Episode 146: Aligning Your Parenting with Your Long Term Goals (Live Couples Coaching)
/This week's episode is going to be a little different. If you have been following me and The Balanced Parent Podcast, you know that there are times where members of my BalancingU membership community so generously allow us to "listen in" to their coaching sessions. It can be so helpful to hear others' experiences and I know that you may have similar struggles and questions. This way, you would know that you are not alone and just like you, the couple that I coached in this episode wants to figure out how to
communicate expectations and boundaries in a way that is meaningful and respectful
align their "in the moment" parenting with their long-term goals
If you've ever wondered if respectful parenting is too permissive, or if you can set healthy boundaries without trying to "control" your kids (while helping them learn self control too) this one is for you!
BalancingU members have the opportunity to be coached on the podcast for free as a perk of being the membership. If you're interested in learning more, check it out here!
TRANSCRIPT
Parenting is often lived in the extremes. It's either great joy or chaotic, overwhelmed. In one moment, you're nailing it and the next you're losing your cool. I want to help you find your way to the messy middle, to a place of balance. You see balance is a verb, not a state of being. It is a thing you do. Not a thing you are. It is an action, a process, a series of micro corrections that you make each and every day to keep yourself feeling centered. We are never truly balanced. We are engaged in the process of balancing.
Hello, I'm Dr. Laura Froyen and this is The Balanced Parent Podcast where overwhelmed, stressed out and disconnected parents go to find tools, mindset shifts and practices to help them stop yelling at the people they love and start connecting on a deeper level. All delivered with heaping doses of grace and compassion. Join me in conversations that will help you get clear on your goals and values and start showing up in your parenting, your relationships, your life with openhearted authenticity and balance. Let's go!
Jennifer: If Mommy and Daddy don't have their time, then Daddy can get really grouchy and you don't want to have a grouchy dad. And so let's figure out a way that Mommy and Daddy can talk and connect. So we're both not as grouchy and that you can do what you want to do. And so we problem solved and figured out if he watched a show in the dining room while we were in the kitchen getting dinner ready, then he's kind of near us still, and then Michael and I could talk and so we were able to do that, and that worked out. Yeah. So it worked out for like 30 minutes or so we were able to maybe 20 minutes. We were able to talk about how things went that day and Luke got to watch his ninja show. And so…
Laura: Oh, I'm so proud of you. That’s awesome! That’s so great!
Jennifer: Yeah. So what you had told us about the like triangle was like really helpful. And so we tried to implement and I told Michael my goal is really to do how you had said like it's like the integrated system where just like flows and it's not like pulling one way. So yeah, I'd like to work towards that. yeah.
Laura: Yeah, you know, lots of people when they learn about triangles, they start seeing them everywhere. I don't know if you've noticed that, but like have you like noticed triangles more and like even like in the office for example,
Jennifer: Yeah, in the office. Yeah, definitely, definitely. Like a little bit more. Like I had a big meeting with my boss yesterday and so that's kind of what we spent a lot of time talking about. But even with him, you know, I had told him, you know, I noticed he's getting tired, you know, he owns the practice. I don't know if I had mentioned like I was thinking of opening my own practice, my own pediatric practice and then I, we've been in the works on doing it just because I feel healthcare so different for children now. You know, it's all this like you know, it's quick and it's fast and it's not really care like it's not really like whole care for these kids and for the parents, you know, who need that support and kids have a diagnosis that's even more, you know?
And my community here in Southern California, everyone calls us kind of like the like scavengers of California or the like armpit of California because we're the in law empire and like everything is in L. A. County, you know with like Hollywood and West Hollywood and the big stars are, everyone's in Orange County and the OC. Or San Diego is so beautiful with the beaches. And then we are the only two counties in southern California. Inland Empire is riverside and San Bernardino which are the two largest counties in the whole United States. But had the least resources for many of these kiddos, you know? And so if kids need pediatric something, we are like advocating so much for them.
And so I just knew that I had to do stuff on my own to really get kids what they needed. And so Michael and I were kind of on this path, he was helping me to open my practice and then one of the local pediatricians who's like 10 years older than me had reached out to me because he's starting to do a succession plan of what he's gonna do with his practice? It was a huge blessing and I decided to take him on and kind of be mentored by him and see. And he says, if it works out, I can just buy his practice and if not, I'll learn about private practice and open my own. And so it was a big meeting. Michael will hear me do all my brainstorming ideas and stuff. But I had with my boss. So my point is I could feel the triangle with like him and me and staff as I'm trying to talk to him. This is Michael.
Laura: Hi.
Micheal: Hello. Hello.
Jennifer: So I do see the triangle. My point is because I'm constantly working enough, but mainly with him who's kind of like the leader and CEO and how I'm trying to help him or work with him and he's pulled a million different directions and I'm trying to…
Laura: Yeah. Okay, good, Michael. It's so nice to meet you.
Micheal: Nice to meet you too… A lot about this session and so I thought it'd be good to be here.
Laura: I'm so glad that you were and I really appreciate that too. It's not easy to like to bring someone else into your world and that way. And so I think you guys are incredibly brave to be doing that to show up for each other for your family. It's awesome. Yeah. So what would be helpful right now, to like, where like what do you have some goals and ideas for what you'd like to spend your time on?
Michael: Me personally, I'm just here for moral support and be a participant.
Jennifer: Alright. So I think one of the big things Michael and I have really talked about is that, the thing that sets him off a lot of times is if I'm talking about like when we have our, when he's trying to get a point across with Luke and I might not agree with it, I'm really trying to be quiet about it. But Michael, he'll give Luke one chance and done. And I probably give Luke too many chances. And then that's what Michael says, like you waffle all the time and, and I just, so it's, I feel like maybe we need a balance between, like if Michael says no, look like you just, you have to do this and then I can tell like Luke is having a hard time. So I'll work with like, no, like you have to do this. And then Michael and I were trying to be better at not doing things in front of Luke, but I'll try to like, explain to him what's going on or explain like that Luke is having a hard time and Those are 10 miles. Like, you know, you just need to read my cues and know that, you know, he's just wanting..
