Latest / The Parenting Podcast / Q&A - Answering Your Questions (Pt. 1) | Ep. 19

Transcript

Q&A - Answering Your Questions (Pt. 1) | Ep. 19 · The Parenting Podcast

• 1:02
  Cheryl: Well girls, that was a surprise to come in on this today.
• 1:07
  Danae: Where's the other microphone.
• 1:11
  Cheryl: So there are four of us in here today, and we only have three microphones gets to
• 1:17
  Danae: cuddle
• 1:21
  Cheryl: We're going to do something we haven't done before today.
• 1:24
  Cheryl: We're going to have a Q and a, and I've had moms send the same questions um, before we get started though, let's reintroduce ourselves.
• 1:32
  Cheryl: He's a three dear long-term friends of mine.
• 1:35
  Cheryl: Denay king.
• 1:37
  Cheryl: Hi, it's
• 1:37
  Danae: so good to be back.
• 1:39
  Danae: I just wanted to remind you guys.
• 1:41
  Danae: I have five kids ages, 20 through 28, and then my son is married and so I have four lovely girls.
• 1:50
  Danae: And then, and then Ethan.
• 1:53
  Christie: Yeah.
• 1:53
  Christie: And I'm Christy Gunckel.
• 1:54
  Christie: I have four daughters ages, 15 to 23, almost 23.
• 2:01
  Christie: And, um, two in the home.
• 2:03
  Christie: Two out of the home.
• 2:04
  Christie: Our oldest is married, so we have a.
• 2:06
  Ellen: Oh, yeah, that's cool.
• 2:08
  Ellen: And I'm, I'm Ellen and, um, I have five children and they went on to give me 17 grandchildren.
• 2:17
  Ellen: And so that's really fun.
• 2:18
  Ellen: They all live in town.
• 2:19
  Ellen: So I'm a very happy Omar, which is German for grandma.
• 2:24
  Ellen: And, uh, so that's, if I get bored, I can always grab a kid.
• 2:28
  Cheryl (2): I'm Cheryl and we have five children.
• 2:32
  Cheryl (2): I have.
• 2:34
  Cheryl (2): Five-and-a-half grandchildren And I was widowed over 20 years ago from bell.
• 2:39
  Cheryl (2): So, um, here we are.
• 2:42
  Cheryl (2): This is such a great group.
• 2:43
  Cheryl (2): All right.
• 2:43
  Cheryl (2): Like I said, I've got some QA questions.
• 2:46
  Cheryl (2): Moms.
• 2:47
  Cheryl (2): I'm going to remind you can later, please send us your questions because we may do it on a program like this, or we may say, wow, this needs to be not just one episode.
• 3:00
  Cheryl (2): Maybe we'll do a series off it.
• 3:01
  Cheryl (2): Just your question, because we want to be relevant for you.
• 3:04
  Cheryl (2): All right.
• 3:04
  Cheryl (2): Let's jump into this, uh, question number one is we know that children seem to be born.
• 3:10
  Cheryl (2): Self-centered all about themselves and selfish by nature.
• 3:15
  Cheryl (2): So how do I teach my little ones to share?
• 3:18
  Cheryl (2): And I mean, I, I struggle with it, you know, I kind of want the best for me deep down inside.
• 3:25
  Cheryl (2): So what do y'all think, what would you say with your little ones?
• 3:28
  Cheryl (2): How would you help them learn?
• 3:30
  Cheryl (2): I
• 3:31
  Ellen: remember when I had my first one and he was pretty easy going kid.
• 3:35
  Ellen: So this before sister came along, so, you know, teaching him to share was kind of like a fun thing.
• 3:40
  Ellen: Okay, honey, you need to share with the kid in the sandbox and things like that, and everything was good.
• 3:46
  Ellen: But then when he got siblings, the level of sharing change for everyone, it wasn't that cute.
• 3:53
  Ellen: Just to hand them the shovel in the sandbox and share it became a totally different life.
• 3:59
  Ellen: Sharing amongst siblings.
• 4:02
  Danae: I think this is the place definitely where to, to introduce and remind often about treat others.
• 4:07
  Danae: Like you want to be treated that that came up a lot with my kids.
• 4:13
  Christie: Well, I think even earlier than that, teaching them to share is different than teaching them to want to share.
• 4:22
  Christie: And so when they're, when they're little bitty bitty, you can teach them the act of sharing, but the change is going to come with age and
• 4:31
  Ellen: share yes.
• 4:32
  Ellen: Teaching you're practicing the
• 4:33
  Danae: Sherry and then you learn the
• 4:34
  Christie: reason why.
