[Ep. 345] "We Think Gentle Parenting Is Cheesy"... How The HLN Team Parents

Marika, Evan, Camille and Luis talk about their experiences as parents on today’s podcast. Marika came to embodiment and studied somatics after her son became an adult, while Evan trained in somatics before becoming a parent to his one year old. So the team discusses embodied parenting from a full spectrum of perspectives and experiences. 

They discuss how embodiment has changed their parenting. As well as which parenting experience has triggered the biggest trauma response for each of them.  And they spread out, with humor, why they think gentle parenting is (Brie) cheesy. 

A question we can ask ourselves relating to children, or our own inner child is, are we parenting from an urgent stress response of fear and overwhelm, or from a place of safety? Are we enmeshed with our child or empathetic towards our child? They discuss the value of giving ourselves permission to take space, interrupting the trauma response. 

Curious to learn more? Check out our 6 Month Embodied Parenting Slow Group starting October 6th 2026. https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/parenting-group

What we teach in Embodied Parenting is not enough to counter the modern nuclear family dynamic of one or two parents doing all the parenting in isolation. We all need a web of support. You can connect with other participants in the slow group and build co-regulating spaces and relationships to support yourself on your parenting journey. 

You can register for the Embodied Parenting webinar here: https://hln.thinkific.com/courses/embodied-parenting-webinar

You can also read more about, and register for, the 6 month program here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/parenting-group

You can read more about, and register for, the workshop at Kripalu here: https://kripalu.org/experiences/food-therapy-how-eat-your-nervous-system

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You can learn more on the website: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/

You can follow Luis on Instagram @holistic.life.navigation

Questions? You can email us at info@holisticlifenavigation.com

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 1:24

Welcome to the Holistic Life Navigation Podcast. I am your host, Luis Mojica. I'm a somatic therapist and nutritionist who combines nutritional therapy with somatic therapy to help thousands of people around the world, including myself, recover from stress and trauma. This podcast serves as a way for me to teach you what I learned for free. How can food aid in the recovery of stress and trauma? What does it really mean to be embodied? And how can simple somatic practices help us better navigate this strange and sensational human experience? Let's find out. So when a child is shutting down, they won't speak, they have no words, you immediately think, What's wrong with you? Why are you withholding? That's someone in freeze, right? If a child's yelling, kicking, slamming, biting, you're like, you're so aggressive, you're horrible. That's someone in flight, in fight. If your child's walking away as you're talking to them, running into the room, slamming the door to get some space from you, they're they're in flight, right? So your kids are in these trauma responses. And if you don't assess it as such the way you did, you mischaracterize it as bad behavior. You you consider it like resma says personality, right?

SPEAKER_01 2:31

Right.

SPEAKER_00 2:31

And it's not his personality, it's what his body does when he's overwhelmed. Welcome to the podcast, everybody. We have an upcoming parenting group that starts in October. I believe October 6th, if I'm not uh wrong. I I said something to Camille, like, we have till November, and she goes, It starts in October. And I thought right there is the whole dynamic of HLN in a nutshell. So October 6th is our parenting group, is a six-month group, and there's always so many different ways you can market or teach people about a group. And I have lots of ways I do that. My favorite is that we sit together and we talk about how we experience whatever the topic is and how it affects our lives. And I recently, it I think it Marika might have brought it to me, but I recently realized, like, oh, we're all parents. You know, everyone who runs HLN is a parent. And so I'm so curious how, and we're all at completely different phases in our parenting as well. We all have really unique parenting experiences. So um I thought we could play with how we navigate them, what's been hard, what's been wonderful, where we are, and just give people listening an understanding of how the teachers and the people behind the scenes incorporate some of this work. Um, so I guess uh the place I I want to start with is well, I think because you teach it with me, Camille, what's our entry point? Like, I'll ask you directly first, then we'll go to Evan and Marica. What because you were parenting before you met me and did HLN. What how did your parenting change from then to where it is now? What what's different? What have you incorporated? Let's start there and then we'll all riff.

SPEAKER_03 4:11

Okay, yeah, um, a lot of things. But if I had to boil it down to like one thing or like a key thing, it has really been understanding capacity, um, what it means to parent from capacity and how I like a lot of parents can have this uh belief that like if I just push myself past my capacity, that's what it means to be a good parent. But I came to the realization and like could actually witness it. Like, I actually don't like myself as a parent when I'm past capacity. That the the belief that I'm I'm a better parent because I'm doing these things above and beyond my capacity actually doesn't have the impact on my children and our dynamics that I wanted to. Actually being aware of my capacity, being aware when it was low, being aware when maybe I had a desire to do something for or with them, but I didn't have the capacity and saying no actually allowed me to show up as the parent I really want to be for them. Um, yeah, I don't say that that's a that's a big thing. And then it showed up, shows up in various ways and nuances, but yeah, capacity definitely.

