because it's it's really ironic. I did not know exactly what we were going to talk about, but I just did a post this morning and I wanted to read it to you. There's a new study that came out in She Knows, and it says a recent study found that a mom parenting style has a bigger influence on their teens than their dads. And then this whole study goes on to say that moms are causing all the anxiety in their kids. So I'm I threw up a post this morning about it on TikTok. And it's funny because I already have so many responses from young women saying, Yep, yep, that's why I'm in therapy. I can show you my bills. And personally, I found the study fascinating and I'd love to dive into it and see who they were asking and who the cohort was. But I don't believe that moms own all the responsibility of our kids' anxiety. I mean, I think it's everything, certainly starting with the parents and at home. And there's also a lot of, I don't want to say harm, but we are, we are creating an environment for them by making everything so easy so that when they have to go into the real world, they cannot handle it. And those are the kids that I basically work with.
SPEAKER_01:Gosh, that's so interesting.
SPEAKER_00:I remember when I had my daughter, I was the co-founder of a public health care company. I had my daughter, I was working until the night before I gave birth. I was at work. I literally went home that night and started to have issues. It was about two weeks early, went into the hospital the next day, had my daughter, and two weeks later, now this is my choice, but two weeks later, I was back at work because I was one of the co-founders, and that's what I knew. That's what I did, that's how I operate. But it's just funny because you know, you're you're trying to breastfeed. So people are bringing you your baby between meetings and you're breastfeeding. And the things that we do, right? Like I remember looking back and I was up at four in the morning working out just so I could be with her before I left for work. I mean, you do almost become superhuman and it becomes part of what who we are. And so I'm I don't want to take that away from anyone.
SPEAKER_01:Right. I mean, women I think are a superhuman. I think that we can multitask like no other. Um, you know, sometimes I've got, and I've mentioned this before, I've got like 37 tabs open, you know? I mean, that's just what we do. Uh, and you have said that we've created a generation that's unprepared for real life. And the world that kids are growing up in now is nothing like when we were young. And I'm not saying that the way that we were raised was right, because I was paddled in front of the class one time. And that wasn't okay either, really. But there was a healthy fear. And somewhere along the lines, we've lost that. Kids today don't even know what it's like to be afraid of authority. What are we doing wrong? And how did we get here? How do we support our kids without shielding them from challenges that help them grow?
SPEAKER_00:Okay, well, I'm gonna, so here's where I'm gonna bring in this is interesting. I grew up, when I grew up, I basically had something called panic disorder that nobody knew was panic disorder. That's how old I am. So it didn't have a diagnosis, it did not have a name. However, I had parents that refused to let me not engage in activities because of my fear of having these panic attacks. So that could look as simple as going to an amusement park. Now, they would not make me ride the rides because that would throw me into another stratosphere. But I was brought along on all these trips, whether it was skiing or whatever we did, and I'll tell you why, because they had a belief in me. And when your parents believe in you, that is more than half the battle. When we know that we have that support system, it makes us believe in ourselves. So when you have parents today that constantly smooth the way and put their kids on winning teams, they get their kids into the class with the best teacher, they smooth out fights with friends, coaches, you name it, they are robbing their kids of the opportunity to build that resilience. And at the same time, they're sending this subtle message that says, I don't believe in you. I don't think you could get on the team without me helping you. I don't think you could fit in with this friend group if I wasn't buying you the highest end of everything. So it's like we not only rob them of resilience, but we give them the message that we don't believe in them.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, this is really interesting because I just had a conversation with my son. Now he has very special needs. So I mean, there is that. But he just instantly thinks that everything should just be given to him. Like he should just be able to be on the best football team. He should just be able to, and I don't know if he thinks that I should pave the way for him or what, but uh, he's not doing well in school, even though that he has a lot of com accommodations. And that's because he feels that um he can just pretty much do whatever he wants and make noises if he doesn't want to do the work. And and I'm like, no, and I don't want to bring in the card, okay, your special needs, I give you a pass. That's not okay. So I'm like, if this is what you want, then you have to work for it. You know, I'm not going to do this for you. You have to figure it out. And I'm willing to help him figure it out with me, but you know, he's got to do the work.
SPEAKER_00:Well, that okay, so that is my entire premise right there. If I had one thing to tell parents, it would be just that. I'm not saying don't help your kids. I'm not saying don't support your kids. Right. I'm saying stop getting in their life and living it for them. Get out of their way. So the book that I'm working on is called the Pickleball Parenting Playbook. And the reason it's called Pickleball Parenting is because it's fascinating. I took up pickleball a couple years ago, and I'm pretty athletic. I work out a lot, I do all the things, and I got on the courts, I'll never forget this. People twice my age, they've got the knee braces, they're like hunched up, they've got the whole thing, just like you see in the, you know, comedy movies. And I get on the court and I think I'm just gonna smoke everyone. And I get out there, and people that can't even move are just crushing me. They're literally killing me. And I'm like, what are they doing? How are they doing this? I'm in better shape. I run, I'm faster, I can get forward, I can get back. But here's what they were doing. They realized that it's placement over power. And when I realized that concept on the pickleball court, right, it's not about coming in hot and hitting everything really hard. It's about knowing where to hit that ball and when to hit that ball and when to give the partner the ball. And all of these images kind of formed in my head over a very short period because I knew I wanted to write this book for parents, but we've all read the books and they all say the same thing. You've got to let your kid face natural consequences. You've got to let your kid fail. You've got to let your kid lose. Because when they do, they will have the natural consequences and say, you know what? I want to win. I want to get better at football or whatever, and I'm gonna work hard to get there. So that's why I'm writing this book and it's a playbook that basically uses pickleball analogies because everything I learned on the courts translates into parenting and how we can get out of our own way and let our kids be the one on the court playing the game.
SPEAKER_01:Oh my gosh, I love that. That's so great. Because in order for our kids to be strong, we have to allow them to figure it out in order for them to, we have to create that space for them to do things on their own. And I mean, let's give a scenario. Say that there's a parent that always steps in, helps with homework, excuses everything, even covers for them, maybe if they're, you know, a little older and they're they mess up at work or something. What would you say to that parent? How can they break the cycle without damaging the relationship that they have?
SPEAKER_00:Okay, so it's all about communication. I think that communication is the number one tool that any of us have in this world. It's why social media is so toxic and has created so much division instead of unity because words are so important. And so I think as parents, here's what we do. As parents, you're a parent of five, you told me. When you listen to an issue, you listen with one ear, but with the other ear, and at the same time, you're trying to figure out how to fix it, right? We listen to fix because we are invested in the outcome of their life. We're their parent. Naturally, we're invested in the outcome. If we were to just listen, like a coach, a coach does, a therapist does, a mentor, a friend, we listen. We are not invested in the outcome. Therefore, when you fully sit down with your child and listen to them, you don't interrupt them, you don't sit there with your cell phone, you give them your full attention and you let them talk and you let them tell you, you know what, mom, this is what I really, really want. And there's another side to that. This is what I really don't want. You've got kids that are phenomenal athletes, and their parents see, like, this is a ticket to start them, this is a ticket to get you into college, this is a ticket to get into the NFL or the MBA or the MLB. And that kid might be really terrific, but they don't want that life. They're really good, but they just want to play, be with their friends, and not do all the extra. But if you don't give your kid the time and the space to have that conversation, then everybody's just chasing this dream that they see on social media and nobody is happy. So, what I would say for that parent is rather than you would never say to a parent, you know, listen, you're doing too much. You have to step back because what are they gonna do? They're gonna step in even harder. You have a conversation with them and you ask them open-ended questions. You ask them questions like, how is that working for you? How does it look? What's the best thing that could happen? What's the worst thing that could happen? But I, as a coach, I never tell anybody advice ever, right? I ask them questions to get them where they want to go. But with a parent specifically, we know this. When you tell somebody, when you push, they pull. I mean, that's just human nature. I do it too. Like my husband always says, I hate to be told what to do. Don't tell me what to do. Because if you tell me what to do, I'm gonna keep doing it. Times 10.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, yeah. Yeah, I'm the exact same way. And you know, I mean, if and that can be a good thing, but also um we have to meet our kids where they are. We have to. I mean, that is so important. And we really do have to listen. I think that's one of the things that you're saying is that we're putting what we want on them and we're not really listening and working together.