• 4:35
  Christie: Yes.
• 4:35
  Christie: And I think, like you're saying with.
• 4:38
  Christie: How I want to be treated if they're experiencing the benefit of someone sharing with them.
• 4:42
  Christie: So if we can make a point when here, I want to share this with you, I have a cookie I'll share with you.
• 4:49
  Danae: We can't do that.
• 4:51
  Cheryl: Yeah.
• 4:51
  Cheryl: I love that.
• 4:51
  Cheryl: That's so practical that we introduced the word share from us and they say, oh, and even with their dad, if you're married here, honey, I wanted to share this with you.
• 5:03
  Cheryl: And we have that word as part of the family vocabulary.
• 5:06
  Cheryl: That's really
• 5:06
  Christie: like, so it's not a trauma
• 5:09
  Ellen: when
• 5:17
  Christie: you have introduced it.
• 5:19
  Cheryl: Okay.
• 5:19
  Cheryl: You know, because the way my children, and then I see it in my grandchildren, the way they share is they simply grab it out of the old person's hand, you know?
• 5:29
  Cheryl: So then we have to back way up and.
• 5:33
  Cheryl: I can understand because I'm dealing with young grandchildren.
• 5:37
  Cheryl: It reminds me how hard it is to have little ones at that age, because you don't do it.
• 5:43
  Cheryl: You do it 800 times a month and to working on it, working on it.
• 5:48
  Cheryl: Um,
• 5:49
  Ellen: yeah, that's an exhausting parenting issue.
• 5:51
  Ellen: You are tired by the end of the day of helping your children share properly really.
• 5:56
  Danae: And
• 5:56
  Christie: nothing is simple.
• 5:57
  Christie: I mean, just passing out goldfish crackers, you think is a simple act and all of a sudden it's
• 6:02
  Danae: there can't fish to more than me.
• 6:06
  Danae: I have a question that kind of stems off of this.
• 6:08
  Danae: How do you.
• 6:10
  Danae: Teach your children about sharing without calling them a good boy or a good girl and a bad boy and a bad girl for not wanting to share.
• 6:21
  Danae: I feel like sometimes I know, unfortunately I did it, you know, they kind of resort to that.
• 6:26
  Ellen: One of the things that, um, I did, cause I know how frustrating sharing can be.
• 6:30
  Ellen: We all can relate to that.
• 6:31
  Ellen: So if somebody had something that they really liked and they didn't want to share it, that person was an allowed X amount of time to play with it.
• 6:40
  Ellen: Okay.
• 6:40
  Ellen: So you can play with this for 30 minutes and then it's shared time.
• 6:44
  Ellen: So then it kind of makes the person who has.
• 6:47
  Ellen: They get to have the joy of playing with it, but they know that an X amount, even with little ones in a little bit of time, you're going to share that with everyone
• 6:56
  Cheryl: else.
• 6:56
  Cheryl: That's really good.
• 6:57
  Cheryl: Not 30 minutes with the little ones, because 30 minutes is all day long, but in.
• 7:03
  Cheryl: And then you see them holding onto it, even though they can't even play well, because they know man, and then the whole, they set it down and then they go, I taught proprietary ownership of the blue man.
• 7:19
  Cheryl: So anyone within three days that pinks it up, I had it first.
• 7:24
  Cheryl: Right.
• 7:25
  Cheryl: So one of the phrases we have to work with and.
• 7:29
  Cheryl: Sharpening my skills with my grandchildren is I had it first.
• 7:34
  Cheryl: Isn't how we love others.
• 7:35
  Cheryl: Well, and that's not an argument.
• 7:39
  Cheryl: Um, well, how would y'all do that?
• 7:40
  Cheryl: I had it first.
• 7:42
  Cheryl: So I have right to that.
• 7:43
  Cheryl: How would y'all speak into that?
• 7:44
  Ellen: well, there was going to say it kind of goes back to the timing thing and they said, well, I have at first, okay.
• 7:49
  Ellen: You can have it first for 15.
• 7:52
  Ellen: And then pass it on.
• 7:54
  Danae: Yeah.
• 7:54
  Danae: To teach them that, having it first doesn't mean it's now there's forever.
• 7:58
  Christie: It means they get firsthand.
• 8:00
  Christie: Maybe.
• 8:01
  Cheryl: So you it's a tricky because like you were saying today, how do we not make it good girl, bad girl.
• 8:07
  Cheryl: And to do one of the things I wish I'd had this wording when my children were little is, and I've said it and I just, my grandchildren visited me.
