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Why the Hardest Parenting Days End Up Being the Sweetest · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: What are the things that drove you crazy then as
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: a parent, But it breaks your heart a bit now
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: that that moment has gone. The kids grow up so fast.
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Stay with us. Hello, Welcome to a Happy Families podcast, Real
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: parenting solutions every day on Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast,
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: we are Justin and Kylie Coulson Today. A little bit
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  Speaker 1: of nostalgia, a little bit of is reverie the right word?
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  Speaker 1: Some reflection, an opportunity to look back on the things
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: that make parenting so hard and yet make it so
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  Speaker 1: meaningful and purposeful. Kylie, I jumped onto Facebook and asked
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  Speaker 1: this question. You know what everyone said? Pretty much every
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  Speaker 1: single answer we had.
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  Speaker 2: Miss pretty much. Toddley is, Yeah, that's right.
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  Speaker 1: I miss I missed when I was exhausted. I missed
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  Speaker 1: when my children were biting, kicking, scratching, when they wouldn't
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  Speaker 1: eat the food and threw stuff all over the floor.
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  Speaker 1: I miss those days. I miss the thinking was I'm
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  Speaker 1: read going nah?
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  Speaker 2: No, there were some great ones. There was reading the
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  Speaker 2: same book over and over again. I missed that bedtime
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  Speaker 2: routine where you're going through the motions and trying so
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  Speaker 2: desperately to have everything calm and your kids are bouncing
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  Speaker 2: on the bed and just having a ball. And you
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  Speaker 2: know the sass and the sticky fingers, the doorlet training,
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  Speaker 2: oh my gosh, toilet training. You know, lying with your
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  Speaker 2: children when you're trying to pat them to sleep and
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  Speaker 2: you've got to try and hide from them, or trying
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  Speaker 2: to work out where the creaky floorboard is that you
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  Speaker 2: don't stomp on it as you walk out the door. Yeah.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, I get some of the nostalgia with some
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  Speaker 1: of those, but for most of them, I'm just glad
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  Speaker 1: that we're not dealing with it anymore now that we've
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  Speaker 1: got a granddaughter. I love not having to deal with
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  Speaker 1: most of this stuff. I just love the cuddles and
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  Speaker 1: the fun stuff. But I already loved that, and I'm
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: literally asking the question, what did drive you crazy? But
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  Speaker 1: now you miss it? And I love some of the
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  Speaker 1: answers that you gave. Is there anything for you?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 1: There is.
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  Speaker 2: There's a couple. The first one is that curious toddler
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  Speaker 2: who wants to know why as as a young parent
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  Speaker 2: who felt so time poor and so frazzled most of
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  Speaker 2: the time. Another why just often would send me over
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  Speaker 2: the edge and Yet I think back to those years
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  Speaker 2: and what was so beautiful about that was our kid's
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  Speaker 2: desperate desire for connection and curiosity. They want to understand
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  Speaker 2: the world around them, firstly, but they trust that you've
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  Speaker 2: got the answers. And now we've got teenagers who number one.
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  Speaker 1: They know everything, they're not curious about they're at all.
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  Speaker 2: And we definitely don't have all the answers. So I
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  Speaker 2: do I really miss those times and how no one
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  Speaker 2: how much easier their questions were that secondly, the desire
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  Speaker 2: to connect.
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  Speaker 1: I've got one for you. This is going to be
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  Speaker 1: weird because I complained about it incessantly, and I think
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  Speaker 1: if I had to start doing it again, which we
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  Speaker 1: won't because our kids are older, but if I had
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: to start doing it again, I would complain again. And
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  Speaker 1: yet it's still one of my favorite memories, and those
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  Speaker 1: when our children wouldn't go to sleep, and I would
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  Speaker 1: have to go into the bedroom and I would lay
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  Speaker 1: on the floor and put my arm up and through
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  Speaker 1: the bars of the cot and I would pat them
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  Speaker 1: off to sleep, and usually I would fall asleep on
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  Speaker 1: the floor beside them and wake up at eleven thirty
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  Speaker 1: or one am. And you wouldn't come and get me
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  Speaker 1: because you were so exhausted that you would fall asleep
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  Speaker 1: waiting for me to finish patting them off and come
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  Speaker 1: to bed. So I'd just wake up with a crick
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  Speaker 1: in my neck and having slept on the carpet, having
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  Speaker 1: slept on the floor for an hour or two or
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  Speaker 1: three or four. For some reason, as much as I
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  Speaker 1: hated that, I kind of it breaks my heart that
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  Speaker 1: I don't get to lay on the floor and pat
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  Speaker 1: my kids off to sleep anymore. But is that we
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  Speaker 1: It feels weird saying it, and yet it's how I feel.
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  Speaker 2: Well. I don't really miss that at all. I'm very
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  Speaker 2: grateful to be sleeping in my own bed again, but
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  Speaker 2: I did used to get really really frustrated with the
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: kids coming into our bed at three am or whatever time.
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  Speaker 1: And I don't miss that.
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  Speaker 2: They'd kick you in the back, and they'd sleep sideways
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  Speaker 2: and you'd end up with a bum in your face,
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  Speaker 2: like all the things. And again, I guess for me,
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  Speaker 2: it's just the acknowledgment that they knew and felt so
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  Speaker 2: safe with us, and again just knew that when they
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  Speaker 2: needed reassurance, there was a safe place to go. I
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  Speaker 2: love that they knew that, but at the time I
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  Speaker 2: absolutely hated it.
