Parents:You Need a Break Too, And It's Okay to Take One.

I hope that you all had a wonderful Christmas Holiday if you celebrate Christmas and if not a wonderful weekend.

This week I am going to briefly step into an arena I typically stay away from. Don’t worry we won’t be staying long but I just couldn’t help myself after a couple of interactions with clients and friends this last week. This arena is parenting. I generally don’t say anything about parenting or how people chose to raise their kids for two reasons. One, I think there are lots of ways to raise healthy happy kids and if they are loved and cared for, who is anyone to decided which is the best way. Two, I don’t have kids of my own, I know nothing about what it is like to be a parent and therefore feel I shouldn’t comment on the subject.

But last week as I sat with a single father of a teenage boy (the boy has some significant mental health struggles) and listened to him sob because of the guilt he felt for wanting to have a night away from his son and to be able to do something by himself even once in a while I thought to myself enough is enough. I also have friends who have children of varying ages and often feel as though they have to do everything for their kids and find a way for them to have everything they want, and to feel as though they can never have a girls night or a night out with friends because they are parents and they should be there for their kids. And to do otherwise causes some of my friends an intense level of guilt like they have failed as a parent.

Here is what I say to that client sobbing in my office and to all my friends that feel is way, your kids will survive I promise and you are not a bad parent for wanting to do adult things with other adults and leave your kids at home. In fact, it is good for you and probably good for your kids too. We take breaks from almost everything else in life, work, relationships, friends, etc why wouldn’t we take a break from your kids too?

You ARE NOT a bad person for needing a break.

 First and foremost this is a win win for you and your children. Your children win because if their parents are happy then they will be happy as well. Sometimes I think we forget how much our moods as adults can affect children. If you are constantly stressed out, tired, and generally frazzled, you children, regardless of their age, will pick up on this and it will begin to affect their well-being, they may start to feel stress or feel pressure to not upset you further. I think we can all agree that’s NOT what we are going for.

Second, it’s a win for you because you are attending to and taking care of the person that exists outside of being a parent. Despite having children and having that change your world in wonderful and challenging ways there is still a person outside of being a parent that needs time and attention. Whatever hobbies or interests you had before becoming a parent are still there and will mostly likely still bring joy to your life, which will probably make you happier and then you kids are happier. . .see how this circle is starting to come together.

Third, I think it’s good for kids to have some time away from their parents because it helps them learn to be respectful and listen to other adults not just their parents, and it give them an opportunity to learn to function in the world independently and way from their parents. And I know you all want that, my friends tell me all the time “I love my kids but when they are 18 they are moving out” this is often said in jest, but there is some truth in jest and if you want your kids out on their own, they have to start learning these things early and often.

 Now I know what some of you are saying. Andrea, this all sounds great but we don’t have a babysitter, we can’t afford a babysitter. Or maybe it’s that the kids have so many activities that you can’t find a night away. Or maybe for you it’s the guilt I was talking about earlier and you feel that unless you have a good reason or event you don’t have a right to have a night “off” from parental responsibilities. Allow me to address each of these individually.

First of all depending on the age of your children you might not need a babysitter at all. I will not presume to know what is best for you or your children nor will I arbitrarily pick an age and say that all kids are ready to stay home alone at that age. But what I will say is that when I was as young as 10 I was staying home alone with my younger sister for short periods of time (15-20 minutes) while my parents ran errands and we built up from there. If you do need a babysitter there are lots of ways to find a good babysitter you can trust, websites, talk to other parents, local agencies that teach babysitting classes. If you can’t afford a babysitter who do you know that would help out? You might be surprised. I often watch a friend’s child so that she and her husband can have a date night. I love spending time with their son and so really it’s as much for me as them. You never know who might be willing to help until you ask.

 Now if the issue is that you are spending all of your time taking kids to activities several nights of the week I would gently suggest taking a look at trimming down the number of activities. I could write a whole separate post about that but I will save that for another time. If trimming down the number of activities isn’t an option it might be time to start investigating getting a car pool going. That way you aren’t responsible for taking kids to practice EVERY night and simultaneously helping other parents find some down time as well. Then you know where your kids are safe and sound and you can have some time with a spouse or a friend.

Finally, the guilt. I don’t know when in our society we decided that it was okay to judge parents for how they raise their kids and how they chose to take care of themselves. Like I stated above I don’t have kids of my own but my understanding is that they are supposed to be a joy that adds to your life not an 18 year prison sentence that requires you giving up every other part of your being. I came from a home with two working parents that were involved in community activities and committees that took them away from home at night and we were regularly left with a babysitter so that my parents could do things socially. I am also a fully functional adult with a master’s degree who has a job and does not begrudge my parents for not spending every waking moment by my side. Guilt is probably the hardest of these to overcome, but remember this, your kids WILL be okay for a few hours now and then without you. And you will be a HAPPIER parent if you take care of the man/woman behind the parent. So give yourself permission to take a break regardless of what anyone else thinks. . .YOU DESERVE IT!!!!