SPEAKER_00 5:27

Yeah, I remember when I was people were asking for a parenting group like right from the get-go in 2020, after we started doing online courses, and there would always be a group of people from every course saying, 'I'm a parent. Do you have anything for parents?' And Marie could be like, 'Well, you don't have anything.' Like, sorry, you know, we'll we'll do something. And I started thinking, well, let me devise a group. And I don't know where I was, but I was on Instagram doing something, and this woman's post came up. She was like, She looked like a beautiful African tribeswoman. I wish I remembered her name. She had like a big, like the Erica Badu, you know, like turban. And like she just had that look. And she was saying, Everyone here designing courses who have only been parents for three years, please stop and destroy your course. And I remember thinking, this is really good advice. Uh, because I was, you know, just five years into it. But I said, Okay, I'm gonna, and her advice was wait for eight years. And I thought, okay, I'll wait for eight years. That's what we did. And when Lyra was eight and I had been parenting for eight years, I had so much information that I didn't have even in 2020 when people were asking. And um, I'm saying that because what was important for me was not going into the the trap, the marketing trap of I'm gonna teach you to parent like me, or I'm gonna teach you the way to parent. That's what every book I've ever read or any expert I've I've listened to speaks to. What I really wanted to do is find a radical way to use somatics, teach people how to parent in a way that's congruent with their capacity, just like you said. So it's capacity-based parenting versus a certain kind of parenting. And that is uniquely different for every single person. And I'm glad I waited that long. And now it's been almost 12 years of parenting. It's been two years, I believe, right, since we taught the group. So there's so much more. I mean, I have so much, I'm right on the heels of teenage years with my daughter, and we have so much more that I've learned the last few years. We homeschooled her for a couple of years, she's going back to school now. So it's been a real test. When you're homeschooling a child, it is a real test. It's like I think Marika's yelling profanities on mute, but like real test to capacity. Um, so the capacity piece, I'm gonna piggyback on Camille here. That's that's what has completely transformed it. Because when I was thinking I should show up the same way all the time that I see this other father, this other parent, this other person showing up, but I didn't have the capacity, I would have so much shame and frustration. And then I would actually take it out on my daughter. It's like I'd be so angry with her that I couldn't be what I wanted to be, that then I'd be even harder. But when I realized, oh, capacity, what's it like if I just say no? What if we don't go to the park, even though it's a nice day? What if we don't go to the birthday party, even though she really wants it, but I don't have a capacity? You know, I came to learn that regardless of what she goes through, which she actually needs more than anything, is a parent that has capacity, not the park, not a play date, not three extracurricular activities, but someone who can be with her. And it's completely changed our relationship. So capacity is there for me. Um, Marika, what about you? You're the old you're the oldest parent here. Not like I guess you are by age too. But um, I always think you're our age, but you're you're the oldest parent and you parented the longest. So tell us the deal. Give us the wisdom.

SPEAKER_04 8:42

Um, yeah, good luck. Um I think other I think parents have older kids will understand what I mean, which uh when I had a lot of um when I learned this work and when I learned it uh the parenting part, uh a lot of regret. I'm like, oh that's how I wanted to do it. Like, I wish I'd done it that way. I really parented past capacity the entire time. Um I was a door slammer, you know, uh sometimes screamer. Oh yeah, very dissociated. And so the thing that I obviously capacity was something that I learned, but the thing that I really um that helped was realizing that this is a relationship I'm gonna have for my whole life. So um, and I just thought like it's not too late, I think is is what the the message for me was because um and ironically I of course gave birth to the exact carbon copy of me. So I get to watch me make all the same fucking mistakes I made, you know, in the exact same tone and the exact same attitude, and it's real annoying, but at the same time, it feels like I'm parenting myself and also, you know, this child. Um and so it's been really helpful for me with teaching him capacity and um and just bringing that language in for him. Right now, he's uh this month he's gonna turn 28. And um, so I started this work when he was around 20 or yeah, 19. And and yeah, I was so teenage teenagers just blew my hair back, and I I don't know how he survived. But um in the 20s, I think it's been really good for me with empathy, with understanding him more through this lens or capacity lens, um having more grace for him, for myself, you know, that type of a thing. So I'm I'm so glad that I have this work, but in the beginning it was hard because I I I was I saw all the stuff I didn't do. Or I saw all the stuff that I did that I like wish I hadn't done. So I get to correct that now, um, just with an adult.

