Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #1098 - Check In, Don't Check Out

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#1098 - Check In, Don't Check Out · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast.
• 0:07
  Speaker 2: It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: once answers, Now.
• 0:13
  Speaker 3: I'll do bet it' tomorrow.
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: That's what we're doing today on the Happy Families Podcast. Hello,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: I'm doctor justin Coursla.
• 0:18
  Speaker 3: I'm here with my wife Mum to our six kids. Missus.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Happy Families, Kylie, Kylie. We've got heaps to talk about today.
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: It's just well.
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: School holidays in Queensland finished two weeks ago, ahead of
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: the pack. Queensland is very rarely ahead of the pack.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know if I should say that out loud
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: or not, but Queensland usually lags a little bit when
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: it comes to most things in Australia.
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: Although, although with.
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: An upcoming election in Queensland and house prices surging to
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: the second most expensive in the country, I think Queensland
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: is becoming the new second best state in the nation,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: right behind New South Wales. Maybe it's just the second
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: most expensive.
• 0:53
  Speaker 3: I don't know if that. I don't know if that's
• 0:54
  Speaker 3: good or bad.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: No, I don't need to anyway, how do I get there?
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: Let's go back to the topic older bit tomorrow. This
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: is where we look at the week or weeks in
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: our case just now that have been and talk about
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: what we're doing right, what we're doing wrong, and help
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: can with better parents.
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: Kylie, do you want to go first on me?
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: We'll go over the last term or so. We've talked
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: a lot on the podcast about family meetings and getting
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: things right, yes, and we've also shared alongside that the
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: importance of checking and with each of your children individually
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: and as a husband and wife team. And I had
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: an experience just recently which really highlighted just how important
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: it is to tap in with your kids.
• 1:34
  Speaker 3: Okay, I'm intrigued with.
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: You traveling as much as you have over the last
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: handful of months. I feel like I have been treading
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: water at best, and not doing a great job at it.
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: I feel more exhausted and more stretched than I have
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: in a very, very long time, and as a result,
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: I've missed a lot of cues when it comes to
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: the kids, and I've actually been really grateful that for
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: the most part, they've kind of been parenting themselves.
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: I don't like where this is going carry on, but.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: I decided to check in with one of our kids
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: because she just didn't have a skip it as a
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: step in the way she usually does. And as we
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: got talking, same three questions that we go through with
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: our family meetings, what's going well in your life right now?
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: What's not? And how can you do better? Or how
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: can we better?
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: What's going on?
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: And she talked about the things that were going well,
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: and there wasn't a huge list, but once we got
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: to the things that weren't going well, the thing that
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: she said to me was she just felt like she
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: kind of got missed a little bit because she's not
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: a demanding child. She just kind of got left to
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: her own devices, and it really felt like a little
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: bit of an uppercut for me as a mum who
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: is trying really really hard to be available to her kids.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: But recognizing with my own limitations that I have actually
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: been grateful that she's just been getting on with life
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: and doing her own thing. And at that point she
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: didn't actually have anything that she really needed to chat
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: to me about, but I was so grateful for the
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: reminder that I just need to check in. So fast
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: forward a couple of weeks last week, I found her
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: it just really snappy, and I thought I need to
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: check in, So I tapped in with her and I
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: asked her what was going on, and she didn't want
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: to say anything. She didn't want to talk to me.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: And maybe about fifteen twenty minutes later, you tapped in,
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: tried to see if you could make some progress there,
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: and she still didn't want to say anything. And then
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: I sat down for dinner. Everybody else had kind of
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: gone to their corners of the house and things had
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: quietened down, and she just sat there and I looked
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: at her and I said, I feel like you want
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: to talk to me, And it all just came out.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: Weeks and weeks and weeks of angst things that she's
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: just been holding on to, just hasn't been able to
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: kind of find the right words or find the right
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: time to be able to have a chat with me about.
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: And I just, of all the things that I could
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: have been doing at that time, that was probably not
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: the thing that I wanted to be doing. It was
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: nearly nine o'clock at night. I was exhausted.
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure the owners that you wanted to be
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: doing was sleeping right then now.
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: But I was so grateful that I had tapped in
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: with her a few weeks ago, and she had just
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: reminded me of just how important it is as a
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: parent to be available.
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: So this reminds me of two or three quick stories,
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: and I know that I'll do better tomorrow is about
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: our parenting, But it just strikes me so profoundly as
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: you talk about this. Number one friend mentor wonderful man
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: Professor H. Wallace Goddard, who is a family life specialist
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: in the United States. He talks regularly about how sometimes
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: we ask the kids how they're doing, and we don't
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: need to ask at all.
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: All you have to do is look at them and
• 4:46
  Speaker 3: they're telling you already.
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  Speaker 1: Look at their face, look at their shoulders, look at
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: the way they're moving their bodies, or the energy that
• 4:52
  Speaker 1: they're exuding.
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  Speaker 3: Or not putting out at all.
