“Fine.” Again.

Your teenager walks in the door after school.

“How was your day?”

“Fine.”

“Who did you have lunch with?”

“My friends.”

“Do you like your English teacher?”

“She’s fine.”

You tell yourself,
Stop asking questions.
Give them a minute.

Maybe they’re tired.
Maybe they’ll tell you more later.

But then you’re sitting at dinner and you try again.

“So what’s your English teacher like?”

“I don’t know.”

And now it’s not really about the English teacher anymore.

Why don’t you want to tell me anything?

Do you think I’m annoying?

Did I do something that made you stop talking to me?

You remember when you used to know everything.

Who they played with at recess. What happened on the playground. Which teacher they loved. What made them laugh so hard they couldn’t finish telling you the story.

Now they can spend an entire day at school, and you’re lucky if you get more than a few words about it.

And when you try to find out, sometimes it feels like they’d rather you didn’t ask.

When did it get so hard to know what’s going on in your life?

So you find yourself asking one more question, hoping this is the one they actually answer.

🧡 Jeanine

What question do you ask that always gets you a one-word answer?