Awkward silences with teenage daughters

[Diemme]

This is such a sad thing to post about. Just want to know if anyone can identify with it and can give me any tips. I like to think I'm quite a chatty sociable person and most of my friends would agree. In life though there are always a handful of people who we struggle to communicate with and where there are always awkward silences. And my God I never expected my children to be among them! I've got 2 DDs aged 13 and 14 and both have lost all interest in speaking to me. Today for instance I picked DD2 up from seeing a friend. During the 20 minute car journey I asked her how the friend was, if she'd bought anything, what she'd had for lunch, just general conversation. And each time she grudgingly gave me a one word answer so I gave up and we travelled on in silence. Again. I really hate it. It's painful to admit but I've lost all confidence in my ability to get my own children to engage with me. Any tips?

this thread has been invaluable for me, thanks op.

I have this on the wall in my classroom - to fend off the "bantz", to be fair :

Before you speak, ask yourself: is it kind, is it true, is it necessary, does it improve upon the silence?

some teens take that too literally though and hardly speak to us!

thats the problem

I'd love a bit more bantz

And I find that in talking to the students - and DS - much more is said if the topic is not overtly inquiring into them as individuals. So we might start by chatting about something on the news and I often find that they then volunteer info about themselves as the discussion develops. You need to be more tactical and less direct.

So I can begin a conversation about Trump's policies or whatever and we might end up with them sharing their own experiences of discrimination that might be bothering them.

ssd - at home, or are you a teacher too? Because the last thing I want is for my Year 11 boys to do any more bantering! It's exhausting!

at home

I have my best chats with the kids when we are doing something else together. We prepare meals together at the weekend, the focus is on the food, but conversations emerge more naturally. Through the week we always eat our evening meal together and wash up and again these are the times when the phone is out of the hand and their attention is on task and they chat more freely. We don't do much chatting in car journeys - either the phones interfere or the music does.

Pretty standard teenage behaviour, they'll soon come out the other side.