• 8:18
  Cheryl: And I've said it 200 times in the last four months, and it's remember sharing as a way that we can love others.
• 8:26
  Cheryl: Well, so we talk, I try to talk about that's how we love others.
• 8:30
  Cheryl: It's we share, and we talk about it.
• 8:33
  Cheryl: And then the notorious two year old, you know what hers is hers and what is yours is hers.
• 8:40
  Cheryl: And then you get the older one who's playing well with something.
• 8:43
  Cheryl: And that two year old reaches right in the middle and pulls it.
• 8:46
  Cheryl: So, you know, We know that the deep down seated thing with children, but this is hard and it takes so much energy to then stop and go back and speak into it and speak into it.
• 8:59
  Cheryl: Um, but I think it's definitely worth it.
• 9:01
  Cheryl: I
• 9:01
  Christie: think on the.
• 9:03
  Christie: You know, bad boy thing, attaching the value to the act, not the person and identifying that as a kind act or an unkind act rather than a kind person.
• 9:15
  Christie: Right?
• 9:15
  Cheryl: Yeah.
• 9:15
  Cheryl: That's very good.
• 9:16
  Cheryl: And my kids again, have brought words to me that I didn't know to use when they were little, his choice, you know?
• 9:24
  Cheryl: That's not a kind choice, but again, keeping it separate from them, but they're making the choice to grab it back and push.
• 9:33
  Danae: Yeah.
• 9:34
  Danae: It kind of makes me think of, and I'll still, we talk about this, you know, in a laughing way now, but it was always the choice with you can have broccoli or you can have green beans, the choice wasn't broccoli or brownies.
• 9:47
  Cheryl: Okay, that good.
• 9:49
  Cheryl: I wish I had had you all speaking into my life.
• 9:52
  Cheryl: When I had little ones, I mean, this is good stuff.
• 9:56
  Cheryl: My okay.
• 10:02
  Cheryl: Siblings came up a lot.
• 10:03
  Cheryl: I get a lot of questions about siblings and related sort of number one.
• 10:09
  Cheryl: And we didn't even touch on it sometime.
• 10:11
  Cheryl: I'd like to do an episode and have moms of only children come in because I've been asked that question over the years.
• 10:18
  Cheryl: How do you teach an only child?
• 10:21
  Cheryl: Okay, let me move to this one.
• 10:23
  Cheryl: How do you help two siblings get along when they're complete opposites, it's been an issue all of their lives, and I thought they would grow up and out of it, the more mature and older they got.
• 10:33
  Cheryl: And now they're teens and it's worse help.
• 10:37
  Cheryl: It's just constant or anytime they're around each other, when we're driving the car, when I'm going to church, when we're having dinner, when they're doing their chores, it's like they are nitro and glycerin and I don't know how to help.
• 10:49
  Cheryl: Except just to keep them away from each other completely.
• 10:54
  Danae: That's really hard.
• 10:56
  Danae: He has something that, that helps me tremendously.
• 10:59
  Danae: When my kids were younger is learning about personalities and.
• 11:06
  Danae: You know, back in the day, that was the Myers-Briggs test.
• 11:10
  Danae: Now it's the Enneagram that I've used more, um, with my children, but it helps me a lot.
• 11:15
  Danae: My first two girls were complete opposites.
• 11:19
  Danae: We had blonde hair and blue eyes, brown hair and brown eyes, Hazel eyes.
• 11:24
  Danae: And I didn't understand how they could be so different.
• 11:27
  Danae: And I.
• 11:28
  Danae: One of them had to be right.
• 11:30
  Danae: And one of them had to be wrong.
• 11:32
  Danae: Wow.
• 11:33
  Danae: I even thought that.
• 11:35
  Danae: And so when I was introduced to the Myers-Briggs and it's the one that has the four letters and every single letter was different and you know, it.
• 11:44
  Danae: See that they thought differently, how they saw the world was differently, how they reacted was different.
• 11:51
  Danae: And that's really helped.
• 11:52
  Danae: Um, my five siblings get along and to be able to appreciate each other is to say we are all different.
• 11:59
  Danae: Look, we can, you know, read a book and look at it, you know, Google it and talk about how we see the world differently.
• 12:07
  Danae: That's something that really helped us as a family do that when they were younger.
• 12:12
  Danae: Um, I would say I can't remember the exact year, but I would say the girls were probably pretty young.
• 12:18
  Danae: I want to say eight and 10, you know, just that it, it introduced me to, it, it wasn't wasn't necessarily.
• 12:24
  Danae: They did a questionnaire as the mom.
