Beyond Diagnosis | What's Really Going On With Teen Girls

0:00 SPEAKER_00: Can I ask you something? Do you ever have one of those days? I mean, you know what I'm gonna say, don't you? The days when you're just putting your hair out at the end, just feeling absolutely frustrated, lost, alone, and wondering what the friggity frig is going on. I hear you. I just want to say what you're feeling or what you're thinking is absolutely natural, and it is so easy for us to get to that situation. Because do you know what? We're never told, we've never been given that guidebook as to what is going on for our daughter, especially during the teenage years.

0:40 SPEAKER_00: You know, when all the ups and downs with everything else that's going on for her, we've never ever been able given those insights as to what is actually going on for your daughter. Do you know what? That's what I'm here for. So hi yeah, and welcome to the Teen Whisperer. I'm Rach Friedley, a mum, a coach, podcast host, obviously, like to state the obvious here. For mums of daughters who are trying their hardest to try and make sense of what the frig is going on with their daughter. Especially on those days like I've just talked about when absolutely nothing seems to make any sense.

1:19 SPEAKER_00: And those people around you are all pointing to one thing: diagnosis. Diagnosis. Do this, do that. There's an assessment for this, there's an assessment for that. But today I want to talk about something I think so many of us do when we're worried about our daughters, especially if you have those people telling you that they have this or they have that, why don't you get her checked? Why don't you get her assessed? We look for the answer. So maybe you found yourself googling at 11 pm. Is this ADHD?

1:52 SPEAKER_00: Is this anxiety? What are the symptoms of ADHD anxiety? Or is this just hormones? Just I mean, seriously, a girl's 28-day cycle isn't just hormones, it's a whole heap of emotions, it's a whole heap of energy and dips and wanting to do stuff and not wanting to do stuff. That's all there within that 28-day cycle. And honestly, I get it, I get all those questions we're putting into Google because we're trying to find that answer. You want something that finally makes all sense, and sometimes a diagnosis is part of that picture.

2:33 SPEAKER_00: But what if? What if we're sometimes looking for one explanation for something that is actually made up of lots of little things? Because as I've said before, behaviour is never just about one thing, and I think we forget when we're right in the middle of it. So think about one of those days, as I talked about earlier, she comes home from school or college or university or work. She drops her bag in the middle of the room. Seriously, what is that about anyway? You ask her how her day was, and she answers you without one word answer.

3:11 SPEAKER_00: Fine. Normally with that undercurrent of behind it. You ask if she's hungry. No. Same undercurrent. You ask if she's got homework if she's at school. And the reply you get is just can't you just leave me alone? And she disappears upstairs for hours on end. Her phone comes out, her door shuts, and you're standing there thinking, I was looking forward to you coming home. Now I'm just thinking, what the frigody freak happened there? And depending on the day, what you've been doing before, what other people have been saying to you, you're then thinking she's got an attitude problem.

3:54 SPEAKER_00: She's so ungrateful. She's addicted to that wrinkling phone. Why won't she just talk to me? And maybe if you're honest, there's another thought underneath that. The one that says, What am I doing wrong? As I said before, at the top of this podcast episode, I said I'm a mum. I know exactly what you're going through right now. I went through it with my own daughter. And this is why this podcaster here. This is why I do the work I do. Because I used to be you. So yeah, I've been there. Because the bit where you say, What am I doing wrong?

4:35 SPEAKER_00: She's lovely for everyone else, but she's hell on earth for me. This is the bit nobody talks about. So I'm putting it out there into the open because her behaviour doesn't just affect her, it affects you, and you feel rejected, you feel frustrated, you feel worried out of your mind, and sometimes you feel completely powerless, and then you react from that place. Those feelings of worthlessness, the feeling of I've got this wrong all the time. How do I get out of it? And then you question her, you push, you lecture, you go from one extreme to t'other extreme in two milliseconds because you don't know what's going on.

5:25 SPEAKER_00: You take the phone away, you confiscate it, and you deal, and you deal with the the fallout that comes from that one. You tell her she needs to sort herself out, and then she gets more upset, and you get more upset, and now you're both in it, and it's escalated beyond all belief out of everything that it started with. Sound familiar? Yep, I get it. My hand is in the air too, so yeah, 100% I'm with you on this one. But what if we zoom out? So obviously you're looking at what's going on in front of you.

6:03 SPEAKER_00: Because here's what I want to offer you. A slightly different where I want to offer you, sorry, a slightly different way of looking at that moment. Not to excuse her behaviour, not to let her get away with anything, just to get curious, because what you can see right now is the behaviour, and we've been told time and time again that behaviour is a problem. But what if her behaviour is showing you what's going on inside of her? What her body has been dealing with all day. So, for example, maybe she slept badly last night.

