[00:00:00]

Marie: Hello and welcome to This Complex Life. This episode has a little ears warning, so if you’ve got some little ears around, perhaps listen to this at a later time. It contains some adult-only material and some explicit content.

Hello, and welcome to This Complex Life. Today, I’m talking with Avril Cook, and we’ve been discussing how to start this conversation. We’ve been thinking about talking about sex, consent, and conversations with teens.

Averil: It also allows you as the parent to stop freaking out about having these conversations because the first time we do that, we’re going to naturally feel a bit strange or a bit uncomfortable.

Marie: And so let’s see how it unfolds. So, I’ll pass it over to you, Avril.

Averil: Hi, everyone. Thanks, Marie. So, my name is Avril, and I’m a clinical psychologist. At the moment, I work in my own practice, and I do consultation with a number of organisations around issues to do with mental health, but also diversity and consultation around organisations trying to make the healthiest workplace possible.

[00:01:00]

Averil: In my private practice, I tend to see families, teens, and adults. I’m really excited to have a conversation with you today about some of the ways we might have discussions with our young people, particularly around delicate issues like discussing sex, consent, and sexual engagement.

Marie: We bonded over our desire for including family in conversations. Even though we’ve been trained, especially in a mental health space, to work with individuals, it’s really… it’s almost like once you work with teenagers and you learn about families, you can’t unsee the benefit and the impact of family dynamics. So that’s how we sort of got chatting.

Averil: Absolutely. Absolutely. I do spend a fair bit of my time providing supervision to early career psychologists as well. One of the amazing things that happens when I talk to them about systemic perspectives is they’re often coming to me saying, “I’m really stuck. We’ve had a… how to work with this young person. We’ve kind of hit a wall. We’re not getting any movement.” And as soon as you start to bring in context, the light goes on. They go, “Oh my gosh, I can see all these ways in which we can actually manoeuvre a situation and bring about change in a way that they probably hadn’t been able to think about before.”

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Averil: And I think it’s the same thing for parents as well, like how do you think outside the box or a bit outside what we’re typically taught, how we’re taught to relate to one another.

Marie: I was thinking with our conversation, we could talk a little bit about what are the building blocks that might need to be in place in a family dynamic to start to have those more tricky conversations, and then perhaps a little bit of content, like what to ask, what to say, and how to go about that. So if we were to rewind back in the developmental history, what do parents often overlook or maybe avoid talking about when it comes to sex and consent with their children?

Averil: Yeah, such a great question because I think often it comes up to parents maybe when the urgency is there immediately because you’re like, “Oh my goodness, my young person is actually dating or they’re starting to show an interest romantically,” and that’s when parents go, “Oh shit, I need to have some sort of a conversation or how do I get out of having this conversation?”

[00:03:00]

Averil: Because I think that one… how do I do this? Do I leave a book on their table? How do we approach this? I really liked how you said earlier about the foundation building blocks, because that’s actually what makes these conversations so much easier down the track—not when they’re urgent.

Marie: Yeah. And is that around… because I’m, I mean, I’m thinking about it in two ways. One is those building blocks of having an open, honest relationship regardless of the topic. And one is talking about body parts, consent, and body autonomy in an age-appropriate way. So how would you sort of start to understand what that means?

Averil: I think like no matter what age a child is at, I would encourage parents to be talking about these things, like you said, in an age-appropriate way with their kids, because what that means is it’s just an ongoing dialogue. It’s not this like, “Oh my gosh, here’s a special, strange, bizarre, stressful conversation.” It’s actually just part of the way we talk and converse with one another. So, opening the door to conversations about bodies and body parts in a really non-judgmental and neutral way, as much as is possible for you as a parent, is really important at any age.

[00:05:00]

Averil: What that then means is it also allows you as the parent to stop freaking out about having these conversations because the first time we do that, we’re going to naturally feel a bit strange or a bit uncomfortable. We’re not sure how to do it. Even if you grew up in a family or an environment that was very open about bodies, it’s unusual. It’s the first time often we’re doing this with our young person. However, most of us have not grown up in those environments, so it’s even more unusual for us. So we also need to practice having conversations, like what are our body parts? Do we refer to the body parts… you know, genitalia and other sexual organs? Do we talk about them? Do we use words? Do we refer to them in conversation with our young people? And then, in age-appropriate ways, how do we talk about sex? How do we talk about how babies are made? How do we talk about pleasure? How do we talk about pain? Essentially, consent, when it comes to the teenage years, becomes a conversation that has to progress and look a little bit different at different ages. Do we want to spend a bit of time talking about what that might look like at different ages, or…?