• 12:27
  Danae: I could, there's a lot more resources now for that type type of testing, but I could just look and read and see how different they were.
• 12:35
  Danae: It helped me understand we are all created so differently.
• 12:39
  Christie: Yeah.
• 12:39
  Christie: I was going to say.
• 12:41
  Christie: We have a very similar situation.
• 12:43
  Christie: Our first two girls are extreme opposites and they shared a room and one was tidy and one was creative is very free spirited.
• 12:55
  Christie: And, um, one thing.
• 12:57
  Christie: Now they're great friends and they have a lot of appreciation for the other personality type, but it did take a long time of them acknowledging, okay.
• 13:08
  Christie: There is value in this relationship with someone completely opposite of me and yeah, we, we use the personality testing, the Myers-Briggs and any gram, and it was really helpful to see and, you know, I always told him, you're always going to have to interact with people that are opposite of you.
• 13:24
  Christie: You may marry a person that's opposite of you.
• 13:26
  Christie: You have to learn to scan.
• 13:29
  Christie: And she did.
• 13:33
  Ellen: I also found with my children, I made, um, if, if they were fighting, I would say you can use.
• 13:42
  Ellen: Choose to get along, or you don't play with your friends today.
• 13:45
  Ellen: If you can't get along with your sister or your siblings, you don't get to play well.
• 13:50
  Ellen: That was a motivation chapter.
• 13:51
  Ellen: Cause they all waited for, you know, their friends to be done with chores or whatever at the end of the day.
• 13:56
  Ellen: So they could, we always live places where there were lots of kids, so they could go hang out with all their friends.
• 14:01
  Ellen: So that was.
• 14:02
  Ellen: Most of the time, they would figure out how to work it out and be cordial to each other.
• 14:08
  Ellen: And then they knew they had the privilege to go play with the friends
• 14:12
  Cheryl: and this particular question, there's a lot more to it.
• 14:15
  Cheryl: Um, so they are now young teens, but they're just caustic and snappy and snarky at each other.
• 14:24
  Cheryl: Um, let's say.
• 14:26
  Cheryl: We didn't start early and now you've got it brewing in your family and you haven't dealt with it.
• 14:33
  Cheryl: What are some steps to help them?
• 14:35
  Cheryl: Mama says, you're talking about my children, you know, and I would say, um, two of mine that were very, very different had to share rooms together and they have that the girls have grown up to be different, best friends with each other, but we're real sure.
• 14:53
  Cheryl: We would get there.
• 14:55
  Cheryl: And so what would y'all suggest for someone who this woman.
• 14:58
  Cheryl: Just saying help me because they fight in the car.
• 15:02
  Cheryl: Elaborated one is, uh, uh, one, a very big talker and the other's not.
• 15:07
  Cheryl: And so the talker likes music, so he's just going and making noise and talking about, look at the trees.
• 15:14
  Cheryl: And so he is just extroverted and enjoying life and happily going like that, which absolutely rubs rah on his system.
• 15:23
  Cheryl: Who doesn't want the noise?
• 15:25
  Cheryl: She does.
• 15:26
  Cheryl: She will.
• 15:26
  Cheryl: Can't we just be quiet.
• 15:27
  Cheryl: I am in the car.
• 15:28
  Cheryl: She has some
• 15:28
  Danae: good headphones.
• 15:30
  Danae: Well, that's been no, but
• 15:31
  Cheryl: seriously, that's where they've gone to, but they're not working on the relationship because their
• 15:35
  Ellen: relationship is controlled.
• 15:38
  Ellen: Both of those siblings are trying to control the extroverts, trying to control.
• 15:42
  Ellen: I can do what I want to, I can sing when I want to, even if it's nothing bad or anything, they're still controlling because they're not thinking of anybody else.
• 15:50
  Ellen: Quieter person is trying to control because they want their environment to be quiet.
• 15:55
  Ellen: Yeah.
• 15:55
  Ellen: And I think that's an important thing at even a young age to start talking about.
• 15:59
  Ellen: You don't have to, you can't have control over everything.
• 16:02
  Ellen: You can't have it just your way and it's not going to be totally silent.
• 16:06
  Ellen: It's not going to be totally noisy.
• 16:07
  Ellen: And I think like on road trips, you can have limitations.
• 16:11
  Ellen: You can say to your extrovert, you can do this for about 10 minutes.
• 16:15
  Ellen: And then we always play the silent game, the quiet game.
• 16:19
  Ellen: Now it's quiet.
• 16:20
  Ellen: And you have to respect everybody.
