The Relational Parenting Podcast

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and I remember this particular story because it was one of
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the only times that I have experienced the level of rage towards a child that I
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think that this mom might be talking about and um and it terrified me it it absolutely
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wrecked my own view of myself
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and who I am or who I was welcome to the relational parenting podcast I'm
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Jennifer Hayes a parent coach and 20-year Child Care veteran each week I
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sit down with my own father Rick Hayes and discuss the complicated issues that parents face today as well as some of
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the oldest questions in the book from the latest research and the framework of my relational parenting method we offer
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thought-provoking solutions to your deepest parenting struggles or in other words how to parent your kids without
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losing your mind or traumatizing theirs added bonuses include intergenerational
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wounding discussions and guest Child Care Experts we will also start taking your parenting questions in episode five
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so be sure to comment with your biggest questions or email me directly at Jenny
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jennyb dot Co let's get started happy Thursday everybody and welcome to
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week five of the relational parenting podcast this week's episode is a little
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vulnerable a little more experiential and a little revealing of some of our
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personal flaws and stories I received an email a few weeks ago from one of my
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parents on my newsletter list and it reminded me of something I've experienced and I've known many other
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parents to experience as well something called Mom Rage or parent rage because
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it happens to all types of parents and primary caregivers I really wanted to do an episode on this because it's
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something that a lot of parents also tend to feel alone in or we convince
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ourselves that no one else feels like this and that's fair because most of us don't talk about it when we have those
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shame-inducing feelings towards our kids it's hard to admit so let's normalize it
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let's bring it into the light so we can deal with it heal it and move forward with more skills for raising kids
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without trauma thank you so much to my reader for being so vulnerable and
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honest and for allowing me to share this message with the parenting world this week we are talking about parental
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anger some would call it rage it has been referred to as Mom rage
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um I don't like calling it that I think that every parent at some point or another experiences
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anger that comes from the depths of their soul and I wanted to talk about
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that this week because I received an email from
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a parent who uh reads my newsletter so I send out a Weekly Newsletter on Sundays this mom
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responded to one of my newsletters and I'm gonna read you guys that email and then we're gonna pull that apart and dig
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into that a little bit so good morning can I just say first and foremost I am so grateful to have read this this
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morning thank you sometimes as a single mom I struggle so much with feeling the
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weight of everything on my shoulders and this friendly reminder of we all struggle in parenting but we can do this
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is a good reminder I will most definitely be looking forward to reading your messages every Sunday morning now
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my son is four and a half going on 16 I swear he's so smart so independent and
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so stubborn I feel as though I am failing him in some ways because I know I have taught him unhealthy response
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mechanisms already when I get over stimulated I get angry and it's an anger I can't really explain
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and have never experienced before motherhood weird right but again I think
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that's because it all falls on my plate I work full time have a very demanding job one that requires me to log in
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sometimes in the evening after a full eight hour day was completed and as I type this I don't even know
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what the point of sending hitting send is because I just feel like it's me who
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can't figure this life out and it's tiring and frustrating so
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yeah so a lot of uh a lot of vulnerability in that email that I got
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and I was I was so grateful to this mom when she sent that to me that she opened
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up and um reached out and you know said what
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was on her heart and I was able to respond and and hopefully help a little bit in some way and also so
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glad that the newsletter was reaching people who needed to hear a little encouragement
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um that's pretty cool not good it's good to get some feedback I'll bet yeah so it's great to get feedback and it's
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great to have you know the sharing and I wanted to to
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share this because it also broke my heart it also you know there's whether you're a single parent or you are
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married or you have a parenting partner um in any of the millions of ways that
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can happen parenting can still feel very lonely and especially with the way that our society
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is set up we are no longer you know we no longer live in tribes or Villages or
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you know some parts of the world do but here in the USA um in First World countries developed
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countries it's very you know everyone has their own house everyone and it's just like at the nuclear family and you
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you know one or two adults live in the home and however many children and that's it and people barely even talk to
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their neighbors anymore and you know there's some some ways that
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people find community and maybe that's through church or through others parents at the school that your kids go to or
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whatever it might be but in in many ways and in most ways we are very secluded and very alone in our parenting Journeys
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and so loneliness can be a very real part of parenting
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nowadays and so that's one of the things that I saw in this email was that she
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felt like she was the only one who can't figure this life out and I think that