Marie: Well, I think… I mean, my area of interest is always working with adolescents. That’s sort of the age group I work with, and where I see these conversations go wrong is, kind of like you said, if it’s not done over time, it’s like this big, awkward, clunky conversation where the young person’s like, “Oh no, please. I’d rather, like, shove the end of a brush into my ear and swirl it around. Please don’t talk to me about this.” But the other bit is around what parents make comments about other people. And so, you know, it’s maybe giving people a chance to think, “How do you navigate those conversations?” So instead of saying, “Oh, I can’t believe that person’s parents are letting her date already,” what kind of impact would that have, for example?

[00:07:00]

Averil: That’s a really interesting observation because I think what you’re noticing there and pointing out is parents giving away their ideas, values, and judgments around relationships and sex before having or even without having an explicit conversation with their young person. So there’s a lot of space for interpretation about what the young person thinks that might mean. And often, our judgments are unhelpful for young people in terms of opening up conversation. So, one of the quickest ways to make sure your young person doesn’t talk to you is by showing judgment because how can you then show up in a vulnerable space or with a question or with something that you might feel embarrassed, shameful, or curious about? How can you do that if the adult in your life has already shown that they’re not open and that they might respond in a judging or shaming way? So, the best thing that you can do as a parent throughout the ages is to withhold and notice when you feel judgment, and to avoid that as much as possible in your comments about other people, your comments about yourselves and your partnerships, and your comments about your children and their bodies.

Marie: The bodies one I do a lot when I run mental health first aid, and we talk about the eating disorders component. It catches a lot of folks off guard when we say, it’s not just you saying, “Oh, I love you. I think you’re amazing.” But if you open up a magazine, you’re like, “Oh my God, what is she wearing? How can she wear that short skirt with those thighs?” Or you look in the mirror and you kind of grab a little roll and you’re like, “Oh, I’ve got the middle-aged spread.” Those are still negative body comments, and that’s getting absorbed by little ears around.

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Averil: Exactly. And it’s steeped in our culture so much. If this isn’t brought to your attention, it’s just the way we talk about, and particularly as women, we’re taught to talk about ourselves and our bodies in these ways and to judge ourselves according to body standards. But what that does is it’s just passing down generation to generation, this idea that we should be judging our worth and our value on our bodies, which then also translates to how do we transact in a relationship and in a sexual or romantic relationship. So, the equivalent of, you know, the ongoing cascade of events is if we think of ourselves in a very objectified, external way, then how does that then mean a young person learns to understand relationships or sexual encounters? Is this something that is transactional, that I get something because they gave me something or because of the way that I look or my perceived sexual value, or is this something that is more integrated where it’s, “I enjoy this person, and I want to do this, and I feel comfortable, and I feel ready, and I feel safe?”

Marie: They’re very different kinds of values that can start very early on in the piece.

Averil: Yeah.

Marie: When it comes to… if we bring it back to sort of sexuality and pleasure, you mentioned pleasure before. Are there differences in how parents navigate that for their children, depending on whether they have a son, daughter, or non-binary young person? I’ve noticed some differences around the late primary school age, but what can you say about that?

[00:10:00]

Averil: What… can you tell me a bit about what you notice?

Marie: Like, if they have a son who’s having long showers and they suspect that maybe he’s masturbating, they might make a joke of it. But if a daughter of the same age asks for a vibrator, for example, it would be seen as like, something… I’ve seen people post to particular parenting experts saying, “Oh, my daughter just asked for a vibrator. What should I do?” And I’m like, but you laugh about it like, “Oh, he’s just a boy. He’s kind of, you know, just having a long shower.” But when this seems to be for a daughter, it’s seen as really kind of like, “Oh, is this allowed? What should I do?” So, I’m really kind of noticing differences in that.

