Helping Your Teen Choose College with Purpose, Not Pressure : Insights from a College Strategist :: Shellee Howard [Ep 529]

Depending on your personal background with puberty, sex and the often avoided topic of masturbation, having open conversations with your kids on these topics may feel daunting. You may want to avoid it or get “the talk” over and done with as quickly as possible. Or maybe your kids are really young and you don’t want to think about it right now. My guests Mary Flo Ridley and Megan Michelson walk us through why starting early talking with our kids about body awareness and establishing our family story about sex is so important. “What we're trying to get rid of is this idea that this is a one-time conversation in parenting. The world that we are raising our kids in has changed so drastically that the way we as parents talk about sex has to change drastically as well. We can have multiple age appropriate conversations and a little-by-little approach where we establish a conversation pattern where we are the loving authority in our child's life on this topic.” They have great book recommendations and advice on talking with your pediatrician so you know when puberty is imminent for each child. We cover ways to pursue conversations with your kids and how to talk to them calmly without overreacting. Finally, we dive into the deeper waters of talking to your older children about masturbation, dealing with our emotional baggage when it comes to sex and how to strike the difficult balance of teaching what is normal and beneficial. “We're hearing from a lot of youth ministers and pastors that work with college kids that this is an epidemic of a great addiction. So there needs to be more of a warning of how this is normal, but not beneficial. That why it's such a difficult topic. You can say, yes, honey, this is absolutely normal. You're learning about your body and how it works, but it can become a habit of comfort. And if this is where you go when you're upset or when you're angry, if this is how you comfort yourself, then this is not beneficial to you in your future.”

14 Huhti 201958min

To celebrate our 20-year wedding anniversary, Bruce and I are answering your questions! We have a fun time reminiscing on our wedding, the early years of parenting and all the twists and turns our lives have taken since we joined them together. We talk about parenting styles, balancing our roles and how I learned not to micromanage him when it came to caring for our boys. As much as we enjoy looking back at our years before kids when we traveled a bunch, the fun concerts we went to, and friends we made, we wouldn’t change what we have now. Bruce makes a great point that if we stay focused on the past, we’ll miss the great things happening now. Stick around to the end of the episode to find out which one of us said, “I love you” first and my personal philosophy on procrastination. We share our ideas for a perfect weekend (they aren’t the same) and how Bruce plans a typical date night.

8 Huhti 201957min

Though millions tuned in to TLC’s hit show Little People, Big World to watch their wedding, the entirety of Jeremy and Audrey Roloff’s love story is significantly less known. Audrey joins me to talk about her marriage, motherhood, and how she and her husband are on a mission to help married couples thrive. The Roloffs have founded a ministry called Beating 50 Percent which is focused on reviving covenant marriages. They share resources and ideas for couples to inspire them to make their marriages more than average. “One thing that has been our lifeline since before becoming parents is our marriage journal. It's essentially our communication tool in our marriage. When life is crazy, we know that every Sunday night we're going to have our time to do our marriage journal. We call it our navigator’s council time. But it's basically just a time for Jeremy and I to connect and communicate about things that have come up in the week that maybe there wasn't never that good time to talk about it.” We chat about how she’s balancing marriage and motherhood since the birth of her daughter, why it’s important to share interests and activities with your spouse and how to balance strong personalities in marriage. “It’s important to take humble perspective and ask God, what do our roles in this marriage look like and is this something that you are pleased with and how can we be a better reflection of the gospel through our marriage? I feel like God has really been impressing on my heart since the beginning of the year to let Jeremy be my forerunner and to view that as a helpful, beautiful thing that helps me and allows me to run the race better.”   What we chat about: Audrey’s background and how she met her husband Jeremy Roloff Jeremy and his family are featured in the reality TV show, Little People, Big World What it was like for her to have her wedding televised for the show Her life verse from Ephesians 3:20 and mantra “Always More” Beating 50 Percent the marriage ministry she and her husband have Their focus is inspiring couples to invest more than 50% effort into their marriage How she’s balancing marriage and motherhood since the birth of her infant daughter Their Sunday marriage journaling time and how they’ve turned it into a book, The Marriage Journal The principle of sharing interests and activities with your spouse and how that can knit you closer together Submitting in marriage when you have a strong personality or leadership gifting What Audrey loves about being a mom

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