Michael: My cue is simple. I say that it needs to happen, therefore it needs to happen. And I'll give Luke one or two chances and I'll speak very calmly and nicely. Luke, please do this. Luke, please do that. But at the third time I'm like Luke now, it's time for me to get his attention because he's not listening, he's not paying attention. And then I say, Okay, please do that thing.
Jennifer: But he gets like, don't, don't you agree, you get like in a little deeper voice that starts scaring, you go like Luke.
Michael: Okay. There's a progressive process, okay. I don't go to any kind of a threatening voice or sound like I'm really angry initially and even when I progress, I give him a few chances. I'll give him one or two chances to kind of come around and if he doesn't, then I have to get his attention, because he's usually not, he's pretending like he doesn't hear you or he's just not responding. And so then I'll get his attention and I will say it again. Luke, this is what I want you to do. I'm very clear. I feel that it's really hard to hold people accountable when you don't convey your expectations and you think you do, but you don't really.
So you really have to make sure they understand what your expectations are. And so I try to do that. I do the same thing with Jennifer.Is I try to make my expectations clear and I expect, you know, I, I asked for her to do the same thing with me. Don't just expect I'm going to do it. That's right. And so I don't, I don't sound like I just throw off cues to, to do different things like Luke, do what you're supposed to do, you know what that is? I tell him exactly what I want to see happen. And Luke will get dressed, perfect example this morning. Luke will get dressed and I come in his room and he's playing with legos. Okay, Luke, guess what time it is? It's time to get dressed. I'm gonna set the timer for you and I will come back and check when you're done.
And so there is a process that I have. Now, sometimes the process is a little shorter and sometimes it's a little longer. It really depends on timelines. And I'm sure it has a little bit to do with my patients, but I do try to give those chances and then I will get to the end of my rope. Everybody has a rope and then you get to the end of it. Yes, Jennifer has a rope. I hear an elevated voice. I hear luke. No, I, I will, she does get to the end of her rope eventually. And again, it depends on her mood, depends on how tired she is. So later at night, the rope is shorter, such as life with everybody, but when I get to the end of my rope? I, in my mind, I thought, okay, did he give them opportunities? Yes. Did I make myself clear and convey that to him? Does he understand what I want? Yes. Okay.
So we've covered those things now. It's time where the rubber meets the road and that's it. You know, my patient. Yeah. It's not, not so much about my patients. It's almost about principle for me. I've asked your father to do what you're supposed to do and now it's time to do it. And Luke and I had a conversation on the way to school, about, you know, I was in some respects, Luke and I are similar on our personalities and how I grew up and in some ways were different. He's very independent. He has his own thought process, he does, he knows what he wants to do. And he knows he may not want to do what you want to do.
I was the same way I was very independent. I had my own mind, I didn't feel like, you know, I had to, whatever. My father was very, very controlling, different than Jennifer's father, but also, you know, you don't want to cross my father. It's not because he, he felt he was going to throw you through the wall, but it was because my father, he was intimidating. He was quite intimidating. He was a tall figure, big figure and he was intimidating. So you know, you learned early on that you may not, it may not be done out of fear, but you do it because if not then you don't like the response, you know, but it was a little intimidating growing up, but..
Laura: Michael, hold on because I want to ask you something, how… like did you like that as a kid? Like looking back now, maybe you…
Michael: No, no, no. The intimidation… No, no, I, I didn't. I don't think anyone really likes that. My father was a pretty imposing figure, but I can only think of one time in my life that he ever spanked me, you know? It's like he laid hands on me as a child even though my parents did believe in an old school way of raising kids in the sense that you know, what's the stick? The stick, little, what's the stick saying? You know? Anyway, in the bible…
Laura: Yeah, there we are, spare the rod, spoil the child.
Micheal: Yeah, Spare the rods, spoil the child, my parents did adopt that way of raising children. My mother hit me far more than my father, even though my mother is a gentle soul. She's still, you know, when she would, I was a strong headed kid, okay, and so she would grab a spatula or something or a fly swatter and you know how else you get a kid that's really strong to do what you want to do back in 1975 or 1980 and that's what you did. So I didn't get spanked a lot, but I definitely got smacked around a lot more about my mother then by my father, my father was like a last resort and your daddy gets home. That was more like my mom's like I'm done, I can't do this anymore. When your daddy gets home, go to your room and that was that. But anyway, so I haven't done that with Luke. But I do try to make boundaries. I do try to, I'm very firm with my boundaries and that I, once I set them, they're set.
Now there's always a new day, right? It's kind of like when you go shopping and the kid wants a cookie that he sees and he's got his heart set on that cooking like, nope, we're not having that cookie by the time we get to the checkout counter, the cookie would be in Jennifer's basket. The cookie would not be in my basket because I said no cookie. Right? And so that's my philosophy on boundaries with Luke. If I've said it now, I may say, let me think about it and you know, Luke, you'll hear him in the background cake, cake, cake cake, he just wants that cake and he wants, you say we'll take one more time and there will certainly be no cake today. And if I hear him say cake one more time, that's what I said, that's what happens. Then Luke is really upset and it's a, it's a process, but I feel if I'm consistent with that now, the problem that I think we have is the consistency doesn't transcend Jennifer and I. When I'm alone with Luke when it's just Luke and I he will not say cake again, he knows better, he will not say cake.