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  Speaker 1: There's a pretty good signal right there as to how
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: they're doing. Second thing, just the power of emotional availability,
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: recognizing what you recognized, pausing and saying is now a
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: good time to chat? Is there anything you want to
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: let me know about? That simple act and being willing
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: to sit there and go through it is so profoundly important.
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: And the third thing that jumped into my mind was
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: a story from somebody that attended one of my very.
• 5:19
  Speaker 3: First ever workshops.
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: I'm talking twenty years ago. When I very first beget.
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: I didn't have any qualifications, but I knew that I
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: was heading in this direction. And so I started running
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: these this series of workshops about parenting. And there was
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: a mum who showed up on the second week. The
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: previous week's assignment had been to be emotionally available to
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: your kids. So she's out mowing the lawn the next day,
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: hot Queensland day, dust everywhere, and her seven year old
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: daughter wants to talk to her, and she doesn't want
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: to stop the law more because well she's mowing and
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: it's hot and it's dusty, and the seven year old
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: can wait. But she remembers the promise that she made
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: in the workshop the night before to be emotionally available
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: to the kids, and so she turns off the mud
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: and says to her daughter, what do you want?
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: And her daughter here.
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: Is in the tone this frustration and says, doesn't matter.
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: My mom says, no, no, no, no, it does matter.
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: It does matter.
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  Speaker 1: I want to be available. So they go and sit
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: on a rock and she says, tell me, what is
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: it that you wanted to ask? And this little seven
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: year old looks at her mom and says, Mommy, I
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: just feel like I don't fit in our family. And
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: I love this story because it highlights again the willingness
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: that we It's so inconvenient. There's no other way to
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: say it. Parenting is inconvenient. It's annoying. As parents, we
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: sacrifice so much, and yet you have that moment where
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: you sit down with your little one and they do
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: open up and they do share because they're ready and
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: because you were available, And I mean, I haven't asked
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: for the end yet, but hopefully you get a good outcome.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: Right.
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  Speaker 1: There's that closeness, there's that connection, there's progress as a result.
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: It would be very easy for me to sit there
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: and actually kind of beerate myself for having missed so
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: many signals from the last couple of months while you've
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: been gone. But I also recognize the immense pressure that
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: I was under, and I'm going to be kind to
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: myself and just acknowledge that I can't be everywhere and
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: be everything to everyone and every moment. But I'm really
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: really grateful for the constant reminders that we have as
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: we check in with each other of the importance of
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: being able to spend that one or one time, this
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: particular child, she actually will not come out and say
• 7:23
  Speaker 2: she needs to talk to you, but she'll hover. And
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: I'm seeing that more and more as she gets older,
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: that she just she kind of just she's there, and
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: if you are not attentive, it's just like an annoying
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: fly on the wall kind of feeling. Do you know
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: what I mean? They're there, they're not doing anything, they're
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: not requesting anything of you, but they're just they're just there.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: They're in your space. But as I have been able
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: to spend that time with her, check in with her,
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: ask her what's going well, what's not going well, she's
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: really been able to just articulate for me that what
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: she needs is to feel seen, and that means that
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: when she's in my space, she actually wants me. Our
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: kids warned us in their space. It doesn't matter how
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: old they are, they want us in their space.
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: This is why I'll still call our parents.
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: It's like yeah, And sometimes they don't know how to
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: ask for it because what they see is we're too busy,
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: so they don't want to be a burden, they don't
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: want to get in our space, and yet they're in
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: our space. So I was really grateful for and I'm
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: going to take it as a win because, in spite
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: of my lack of availability for her in the past
• 8:34
  Speaker 2: few months, we've been able to tap in and really
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: connect on such a beautiful note and being able to
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: kind of help her work through some challenges.
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: So many great take home messages. They're my favorite one.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: Being kind to yourself and not getting it right all
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: the time.
• 8:47
  Speaker 3: I just think that's so important.
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: What's your story today?
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: You know me, I don't have one. I have several.
• 9:00
  Speaker 3: First off, you.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: Know that you added a few stories to my life.
• 9:04
  Speaker 3: But I just love what I do. I love to
• 9:06
  Speaker 3: get to talk about this stuff. There's so much that
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: we need to highlight. Three things.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: First of all, the Americanization of our children is complete.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: Just wanted to highlight that thanks to Instagram and TikTok
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: and snapchat and everything else that.
• 9:18
  Speaker 3: The world now has.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: The other day, we were goofing off in the living
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: room and Lily, our fourteen year old, said, oh, no,
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: call nine one one. It wasn't called triple ow, it
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: was called nine one one. Now, I wasn't a real emergency.
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: We didn't need to call anyone, But that was the joke,
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: but she and she meant it seriously. And when I
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: looked at her and said nine one one, and she said, yeah,
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: we need the ambulance and I said that's not who
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: we call, and she looked at me strangely for three
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: or four seconds, and then there's that, you know, the
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: literal light bulb goes on in the eyes, and like, oh.
