279. Teens Need to be Bored Sometimes
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
Release Date: 08/05/2025
300. The Over-Loving Parent Trap (and How to Step Out Gracefully)
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
If you’ve ever thought, “I just want to love my kid and have them let me!” — this episode is for you. Many parents find themselves chasing their teen’s affection, bending rules, overgiving, or trying to buy closeness with gifts and favors — all in the name of love. But instead of feeling more connected, they end up tied in emotional knots, walking on eggshells, and quietly wondering why they’re getting less respect, fewer conversations, and more distance. It’s painful, confusing, and it can make even the most devoted parent feel rejected. In this episode, I’m unpacking why we...
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299. Healing Apathy in Your Teen, with Alma Galvan
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
Your motivated kid turned into a teenager who doesn't care about anything. Now what? It's heartbreaking watching your once-enthusiastic child become indifferent to grades, goals, relationships - everything that used to matter to them. You're probably wondering if you did something wrong, if it's just a phase, or if there's any way back to the kid you remember. In this eye-opening interview, we dig into the real story behind teenage apathy and what parents can actually do about it. What We Cover: The fear driving both you and your teen (and why it paralyzes everyone) How the way you see...
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298. Worrying About Your Teen
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
If you’re a parent who lies awake at night mentally running through worst-case scenarios, overthinking every decision your teen makes, or trying to prevent every possible meltdown, mistake, or danger—you’re not alone. Parental worry is universal. And it’s exhausting. In this episode, I’m breaking down why we worry, what it’s actually doing inside our brains and bodies, and how that worry—despite our best intentions—often lands with our teens as pressure, distrust, or emotional distance. We’ll talk about the psychology behind parental anxiety, how teens interpret our constant...
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297. 5 Steps to Stop Nagging and Get Buy-in from Your Teen, with Marielle Melling
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
Nagging your teen never works—but what if you had a framework that did? In this episode of Pivot Parenting, I sit down with author and parenting expert Marielle Melling to talk about how parents can finally get on the same page with their kids without the endless power struggles. We unpack why nagging backfires, how to soothe the discomfort that keeps families from healthy communication, and the secret to meeting everyone’s needs in ways that actually strengthen family bonds. Marielle also walks us through her key questions that help parents see themselves and their teens more clearly—so...
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296. Protecting Harm with Connecting Conversations, with Jason Reid
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
Today I’m talking with Jason Reid about one of the hardest parts of parenting: having real, honest conversations with our kids about the things nobody wants to bring up. The messy things. The scary things. The things we hope aren’t happening—but often are. Jason shares his family’s story of losing his 14-year-old son to suicide, and the gained wisdom he's sharing with all of us. He reveals the number one mistake we simply cannot afford to make as parents, and how small shifts in our conversations can genuinely protect our kids. This isn’t an episode about fear—it’s about clarity,...
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295. Teenage Loneliness Epidemic
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
Teenagers today are more “connected” than ever—and also more alone than ever. In this episode, I break down what researchers are calling a teenage loneliness epidemic and how it’s quietly shaping our kids’ emotional, social, and spiritual health. Large global studies show that about 1 in 9 adolescents worldwide report feeling lonely “most of the time” or “always.” Long-term data also shows that by 2018, high loneliness levels in adolescents had nearly doubled compared to 2012. In the U.S., young people hold some of the highest loneliness rates of any age group, with one...
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294. Purity Culture and Teens
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
Purity culture isn’t the opposite of sin—it’s the counterfeit of real purity, emotional maturity, and healthy sexuality. In this episode, we unpack how purity culture quietly slips into our parenting, our faith conversations, and our expectations of teens… and how to replace it with something actually healing. We’ll cover five practical steps that help your teen build healthy sexuality, spiritual resilience, emotional wellbeing, and genuine self-trust—without shame, fear, or pressure. You’ll walk away with: A clear understanding of how purity culture harms both boys and girls...
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293. Stop Fixing Them, Start with You- with Chris Rich
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
If you’ve ever thought, “Why do my teen’s moods control the whole house?”—this episode is for you. Instead of doubling down on control (which never works), I’ll walk you through how to regulate yourself first, so you can actually connect with your teen and get real results. Here’s what you’ll walk away with: 3 steps to ground yourself fast (including Chris’s “Safety Sequence” you’ll want in your back pocket forever). Why high emotions = low intelligence, and how to flip the script in heated moments. How to retrain your brain so you see possibilities instead of...
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292. Help! My Teen Is Using and I Don’t Know What to Do, with Brenda Zane
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
What do you do when you get that call in the middle of the night—the one that flips your world upside down? For Brenda, it was the night her son was picked up for wilderness therapy because his substance use had reached a breaking point. In this honest, gut-punch of an episode, Brenda and I talk about what actually helps when your teen is using—and spoiler alert, it’s not pretending everything’s fine or doubling down on shame. We get into: Why your kid’s using makes total sense (yes, really) Realizing your child is not your report card How to talk to siblings without scaring...
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291. How I Fixed My Teen, book reading CH 11
Pivot Parenting: Expert Tips for Navigating Teen and Tween Challenges
In this special 9-episode series, I’m reading chapters straight from my first best selling book, How I Fixed My Teen. You’ll hear my raw, real stories and practical tools that helped me turn my relationship with my teen around. Plus, get an exclusive sneak peek at my upcoming book, —where I dig into healing from harmful religious patterns and show you how to reclaim a faith that truly loves. If you're liking my first book, you'll love my second- preorder To book a free 45 Peaceful Parent strategy call, click and lets chat. xoxo
info_outlineLet’s be honest—most of us feel a little panicked when our teen says, “I’m bored.” It triggers something, right? We start signing them up for more, pushing them to be productive, filling every gap… but why?
In this episode, I’m sharing why boredom is actually a gift—and how our discomfort with it says more about us than them. You’ll learn:
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The real reasons we try to keep our teens busy (spoiler: it’s not all about them)
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What chronic activity and distraction actually creates in your teen
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A simple 3-step process to allow boredom in a way that builds connection, resilience, and creativity
If you’re ready to stop managing your teen’s schedule like a cruise director and start raising a grounded, thoughtful human, this one’s for you.
And if you'd like to join the Senior parent group for Septemeber 2025-2026, click HERE to learn more. xoxo