SPEAKER_00 11:04

And do you see because people listening are gonna relate to that a lot of people? Uh, and I see that in the parenting group, we'll often have we'll often have grandparents in the group, or we'll have parents even of adult kids in the group who are going through what you're going through of well, how do I repair the connection now or how do I show up differently now? Think of Byron Katie, you know, like her classic example was that her kids hated her. Like if she walked in the room, they wanted nothing to do with her. And then I think when they were in their teens, 16, 17, 18, 19, is when she had her kind of breakthrough. And she said that it took a couple months for the one child, it took like 10 years for the other one to fully trust her again. But she said it eventually happened and they have the best connection they've ever had. So it's important for parents to hear that when you parent from a trauma response through their developmental years, you haven't destroyed them or your connection to them for life. Like there's so much more tending. Do you see that now? Like, do you see shifts in how you relate? And if so, what do you notice just for people listening?

SPEAKER_04 12:02

Well, I mean, I definitely see shifts in how I approach him. Um, and and I also have a good support partner who can sort of gently do this when I start sounding too shrill or too um instead of just listening, wanting to give advice. So I, you know, I've just been trying to listen a lot more and um and meet him where he is rather than where I kind of either hope he is or wish I was, or you know, and it's helpful because I get a lot of the reinforcement that I should be doing it differently because he should be at a different place at this age, but that helps me kind of focus on where he is right now, and and meeting him there really just looks like accepting him where he's at, asking asking questions, being curious, consistently offering different kinds of support, like you know, that we would pay for therapy or he or that we would pay for him to do something like this, you know. Um or let's go for a weekend somewhere, you know what I mean? Like just spending time together. I think since he was between two houses, um, two or three houses when he was growing up, I think just time together is is helpful because it it it helps him get comfortable so he can really, I think, show up and and talk with us. And the more kind of the older he's gotten and the more we've done that, he's been more willing to come to us in times that I think he would have just tried to figure it out on his own.

SPEAKER_01 13:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:41

So it's that's huge.

SPEAKER_04 13:42

So it feels like we're more of a family union now, too, which I really like.

SPEAKER_00 13:46

Well, especially that age, like for a young man of that age to come to you, you know, after he developed the habit of isolating or not trusting you, and now he does it. That's that's a pretty good breakthrough. Because I see that with teenagers when I've worked with families of teenagers who really like truly hate their parents and will lock themselves in their room, won't come out for 14 hours a day, won't even look at them. You know, just come out to eat, go back in the room. The big breakthrough is when you start noticing, oh, they're coming out and just sitting with me on the couch while I'm watching a show. Like they're showing that I want to be around you, and that's one of the beautiful ways that they're picking up on your body being more regulated. So there's trust developing. That's awesome. Now, Evan's our youngest parent. Um, youngest in age and parenting. We got baby girl. This is baby girl today. So tell tell us what you're experiencing as you are almost exactly one year into it. You have a cancer who is, as Amon says, a true cancer.

SPEAKER_02 14:42

He is.

SPEAKER_00 14:43

Tell us, tell us what we need to know. What are you learning? What do you do? Tell every parent who's exhausted right now one year in. Yes, what we got.

SPEAKER_02 14:50

Um well, I'm very glad um and grateful that I was introduced to this work, um, obviously from you beforehand in advance, because I feel like um a combination of like the capacity and the self-relating pieces are so big because um especially now, um, you know, I obviously it's not the same, but I feel like I always say um I got a little bit of a taste of parenting because my brother is about 12 years younger than me. So I have some memories of like, you know, the stuff um and just how overwhelming it can be being a first-time parent. Um but on top of that, really um shocking how much of an industry there is around it now that I was not aware of. Um, all the marketing and the media and the different kinds of specialists, and there's sleep specialists and feeding specialists, and and everyone's trying to sell you courses about it. And I think that there is something about the way that you and well, everybody and Camille, everyone in the team holds the realness of parenting that is so devoid in all these other spaces where everything is really there's so much um toxic positivity and just do this, and your baby will sleep through the night, and all these kinds of things that are like the second year, and like that's not and I feel like it's so easy to internalize that as oh, why what am I doing wrong? And knowing um having this understanding, understanding somatics, being able to relate to frustration or anger, um, or even just you know, this the extreme exhaustion of like, well, I'm I'm just not gonna get that done today. So this is the way it is, and it's capacity, and not to necessarily um yeah, just all the all those parts of understanding that what comes up is um normal and sh and you're allowed to tend to it, and things aren't gonna be this picture that um is constantly, constantly being reinforced on social media. Um that just to be able to come and have the space to like feel your emotions and be real and talk about what's happening um and have that space, yeah, is is invaluable. And I feel like that's something that I'm I'm already seeing is um incorporating and you know, even though it's only really been a year, bringing that in um in boundaries, and that's a whole other story, but really um masterclass in boundaries that has just begun. Yes, it is.