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that is a common feeling that parents have I know that it is I've talked to
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many parents and I know that it's a common feeling that a lot of parents have and can lead to almost like feeling
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like you're crazy or you're the only one that yells at your kids or you're the only one
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you know messing up and having to apologize or
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reading a parenting book and feeling like you just your lizard brain just
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takes over sometimes yeah so I'm curious did you ever
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experience that when you were parenting oh absolutely it's the nature
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of parenting we've talked before I mean you kind of have to figure it out as you go there are the world is the world or
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there are stresses and strains you have to do it in amongst that situation that the
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environment you know there's uh learning learning how to keep your environment
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steadier as steady as you can uh is part of the is part of the challenge as part
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of the learning curve absolutely did you do you remember feeling like
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do you feel like you had people other parents who were friends with whom you could exchange
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frustrations or stories not just in like a blowing off steam kind of way but in
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like an actual productive helping each other out with
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advice of like this worked for my kid or this didn't work or you know things like
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that do you feel like you had people people outside of the home that you could turn to I did but I was not
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primary caregiver um when you guys were little so I
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probably didn't do that as much I was very interested I mean when we went to a
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party or something I was always talking with the women about kids and relationships and things rather than
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Sports and you know cars and uh with the guys
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um to get that information at work you know from people but uh I probably did
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less of it as a as a dad that was working far from home so some but and I
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don't think it was as common come to think of it 30 years ago
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40 years ago when we were doing that when we were raising you guys as it probably is today yeah what wasn't as
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coming talking about parents yeah talking talk I mean when we would
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we had friends we would get together with um and we would certainly talk with some
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friends I guess it wasn't it wasn't like a casual conversation but there were people that we had relationships with
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and shared you know they were all raising kids too and we would talk about uh re you know strategies for raising
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kids and share things and and uh yeah yeah now that I think about it we did do
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quite a bit of that we had several couples that we socialized with you know we get
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everybody to get together at somebody's house and the kids would all play together and the parents would do
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whatever together and so those were good sharing times yeah do you
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did you ever have moments where you felt like either you didn't you you know you
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yelled or you did something like did you ever have a moment where you were like struggling at like to parent well
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and felt like you were the only one or like you know like
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everyone else had it figured out and knew what they were doing and you were the only one that felt like that I I
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remember a lot as we were raising kids thinking as I was raising kids that
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thinking that there should be a book you can read on this by now we've been you
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know human beings have been raising kids for a hundred thousand years or something and where's the manual I you
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know I have a question why can't I just go look this up authoritatively in this situation do
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that and of course life's not like that and there's too many variables kids are all different parents are all different
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yeah it's uh it is a a battle I saw
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somebody talking about the choice not to have kids on something I was listening
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to the other day and uh oh that was Chelsea Handler that's what it was you know here's what not having kids is like
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and it's like you know having the choice to have kids yeah you know yeah lady
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quick I was it aggravated me it's like yeah it's easy simpler is always easier
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you know that's not that's not why you have kids is or not have kids uh for
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simpler it's uh it's a circle of part of a circle of life thing and I don't sit
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in Judgment of anybody you know everybody's choice is different there's all kinds of reasons there's there's no
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judgment but um it is it is certainly a challenge and
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if you're doing it right it's very time consuming and it's not you know it's a needs to be
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needs to be something you devote devote yourself to and it's you're not gonna do it
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you're not going to do it perfectly all the time I guess is where I'm trying to get to you you have to give yourself you
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have to give yourself some Grace um to mess up and do better next time
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and just like you do with your kids and everybody else you know that's uh there
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are absolutely times where you're not proud of that yeah that's but absolutely it's it can be very frustrating and you
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know there's still bosses and jobs and financial issues and you do it in and amongst that that's kind of what you're
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teaching your kids to do is how to deal with that stuff yeah and I wanna so I wanna touch on
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some of that stuff is uh you know people who make a conscious choice to have children
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there's there's many reasons and situations that children come into the
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World by and so talking about the population of people who have chosen
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consciously purposefully to have children want to be parents want to
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guide a new spirit you know a new human on earth through through life
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um and some of the things that come along with that that my friend here in the
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email was talking about um who I also forgot to mention I asked
