Beyond Material Gifts: Celebrating Birthdays Through International Travel with Your Teenager

0:00 Welcome to the A World of Difference podcast. I'm Lori Adams Brown, and this is a podcast for those who are different and want to make a difference. Hi there. I'm coming to you today to talk about my exciting trip that I took with my teenager on a birthday trip. And the reason I'm doing this special episode today is because I've gotten several of you who've asked me questions about taking my teenage you're on a 16th birthday trip to Rio. We just got back not long ago from going to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, together. Just a mom teenager trip. And this is something that was very planned and special, and I know a lot of you had questions about it, and I do not at all consider myself to be a parenting expert. But I do know that once in a while, I have people in my life that do things that I also have questions about, and it revolves around how did you do that? That's a little bit unusual. How did you come to that conclusion? How did it go? What did you learn? Do you have any tips? So because I've been getting some questions about it, I thought, you know what, let's do an episode about this. So here it is. We're doing ten tips today on taking a birthday trip with your teenager as a parent. So, yeah, here we go. Tip number one is, from the beginning, I involved my teen. And so this meant discussing and involving my teenager in the trip, planning not only to just

1:31 increase the excitement and get buy in, because any of you who are parenting teenagers know that sometimes the parent teenager relationship can be a little bit fraught at times. And if mom suggests it, then it may not be the best idea out there. But when I brought up the idea, it was all around a particular concept of a place that we could go that I knew that my teenager would enjoy. Also a place that I would enjoy. So I threw know pitched the idea of going to Rio, and it was already a win from the beginning. Now, that may not happen for you, but definitely involving your teenager can help increase the excitement and ensure the trip aligns with their interests. It just so happens that Taylor Swift was going to be playing in concert in Rio in November, and so it worked out to know be there for the Taylor Swift concert, which brought extreme buy in. Because if you're raising a Swifty like I am, then, you know, if you know, you know. So that worked out really well.

2:28 And so, yeah, choosing the destination really was something I sort of did some legwork on ahead of time. Figured out this is a place that we could make work together. And so, fortunately, pitching the first place worked out. But my husband is planning a trip with our so we have twins, right? So the other twin and that's going to be a completely different location because that twin wants to go somewhere completely different. So knowing your teenager and when you pitch the idea, making sure it's something that you're pretty sure they would enjoy, but choosing the destination number two is that you want to consider destinations that cater to both your teenager's preferences and your own. So if it had been somewhere that I absolutely hated, I wouldn't have brought that up. It didn't have to be my absolute favorite place, but something that I could somewhat enjoy, too. You definitely don't want to be the kind of parent that's like, here's my favorite place and you try to persuade them to do it. That's not a good idea. It probably wouldn't work anyway, and if it did, it would just make you a really manipulative parent. So don't advise that. But yeah, finding a win win, hopefully is always possible, but also finding a balance between fun activities for them and a little bit of time for you to relax. Both of you as well, because especially if you're going somewhere like we did, 5 hours difference in the time zone and just the long amount of travel. We flew through Panama and had a layover in Panama City, Panama, and then flew to Rio from there.

3:48 And it was just a long couple of long know. So we were tired when we arrived. And then also the jet lag of five hour time difference. We wanted to plan in some time to relax as well as do fun things. And the third one is budgeting and planning. Unless you're know the very few people in the world that have so much money they don't have to think about that. Most of us have to stick to a budget and plan that out. And so discussing that with your teenager ahead of time is really important. So that not only are you teaching them how to be financially responsible, but you're showing them how you can have money in your budget for travel. It just so happens in the Adams Brown family budget, we prioritize travel in ways that maybe not everybody does. It's just a high value for our family. We're all third culture kids. We've not grown up in families where we just owned one home and one place for our whole lives. We grew up traveling and moving around and travel was important to our families of origin growing up, and we've raised our kids that way. So you'll definitely find in our home, we don't prioritize home decor or nice cars. We have really old cars that we drive. We keep them well maintained. We have a great mechanic, but we don't spend a lot of money on things that some Americans might typically spend more money on. And so we do prioritize travel also. I do have a lot of skills when it comes to traveling frugally mainly because of my whole life traveling. So I know how to do certain things cheaply or use my points here and there. And so in our difference maker community, I'm going to go into way more

5:18 detail about this trip and how I used some of my Frugal savvy skills that I've honed over the years of doing a lot of travel and learning from other people along the way in my Expat and TCK life. But because none of those people sponsor my podcast, I'll do that for our paid difference maker community. And if you want to check that out, you can go to Patreon.com A World of Difference, and we'll have an exclusive episode there where I go into way more detail about where we stayed, how we did the flights, and how we did all of that to make it work. So if you're interested in more detail with that, we'll do that there. But yeah, budgeting and planning number three is really important as you do this trip together, because it not only teaches your teenager how to plan, and it also involves them in the decision making of how you're going to spend the money.