SPEAKER_00:That's exactly what we're doing. And we want it because listen, I I told someone this the other day. I woke up and I had this aha moment. Imagine if a parent thought of themselves as a teacher. So, say you send your kid to math class and the teacher gives them tests, and the teacher knows the material, just like as parents, we've lived the life. We know the answers, we know the best choices, right? If you give them the nice teacher that gives them a test but tells them the answers and they all make A's, oh, they're so happy and they all love this teacher. Or they have another teacher that doesn't give them the answers that teaches them the material, and then they take the test, and none of them do very well on the test. And they hate the teacher. She sucks. You know, she didn't teach the material. Then she teaches more material and they slowly start to learn it through the year. Where the other classroom that has the nice teacher never really gets the concept. So when they move on to the next year, the class that had the nice, easy teacher, guess what? No one can pass the class because no one understands the material. As parents, it's the same thing. We've lived life, we have wisdom, we know how to get there, probably quicker, faster, better, smarter. But when we give our kids the answers, we are not helping them in the test of life. So when they have to go live real life, they're failing the test. They can't make simple decisions, they can't figure out what to order for lunch, they can't figure out what classes to take. They just can't think for themselves because they've never had to.
SPEAKER_01:You know, I always respected the ones that were harder on me. Always. I was a swimmer.
SPEAKER_00:And oh wow, that's a hard one. Swimming is brutal.
SPEAKER_01:And and I had all kinds of, we did four hours a day. We did two a day workouts and dry land and you name it. And uh, the ones that were the hardest on me, that expected the best out of me, I believed that they believed in me. And I I respected that.
SPEAKER_00:See, but that's not, and the irony is that's not who we're raising today. So today, because here's another concept that we have to agree to. Nobody wants to be uncomfortable. We are like allergic to discomfort in our society. So we don't want to be uncomfortable. We definitely don't want our kids to be uncomfortable. So when they're uncomfortable, we're gonna make it so that they are. So if they had that swim coach and they decided, you know, five in the morning is too early. I mean, she gets in late, she does homework, blah, blah, blah. I'm gonna talk to that coach and tell them, you know, this isn't working for my daughter because she has X, Y, and Z issues, and I'll get a doctor's note. Like people go to those extents to smooth things for their kids. And that's, you know, you're an outlier that you liked a coach that pushed you, that corrected you. We don't do that today because we are not comfortable with discomfort.
SPEAKER_01:And I don't know why that's changed because our generation, we were coached and taught that way. And then somewhere along the way, there's been a breakdown where we've been afraid to be tough on our kids. But we were had people be tough on us all the time. So I all the time say, How in the world did we get here? Because I don't get it.
SPEAKER_00:Listen, it is such a role reversal. I cannot tell you how many conversations that I have with people. But here's what became eye-opening to me and completely eye-opening. When I started coaching, I then immediately started getting asked to give talks. And so I gave talks to first it was groups of girls, and then it was groups of moms. And it was the moms that I spoke to that I found fascinating because of the questions that they asked me at the end of every single talk. I mean, they would literally raise their hand and give me a hundred examples of things that had to do with their daughter's confidence. How do I help my daughter build her confidence? And so I started talking to them about things that they could be doing. I mean, they were taking pictures of my slides, and I was so shocked by this because I just thought these are some basic common sense. I'm not talking about anything crazy. It's some basic common sense things that will help your daughter with her self-esteem. And so I really believe so strongly that social media now plays a very, very strong role in why parenting has shifted the way that it has, because we can't parent the way that we were parented. Like, like when people say this train has left the station, this has left the station. And our kids today are growing up in such a different world than we grew up in, that it's not apples to apples. And so we have to, like you said, meet them where they are. While we would love to say, take away your phone. Don't be on your phone, don't be on social media. Of course, we can't say that. And of course, we can't even ban cellular devices because they use them at schools, they use iPads, they use all the things. So what we need to do is meet them where they are and focus not on the external validation and the external likes from strangers, but the positive things that your child or children bring to this world and to themselves and to their family. And the more you get your child to focus on the positive in themselves, they start to feel this little bits of confidence and they feel little wins. And little wins become big wins. And then all of a sudden they might try something and they might fall down, but they're not set back as far as they would be if they didn't feel the little wins and have that to hold on to. Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I and it is a different world. And I don't think we're ever going to be able to get back to what it used to be, unfortunately. And I miss those days. But uh, you know, you I I watched or read one of your interviews, but and this is a really heartbreaking situation that happened, and this is reality, this is where we are today. And with the 14-year-old boy who was sex torted and ended up taking his own life. And I mean, that is beyond heartbreaking. And we might be able to try to keep our kids as safe as we possibly can in this world that, I mean, like you're talking about with social media, but there are so many people out there that are stalking, lying, and manipulating our kids without our knowledge, because no matter how much we try to protect them from themselves on this online space, you know, they're sneaky. So it's almost impossible for us to do that. So I was wondering if you could talk about that.
SPEAKER_00:Well, yeah, uh one of the things I would tell you, and if I could have done this differently, with zero hesitation, I would have done this differently, is to take the phones away at night. Nobody needs the phone in their bedroom at night. And let me tell you, that's where a lot, so many problems happen at night. Let's just start with the most basic, which is sleep and lack thereof. Sleep is so important. And I know we realize that as we get older and older, but our kids lose hours and hours of sleep because they are doom scrolling through the night. So that's like the first and to me, most important. But now you take being on that phone at night and they start going down a rabbit hole, whether it has to do with a health obsession that leads into, you know, body image issues, whether it leads to meeting, and I've had a client whose daughter got herself into this situation and the mom had no idea. I mean, it happens so much more than we think. So to me, the number one thing that a parent, and I hate the word should, but that a parent should do is take that phone away at night. They do not need it in the bedroom because you were essentially saying, I'm gonna let a thousand strangers into your bedroom at night. Would you ever do that in real life? Of course not. Well, you're doing it when you let them have the phone in their bedroom at night.
SPEAKER_01:That is so absolutely true. I mean, we have no idea who's reaching our kids. You want them to be able to have use that phone as a safety, you know, because in ways they need it as a safety, like when they want to take phones out of school. I have a mixed feeling about that because I want, if my kid is in school and there is a school shooter, I want them to be able to call me, but that they've taken it away from them because that they feel that, you know, they're using their devices in school and we need them to learn. So, I mean, there's so many mixed feelings about how uh, and I do get both sides. And yes, they should not be in their bedrooms at night because we don't know who they're inviting into their rooms at night. It's scary. It is so scary.
SPEAKER_00:If you've ever watched any documentary with the people that are the founders and the creators of all the apps at Meta, if you've ever watched even one documentary, every single person in that documentary unanimously says I would never give my kid access to a phone and social media until they're at least 16 and some 18. So if they're not gonna do it and they're the ones creating this, why in the world would we? You're absolutely right.