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  Speaker 1: I got one more for you, one more, and I
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  Speaker 1: think you're going to think this is a weird one.
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  Speaker 1: But now that our children are older, so we often
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  Speaker 1: now I shouldn't say often, but with a lot more
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  Speaker 1: regularity than ever before. We have the house to ourselves
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  Speaker 1: some evenings, maybe one maybe two nights a week. The
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  Speaker 1: kids are all out and one child's running another child
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  Speaker 1: who doesn't have a license around the place, and we
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  Speaker 1: can delegate that responsibility and they're happy to be out
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  Speaker 1: and driving, listen to music in the car and driving
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  Speaker 1: their siblings around, and so we'll be at home. We
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  Speaker 1: get to have dinner alone once or twice a week,
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  Speaker 1: maybe once a week, no kids. I know that when
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  Speaker 1: we go out for dinner or when we get to
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  Speaker 1: have a date night, and we look at each other
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  Speaker 1: and go, oh, the peace and quiet, How good is it?
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  Speaker 1: But it's kind of different when you have an event
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  Speaker 1: where you go out and have dinner versus you're sitting
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  Speaker 1: at home and it's just the two of you without
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  Speaker 1: the kids. There's no noise, there's no conversation, there's no
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  Speaker 1: discussion about it.
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  Speaker 2: Sounds like Heaven to me, I might have a few
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  Speaker 2: more years before I'm going to be in the same
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  Speaker 2: position you're Maybe that's because for me, I still feel
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  Speaker 2: like I'm very much actively parenting.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess so. And we are making it hard
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: for ourselves because we had six kids and there's only
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  Speaker 1: with a fifteen year age gap, our youngest being eleven.
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  Speaker 1: We've got an almost two year old granddaughter running around
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  Speaker 1: the place as well, so the house is starting to
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  Speaker 1: get that toddlery feel again. We've had to lift everything
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  Speaker 1: off the bottom shelves and there's toddled toys around. But
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  Speaker 1: I know it's just the noise. The noise. We don't
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  Speaker 1: get it, and.
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  Speaker 2: You clearly are away way too much because there is
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  Speaker 2: noise in our house.
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  Speaker 1: I miss it, like I.
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  Speaker 2: Think the neighbors sometimes think someone's being murdered, and that's
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  Speaker 2: when they're singing. Yeah, that's right.
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  Speaker 1: So that's kind of me. Is there anything else that's
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  Speaker 1: on you? This might be the world's shortest podcast we've
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: ever done. Is there anything else from you?
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  Speaker 2: The last one for me is play Hats in the Park.
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  Speaker 2: I used to really really struggle with going along to
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  Speaker 2: the park and letting the kids play and just kind
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  Speaker 2: of being present because I would literally be doing a
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  Speaker 2: mental take of what I still had to do when
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  Speaker 2: I got home. And often those playdates would last for hours.
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  Speaker 2: Because we're all stay at home mums, we were looking
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  Speaker 2: for something to keep our kids occupied so they weren't
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  Speaker 2: destroying the house or we weren't having to deal with
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  Speaker 2: the ongoing challenge on our own. And while there were
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  Speaker 2: moments where I really appreciated it, for the most part,
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  Speaker 2: I actually resented it because there were so many other
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  Speaker 2: things I would have liked to have been doing. But now,
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  Speaker 2: as a woman in my mid forties, I recognize the
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  Speaker 2: absolute privilege and blessing it is to have women in
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  Speaker 2: your village. I think that with the changes that have
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  Speaker 2: occurred in society in general, most families have two incomes
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  Speaker 2: mums working as well as dad, it's getting harder and
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  Speaker 2: harder for women to come together and spend time together
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  Speaker 2: building that village, building that community, and I miss it.
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  Speaker 1: And it's also the downtime ride. Like so much focus
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  Speaker 1: on efficiency and getting stuff done, imagine being able to
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  Speaker 1: just go and sit in the park and enjoy it
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  Speaker 1: and watch the kids and not have that feeling of pressure.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, totally need. And when I think about that specifically,
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  Speaker 2: one of your followers actually said something so profound in
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  Speaker 2: relation to that post. She said, I wish I loved
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  Speaker 2: it more when I was in it, but I just
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  Speaker 2: didn't have the perspective. And I remember so many times, older,
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  Speaker 2: more mature parents would see us struggling up to our
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  Speaker 2: elbows in mess and kids and sass and the whole thing,
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  Speaker 2: and they would look at us with fondness and say,
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  Speaker 2: one day you'll miss it. You'll miss it, but your
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  Speaker 2: wish that you'd loved it, And we would both look
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  Speaker 2: at each other and go, they have no idea what
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  Speaker 2: they're talking about, but the reality is there is a
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  Speaker 2: part of me that deeply, deeply wishes that I recognized
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  Speaker 2: it and appreciate it for what it was in the moment.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: Well, normally, I've got to take home message the key takeaway,
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  Speaker 1: I think you've just nailed it. Soak up the moments,
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  Speaker 1: even the hard ones, be present. One day you look
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  Speaker 1: back and you'll miss even the stuff that you can't
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  Speaker 1: believe that you you would miss. The Happy Families podcast
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  Speaker 1: is produced by Justin Rouland from Bridge Media. If you'd
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: like more information and more resources to make your family happier.
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: We'd love for you to visit us at happy families
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: dot com dot au, and we'll link to that Facebook
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: post in the show notes