But when Jennifer and I are together, I can almost guarantee I will hear a trailing off of cake cake, you know, he will say it again or more times and so course then for me, I'm consistent whether we're alone or together, the same thing applies, but it's just, it's something I've I realized with us, we realized that there when we're together Luke will not respond the same way to me as he will say he and I are alone. And it's not that he doesn't throw a tantrum with me, he doesn't cry. He just knows that if he says cake one more time, there is literally nobody in the audience that can save him, it's over. And he says cake. And so then he holds his tongue and doesn't say cake, I feel because he's acknowledged that I have boundaries and if nobody is around to save him that those boundaries will be very solid and I don't think he's figured out yet that even if mommy's here and I set a boundary, he will still lose. If he says the thing, he kind of hopes that mommy will save him, which usually doesn't occur and then there's the tantrum.
Jennifer: I do the nurturing stuff with a nice, I know daddy just said no, so we can't,
Micheal: But I try to be respectful, I try to enter it calmly. But by the end it's like today right over here at the dining room table. What was the scenario? What was… Why did he he…
Jennifer: He wanted the cake and you wanted to give him this brownie and you said look, do you want a brownie? And he's like, no, I want Michael makes healthy. It was the cake?
Micheal: It wasn't, it was at the end where Luke was, I was telling him I wanted him to eat his eggs or so. Yeah. Anyway, I told him please do this. I, I told him like 2, 3 times and finally I came over to him because he would, I told him comes sit down at the meal. One of the hardest things we have is getting this guy to sit down through a meal, finish a meal. It's like Jennifer will sit down with him to have a meal, Jennifer eats her meals, he runs around and then she will enter into yet a second meal period to get him to eat. Last night they didn't get to bed till almost midnight because Luke would not eat his dinner and it's hard on her.
Jennifer: I got home at seven and that's when our night started. So I got home at seven and then Michael and had us time, and then we made dinner and then by the time we sat down and so yeah, last night and then he wants, he always wants to read a book and connect. So when I get home that late, everything gets pushed.
Micheal: So I, I eventually ended in a, in a lower voice, you know, I was like, this is serious time, this is it Luke because I've asked you four times to do this, this is and of course the tone of voice I was using, it was maybe it was a little threatening for him. It wasn't meant to be or it wasn't, it wasn't a prelude to something physical, but it was like, it was my very serious voice like this is, this is it, I do not want to see this anymore, you're gonna go sit in your seat and I could see on his face that that tone was like, oh I need to scroll this away for the future because that definitely worked.
Laura: Michael wait, you could practically teach a parenting class. Like right now so much of what you're saying about consistency and like think, like making conscious decisions about like am I gonna hold this limit? Am I gonna like ask like you're doing so like so much, but at the same time you like the way your dad parented you and that low voice, that kind of threatening voice, like that is in your… It's like, like it was hardwired into you. That when I like there's like when I'm not like when the limits aren't being upheld when I don't have… like, when it's not happening, then it comes out almost naturally and it works absolutely.
Michael: But 1 thing, one thing okay, so my, to finish that thought off was I acknowledge that it really was effective, but at the same time, I know you're laughing… At the same time. I noticed there was a byproduct of that, that I wasn't, I didn't like, which was that, you know, he flipped to a cry, you know, instantly he was sad and he was scared. I know that deep down he knew I wasn't gonna thrash him because I've never thrashed him. But he, it was, it was scary for him because I think his, his imagination go like, what would daddy do? And, and so I realized in that moment that even though that was effective, it was not what I, it was, it was, it didn't have the perfect results that I wanted and I didn't like the byproduct of that result, even though it was effective. That's what I kind of wanted to tie that off,
Luara: Michael, like your reflection and your thoughtfulness, like you're like doing my job for me, you for being so easy. I like, this is so, like, it's so good, you're so right, looking at that, like what's the difference between effective and it works in the short term versus that kind of long term goal. And then I think it seems to me and correct me if I'm wrong, but what I'm hearing too is that you want your kid to be able to trust you that you want to be a man of your word and you you want to like have those firm principles that when… I like, I want my kids, like if I say something to my kid, he can trust me, he can count on me even if that means like he doesn't like the outcome. That's… Is that right? Like you want him to be able to trust you and be confident in in like what like the consequences of actions in your family. You want him to know that, what, that he can count on his dad. I mean and that's really what it is. That's what holding firm boundaries is about right? It's about having the like the safety net, the like the, on a roller coaster and the like bar comes down, having that bar. Like they need those boundaries they need to be able to trust so that they can relax and do their work as children.
Michael: Yeah, I think it’s foundational.
Laura: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. But a key piece of that is that just like when you get on a roller coaster? I don't know. Have you been on one that goes upside down? So it has the things that go like what it like when it came down, what did you like, what do you do right away ,when it comes down?
Micheal: You grab it.
Laura: You grab it and do you pull up on it?
Michael: Yeah, you make sure, you make sure it really is not gonna… there’s so much play there is.
Laura: Yeah, right? Or, and like squeeze yourself down so that it's a little tighter, right? But you pull up on it. You test it to make sure it's locked, right? Yes. That's what kids do too. That's why kids push boundaries, that's why they test limits. And it's not because they don't respect you or you know, it's so that they know that the safety rail is there for them, right? And that's why it's important to be firm. I think like you and I, Michael, I think we're totally on the same page with this, right? And so then the question is like, how do we know when to hold a limit and how do we know when to be flexible? How do we build trust?
And without rigidity in our relationships with our kids, right? Like how, like how do we do that? You know, it's a good question. I have this story from my own childhood. We were going, we were driving into the store to pick out movies and my sister and I, like, we would do this on friday night for the weekend, we would always get to pick out one movie. And I, like, was sitting in the front seat and I was playing with the radio, switching the radio station and my mom said to me, if you do that one more time, you don't get to pick out a movie, okay. And like, I wasn't thinking about it as a kid. I was I think I was like six or seven. Like I really remember this. I did it one more time. Not necessarily on purpose, but like, you know, I just did it. It was there was low impulse control or whatever.