SPEAKER_01:I don't know why. I don't know why. I mean, kids, I mean, I know how I was as a kid. And if somebody gave me a phone and, you know, really, we're putting too much pressure on the kids. We're putting too much on them and expecting them to handle it as an adult, and they're not adults. So we're giving them a very mature device, and we're telling them, here, do whatever you want with it, basically. But, you know, be careful.
SPEAKER_00:And and yeah, we're giving them the keys to the liquor cabinet and saying, don't drink. Here you go. You know, it's funny, it's funny, and because I work retail on the weekends. I love it. I love working with women, and this would make you absolutely crazy. But women come into the store and they're pushing their babies in the stroller, and the baby is holding up the big, you know, with blue plastic thing holding their iPad. And you've heard of iPad kids, but until you've seen them up close and personal, you have no idea. You're literally watching the making of a child that has no and will have no ability to have social interaction with people. They'll have no ability to sit here and talk face to face. And I say this because I'm a stylist there. I talk to people, I make them laugh, I make them happy. It's just fun for me. But one of my favorite things is when people come into our store and bring their dogs. Dogs are just so I love dogs, right? So here you have a dog in the store and a woman with her child in a stroller with the iPad, the child doesn't even look down and notice the dog or the puppy. And for me, I'm like, I just look at these women like, do you see what you're doing? And of course I don't say it. And I'm not trying to be rude, judgy. I'm trying to say you are creating an addict. This child is one or two, and they are glued to a screen. That is scary. Just because they grow up digital does not mean that we have to give them an addiction starting at that young of an age. I disagree with that wholeheartedly. I do.
SPEAKER_01:And and I'm also gonna say something about this as an autistic individual, with, you know, and and it's hard for people with autism to socialize. And I was made uh to socialize. I mean, you know, and it was really hard, but and I still and I do that with my kids, I put them in all kinds of scenarios, and I believe in like immersive experiences where they experience everything. And if, and if they've got their head down, and if we allow them to continue to not be able to enter into every environment and try to figure it out and socialize with other people, then it's only gonna get worse from here.
SPEAKER_00:I just am such a believer of IRL in real life. And again, and I understand there are the people that cannot stand the people that always talk about pickleball. I get it, and I see that. But here's what I want to say about another reason why I use that analogy in this playbook. And that is because when you go, okay, as an adult and as a parent, you're constantly shuttling your kids around from sport to sport to sport. And you realize that as a parent, you're not playing sports. I mean, I had some friends that played soccer through their 40s, and I totally admired them. I could never do that. That's an insane amount of running, right? So, and I don't play golf. And um, and it's funny because I picked up pickleball, like I work out, but that's not playing a sport and being competitive. And there's something so amazing when you go to the pickleball courts and like the playing field is leveled because you can play with people that are much better than you. You can play with people that are worse than you because you're hitting a wiffle ball. Now, yes, you can get in with the really competitive people, but that's not the point. The point is that you're outside, you're with other people in real life. Do you know how many lonely young people we have today? More than we want to count. They're so lonely and they don't know how to make friends. I mean, I get very frustrated when a mom on Facebook goes to a Facebook group and says, you know, my daughter's a college and she has no friends and her roommates out there making all these friends. And, you know, what should I do? And I want to come through the screen and I want to shake her and say, not what should we do? What should she do? You cannot make friends for your college daughter, but she has to learn that she has to put herself out there. And so frankly, one of the best things I think a young person can do, and when I coach, this is what I tell them, is go get a part-time job because a part-time job will give you such a sense of accountability. It puts you around other people. You learn how to interact. And you know what? I'm a people person. So I'm on the floor talking to you. Other girls are behind the cash register. I would be terrible back there. But it doesn't matter. They still have to interact with that customer. We have to put ourselves in environments that are going to make us a little uncomfortable in real life if we want to be able to not all just be robotic and talking to Chat GPT.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, you know, when you were talking about the college student that was sitting there feeling lonely. And I think that there's a huge group of people right now that do, because living in COVID and isolation, it was a huge it really affected our kids. It affected our kids so deeply where uh they had to be isolated or you know, without or wear masks and they couldn't go to school. And I think that that created a whole nother level of anxiety and fear.
SPEAKER_00:Again, I it it I believe it impacted every age. I mean, imagine you're a baby born and you can't even see your mom's face and her smile because she's wearing a mask. It impacted the little kids, certainly, because you're learning social skills down in your pre-K, you know, through your toddler years. It impacted those middle schoolers that are at the stage where they're learning how to interact with the members of the opposite sex. It impacted the high school kids. Now, the boys, one thing that I always found fascinating is people talk to me about taking their son's video games away. And during COVID, I said, dear God, do not do that. That is how they're interacting with friends. That that is their social interaction, you know. Um but it also, it also did spawn a whole new group of um things that kids started to do that were very mean to other kids. I learned from clients who I work with about, you know, they they really got very proficient on their social media and learning how to kind of do mean things on Snapchat and then spread rumors and really hurt each other so much so that when school was back in session, a few of the girls that I worked with, they didn't even want to go back to school anymore. And so it impacted, I believe, our entire society so negatively. And um, we're still feeling the effects of that. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I see it with kids all the time. And there's a lot more isolation than there used to be, and there's a lot more kids who want to be isolated than they used to be. So, I mean, that really is scary. And one of the other things that our kids have to deal with that we did not have to deal with was school shootings. I think that. There's a fear out there with our kids when they're going to school and they're trying to learn that we didn't have. And they're having to deal with things like with the phones, but with school shootings and things like that that are chronologically a lot harder than they can deal with. I mean, it's just there, it's it's way above them.
SPEAKER_00:Can I tell you something? It is so terrifying to me. And I definitely don't want to talk politics. However, I just want to say that when Charlie Kirk was assassinated recently, I I was in so much shock and awe when that happened over the fact that we witnessed someone getting murdered, up close and personal. And if you're on any type of social media, like I am on TikTok and Instagram, and you're scrolling, you're not looking for it, you're not trying to see it, you're scrolling, and all of a sudden you're watching this video. And I said to, I mean, I was dysfunctional for two straight days. I couldn't talk to anybody because I kept thinking to myself, are young people, I mean, how desensitized are they going to be? They've watched a murder in real life. Nothing about that is okay. And nothing will ever be okay about that. It is, it's it's horrific.
SPEAKER_01:It is just, it's how they're being raised. They are being trained to do lockdown drills. And it's reality to them. And any day when they hear a noise or a pop, you know, they they hit the ground. And that's just how our society is right now.
SPEAKER_00:Well, you know, just an aside, my mom started um teaching, substitute teaching a few years ago in Colorado. Young kids, young kindergarten uh through like third, and she would tell me stories and say, Randy, I've never seen anything like this. When I started a school, the first thing they do is they take me through the entire shooter drill and they make sure I know it. She said, These little kindergartners, this one I found horrible. Little kindergartners are all given a stress ball, and they take this thing and they just kindergartners are squeezing this little stress ball all day. And like one of her little students went to gym or PE class, forgot a stress ball, and had a complete meltdown. I mean, what world is that that a kindergarten? I don't even think I knew the word stress until I graduated college. Like stress should not be an everyday word. It just shouldn't.
SPEAKER_01:We have a bin in our house that is huge of stress balls and stress things for gadgets for our kids to be able to play with. And um, the schools provide them. I mean, that is just where they are. And if and and kids can't learn if they're afraid and they're going into these buildings and they're already afraid.