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her permission to share this email even though I was going to do it anonymously and she very
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very graciously said yes uh and so I just want to say thank you to that
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person for [Music] um being open to this story being shared
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with with the world to um hopefully help someone else who needs to hear it so some of the other things
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that I pulled from this email were specifically the the mom Rage or this
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anger that she says she felt she's never felt until motherhood and I think that
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um it's important to point out here that when you have children
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that is now a relationship and
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relationships the purpose of our relationships is one so that we feel
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connected and loved and supported and safe but the other purpose of a
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relationship either with a romantic partner with a friend or with your children is
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to be a mirror and to challenge you and to help you grow as a human being and
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they're going to shine a light on those pieces of yourself that are still easily
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triggered that are still full of anger or shame or wounding or whatever it
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might be that needs to come forward that needs to be seen that needs to be in the
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light so that you can become aware of it and work with it and hopefully heal
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it and become a more integrated being in your existence and move through
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your life feeling more peaceful and more centered and more calm and capable and
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so the that anger is a very natural part
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of the parent-child relationship and this is something I want to normalize for any parents that are listening
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because you there's nothing wrong with you and
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you are not a bad parent and you are not crazy and you are not incapable because
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you ha you have this anger because you you feel such frustration or high levels
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of rage towards your child and it's more common than you might think and so
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um that that anger can come from things like like your environment and being over stimulated touched out
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overwhelmed with just juggling life and keeping another human being alive or
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multiple human beings alive um feeling depleted and maybe your cup
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is completely empty you haven't done any self-care or maybe you don't have you
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know you don't have any good routines in place whether that's movement or healthy
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food or um whatever it might be and there's a lot of reasons that those things may not
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be in place it's not always just a choice it could be uh let's see
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so so the environment feeling overwhelmed feeling overstimulated being stressed out things things that just
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happen life is hard right so it could be coming from Simply a momentary lapse in
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Stress Management another place that it could be coming from is as a parent you are seeing your
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child's Behavior as disrespectful manipulative rude or otherwise being on
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purpose and whether it's that they're not listening to you or you're having to
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repeat yourself or um their
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arguing with you or maybe they're just screaming because they didn't get their
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way having a big emotion about something which you know we all know happens often
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um so the there's a part of that that is the
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fault of how we View our child's Behavior
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and if we are viewing it as on purpose rather than developmentally appropriate
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then we will respond to that child we will have a physical first we will have
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a feeling about what they're doing so we will have an emotion happen inside of us
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that becomes anger or frustration or Injustice or feels
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disrespectful I've been disrespected and then that in turn will cause your
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outward Behavior or your verbalization towards your child um and the third thing I want to touch on
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is that we take things so personally and we can see our child's Behavior as a
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direct reflection of how good or bad of a parent we are which by the way just
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eliminate those words from your vocabulary you are a parent and
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you are doing your best and as long as you are doing your best and you are not
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you know obviously abusing your child in some way intentionally um then we are going to set shame aside
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and instead of seeing our child's Behavior as you know oh well I did something wrong
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or I'm not good enough or I can't get them to listen
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um you know taking things personally will also cause shame and will cause a
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reaction inside of you and a behavior outside of you towards your child that
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is not aligned with what's actually going on with them and so those those
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three factors are things that I want to
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that we'll continue to talk about throughout this episode um but I want to go ahead and start with
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some story time let's see I was a nanny for many years and with one of my
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families that I worked with for
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almost two years I had been with them when the time this story happened I had been with them for about a year
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so I was settled in we had our routine you know I had a really strong bond and
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relationship with them and you know I had become a primary caregiver a primary
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attachment figure and a safe place and all of those things and
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I remember this particular story because it was one of
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the only times that I have experienced the level of rage towards a child that I
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think that this mom might be talking about and and it terrified me it it absolutely
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wrecked my own view of myself
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and who I am or who I was as a caregiver and a professional and a
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lover of children and all of these things yeah so the boy was about