Michael: That was a kid in you. Why not?
Laura: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean like I didn't like, I forgot. Like I knew my mom had said not to do it, but like in the moment as I went to push the button, like I didn't like it wasn't a conscious decision to push the button and disobey my mom. It wasn't like looking at her and like push kids do that too, but it was just like, you know,
Michael: See? Kids, do do that… It was like, yes.
Laura: Oh yeah. Oh yeah, so much. But like my mom didn't want to lie to me and so she held firm on that and you know what she still talks about that as one of her like regrets as a parent.
Michael: Oh, really?
Laura: Yeah. She was like, I wish I hadn't done that. Like it stole so much joy from that weekend. Like we like you would have been able to watch this movie, we would have been able to snuggle on like how much we would like, we would have had so much fun and instead it tainted the whole weekend, you know, because you were unhappy the whole time, you know? And it was just a button. And so that was like and it was one of those times where like she bumped up against two core principles of what she wanted for her family. Like warm connected loving memories and kids who could trust her, you know? And so like we have these principles, these guiding principles that drive our parenting decisions and sometimes they do bump up against each other.
Like right now, like one of my like big values in our house is that we have a neat house, not my office where all the mess collects, but we have any house so that kids can play in everything. But my five year old is in the midst of this really deep immersive, like imaginative play and our playroom has been set up in this game for like two days and I have been for going the limit of cleaning up in service of this deep play that she's really like needing, it's like, she's like, it's really like this kind of like really deep expressive play that I know is important to her. And this these are two values of mine that are in conflict right now, and I'm having to figure out like, okay, so I have this value of having a tidy home things going back to their space so that the kids can really be comfortable and start fresh and they learn these values of picking up after themselves all of those things. Plus I have this value on play.
And you don't have to have the same values as me, it's okay, but like this is, they’re in conflict right now for me. And I'm having to decide with my partner too, who gets really annoyed. Like he, he gets really annoyed with clutter and mess is, and so we're working together right now to figure out like, how long do we let this game stay up? Like, you know, that's taking over the whole playroom and it's, there's not one right answer. It's a process. And like that's what the partners in parenting teaches you to do is how to have that conversation together to figure out like what are the competing priorities and core values right now because that's what's happening within this situation between you, you two, when it comes to, he's testing a boundary, he's wanting something. It's Michael's inclination to hold that boundary firmly. And it's Jennifer's inclination to be more flexible and preserve the, like the relationship overall. So you are having these two important core values that are competing with each other, right? Is that right?
Jennifer: Yeah, that sounds good.
Laura: Yeah. So then like then what do we do? And is there a balance? And is there a way to preserve the relationship and hold boundaries that our kids can trust us? Because both of those things are incredibly important and what a lucky boy Lucas to have two parents who have such like really good healthy values for him, right? Who have parents who believe like it's so important that he can trust us, that he feels safe and he can relax into his childhood because he knows his parents are in charge. He knows he doesn't have to be the adult. He knows he doesn't have to be in control, right? He can give up control because he trusts us like that, Michael, that's a huge thing. That's really healthy for kids. And then Jennifer, it's also really healthy for kids to know that no matter what I feel, I'm loved.
No matter what I do, I’m loved. That my actions have nothing to do with my worthiness. They have nothing to do with how my parents feel about me. Like that's hugely important too, right?. And so then like what do we do? How do we marry those together? Right? And I don't think that those two values are in conflict with each other most of the time at all. I think that those are two values that can be supported, and it can drive parenting. Like that's what respectful parenting is. Those two values that you're talking about. Like those are the two like really core values that you need in order to put respectful parenting into practice. You've got them like now we just need to figure out like what does that look like?
Jennifer: Yeah, because I had told you when we started our sessions, I am not good with sound like I'm trying to be better. Michael said like, and then I try to work with him. I know he's not like men just in general aren't the nurturing type and that's fine because that's how God created each of us, you know, man and woman different. But I want him to think more of the relationship a little bit more than the principal and I need to think more of the principle more than the relationships.
Laura: There is fear on both of your parts and again, correct me if I'm wrong. But you're both in like you both have these really important core values, but you're letting a certain fear that's different for each of you, enact those values in a way that isn't supportive of your long term goals. Okay? And the fear for you, Jennifer, is that if I hold this boundary firm, I'm gonna hurt somebody I love and I might lose their love like, right? That's your fear and for Michael…
Michael: And she grew up that way. That was, what she under receiving and…
Laura: Right. So of course it makes complete sense…
Jennifer: And I don't want him to be sad because I don't like conflict either. So I like I try to just make him… my mom is really like that. Like I don't want to hear him cry, just give him whatever he wants, you know? And I try to hold that better now…
Micheal: And I don't like conflict either. Don't, you know, that's that, that's not it. However I feel sometimes it's necessary, you know, for the boundaries sometimes conflict has to be, that's the way it is. And so if we can avoid it, great. If we can't then apparently, we have to go through this.
Laura: Yeah. So I agree with you wholeheartedly. I actually think conflict is really healthy and good for relationships. If you learn how to have a conflict in the right way, it will deepen your relationship and you'll come out feeling more committed and more connected than you ever have before. Like out of a conflict. So again, like that's what you're going to learn how to do and partners and parenting. Those are communication skills that you can practice. They feel awkward at first, like so annoying and so awkward and unnatural, but you practice on them and they get better. Just like if you, I don't know you guys right handed or left handed?
Micheal: Right.
