Am I Messing Up My Kid?

Unless you are doing something blatantly awful like beating up your kids or leaving them home alone while you jet off to Vegas, you are probably doing a fine job of raising your kid/s. I only have one child so I have plenty of time to wonder how I am totally screwing this up.  I think if I had a bunch of kids I wouldn’t have time to worry about all this screwing up nonsense.  

I’m not sure if it’s just me, it might be, but I don’t want my kid scheduled into classes, clubs, activities every day of the week and on weekends where I am made to drive all over the state.  If you are a parent with a child and you both like that lifestyle, more power to you.  I happen to like the fact that my son isn’t scheduled out the wazoo.  He’s in school from 7:45 until 4 or 5 pm.  I think even that is a bit much but he loves his school so it’s all good.

I tend to feel guilty when he shuts himself in the game room playing his video games. He plays too many video games and I let him.  Horrible by today’s standards, right?  What would society (other parents) say?!?!  I don’t know, but I do know he is also having fun and I did the same thing when I was a kid.  He also gets almost straight A’s.  When I was a kid we entertained ourselves with videogames, MTV, movies, and TV dinners.  If we were bored we made up games to play, burnt bugs with a magnifying glass (sorry bugs), had mud pie wars and ran around the neighborhood.  

Things I have done to “mess up” my son:

• Allow him to play all day on the XBOX

• Shamed him (accidently but still…)

• For sure I taught him swear words (I can’t believe I fucking did that, but I did.)

• Not enough veggies and fruits and way too many chips and ice cream.  

• I didn’t believe him and then found out he told the truth.  Sigh….

• Had one too many cocktails in front of him

• Fought with my husband and for sure he heard

(side bar - my mom told me once that my dad came home after too much boozing and peed in the closet cuz he thought it was the bathroom, hahaa, I have NOT done that)

So if you are a parent who spends quality time with your kid/s, gives them lots of love and hugs and kisses, is there for them when they need you, well you are one awesome human being.  They don’t HAVE to have a phone.  If you are considering it, call me so I can get The Phone Contract out to you asap.  My son’s job is to try hard in school, be a good friend, have fun and be a nice human.  That’s it.  He doesn’t have to be numero uno at a team sport, he just has to play if he wants to and enjoy the game.

There are way too many kids ending up in hospitals and inpatient facilities because of the huge amounts of anxiety put on them in school, sports, social settings, you name it.  The super sad part is that often all the beds are taken.  Let’s just encourage our kids to be kids, to be who they are and we love them no matter what.  If they get an F, we love them.  If they strike out, we hug them for trying.  If they no longer want to play when the seasons over, they don’t have to sign up again.  

If you have a list like mine, congratulations, you are a real live person who makes mistakes.  Own your shit, apologize when you jack it up and move on.  It’s called being a good role model when you haven’t been a good role model, get it?  Let’s all stop pretending that certain parents have it all together cuz I’m here to tell you it’s total bullshit.

If you are brave enough (and you don’t have to be!), go ahead and put your list of jacking it all up in the comments section.  Let’s all bond over it.  Or, if you’d rather do it in private, call me and we can chat.  No more feeling like we are alone in this parenting business, the only one confused and sometimes freaked out.  Cuz I really think we are ALL a part of that group.  

Thoughts??

Holiday Family Traditions

Family traditions can provide a feeling of cohesion and belonging within families. Family traditions can come in all shapes and sizes, from weekly pizza nights to annual holiday celebrations that bring extended family together. The holidays are a wonderful time to create new traditions for you and your family members to look forward to. Maybe you drink hot chocolate and watch a holiday movie on the first snow of the year. Or, if you celebrate Christmas, perhaps you decorate the Christmas tree as a family on the first Saturday of December.

Holiday Traditions to do with Family

1. Go cut down a Christmas tree together the weekend after Thanksgiving

2. Decorate the tree together while listening to Christmas music

3. Bake and decorate holiday themed cookies

4. Drive around to different neighborhoods and vote on your favorite light display

5. Build a gingerbread house

6. Ugly sweater contest

7. Give everyone in the family matching pajamas for your holiday festivities

8. Start a silly tradition your kids decide on

9. Write holiday letters to kids in the hospital

10. Adopt a family in need and gift them with items they want or need for the holidays

Benefits In Engaging in Family Traditions

• Traditions are often formed around values and areas of importance for families and can help family members discover more about their unique identity as a family.

• Families who come together around a common interest when engaging in a tradition can feel a sense of cohesion and closeness.