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third he was three something so I'd been with him for a little over a year uh and
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we had baby gates up uh there were there were two staircases and so we had two
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baby gates on one on the stairs going down and one on the stairs going up uh
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so that you know no one could go on the stairs without a caregiver present and
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the the little boy kept uh he kept
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like he would he would stand on like the base of the baby gate and Shake It and I had explained to him
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you know 70 times that minute that you know please don't do that if you you
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know when you do that uh it shakes the sides loose and you could knock the gate over and get get really hurt
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um and he would listen and he and I would
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you know thought he was understanding and then I'd kind of go back around the corner to the kitchen and I would think
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I was fixing lunch or something or a snack for them but I was occupied and they were supposed to be playing in the
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living room and you know once again heard heard the gate jiggling around the
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corner and came around the corner and said again like hey
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please go in the living room and play that's not safe and you know over
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I mean it was literally in like a less than five minute time span I think it happened like four or five times where
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and you know I was not setting the boundary firmly enough of like don't do
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that or I'm not going to let you do that anymore I was tired I
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was trying to get snack done or get dinner prepared or something and I was otherwise occupied and
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frustrated and just kept coming around the corner and being like stop doing that stop doing that stop doing that
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and the next the next thing that I heard
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was rattle rattle rattle slam and this was not this floor was a hard
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um tile and it was a raw material like rock like uh tile so it wasn't like
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shiny and smooth it was a rough um a very rugged kind of tile on the floor
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and these baby gates were metal they were not the plastic so they were they
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were all metal parts and um and so he shook it loose and it fell
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and it fell on top of him and made a very loud bang and so I came around the
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corner and my first thought was oh my you know oh my gosh is he hurt because it fell on him and he kind of
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like sprung up he jumped up and and seemed fine and took that like
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and then just kind of like started screaming and crying like and like he was terrified
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not like he was hurt and I and I was like oh my gosh like buddy are you okay
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and he was like yeah um I said are you hurt and he and he
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said and he said no and I was like I was like okay I was like did you get scared by the loud
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noise and he goes and he and he goes yeah yeah and he's still like screaming
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and crying or whatever and I said
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I said out loud to this terrified
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traumatized child I told you that's what was gonna happen
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[Laughter] told you so and I remember I just I just had like I
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just even telling that like admitting that out loud to the world just had I had a visceral reaction in my
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body of like tingles that just went down into my fingers and into my toes all the
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way like from my chest of of Shame because
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in that moment this this crying tiny terrified child
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instead of wrapping him in my arms and
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addressing his needs in the moment and helping him return to safety helping
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him regulate his nervous system and his Terror I
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shamed him yeah he's three you he doesn't know he acted
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out of uh out of your child rather than an adult caretaking when I reacted out
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of my ego and I reacted out of out of not Delight that's not the right word
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but out of like I felt Justified yeah like I like I knew that's what was going
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to happen I told you that's what was going to happen and now you know now you've learned and I felt
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I don't even know if justified's the right word but I was I felt righteous Vindicated Vindicated I don't know
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there's a lot of words flying around right now yeah and once he had calmed down and I had you
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know walked away and cooked dinner and whatever and I was driving home I cried
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the entire way home and I felt awful and I got home and
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I went to my partner that I was with at the time and I was I
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just was crying I was just bawling and just lost in shame and and he didn't
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understand and it took me a while to actually tell him the story because I
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felt so bad about it I couldn't believe like I I didn't want him to see that part of me that dark part of me that
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felt good doing that to something so tiny and vulnerable and yeah even for an
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instant even for yeah just a flicker of an instant and but once I told my partner about it
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once I once it was out there I it was like it was a it was kind of like
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a weight lifted off of me and I didn't feel quite so bad about it I still felt like I mean
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it like not that I then made it okay but I weight lifted off of me having
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admitted that to someone because as a as a nanny
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or as a parent you constantly feel the
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weight of their lives and their experiences and
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their emotions on you and to admit
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that no matter how good I was at my job how professional I was or how much I loved and adore children that I was
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still that there was still a part of me that was imperfect
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welcome to being a human being was it felt awful coming up and out but once it
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was out here oh it felt liberating
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and not and and I went back the next day and and that Liberation that admission