Laura: So like if you tried to write your name with your left hand, like the first like 1000 times it would be super awkward, but by the time you got to like 2000, like you'd be good to go. Like it would be, you know, cause you build the muscles, right?
Jennifer: You were saying about the fear.
Laura: So I don't know what exactly do Michael's…
Jennifer: Yeah, what did you say?
Laura: I don't know exactly, because I don't, I don't know Michael as well and I don't share that. Like, you know, like, I don't know your fear better, Jennifer because we've had more conversations, I don't know, Michael's as well. But oftentimes folks who have, they fear like that they will lose respect, that they will lose control, that they won't be the authority figure that their kid needs.
Micheal: My fear, my fear I think there's probably an element of some of those things, but my fear is that if, if I don't, if I don't enforce boundaries, Luke will not grow up understanding what boundaries are. Because I feel that my job is to make sure not only that he's safe, not only that he's loved and all these things. My goal is to make sure that when he gets out, he understands how things are gonna roll. How the world works and he has built enough skills so that he can understand what it's like to be to work late, and get in trouble to go to class, and then be sent home or sent sent out of there because the teacher doesn't want you to be late, you know, like that's my rule.
I want him to understand how to process boundaries, how to deal with expectations, when you have people that are not your parents and that don't have any kind of love or connection to you. And so I want to make sure he knows that when there's a boundary, he better respect that boundary and not just take it for granted that someone's gonna forgive that boundary because I feel that that's an elemental fundamental life skill once he leaves the house. And I didn't always have that in college because I was, I grew up with excuses, I'd make excuses herself. My mother was fairly easy. My father wasn't, but he wasn't around as much. My mother was really the one around, she was a homemaker. Like Jennifer's mother was, it was a different time. And my father, he was gone a lot. He was the CEO of a company. And he traveled a lot and he was busy a lot. He didn't always work eight hours a day. He'd work 10 or 12.
Ultimately, you know, he wasn't totally faithful to my mother and it was later in life, like when I was closer to 20, but they divorced, but he was always really engaged with work. He was in the natural foods business and the cutting edge of natural foods industry in the late seventies in the eighties and down here in Los Angeles and it was a whole lifestyle. He ultimately was hired on at whole foods as the president for California region when they sold the company of whole foods. And he was just, he was a big wig guy. He traveled a lot. He would go fishing in our shooting, hunting in Argentina, fishing in Alaska. He was kind of a… anyway, he wasn't around as much, you know, my dad would go golfing on, sat on Saturdays when my mom and my sister would have to go to, we'd go to church. He'd go golfing.
On Sundays, he would go shooting or do you know, he would, I could go sometimes if I wanted to, like when I was in my early teens, he said, hey, you wanna come golfing knowing fully well that I'm supposed to go to church with my mom. But he would just ask, you know, like you're welcome if you want to go, I'm not gonna make you. But I, I just, one of the things, I'm not sure how I got off on that tangent, but my, I want to make sure that Luke understands that, that the boundaries are really important and they're gonna be useful in life, that he understands how they work and he's not uncomfortable with them and that's just really important. Me, and a lot of times I feel that if I don't hold the boundaries, if I don't make the boundaries and hold the boundaries, he's not gonna get that from Jennifer.
About the boundaries, he'll get the love, he'll get the nurturing and all that's to feel acceptance. But when it comes down to real life skills that he's gonna need to, you know, be successful in his own professional life, he's gonna lack some things. It's like time management. It's a big thing for me and it's not because I'm always on time to everything in my entire life. I've had problems and I, like, like I said early on, you know, I was not always good at school beyond time and with everything, but I learned a lesson when I did my first management job. My boss, he was very like rigid and either learned the right way to do things or don't let the door hit you on the way out. And so I learned as a manager in training when I was 22 years old and the people I was managing were 40 and 50 years old in a restaurant setting, that you don't be late. You'd be early. That's on time if something goes wrong and he asks what, you know, this needs to be fixed. I don't say, oh well, you know, Jason was walking through and he dumped some trays and so I'm cleaning it up, I want to hear yes.
Yes, lets me know I understand what you need and you're gonna take care of it. That's what I want to hear is yes. One word, I don't want to hear a long explanation. And so I try to soften all those things, but life lessons are, is that to me, is that life is, it can be unforgiving and you can expect that if someone says you need to do this, you need to do this. Or you will be unsuccessful in that. And so I try to instill an element of that into boundaries and expectations. And also, when with Jennifer, when I see her not holding to boundaries, to not either being clear with expectations or being extra flexible with expectations. That's a hot button for me because I look at that and say you're not teaching him basic principles that he's gonna need in life to succeed. And that's one of my main goals is making sure that Luke can handle himself period.
Laura: Okay. So it sounds to me like your fear is that if you don't hold firm on these things that you'll be setting him up for failure.
Michael: And my fear is that nobody will.
Laura: Yeah, but that feels heavy too. I can imagine it probably feels heavy to be the bad guy. To be the bad cop.
Jennifer: He calls himself the heavy.
Micheal: Yeah,The heavy to come in. I'm gonna be the heavy again.
Laura: Yeah. I mean that's a lot. Michael, that's a lot to take on, like responsibility for. Like I am the one who is going to teach my son how to be a man, how to be successful as he grows and ages. That's a lot. That's a lot to take on it. Absolutely is. I can see too that these are things that you're trying to do with him that maybe you didn't get right, that you didn't get support and how to take accountability and responsibility for yourself and for your time and that those are important values to you. So my question is for you then how do kids learn those things? You know how you learned it as an adult, as a young adult. But how do kids learn those things?