• Joining in traditions as family members allows an opportunity to “show up” for one another, even in times of stress, frustration, hardship, and conflict.

• Traditions can help families create legacies and lasting memories that will live on with family members as treasured experiences.

Some families find it difficult to engage in traditions and experience the cohesion they desire. If you find yourself struggling to feel as close with your family as you would like, especially during the holiday season, please reach out to schedule an appointment today.

How to Deal with Family Estrangement

Recently I have had a lot of families seeking my help because the dynamics between parents and their adult children have become so conflicted and found communication so difficult that the family members have cut themselves off from one another. There is no one type of interaction, parenting style, or conflict that leads to estrangement or family cutoff and it is rarely due to one event but rather more likely to be the result of a history of complicated factors.

Family cutoff is common, and often a healthy choice, when there is toxic parenting, abuse, or addiction within the family. More than one in every four American adults are estranged from a family member. However, family estrangement and cutoff are becoming more common for less severe reasons. Our increased mobility, focus on personal well-being, and a shift towards a more individualistic culture means that many are less reliant on relatives than in previous generations. Joshua Coleman, an author on family cutoff, writes, “today nothing ties an adult child to a parent beyond that adult child’s desire to have that relationship.”

Western society has also become more politically and culturally divided than ever and families are following this pattern. Value differences related to disagreements of opinion about sexual orientation, gender identity, religious beliefs, politics, and race has been cited as the cause of family estrangement by more than one in three mothers in the US. Most recently, disagreements the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccination have led to more family estrangement.

In addition to disagreements and value differences other common reasons for family division include, lack of flexibility when one family member asks for a change in the relationship dynamics, including the lack of respect for new boundaries, holding on to perceived slights from the past, disagreements about money or inheritance, perceived or actual differences in the treatment of siblings, uneven division in responsibility for aging parents, or loyalty to a newer relationships (spouses taking precedence over parents). As opposed to the more severe reasons for family cutoff, these conflicts mostly come down to the inability to resolve conflict, communicate in a healthy manner, and to listen effectively to one another.

The good news is there is hope for reconciliation. Family estrangement is rarely permanent and often comes with cycles of cutoff, distance, and reconciliation. However, the best solution is not to “let it go,” “just get over it,” or “forgive and forget.” Both parties need to work on their communication, understanding, and extend empathy for one another, not to exonerate someone for their wrongs, but rather to make that person’s behavior less personal to you. Adult children who understand that most parents do the best they can with the tools they have will be more likely to understand perceived slights or mistakes their parents made are not personal but rather a part of being human.

For the relationship to move forward, it is important for both parties to be able to express and what has hurt them in the past in and feel heard.

Parents who can listen to their adult children without defensiveness and validate their experiences, even if they disagree with their interpretation of events, are perceived as more easily approachable by their children and lessen the likelihood of harsh disagreements in the future. It’s also vital for both parties to accept their family members as they are without accepting their hurtful behavior.

You have a right not to be attacked or blamed for all the bad outcomes in a person’s life. If not approached in the right way by both parties, these conversations can be hurtful and can lead to further conflict, especially if you are dealing with a toxic parent or complicating factors such as abuse or addiction. If this is the case, then seeking professional help from a neutral party who can mediate is recommended.

Other sources on family cutoff and estrangement:

• Fault Lines: Fractured Families and How to Mend Them by Karl Andrew Pillemer

• Brothers, Sisters, Strangers: Sibling Estrangement and the Road to Reconciliation by Fran Schumer Chapman

• Rules of Estrangement: Why Adult Children Cut Ties and How to Heal the Conflict by Joshua Coleman

• Family Estrangement: A Matter of Perspective by Kylie Agliias

If you are dealing with estrangement from your family and want to talk or need help bringing your family back together, please reach out to us. We are here to help you find your way back to happiness, whatever that might look like.

Attachment and How It Impacts Your Relationships

Attachment is a bond that is formed in early childhood between infants and their primary caregivers. Attachment bonds impact our relationships well into adulthood and informs how we think about ourselves, how we relate to others, and how we function in romantic relationships. We are biologically wired for attachment because it ensures that we are safe and can survive the years when we are too young to care for ourselves.

Secure attachment bonds form when babies cry and caregivers are effective in soothing the child. Secure children expect that when they reach out, a caregiver will be there to respond to their needs. These individuals grow into adults who find it relatively easy to be close to their romantic partners and are comfortable depending on them.