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and awareness of of what I did and and accepting that that that Darkness or
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that thing or that imperfection lived inside of me allowed me to go back the next day and
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I think at breakfast or something I said hey bud I was like you remember when the when that gate fell down yesterday
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um and how scary it was and he goes yeah you know that was so loud you know and
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he you know he's like being a three-year-old and I was like well I just wanna I just want to tell you that
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I'm really sorry that I wasn't more loving towards you when you were
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scared I'm really sorry that I said I told you that was gonna happen instead
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of I'm sorry that that happened to you and I'm here and you're safe
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and he goes oh okay and and that's great that's an apology
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but then I went on to say I went on to explain to him that
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even though I told you not to do it even though I tried to teach you that
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that's what was going to happen it is normal at your age
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to want to try things and learn them for yourself
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because otherwise he is going to walk away from that experience even with a
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heartfelt apology without explaining that to him and telling him that what he
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did was normal for him and not
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to be ashamed of it not to carry some kind of like I'm a burden or I don't
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listen or I'm bad to not carry that forward and internalize that from what I
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said inside of the experience it's it takes more than just an apology an
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apology is great it's a first step but then telling your child that it that
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what what they did was was normal and that's how we learn
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and that that was scary and I'm sorry that that happened to you because you can hold all of those things
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all at once and there's in a lot of parenting that I have seen
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there is this feeling or fear that if you don't really drive
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the lesson home that a child learns when they don't listen to you then they're not gonna it's not gonna
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soak in and they're not gonna carry it forward and listen to you the next time and but your job in that moment
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is not to drive it home and make sure the lesson sticks and that they feel all
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that pain and carry it with them and next time they'll just listen to you blindly because they won't
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promise they won't because the nature of humans
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is to try things for ourselves and learn things yep
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test boundaries and that's your this is your this is your Velociraptor thing
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no well sorta kinda yeah you know that's uh watching Jurassic Park there's a
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scene uh where the where the I think it's the game warden is is saying and
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they think they they're systematic somewhere in there there's they're systematically testing the fences and it
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occurred to me that that's a perfect description of raising children I I just
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I like to refer to them as little Velociraptors when they're doing that because they're always running around
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checking the gate you know the other moral of the story there is as well we
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need to put screws in the wall on the gate you know to you know in a perfect
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world that's something they're all experiences we learned from and and
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um you know what you were talking about feeling unburdened when you shared it
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out loud you know that's that's the whole thing behind you know confession
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or prayer or having a friend to share things with you know it you know when
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you get it out then you've acknowledged it and now you now you've taken a step
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towards dealing with it instead of you know just hiding it and covering it up and wearing it the rest of your life you
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know it's it's uh something about the way we're made I'm sure there are better psychological explanations for it but
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yeah that's a that's a that's a terrific story and growth all around and and now
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also uh the little boys got an experience of somebody said something snarky to him as as he would have
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processed that but also coming back somebody coming back and trying to
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remedy that or whatever you know setting his expectations for how to be treated and I mean just all kinds of learning
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going on in in that story all at all levels yeah well that's so that's a great uh
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way to wrap up that story is that it was a it was a learning experience
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um no one is perfect and so so the so the the gift of
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imperfection I think that's actually a book title I think that's a brene brown book uh the gifts of imperfection I
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think yeah I actually have it over there on my shelf um
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the the gift of messing up and not being perfect as a parent as a human as being
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in a relationship is that you get to see this side of yourself and you get to to
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learn that that thing exists inside of you you become aware of it and then that's what
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allows you to heal it and that's also what allows you to learn what is normal
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for your child and what your child is going to do and the nature of children and like you said
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to problem solve that it's not to try and bang into his head 300 times a day
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not to shake the gate maybe the solution and he never did it
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again by the way so that did teach him and he never did it again but we don't always want we don't want every lesson
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that our children learn to be that traumatizing and that's scary and so a
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solution that had been discussed a lot even before that happened and never happened
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but um a solution to that moment is okay get more secure baby gates do what you
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need to do so that the baby gates are no longer a safety issue nail it down baby yeah and it's like I I had a roommate
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once when I was younger and my dog Lucy would she had a cat