Micheal: I think there's a couple of kids learn I think and I am the first one to tell you and I've like, I've told Jennifer, I'm not a child expert, I don't want to be a child expert, I want to raise one child and when I'm done with that, I want to do a lot of other things in life. So I want to learn the tools I need to know for this one child and if I get it 90% perfect or 85% perfect, that's a winner. I'll take a B. No problem.
Laura: I love it. I love this, I love it. Oh my gosh, Michael, like I'm like your biggest fan right now.
Michael: Well that's good, but I think, I think that there's two things, one is probably the biggest way children learn is modeling. So if you model something, I feel kids learn through modeling really well and we look at our child, he likes working with older boys. Not 20 year old boys, but you know, eight year old boys or six year old boy or seven or 10, you know, he likes just a little older boy with a little more experience. But I think that he learns best by watching them and that modeling and so I think that is the best way to learn is just by watching by someone modeling it for you. I learn best that way, I always have. Never been a bookworm. You show…
Don't don't tell me how to do it, don't write me a diagram on how to do it, I want to get out there and do it with you and then we'll figure out and I will, that's how I learn best is my hands on it, so experience. And so that I think is the number one, number two I feel that sometimes people need guidance and they need to be told and explained and shown and if they are reticent to do it or don't want to do it because sometimes it's uncomfortable for them or ultimately it's not, they'd rather play with their legos, then get dressed, then that's where you have to say, okay, I understand that's what you wanted to do, but this is what you're gonna do because this is why we have to be somewhere at a certain time and so, hop hop chop chop like an onion, you know, that's it. And so anyway, that's kind of my philosophy and kids learning, I think the modeling is number one and number two is you've got to reinforce that with all the boundaries, all that stuff.
Laura: Okay. So can I share just a couple of things just from like the child development piece and the learning piece because I think, you know a lot more than like people with like psychology degrees and child development degrees, like already like you're already like you there's just a couple little tweaks that like I think will be really helpful. So one is just understanding that there is no emergency to this learning of responsibility and accountability and time management skills. That like this is not something that is urgent that he has to learn right now as a five year old to be Uber responsible for his time. There's he's got lots of time to still learn that.
And so like sometimes when we have a really strong value that we're really committed to, it can create urgency in our minds and the way we think about things that isn't really there, right? So like when in that moment when he like we've asked him three times, it's clear he's ignoring us and like we start talking to ourselves in a way that creates more urgency, he needs to learn that he's got to listen, if he doesn't learn this now, he'll probably get fired when he has his first job because he will never show up on time and have what he needs, he's probably gonna fail school. Like we go down this path of worries and fears that take us out of the moment and out of reality, like really in that moment, like when he's playing with legos and not getting dressed, like he's probably not learning like learning exactly what we think, he's learning.
He's probably learning lots of different things, but he's probably like when you make him or for or make it painful if he doesn't do it right then he's learning something else and kind of what we think we're learning. We think we're teaching responsibility and accountability but in reality we're thinking like he's learning other things in addition to those things things like when I have a problem, you know or when something is hard for me like I'm gonna get in trouble for it. Or you know when I really, really want something, people are just going to say no to me and so I either have to be really, really loud or just push down my want. He's getting other messages too. But we have to be aware of like all the messages that he's getting and like what he's go, what's going on developmental too.
So one thing about like listening and like focus for kids who are five, so their prefrontal cortex is still developing and will be developing. Men finishes up around 26. Women, it's about 24. So the brain development that's happening for him is really cool right now. As a five year old he is gaining the new ability to filter and maintain focus and attention and so like when he's playing with legos and it's something that is like that he's getting a lot out of, we know like to us it looks like just playing but we know like a lot of good stuff is happening when you're working with legos, like spatial recognition like I mean there's so much good stuff happening with lego building but in order to do that he has to have laser like focus on it.
Micheal: That’s good. Because Legos are expensive. Bought lot of Legos.
Laura: So good for, I mean legos too. When he's working with legos, he's building the fine motor skills that he'll need to be able to write too. Like, so like those are really good for like, like early learning skills to like really critical parts. Like legos are good, very good. Yeah, but the like the focus that he has to have to do it well. And the, like the new skill that he has to filter to like filter out distractions, he's not good at like those filters aren't selective yet. So when he's focused in on something like building legos as he gets older, he will have the ability to filter and allow certain things in like dad's voice in or certain cute keywords that cue him, he has something else to do, like get dressed or bathroom or car. Like he'll be able to let those words in, but at five he can't do that yet. His filter is not selective.
His filter is completely like, it's like a concrete wall that he puts up while he's working on it and so he literally can't hear you. So one of the things is you have noticed Michael that if you really want him to do something, you've got to go over to him, you've got to get his attention, you gotta get on the same page with him and tell him like, this is what we're doing and we're doing it now, right? I would highly recommend that you start doing that from the very beginning the very first time you ask him to do something. That you let him know like this is what we're doing and we're doing like we're doing it now or we're doing it like do you want to build one more tower or you know or crash one more tower or like drive one more car up your ramp whatever it is. Like give him some like some indication and then stay with him. Five year olds need a lot of presents from us. We can't parent from the kitchen with them because they're…
Micheal: That’s my favorite place to parent from…
Jennifer: I'm like please go see him.
Micheal: I know you heard me.
Laura: So he like that this is the thing, like he maybe did hear you but his filters so yeah he didn't process it. It didn't go in, it went in one ear and out the other because he's filtering everything so that he can maintain focus on what he's doing. And so if you come and join him in his world, validate how important what he's doing is like who tell me about the towers you're building, you build a castle, who's gonna come in the castle? Okay. Like you know whatever it is that is whatever he it is he's doing.
Micheal: Mommy does that very well.