SPEAKER_00 17:21

Maybe maybe we'll get there. Um why don't you share since Camille's with us the the gold that Camille has given your family with one of her throwaway lines that she probably doesn't even realize.

SPEAKER_02 17:32

Oh, that wait, the living out of the dryer? Oh yeah. Yeah, we quote that one all the time. Um that means that I think maybe it was an integration call. You said somewhere, Camille, that you were talking about capacity. And that it wasn't even necessarily that you didn't have to do um the wash, but it was like you had capacity to put the clothes in the wash and then put them in the dryer, but not to fold them. So it was this nice middle ground of oh, there's nuance of you know, it's not just we're all wearing dirty clothes for a year, and it's not just you have to push yourself to fold these things. So you're like, well, we're living out of the dryer this week. Um, and we've been living out of the dryer for probably a month now, and it's great. Ah, yeah. I can't recommend it enough. The clothes are clean, which is great, and also it's it's so much easier when there's no time.

SPEAKER_00 18:21

So, everyone listening, what he just said, that's what we call success at HLN. Living out of the dryer, it's not putting everything away, it's not color-coding your baby's clothing. We call that insanity. We call that, I won't say we call that, I won't say it on air. We call it something I can't say on air. But uh, living out of the dryer, that's success. And this is important because you're talking about the industry. And my greatest fear, no, that's not true. My greatest concern is when I'm marketing anything that we're doing, I don't want to uh reflect dominant industry. Like I go out of my way to try to realize, okay, what is dominant culture doing? How have I inherited it? How can I do this differently? And one of the things I'm hearing from your share is this formulaic idea with kids. The same way people show up to somatics or anything else with their body of I do this, this will happen, manifestation work, if I do this, this will happen. I see the same thing with parenting. Just like you said, follow this approach, a child will sleep beautifully. It's like, what? Do you know my unique, mysterious child better than I do? I don't think so. You know, so there's so many factors that make a person a person. There's so many factors that make a child a child. So many reasons they'll cry, so many reasons they'll hate or love food, so many reasons they'll sleep or they won't sleep. And I've come at 12 years almost into this experience of parenting, I've come to learn, I feel so settled in this, that actually the less I do, the better she develops. And I really thought the first like three years, I would say, we really were like, we have to do a lot to make this development work, especially because we came from so much trauma ourselves. So we had this obsession with not traumatizing her. And guess what happened in the first three months of her life? Broke her arm, broke her leg, had to get a cast cut off, and developed uh Tourette syndrome from the cast being cut off. So things outside of our um control happened to her body that caused her nervous system to experience trauma on a level that I didn't even experience at her age. So it was this interesting, you know, teaching from the universe of okay, it's not my job to prevent her hardship or to make everything perfect. It's my job to say, what am I capable of and what do I need to do to have the most patience and kindness to be around her? That's all it comes down to at this point for me. So less is really more. So I I I never really had parenting books. They always seemed so cheesy and they never really reached me. I've Aamon had a lot of parenting books. She was so curious, but none of them really spoke to us. And so I've tried to develop this whole philosophy around parenting from an embodied place of well, what's your body telling you in this phase right now of the parenting based on the circumstance you're in, based on your unique child? And when you're out of your trauma response, your instinct is like clear as day around parenting. Like your yes is clear, your no is clear, your boundary, everything's just so clear. But when you're in that trauma response, like Marika's like saying, slamming and yelling, like I know that place. That's the fight response that comes up. Lots of parents have it. There's the flight response that comes up of like, I avoid family as much as possible. Overworking is one of the best ways parents go into a flight response to not be around their kids because they're overwhelmed by them. Right. Lots of parents fawn the trauma response of fawning. You'll see lots of parents pleading with their child to behave or pleading with them to feel better. I'm so sorry this happened. I'll get you this later, because they're just wanting the child to like them. And then more than anything, at any of those, I see parents living in collapse and freeze, just really shut down, really overwhelmed, really um, really uh stressed to the point of not having any mobility or action or agency because they don't even know what to do. It's just, it's just too much. And the one thing I like to normalize here, but also in our program, is everything we give you, in my opinion, still is not enough to counter the modern nuclear family dynamic, which is not enough bodies to help raise a child. I don't think we're designed to have one or two people raising a child. So we give you as much as we can to actually respond to that issue, but it does not even get close to repairing that issue. Um and I wonder where you go with that, Camille.