Averil: Absolutely. And I think this comes back to our gendered view of sexuality and what is perceived as permitted for various genders. If we’re not conscious, we can be very much passing down very old views and old ways of understanding. Like you said, when it comes to boys, there is a very powerful part of strong social messaging around “boys will be boys,” and sexuality is something that we should expect from them. And it isn’t something that necessarily comes with… boys are not told that they shouldn’t have sexuality, and they’re also not really taught to police or be policed around their sexuality. But conversely, girls are. So, first of all, girls shouldn’t have it, or they should only have it in a particular way that is palatable to society, which is very muted. And if there is any discussion around pleasure, then that is, as a societal view, very much shut down and considered or called slutty or promiscuous, or there are concerns around a girl sort of going off the tracks if that were to be something that she explored.

[00:12:00]

Averil: Unfortunately, that’s also a way that society places women and girls around their sexuality. So, when it comes to having consensual sex and consensual sexual interactions, it can be very complicated for both boys and girls because this is the messaging that they then go into their relationships with. If a young girl does get involved in a sexual encounter, there can be a lot of perception that maybe they’re doing the wrong thing, which may be enticing for a girl or maybe feel quite shaming and embarrassing or something that they want to hide.

Marie: Something I heard, and I’d be keen to have a discussion around it, is I heard from some young women that their goal was like… sex was good if they weren’t in pain and he had an orgasm. That was their definition of sex being good—if it didn’t hurt and he had fun.

Averil: Yeah. That makes me so, so sad. Really sad.

Marie: Do you see that play out in some of the work you do?

Averil: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely, I do. I don’t know… I’d be interested to hear about the trend that you’re seeing. I do see a trend away from that in my young people, which I feel is really exciting. I do live in an area that has far more open, liberal kinds of practices. What I have seen over the years is a real pushback against those ideals in the younger generations, like the 14, 15, 16-year-olds that I’m talking to. When I bring up these ideas, it’s not actually… well, they’re already practising it, or they’re already enacting it. But yeah, absolutely, it does happen. It’s still where a therapy room is around, “What’s in this for you? And where’s the benchmark for you in this? And where’s the benchmark for your partner in this situation? Is that an enjoyable exchange? Is that a fair exchange? Is that a safe exchange?”

[00:14:00]

Marie: How can parents start to navigate the relationships they have with their young people so that these conversations can happen more naturally? For example, I’ll use a non-sex-related example, but if a young person comes home from school and tells their parents, “Oh, I got a C on this test,” and straight away the parent’s like, “Well, have you studied? Have you done this? Have you done that?” They’re less likely to then come to them with the next problem because that small thing meant they got in trouble or scolded, or maybe they got some great ideas, like, “Yes, they should have studied. Maybe they could have prepared earlier,” but in that moment, they just wanted someone to say, “Oh, that’s no good. How do you feel about that?” And so they learn through these… they’ll test the waters with other non-related things, and they don’t do this intentionally necessarily, but they’ll test the waters. If those small comments around homework or a friendship issue or maybe they broke a vase and they owned up to it… all these little things, they’ll test to see if that relationship feels comfortable. Then when something big happens, they’ll have a history of, “Can my folks cope with this conversation?”

Averil: Absolutely. You’re 100% spot on. How able is your young person to come and talk to you, and how able are you to talk to them as well, and how able are you to have a dialogue between one another? I think the examples that you gave just a moment ago are a really good example of maybe parents intending to parent and intending to provide guidance. But what that kind of messaging does is it causes the young person to learn how they’re meant to perform and behave in front of the parents and to actually have their own problems dealt with internally or with other people. 100% of the time, that is the internet and their peers. So if you want your young person to be getting all their information and guidance from their peers and the internet, which a lot of the time includes porn—and porn is the biggest way that young people learn about sex—then we have to be really careful about how we’re allowing conversations to evolve.

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Averil: One of the things that I… I mean, I have kids myself, and one of the things that I try and do with them is when I have that urge to say, “You shouldn’t have done this,” and tell them what to do, or “This is what you should have done,” is to ask them instead, “What got in the way of doing X, Y, and Z?” or “What happened? What happened there? Tell me what happened.” And “How can I be a part of supporting you to figure out how to make that outcome occur next time?” Now, you often end up in the same place where they do recognise that actually something… they weren’t able to follow through on something that they wanted to. But if you allow them to get there in their own time, it is so much more organic. You haven’t set up a combative relationship with your own young person. And hopefully what you’re showing them time and time again is that you’re not going to sort of wag your finger in front of them when they come to you with a problem.