6:05 And that always feels better than mom or dad making all the decisions. And then you've got a grumpy teenager because they didn't want to spend the money that way, and it really was their birthday trip. So letting them call the shots within reason and showing them how much different things cost and showing them different options. For my teenager, there was a huge desire to Jet ski. And so that was something we had hoped we would put into our budget, and we had that as a plan. But when we got to Brazil, we realized you have to have a driver's license in order to drive a Jet Ski in the ocean in Brazil. So since my teenager was not yet 16, didn't have their driver's license yet, we had to say, oh, I guess we'll do that next time. But we wanted to make sure together we made a plan that was something that was fun for both of us. On the budget number four, balancing independence and guidance. This is huge with teenagers. Once again, I'm not a parenting expert, so go to the researchers and the people with PhDs writing books about that out there to find more detailed information about this. But I do know the basic parts that teenagers really crave independence, but they also might need some guidance here and there.

7:13 Their frontal lobes are not yet developed, and so they might not understand particular risks involved in certain things, for example. So, yeah, finding the right balance between giving them space and being responsible really is really crucial in all parenting, but especially in a trip like this, I don't know, like in my work that I do as a senior manager in a tech company, I think about stretch assignments that I give people. And so think about this birthday trip as an opportunity for a little bit of a stretch assignment with them where you're sort of doing this model assist, watch and leave approach with them. So you're giving them a little more freedom than you would otherwise give them, but you're not just like throwing them out of the nest and saying, bye, do your own thing, because they do need a little guidance still, especially at 15, almost 16. So the fifth thing is just when we think about using technology during the trip, every parent does this differently. There's no manual.

8:09 My twins were certainly not born with little manuals, and we're all trying to figure this out. I think every parent is going to want to figure out how to set boundaries and rules around technology that they use during the trip to ensure that they're present and engaged in the experience. But also, I know that my teenager really loves a lot of particular social media and so they wanted to make sure, especially during the Taylor Swift concert, they were making videos, that they wanted to be able to capture that moment and show their friends when they got back to school. And so we planned technology around, bringing extra battery chargers for phones because we knew we were going to be in a three hour concert and get there earlier and be in long line.

8:51 So it's going to be like a four plus hour ordeal in making sure we plan that they were going to be on their phone while they were enjoying the concert because that was sort of the experience they wanted to have. And that's what it means to be a teenager in 2023, doesn't it? Also number six is think through the activities and experiences you're going to have together, plan activities that really cater to their interest. So if they love adventure sports like I mentioned jet skiing, they love cultural experiences or just exploring new places. My teenager and me, we don't have the exact same preferences. So there was one morning where my teenager just really was tired and wanted to sleep in. And so I left them in the hotel to get some extra sleep that they needed and went on an early tour from my hotel where they picked me up and dropped me off. And I did the Cristo rentor, the big Christ, the Redeemer Statue, and saw the Maracana Stadium where the Brazilian football team plays and where the World Cup was held and this beautiful cathedral. But my teenager wasn't super interested in those things and it was time they'd rather spend sleeping. So we kind of worked that out between us. But everything that my teenager wanted to do, I was there with them. Because I'm an adult, I did need my sleep. But also I was like, I'm in Brazil, I just want to do it all. We have different personalities when it comes to that, so accommodating that with each other was important. And then also number seven, it's important to really document your trip. So I involved my teenager in this. There were times where I took pictures and my teenager's like, I don't

10:22 like how I look in that photos. And so I was like, okay, I'll delete that or I won't post that one. But also they took pictures of me and have videos of me. And so we were able to document our fun times together. We went onto Copa Cabana Beach at night and ate seafood by the beach and then walked onto the beach and took some fun photos there. And it's important. Those are memories that we'll keep forever. And who knows, maybe my grandkids great grandkids will see those and see that we were on Copacabana Beach together back in the day. When we have a 15 year old in the photo who's now 80, I don't know. These are important things to document. These are once in a lifetime opportunities. And as our teenagers are growing up, we want to capture those moments. It's really important. And then it also helps to tell the rest of the family, here's the videos, here's what we did. And it kind of helps you do the storytelling process together and relive it and it's a lot of fun. The 8th one is to be flexible and anytime there's travel anywhere, that's important, but especially with international travel. So being open to changes and plans or unexpected detours that could happen, like the jet skiing obviously didn't work out and we were able to pivot and do something else. And that included doing something in the spa, which was a lot of fun. So we were glad that that budget could go to something else, which was super fun. Sometimes the most memorable experiences happen when our plans go awry and we were able to find some other things to do which we wouldn't have done otherwise. So number nine is just respect their wishes. This is a

11:52 teenager, it's not an infant. Your teen may want to spend some alone time and you don't have to be vigilant with them all the time. Or if you're in a place where they know people, they might want to spend time with their friends during part of the trip. So just respect their wishes while you're making sure that they're safe. And number ten is reflecting and bonding. After the trip, it's important to take time to reflect together on our experiences. And sharing our thoughts and feelings can really strengthen our bonds together. I know from my teenager, when my husband asked me about the trip, when we got back, one of the things I said to him was we have a very different relationship now than before we took this trip. And there's something about this trip that we had a special bond, just the two of us.