SPEAKER_03 22:38

Yeah, you're gonna need help. Um for me, that's like part of capacity, like being able to um how do I say this? Again, I think there was sort of this uh unwritten, maybe written rule, or like, I should want to be around my child all the time. And if I'm not, if I don't, then there's something wrong with me. No, no, like even between me and and my husband, there are time uh times I look at him and have to say, These are your children for the next three hours. I wish you all the best of luck because I need to not be be a parent, or you know, like my my parents, his parents have have helped out. You know, we we have daycare, we have um uh we we've had nannies. So we yeah, like I I think first is just like releasing that notion that I should want and Be able to be around my child 24/7. No.

SPEAKER_00 23:28

Nope.

SPEAKER_03 23:29

No, not at all.

SPEAKER_00 23:33

Um, before I go any further, um, we're uh recording this with uh our live audience of members. This is a great call, actually, to in the chat post a question to us, whether it's like a general question or one for anyone specifically here, just about parenting, any any curiosities or questions you have? I would love to see some of those. And I'll read some of them in a in a moment as they come through. Um yeah, Mariko, where where do you go with like the permission of not wanting to be around your child? Like, did you feel that growing up? Did you feel bad for when you had overwhelmed at certain times? Do you feel better for now? Like, how do you hold that? Because that's a big taboo topic, especially for women. This uh obsession that you should have this maternal instinct, just always want to be around them. This should just make your life amazing. You know, how did how did you experience that? Do you experience that?

SPEAKER_04 24:24

I was the friend out of the friend group who said I was never gonna have children, like loudly, and I was the first one to get pregnant. Yeah, of course. And you were young, right? How old were you? Very quick lesson, 21. Oh girl. And uh yeah, I had about four months of of 21 drinking in the and I was like, oh my god, we have to figure out how to raise a human. So yeah, and and it was like with someone I I mean, I love him now, he's a wonderful person, but somebody I didn't even really like.

SPEAKER_01 24:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:00

But um yeah, I one of the things one of the things that I had to really learn was um obviously it was a capacity thing, but I loved the baby time. I loved like toddler time, you know, that type of thing. It was when I was getting, you know, uh like two bull two bowls, you know what I mean? Like constantly. Oh yeah. Um I did not know how to deal with that. Um, and I was really lucky to have like my family uh was very involved, and I had friends who were very novelty, like, oh my god, it's a baby, you know, and they're like in college. Um so I don't remember being I mean, yes, I had some of those like I feel bad because I'm not being the perfect Martha Stewart mom or whatever, but I knew that wasn't even really possible because we didn't have any money and we were very young. Um so it's it's just been later on where I'm when I've noticed the stuff, he and I are both freeze people, my son and I. And so we'll go sometimes two or three weeks without talking. And it's not because we didn't want to talk to each other, it's because we're just so like myopic on our own thing. And then all of a sudden we'll be like, uh, you know, and then I talk about I have a child, right? Exactly. And he'll be like, I'm a mom, you know. Um, and so I I've learned not really to, you know, I I'll check in with him more often now. Like, I just have alarms, do you know what I mean? Like I just have like like a reminder because I don't I don't remember to call my own mom, you know? So it isn't like I know it's not um I know it's not like something I don't want to see him or anything anything like that. It's more uh I I need the reminders and I would only kind of feel bad when I would see the my friends who are mom who are Martha Stewart moms, you know. I I don't know if they really are in real life, but just how they present, you know, like because usually at some point they'll call me and be like, take these fuckers off my hands, you know, like please come over and bring me coffee or something, right? Instagram tells a different story. So yeah, it's it's been a really interesting um uh trying to be trying to be gentle with myself around those things around um how I show up when I show up. Um because the thing is, is I know that when I reach out to him and when he reaches out to me, we really want to, you know. Yeah. I mean, half the time he might need money, but the other half of the time But he really wants to, right? So we're gonna connect. Oh yeah. You know, so it's just you know, figuring that stuff out, and he's needed money less and less, and you know, as he gets older, and so um as I get older, I'm realizing I do want to have more of that time with him, you know. Um, and so I'm trying to figure out as he's going even into his 30s, like what is that gonna look like and how can I do that? Um, so that we can both keep having this time together, you know.

