Talk time

I was recently reading in a blog that I frequent, that in the world of teenagers, there should be an unwritten law stating, "DRIVE TIME IS TALK TIME". Basically suggesting that parents should never miss a moment to connect with their teens and impart their words of wisdom, talk about life etc etc.


luckily we are still a few years off 'teenager-hood' in this household (which I am completely afraid of by the way) and although we do A LOT of talking about A LOT of things in the car, the conversation never gets too far, or too 'deep' without being interrupted (due to the almost 2 year old that also likes to TALK while we're driving :)

But we still do have 'talk time'. Just not in the car.

For us Bed time is talk time. Somewhere in the world of parental advise for 'younger kids' this should be stated in big bold fat letters!!!!!

It's funny cause this really kind of started accidentally. Rylan is our first child. and unlike our other 'trained' children, either Chad or I would lie down with him pretty much every night until he went to sleep. This lasted until he was about 6.

So by age 6 Rylan had started school and when we would lie down together at the end of the day it always inevitably resulted in a few minutes of talking!

AND MY OH MY I can't tell you all the things that started 'spilling out' of this boy.

After being at school for a while he started asking all kinds of questions. Questions about 'this word' and 'that word' (some more shocking than others). Questions about friends. Questions about right and wrong etc etc. Our chats are now often still about friends and apparently a time for him to confess whatever it is he thinks he needs to confess.

So this has become our little opportunity to talk about 'life' and all things relating to the musings of a young boys mind.

Sadly we haven't done this much lately. The climb up his ladder to the top bunk has seemed like a rather extreme activity - and then i've got to ackwardly climb back down when i'm all relaxed and sleepy......but i digress.....

Now that's he's a little older I'm pretty sure that he's catching onto the fact that when we lie down together, there's just some things i'll ask and talk about and there are just some things he'll say. (to illustrate this point a couple of months ago he said "mum tonight can we just talk about pokemon"......and so we did :) but not without me sneaking in a few 'questions' about school and friends first :)

Like I said before, teenagers scare me. Maybe girls more than boys. But I do worry about communication with boys. Let's face it, when Rylans 16, I can't imagine that we'll be lying down together having little chats before he falls asleep????? (I imagine it more like sitting on the end of the bed chatting ?? but then do 16 years old boys even let their parents in their rooms???? And even talk to them????

I hope so! And if I'm too uncool by then hopefully Chad will be granted access to his room :)


I often hear that now is the time to create open communication with children. That way, by the time the 'terrible teenager' years arrive, TALK TIME is something that is already established. something they are already comfortable with. Something they already do. Man I feel a LOT of pressure about this. AND I often feel guilty if I don't feel like we're doing it often enough..... like at the moment!

Luckily we're still 5 years off teenager-hood around here, so hopefully there's still plenty of time to TRY and establish good habits for 'talk time' and confessions of a teenage soul :)