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and she would leave her bedroom door open and the cat food out on the floor and she would get mad if Lucy came in
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and ate the cat food and then she tried to tell me that I had to buy her more cat food and I said we talked about this
37:15
when you moved in I have a dog if you leave food at her eye level or below or even up on the
37:22
counter you know it's literally in the lease so that it's in writing and understanding you
37:29
understand that's how far I had to go when I was getting roommates back then living with strangers crazy um I had to
37:37
write these things into a lease so that people couldn't whatever try to screw me over
37:43
all food on that counter or below is mine dogs is it the dog will get to it
37:49
and not not just like for them to not lose their food but to not make my dog
37:56
sick and yes there's a level of training she
38:01
did not receive when she was a puppy because I was broke and working and whatever I didn't have I
38:08
didn't train her she and even with reward and punishment she still gets on
38:13
the counter if you leave a pizza on the counter yeah nature of a dog
38:20
the nature of a dog to buy it right and so if you leave that
38:28
food on the floor her eating that food is your fault not hers
38:35
if you know that that's what she's going to do and you choose to do it anyway
38:41
it's your fault that your cat food got eaten not mine and it's your responsibility your responsible it's not
38:48
my responsibility my dog is not irresponsible frontal lobe thinking creature
38:55
she is an animal and she will do what she does and she's programmed to do
39:01
yeah so anyway children are the same children are programmed to learn about
39:08
their environment and the way they learn about their environment is by testing boundaries and pushing rules and
39:14
negotiating and thinking for themselves and trying new things and if we shame
39:19
them when they do that no matter how triggering it might be for
39:25
us if we shame them and we don't become aware of our own triggers become aware
39:31
of it fix it figure it out heal your stuff and get better or come back and
39:37
apologize and normalize it for your child then your child is going to grow
39:42
up feeling like they are nothing but a burden nothing but an annoyance or they are stupid and they just don't listen
39:49
and they're bad and all of these things they're going to internalize all of that snarkiness that you think is just like I
39:56
see parents too who just think it's like like start like like like reciprocal sarcasm
40:02
think it's and it's like your three-year-old doesn't understand sarcasm [Laughter]
40:08
they don't sorry they're little sponges there's almost nothing that you'd say or
40:13
do around a kid that's actually inconsequential yeah the gift of
40:19
imperfection is that we get to learn we get to grow we get to become aware and
40:24
get better and so the goal of this podcast is not necessarily is not to
40:30
shame any parents or tell you that there's you have to do it that's why or else you're a terrible person like none
40:37
of that it's to like to talk through all of these like multi-faceted issues and look at them from all these different
40:43
angles and um talk about where where that stuff comes from and why you know how it
40:49
actually serves us why it comes up and then how to move forward with that
40:54
um yeah so I want I wanted sorry go ahead that's it I mean that's the trick
41:00
when you're parroting I've I've got a similar story um of losing my cool not being a perfect
41:08
parent um with one of your brothers when they were little he was uh he was a little
41:15
hyperactive little little add like his dad and uh one night we're all
41:22
eventually diagnosed with it wow there you go genetic and so so I don't remember all
41:32
the circumstances I don't remember the because it was 30 some years ago
41:37
not sure how old he was and he was he was diagnosed add but this I don't know
41:44
and I don't know if this was before or after um because when when we realized he was
41:50
add which would have been kindergarten so he was four or five
41:56
um kindergarten teacher asked us to have him tested or when he started school was when we had him tested and that was kind
42:04
of a new thing back then at least new to me but anyway we were having an evening
42:10
and uh I ended up uh not being he was
42:16
also big freeze age I don't want to want to excuse this but there are all kinds of factors that go into how we process
42:24
what our kids do and what they're capable of you've told me that he was
42:30
because he was so much bigger for his age he seemed older and so he seemed
42:36
like he would he should be more capable of self-control and listening and all those
42:41
things and yeah yeah and that's something we learned and practiced or I
42:47
learned and practiced after uh uh after we knew that that he you know learned
42:53
about kids and uh but boy this evening he was I think I was trying to get him
43:00
to bed and he was not going to bed and I remember grabbing him by the arms and
43:07
pinning him down on the bed you know looming over him as a dad and yelling at
43:12
him you know I'm making him expecting him to stay in bed do not get out of
43:18
this bed again and uh and like you described I mean you walk
43:25
away from that just feeling like a turd resorting to that you know you just run
43:33
out of I've run out of tools and uh and that probably had something to do with
43:39
my desire to come up with better tools going forward be the first you know the
43:44
firstborn was an experiment I guess and so he he bore the brunt of all that and
43:50
uh yeah those experiences I think
43:55
everybody has them it'd be we imagine
44:01
that we don't you know with Facebook and everything we see the the perfect parts of everybody else's lives but I I think
44:10
that part and parcel of parenting is losing your cool and learning not to
44:17
better and learning how to redirect and learning better you know learn ways to
44:23
head it off and learn ways to better ways to deal with it it's all learning I
44:28
don't I don't look at kids as being different than their parents or other people it's uh we're all human beings
44:34
and grown-ups have had a little longer learning curve you know but we're still
44:39
subject to all the big the big feelings and and everything that kids are too you
44:44
know we just had more practice hopefully and have learned a little more
44:50
um but yeah those are there are going to be not proud moments in your parenting no matter how smart you are no matter
44:57
how much money you've got no matter no matter no matter um and it's a it's a challenge two
45:04
things come up for me as you're you're tying that story up and
45:09
one is that we are still learning just because we're parents doesn't mean that we know everything and everyone is still
45:18
a student of life no matter what no one living has experienced everything you
45:23
could possibly experience and so you know what you know and there's a lot you don't know and so
45:30
being open to learning new things and checking in with yourself and seeing yourself
45:36
from a lens of like reality versus
45:41
um I'm the adult you're the child I know more than you so I you know just
45:47
listen to me blindly but it allows us to be in relationship so the the apology
45:53
and the normalizing and the discovering this part of yourself that you didn't
46:00
know could get activated the Le or the level of Rage um that my friend in the email is
46:07
talking about or that you felt when you you know you put him in bed
46:14
um stuck him too um yeah um you know once we're aware of those
46:21
things part of a relationship is conflict and recovery and arguably in my
46:28
own experience this is not a psychological thing um scientifically but from my own
46:35
experience one of the most effective pieces of being in healthy relationship
46:44
is the ability to have a conflict and then fully recover and not just slap a
46:50
Band-Aid on it not just agree to disagree and move on like nothing happened
46:55
yeah sweep things under the rug and just not talk about it until everyone you
47:01
know just take a couple days to cool off and then we just move on none of those things are true recovery
47:07
so the ability to have a conflict whether it's between you and another adult or you and your child the ability
47:15
to have a conflict and maybe it wasn't a very healthy conflict and to be the one
47:21
to come back together and say hey this is how I messed up yeah this is how
47:29
you did not deserve to be treated and I am sorry and I will do better next time
47:38
uh that that is one of the most powerful most solidifying
47:45
parts of a healthy relationship that could possibly exist and that is what
47:50
will give longevity and trust and safety over time and repetition that is what