SPEAKER_00 28:16

Well, so I'm curious, this is a question for everybody who ever wants to answer first. What in your parenting experience so far has been the most triggering? Like what behavior, what experience, what has triggered your own stuff? Because a whole thing that we work with in this group and that I've worked with with parents one-on-one over the years is when we're in our trauma response with our kids, like when we're our most threatening, when we're our most shaming, when we're our most overwhelmed with them, they're bringing up something in us we haven't metabolized or really learned how to be with. And we just got off this amazing membership call that was all about inherent and inherited shame. And when someone in your family shames you, what they're really doing, unbeknownst to them and us, is they're saying, hide that thing that I don't know how to deal with either. You know, it's like something in you that you're expressing that people before you didn't really understand how to be with, they want you to shut that down because they don't have capacity for it. So, what have we learned with this embodiment work that our kids are teaching us, whoa, you have to develop more capacity for this thing because I have it too. And if you don't develop more capacity, you're not gonna be able to hold me through it.

SPEAKER_03 29:25

I have an example. Um, probably one of the most triggered I've ever been with my, with any of my kids was my my my middle child, um maybe around the age of six, started going through this phase of um of stealing, like going into his father's wallet, taking five or ten dollars. And um one day I was in his room and I saw a $20 bill and I said, called Jamal in. I said, Jamal, what is this? And he said, Oh, dad gave it to me. I said, Jamal, if I go ask your father, he gave you $20, a $20 bill, he's gonna say yes. And he just looked at me and I said, Did you take this out of your dad's wallet without permission? And he immediately went into freeze, which I know, like his go-to uh responses are are freeze and fight. And I immediately went into fight. I could feel myself, I could, I could hear myself saying, You need to help me understand why you're doing this. Because this is like the third time. And for me, what it was triggering, because I have with my children being black, I'm already, I already have things related to how they'll they'll navigate the police, in particular Jamal with him being autistic, I have this thing like you need to know how to navigate police officers, because if you don't, your life is on the line. So, in literally in that moment, that's how I was addressing him. And I can see him go further and further into freeze the more I went into fight. And so I had to pause myself and I said, I cannot trust you to be in the room where your father wall, your father's wallet is, therefore, you can only play in the living room when you are ready to talk. Let me know. But that was one of the moments where I was really glad for this work because if I hadn't, it would have been very, very easy for me to continue down the path I was going, where pushing him, like, you need to help me understand because this behavior cannot continue, and I wouldn't have been able to touch into what I was really afraid. Like, I'm afraid you're gonna get killed by a police officer when you grow up.

SPEAKER_00 31:27

And that fear would have and was starting to overwhelm him, shut him down. This is the shame piece I just talked about. Like, you need to hide this thing you're doing because I don't want you to get hurt.

SPEAKER_03 31:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:38

Um, yeah, that's that's so powerful. I I love how, as you were speaking that, you were assessing in that moment his trauma responses. Because I think what what gets lost in a lot of parents, it got lost on me, and I'm a trauma therapist that teaches this stuff everywhere. We call we talk we call them tantrums, and so it leaves the realm of humanity. It's like this thing that only kids do, and it's like annoying and frustrating, they shouldn't do it. But tantrums are just kids' trauma responses. So when you see a child have tantrums and I just say, quote, bad behavior. So when a child is shutting down, they won't speak, they have no words, you you immediately think, what's wrong with you? Why are you withholding? That's someone in freeze, right? If a child's yelling, kicking, slamming, biting, you're like, you're so aggressive, you're horrible. That's someone in flight, in fight. If your child's walking away, you're talking to them, running into the room, slamming the door to get some space from you, they're they're in flight, right? So your kids are in these trauma responses. And if you don't assess it as such the way you did, you mischaracterize it as bad behavior. You you consider it like resmus as personality, right?

SPEAKER_01 32:43

Right.

