Understanding Teen Girls | A New Way to Read Mood and Behaviour - Teen Whisperer

Intro

It's ten past four, and your daughter's just come in from school, college, work, university, whatever it is. At breakfast, she was laughing at something on her phone, interacting with you, and relaxed-ish. Now she's walking straight past you with her bag still on her back, and you ask her that one question. How was your day? Fine. Would you like something to eat? Why are you always on at me? She drops her bag, she slams that door, and up she goes. And you're left there standing in the kitchen with yet again that kettle in one hand, and absolutely no idea what you just did wrong.

Welcome

Hiya, I'm Rach Readley, and this is The Teen Whisperer, the only podcast for mums and girls where we connect the dots everyone else is staring at separately. Because as I've said before, and I'm gonna keep saying it, behavior is never just about one thing. Every week we are gonna slow things down together. We're gonna start with what you're seeing, then what you're thinking about what you're seeing, then what you're making your thinking mean, then how it makes you feel, and then what you do because of those feelings.

Only then do we zoom out and actually focus on your daughter and ask one completely different question. What is going on for her? What is happening in her body? Because when we stop asking what is wrong with her and start asking what is happening for her, everything starts to make a hell of a lot more sense. My hope is that every time you listen, you leave feeling a little more seen and a lot less alone. So let's start with what you're actually seeing.

What You’re Seeing

Your daughter was fine this morning, as far as you could tell. Now she's giving you short answers, a door that she slammed on her way up to her room, a silence you can hear from the kitchen. That is all you can see in that moment. So it's so simple, isn't it, to just jump to those conclusions. You know, two plus two equals twelve. Because that's the way our brains work. Our brains ruminate. So they go round and round and round about what went wrong. What could you have done better? So the questions you then start asking yourself, it's that negative brain, that monkey brain, what did I do wrong?

What you’re thinking

Here we go again. Is this ever gonna change? She was fine this morning. Do you think she's like this at school, college, university, work? And then the one that sits the heaviest on us? Is something wrong with her?

What you’re making it mean

And now it's stopped being about her and about her slamming that door, and it's becoming about the whole picture. I'm getting this wrong. Something is wrong with her. She's had enough of me. Is this what the next five years is gonna look like? And that last one is a long road to be standing at the start of. I know, because I've been there exactly where you are right now, feeling absolutely shiz for not knowing what the frigity frig is going on in the situation. So then you feel it, you feel it in your body, you feel that worry first, that fear, and underneath all of that, there's that constant tiredness, that walking on eggshells that comes from tiptoeing around every single conversation because you never quite know which afternoon you're gonna get, because they're all frigging different.

What you’re feeling

And then, of course, if that's not bad enough, we do what most of us do.

What you’re doing

We ask again, is she okay? We go up, we knock on her door. Are you okay in there? You ask again, you hover just in case she needs you, and then you snap because she's not replying, she's not answering you, or you give up and you tiptoe back downstairs, and then dinner is quiet. You're both braced, and by bedtime you are totally exhausted. She's gone to her room, and neither of you really know why the afternoon went off the way it did.

It’s ok

So if any of that has just sounded familiar, and you know what? I've got my hand up in the air right now, way up high, because yeah, as I said, I was you. I've been where you're standing right now, and I want you to hear this. You are a friggin' awesome mum doing a blinking hard job, a tough job without a map, without a guide. You are learning this as you go along, and there's no other job in the world that teaches it like this. Other jobs all have training before them. Being a mum never had a training, no guide, no instruction manual, nothing.

So the word we reach for when we have no map is moody. And we're told it's just a stage. We're told to wait it out. We're told to just grit our teeth the whole way through, and it'll be better in five years' time. But you know what? Five years is a hell of a long time to wait when you have no idea what the frig you're waiting for. And here is what nobody else tells us, bar me.

The Reframe

That's why I'm here. Girls' bodies, I've said this before, can move through a monthly hormonal rhythm, and that rhythm can influence things like her energy, her sleep, her appetite, her mood, her connection, her sense of community, her sense of friendship, how much capacity she has for the world around her. And that pattern starts developing way before her periods have even started. Sometimes at a very young age, and you're left thinking, what the frig is going on here? And most people jump to that conclusion.

Two plus two equals twelve, and she needs a diagnosis. But actually, it is her natural bodily rhythm. Every single month she'll go through this. So I call them the energy week, the social week, the volatile week, and the hiding week because they are what they say they are, they're not four boxes, they're not four rules, they're not four things to tick off, and they won't look exactly the same for every girl. Because remember, everyone is freaking different. We all have different DNA, so we're not all going to show the same signs as each other.

These weeks are simply a way of where you can start to notice patterns. The energy week. So she's up early, she's balancy, she wants to try everything, she wants to have a conversation with you, she wants to rearrange her room and ask about a new club or run up the stairs two at a time. She eats well, she sleeps well, and she talks to you, you know, that thing. Then you've got the social week where everything is about her friends, it's about connection, it's about community, her phone is buzzing, she wants to be out and she wants to be talking with other people.

