Understanding Parenting Self-Doubt with Dr. Laura Froyen

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Dr.Laura Froyen

Mom, Child Development Expert, POdcaster

Are you struggling with negative thoughts that take a toll on your mental health as a mother?

Laura and I discuss simple ways to gain valuable space from habitual, obsessive, and intrusive thoughts (listen to the full episode below). We suffer from all types of different thinking patterns as humans. And when you are under the stress of parenthood, these patterns can swing more to the negative than they may have in the past.

Every few episodes, I invite a guest to answer a reader’s question - do you have one? Fill out the form below, and I will bring in an expert to answer it.

OUR QUESTION TODAY WAS THE FOLLOWING:

Why am I always failing My Children?

Here are some takeaways from our conversation…

Sometimes our thoughts can seem true - maybe like: our kid's behavior reflects how “good” or “bad” of a parent we may be. Read more below as we talk about temperament, personality, and our innocent search for worthiness within our children’s childhoods.

I shared with Laura that I had recently had a tough morning that ended in a Mom Trantrum (I wrote more about it here), and the only thing that I could think of for the next day or so is, Why am I failing them!? It was such a believable thought because my children’s behavior was bad; therefore, I was bad or failing them somehow, like there was proof of my failure in their horrible behavior.

Dr.Laura: We think (our habitual bad mom thoughts) are supported. We look at our kids behavior and take it as evidence that supports our negative or disordered thinking. Absolutely yeah. Okay so first of all I just want to send you a little bit of love and compassion to you. I mean I think we've all had those moments and I don't think you can do this work of trying to parent differently without having that fear be there. It's there because if it wasn't this wouldn't matter so much to us. Taking that as evidence you could also take the fact that thought is there as evidence that you actually do care and you're actually doing something right.

I also think it's really important that when those thoughts come out, those are deeply vulnerable thoughts and for me when I would have had thoughts like that in the past and expressed sadness a pain or worry to my parents I would have gotten dismissed as a young child and so I find that it's really important for me now as an adult when those vulnerable thoughts and worries come up that I don't perpetuate that dismissal on myself.

So how do we separate our parenting outcomes and our child’s behavior? They seem so intertwined.

Dr.Laura: We do use our kids’ behavior as evidence for our success in parenting and it's one of the biggest mistakes that you can make. One thing that can be really helpful when it comes to restructuring and reorganizing thoughts is to think about the validity of the evidence that we're using to support them. It’s so important to remember that just like for us, the knowing of the right thing to do and the being able to do the right thing are two separate things. They're paralleled like train tracks. They don't necessarily intersect. They run next to each other.

The same is true for kids and so all of our parenting for the most part is teaching your children how to know what the right thing to do is — but that doesn't necessarily mean that they're always going to be able to do the right thing because behavior is not just driven by what they know. Behavior is driven by impulses by executive functioning, cognitive and brain development. There's so much that goes into a child's behavior at any given moment: Have they eaten? Did they sleep, or did they have a bad dream? Did they get in a fight with a friend? You know, or all those things combined — just like they do for us and so using our kids behavior at a birthday party to mean something about our parenting, there's a big disconnect there.

I see the disconnect because I have two children with two different personalities, and although sometimes they do act similarly they are their own people. And even though they are growing up in the same house with the same parents, they don’t act the same. Their behavior is different.

Dr.Laura: And they were also born with a temperament and have a personality that's theirs - and you do too. There’s something called Goodness of Fit at play as well here. There will be greater harmony between parents and children when either those temperaments are a natural fit for each other or the parent is able to see the child's temperament and make adjustments, to kind of support them. So that ‘goodness of fit’ piece is there and then acknowledging that there will be children and parents who have temperaments for whom they are is there's rubbing there's they don't necessarily rub along smoothly next to each other and and that is also important to recognize.

That doesn't mean the child doesn't love you. This doesn't mean the parent doesn't love the child. All this means is “hey you know what we kind of butt heads with each other” by the roll of the genetic dice.

We have to take some of the importance of our “role” out of the equation. Yes, we are very important to our children, but in the end, whether they grow up to be wonderful people or not is not totally up to us. Dr.Laura also suggested that if you are interested in this topic, the book The Gardner and the Carpenter by Alison Gopnik is top-notch.