Marie: Yeah, it makes me think of the book Hold On to Your Kids. Have you read that? It’s really talking about attachment and sort of saying as parents, they’re supposed to be the primary attachment figure. And if, through a number of different reasons, the young person separates from that attachment and then becomes peer-attached, you’re going to have all sorts of difficulty in those interactions because you don’t hold weight. You’re not seen as a person to learn from. You might get some compliance out of punishment or restriction or consequence, but you won’t get positive influence. And so when I’m having these conversations with parents and I’m really trying to focus on its connection, it’s building a relationship, then they’re more likely to take your advice, listen to feedback. It’s not actually about how right or wrong your feedback is. If that connection is not there, if that relationship isn’t there, it won’t work at all. No strategy, no star chart, no consequence, no punishment will—if anything, that’ll push it further away. None of that will be effective if that connection is not there. And if that connection is strong, when I work with families where there’s a really strong connection, they don’t even know what punishment or consequence looks like because they’ve never needed that. And it’s not about compliance; it’s about respect.

[00:19:00]

Averil: Respect. Absolutely. Absolutely. And so I think for a lot of families, your hard work is actually about building that connection in the years up until teenagers hit. Because by the time they get to teenage years, very rarely can you, like, lock them in a room and make sure they don’t do whatever they want to do. You’ve only got that sort of influence when they’re in their younger years, where you are managing their life to a greater extent. Once they’re teenagers, they actually… they can leave the house, they can do whatever they want. Their likelihood of behaving and being engaged and connected to social structures is through their desire to. So, you know, a lot of the time we are managing how do we ensure there is that desire to remain connected during the teenage years?

Marie: If someone’s listening to this now and they have a, I don’t know, 14, 15-year-old child and they’re like, “Oops, I have not had any of these conversations. I’m a solo parent, or I’m a dad who has a daughter. I don’t know.” Where can someone start if they’re listening to this and they’re like, “I’ve noticed this is a gap in our family. What can they start to do?”

[00:20:00]

Averil: Yeah. Look, I think one of the most positive ways you can interact with your young person is to join them in what they enjoy doing and try to find spaces that you can do together and be together, particularly around something that your young person likes to do or that you might like to do together. But sometimes you’re going to have to suck it up as a parent and just do the thing that you don’t really love because they love it. And in that space, if you haven’t had an ongoing close relationship, that’s going to be the space that you grow that and be gently curious about your young person and their life without being too intrusive, I think would be the first place to start. So, just having conversations about what they’re interested in, what they’re watching, what they’re listening to. Can you watch or listen with them? Is there a show that they want to go to, a concert? Can you go along with them? I think showing that curiosity is a really powerful thing to do. I think also, the other thing to remember is that often young people really do want their parents’ interest and involvement, even if they show that they do not.

Marie: Those who can’t see it, we’re both nodding like they do. It just looks… I heard someone describe it as they want them to be like an indoor plant, like, kind of there and visible.

[00:22:00]

Averil: I remember… I’m just laughing because also I had… I remember giving some supervision to an early career psychologist about how to work with teenagers. And I don’t think this translates to actually parenting with teenagers. You’ve got to appear to be less interested than they are, but you’re there still. So you’re like, “I don’t care if you want to go to a soccer match, but I’m available and willing to go to the soccer match if you’re also interested, willing, and available to go. But it doesn’t really bother me if we don’t go.”

Marie: No, I think you’re spot on because I think it can… I’ve seen parents take this advice and execute it in a way that’s like, “Oh, so what kinds of things do your friends like? Stuff? What kind of stuff? But like what, and what does that look like?” And they’re trying too hard to connect, and the other person’s like, “Why are you interrogating me? Just leave me alone.” Sometimes it’s sort of like, “Did you have fun?” “Yeah.” “That might be… that’s it.”

Averil: Yeah. That might be it.

Marie: If we rewind it back to sex and consent, let’s say they have a young person who’s starting to date. How might they start to ask questions? Maybe they’ve never thought before, they’ve never sat down… would you encourage someone to sit down with a young person and say, “I know this is going to sound awkward and we’ve never actually spoken about this before…”?