SPEAKER_00:I I mean, I couldn't agree with you more, but so if we were to get back to the parenting, right? And what parents can do, I think on a positive note, I think there's so much more that we could be doing for our kids right now. And I'm this is not placing blame because anything I'm gonna talk about, I am absolutely guilty of doing myself when my kids were in high school. So, you know how everything is relative, right? Like we have our perception of things. So if you were to ask me in high school, I would have told you absolutely, I am not that mom. I don't do everything for my kids. I would never run my kids' homework or lunch. I wouldn't go pick up jersey mics and run it to them. And I'm watching all these other mothers do that, right? So in my mind, like I'm raising some resilient kids, you know. But then you could turn around and be like, but Randy, you're setting up all the appointments for the driver's test or you're doing X, Y, and Z, which if they want it, they should be doing it. Do you see what I'm saying? So, like, perception is reality. So here I was like, no, I'm raising the most resilient kids ever, but no, we do so much more than we need to be doing for our kids. And it's not like you need to be called out on it, but just when you realize you're doing it, you take a step back. And you're like, you know what? You you can be you can be doing this, and I am here to help you. If you run into any snafuos, I'll help you find paperwork or I'll help you with your, I'll help you. But you can do this, you got this. That's what we can be doing for our kids, giving them independence.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And you know, we're not there to be their friend. And I think that we just want to help bridge that gap for them and and try to help them, but it can we can cross a line and end up trying to be more of a friend, I think, at times. How do we find that balance? And when is the right age for us to start really stepping back?
SPEAKER_00:Oh gosh, I feel like at every stage of life, we could be taking little steps back. So, what I mean by that is when our kids are little, right, we should give them choices. Like, you know, they get up every day and we have the little outfit laid out and they put it on and let give them a couple choices and let them choose the outfit. Give them two choices for, you know, little things, because I'm telling you, we have a generation of kids right now that have a terrible time, very smart, capable kids. So let me make that clear. They're at incredible colleges, they're smart, but they're lacking that common sense piece, that piece that their parents never let them do on their own. So from a very young age, I say we start letting our kids make choices. And as they get older, you know, for instance, different values in different homes. So I would never tell anyone their value set. However, in our home, if you started a sport, you signed up, you had to stick with it through the season because my value system is you're not gonna let your teammates down. You're not gonna quit because you don't like the coach. That's not how I roll. You're gonna figure it out. I don't care how much you don't like the coach or the other kids on the team. However, I'm not making you sign up next year. You didn't like it, we move on. We try a new team. But as they get older, the whole time we are fostering this sense of independence. And I think we know when we've crossed that line and when we want it more than they want it.
SPEAKER_01:Well, let's say that they've reached 19 years old and they're still on your couch. I mean, that's a problem too, you know? And they won't leave the house and they're not really trying to look for a job. So, and the parents are, you know, kind of allowing it. I mean, what's going on with this dynamic and what needs to happen?
SPEAKER_00:Okay, well, and again, I'm not, I'm not going to tell anyone how to do it. However, if you have a 19-year-old and they don't choose to go to school, absolutely more than legitimate, do what you want. However, if you're gonna live in this house, you're gonna have to start contributing. And here's one thing I can guarantee you every parent is paying for their kids' cell phone, is paying, you know, is not necessarily paying for their car insurance and gas, but they're paying for some type of transportation.
SPEAKER_01:Yes.
SPEAKER_00:So there are things that you can actively take away if they refuse to get a part-time job. We can't tell them what to do because they're not gonna listen. But what we can do is build the relationship, build the trust, not push, but have the tough conversations that say, listen, in this house, if you're gonna live here, I'm not gonna expect you to, you know, go to college or maybe you want to go to community college, but you're gonna then have to get a part-time job or a job, you're gonna have to start contributing to the family. These are my expectations. And if they flat out refuse, guess what? They don't get the the video games, they don't get the cell phone. You know, you have you have to start, and you can't say it and not do it. If you say something, so you can't you have to say it and do it. So you can't say something like I'm kicking you out because we all you you're not gonna kick them out. You gotta say what you mean and stick to it.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I mean, that's a huge one. Yeah, I've been ab I've been guilty of that. So I'm not gonna lie. We all are. I've said, and you're never gonna be, you know, and it's like now you can't use words like that, you know, like never. But you know, and and you and I have talked, and I have three kids with autism, and one of them especially struggles with just about everything, and he's homeschooled, and his fears are very real, and he shuts down and is genuinely afraid. I mean, this is not a fake thing, and I often remind myself to back off, let him work through whatever he needs to, because I know that those are important skills, and I had to do as an autistic child myself with my dad who had passed away, and my mom worked, and I was 11, and you know, I was home alone all the time, and I just had to figure it out. And I really do believe that those situations prepare us for life. So, how do parents, and this is like a tricky thing because these are two words that what is the difference between enabling and being empathetic?
SPEAKER_00:Enabling is when you're let's take sports because I work with so many athletes and I know this area so well. Let's take sports and let's take a child who is is good at their sport and you want them to be on a certain team because you want them to get this D1 offer, right? Enabling is when they mispractice and they they're constantly ill, so they have a reason why they can't do things, and you're always making excuses. And if you think about this, Anne, we start this behavior when our kids are young. If you think about it, when we have little kids, and let's just say they go on a plate date and they act like a little jerk. And you know what we do? We're like, oh my God, I'm so sorry. I forgot to feed him or her before they came over. They're so hungry. But really, they're not hungry, they're just misbehaved. You know what I mean? Or, oh, they're so tired. I should have given them a nap before they came over. We start the excuses as parents so young that we don't even realize we're doing it as they get older. So we have to stop with the so when they're older, and I'm going back to this, to the sports example, and we have made excuse after excuse after excuse, but the coach, they don't care about the excuses. You didn't come to practice. Guess what? You don't get to play in Friday night's game. And all of a sudden that kid melts down. But yet you enable the situation by calling that coach. You are furious with that. How dare you? My kid is the best, is the best midi on the team and you didn't play him. No, Randy, I didn't play him because X, Y, and Z. By the way, this is all hypothetical. This is not me, but I'm just saying, so when we enable, we are victimizing our kid. It's the coach's fault. They should have played you. They know you're better than that kid. No, no, no, that's not how it works. There are what is called natural consequences. And if our kid wants to miss a practice, miss the practice, deal with the consequence.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I I was a coach of over a hundred kids on a team. And I was the head coach, and it was pretty difficult because you can't make every parent happy. You just can't, no matter what you do. And so, um, and it was a a pretty competitive team. And but we had some kids who and they felt that they, their parents felt that they should be in every race or be the top swimmer, and I didn't swim them in something that they really felt that they should have been, and or they complained because I worked them too much, or if their kid didn't do what they needed to, and I told them to do push-ups. Oh, I can't believe you made my kids do push-ups, you know, that kind of thing. And then I even had some parents say, Well, um, I I we're gonna leave. And I'm like, Okay, all right. I mean, if you if this is what you want, you can go find another team that fits what you want. But this is what this is how I run my team. And you know, I believe that failure sometimes is a key ingredient in resilience and allowing our kids to feel some of these things. And how do we get back to normalizing some of these things, normalizing failure for kids, if that's even a word that I'm allowed to use right now.