An insecure attachment bond forms when caregivers are inconsistent, unreliable, or inappropriate in responding to the child’s emotions. There are two common types of insecure attachment and are formed based on the type of caregiver response. Caregivers who are inconsistent in their response are sometimes effective in responding to a child’s needs and other times the child may feel ignored or shamed for their emotions. This produces children who have an anxious attachment style. In adult relationships these individuals often appear co-dependent and worry about whether or not they will be abandoned in their relationship.

When caregivers ignore or minimize their child’s emotions, children form avoidant attachments. As adults, these individuals minimize their own emotions and struggle to engage with their partner’s emotional needs. A third, less common insecure attachment style called disorganized attachment is formed when caregivers are so inconsistent in their responses that they become source of fear for the child. Because the child does not know what to expect, they attempt both anxious and avoidant strategies. Adults with disorganized attachment usually yearn for intimacy with a romantic partner but fear intimacy just as much.

Knowing your attachment style is key to understanding how you operate in all kinds of relationships, especially your romantic relationships. Please reach out or schedule an appointment if you are interested in understanding more about your or your partner’s attachment style.

The Book: Part Two

The book is complete…. I think.  For those who missed it, I spoke in a previous blog about creating ‘the book’.  For many in the adoption process, creating a scrapbook snapshot of your lives is how birth parents choose which potential adoptive parents they want to meet.  This book can be the key to getting a baby, so it’s a big deal.

Creating the book, for me, was a bit agonizing. Normally, my husband is the perfectionist in our relationship, but in this case, I was the one obsessing over the details.  I love to travel. Its an absolute passion in my life and I have so so lucky to have been to many amazing places.  Therefore, any book about me is going to have to include talking about travelling.  Normally, I’m more than happy to talk about anywhere I’ve been and all the places I still want to go.  However, when trying to show this in the book, I was suddenly questioning everything.  Here’s what happened in my brain: “What if the birth mother also loves to travel? I need to be sure to show that connection and put up fabulous pictures in from the pyramids in Egypt and Machu Picchu in Peru! She’ll love that!” But then: “wait, what if she hasn’t had the opportunity to travel? Maybe financially it’s not an option in her life and putting these pictures up will make me look disconnected from the hard reality of life and she’ll think I’m totally pretentious and don’t understand where she’s coming from.  Ok, take those pictures off”.   But then “But maybe she’ll wish her child will have the chance to travel that she never had.  Put the pictures up”  But then…..  You get the picture.

So, with some advice from the owner of the adoption agency, I decided to just be as authentically myself as possible.  All I can do is put it out there in the way that is the most true to who I am and who we are as a family and trust that the right person is out there.  Turns out that this process feels a lot like dating.  I recall some dates in my younger years when I would spend most of the night trying to figure out if I was acting right and saying the right things etc.  Then I learned that if I wanted to meet the right person to be in my life, I needed that person to like me for exactly who I am, not someone I’m trying to.  Turns out that’s true when adopting a baby also….

If you are looking to adopt, or have adopted in the past, and need someone to talk to about all of the emotions that come along with adopting, please come see me and we can work through it together.

The Book: Part 1

For many people who are looking to adopt a baby, creating your personal book is part of that process.  For those who haven’t had to do so, the book is like a scrapbook snapshot of your life.  Nowadays, most people use internet photo services to upload photos, add descriptions and print out hard copies. Then, these books are shared with birth mothers who use them to help match up birthparents and adoptive parents.

My husband and I are in the process of creating our book right now.  When I first heard about these books, I was  excited.  I thought it would be fun to look through old photos and share the story of our lives with others.  However, now that I’m in the middle of it, it’s really quite daunting.  With the agency that I am working with, these books are shown to the birth mothers who have most of the control when it comes to the matching process.  I like this model and I agree with the reasoning behind it; however, it is also the reason that I have about 20 pages to try to convince a total stranger that she should give me her child… her CHILD!  I’ve found this process to also make me feel very vulnerable.

How do you display seven years of a relationship in way that makes you look loving, caring, responsible, etc.  Additionally, how do we make ourselves stand out from other couples who are also just as deserving of this amazing gift?  Are we likeable? Seem pretentious? Not good enough? Generic and exactly like every other couple? I’m suddenly regretting never having gotten into the scrapbooking fad! I love my life.  I think we’re pretty great.  But honestly, in Colorado, everyone loves to hike, ski and has at least one adorable dog so how I can get us to be THE ONES?  So now I have a pile of photos, some other books to use as references, no idea what to do next… An update to follow when the book is completed.

If you are looking to adopt, or have adopted in the past, and need someone to talk to about all of the emotions that come along with adopting, please come see me and we can work through it together.