12:36 We'd never been just the two of us for that long, away from the rest of our immediate family. And also being twins, this was like the longest they'd been apart from each other, too. And so it was very special that we had this time together, an experience that only we went through together, especially the Taylor Swift concert, which was incredible. And it rained the entire time we got out of the taxi and there was a guy there selling ponchos, and we immediately put these ponchos on and wore them for a while, but we got soaked. Even his ponchos, it was just like so rainy and crazy. But my teenager was such a Swiftie, they were screaming so much of the time. And then there's this moment when Taylor Swift came up and sang right to my teenager, and I'm not sure they're ever going to get over it. It was pretty crazy during the song Antihero, which is up for a Grammy, and it was super special. And we went through that together, and we experienced that together. And I think there's something especially about music and international travel, trying new foods. We had a lot of acai, we had a lot of Brazilian steak, which is amazing, and just fun experiences. We were in a heat wave in Rio, where they had to the first night of the Taylor Swift concert you probably read about in the news because it was all over the news. Several people passed out from the heat, and one person actually passed away. Her name was Anna. And then the second night, the Saturday night concert, they ended up canceling. And our concert was the next night, the Sunday night, and it had cooled down about ten degrees Fahrenheit and then was raining, and so it

14:06 was able to go on. And they changed the rule with the stadium where they could provide free water and open up the airways a little bit to get more airflow. So it was great. Other than the rain, we couldn't complain. We were completely hydrated. My teenager also got a friendship bracelet from Sabrina Carpenter's mom, who Sabrina Carpenter opened for Taylor Swift, and Taylor Swift's dad was handing out these Taylor Swift guitar picks, and my teenager got one of those too, so it was very special. So my teenagers coming back, telling all their teenage friends at their high school about all they did, and I overhear them say, and then my mom was there, and it was really special that I got to experience that with my teenagers. So, yeah. I offer all of this to you as just a story of what we experienced, some tips we came up with together, things that we would do again in terms of how to do a trip like this and once again join our difference maker community. If you want to hear more details about how I specifically planned this out by using points and which hotel I chose, there's a lot of options in Rio specifically, if you're thinking of going there. So there's Copacabana Beach.

15:16 There's Ipanema. There's another few smaller, lesser known beaches. All around and then there's the city of Rio itself. And so we had all these different choices. So I'll going to more detail about why we chose to stay, where we did, what airline we flew, how we made that work, the routes we took, and the things we decided to do when we were there. So we'll talk a little bit more about that and our Difference Maker community, which is an exclusive space where we do a little more deep dive content for those of you who want to pay as little as $5 a month to be a part of it. And we have different tiers of different exclusive content you can be able to access there and it's a lot of fun. We love the difference maker community. So I do. It means a lot to me and I appreciate every one of you who are there and how we go a little bit deeper.

15:58 So, yeah, we'll go deeper onto some Lori's travel tips around this. We'll do a special episode there just for you Difference makers. Anyway, I hope this was helpful. If it was, please let me know also if you have additional tips or have taken a trip with your own teenager or also just love birthday trips in general, which I personally do most years. When I ask for something for my birthday, I just say I want a trip for the last many years because I'm more of a trip person than a present person, more of a collector of memories and experiences and things. So that means a lot to me and I was glad to do it with my teenager, too, this time on 16th birthday, which is kind of a big deal. So, yeah, let me hear from you. Let us know if you have your own stories, your own tips. And yeah, in the meantime, I know there's a lot of travel going on around this holiday season, so if you have more tips on traveling in general, let us know about those on social media. You can find the Aworld of Difference podcast on Instagram at aworldof difference. And you can find us on Twitter at awadpod awodpod.

17:01 And you can find me on Twitter at loriadbr or Instagram at brown. Yeah, we'd love to hear from you also on threads on both of those as well. So, yeah, reach out. Let me know if you have any thoughts around this episode, if it brought up any stories in your own experience that you'd love to share. And we can share tips with each other about how to take trips with your teenager, especially on a birthday trip. Anyway, for all of you who are celebrating, lots of things out there, whether it's birthdays, getting ready for Advent, Christmas, Hanukah, a lot of Americans just celebrated Thanksgiving. I know there's a lot of celebrating going on everywhere. Enjoy time with your family and loved ones and friends and also take care of yourself. Hopefully you can get some rest and enjoy some of this travel and celebrating too, because a lot of you difference makers out there are doing a lot of incredible work around the world.

17:53 And I know that sometimes you neglect yourself. So if that's the case, don't do that anymore. And this is also another opportunity to talk about our sponsor for this podcast, which is BetterHelp. And if you go to BetterHelp.com Difference, you'll get 10% off your first month. And I have really benefited from BetterHelp because I've been working through some of my trauma, from working in a toxic work environment, and my therapist through BetterHelp has been super helpful. We've worked through a lot of somatic work, DBT therapy, a lot of grounding techniques. All of it has been super helpful to me. So if you're somebody who struggled with anything traumatic or difficult, relational conflict, or just find yourself getting stuck and needing some help, please go to WW dot BetterHelp.com Difference and get 10% off your first month. And everyone out there keep making