SOME OTHER TAKEAWAYS FROM OUR CONVERSATION:

• If you are interested in these ideas and curious about learning more, this part of psychology is called Cognitive Behavioral Theory.

• Intrusive thoughts can be normal for many people, but if you just had a baby and feel like it’s more than that, here’s an article that I wrote with Dr.Laura about PostPartum Anxiety and what to look for in those first few months: Postpartum Anxiety Quiz: Better Understand Your Symptoms

• Gain distance from habitual or obsessive thoughts by writing them down. Laura keeps what she calls a “Rage Journal.” Doing this can help you see what is most important about the thoughts and what they are trying to tell you — and how irrational they can sometimes be!

Find out more about Dr.Laura Froyen on her website, laurafroyen.com, and she will send you a free self-compassion exercise to try with your family.

Make sure to listen to the episode for a whole lot more information! - Stef

Listen to the Full Episode Here:

Moonlight Gratitude with Emily Silva

Podcast Guest:

Emily Silva

Coach, Author: Moonlight Gratitude

Are you struggling to add new routines that support your mental health as a mother? Are you feeling ashamed about not being able to stick with new habits? Discover how to add gratitude to your routine with guest Emily Silva of SoulsAdventures.com. Emily and I discuss simple ways to make new routines stick and answer a reader’s question.

Every few episodes, I invite a guest to answer a reader’s question - do you have one? Fill out the form below, and I will bring in an expert to answer it.

OUR QUESTION TODAY WAS THE FOLLOWING:

Why can’t I add a nightly gratitude routine?

Here are some takeaways from our conversation…

I've been doing gratitude forever and I have a great morning routine. It's very solid. But I can't practice gratitude or get into a routine at night and so this week’s question was acutally from me!

I think I've tried for 4 years to have a nourishing nighttime routine. And to give you a little back history, I used to drink at night, but I don’t anymore. I also used to have that “mom coping time” where it was finally quiet, the kids are asleep, there was no one demanding anything from me and so I'm going to have a couple of drinks and I'm going to scroll. Maybe you know it.

By the time I would hit the pillow I was exhausted and I was not sober, right? So I thought maybe that was the reason I didn't have an evening gratitude practice because I was in an altered state. However, recently I did a no-sugar diet and I cut alcohol. When I came back from the diet I decided not to drink before bed anymore. So I completely changed my habits. Now I make myself a cup of tea and then I read before bed. But even with these new habits I still couldn’t add in a gratitude practice. What should I do?

Emily: Well it sounds like you have a bedtime routine. The thing you just told me is your routine is reading and a cup of tea, that is your routine. You do it every single night. And so if you want to add gratitude to your routine that you already have, you just have to pair it. So before you open the book do your gratitude.

This shocked me because it was so simple. Of course, it you have a reward you can introduce a new aspect of a routine much easier. And the thing I like the most about my routine is the reading. So it becomes my reward. In the morning, I have always stuck to my routine because I get up 1 hour earlier than the rest of the household. And the QUIET and peacefulness of the house is my reward.

Emily: I think with habits we need to reward ourself. It's not like you're punishing yourself with the routine. It's just training yourself and so the reward is the next chapter of your book. To answer your question more generally: Why it's hard to practice gratitude at night? It’s hard because our day is done and we just went through the entire thing. And so I think sometimes we can get ourselves to bed and we're so tired that it's like I can't even do a thing. I can't even open a book and write down something. So if you're at that point, as you're going off to sleep just think of the one thing - like one magic moment of the day.

It doesn't even have to be magic. It could be just something that made you smile and I think the expectations we place on routine, morning routine, night routine, wherever we're at in our schedule — it sets us up for failure because you already have a routine, the expectation makes it feel like you don’t.

I asked Emily how she established a morning routine since she is more of a night owl:

Coffee. Using a drink in the morning or even in the evening is like pairing routine with a reward as well. Like I'm not going to have my glass of wine until I have my gratitude done. I'm not going to have my tea or coffee in the AM or I'm not going to read my next chapter. Whatever it is, we have to reward ourselves and that's something that James Clear says in Atomic Habits: In order to create a habit we need to make it easy and we need to make it enjoyable.

