Dinner Dialogue: Addison Wants A Later Curfew

This topic came up at the end of our dinner time. Addison announced she wanted to talk about something. This is the usual in the Raymond Household. Important topics come up during our dinner time. I pulled out my phone and started the voice recorder.

She pitched us in making her curfew later...to 12:30 or sometimes to 1:00 am. 

What are her reasons? 

She wants to practice time management before she goes to college in a year and a half.

How do Mark and I respond?

We have similar responses however we do disagree in some parts of this.  With that being said, curfew is a struggle for us because Addison does not always have  a set plan of what her friends and her are doing. We do not want her driving all around town at night so how do we come up with an appropriate curfew time?

She has to have more of a solidified plan of what she is doing in order for us to be comfortable making her curfew later. And it depends on what is happening the next day as well. 

Listen in as to what we decide.

Our goal is to make sure everyone is feeling good at the end of the conversation, to avoid anger and frustration, and to keep navigating JOY in our household.

Please share this with ONE person who you know will take value in this. Someone who has teens or will soon have teens and wants to hear how we navigate these conversations.

Please share with us your thoughts, ideas and feedback!

We all learn from each other as PARENTING IS HARD!!!

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Transcript

*AI Transcribed*

00:01
free audio post-production by alphonic dot com

00:15
Hello and welcome to Navigating Joy Together. My name is Lauren and I'm here with my family. Mark. Addison. Hunter and our dog Onyx. Each episode you will hear about our experiences with Navigating Joy Together. Hello everybody and welcome back to Navigating Joy Together. Before we get to this week's episode I just wanted to give you a couple of reminders. If you are looking for a research based strategy to encourage meaningful conversations with your children I want you to check out Drive-A-Log.

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01:14
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01:42
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02:08
that I wrote, it's on Amazon, it's a memoir called My Dad Died of ALS and How I Found Joy 30 Years Later. And it's just my story about my dad being diagnosed with ALS when I was in eighth grade and the four years that followed up until his death and even how life transpired since his death, which has been over 30 years. It's affected me in many ways. And one thing I did learn,

02:34
is that we can still find joy in suffering and in grief. And it took me a while to really find that true joy. And I talk about that in the book. So go and get it, share it with one person, just one person you know who might be struggling with something or has a family member who may have an illness or a terminal illness. There is some value in there. And I would love and be grateful if you checked it out and you shared it with one person.

03:02
I know that it will impact other people and give them some hope. The link to the book you can also find in the show notes as well. All right, now we will head over to this week's episode. During this week's episode, this conversation you're about to hear started like any other conversation in the Raymond household. It was during our dinner time, pretty much at the end, Addison said she had something to talk about.

03:27
And so I just whipped out my phone and started the voice memo recording. I didn't even have a microphone set up. So hopefully the audio is not too bad. And you can hear this natural conversation about Addison pitching to Mark and I for a later curfew. So I'm excited to share this with you all and you know, in households of teens, these are normal conversations, right? And so.

03:56
This is how our conversations go and the kinds of questions we ask and what it leads to and if there was a decision or not. So enjoy! Okay, so I would like to talk to you guys about something. And first, I want to thank you guys. You guys have been very, very cooperative and very open-minded and open-minded about this and I very much thank you guys for it. So you know how my curfew is 12 o'clock?

04:25
Yep. Well, I was wondering if we could discuss and talk about moving it to 1230. One reason I was thinking this is because I'm going to college in 15 months, and I think it would be very good if I start being able to manage my time, learn how to manage my time.

04:54
when it comes to nights and hanging out with friends and stuff. Because, you know the saying, time flies by when you're having fun. So if I'm in college and I'm hanging out with friends, then next thing I know it's like three in the morning and I'm like, shoot, I have no sleep. That's because I didn't get good time management. So if I could start being able to learn how to manage my time for college and in the future, that'd be very good. Or...

05:23
Or just no curfew at all. And I, and I, and I manage my time. So how is this different from your curfew being at midnight right now? Um. You still manage your time? Well, you see, 1230 gives me a little more of a care of range to manage my time. Neutral eyebrows, neutral eyebrows, neutral eyebrows. Let's, let's kick off a couple of things here. Nothing good happens after 10 o'clock.

05:52
Now, in college, after college. Now, before we have a discussion about 12 or 1230 or no curfew, which we're not having that discussion.