• 9:53
  Speaker 3: Triple zero.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: I forgot. So that was just I mean, it's not
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: really an older but it tomorrow more of just what
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: in the world is going on with our kids when
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: they really I wonder how many Australians really do call
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: nine one one. It got me thinking I might google
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: that letter and find out what I can. I had
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: a conversation with our daughter who's en Canada at the
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: moment twenty one years twenty one, Yeah, she's twenty one
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: or about to be twenty one, and we were talking
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: about the loss of my grandpa. He passed away, as
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: we mentioned on the podcast a couple of months ago,
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: and she was really serious about it and just said, Daddy,
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: I don't ever want you to die, and it was
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: really heartfelt. And then she said this, and I wrote
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: it down because it touched me so profoundly almost I
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: almost burst into tears talking to her. She said, when
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: you died, Daddy, I'm getting in the grave and holding
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: your hand forever.
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: How do you respond to that.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: I'm just I get weepy just thinking about it. So
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: that was again, probably not so much, and I'd do
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: about it tomorrow. But I guess when we build that
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: relationship over the years, that's what we that's what we're
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: aiming for, right I was like, please, don't get into
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: the grave. You need to let go up my hand.
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: It's going to be kind of gross after a couple
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: of days of being dead. Anyway, the butt it tomorrow
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: that I wanted to share it was a really simple one,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: and that is that during the holidays, we've had a
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: recurring theme on this podcast, and that is that we
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: don't do a lot of these particularly well. We have
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: had some really good family getaways, but quite often you
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: leave the comfort of your home and the space of
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: your home and go somewhere else and you go into
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: a tent or a cabin or a hotel room. So
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: you've got about one tenth of the space you normally have.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: You don't have any of the usual things that make
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: life comfortable that you have accumulated at home and then
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: you try to live and have an awesome time. We
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: had Coughs Harbor family holiday and we gave up halfway through.
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: Well not only that when the kids started, because why
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: did we come to Coffs Harbor. The last three holidays
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: and coughs have been terrible. The first time we got
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: absolutely rained out. The second one you broke you back
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: and we got rained out again.
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: This time got rained out. So we were wrapped up
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: the holiday two days early. And you had planned and
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: she had down south to Wollongong, to a place that
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: we loved. We lived there for a decade. I came
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: home with Annie, so you had five days I think
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: down south with the other kids while I was at
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: home with Annie, our seventeen year old. And on the
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: way home we were talking about stuff, and for some reason,
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: the Hunchback of Notre Dame came up, the Disney movie
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: and she said, can we watch it? So we watched it,
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: and then the next night we watched The Emperor's New Group,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: and then the next night we watched Wreck at Ralph.
• 12:25
  Speaker 3: I just had a boy, what's going on?
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: You won't watch movies with us? When we have family night.
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: I hate watching movies, but for whatever reason, do you
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: know what it was? I had nothing else to do, Like,
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: there was just me and Annie. Life was so quiet,
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: it was so cool.
• 12:42
  Speaker 3: It was amazing. Anyway.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: I just loved hanging out with our seventeen year old
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: daughter and watching some fun movies and cooking meals together
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: and cleaning the kitchen together and having a really quite quiet,
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: easy time. That one on one time is just precious.
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: Didn't do anything hardcore, didn't have any profound conversations or
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: anything like that. It was just time together watching some
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: of my favorite Disney cartoons.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: And I think that that is the big lesson here.
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: Will you think that our kids need a big, flashy
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: holidays and you know, kind of adventure seeking activities.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: Take them nowhere. Just watch them Disney and you'd be right.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: Is that what you're saying?
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: No, they just warnt us.
• 13:24
  Speaker 3: Yeah they do.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: They actually just want us.
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: I've done this too many times, but I'm going to
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: do it one more time. We had some friends many
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: years ago who took their kids on a big trip
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: to the United States. They were gone for five or
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: six weeks, came home and the city in which they lived.
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: There was one of those free buses where you jump
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: on the bus and go around the city, and there
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: was a day before school, and so the dad decided
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: to take the kids on the bus so mum could unpack,
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: get the house in order, and just have the kids
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: out from under her feet and have some breathing room.
• 13:49
  Speaker 3: She was happy to do it.
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: They were happy with that division of labor. Next day,
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: they're heading into the school yard. The teacher says, how's
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: your big trip, because the teacher knew that they'd gone
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: away for that long because they missed extra school. And
• 13:59
  Speaker 1: the kids said it was amazing. And the teacher said,
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: what was the favorite part of the holidays? And the
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: kids said, yesterday, I'm the.
• 14:04
  Speaker 3: Freebus with dad.
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: It's like, what did I spend the forty grand for
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: fifty grand?
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: Whatever it was.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: Anyway, we really hope that you've gotten some good value
• 14:14
  Speaker 1: out of these ideas, these stories, and these take home messages.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: The Happy Families podcast returns on Monday. Thank you so
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: much for listening, have a wonderful, wonderful weekend. We appreciate
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. He produces the podcast, and
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: if you'd like more information, about making your family happier.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: You'll find it all at happy families dot com, dot
• 14:32
  Speaker 1: a