SPEAKER_00:No, yeah, you know, okay, I'll tell you a funny story. I was playing pickleball last week with eight women, and we were playing on what's called a ladder, meaning there's the top court and the bottom court. And quite frankly, Ann, the bottom court means you're on the loser court, right? But it was my birthday. So it was a really funny story because I played in my first match and I lost. I was playing with really good women, much better than me. So I lost. And after I lost, we all come together and they're like, Randy, which court are you on? And I said, I'm over there on the loser court. And they go, Randy, it's your birthday. You're not a loser. And I said, guys, do not go there with me. That's the court for the people that just lost, and I am on the loser court. Now, it's like not the nicest way to say it, but the point is we have to start praising the effort our kids give and not just the outcome. I was proud of the game I played. I still lost the game, but I was really proud of what I put into it. So you can say the word failure because you can fail a test, you can lose a game, you can lose a national championship. But we as parents have to stop praising the outcome. Like, yes, you won, you crushed them. You know, it's about how did your kid do in the game that maybe they lost? We must start praising the effort and not the outcome. It's such a big part of it. Now, if you just watched the US Open and you watched Arena Sablanka win the women's finals, her speech just said it the best. She was talking to the girl who came in second and she said, Listen, I know how upset you are right now because I just was in two semifinals and I lost both of them. This win means like more to me than anything. And when you experience that loss, it makes that win worth it a million times more. If you just went out and won everything all the time and you had no comp, I mean, that's just not that much fun. You must experience a loss to experience the absolute joy of that win.
SPEAKER_01:You said so much there. I mean, that is absolutely so true. Plus the fact that you then earned it. And so then when you earn something, it means so much more to you than something just being given to you.
SPEAKER_00:It means everything. Because you bet your butt. We played a bunch of games. I won two games that day. Both times I made it up to that winner court. You know how good I felt? And you know what? Even on the court when I lost, I am never gonna be somebody that gets so down on myself if I lose a game. I'm gonna get down on myself if I play really poorly and I'm making mistakes that I really shouldn't be making. And like that's me saying, okay, do better. But if I play a great game and I lose against great players, I still feel like I won. Like that's what we have to do. Because then when I do win the next game, my God, you think I just won the lottery? I'm so excited. That's the feeling we want our kids to have, and we cannot give that to them. They have to earn it, they have to want it.
SPEAKER_01:This is so good because I think that we, you are giving the recipe and what is needed in order for us to turn this back around to get our kids to where we need to be. You know, I mean, it we are going in the wrong direction. There's no doubt about it. And every single generation is getting worse. And I think that the only way that we can make this better is for us to have accountability, for us to be able to push our kids in having them do things on their own and allowing failure to be okay. And I wanted to also know the difference between accountability, parenting with accountability and parenting with shame.
SPEAKER_00:Well, parenting with accountability is so amazing because you're teaching your kids not to be victims, right? Right. These kids are such victims. Like it's always somebody else's fault. It's the teacher's fault, it's the coach's fault, it's your friend's mother's fault. It is never their fault. And I have a brother who is this way. So I can say this with so much conviction when you have never been made to take accountability. See, here's the other thing that happens. There's so much negative that comes out of parents solving their kids' problems for them and fixing their kids' problems. And on top of raising victims and taking away grit and accountability, you're teaching them that because you made the choice, the kid can blame it on you. Does that make sense? Like they, of course, they don't take accountability because you know what, mom, you're the one that told me to take physics with this teacher and I failed. And and look at what happened. So it gives them an out. And that is so when you teach with when you parent with accountability, you're parenting by saying, listen, I'm gonna let you decide which physics teacher you want to take. And then when they take said teacher and they don't do well, I mean, certainly I'm not gonna shame them for not doing well if I watch them working really hard and still not doing well. That's the whole point. We want never to shame our kids, especially when they don't do well at something. Shame should never be part of it. We always want to focus on what they do well, and that's what we want to talk about. That's what we want to emphasize, because that is what their little brains pick up on. Like mom sees, you know, that I'm doing X, Y, and Z, and they feel that energy, and then they run with it. However, if we shame them, like you're so bad at physics. I mean, I don't even know why you thought you could take physics. They're now that's their narrative. That's the narrative in their head. They believe they can't do physics. Never should we do anything like that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Oh, I felt that even when you said it, and you weren't even saying that about me. That's how bad shame is. I mean, and it's something that we carry, and it's really hard to shake. Once you have it, it's in there and it you can't get rid of it. So we really have to be careful with our words. And like you said earlier, communication is everything. We have to allow it to be an open communication, a dialogue with our kids. Because, and I knew somebody that had um had a chair, and their dad would say, you know, this is this is a chair. And when you sit in this chair, you can tell me anything, and there's not going to be any consequences, and I'm going to listen and I'm not going to judge. So, what do you think about that approach? I I think it's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_00:I love it. Are you kidding me? I I, because, okay, so back to my pickleball analogy. If you play pickleball, you know that you can't quote unquote be in the kitchen. It's an area of the court where you're too close to the net. And so you can only be in the kitchen if the ball bounces. So I use a play on words, and as a parent, I feel like the kitchen should be like your chair. The kitchen should be the place in your home where your kids know they can come and tell you anything and they are not going to be judged. They are not going to be shamed, certainly not shamed. And if we were to go back to the example of the boy that got sex dorted, which happens all the time, by the way, that is not a one-off at all. Right. If that boy knew that he could sit in the kitchen across from his mom or his dad, either or or both, and say, listen, this is this is what I've done. And because you have a lot of parents out there, Anne, that will say, My kid would never send nudes. Oh, yes, they will. Yes, they will. You cannot be a parent that says, My kid would never do that. They would never send nudes, they would never try drugs, they would never drink and drive. They would, kids are kids and they push back and they're learning boundaries and they're learning who they are. Of course, they will do that. So if you're gonna have that attitude as the parent, of course your kid is not gonna go to them or go to you and say, I've made a really bad error in judgment and I need your help. So for me, the chair is the kitchen. I write about it in the book. Make your kitchen your place of the no-judgment zone. They can tell you anything and you must be quiet and you must listen and you must process before you speak, before you freak, before you say anything.
SPEAKER_01:I love that because I think so many times in my own life in my past, if I would have had the feeling that I could talk to an adult and them not judge me, shame me, or um make fun of me, or, you know, remind me of it later at another time or something like that, you know, it's really important that we keep that dialogue open. I think another thing that's really going on with our kids too is that they're so performative. I mean, think everything is a performance to them. And I really would like our kids to be able to get out of that and going back to authenticity when we have teenagers where selfies don't matter. You know, everything is a, oh, I gotta take this picture. And they obsess over every single like and they define themselves on how other people see them by, oh, I got a like.
SPEAKER_00:First of all, now there I think you might have a problem. I don't, I don't, that train has left the station. I don't think we're ever gonna get to a place where, like, if it's not on the gram, did it happen? You know, that's just who they are. That is their life.
SPEAKER_01:It is who they are. It is.
SPEAKER_00:They're totally performative. But what's really scary about it is this like we all wear masks. We all do. Whether we're like in our mom role, our volunteer role, our coaching role, our podcast guest role, we're all wearing a mask, right? And at some point we're exhausted and we just want to take the mask off. But guess what? Like, we could do that when you and I grew up. We could go home from school, take the mask off, sit in our bed, have our chocolate milk and our cookies, and like do whatever the heck we did, right? You can't do that today. You cannot do that because they get home, they get in the room, and they don't have the freedom to just feel like, whoo, that was like, that was a day. Now I'm gonna chill. They get on their phone and they start scrolling. And what do they see? They see, well, I invited this friend to come over and play with me today, but apparently, like they say on Snapchat that this group of friends all got together and they didn't invite me. Now my feelings are so hurt, I'm like dysfunctional, you know, because they said no to me, but yes to this group, or a party they didn't get invited to, or a picture that everyone's in, but they're not tagged in. I mean, the list goes on and on of things that could really hurt them. So they don't ever really get to take off the mask. So when they do take off the mask, sometimes it looks ugly and they kind of take it out on us, the parents. And I I urge parents to have so much more grace with their kids when their kids come home and act like little jerks because they need somewhere to vent. And if it's me, so be it. Let it be me for a few minutes. I'm not saying I like it to cross over into epic disrespect. That's not okay. But it's their way of taking off their mask for five minutes because they have nowhere else to turn.