• 16:23
  Ellen: It's time to be quiet and you can do the same during the day in your home.
• 16:26
  Ellen: If you have an extroverted kid, sometimes it's okay.
• 16:29
  Ellen: In a kind way to tell them to be quiet.
• 16:32
  Christie: Yeah.
• 16:32
  Christie: I think respect, you said respect.
• 16:34
  Christie: That's a huge, it's almost like a two-fold approach.
• 16:38
  Christie: You're talking about respecting the other person's needs and preferences, but you're also talking about acknowledging their strengths and.
• 16:47
  Christie: And respecting their strengths.
• 16:49
  Christie: And so coming at it from both ways, and then also just practically, sometimes you have to enforce those boundaries and while they're maturing and still growing into their choice of respecting one another,
• 17:03
  Cheryl: the sounds some of shy, what you just said on sharing
• 17:08
  Danae: right.
• 17:09
  Danae: I mean, it's
• 17:10
  Cheryl: the same thing.
• 17:11
  Cheryl: You're right.
• 17:12
  Cheryl: I had, at first I was talking and I had it first, so I'm just going to keep talking,
• 17:17
  Danae: which it's all countries like Ellen was talking about.
• 17:19
  Danae: We want to be the ones in charge
• 17:21
  Cheryl: and she reaches over from the backseat and says, no, I have it now.
• 17:26
  Cheryl: I want it quiet.
• 17:27
  Cheryl: I am in
• 17:27
  Danae: control.
• 17:29
  Danae: You know, I was thinking that I know this is such a hard situation and this mom sounds like.
• 17:36
  Danae: Yeah, she's pretty distraught over it, but also if you can look at it like this is an opportunity to help these young people grow into respectful humans, adults that think of others, you know, this can be an opportunity.
• 17:51
  Danae: It's like you, as the parent, you're looking at this opportunity to say, how can I help in these very, very last training years to help them go out into the world.
• 18:01
  Danae: To be loving and also to be people that other people want to be around.
• 18:06
  Danae: It's not just about the sibling relationship.
• 18:09
  Danae: It's really about who they are and who they're developing as people.
• 18:11
  Danae: Wow.
• 18:12
  Danae: I
• 18:12
  Christie: think with teens, casting vision for adulthood is really helpful because you're acknowledging I see you and I know you want to be an adult that people like to be around and just casting that vision of, I want to help you grow in that direction.
• 18:26
  Cheryl: Wow.
• 18:27
  Cheryl: Fantastic.
• 18:29
  Cheryl: That's a lot of conversations.
• 18:31
  Cheryl: Yes it
• 18:31
  Danae: is.
• 18:31
  Ellen: I think it starts really young.
• 18:33
  Ellen: We laid to lay that foundation of respect.
• 18:36
  Ellen: Cause that's why, what you're doing with your two or three-year-old, you're teaching them to respect other people's boundaries.
• 18:41
  Ellen: You may not explain that whole concept to them, but you need to know that's what you're doing.
• 18:46
  Ellen: I'm teaching my two year old to respect to that toy belonged to that other child.
• 18:51
  Ellen: And you have to respect them and ask them for it.
• 18:54
  Cheryl: Okay.
• 18:54
  Cheryl: So what I like about this.
• 18:56
  Cheryl: When I had had all of this, when mine were little is we were taught a lot of sort of behavior modification.
• 19:06
  Cheryl: You know, if you can just get them to be quiet and not fight, this is what we want, but it never touches their hearts.
• 19:12
  Cheryl: Absolutely.
• 19:13
  Cheryl: And what y'all are talking about here, this is so good.
• 19:16
  Cheryl: Whether it's the two year old, I had it first.
• 19:19
  Cheryl: Or the 12, 13 year olds who I was speaking for a second, I'm just going to keep on doing really good.
• 19:27
  Christie: And that's
• 19:27
  Ellen: what I think it's parents, especially with the younger ones, we have to think through why are we asking our kids to do these things so that we're not reacting?
• 19:36
  Ellen: Two, they're not sharing cause it's the end of the day and you're tired, but we know the reason behind what we're trying to accomplish and trying to do it in a more civil way rather than out of frustration because the reminder, okay, I'm teaching them respect,
• 19:51
  Cheryl: but the release valve is if you are at the end and you're just have nothing to get.
• 19:59
  Cheryl: It's okay.
• 20:00
  Cheryl: Cause you'll have again tomorrow,
• 20:02
  Danae: you'll get more chances.
• 20:05
  Cheryl: And so this is just today.