Laura: Yeah so and then you stick by him until it's time to do it or you'll say like okay so in a couple of minutes it's going to be time to put your shoes on, and then we're gonna go to school. So what is gonna happen in a couple minutes, I'm gonna come back, I'm gonna rub your shoulders. I'm gonna say it's time to put on shoes, are you ready? Okay, so I'm gonna go grab your lunch box, I'm gonna put it in your car and then I'm coming back and we're gonna put on shoes. So like a few times like Michael you already have are so good at setting very clear expectations you are. I know you're like this, this is gonna just take it to the next level. You're already really good at this.
Just a little bit of connection beforehand and like doing it the first time. I don't want you getting to the point where you're like feeling like my kid doesn't listen to me, I have no authority. He's never gonna learn to like, be responsible. Like and all of that takes you down that path and start parenting from a place of fear. And I don't want you parenting from a place of fear. It's much better to be to do the like before you get to those thoughts to just be like present with him in it. You know, I know you don't want like it would be so nice if we could just say, hey, it's time to brush your teeth, go brush your teeth and off they skip to go brush their teeth right away with…
Micheal: That would be so nice.
Laura: Would be so nice. But it's not developmentally realistic. Like that's just not where they are, even like and like, and that's, there's individual differences with that too. Just like there's a huge range for when kids learn to walk, you know, like some kids are walking at like eight or nine or 10 months, right? And other kids are walking, like at 15, 16 months and that's still the range of normal, right? So there's a range for when kids will become capable of doing that without more support. And Michael, you have very long-term goals for your son. You do. The beautiful long term goals.
And what's important for you to remember is that, with long term goals they take more time to build, they take more effort usually. So parenting this way does take more effort when they're little. It's more active, it's way less from the kitchen, like, you know, and calling in. But the payoff is huge because you've laid this foundation, this groundwork and by the time they get to 10 or 11 they trust you. They know what you say, you mean. They know that the boundaries are there to help them to guide them. They know that they've got a partner on their side who when they have a problem is going to help them not hurt them. I know nobody's hurting like physically but hurting emotionally, you know, like…
Micheal: Yeah, we’re scaring. Yeah.
Laura: Yeah. like when I have a problem, I can go to my dad and he'll help me solve it. Like isn't like that's probably a long term goal of yours too.
Micheal: Oh yeah, I want him to see, I don't have that with my father so much. I mean he will, he will help me with a problem, but he's not, he's not very available period. Even though he's retired even though he spends half his day golfing or getting ready for a dinner party or whatever the heck it is. He doesn't, he's not available for me very much. I have family, friends like my mother's boyfriend from high school who's retired now and we connect on, I'm a big car guy, historical cars especially. And I can call him and he'll answer the phone, he'll be available to chat. My dad, I could call him six times in a week and you know after the sixth time I'll say forget about it. And then he'll call me and say, hey, just wanted to connect. Haven't heard from you for a while or something. And it's like, dude, I'm calling your cell phone. I know you see miss calls, left your voicemail, it's like I know you don't read your text but he's just that way and then when we do connect we do talk it's a three minute phone call.
He just, he doesn't have, he can't, he can't focus and stay involved for very long. And when we do, it's rare. You know, it'll be, you know politics or something then he can get, you know charged up or something. But I do want Luke to be able to call me with issues or to talk through an issue and to be accessible for him and I think as he's more because he's older, more developed, you know, in his head, we'll be able to connect that way because I connect way better with adults than I do with children. So I think my dad's the same way in that respect. He is horrible with children, but when it comes to adults, he's able to have these conversations, but he is not a kid person and I feel I'm a little that way, but my dad is so much more, you know? He's, he really cannot like he cannot understand children, period. Patients that he had for me was tiny.
Jennifer: Michael has much more patience than his dad does.
Laura: Absolutely. So in just like you are feeling like by, you know, holding him accountable, holding limits firmly, you're building a strong foundation to set Luke up for success. This idea that you want him to be able to come to you, you want to have an authentic relationship, a real relationship with him. All of those things are foundational for him right now too. He's learning in all of your interactions about, like what it's gonna be like to be in a relationship with another man, what it's gonna be like to be in a father son relationship? He's learned the patterns that you're using with, like the techniques and skills and tools that you're using with him right now are building his concept of like what is a father? What does it mean to be in a family? Like how, like is the world a place where I can screw up up and people will have my back.
Is the world a place where I can be imperfect and people will still love me, like it is the world safe for me, it is the world, a place where I can be successful as the world, a place where people will believe in me. He's building all of those thoughts, those scripts that it's called an enter internal working model. The scientific, like child development phrase, Like he's building that right now in every single one of your interactions and so like part of intentional parenting than two is being clear, like what is the message I want to communicate to him right now? And what is more important that he know right now in this moment? Like, so kids have time to learn responsibility, they don't have well developed brains right now. So they have very low impulse control.
So learning something like sticking to a task or taking responsibility, or focusing on someone else's needs or you know, balancing like someone else's perspective and yours. like those are skills that like literally like a five year old brain can't do. And so there's time for them as his brain grows and develops that capability to shape that and scaffold that for him to do it through modeling to help him learn those things. And right now the, like what his brain is open to, is able to do, is learning like when I have big feelings or when I have a problem, I have people to go to who will help me with them. When I don't want to do something, I have someone who will help me figure out like what we need to do to get it done. Like, like that's what he's learning now at five. I don't know if that's helpful, but like…
Michael: It is. Yeah, I know that is helpful and I know he needs a lot of that connection right now and that I understand that the long term goals and how there's time to, to get him where he needs to be with all those values which are really important. So yeah, so I guess part of it I think is maybe not setting so many or maybe being a little more, once I said it, it's done period. So I have to be careful, have to be careful in setting it because once I said it, that's it and I won't go back on that, it will be done. So I need to maybe, you know, be a little more, maybe just not set them. I need to be a little more thoughtful about when I set those and when I don't because…
Jennifer: It's kind of like you tell me. Cause I'm really, I give in really easily right like he said, but he says, you need to say like, let me think about it. He said, just give yourself that pause and think about are you going to follow through on what you just told him or not?