6:46 SPEAKER_00: Maybe she hasn't eaten properly today because I don't know, she's at school, she was late in writing something, got late to lunch, there wasn't any food left that she liked, she didn't eat anything. Or maybe she's been sitting in a noisy classroom for six hours. I mean, seriously, it would drive me insane. Or maybe she's had a horrible interaction with a so-called friend, and they've turned around and ignored her. Or maybe she's been holding absolutely everything else together at school and has finally got somewhere she feels safe enough to fall apart.

7:24 SPEAKER_00: Maybe she spent hours looking at screens, maybe she hasn't moved, or maybe she hasn't even been outside because so many of our girls are in school from whatever time it is in the morning, eight o'clock, till four o'clock in the afternoon, sitting at a desk. They haven't got that time outside, they haven't got that time to move, they haven't got that time to process what's going on for them, or maybe she's experienced that hormonal shift that's talked about at the beginning of this podcast. Or maybe it's a combination of absolutely everything and several of those things all at once.

8:06 SPEAKER_00: And this is the bit I want you to notice. I'm not saying ah, she's grumpy because she hasn't been outside. That's too specific, or she's emotional because of her hormones, because that's what we keep being told. Because they're girls, apparently they are the only ones on earth to have hormones. Hello, don't boys have hormones too? Anyway, tangent gone down. Because this again is just another version of looking for the answer. Instead, what I want you to ask is what else might be going on here? And this is where her physiology matters because her body is responding to all of this, not her brain, her body.

8:54 SPEAKER_00: So sometimes understanding what's happening inside her body can change what happens next. Take her breath, for example. When she's really overwhelmed, you know that point, the feeling, her breathing changes. And when you understand what's happening, her breath can become something she can use to help herself. Not because you've told her to calm down or just breathe. So many people say that, and you're just like, I am breathing, it's how I'm alive. It's about understanding that her body is reactive right now, and that little bit of understanding really matters.

9:42 SPEAKER_00: Because now she isn't just experiencing something awful that she doesn't understand, she's beginning to recognise herself. I know what it is, and eventually I know what I can do. Those are very different situations to be in, and it's why I talk about physiology so much. Not because I want you to become an expert in your daughter's body per se, but because sometimes when you understand what's happening underneath the behaviour, the behavior itself becomes a hell of a lot less confusing, and this is where I think we can get ourselves into trouble.

10:26 SPEAKER_00: Because once we discover one thing that explains our daughter, we grab it with both hands. She's got ADHD, she's anxious, it's her hormones, it's her phone. I mean, so many times. How many times do you heard that recently that the phone is getting blamed for everything? But the phone is not the problem. The phone, yes, its algorithms have been set up to it hold your daughter in there, to get her attention, to hold her there for hours on end. But the phone isn't the problem, it's what she's looking for when she reaches for that phone, what her body is looking for.

11:06 SPEAKER_00: And then we have she hasn't slept, and suddenly everything gets explained by one little thing. But your daughter isn't one thing, she's a whole person. Her sleep matters, her food matters, her movement matters, her environment matters, her friendships matter, her hormones, yep, they do matter, her 28-day cycle matters, her screens matter, her experience matters, her breath matters, her time out in nature matters, and so does what happened five minutes before she slammed that door. All of it is information.

11:47 SPEAKER_00: None of it is necessarily the answer. It's the whole picture. So what do you do with it? Do you know what? I am so glad you asked. Honestly, nothing complicated. The next time your daughter's behaviour really gets to you, before you decide what it means, stop and ask yourself, what did I actually see? Not she was being horrible. Just she came home, snapped at me and went upstairs. That is fact. That is what happened. Then what have I made that mean? And then you'll see it. She doesn't want me. Doesn't love me.

12:36 SPEAKER_00: I'm failing her. And then that one final question. What else might be going on? And honestly, that is it. You don't need to solve it. You don't need to diagnose her. You don't need to work out whether it was her sleep, her food, her hormones, her screens, her schools, her 28 cycle, 28-day cycle, friendship drama or something else. You just leave the door open because do you know what? You don't know yet. It's a much kinder place to be than she's just being difficult. For her, and actually for you too.

13:14 SPEAKER_00: So if you've been googling your daughter late at night, trying desperately to find the one thing that will finally explain what the frick is going on. I see you. You're not looking for a label because you want to label her, you're looking for an explanation because you love her, and that is completely different. You want to know how to help. And sometimes that answer involves a diagnosis, but most of the time it doesn't. It's about working through what is going on for her so you can better support her.

13:49 SPEAKER_00: It's about learning to see the whole picture, it's about zooming out. What you see is real, but what you make it mean isn't necessarily the whole story. So next time you're standing outside her closed bedroom door thinking, What the hell is going on? Maybe you just don't need that answer straight away. Maybe just pause. Take a breath into your belly and feel your belly rise as you breathe in and your belly lower as you breathe out. And then wonder, then ask yourself this question what else might be going on?

14:27 SPEAKER_00: Because as I've said before, and I'm going to keep saying, behavior is never just about one thing. So have a wonderful week, and I'll see you next time.

14:37 unknown: Bye bye!