SOME OTHER TAKEAWAYS FROM OUR CONVERSATION:

• Savoring good feelings for 15 to 30 seconds helps the brain to make new neural pathways - learn more here.

• James Clear empathizes that to introduce a new habit it has to be both easy to adapt and enjoyable - even if that joy comes from the reward you give yourself once it’s over. His book Atomic Habits will change the way you look at your daily routines! 

• Have you tried Itsy Bitsy Baby Yoga - it’s my favorite baby yoga book and it’s what helped me to become a morning person all those years ago when I had my first son.

You can find Emily on Instagram @soulsadventures and her books (listed below) on her website as well as on Amazon: 

• Moonlight Gratitude - new audiobook version available on Audible!

• Moonlight Gratitude: A Journal

• Find Your Glow, Feed Your Soul

• Sunrise Gratitude

Make sure to listen to the episode for a whole lot more information! - Stef

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Listen to the Episode Here:

Gracious Mealtimes with Alison Mountford

Podcast Guest:

Alison Mountford

Chef, Food Waste Expert and Mom

Alison and I chatted recently on the Podcast about family mealtimes, food waste, and what its like to parent differently than our mothers.

Every few episodes, I invite a guest to answer a reader’s question - do you have one? Fill out the form below, and I will bring in an expert to answer it.

OUR QUESTION TODAY WAS THE FOLLOWING:

What’s the difference between a picky eater and a child who knows what they like and don’t like? And where do you draw the line and say forget it when it comes to offering the same foods repeatedly?

Here are some takeaways from our conversation and Alison’s advice.

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Alison: So to me, the clear difference between a picky eater and an opinionated one is their attitude and willingness to taste it.

If you gave my kid pasta with a marinara sauce he's going to go “I don't like that” but has he tasted it? No, so he is solidly in the category of Picky Eater. Or if you give a kid of food and they don't comment on it, they taste it, they give it a fair chance — and they have a good attitude and some curiosity about trying a new thing even if they're a little hesitant but they try it and they can intelligently talk about why, like “this was a little too spicy for me” or “it was really tangy” or “I don't love the texture of this” then that is the point where you can say “Okay well just like Grandma doesn't eat brussels sprouts. You are allowed to have an opinion and say you don't like this food or you did not enjoy it prepared this way.”

But the pickiness really comes in when they have no willingness or when they're clearly with their attitude and their demeanor demonstrating that they're unwilling to try something because it's not familiar to them — or because they actively think they will dislike it but without ever having tried it. So that's a big difference.

I would give a shout-out to all the toddler moms out there who can't really figure out if it's picky or an opinion because there isn't the language around that and that opens up another conversation around teaching language and really talking about your own food.

Alison: So I would I would default till like pre six years old and just assume it's pickiness. But maybe even give them more of the benefit of the doubt than just pickiness which I think has an icky kind of connotation. It's like as soon as you say picky eating everyone gets all ratcheted up about it. I would not say maybe let's not call them picky eaters but let's say if they're younger than 6 or seven years old they're just not experienced. So don't ever write anything off unless it's an allergy and then again, that's not picky. But younger than 6 or 7 I would not allow them to fall into any category quite yet.

What about offering the same food again and again and again?

Alison: You have to serve food in a variety of ways. Maybe one day you have spinach as part of a saute, maybe another time you have it with a lot of garlic. Maybe you try it with balsamic. Maybe you put it chopped up with cheese in a stuffed shell — and just sort of over the course of many years they will be able to experience this one food in a lot of different ways and then maybe they'll find one way that they like it. I would truly say that everybody doesn't stop experiencing foods in different ways. You can always learn to like new foods. So I don't think it's too late for anybody.

Talk about these things openly, learning to like new foods, changing your mind about things, trying things in different ways, trying things at your friend's house or at a restaurant or cooked by somebody else. But what I wouldn't want to do is put the same piece of spinach in front of a kid for 17 years and say no dessert until you eat that spinach. or “I know you didn't like it for the last eleven years, but we're still gonna keep trying this” but I would never allow myself to write off a food without really good reason that they will never like it.