47:57
will build a bond with your child Leaps and Bounds
48:02
yeah over a gift you give them or whatever like
48:08
whatever else you know um positive positive bonding experiences and positive conflict recovery
48:16
experiences mm-hmm yeah yeah those are you know uh
48:22
what do they talk about Battlefield buddies or something like that you know we learn the child that fell and the
48:29
gate and got scared you know fear is a big teacher trauma or or being being
48:35
scared or hurt and in those situations together that those are tremendously
48:41
impactful learning experiences you know I remember I remember talking to Josh I
48:47
don't remember what I said but I remember letting him know after that that was it was the next day but it you
48:55
know that that's dad lost he's cool and shouldn't have done that and that's the other half of you know like you say in a
49:01
pile I don't know if I went past much past apology and and
49:06
um you know you shouldn't be treated that way that that was my bad
49:12
not yours that's part of the you have to own your
49:18
stuff you know you you you share you can share it with people and then burden and
49:23
get it out there which is really not about the other person it's about
49:28
it's like a a uh like a marriage you know what do they call it a public and
49:33
uh a a public show of
49:38
something you know you're getting you're making it public when you when you get it out of your own head you're making it
49:44
public it's healing and the next uh next step like like Alcoholics Anonymous is
49:49
you know you acknowledge you're something bigger than you that you need to uh whether it's a relationship or
49:56
whatnot that you need to acknowledge it to and then you need to talk to you know
50:01
the apology so you go around I think one of the steps in Alcoholics Anonymous is to go around and abolish apologize to
50:08
people you've um um wrong in some way and that's a that's
50:14
just another that's just the way people are wired normally you know that's uh those are
50:19
those are absolutely important steps can you see you guys when we don't we're
50:25
wired or we learn it in adulthood and we can see examples of it
50:30
but it's so often overlooked in towards children yeah because of that
50:37
power Dynamic that we always talk about of you know parents over children and it's like
50:45
I know stuff and you don't and so there's there's this lack of respect towards the child as a whole human
50:54
having a fully whole Human Experience and deserves the same kindness and
50:59
respect and input and acknowledgment and validation and all of those things and
51:06
even on a greater level because they they they're learning they're brand new here yeah so not only our experience
51:13
give them the same respect that we would give someone else in our life that we love and respect but give them but even
51:20
more even more validation even more normalizing things for them even more
51:26
empathy um because if they are going to grow into
51:32
a confident self-worth having
51:38
[Music] independent person
51:45
they need all of those things in childhood yeah so I want to close this
51:53
episode down with giving a little we kind of gave our own examples and
51:58
stories but I want to give a little bit more somatic experiential
52:06
um practice to any parents that are listening and are really looking to uh
52:12
work on on whether it's anger or frustration or yelling at your kid you
52:18
know losing your stuff on your kids whatever that might be um I just want to wrap wrap up with kind
52:24
of a helpful tool um and so one I want every parent to
52:32
understand that you're not alone and you may feel that way and you may not have
52:37
everyone anyone immediately close to you that you can rely on
52:43
um but I think I I think that a lot of people do and they're just and you
52:48
you've got to be able to reach out and ask for help and look around and see
52:54
where the resources are and you know if if you are truly either surrounded by no
53:01
one or you know supported by no one or surrounded by people who you cannot rely on so they're
53:07
you know toxic family situations Etc um then
53:13
either find a parent group or find a therapist or find a coach find a
53:18
psychologist someone someone that you can talk to because that piece of it is so important
53:27
and so validating and so self like being able to see yourself outside
53:33
of your own head um is so helpful but specifically to work with anger anger is a
53:40
secondary emotion in most instances it can be a primary motion but in a lot of
53:47
instances anger is actually a secondary emotion which means that it is a cover-up for the real emotion that's
53:55
underneath so what lives what is living underneath the anger
54:00
um that you are experiencing towards your child and I am going to reference
54:06
and I'll put a link in the show notes to this for anyone who's interested but I
54:12
there's this emotion wheel uh that I was introduced to years ago
54:18
and I'll just hold it up for a second here um and it was
54:24
invented I Believe In 1980 by a psychologist
54:31
and I wrote his name down I don't know where it went let's see Robert
54:38
puchnik pachnick Patrick I'll put it in the show notes uh and but
54:47
I just want to give credit where credit is due I did not invent this wheel but I've used this wheel for years and in
54:54
the center are depending on what wheel you look up because you're there's if you type that
55:00
into Google uh there's several versions of this you know that have been modified since 1980 obviously uh modified updated
55:09
Etc based on different understandings of human emotions but the
55:15
middle circle is like base emotions so anger
55:20
fear happy sad surprised disgusted
55:28
hmm yeah um and so the center is very very like basic
55:36
human emotion and then it extends out into two more sections and it goes into more
55:44
descriptive and more in-depth descriptions of of for instance anger so
55:52
anger could also mean that you are humiliated you are have been let down
55:58
you are bitter about something you are feeling aggressive
56:03
or defensive or frustrated um critical so you're judging something
56:13
um something feels like an injustice something feels like a betrayal you're
56:19
feeling resentful disrespected Etc
56:26
and so what I the exercise that I want to give
56:32
to you as a parent is to whenever you have a moment
56:39
I know that they are few and far between but whenever you have five minutes to
56:44
yourself instead of turning on the TV instead of scrolling on your phone and instead of picking up a book or you know right
56:52
before bed whatever it might be when you have five minutes in the shower maybe
56:58
just take a moment and check in with that anger remember whatever the
57:05
situation was where you lost it where you didn't show up as your best self or you responded in anger
57:14
um and instead of looking at why it happened or trying to think your way through what happened and why it
57:21
triggered you I just want you to find where that anger lives in your body first
57:27
and just so you can close your eyes and take them out so don't do this while you're driving
57:33
um take a moment close your eyes and find your anger and where it lives in your
57:39
body and then I want you to either look at this wheel
57:45
um or if you have enough you know emotional know how on your own already
57:50
you can just sit with your eyes closed and feel into this and feel into what what in that situation what other
57:57
feeling word comes to mind besides anger did your
58:03
child did you feel disrespected by your child did you feel like they there was an injustice that happened did your
58:09
child hurt hurt your other child hurt their sibling um did you feel frustrated overwhelmed
58:18
stressed out you know and just sit for a minute and and see what the other
58:23
emotion is What the deeper emotion is and from that
58:30
you can start to work with it you can start to instead of just I got
58:39
mad and I lost my [ __ ] and every parent does it and I'm just gonna move on
58:45
instead of just washing over it sweeping it under the rug either for yourself or for your child or within your
58:51
relationship just take five minutes look at where it lives in your body and
58:57
give it a different name because it's a cool tool
59:03
thank you you are from that simple practice you are going
59:09
to be able to the next time something happens the next time that trigger we
59:16
talked about emotions being energy in Motion in your body the next time you
59:22
feel that when your child does something you are going to be able to catch it so
59:28
much faster and you may not catch it the next time that it happens or five more times after
59:34
that but if you every time it happens you sit with yourself and rename it and
59:40
find out where it lives in your body you are going to be able to start working with that and you're going to be able to
