Helping My Daughter Understand Feelings vs. Choices

0:00Thanks for listening to my call of the day brought to you by my sponsor, Native Hydra. It helps replenish key electrolytes and support muscle recovery, strength and overall wellness. Visit nativehydra.com slash Dr. Laura. Remember, you can hear my radio program daily on Sirius XM Triumph and Connect with me 24-7 at Dr. Laura.com. Mom and Korra, welcome to the program. Hi Dr. Laura. Hi. Hi Korra. How old are you? I'm 11. Any brothers, sisters? Um, my one sister. And how old is your one sister? 12. Okay. Okay. So Korra, tell me what makes you call? What's going on? How can I help? I've recently put one of the things I've loved.

1:04I've recently put one of the things that I've loved because of my feelings. What if your mom and dad decided they didn't want to become parents anymore because they were feeling kind of crappy? What would happen to you in your sister? Come on Korra, I'm waiting for an answer. Okay. Putting you guys on hold since I'm not getting any feedback, I'm not sure we're even connected anymore. Come on. My number 1-800-375-2872. I quit things because of my feelings. You know, it goes your life. Yeah, I'm coming back with mom and Korra.

2:09Hi Korra. Welcome back. Hi. So you thought a little bit about you said you quit something you loved because of feelings and I asked you, what do you think about mom and dad quitting being parents because of feelings? What would your life be like then? I know what your answer. I probably wouldn't be able to do anything and that just, it made me realize that I quit really easily. Yeah. But at the same time, I was thinking about quitting for a really long time. Okay. What is it that you quit that you loved? Karate. And how far along were you in what kind of karate? It is called Shota Kon Karate and I was Greenbelt.

3:12I was two years in. Okay. And what were the feelings that led you to quit? I felt people were staring at me and making fun of my parents. They were making fun about your parents. What about your parents makes people notice? Mostly like my hair. What is there about your hair that makes people notice your hair? My hair is naturally really fluffy. So I'm not sure how to take care of it. How long is it? It's about to my shoulders. Okay. Can't you put a rubber band around it like a ponytail or make a bun out of it and keep it in place? Because you can have long hair fluffy when you're fighting because somebody will pull your

4:18hair, drag you to the ground and kill you. Didn't your sensei tell you to do something with your hair? Yes. I had to put it up. That's right. People would make... Well, that's when people would, I think, make fun of me because of how my hair was. Oh, who cares? Who cares? Why do you care? I know you're 11. I remember being 11 and everything was huge. That sort of changes when you're 80. But when you're 11, if somebody's making fun of your hair, it's like life and death, right? Sometimes. Yeah. Okay. I want to say some bunch of things to you. Okay. One of them is my dad during World War II, which you know nothing about because they don't teach in school anything important anymore.

5:21But married my mother in Italy where he was fighting, brought her back here. My mother was unbelievably gorgeous. Really. I take after my dad. Yeah, I can't win him all. So in the neighborhood, I guess there were a lot of mothers who weren't nearly as pretty. And people would say terrible things about my mother. So he said dirty, immigrant, all kinds of things like that. Herped my feelings. That's a little more ugly than people commenting about your hair. Did you agree to that? Yeah. I didn't stop going to school. And you can't stop going to karate. Because there are always going to be people who are, mom, I know you're on the line. You'll have to forgive me on this. Kora, there are always going to be kids and adults who are shit. They're just shitty people. They're just shitty people. The world is filled with all kinds of people and a substantial portion are shitty.

6:26And if we allow the shitty people to stop us, you and me, Kora, from walking forward, then that's dumb on our part. What do you think about that? I agree. Okay. I don't care how your hair looks up. It's going to save you someday if you need to use karate because you run into a shitty person on the street who thinks they're going to steal your purse and you're going to take them down. Or when you go to college, everybody will be at a drunken party and somebody will put a drug in your drink so they can take advantage of you. Mom is now fainting. And you'll know better and you'll take them down. Even if somebody's hurting one of your friends, you'll take them down. We need you to learn karate, to protect other people in spite of your hair.

7:32What do you think about that? So I want you to go back into karate. I hope you do too. So I want you to learn how to kick ass. I really do. I've got a black belt in martial arts. Did you know that when you called me? I did it, wow. Yeah. Yeah. Yes, see? I still know how to yell. And I didn't bother with breaking boards. I bothered with somebody attacked me. I could take them down. I want you to have that strength and confidence that you can take care of yourself and even help other people in spite of your hair. So from one black belt to an up and coming someday black belt, I salute you.

8:38I bow. Thank you. Okay, sweetheart. You pass your next belt test. I'm counting on your mother to take a picture and send it to me. You got that, mom? Yes, ma'am. And when she's a black belt, what's stay to you in? Florida. Oh, it's 3,000 miles away. I can't attend. If you were closer, I'd come to your black belt test. Well, you could, she could video it on the phone and I could watch it happen. What do you think about that, Korra? I think that would be cool. Well, you get your black belt test and your mother is going to FaceTime and I'm going to watch you get your black belt. That's a promise. I want your hair to look very weird on purpose.

9:51We home school too. So good. Good. She's an exceptionally young lady. And I can see you're very proud of her. Thank you. It's just that if she homeschools, she's not used to how shitty kids can be, you know? That's that's I think that's a big part of it. She'll get used to it. Right, Korra? Yeah. By the way, you're not yet allowed to use the word yet unless your mother tells you you can say she's a shitty kid, you know? You don't have to ask permission for that one. All right, guys. Thank you. I mean it. She does her black belt test. I want to watch it. My number one eight mine was like, oh my god, it was all day. It was an all day test. I don't know how I got through it. My number one eight hundred three seven five twenty eight seventy two. If you like this podcast, be sure to rate it on Apple podcasts or your favorite place

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