SPEAKER_00 32:43

And it's not his personality, it's what his body does when he's overwhelmed, especially. And this is your autistic point, too. You said, right? Yeah. So it's especially on top of that with a neurodivergence. And I I have a similar I had a similar thing with Lyra where she was having an issue with in school. Um, and the kids were making fun of her because she has ticks, you know, from her cast being cut off. And I grew up being like horribly bullied for having uh Tourette syndrome and nervous ticks. I had no control over what my face would do or sounds I would make. So when she came home and told us that she had been getting bullied, this was like six, seven years ago, I felt the fire come up and the terror. You're gonna experience what I experienced, which to me went all the way into sexual assault and all these other places, right? And so it went that quick from like, you know, a second grader who's being rude on the bus to this like massive experience I had in middle school. So I was already seeing this future based on my experience. And I felt this um moment for it was probably a good couple months. Whenever she would have a tick, I would feel this aggression in my chest. And I want to be like, stop it. Like that's what would want to come out. It didn't, but I really want to be stop that now, like shut it down because of the fear of what that would mean. But I, you know, I worked with the anger and and and sat with it, and I would find other ways to talk to her about it. Now it's it doesn't actually trigger me anymore. But it took a couple of years for it not to trigger me. The good news is because of this work, I didn't have to act on the trigger. And I think that's an important thing to note before we get to Marika and Evan. I don't try to make people perfect, I think that is so basic boring, like Costco. That's Costco level boring. Of like, okay, you can't just wipe out people's trauma responses or triggers, but you can relate to them. So I don't suggest anyone who does work with us, especially a parent, you're gonna emerge like loving everything about your kids or feeling peaceful all the time. What you will emerge with was normalizing your behavior, normalizing why you feel this way and learning how to actually hold it. Right. And when you hold it, you're able to be with them and yourself. So there's this like dual parenting that happens.

SPEAKER_03 34:56

Yes. And you're able to parent from from not the trauma response. Because let me let me let me let me be perfectly clear ain't no gentle parenting happening over here. But Jamal got his ass read for stealing in my house, but I'm not responding as if a police officer is shooting him in the street. What I am gonna do is sit down and tell him, I don't live with people who steal from me. All right. Uh uh. You lost trust from me. You gotta earn this trust back, and it's gonna take some time, my friend. I hope you get it. So that I want to make that really clear.

SPEAKER_01 35:25

This is not a person happening over here.

SPEAKER_03 35:27

We still set boundaries, still keep it real, but I'm not gonna be talking to you from that place of fear that has absolutely nothing to do with what's happening in this moment.

SPEAKER_00 35:36

Real talk, brave spaces. I want everyone to know that Camille and I think gentle parenting is dorky. We think it's dorky. I'm sorry. You can hate me. I tried it, I drank the Kool-Aid too, so I was one of you. It's cheese. It's straight up Brie. And you and I are over it. And what makes I think our space really wonderful, that I love about it, that I stand behind it, is we don't do that gentle parenting shit with people. We're like, no, you're allowed to be annoyed. It's actually good that your children see the consequence of their behavior when you lie, when you yell at, when they yell in your face, when you know they do something that annoys you, you're allowed to be annoyed. You want to teach them in the world how people are going to respond to them. We want you to keep your humanity, not become this archetypical parent that has no needs or preferences and never gets bothered. I think that's just as detrimental to kids as screaming and running around slamming doors. So to teach them, there's this middle place of I'm pissed at you for stealing from your dad, and I'm in my body and grounded in my heart's open as I'm pissed with you. Like that duality is so massive and really, really unique to hold.

SPEAKER_03 36:48

So I love that you just brought that in because I want people to understand this is not a call to like, brother, sister, please let's just feel into why you took the $20 and okay.

SPEAKER_00 37:00

It's just an energy. You know, we're not doing that. That's not what we're doing here, everybody. This is real, this is still parenting, and we're still in the trenches with you, and it sucks sometimes. And we're gonna teach you how to make it suck a little less. What Mariko, what about you? Like, what are you thinking about all this? We know you weren't a gentle parent, and I love how candid you are about that.

SPEAKER_04 37:20

I mean, I'm Gen X, I feel like it's illegal for us to be gentle parents. You are lucky, I just didn't smoke cigarettes in the house.

SPEAKER_00 37:28

Yeah, that was that was the big sacrifice that you opened the house.

SPEAKER_04 37:31

When you go outside on the deck when it was combed, oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 37:37

Things you did for your kids.