Some other takeaways from our conversation:

• The pressure to meal prep on the weekends is just that, pressure. If you enjoy cooking, then great meal prep on the weekends, but if you would rather be hiking or shopping, then you can easily get by with 30-minute meals on the weeknights.

• Restaurants are much better when it comes to food waste than our own homes. We tend to overbuy and then throw away lots of unused food. At a restaurant, the only person throwing away food is the consumer if they order too much.

• Picking hobbies like cooking and gardening can help to teach our children the valuable skill of waiting - which is essential to combating entitlement in our on-demand society.

You can learn more about Ends & Stems and Alison’s awesome 30-minute recipes that reduce food waste at EndsandStems.com and make sure to listen to the episode for a whole lot more information! - Stef

Check out more Guest Episodes here:

Mindful Sleep - with Sleep Consultant Yasmin Johnston

Podcast Guest:

Yasmin Johnston:

pediatric sleep consultant and mom.

Yasmin and I chatted recently on the Podcast about toddler sleep disruptions, what a night doula is, and so much more.

Every few episodes, I invite a guest to answer a reader’s question - do you have one? Fill out the form below, and I will bring in an expert to answer it.

Your Question for the POdcast

Podcast Question

Our question today was the following:

My almost 4-year-old has developed a bad habit of waking in the middle of the night and coming into my room to ask for water, milk, etc, every night, and I am exhausted. What do I do? Also, should I hire a night doula to get some sleep, and then they can teach him not to get up?

Here are some takeaways from our conversation and Yasmin's advice. First I asked her just what a Night Doula is:

Yasmin: “So a Night Doula, you'd be hiring them on and they're typically not doing the sleep training. They might do some education or helping with setting the boundaries. But they may not have the experience in the formal sleep training when it comes to toddlers. A night doula can be a little bit pricey, especially depending on where you live so there's that to consider. A sleep consultant in this situation would help you with figuring out the different boundaries that work for your family, and doing the formal sleep training. Usually within two to three weeks for one set price you're able to have your child sleeping in their bed all night.”

So if you want to correct the behavior and want to give it a try on your own to start, what should you do?

Yasmin: “The thing that we want to achieve here is to correct this behavior. You know toddlers, they love to push boundaries and so once it's allowed, like you let something happen one time, they think that it's okay to do this every single time and so it's putting that firm boundary in place; “It's time for sleep.” You can do water before they go to bed and say, “Okay this is our last chance for water” or since the child is a little bit older if they don't have issues with going to the bathroom in the middle of the night, you can allow them to have a water bottle in their room. Just know that they may be getting up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and so then you have to think about are they going to require your assistance if they have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night? But for milk I usually say, “We don't do milk at night, if you need water you have a water bottle in your bed or on your nightstand.”

Some other takeaways from our conversation:

• Personally, I love to have a list of clear rules for bedtime. Start these early, like when they are a baby, and keep it to 2 or 3 very specific items. My kids had the following rules: Calm body, Quiet Mouth, Stay in your Bed. Say them every night or when you leave the room which could be multiple times a night lol!

• You can also use a nighttime checklist they can consult BEFORE calling you - you can sign up for my free checklist below.

• And finally, and probably the most crucial step to a successful bedtime: Connection.

Yasmin: “The mom has to go to work all day right? So, she's going to work and then when she gets home it's just craziness, getting dinner done, doing this, doing that, and then bedtime — but slowing down and taking 10 minutes of connection time with with your child before bed — especially if you're away from each other all day matters. They're going to need that little bit of connection time: whether it's active play, or sitting down together and reading a book together, or even just having the child pick an activity and you sit there and play along — but without being too inquisitive, without asking your child a million questions. Just saying things like “Oh, I love that you chose the red car, I'm going to choose a red car too” Letting them know that you value their choices and their likes and dislikes and really being fully into them during that play time is enough.”

You can learn more about Mindful Sleep and Yasmin’s offerings on her website mindfulsleepconsulting.com and make sure to listen to the episode for a whole lot more information! - Stef

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