Averil: Yeah.

Marie: “Blah, blah, blah.” But like, how can they start from today?

[00:23:00]

Averil: I’d say the worst way you could do it is sit them down. I would never recommend that with a young person. If you’re ever having awkward or sensitive conversations, I would highly recommend doing a joint activity, and the conversation occurs in that joint space. So, you might be going for a walk together, or you might be playing a game of ping pong or something, or the scenario which most of us have is you’re driving your kids somewhere. And that is like… they are trapped. They can’t leave. There are also things you have to focus on together. You don’t have to look at each other. And you want to come in and be cool. Remember, like parents, you’ve got to be cool when you have these conversations. Don’t sound too eager. But I would test the waters and just gently drop in little bits of conversation. I wouldn’t dive into a big, heavy conversation because that’s going to freak both of you out. But I would just start having the conversation so that everyone gets familiar with it. So you might be driving in the car and you might be saying, “Oh, hey, I’ve noticed that, you know, you’re hanging out with so and so a bit more regularly. Are you interested in each other? Are you friends? What’s the go there?” And the young person says, “Oh, Mum. Oh, Dad. Like, gross.” Like, “Oh, okay, just… just wondering,” you know. And the next time we might sort of talk a bit about your relationships or relationships you had when you were a teenager as ways to share about yourself, but also you’re sharing little tiny drips of life lessons. But you’ve got to not be too obvious because if they spot you, they will shut it down big time.

Marie: I had two thoughts about that. Like, the car does seem to be a popular strategy. One is when they say things about their friends. So, if they’re like, “Oh, you won’t believe that, you know, so and so is going out with this person, and he’s like in the level above us,” that’s a chance to kind of be like, “Oh, what do you think about that?” Like, instead of making a judgment yourself, it’s actually saying, asking the young person. There’s some wiggle room there where I see it go really bad, though, is when the parents will use other siblings or family members or cousins as a… like saying, “Oh, did you see your cousin’s now dating this person?” and try to weave in… because I think what that does is that erodes trust because then that young person thinks, “Ah, if Mum’s talking to me about my cousin Francis, then what is she telling her sister about me that then Francis is going to hear?”

[00:25:00]

Marie: So it does… like, you don’t want to use… and parents don’t see it as gossip because they’re like, “No, no, but we’re just talking about family.” It does mean, I do see the young people then clam up because they’re like, “Well, I can’t trust you because then I don’t know which auntie or uncle you’re going to go tell this to and come back to me.”

Averil: Yeah. That’s why I love the example that you can give of yourself because that’s your information to share. And what you can do is you can very lightly pepper in lessons. So it might be like, “Oh, when I was younger, you know, oh, I remember when I was your age, I actually really liked this boy or I really liked this girl, and this is what was happening. And then I did this, and this happened, and I realised this about myself,” right? So you don’t need anything from them. They’re listening, and they’re hearing the lessons you’ve shared about yourself. You’re getting to exchange more personal, vulnerable information about each other, and you haven’t given away someone else’s story or breached any kind of trust.

Marie: I like that you said, “This is what I learnt about myself,” because it’s not a judgmental statement.

Averil: Absolutely. Absolutely. So it might be around like, you know, say maybe the lesson, if we want to give it sort of a title, is how do you make sure that you are choosing to be with someone that you genuinely want to spend time with or be romantically involved with, rather than they’ve just chosen you? They like you; they’re really cool, so we’ll go with that. I really, you know… you could deliver it by saying, “So don’t… don’t go out with that person just because they’re cool,” or “Don’t be dating them because they are the most popular person on this,” you know…

[00:27:00]

Averil: To deliver it in a judgmental way where your young person is going to go, “Screw you, parent. Like, I’m going to do what I want to do.” But a way to do that can be to touch in on your own stories and to say, “Oh, this happened to me, and this is what I realised is that, oh, I actually wasn’t really enjoying that person’s company. I realised I was drawn in because they were so popular, and I thought that was really cool. But then I realised when I was in it that actually it wasn’t bringing me any satisfaction. That gave me X, Y, and Z, but I felt disappointed about X, Y, and Z.” And that can be a way to gently share lessons where you’re not shoving it down their throat.