Please note that as I stated above I am NOT a parent, I don’t pretend to be an expert on the subject, and I am CERTAINLY not telling anyone how to raise their children. This blog is based solely on my experiences working as a therapist and with friends that have children.

Sometimes the Little Things Aren't So Little Afterall

 Here’s the reality of being a therapist, 98% of the time I absolutely love my job, I love talking with people hearing their stories, trying to put the puzzle pieces together to get the complete picture. No matter what happens I think I will always be a therapist in some capacity, I can’t imagine my life without that being a part of it.  At the same time my job is not without its frustrations. Progress is generally slow because change is difficult and most people, even if they want it, are somewhat reluctant to do it. People rarely say thank you for your services, but are more than happy to blame you when things with them or their children don’t change fast enough. But most days are pretty uneventful and at times you can feel like you are spinning your wheels. BUT in between the boring, frustrating, and upsetting moments there are nuggets of pure gold that remind me why I do what I do. I had one of those this past week and I want to share it with you and what I learned from it.

“Mary” is a woman in her 20’s who has struggled with anxiety for most of her life, but it has worsened in the last few years due to a couple of traumatic events. She currently lives with her parents and wants move out but has a great deal of anxiety about living alone. “Mary” also spends a lot of time worrying about what others in her community think of what she is doing. We have spent a lot of time talking about coping with anxiety and have recently eased into making a plan for her to move out of her parents’ home and put a deadline in place.

A couple of weeks ago “Mary” came into my office and in many ways seemed like a different person, she came in with a stack of apartment listings in her hand talking about what she liked about some and what she thought she could afford. “Mary” also made mention that she had accepted a dinner invitation with a male friend that was significantly older than she was, despite having concerns about what other would think and say. During our next session (this past week) “Mary” continued to talk about moving out and wanted to move up the target move date and that there had been some frustration in other areas of life but stated she was done with bullshit.

Sometimes you've had enough

 Towards the end of our session, I asked her what had changed in her thinking that was spurring all of these changes in decisions and attitudes. “Mary’s” response was very casual and nonchalant “I don’t know, I’m just tired of always having to live by other people’s standards. I mean yes some of these situations have made me anxious, but it’s not going to get better unless I do things in spite of being anxious.”

It’s not going to get better unless I do things in spite of being anxious. A seemingly mundane statement, said in casual tone. But in that moment it was like the heaven’s opened up and the hallelujah chorus started. She got it!! After weeks of talking about coping with anxiety and how anxiety works and effects the body she got it!!! She understands that her anxiety, uncomfortable as it may be, isn’t going to kill her and if she can use her coping skills to face it she CAN do all the things she wants to do.

I know to some this may seems like an eh interaction and what’s the big deal. Well let me tell you getting someone to face something that causes anxiety and fear and to understand that that anxiety and fear isn’t going to harm them is a GIANT win. It opens up the world to someone with anxiety, everything that once seemed impossible is NOW possible. It’s like when you FINALLY got your driver’s license and all of the sudden your world got bigger and you could do more things and go more places because you had learned a new skill.

 While I was soaring no cloud 9 and enjoying the sheer happiness I felt for my client and the progress she had made, it caused me to pause for a moment and think about my own life. It’s no secret that I have had my own struggles with anxiety, and lord knows it has gotten in the way of me being able to do the things I want to do. It has gotten substantially better over the years but it’s still there at a times, and the discomfort of that anxiety shapes my behavior to a degree.

 As I talked with “Mary” about her experiences over the last couple of weeks and the way she felt as she faced some of these anxiety triggers, it was a refresher and an inspiration to me to continue to challenge myself in my own walk with anxiety. To do a check in with myself and make sure that I was still on top of the anxiety battle and using the skills that I spend my days teaching to others to better my own life. Sometimes as a therapist you catch yourself in a “do as I say not as I do moment” we are human too.

These are the golden nuggets of being a therapist, when the pieces come together for a clients and they start walking out all the things we have talked about. When they are able to take on the challenges they have avoided for so long. And yes even the moments when a conversation with a client inadvertently calls you, as the therapist, on the carpet for the areas of your life that you need to continue to work on. These cloud 9 moments keep me going when I feel like I’m beating my head against a wall or getting yelled at for something that isn’t my fault.