06:07
Do you yet have an understanding of the concept of where the challenge comes with you and the timeframes that we allow? Have you figured this out yet? I'd like to ask a question. Sure, ask a question. Why, what are the reasons you would like me home at 12? Wrong question. No, it's an okay question. It's an okay question, but I want my question answered.

06:34
Do you understand the chat? You don't. So we should revisit that first.

06:43
Has it ever happened where you go out, let's pick some random times and fill in some blanks, go out at eight to go to some hockey game, to get done with a hockey game, to then all of a sudden, oh, we don't know what we're gonna do and the hockey game's over. And then we go sit in a park, and a cup, I'm not done, sit in the park, staring at the stars, to then, oh no, maybe we should go get ice cream. And then maybe we should do this.

07:12
But then we go back to the park and just sit there staring at stars. And then the timeframe and what you're doing is a constant evolving, changing thing. Does that sound at all familiar to any of your experiences in the past six months? Yes. Does it sound like that is more the common thing or the uncommon thing? Yes. Yes, what? It sounds like a common thing. A common thing.

07:42
Do you understand that the constant changing of plan and then, oh, I'm gonna do this and I'll be home right after, to, oh, I'm gonna do that, but then we decided to do something else, to, we did this and this and this, and A, B, and C, and D, and now we're thinking about E, and the plan kind of consistently shifts and changes, and the timeframes start to shift and change. Does that happen more often than?

08:09
Here's my plan, I'm doing A, I'm doing B, I'm doing C, and I'll be home at 11.30.

08:15
The first one. Are we starting to identify a pattern of something that would make it way easier to have discussions about almost any timeframe? How many times has either mom or I said, establish your plans, come up with a plan, and no, I am never going to understand that you and your friends can't get your shit together enough to figure out what you're going to do.

08:42
before, after, and during, in the evening on a Saturday, then hang out at Crown Mountain Park staring at stars, which by the way, I think is bunk. I don't believe it. I don't buy it. And I have lots of questions about that. So, can you see where there's a behavior that you could take responsibility for that would make it way easier for us to go, oh, of course, stay up till 12 30, or of course, stay up till midnight, or

09:11
Special night, stay out to one. Can you see where some of your behaviors in lack?

09:18
of some sort of disciplined idea other than hanging out at a park in a car with a girlfriend looking at stars, which is why I have so many questions about set activity. Can you see where I'm coming from? Yes, can I say something? Please. First of all, staring at the star in a car in the parking lot, number one, we talk crazily. We go into deep talks. Number two, stargazing, it's pretty.

09:49
Absolutely, yeah. It's perfect when you have a warm space where you can play music as well as staring at the stars because I have a shade that opened on the top of my car.

10:04
I'm not done. Thank you now I Understand your frustration with the why can't we establish our plans earlier, but you see um We'll have let's say I have a plan we're going to dinner right Okay, so we're going to dinner at 7. Mm-hmm. Okay, we don't we are planning To like go get ice cream after it Sunday. Oh, so we get ice cream but

10:33
we don't know what to do, so we either go to a friend's house, but we say that someone wants to go to the park or someone wants to go to someone else's friend house because we were invited to that friend's house. Like, it's, what I'm trying to say is in a small valley, plans come up and I was like, I understand. What you're trying to say is sometimes you don't know what's going to happen and then last minute something comes up. Yes.

11:03
And I'm really trying to work on this. I know how you guys, how much you guys are not a fan of like last minute things and that, and I'm trying to like tell you guys earlier and like all this and that and this, um, but yeah. Well, I understand that it changes or sometimes you don't know right away or then someone's like, Hey, let's just go to my house. Um, I get that. Like I've experienced that too. Um, I think the struggle is being like.

11:32
Yeah, you can stay out till 1230, but I don't know, are you sitting at the park the whole time or are you guys driving around? Like I'm not a fan of you guys driving around back and forth from Basalt to Algebel to the park to this park to Carbondale. Cause I just don't think that's a smart way to spend the evening. And there's just, I think a whole bunch of things that I don't think is, I just don't think you need to spend the night driving around 82 and through towns. You know, if you had an actual plan.

12:01
Can I spy?

12:04
Yeah, don't need to be number one and pound a bunch of people in a car. Where were we at in our year of license and the law?

