How To Get Kids To Open Up

"Hey, Jess.

I love Nurture First and the podcast.

I follow you religiously, and I am a better parent because of it." Thank you.

I really appreciate that.

Love reading your messages, and we're so glad that the show can help you.

"I did have an episode request.

Please share on how we can get kids to open up more and share what's going on in their life.

I feel like when I try and get my child to share about her day, it sounds like I'm quizzing her, and she closes up.

Rather than quizzing them about their day and struggles, how can we make it more organic?" Such a good question, and it's so true.

So if you imagine, let's say you're coming home from work after a long day, and if you have a partner, they're like, "Hey, how was your day?" And you just lived it, right? I always say this [chuckles] to Scott, because he'll ask me those questions.

I'll be like, "I don't really want to talk about it, honestly.

I just lived it," or I'm overwhelmed, or I'm thinking it through in my head, or I'm like just ready to be present with my family and think about the next thing.

And if they keep asking you and saying, "Well, why don't you want to talk about it? What's going on? What happened in your day?" More and more questions, kind of the more overwhelmed and kind of your guard up is.

And so what we need to know about talking to someone is that, A, you have to be ready to listen to what they want to say, even if that thing is, "I don't really feel like talking about it right now," and, B, leading with a lot of, like, really closed questions often can make someone close off.

And so it's more about the relationship, always, and the way that we can show up in the relationship and the questions, the type of questions we ask, and the way that we ask these questions that actually really get someone to open up.

And sometimes it is actually about respecting that the answer is, "I don't really want to talk about this right now," and not pushing it further in that moment.

So I'm gonna give you things that you can do, like, really practical ways to get your child to open up to you, and some of these might work for your child, some might not.

So take what you want to take, and we'll go from there.

Okay.