SPEAKER_01:I really like this. Now I've got this whole thing in my head where I want to talk to my kids and say, okay, now we're gonna take off our masks and we're gonna have a conversation and allow us just to be who we are. Just be.
SPEAKER_00:It's and it's exhausting. I mean, I'll do a lot of TikTok, and a while ago there was all these things about these young girls at Sephora. And I remember saying to myself, okay, I thought about it right before judging. And if I was a young girl and there was a Sephora, I guarantee you I would have loved it. I would have been in there and, you know, like checking it all out and whatever. But like you now have these 10-year-old girls, literally, I've seen this with my own eyes at Sephora. You have 10-year-old girls walking in there, they'll be with their grandma, because I always have conversations with people. And the grandma will look at me and she'll kind of roll her eyes and be like, please help me. And the little girls will have baskets full of all these different face products, right? Things that should never be on a little 10-year-old face. But the grandma, how is she supposed to say no when all the other little girls are doing the same thing and then they're all making the little videos? It is so like we are in this society of performing and comparing. And so that is why, to me, like the phones in the bedroom, listen, we can't stop the social media. The phones have been given out, but you know what? We're the parent and we pay for the phone. So at some point, we have to have the value system to say, you know what, honey, we're gonna go to Target because they have age-appropriate cleansing washes for your face. That's what we're gonna do. So you don't like it, you find a way to earn money and get yourself to support it and buy yourself the peptides that you don't need until you're in your 20s. Like we have to set boundaries or it's gonna completely run away from everyone.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I mean, the dynamics have switched where the kids are the ones that are setting the boundaries. They're the ones telling us what's gonna happen. And and we are too afraid to set up a boundary and say no.
SPEAKER_00:We do. We we're parenting from fear because God, what if we say no? And listen, I have people that I work with and they're petrified. What if I say no? And my kid is the only one that doesn't have the Lululemon leggings, and then they start getting bullied. And you know, I mean, like they spiral, they go down, they ruminate over what could happen. And I'm like, lady, you have to sit, we have to stop right there. Oh my god, stop, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, right. Oh, I know. I mean, you are talking my language because I actually think or have these conversations all the time because I am raising three youngers and I raised or two olders, and the difference between then and now is even um a ton. Another thing is if I and I I considered my kit myself kind of troubled as a kid, and I was bullied, and I think that life would have been a million times worse for me if I had social media. So uh you had your problems with uh the panic disorder and things like that. You did talk about it briefly earlier, but could you talk more about that and how it affected you to where you are, what you're doing right now?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, absolutely. I grew up and when I was little, I used to get these dizzy spells. And that's what I called them dizzy spells. And nobody knew what they were. Doctors completely dismissed it, but it would paralyze me. Like I would be a little kid, let's just say I was at the beach in a competition, like a running competition with friends, and um, I would all of a sudden have a dizzy spell and I would stop. I would literally stop, I would freeze, and I would be so scared and I would cover my eyes, and I completely freaked out, and no parent knew what to do. My parents were as freaked out as I was, and nobody had a name for it. It wasn't called panic disorder. Obviously, mental health was not talked about at that time, but we are talking about the time when I was like, you know, five years old enough. This went on forever. So finally I remember going to the Mayo Clinic and all these doctors were trying to diagnose me, and they said, you know, Randy, there's other, there's other little, there's other people like you. They're all adults, but they describe these same symptoms. Would you want to meet them? And I was a little girl, and I said, no, like I don't want to meet adults that have dizzy spells. It had no bearing on my life. And this went on for years. And I'll never forget when I was um, when the internet came out, actually. I was on the internet one day and I was working, I was in New York, and I remember reading an article about panic disorder. And I read it and I call my dad and I say, Oh my God, dad, I have panic disorder. This is what I have. No one's ever been able to, you know, there's medicine for it, there's all this stuff. There's, I'm having panic attacks, and um, you know, and it's funny, I did try all the things. I don't, um, but it made me, but it it's the reason that I have a double major in college, but psychology was one of them. And I have also been through some kind of traumatic experiences in my life, which we don't have to get into, but I learned that cognitive behavioral therapy and that talking and writing are the two very best ways to quote unquote process what goes on in your brain, and that we have these neural pathways and they're like on the same freeway, right? And for years, mine were on this freeway and petrified. I would get petrified. I'd get up and I'd give talks, you know, and I'd be like, I'd have a panic attack before I'd get on stage. Like, what do I do? Right. But I've learned that when you talk, it's fascinating to me, but when you talk about something with someone, you relive what happened, it's like it, the easiest way for me to describe it is it unlocks these things in your brain. And when it unlocks it, it creates like a new route, a new route on that freeverse. And all of a sudden, you don't go to the panic, but you go down a different road. And um, I mean, it changed my life, completely changed my life. And so now every single morning I do a meditation, every single evening I do a meditation. And when I start to feel a panic attack come on, I will the first thing I'll do is put my hand over my heart and just say, I'm okay, this is just a panic attack. It's not a panic attack, it's excitement. So, like I will talk to myself, it takes two seconds and I'm out of it. And I I work with a lot of girls because a lot of people have panic attacks, but this was not it, I didn't know what it was for 20-something years of my life.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, we um live in a different age where, you know, things are labeled, and we did not grow up with that. And, you know, and and so, and you know, mental health, like you said, just wasn't even a thing. It wasn't really thought of as important. Everybody just went to in the same classes, everybody just seemed to be figuring it out. There were a small group of kids that were um had differences and they were in another room. Um but for the most part, uh, and and everybody you didn't really see a lot of. Yeah, we would have parties and things like that, and you would see some drugs and you would see people drinking and things like that. But for the most part, during the school day, everybody was good, and it nobody really stood out. And now it's it's completely switched, and um, it's really scary that this is where we are, but at least things are labeled and things we know more now, and that's a good thing.
SPEAKER_00:I feel like as much as I don't like labeling things, it makes it clarifies and it explains, and it really is very, very helpful. Like when I found out that there was a name for what I had, it literally changed my like this is it. Now I can deal with it. When you have something and you don't know what's going on and nobody can identify it, you feel very lost. You're lost. And when it's a brain thing, I mean, it's funny because my husband, who has absolutely zero mental health issues, when he first met me, I'm like, listen, there's limits that I have here. Like, I cannot go on rides at amusement parks. I will not go, like even at Disney World, I can't get on the it's a small world because I'm on something that I can't control and it's going round and it's I cannot do anything like that. So I try explaining this to him, and it took years for him, but he's God, he's so amazing, and he absolutely stands by me and supports me. But when someone has no mental health issues and they don't understand what is panic disorder? Like, why won't Randy just get on the simplest of rides? When our kids grew up, I'm here in California, I hated going to Disneyland. Everyone here goes to Disneyland, it's what you do. I'm like, I hate it literally more than anywhere on earth because there's so many people. It freaks me out. The rides freak me out. So do I think it's a bad place? No, but for me, yes. It is, it's a terrifying place to be.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And it it is a good thing that we've reached the point where, you know, we don't treat, we wouldn't want to treat a heart problem with cancer medicine. So I mean, it is good for that respect that we know exactly what we're dealing with. So people can look it up and Google and say, look, this is what I've been dealing with, and there are other people, and I'm not alone, because you know, that's what the internet also has done, and it's freed us up from being able to feel like we're the only ones that have gone through this. So it it is a good thing. Right. What you also mentioned, which I and then we'll wrap it up here soon, but was you started talking about something which has saved me, is I called it thought stopping. And every single time I would start going into a panic or into a direction that or thoughts in a way that weren't healthy for me. I would instantly start, I would stop my thought and make it going into a different direction. I would How?