Marie: Right. Yeah, I’ve done something similar. I don’t share my own stories, but I’ve got a few examples that are so similar in how they’ve happened where the young person’s dating someone who everyone else around them could say, “This is not a great relationship.” But if the parents are like, “I don’t like this person. I don’t want you going out with them,” that doesn’t work at all. It shuts things down. And when I have a conversation, I’m like, “Oh, your parents seem really concerned about that, but what’s going on for you?” After a few conversations, they can see some of those same patterns, but if everyone keeps shutting down the conversation, they can’t. So, if we’re able to talk about it and they’re like, “Oh, and he did this.” And I’m able to say something like, “That doesn’t sound like the kind of thing someone who really respects you should be doing. What’s that like for you?” So, I’m commenting on specific behaviour and examples, but if I just went in with saying, “Well, your parents are right. That person’s definitely bad news,” it’s not going to work at all.

[00:29:00]

Averil: Exactly. And actually, what you inadvertently do when you come in with a strong position is you harden the other person’s position against you. So, the alternate is to do exactly what you said—not have a hard view, but explore and be open and be curious about the other person, and in this instance, the young person’s feelings, reactions, and responses to various scenarios, and get them to elicit how it affected them, which is exactly what you did.

Marie: If someone’s listening to this and they’re like, “Yeah, I’ve done some of those,” how would you phrase a kind of repair attempt or a bit of accountability? How could you script that for a parent to start with?

Averil: Yeah. Look, my favourite one is to say, “I stuffed up. I went away. I thought about what I said, and I realised I didn’t do the right thing there. I think I was getting angry, annoyed, or worried, and I just jumped into judging you or I jumped into telling you what to do. I did that because I was worried about you, but I realise that’s actually not the way to go about it, and I’m sorry.” Owning it is one of the best ways you can engage with your young person. As a therapist, I do that. I go, “Oh shit, I missed this or I stuffed up on this,” and I realised it may have made you feel like X, Y, and Z. Teenagers love that. They love it when you say you’re wrong.

[00:30:00]

Marie: Well, I think you highlight a couple of bits there, and I say something very similar scripted in a number of different ways, but what it role models is firstly, it gives them language on how to do it because often I find parents expect something of their young people that they haven’t taught them. They might say like, “Well, you’ve got to show some integrity or some accountability.” And the young person’s like…

Averil: They don’t even know…

Marie: Yeah, or they don’t even know what that looks like. So this role models that, and the misconception I see is it doesn’t mean that you agree with whatever caused that initial rupture. So, they might have broken curfew, and you might have responded in a way that was not cool, calm, and collected. You can still apologise for that. You might still say, “Look, what you did was still not okay. I said be home at 11. You came home at 1. We were worried about you. This was not okay. How I handled it was also not okay. I was scared. I was overwhelmed. That’s not an excuse, and I apologise for raising my voice and yelling at you. There still needs to be a consequence, and I want to own this part.” Like, there’s a big difference there.

Averil: Yeah. Absolutely. And I think sometimes we expect our young people to have a level of ownership that we haven’t demonstrated to them ourselves. They’re like, “Screw you. I’m not going to own it if you’re not owning your stuff.” And they can… they’re very good at seeing through our bullshit. So, we own that, and we let them know about our internal processes as well. That’s going to show them how they can work through their own mistakes or areas in the way that they’ve wanted to handle things, but also it shows them how they can come back to us when they have felt like they’ve stuffed up, and they can take responsibility. But they also can repair, like you said, because that’s one of the most important things as parents is we’re not meant to get it right all the time. You can’t. We absolutely can’t. But the most important thing is when you stuff up, do your repair and do your repair effectively. And if you can do that, then you actually… what I find is once there’s been a breach and a repair, you can come back actually even stronger than you started off being.

[00:32:00]

Marie: So, if someone’s trying to repair awkward conversations around sex or even like puberty, I think that can start there. How can they go about it? Like, if you’ve got a parent who’s like, “Oh, my daughter’s menstruating, or I don’t know what to do about that.” I know they might feel like that’s okay to avoid it, but I feel like that gives the message that this is something to be uncomfortable about.

Averil: Yeah.

Marie: So, how can parents firstly… what do they need to do, or how can they resource or upskill themselves to handle those moments a little better?