• 20:08
  Cheryl: Another question from a mom, I find this really interesting.
• 20:12
  Cheryl: And this mom writes, I really enjoyed my big family and we're thankful to have.
• 20:17
  Cheryl: But I just feel so absolutely stretched because I have olders and youngers and their needs and their time needs and they're talking needs and they're needing me needs seems to be constantly conflicting.
• 20:32
  Cheryl: How do I handle this?
• 20:34
  Ellen: Yeah, cause it's really mind numbing.
• 20:36
  Ellen: You go from a teenager talking about maybe relational problems or helping them with the algebra down to a first grader who just wants you to have them tie their shoe.
• 20:47
  Ellen: So sometimes you feel like your life in your brain is crazy shifting back and forth in literally
• 20:52
  Cheryl: seconds.
• 20:53
  Cheryl: I remember when, um, we had our youngest And so we had all the way up to teens and I thought, what is wrong with me?
• 21:06
  Cheryl: I it's just another child.
• 21:08
  Cheryl: Um, pretty experienced mom, why do I feel this crushing weight and stretch and all of that until I realized that's what it was, my olders needed me.
• 21:20
  Cheryl: What you're saying.
• 21:21
  Cheryl: I was.
• 21:23
  Cheryl: Across to so many worlds.
• 21:25
  Cheryl: And my mother had moved that year and she lived in town.
• 21:29
  Cheryl: And so we also had that dynamic to deal with.
• 21:32
  Cheryl: It was just so much so was being stretched.
• 21:36
  Cheryl: Okay.
• 21:37
  Cheryl: So you're talking to me.
• 21:38
  Cheryl: I'm this mom, what else?
• 21:40
  Cheryl: What else can we say from her encouraging this is the philosophy maybe or practical, what would you want?
• 21:48
  Ellen: I have just one more little thing.
• 21:50
  Ellen: That's practical.
• 21:51
  Ellen: It's okay.
• 21:52
  Ellen: Sometimes to just go, excuse me, go into your bedroom and withdraw from a little bit that, you know, we act like you're being a bad mom, if you do that, but sometimes you just need to not have a voice in your head.
• 22:04
  Ellen: Nobody needs anything.
• 22:06
  Ellen: You just make sure everything everybody's got what they want for the moment and go back for 10.
• 22:10
  Ellen: Do some deep breathings.
• 22:12
  Ellen: If you're reading a book, pop into your book for a few minutes, listen to some music, just something to go.
• 22:17
  Ellen: Okay.
• 22:18
  Ellen: I've renewed myself.
• 22:19
  Ellen: I mean, every other job you get a lunch break, you get, you know, you get 15 minutes, every couple hours as a mom, you don't, you know, we should schedule those in, but it doesn't usually
• 22:31
  Danae: happen.
• 22:33
  Danae: Ellen, you seem so.
• 22:34
  Danae: And that, and I, I think if I would have heard that as a younger mom, my, what I would say back to you, or at least what I would have said in my head is I have time.
• 22:44
  Danae: I don't have time.
• 22:45
  Danae: I never had enough time and I'm already not doing enough anyway.
• 22:48
  Danae: And if I would just do this and you know, I had so much of that kind of the guilt and feeling like, you know, I must not be doing something right.
• 22:57
  Danae: If I'm so exhausted.
• 22:59
  Danae: So how do you think.
• 23:01
  Danae: Do you feel that way when your kids are younger?
• 23:03
  Danae: Is that something just as you've gotten older, do you able to do, because
• 23:06
  Ellen: I, what was the combination of both?
• 23:08
  Ellen: I was fortunate that I had all my, my parents weren't around because we were military, but I always sought out older people, like older women and they.
• 23:20
  Ellen: Mentor me.
• 23:21
  Ellen: And so I always had someone I could go to and say, is this normal?
• 23:25
  Ellen: Or how come my kids are doing this?
• 23:27
  Ellen: Or how do I handle it?
• 23:28
  Ellen: And I was in a group with a little bit older women, but that, I mean, I was in my twenties and they were in their forties.
• 23:35
  Ellen: I am.
• 23:35
  Ellen: So it was nice.
• 23:37
  Ellen: I think we forget there's resources and lots of time older ladies.
• 23:41
  Ellen: They're not really old, but you know, that are older than you
• 23:49
  Danae: um, you
• 23:50
  Ellen: know, they're happy to help you out.
• 23:51
  Ellen: They're happy to say, oh, I remember how hard that.
• 23:55
  Ellen: But, um, I think for me that was a lot, it still was overwhelming and it was overwhelming because the list in my head was longer than I could ever accomplish in a day nor that needed to be accomplished.