 I LOVE being a therapist and this is why. I would also like to pass this challenge on to you. What are the areas in your life that still need some fine tuning or work? I challenge you this week to take cue from “Mary” stand up and face those challenges and know that the as uncomfortable as it may be, feelings can’t hurt you. Maybe you can face your anxieties or fears head on and that’s great. But maybe for some of you standing up to those challenges is reaching out to a friend, family member, or even a professional and saying I want to change this but can’t do it by myself, that’s as much of a win as anything else. No matter what it is, just don’t let it keep your world small anymore. J

If you are struggling with anxiety and don’t know where to start, I would recommend you check out my review of my new favorite book on the subject, F**k Anxiety HERE. If you feel like you need to talk to a professional, but don’t know where to start I would recommend Psychology Today to find someone in your area to get help.

Tips for Coping with Mixed Emotions

Recently I was approached by a friend that works for a local university and asked if I would be willing to teach a few courses in their undergraduate psych program. I answered yes almost immediately and was super excited to start looking at textbooks and start building these courses. I have taught before, but due to the circumstances I was pretty much handed the course and didn’t really get to make it my own. This was my chance to build this class from scratch and make it my own, and the prospect was exciting.

The weeks went by and the quest for textbooks hit some bumps, and finally now about 6 weeks after I was initially approached to teach, the syllabus was due to the school and I attended my first training on learning how to use the software for online courses. And the unmitigated excitement has turned into waves of pure anxiety. All the what ifs start swirling, what if I don’t know what I’m talking about? What if the students think I’m an idiot? What if the university thinks I’m an idiot? What if I make a fool of myself? And on and on and on the questions go. Slowly this thing I once had so much excitement for now seems big and scary and part of me wants to run and hide.

How does that happen? How can we have such excitement, joy, and eagerness to take on a new adventure, only to have it suddenly change into intense fear bordering on panic? Well the simple answer is that new is often anxiety provoking. When we embark on something new we are leaving our comfort zone and that by nature tends to put us on high alert for everything that could potentially go wrong, and you are putting yourself at risk to fail. But wait what about all the excitement from the beginning? Well that’s pretty simple to, new things can often be exciting, thinking about how you will feel if things go well and the fun you will have in the process.

Now wait a minute, if there are simple answers to both questions then why do I feel so crazy? Well the problem is when both feelings start coming at the same time. Mixed emotions. Mixed emotions are a normal part of life but man they can be confusing and tough to deal with at times. I don’t know about you but there are times when having mixed emotions about a situation makes me feel like I am losing my mind because the emotions are so intensely opposite of each other. There are a few things that seem to work really well for me when my emotions get a little mixed and intense. Here they are in no particular order.

• Remind myself my feelings are valid. My emotions may be mixed and intense at times, but there is a reason I am feeling all the things. I am REALLY excited to teach this winter, and I should be. It’s something new and different where I get to talk about things I love, of course that is exciting. At the same time there are going to be a group of students looking to me as somewhat of an expert on this course content and I never think of myself as an expert in anything and so that can be a stressful position to be in. Of course I’m going to feel some anxiety. Both of those feelings are a valid response to this situation, they just happen to be in opposition to each other.

• Breathe. Sometimes I get myself so worked up over all the stress and excitement of a situation that I forget to breathe. Often times all I need, all any of us need, is to take a few deep breaths. You know the kind that goes all the way into your belly. Deep breathing forces your body to slow down, and works against the fight or flight response that comes with anxiety and causes your breathing to become faster and more shallow. There is a favorite video of mine on YouTube that teaches a super simple breathing exercise. I’ll link that HERE.

• Take it one thing at a time. Whether that thing is one step, one task, or one day at a time, take things as they come. Right now I can’t do anything about the fact that some of my students may not think I am the coolest professor they have ever had. All I can do right now is prepare to teach this class to the best of my ability. Looking over the text and other material etc. I can’t deal with how the students react to me until class has actually started, so I try to remind myself to focus on what I can control now and deal with the rest as it comes.

• Be kind to myself. It is easy to get wrapped up in the tasks that need to get done and wrapped up in simply surviving the anxiety and excitement I am feeling. And when things don’t go as well or as fast as I want it to I start coming down on myself. Which in the end only serves to heighten the angst. In the midst of any of the crazy mixed emotions life throws at me it’s important for me to remember to take a step back and be patient and kind with myself and to take care of myself. Whatever that means to each of you take care of yourselves when things are stressful.

As I continue down this road towards teaching in January and work through the holiday season to get ready, the mixed emotions will continue to rise and fall. The first week of class I will probably spend the first couple of days feeling sick to my stomach and fighting the anxiety using all the things I’ve outlined above. But one thing I always know for sure in these situations that provoke mixed emotions is that I am pushing myself in a new direction and outside of my comfort zone and even though that is uncomfortable I will be a better person on the other side because of it. The only way we grow and change is to get uncomfortable. But the reward is totally worth it.

 *** All images from Google images ***