She's laughing with you in the car, she's glowing. And then you have the volatile week. Everything feels way bigger. A look from somebody that she reads wrongly can be an insult, insult. A question feels like she's under attack. She may sleep worse, which means her energy is going to be way worse the next day. Her conversation is going to be way worse. Her concentration, her focus, and her attention are going to be out the window. Her body can feel tired, sore, or hungry, and she may not have the words for any of it yet.

And then on top of it, the hiding week. Now we all know which week this is. She wants her room, she wants the dark, and she wants a hot water bottle. She wants no questions at all. She's slower, she needs more sleep, she's knackered, her body is asking for rest. Now, put all of that into that conversation we had at the very beginning, that topic of that kitchen at 10 past four. If you put that into our energy week, she takes a snack from you and tells you about a day. Put it in the volatile week, she slams that door.

Same girl, same kitchen, same snack. A completely different afternoon. But here's the important bit. The cycle is not the entire explanation. It's still one dot. Sleep is a dot, food is a dot, school is a dot, college, university, work is a dot, friendships are a dot. How she's breathing is a dot. Whether she's had any movement is a dot. Whether she's got outside into nature is a dot. What her sleep is like is a dot. What happened yesterday is a dot. What is happening in her life is a dot. You get it?

We don't just pick one and declare, oh, that's it, that's the reason why she's behaving like this. We connect them. Because as I said before, behavior is never just about one thing. And that is why keeping a little tracker is really useful. In the early years of her periods, and around that, the pattern can be messy, the weeks move around, and that is totally normal and natural. We're not trying to predict exactly what is going to happen, we're looking for her patterns. And again, there's another body in that kitchen too, yours.

You have your own capacity as well as your daughter. You have your own energy, your own sleep, your own shiz going on. So sometimes she's having a difficult afternoon and you've got plenty in the tank. And sometimes you're both running on empty, and nobody is doing anything wrong because all of this is natural. But here's what can make those afternoons tip. A girl in her ah can read the room way before she hears a word. So when mum is calm, she's more likely to land, find somewhere to land. But when you're rattled, it can be way harder for her to regulate herself.

She mirrors what she walks into.

This is what I mean when I talk about the whole body reset.

Connect the Dots

Sleep, food, movement, play, and rest all talk to one another. And in different parts of her month, her body may be asking for different things. So we meet the body where it is first. And sometimes the first body we need to meet is yours, not hers. But before we change anything, we need a tracker, and I call it the four weeks tracker. Simple what it says. Every evening, write down two words. One was for how was your day, and how one is and the other one is for how she was that day. So whatever fits, you know, you'd pick the word, you put it in there.

The hard afternoons always stick in our memories, the good ones ones slip away. So the hard days start to feel like a whole month. Written down one word at a time, the month starts to tell the truth, and it's usually way more mixed than it feels like in that moment. Keep it somewhere private, like the notes on your phone. It's a notebook for you. And after four weeks, you look back on it.

And remember, you're simply connecting her dots. And once you start seeing a pattern, something shifts. You stop asking, what did I do wrong? And you start asking, what is happening for her here? And eventually, even better, what does she need? Because that's where this becomes way bigger than simply working out which week she's in. Because we're not trying to work it out for her, we're helping her begin to work herself out.

One thing to do

So in an energy week, get her moving. Say yes to the plan. Take her out, let it burn it off. In a social week, let her be with her friends, let the house be loud. In a volatile week, think warm food, an earlier night, less on the list and fewer questions. And in a hiding week, remember what we used to have: a blanket, a hot water bottle, a movie binge, quiet house and rest. And mum gets the same menu. Mum is allowed the same. You are allowed the same. Body first, words after. So here's the bit I really want you to try this week.

Pick a quiet moment, wherever you are, and say, I've noticed that some days are harder than others. What would make those days easier for you? What do you need? And then listen to her. Some days she'll shrug, some days she'll say, I just don't know, mum. Some days she'll just say, I'm tired, and that's okay. And you know what? Some days may actually surprise you. Whatever she says, do not try to fix it. She needs to hear that you see her for what she's going through. Because those few moments are not about giving her the right answer, they're about helping her start noticing what she needs in that moment.

What actually helps her. This is a beginning of body literacy, and it's the beginning of self-trust. So, one thing I'd like you to do this week literally, those two words, one for you and one for her.

Practical Takeaway

14 words by Sunday. That's the whole job. Don't analyse them, don't turn them into a spreadsheet, just notice. Because you're not trying to fix a box, find a box to put her in, you're learning how to see the whole picture.

And if you're listening to this thinking, that's me. Do you know what? I've got something for you. It's well exciting. It's called connect the dots.

Freebie - Connect the Dots

And no, it's not that dot-to-dot picture that we all had when we were kids. It's a simple guide to help you slow down, look at what you're actually seeing, and then zoom out to the bigger picture what actually might be happening for her. There isn't even there is even a question in there to help you start noticing patterns, including where she might be in her cycle. And you can grab it via my website. So yeah, have a wonderful week. Hope you've got it this week. Hope you understand what I'm talking about.

Have a wonderful week, and I'll speak to you next week. Take care, bye bye.

Understanding Teen Girls | A New Way to Read Mood and Behaviour

The program