Averil: Yeah. Yeah. Look, I actually think it’s just… radical honesty is the best way. Like, if you haven’t had these conversations and you’ve been avoiding it, I think just own up to your kid and say, “Look, I realise I’m super awkward about talking about periods with you or sex with you. I realise that. But I also realise that we need to have these conversations because you’re at this age and you’re dealing with it. So I want to be able to help you with it, but forgive me if I’m a bit weird or awkward about it. I’m going to do the best I can. Let’s go for it.” You know, like that really joins you because no one’s pretending. Thank you. No one’s pretending that they are comfortable. No one’s pretending that they know what they’re doing. You’re modelling to them not having it perfect and doing it anyway and trying to join. And that’s kind of what teenagers have to do too.

[00:34:00]

Marie: And where can parents go if they want to increase their vocabulary or even just their comfort at hearing certain words? Like, I know…

Averil: Yeah.

Marie: I’ve done a lot of work around sex therapy, for example. So when someone throws a word at me, I don’t blush, I don’t freak out. If someone says… there’s almost nothing that they could say that wouldn’t shock me, but that’s part of our training. We have to be put in lots of role plays and case studies and hear this stuff so that the first time we’re exposed to it isn’t in someone’s most vulnerable, private, open, honest conversation with a therapist. So, how can parents… like, I mean, I tell people to listen to The Hookup as a podcast, or I think there’s a Sexology podcast, which I recommend. But are there other resources or places to go for folks to just be like, “Okay, I need to hear some of these words”?

Averil: Some of these words, yeah. Look, I think you’ve given some really great examples. I don’t have any in particular to add to that. I will say there are a lot of books that are coming out that are more… that are readily available, like you can get in Kmart, Big W, around sort of language for young people and sex and talking with them about sex. The other thing that I do is see if you can find another parent or, you know, a group of people where you can have these conversations around how do you talk to your young person and find people that do have more comfort with it. Because the more you talk about it yourself, the less weirded out you will be in talking about it with your young person.

[00:36:00]

Averil: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I’ll say therapists are a great guide for this as well.

Marie: Yes, we are.

Averil: Especially when you’re working… yeah, working with young people, just be like, “Help me. Help me with the script. I don’t know what I’m meant to say here.” Or if you’re already engaged with the therapist, you might say, “Look, can you help us have a conversation about this particular situation or this scenario that I want to be able to speak about?”

Marie: I think that’s a really great one, and being a family therapist, I really try and get as many of the family in as possible. And I encourage parents… when I get, you know, when I run training, I’ll always, without a doubt, get an email about, “I’ve noticed these things, but my kid won’t go to therapy. What do I do?” And one of the things I say is, “Well, you can go because you can fill in your therapist around what’s happening.” And sometimes we can map that out… part of that interaction just by hearing your account of things. And sometimes bringing the young person in saying, “Oh, look, I’ve been going to therapy and my therapist would love to meet you. Can you come in to help me out?” That’s very different to saying, “You need to go and you need to be fixed.” So there is still room to have a few sessions to nut some of these things out with a therapist, even if the area you want to work on is the relationship with your child.

[00:37:00]

Averil: Yeah, absolutely. And therapists are great at helping people to have conversations, particularly family therapists. And often that’s actually what it’s about. It’s not necessarily that you need to talk to your child about consent… like, that is obviously an important one, but it might be, “How do you even start to have that connection where that conversation becomes more possible?”

Marie: Awesome. And if folks want to reach out and connect with you or learn more about what you do, where can they find you?

Averil: Yeah, so my practice is Bodhi and Psychology, B-O-D-H-I. You can find me on Instagram and Facebook, and also my website is www.bodhianpsychology.com.au. On Instagram, I do post a fair bit of stuff up there about what we do at our practice and how we work with clients. So, I look forward to hearing from people if they want to reach out and get in touch.

Marie: Awesome. So we’re encouraging some awkward conversations. I feel like that was almost a Brené Brown thing, saying, “You know, stay awkward, brave, and kind,” or whatever she says. I think that’s really spot on, right? We’ve got to sit in… and that’s why the podcast is called This Complex Life. There’s, you know, for any big, complicated problem, there’ll be a very quick, easy, incorrect solution. So none of these are easy fixes.

Averil: Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Thanks so much.

Marie: Thank you for having me, Avril.