12:15
How many people you allowed to have in there under the age of 18 in your first year? How many was that again? One. And so anytime there is more than one of you and there's like, oh, let's go stargaze a crown. Now let's go stargaze at RVR. And then let's go stargaze wherever you go in stargazing. There's an opportunity where there's gonna be more than just you in one person. Yes? Mm-hmm. Legal? Mm-hmm. No. So part of it is as simple as

12:45
When do police start patrolling and looking for people making poor choices? At night. See how I'm starting to add this together? Mm-hmm. And it's not even the number of people in your car either. I mean, that's part of it. But if they're going to, if they see, you know, if you're just driving back and forth for two hours to different places, you're just putting yourself a little bit more out there versus, versus being at someone's house and hanging out. And that's what I do mostly. I'd feel better if you're like, hey, we're gonna get on Maggie's.

13:15
Okay, great. Stay up till 1230. If there's not a set plan, then I would really struggle. I'd be like, okay, stay up till 1230, but I have no idea what you're doing. Are you guys just driving around to Carbondale, to Basalt, to Albany Park? That just doesn't sit well versus when there's something I know that is a better choice and even potentially a safer choice. I can fast-track this a little bit. I'm not sure I'd oppose you having the 1230 curfew.

13:44
And there will be times where, yes, you may. And there might be times where no, you may not. But I'm not opposed to it. I'm not saying no. What I am saying, to be very clear, and you don't have to like it, you don't have to understand it.

13:59
what I need and you have been much better, much better. We went from every time not knowing what you were doing, when you were doing it, how you were doing it, where you were doing it, with whom you were doing it. And now there's at least some ideas of like, hey, we're gonna go to the hockey game, then after the hockey game, we're gonna go ice cream, then we're gonna go stargaze at the park. That is better than what we were doing six months ago. So I appreciate your effort in doing that. And I also realized that you guys...

14:28
Either A, can't make up your minds, or B, have too many things to choose from to make up your minds. But what makes it easier for mom and I to say yes to almost anything, at some point in time, you guys were able to make a plan and stick with it to do the whole Sadie Hawkins thing today, right? Mm-hmm. I need more planning and execution of said plan to start going, oh, you know, you wanna start talking about one o'clock because that's gonna be the next conversation.

14:56
No one o'clock until you can start actually, if it was once in a while, Addison, that you guys jumped all over the griddle like a flea going, Holy smokes, let's do this. And then let's do this and let's do this and let's do this. But that, that tends to be the pattern. And I don't understand how we can't get a little bit more structured decision-making. Well, sometimes we like, don't know what we're going to do after that. Like at the hockey games, like we know.

15:26
Like, we're gonna go to Taco Bell or McDonald's before, or like Dairy Queen before, then we're gonna go to the hockey game. But when we go to the hockey game, after the hockey game, we'll go back to Carissa's house, but then we don't know what we're gonna do at Carissa's house. Well, so if you're like, hey, we're gonna go back to Carissa's house after the hockey game. What if like something comes up though once we're at Carissa's house? Like what would come up? Like, what if we want, I don't know.

15:55
Um, just like something else that's not at Karissa's house. It's, I think it's hard to, I remember that's definitely something that's going to happen and I think we need to be flexible in that piece because I don't think they're always going to have a set plan. Like.

16:11
like homecoming, there was, I'm going to the dance, and you know what I mean, like you guys had a plan to go to the dance, obviously, and then at that point, before the dance, there was no plan of what you guys were gonna do after, which I thought was kind of interesting. I expected you to be like, hey, after the dance, we're gonna go do this, like before the dance even started, right? And then we didn't hear anything until you got back, you know, the end of the dance. And so...

16:41
Maybe you can initiate. So I think there's some flexi- I think we can be a little flexible because I don't think they're always gonna know, but it does seem very, what's the word, shoddy, I guess, to be like, it just feels shoddy and unplanned. And then again, my concern is, okay, well, what are they doing? Are they driving all over the town? Are they driving all over the valley? Especially if you're in Aspen or in Glenwood.

17:07
I was talking to one of your friend's parents a while ago, and I asked, I'm like, what do you do when they don't, when your daughter doesn't know what's happening after a game? She goes, I just tell her to come home. She goes, she doesn't tell me if they don't have a plan, then she just has to come over after the game. Can I ask who? Yeah, you can ask who, who is Katie? Maggie? Yeah. And I mean, to me that's like, okay, great. If you don't have a plan, go to the game, have fun, come home. I, I've held my tongue, okay. I appreciate what you're saying.