• 24:07
  Ellen: And I think that's the hard part.
• 24:10
  Christie: Yeah.
• 24:11
  Christie: Okay.
• 24:12
  Christie: I heard somewhere and Denise, I think you talked about it about how kids really only need a good enough mom.
• 24:19
  Christie: And when you have a large span of needs and you can only be so much to everyone, I think that really applies here.
• 24:27
  Christie: Yeah.
• 24:28
  Danae: Yeah.
• 24:28
  Danae: I think I'm still.
• 24:30
  Danae: Kind of, that's still going around in my head.
• 24:32
  Danae: I actually heard that and I thought, no, that can't be right.
• 24:35
  Danae: No, it's not the good enough mom.
• 24:36
  Danae: I need to be the perfect mom.
• 24:38
  Danae: Right.
• 24:38
  Danae: And I definitely held myself to that standard.
• 24:41
  Danae: I think, you know, recently talked about the Pinterest perfect holiday and, and it makes me think of the Pinterest perfect mom, you know?
• 24:50
  Danae: And so, um, the good enough mom is actually what psychologists say it enough, mom is this is that.
• 24:59
  Danae: The kids' basic needs.
• 25:01
  Danae: And they're love that the kids need, but that actually, our kids need to be a little frustrated.
• 25:09
  Danae: You know, you think about the child that we're talking about, the sharing and it's, we're actually, if we're doing kind of what you were saying, like we're practicing sharing, and maybe, maybe we could afford two cookies.
• 25:22
  Danae: Okay.
• 25:23
  Danae: Each of our children could have a cookie and we think to ourselves, you know what, this is a perfect time to buy one cookie.
• 25:30
  Danae: Okay.
• 25:30
  Danae: And frustrate them a little bit because that's, what's going to help them grow.
• 25:35
  Danae: So in the area.
• 25:37
  Danae: Let's say, you know, that I'm weekend, or I don't have enough energy or enough time or enough expertise to figure this all out for my kids.
• 25:46
  Danae: That little bit of frustration helps them grow.
• 25:51
  Danae: It helps them practice growing.
• 25:53
  Danae: And like I said, I'm still, this is a new concept, but
• 25:57
  Christie: I liked really good because I'm remembering my oldest was about 14.
• 26:03
  Christie: And my youngest would have been seven cause we have a seven year span.
• 26:06
  Christie: And I remember I just felt overwhelmed with the needs that day.
• 26:11
  Christie: And I just lashed out and screamed.
• 26:13
  Christie: And I went to my bedroom just sobbing because I had done it again, you know, screaming was an issue for me.
• 26:18
  Christie: So I was always trying to work on that.
• 26:21
  Christie: And my 14 year old came in and said, We're glad you're not perfect because that relieves us from the pressure of feeling like we have to be perfect.
• 26:29
  Christie: Wow.
• 26:30
  Christie: And it was so freeing that I could model what it looks like to make a mistake and just not, not be the perfect mom and then come back and apologize and she could watch how I worked through that.
• 26:44
  Christie: And, and so I think there's a lot of truth to this.
• 26:47
  Christie: Good enough, mom.
• 26:48
  Christie: That's
• 26:48
  Cheryl: really interesting because that's what my grown children, when they come back.
• 26:53
  Cheryl: They don't say, oh, don't worry, mom.
• 26:55
  Cheryl: We know you never made a mistake.
• 26:57
  Cheryl: That's not, that's not fair, but they do say this.
• 27:01
  Cheryl: No, we watched to, what we brought out of our childhood is watching you grow and be authentic and be willing to apologize and be willing not to be perfect or pretend like I was being perfect.
• 27:17
  Cheryl: So I did not being perfect, very depressed.
• 27:20
  Cheryl: That was not hard, but just what you're saying, that our heart needs to be loving, available, that we would apologize.
• 27:30
  Cheryl: And it's really interesting.
• 27:31
  Cheryl: Maybe I can do a whole episode on this.
• 27:33
  Cheryl: Good enough mom.
• 27:34
  Cheryl: Cause I liked this idea and it's connected something that I also want us to do a episode on is the concept of grit.
• 27:42
  Cheryl: And so there's a whole big study in the book and the Ted talks and it's amazing.
• 27:47
  Cheryl: It's the inward.
• 27:48
  Cheryl: But it really is when you study what makes the difference between someone to have grit and it comes back a little bit to that frustration, right?
• 27:56
  Cheryl: Because we've got the whole snowplow parenting.