59:46
start catching it in the moment and stopping it yeah
59:51
we're talking about it they just kind of they spill out on your kids because you're not
59:59
conscious they'd still use the words conscious unconscious egos that kind of
1:00:04
thing you know if you're not aware of it of where it's coming from then it just kind of spills out because you're not
1:00:10
directional with it if if you have a thought and you go oh yeah I'm reliving my child something in my childhood or
1:00:17
something like that that's causing this feeling towards your child
1:00:23
that might not be appropriate or Justified then yeah and this is a great
1:00:29
I like I mean it starts with a small number of basic emotions in the middle and that just having a list of all these
1:00:36
emotions to go what what the heck am I feeling it's nice to have 50 or 75 words here to look at and because if you can't
1:00:43
name it it's harder to deal with if you can just come up with well it's not quite disappointment but it sounds like
1:00:50
something else that's a that's a big step to it's a five minute what you're describing is a five minute way to work
1:00:57
on work on your stuff um in the midst of life this is a great
1:01:03
tool and I didn't you know
1:01:09
nucularly remember learning any words in my childhood
1:01:14
to express my emotions outside of these you know five six seven eight nine ten basic I'm mad I'm sad I'm whatever
1:01:24
and you know in adulthood in my own therapy and having this wheel
1:01:32
and you know it kind of blew my mind you know and and through socialization in
1:01:37
college you know you kind of pick up other words to describe different emotions but
1:01:43
um no one no one taught them to me until I was like 26 and got some therapy and I
1:01:52
discovered this emotion wheeler it was given to me and and it was just like
1:01:58
whoa like there are so many different
1:02:04
kinds of emotions let's do those
1:02:14
[Music] glowing I use this my husband and I use this sometimes not
1:02:21
so much anymore because we've had it for so long but um but we used to hang it in our house and
1:02:27
reference it when we would fight so that we could accurately tell our partner what was
1:02:34
going on for us um because then that allowed them to understand
1:02:39
what was happening so that they could actually respond to what we needed versus just seeing
1:02:45
anger yeah yeah it's hard to communicate without a common frame of reference it
1:02:51
lets everybody okay now we can figure out what Furious means you know or here you're looking at Furious right now or
1:02:58
or something like that I've seen this as part these words I really first ran into uh I saw at a uh
1:03:07
at a marriage uh encounter kind of thing where people were learning to
1:03:12
communicate and they you know there's lists of words you probably shouldn't use and here's a list of emotions that
1:03:18
that might be better to use so that I think they gave us a little cards you know because so you could you could go
1:03:24
hey here's a here's some words in front of me you know instead of just I can't can't come up with the word right now
1:03:30
especially if you're upset not thinking straight well it's a great tool to have a list of words in front of you that's
1:03:36
uh this is a good thing I like it yeah especially when you're super
1:03:41
triggered super in your lizard brain and fighting with your spouse or fighting with your child this could be something
1:03:48
that if if it's visual you put it in your environment somewhere where you're gonna like see it you know maybe you
1:03:55
blow it up make it a little bit bigger than an eight and a half by eleven sheet of paper put it on the fridge it's going
1:04:00
it's going to grab your attention it's very colorful and bright it's going to grab your attention and it
1:04:07
it kind of helps ground you and bring you back down to earth and like and it's
1:04:12
like okay I'm still mad or I'm still frustrated I'm still you know like tense but I'm gonna look at
1:04:19
that stupid piece of paper there you go that one that's what I feel like which
1:04:25
one am I yeah yeah and for my this just popped up for me that I feel like I need
1:04:33
to share because I think that it's an association that that is often overlooked and for me anger comes
1:04:41
most often when I am scared scared not not in like the physical sense but
1:04:49
scared like oh my God we're in conflict and you're
1:04:55
you become scared of losing that connection with your partner with your
1:05:00
child um this is actually a very common one for children their behavior is actually
1:05:07
a survival mechanism out of fear of losing their connection with you but for me my husband
1:05:14
has had to learn and I learned alongside him because I didn't know
1:05:20
but we learned together that when he sees me angry he he his his best defense
1:05:28
is If he if he can in the moment because he has his own stuff to regulate but if he sees me angry instead of getting
1:05:35
bigger and madder and more defensive his best tactic in that moment is to is to
1:05:43
make a safe environment for me and whether that means hey saying
1:05:49
something out loud and going hey I see anger I'm guessing you're scared right
1:05:57
now let's take a deep breath we we'll figure this out we always talk
1:06:04
through stuff like um you know you're saying he will literally
1:06:09
say the words you are safe right now you are safe
1:06:14
and everything is going to be okay and then that literally literally
1:06:21
just completely like drops everything that I have
1:06:28
into the ground and I'm like oh oh okay
1:06:34
that was scary and
1:06:40
and then we can sit down and discuss whatever's going on
1:06:47
um so anyway that's just that's just another another layer another piece another tool I just we could talk I feel
1:06:54
like we could just talk for hours all the time we've always been able to do this that's the cool part about
1:06:59
relationships is conflicts are more intense because there's danger you know
1:07:05
you don't want to you don't wanna lose the relationship as opposed to a
1:07:10
passing stranger that says the same thing and you just keep walking you know it's like there's no risk there and so
1:07:17
yeah learning to be relational with your kids and teaching them how to do that
1:07:24
for other people in their lives you know building relationships relationships is a is a very good human skill to have
1:07:31
some would argue it's the most important skill to have how to stay in the get how
1:07:37
to make them and then keep them also we're going to wrap up because we're at our time but I forgot to point
1:07:45
out my new sign at the beginning of the episode it's a little too shiny and
1:07:51
we're gonna we're gonna get it fixed we're either gonna mattify it or put it on a different
1:07:58
um material but I officially have a background for the podcast very cool and
1:08:06
we're working on yours we're working on your background so we have a little getting more aesthetically pleasing for
1:08:13
those who watch us on YouTube you know figuring out how to cast how to podcast yeah so we will wrap up here we
1:08:23
um let's see next week will be our last
1:08:28
episode just you and me before we start diving into taking guests
1:08:35
so we will do another topic next week me and Dad and the week after that February
1:08:43
26 I will have my first guest and she is
1:08:49
a she's a parent she is also a coach for moms and
1:08:58
um professional moms professional working moms specifically as her Niche
1:09:03
and she has got some great insights into her parenting journey and
1:09:09
um yeah so I'm excited we're March March is gonna be we have a whole theme for
1:09:15
March so stay tuned for that and yeah we're ramping up here people so keep
1:09:21
tuning in every Thursday morning and we will see you next time
1:09:27
thanks Dad thank you bye everybody if someone came to mind while you were listening to this
1:09:34
episode or you are wishing you had a friend to digest it with I would be so
1:09:39
honored if you shared this link from this episode with them I myself have always benefited from
1:09:45
community and sharing and I truly believe that it takes a village to raise
1:09:52
a child our society has become so independent from one another and parenting these
1:09:59
days is often a lonely Journey but it doesn't have to be that way
1:10:04
that's why I'm here if you have been seeking a more intentional approach to
1:10:09
Parenting but you aren't sure where to start I would love to hear from you you
1:10:15
can find me and all of my offerings at www.jennyb.com
1:10:21
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1:10:27
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1:10:32
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1:11:10
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