Micheal: So, well that was one of the, actually Jennifer's mother, that was one of the tools she used to use. She would say: “Let me to think about it” because her English wasn't great. And so Jennifer knew that oftentimes that would come back as a no, it wouldn't come to fruition, whatever it is, but at the same time I thought that that was smart of her mother of giving herself a little space to contemplate it and also to buy a little time to let, you know, Jennifer get out of that moment and let let's, you know, maybe it won't be quite as a shiny object in 10 minutes when she has come to her conclusion and maybe it will be a smaller splash.
Laura: Absolutely.
Jennifer: Maybe both of us can think about it. Like I need to think about my boundary and he has to think about the principle versus the connection.
Laura: I'm willing to die on like…
Micheal: Yeah, there’s so many, there’s some few tools that I respected her mother used, but that is one of them that I liked that tool.
Laura: I love that and like that pause is everything like getting that pause and like it gives you the opportunity to reflect, okay. So what, like what is the value that I want to convey in this moment to my child, you know like what, what is like am I being driven by fear? Like are like is my brain go way down the road to like, if I like, set this limit and he pushes against it, like am I gonna be afraid of holding it and taking his big feelings and holding them? Like am I gonna be afraid like that he won't love me anymore if he pushes against it and I hold firm like okay, so let's think about that and like do what I really need to be afraid of that?
Micheal: I think I have a little less fear of that than say Jennifer does. But the other thing I fear is will I have enough energy because you know, Jennifer when it comes to how much time and effort we want to put into childhood rearing and parenting and all that, she has a higher, she has a higher allotment of that than I do because I, I, when I work, I tend to, I feel like I worked pretty, pretty solid amount to contribute to what we do, even though Jennifer's contribution is here and because of salary mine is here. It's much smaller but I feel like I do contribute a fair amount of hours working outside the household and I come home and I do like myself time. Jennifer likes herself time. It's good, she uses it a lot of times for development. I just want personal time because that's, that's my happy time and that's the way I do. If I want to go smoke some meats in the back yard. If I want to bake a cake. If I want to watch a movie. There's the time I went to work and now there's my time.
And I, some of it, I want to be family time if it's happy time. But other times I'm like, okay, you know, Luke screeching, this is my cue. Later dudes because the interaction isn't, it's training. It's difficult. I've worked, worked today. I get up at the butt crack of dawn is would not even describe it because hasn't even been a thought yet. Get up, I get up sometimes 11:30 12 at night, you know, midnight one in the morning. It's super early. And so by the time I pick Luke up at two o'clock, I'm having trouble staying awake because I may have only gotten three or four hours to sleep the night before, which happened, happens multiple times. And so I worry about my energy level and my commitment to holding firm what, you know, I want to happen and stuff. I, I don't want to just like I'm just I have no energy for this. Forget about it.
Laura: You guys did too. It was my like I had a connection unstable thing so we were at our time but I just want to offer you one re frame to think about like as you move in there because I know how draining and effortful, more emotionally connected parenting can be. Absolutely, it can be draining. But just one reframe so oftentimes we are coming from, like to that, like we are bringing like an energy of scarcity like there's only so much of my like emotion reservoir to, you know that like, there's only so much of me you know, and so we can shift into like an abundance where I'm, I'm filling my reservoir and so I have it to give. But also we are coming from a place where we view big emotions that are typically thought of as negative like crying, sadness, anger, temper tantrum meltdowns that we view them negatively and so they are draining for us.
A big shift that you can make is that if you view those as opportunities for intimacy with your partner, if they're having the big feelings or with your child an opportunity for connection, it doesn't feel draining anymore. But in order to do that you have to restructure the way you think about negative feelings and emotions. Like you, I mean and that like that like you have to get not even as a parent, but like your core thoughts about like sadness and like pain and despair and anger. Because human emotions is a spectrum, it's a range. And when we limit our, our feel, our ability to feel and experience pain on one end, like we limited the positive end. We just are shortening the whole spectrum, right? Yeah. And so like see like when he has a meltdown, like when my kids have meltdowns, the first thought in my head is oh good, we're gonna get to connect. Oh good. This is an opportunity.
Micheal: That be first thing in my head. Here we go again.
Laura: It was not always that way. This was effortful and intentional because the feelings are gonna happen anyway. And we can choose like, are these feelings gonna burn me out? Are they gonna disconnect me? Are they gonna take me off my path? Or are these feelings gonna be my chance? My chance to put on my supermom cape, my chance to show up for my kids, my chance to teach them what it means to be in a connected supportive relationship and to get to know them like on this like deep level to really like get to know like what they think about an issue? What they feel what's important to them because even at five they have lots of thoughts, lots of ideas. You said it yourself, Michael, they had that he has this agenda. He has this whole thing of like importance and priorities that are all his that are just him.
And so when he's pushing back against a boundary, like that's your chance to find out what makes him tick. Let's find out what's important to him, to help him feel seen and heard and valued in a way Michael that your dad never, like even now doesn't make you feel? Like this is your chance and so like that's just a reframe. I have to go to the school pickup run because it's early out day for us here. But like I just that reframe, I just come back to it, keep thinking about like, how can I see these big feelings differently? How can I step into them instead of avoiding them? How can they fulfill me instead of draining me? I don't know, just something to think about. I love meeting you. It was so nice to see you.
Jennifer: Bye.
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All right. That's it for me today. I hope that you keep taking really good care of your kids and your family and each other and most importantly of yourself. And just to remember, balance is a verb and you're already doing it. You've got this!