SPEAKER_00:How do you stop a thought?
SPEAKER_01:I would just stop it because when you your neuro pathways or whatever, you know, you've gone, it it'll just go, there's wiring in our brain, basically, you know, when you have a thought and it just goes a different direction. The thought starts and it'll just automatically go to the direction in the path that it's always gone. But if you and this is what I've done for me, is as soon as it starts and I and I know which direction it's going to go, I will stop it. And it, I would force it to go a different direction and force myself to start thinking positive ways, and eventually it would start going a norm, it would become the normal for me. It would take time, it would take a lot of time, but I would call it thought stopping.
SPEAKER_00:Okay, yeah. Smart.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. So I want to touch on your book. Um, you have mentioned some of the lessons that you have in your book. Are there any other lessons that you want parents to take away from your book that you're working on?
SPEAKER_00:I mean, I think that we've covered a lot of it. That to me, the most important things that we can do are have the open line of communication with our kids, listen to our kids, stop poaching their shots, meaning stop taking their shots, let them lose, be move your feet, move your body. I have a whole chapter on that. In other words, be adaptable, like be flexible. You know, we're not given a playbook when we become parents. And I think everybody forgets that, that like we're going through parenting in real time while we're raising our kids in real time. So they don't understand that either. This is all new for us, too. So I think it's very easy to have a visceral response when we hear something that we were not expecting. So I think it's very, very important that we anticipate that we never be that parent that says, not my kid, and we're able to move with them and like you said, meet them where they are. Because we are not parenting in our generation, and we have to, we have to be able to step back and understand that they are living in a whole new world. So parenting is really, really hard today, but it doesn't have to be. And we don't have to parent from fear. We can make parenting fun. And the way to do that is to build trust and communication with your children.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's really important. Because then who else are they gonna talk to? They're gonna go to the wrong people.
SPEAKER_00:They are going to the wrong people. They're going right now online and they're listening to influencers, influencers who are probably full of baloney on what to eat, how to build muscle, how to look, what to do with their face, their thighs, their eyebrows. So they're getting see, we when we grew up, we got our values from our family, from our church, from our community, from our teachers, whatever. Our kids, they're getting their value system from social media. That's who's teaching our kids what's important. It's important to have the Louis Vuitton and the makeup and the club. No, it's not. No, it's not. So we need to get back to a family value system. So what I say in the book is if I had one huge regret for real, it would be that I did not insist, absolutely insist, on one family dinner a week, at least. Because when you have different kids and they're in multiple sports and their schedules are crazy. Some are getting home at seven at night, some are getting home at 11 at night, some are going to cheer at five in the morning. It's really, really hard. So when your kids do get free time, you just give it to them blindly. You say, you know what, spend it how you want because that is your currency. Right, the rest of your time is so booked and so busy. You know what? We all need at least minimum one family dinner a week where it's everyone in the family is at the table, extended family, you name it, whoever can be there. And you can just talk. And that's where you instill the values. That's where you lay the groundwork for who you are, what you believe in. Because when or when, and and by the way, no phones at that dinner. Because otherwise, literally the phone and the apps are raising our kids.
SPEAKER_01:Right. So you have to shut out all outside, everything from the outside. 100% be with each other.
SPEAKER_00:30-minute dinner. That's all I'm asking. I would, if I could do that differently today and take the phones out of the bedroom at night. Um, no, again, luckily, my kids are a little bit older, so they're not, they never were big on the whole posting on Instagram or anything. Like they just missed that. But they still did, they still have their phones at night and were texting and Snapchat and all of it. And that's just not healthy. It's just toxic.
SPEAKER_01:When do you think parents should stand up and pay attention and say, hey, it's time for my kid to get outside help?
SPEAKER_00:That is a great question. And we all know our own kids. So every family is different. But I would, I have always said, and I believe this, that a mom's gut instinct is better than anyone else's, a mom's, not a doctor, not an outsider, but a mom. So when you know, when you know in your gut that something is off, it's more than just they come home, they go right to the room, they don't come out, they start dressing a little bit differently, they are not interested in going out with the friends that they've always wanted to go out to with their grades have dropped. Like it, but but you know, they go through periods, and we all know that. They go through periods of pulling away, which they have to, but it's different. And I believe wholeheartedly that a mom's gut knows that. And when you know that, you absolutely do not be afraid to speak up and to have a talk with them and to say, hey, I've noticed some of these things going on. Not, hey, I've noticed these things going on. I'm taking you into a doctor. That's not the conversation. The conversation is, and again, meet them where they are. Do they love to go to Starbucks? Take them to Starbucks. Do they love getting frozen yogurt? Take them to get frozen yogurt. But take them out and tell them you've noticed a change in their behavior. You love them, you care about them. Whatever is going on, you are there to support them. You will not judge, you will not shame, you want to help them. And but the minute you sense it, you do it. You jump in with both feet, you don't hesitate.
SPEAKER_01:You just touched on something. My one of my older kids, we went, we made it a point to go to Starbucks or a bookstore every single week. And we would just, you know, sit in the books and drink coffee and talk. And yeah, I think that in with having five kids or however anybody, however, um anybody might have, but what we need to do, I think, is make sure that we make that one-on-one time. And and you keep that connection and you keep that dialogue open with them when you go into places like that. Just get a cup of coffee and sit down, and it frees them from being able to maybe talk. They might be able to talk with us then.
SPEAKER_00:I think that there you really catch your kids off guard when you actually listen to them. I mean, I absolutely caught mine off guard because listen, again, as a parent, you've got a high school son, you're fighting with him, he's yelling at you, stop interrupting me. You're yelling, shut up, I know what you're gonna say. I mean, that happens. That happens, right? Yeah. But you really catch them off guard when you have a fight with them or they start bringing something up and you could have a fight with them, but you're like, you know what? I'm gonna let them say what they want to say. I'm gonna listen to this whole thing all the way through. Even though I know what they're gonna tell me, you let them finish the thought. And guess what? They might surprise you too. They might surprise you with what they say because you've never let them finish the thought.
SPEAKER_01:And then they might listen to us. They might until we listen to them, then they'll listen to us.
SPEAKER_00:You have to build the trust. And when you build the trust, they will open up. And then you can't take that trust and betray it. You cannot betray the trust once they've opened up. You then have to sit on knowledge that you know and be in their court and be there for them, but not go in and fix what you learned. I like we have a crisis, quite frankly, not to be a fear monger, but we're in crisis with our kids.
SPEAKER_01:It's because we know what it used to be like. I mean, it was a joy to just live and be free and go outside and play and not have the fears and the interruptions with our families and things like that. That we I mean, it's it's really rare for families to come together, like you said, at a table.
SPEAKER_00:And it's incredibly rare. It's impossible.
SPEAKER_01:It we just know we had the leave it to beaver, you know. I I wasn't, I came a little bit after leave it to beaver, but you know what I mean. I mean, those days are gone. The Leave It to Beaver families. Like you said, it's a crisis and it's needed, and not very many people, not enough people are talking about it.