• 27:59
  Danae: How do we learn persevere?
• 28:01
  Danae: Cause I think that's when that definition, if we're not ever asking our children to persevere.
• 28:06
  Danae: Through, whether it's a two year old not having a whole cookie or it's the teenager who doesn't get to listen to the music they want in the car, you know, they're not having to stretch and grow
• 28:19
  Ellen: because what does adulthood do?
• 28:22
  Ellen: That's all we do in adults, you know?
• 28:25
  Ellen: And.
• 28:27
  Ellen: Ability to make your children elastic in a sense, the easier the transition is into adulthood.
• 28:34
  Ellen: If they're used to always having their own way, they're used to getting things the way they want.
• 28:39
  Ellen: Whether they marry or not, it doesn't matter, but they have to go out and get a job.
• 28:43
  Ellen: They have to run their life and no one's going to say, oh, well, it's okay.
• 28:47
  Ellen: I don't mind.
• 28:48
  Ellen: You don't have to pay me today.
• 28:50
  Ellen: You don't
• 28:51
  Danae: have to share.
• 28:52
  Danae: Yeah.
• 28:53
  Danae: Thinking back to this question about the big family, just to kind of bring it back to that is what about including conversations with the.
• 29:03
  Danae: Those teenagers, those older children and say, you know, sister who's four year old needs these certain things.
• 29:11
  Danae: This is what a four year old needs in their lives.
• 29:14
  Danae: I need to make sure she has healthy food and make sure she gets to bed on time.
• 29:18
  Danae: Remember those lovely stories?
• 29:19
  Danae: I would tell you, I mean, we want to make sure she has that and maybe an asking them, how can we.
• 29:25
  Danae: As this family that looks different than when you were four, you know, how do we together make sure that those younger kids, you know, get
• 29:36
  Christie: okay.
• 29:36
  Christie: I think too, as a firstborn, I have to stand up for the older kids.
• 29:42
  Christie: I also think it's important to say to the four year old, Hey, when you're 14, there's special things that you need from your mama.
• 29:49
  Christie: And so I'm going to have to do this with your sister.
• 29:51
  Christie: And so when you're 14, you will.
• 29:54
  Christie: Want those things for me too.
• 29:56
  Danae: So it's having just an open conversation in the family instead of the mom.
• 30:01
  Danae: Trying to think she needs to do it all and be at all right for all the ages and your
• 30:05
  Ellen: 14 year old can do the thing that you're not able to.
• 30:09
  Ellen: I know.
• 30:09
  Ellen: Cause we had that.
• 30:10
  Ellen: We have a 12 year old, we have five kids with 12 year age gap.
• 30:13
  Ellen: Well the older kids could read the book to the younger child while I was doing something with another one.
• 30:19
  Ellen: So you could stay
• 30:20
  Danae: up till midnight and talk about other things,
• 30:25
  Cheryl: but what you're saying, Christina, Sympathy now I utilize my older ones a lot, and I'm afraid they may have felt kind of marginalized and.
• 30:36
  Cheryl: You know, wow, I've got built in babysitter.
• 30:38
  Cheryl: I've got all this where they're having to take all the gaps
• 30:42
  Christie: just because they're, self-sufficient physically and practically the needs are deep,
• 30:47
  Cheryl: which is a great thing.
• 30:48
  Cheryl: And the horrible thing is a time is out on this week.
• 30:55
  Cheryl: So I love this format.
• 30:59
  Cheryl: Please send us your questions because these came from just a few moms and I have a whole list here, but we want more.
• 31:06
  Cheryl: And some of these, I think, may become episodes.
• 31:09
  Cheryl: Like I said, so you can DM us on social media.
• 31:13
  Cheryl: You can, um, text or email to contact@theparentingpodcast.com or go to our website.
• 31:22
  Cheryl: All these ways we need to hear from you because we want to stay relevant.
• 31:27
  Cheryl: And we want to speak into what your yes.
• 31:31
  Danae: Yeah.
• 31:32
  Danae: And I was thinking of Ellen was talking about having the older women in her life and having the mentors.
• 31:37
  Danae: And I thought here we are, we're sitting around and, and talking about these things.
• 31:42
  Danae: So if you have your questions, we'd love to, to help you out with those.
• 31:46
  Danae: Yeah.
• 31:47
  Danae: The
• 31:47
  Cheryl: point.
• 31:48
  Cheryl: So remember moms, whatever you're seasoned, hang in there.
• 31:53
  Cheryl: Keep loving, keep persevering because it's worth it.
• 31:57
  Cheryl: Yes, it is.