Ep 236: Navigating the Tween Years

<p>Our sponsor this week is Tallo. <a href="https://bit.ly/tallotalkingtoteens">Check them out</a>! </p><p>Visit our website, <a href="https://bit.ly/talkingtoteenswebsite">talkingtoteens.com</a>, to sign up for our newsletter so you'll never miss an episode!</p><br><p><br>It can be jarring to raise a tween. One day they are our cuddly kids, and the next day they seem to want nothing to do with us! They start saying our jokes are lame, our style is dated, and we just “don’t get it.” </p><p><br>The tween years can be a contentious time for both parents and tweens. Our kids are taking the first steps into adulthood, and as scary as it might be for parents, for tweens it might feel awkward, uncomfortable, and lonely. Their bodies are changing and so are their brains. Tweens, in addition to developing more complex thinking, start experimenting with who they are. Hence why they might seem wildly different month to month, day to day, hour to hour! Tweens might argue more as the desire for autonomy peaks, and they might even practice lying. </p><p><br>But it’s also an incredible experience for parents: they are witness to the extraordinary process of a young person figuring out who they are in the world. </p><p><br>To help us untangle the confounding changes happening in the tween years, we’re joined by Michelle Mitchell, author of the new book <a href="https://amzn.to/3J5CflI">Tweens: What Kids Need Now, Before the Teenage Years</a>. Michelle Mitchell is an educator, author, and award-winning speaker who has conducted extensive research, surveying over 1,600 parents and 600 tweens, for her latest book. (We’ve spoken with her a few times before on the show about <a href="https://talkingtoteens.com/podcast/how-to-deal-with-a-moody-teenager/">self harm</a> and <a href="https://talkingtoteens.com/parents-street-smarts-savvy-teenagers/">puberty</a>.)</p><p><br>In our conversation, Michelle walks me through the transition in tweens thinking, as well as how to talk to tweens about their emotions, confidence, same sex