SPEAKER_00:We're never gonna get back to leave it to beaver, we're not. We're never gonna get back to kids not wanting to like document their life online, we're not. But what we can get back to is teaching our kids confidence at home and building resilience and building grit and stop robbing our kids of those opportunities. Because when we do that, they will then have the confidence when they do post and it goes south to not let it ruin their entire day, week, month, year. Do you know what I mean? We're giving them tools at home. Right now, we're not. Do you have specific tools? What I talk about when I give kids tools is very simply a concept called your mental bank account. So when I grew up, my father always talked about you have to have a mental bank account. It's like a fake bank account. And every time you do something, little or big, you stop, you there's a pretend teller with your name over it, and you make a deposit, right? So it could be anything from like, I just won a pickleball game against the hardest ladies out there. That goes in the mental bank account. It could be I just landed, you know, my first TEDx talk, that goes in the mental bank account. So that you draw from that, because I am such a believer in doing, in taking action. And so any little win adds up, and the little wins become big wins. And so when I talk about having tools, it's drawing upon your experience. But you will only have that experience when you go out and when you take action. Obviously, I talk about breathing and meditation. I that's what I do every day: meditation, setting intentions for the day, starting your day every single day, getting out of bed. I mean, my girls, all of them know. You put your feet on the floor, today is going to be outstanding. Will it be outstanding? I can't promise you that. But what I can promise you is that if you get out of bed and say today's gonna be outstanding, instead of today's gonna suck. I hate going to this class or I hate going to practice after school, I guarantee your day is gonna be better if you start your day with a good intention. So I have a lot of little things like that.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, well, it's all about perspective.
SPEAKER_00:Oh.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. And if we, hey, it we can go into every single day if we want to. And it, whatever you go into it with, if you think it's gonna stink, it's gonna stink. If you think it's gonna be a great day, you're gonna make sure that it's gonna be a great day. And I've had it where it's like dominoes, it's just like everything is falling, everything is gonna go in every direction other than the way I wanted it to be. And then I just say, Oh, well, that's the way it was supposed to go. And then I move on. And, you know, and and try not to wallow in it either. I mean, that doesn't do any good.
SPEAKER_00:You're actually so right. It's so funny. It's it's just like all the Murphy's law, right? Like when one thing goes wrong, everything goes wrong. But the other thing I do talk a lot about with my clients is their energy because we are all energy. So if you come into a room with a negative energy, everybody feels it before you even open your mouth. If you come in with a positive energy, you're a light in the room. Everybody feels it. They want to be with you, they want to be around you, they want part of that energy. So it's like we talk about intentions and how we start the day and our energy and what we're bringing to it. It's all about all those little things.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, that's really important. And I think if you feel down and out, it's hard to find that energy to be able to, you know, put that out in the room to bring people towards you. I think, you know, it it will do the exact opposite. Well, then again, but so then that will make you shrink up even more. So it's hard to reverse that once you're in it.
SPEAKER_00:Which is why you need, okay, which is why you need to experience a little win. So, what that little win could be is you're not feeling it, you don't want to go to that networking thing, but like yeah, for call like to get into college, you know, because there's gonna be so many people there and you're just in a get yourself dressed, looking good, feeling better than you did when you weren't, and then get to the event. I don't care if you spend five minutes there and then you leave. But you know what? You'll tell yourself that you were able to get yourself there. And as far as I'm concerned, like check, you did it. That's the hardest part. Now you might get there and be like, oh, this isn't that bad. Someone started talking to you, and it the whole thing could turn around. If you feel it going south really quickly, you leave. But you know what? You put the fact that you went in your mental bank account because everything changes when you take a shower, you brush your teeth, you put on a little makeup, you get dressed, and you go. You're already better off than when you were sitting in bed or on the couch not doing anything. Action is always gonna be better than inaction. And you have to be proud of yourself for any little action.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, I always say that manifestation is action. And if we want something to happen, we have to move.
SPEAKER_00:You have to move.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, this is good. And um, I I did want to ask you that if somebody is being bullied and they're being sexorted or they're having all of these issues, what would you tell them?
SPEAKER_00:As their mom or as their what?
SPEAKER_01:As um as an adult, just as an adult.
SPEAKER_00:Okay. As an adult to a kid that has confided in me that this is happening to them, I would talk to first of all, I would open the line of communication with them, let them know that I am here for them and that we together as a team are gonna fight back because bullying is not okay. So let's figure out what that looks like. And then you don't come up with the plan. You don't say, I'm gonna, I'm gonna take care of this, I'm gonna go to the school and I'm gonna get every person fired. You don't do that. You talk to them, you're a team, and you're gonna figure out what you're gonna do. Is it if it's sex tortion, we're gonna go to the police. If it's, you know, we're gonna take whatever action necessary, but your kid has to buy in and has to be comfortable with it. So the first thing you have to do is build their trust, which is not always easy. And once you build their trust, because again, like I said, that's where I'm talking about don't violate it. Don't have somebody come to you and then violate it and go behind their back and get involved because now they don't trust you and they feel they feel violated by you as much as by the bully. So you can't ever do that. You have to work as a team and decide if this goes to the police, if this goes to the school. When you ask me why I do what I do, I am telling you right now, there is nothing on this planet, nothing, that I literally hate and I don't even like the word hate more than a bully. I I don't I've never understood it. And by the way, there are schools that don't get involved and schools that are just as bad as the bullies. And if that's the situation you're in, maybe you think about homeschooling, maybe think about switching schools, but I will be there for that kid or my kid or whatever kid that is the entire way.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. And trust is everything. Yeah. I mean, since you are a certified life coach, how can people reach you if they need help?
SPEAKER_00:So I have a website, Randy with an I, randycrawford coaching.com. And on there is a button, a link to my calendarly, and um, they can set up an initial um 30-minute conversation. And usually I talk and I am a very accessible coach. I mean, when I work with people, they have my cell phone, they'll text me in between. Um, and I'm also on Instagram and TikTok at Randy Crawford Coaching. And I just make little videos about, like I said, today's was about, you know, the study about moms creating the anxiety. And it's a dialogue. I don't go on there and preach and say, in fact, a friend said to me yesterday, Randy, you always ask these questions, but you don't give the answer. And I said, that's because I don't give the answers. This parenting is debatable. I mean, there is no right or wrong for any child or any family. It's how do you want to look at this situation? What are your values and what do you think about it? That's what I like to put out there.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, when I think of the helping profession, because I I have a degree in counseling and that kind of stuff. And I always say to my or say in general, you know, the helping profession is helping people help themselves. And that's what it's supposed to be. It's not for us to be able to sit across from somebody and tell them what to do, it's helping them help themselves.
SPEAKER_00:First of all, if I ever told anybody what to do, they'd be in big trouble. That's the comedy. I would never even attempt to tell somebody what to do. But when they lay out a problem, I absolutely can ask the questions to get them to figure out, you know what I mean, this is what I should be doing, or this is what I should try. I give them the confidence to be like, why wouldn't you try that? What's the worst thing that can happen? And that's what we kind of talk through.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Yeah. Well, thank you for this conversation. This has been great. I've really enjoyed it.
SPEAKER_00:Me too. This has been amazing. And I'm just so thankful that you had me on. I really appreciate it.
SPEAKER_01:We covered it all, I think. We it it was a really great conversation. You just served us a whole pickleball court of truth. From screens to self-worth, you've helped us see what we can do better as parents, as mentors, and as humans trying to raise real, resilient kids. To our listeners, stop rescuing, start, start preparing, and have those hard conversations. Be accessible, be available. Follow Randy at Randy Crawford Coaching. And if you love this episode, please subscribe to Real Talk with Tina and Ann. Follow everything that Randy Crawford is doing. Remember, there is purpose in the pain and there is hope in the journey. And we will see you next time.