17:37
And I disagree. And I appreciate what you're saying. And I disagree. Because we're talking as if this doesn't happen consistently and constantly. It has gotten better. You want to talk about being out till 1230? Let's talk about being out till 1230. Here's what I need. I need you to advocate a little bit with your friend group if it was truly once in a while that your plans adjusted and changed and this and that. But I just don't understand how, and this is some place where I absolutely align with Katie.

18:06
If before you go into the game, there's not a point saying, hey guys, my parents are gonna be wondering what I'm doing after the game. What are we thinking? And it can change. But, and we've already talked about this, right? There's an established pattern that you said, yeah, more often than not, we plan for the next five minutes, not the next five hours. Does that make sense? Mm-hmm. I need just a little bit more effort of planning for the five hours from you. Because we're...

18:34
Where I feel like I get a little frustrated and where I can absolutely tell you your mother loses her mind is when at five minutes after the hockey game, so random times, it's 8.30, hockey game's over, you're heading to McDonald's. At 8.35, well, maybe it's not McDonald's, we're gonna go over to Target. Then at 8.42, it's not Target, we're actually gonna go over to Lowe's and look at the plumbing department to get mom another sink. Then after the Lowe's, oh, we think we're gonna go Stargaze at the...

19:03
Carbondale Park, but on the way to the Carbondale Park at 849, you change minds and go to the other park.

19:11
There's just a lot of changing in, I get it. You gals are a bunch of teenagers trying to figure out what you want to do. I get it. I need for it not to be a constant ever evolving change every time because I'm already saying, you know, you want to talk about going until 12 30, but I can tell you that if it's like jumping all over, like kind of plan, sit on it and adjust as necessary, not make no plan.

19:40
and change it constantly, literally to a point where it feels like minutes between texts and phone calls of things changing versus, hey, I plan on this hockey, then ice cream, and then Maggie's. Great. And then you do the hockey, and then you do the ice cream, and then you're like, oh, we changed our minds. Instead of Maggie, we're going to go to Ruthie's. Cool. Can you see the difference between those two things? Mm-hmm. Now, do you understand why it is important to us?

20:10
Why? You tell me why it's important to us that you have at least once a month a plan that gets executed and you actually follow through on it. Um...

20:24
Because you want to know that there's like actually an established pin. So we're not like going all over the valley the entire time and just driving. Um, and so we're not doing nothing while we're out and we like. Listen, you guys want to have a great big fun, do nothing party. Come here. I promise you, I can lock myself and you will never hear me or see me or go to Ruthie's or go to Chris's or go wherever.

20:52
At the end of the day, who is responsible for your safety?

20:59
you primarily, and then it comes back to us. So to mom's point, and I don't disagree with mom at all on this, the driving here and the driving there and the dit, dit, dit, dit, dit, dit, and bouncing around like a pinball machine, that becomes a challenge because ultimately, if something goes crazy, something goes wrong, if you need help, if one of your friends needs help, if something is going down, we're all of a sudden it's like, man.

21:26
I wish I had mom or dad here. It's really hard to track what the heck you guys are doing. So, part of this is just a responsibility. I would like to have a better idea and I don't need it every time. You wanna go out this weekend and I don't want this to be the conversation you're thinking about. What'd be great is if you're gonna do something on Saturday night, it's Wednesday. Maybe you should be having that conversation with your friends on maybe Thursday, Friday for sure.

21:56
Saturday at nine in the morning. Okay. Saturday at nine at night. I struggle with it. Because ultimately at the end of the day, I need to know where you are, what you're doing, who's with you. So that if anything's going on that you need assistance or need help, you follow what I'm saying? Same kind of thing. All right, we're gonna bring up something that's not meant to be a touchy subject, but you get rear-ended after school, correct? Okay.

22:24
If something like that was to happen at 1130 at night and we have no idea and you keep changing, how are we going to be able to support you? So again, I don't need it to be, to turn and flip overnight overnight. I don't expect you to go from what you guys are currently doing to what ideally I'd like you to do by Saturday, but I got to see some traction in that direction.

22:51
I don't know if it's realistic though for them to plan something on Wednesday. Like we never really did unless there's an actual game, you know, unless they know they're going to a game. I don't think it's realistic. You said we, you mean you and your friends when you were her age. Yeah. That's not me. But, well... I just want to be clear. I'm not saying it was you. I know. But what I'm saying is I don't know if it's realistic to expect them to be planning something midweek of what they're going to do on the weekend. I don't think it just...

23:18
Really, this will work that way. I don't think it's unrealistic for two of these. I don't need to get an argument about this. Have I identified something that we all can agree could be tighter? Yeah. Okay, let's get it tighter. However you two want to figure out accomplishing that, but that then starts to establish patterns that we can be more supportive of jump here, there, and everywhere like a flea on a griddle, yay. And again, this comes back to the original question. Do I think it's a huge difference between 12 and 1230? Depends on, are you working the next day?

23:47
Are you working the next morning? Do you have a track meter or track practice? There are other things I'd factor in on saying, oh, so you want to go out Friday till 12 30, but Saturday you have to work at nine? I'm probably going to say no. Now on Saturday you go, can I stay out till 12 30? You got nothing but sleep and awesome smelly candles going in your room and all that good stuff. I'm probably like giddy up girl, have a great time. Mm-hmm. So like, this isn't like,

24:16
arbitrary thing where it comes down to, oh, 1230 is like the make it or break it for any particular reason. You gotta kind of look what's leading up to it and then what's happening after it. That seem fair and reasonable? So my initial thing is, I don't know where you're at with the 1230. I'm not fussed, but we're still gonna ask the questions of, okay, when do you have to work? What do you have tomorrow morning? When do you have to practice? When do you have this? When do you have that? To figure out.

24:44
If on a Friday night, 12, 30 is reasonable or is midnight or even 11 more reasonable, depending on your Saturday. And then on Saturday, what's reasonable depending on your Sunday. Mm-hmm. We might as well tackle the other one right now. I think it's just night, hold on. I do think, like you said, it's just dependent on what's happening, going on and what the plan is. So, okay, finish my thought please. Let's talk about the one that has come up quite a bit lately. Hockey games midweek, school nights.

25:12
There's a huge difference on what time is acceptable for mom and I on a school night that's different than a Friday and Saturday night. Way more Lucy goosey on Friday and Saturday nights. Uh, on a Wednesday, if you're like, Oh, I want to go to Glenwood and watch a hockey game, the likelihood is we're going to say, okay, at the end of the second period, you're heading home because the game starts at seven 30 there are five, 20 minute periods to it when you consider game time and ice time. So we'll give you an hour and 20 minutes of that.

25:41
So then it's like, all of a sudden, if the second period ends and it's getting to be quarter nine, we're going to stay on a school night, get the took us home. Mm-hmm. That seem fair and okay? Mm-hmm. All right. Anything else? Anything else you want to add? You in a good place or is this going to be, are you in a good place? Because if you're not, or you know, like how I just said anything, or you're not feeling like you're getting the support you need, this is a great time to have that conversation. I'm in a good place. Okay.

26:11
Okay. Thanks for bringing it up. Well, there you have it. That's our conversation with Addison about her wanting to extend her curfew. As you can tell, lots of questions, a couple of places Mark and I didn't necessarily agree, and we still have some figuring out. And to be honest, every single time she goes out, it's up and down, it's not cut and dry, or I should say it's not black and white. It is just something that we go back and forth and we're just trying to navigate and figure out how to make this

26:41
all easier for everyone involved. So there's no anger or emotion or frustration during the time that Addison is out. So it's all trial and error as parents, right? With teenagers or with any age, teenagers for sure is definitely a new experience. Well, I'd love to hear what you thought about this and maybe what you do with your teens and their curfews.

27:07
conversations that you have and how you come up with agreements. We all learn from each other, so please, please, please share. You can email me. There's an email link in the show notes. You can also reach out to me at lauren at dailyjoy.us or find me on Instagram, Lauren's Daily Joy or Facebook, Lauren Goldman Raymond. And I know there's so many of you out there that have teenagers or are going to soon have teenagers, so if you can find one person to share this episode with, I'd be forever grateful.

27:37
We are just trying to get as much information out as possible and share with people. This is how we run our household and this is how we have conversations. We really, really try very hard to eliminate the frustration anger. Doesn't mean it doesn't happen. There's plenty of times where one of us kind of loses it and all of that has gone down, down the drain, but you know, our goal is to navigate the joy together. So please share. And we always love to hear feedback.

28:06
Thanks for listening. I am outta here. Did you enjoy your time with us today? If you did, please give us a review on Apple Podcasts. Your review will make navigating joy together much more fun and we would be truly grateful if you would share this with others who you know would gain value from our podcast. Thank you again and we look forward to sharing our next episode with you in two weeks.

29:11
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