SPEAKER_04 37:38

I know. I mean, I like cheese and I like Costco, but no, I didn't I didn't really do any of that. Um I I would say that my parents were closer to gentle parenting parents, you know what I mean? Parenting before that was a thing. Um, they brought conflict resolution and those types of things too rather than just yelling or whatever the other people did. But um the trigger for me, it happens now. It's um and it's happened all throughout his 20s, which is um people asking how he's doing. Um and you're just supposed to have a fancy answer, do you know what I mean? Like no one actually wants to hear the truth. Yeah, like well, he can't totally hold a job, and he's probably vapes too much, and all he does is play video games, and he's in freeze on the couch all the time. And you found a cute little girlfriend who was also in freeze all the time, and you know, and it's like, and I hope that they find a way out. I really do, but it's just this is where he's at, you know.

SPEAKER_00 38:40

And hold on, just pause you saying that. I think so many parents, their shoulders just came down because like the realness of that was just like, yep, that's how our kids are doing a lot of times.

SPEAKER_04 38:50

It's I mean, it's just true, and but you know, it's like it's not like I don't have the friends whose kids are going to Ivy League schools or who's whose kids are trying to cure cancer or whatever. That's great. I don't I don't have that kid. He's a very sweet, wonderful, wonderful boy. But um, you know, I think much like my I felt like my journey to get here was getting out of freeze after many, many decades. I absolutely see him doing the same thing. And because of that, I feel like I'm the only, not only, but the only one in our family and in our circle that understands it and has empathy for it. Yeah, like I know that my siblings are like my you know, people that that know him, they just have the labels of someone in freeze, you know, lazy, like procrastinator, can't can't can't hold a job, like that type of thing. And so it's hard when someone mechanics that create that right, and I'm like, I want to defend him all the time, but I'm just like, this is just where he's at. I remember being there at his age. You could have put the the the most amazing relationship, the best job in front of me, yep, the best living situation. I would have fucked it up in six months. Yep, he does that too. It's really annoying because I know why. And I don't do that anymore. And I'm like, learn from me, but you know, this is not how he's doing so. I feel like the thing that I can give him, which I think is the best thing, is understanding. Yeah, not judging him for the things that I know that he's going through, even though I know everyone else is judging him. Um, I try and explain a little bit to people about it, but at the same time, you know, you just if you if you don't really understand trauma response's responses or you're too close to it, it just seems like he's mooching off of you, which I totally understand, or it seems like he just won't get his shit together, which I totally understand. But I remember being that person too and not having anybody understand what I was going through. So I feel like at least he has one person.

SPEAKER_00 40:55

It's such an important piece you're bringing in because the understanding versus trying to save them is a huge discernment. And because there's so much writing on the outcome of our children, like I like that you bring this piece in because people judge themselves based on the outcome of their kids, and people want to be judged by others based on the outcome of their kids. And that's why that question understandably is so triggering, because it creates a story about you, about him, about you know, whatever it is. When really, I think the you know, we we say this a lot to parents, Camille and I. Uh your job isn't to affect their outcome, actually, is to show up for where they are right now. So your ability to first of all understand the freeze because you live it and have lived it severely, like you get it. To understand it and to be like, hey, sweetie, you got this for me. I get it. Like, I'm learning how to navigate it. If you ever need help, I'll teach you, but I'm I'm with you regardless. That is so much more valuable than trying to get him out of the freeze. Because how do we try to get someone out of freeze? We put pressure on them. And what does putting pressure on someone freeze do? It create it doubles the freeze, right? Freeze from pressure to begin with. So it's an important piece for people to hear. It's our job is just to show up with capacity for what they're going through, not to change what they're going through. That's theirs to do. And so I even think that discernment is important of like what's my responsibility as a parent.

SPEAKER_04 42:16

I also had to really pull apart because I get very angry.

SPEAKER_01 42:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 42:22

You know, if people are like, oh, you're still not doing, or whatever it is. Like, um, I have to be able to recognize when what you want is to feel comfortable, right? It would make everybody feel very much very comfortable and happy too, I think, that they that you know, that they could be rooting for him and and say, Oh, he's doing this or he's doing that. But I recognize when he's like, let's say he gets a job or something, everyone like okay, good. Oh, thank God. There's settled. Finally, he'll be able to yes, like, you know, and oh, maybe he'll get health insurance. Maybe he doesn't give a shit about that.

SPEAKER_01 42:57

Yep.

SPEAKER_04 42:58

He just wants some money and then he's gonna figure some stuff out. So lately, my my best answer is that he's doing well and he's figuring things out because that's all we're that's all we're doing, you know. And it's doing that, yeah. So it makes me feel like I gave a real a true answer and I'm not fawning because I I feel that fun, you know, like oh yeah, I've wanted to lie before, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, just to avoid the he's amazing and he's doing all this stuff, and you don't know.

SPEAKER_00 43:23

You know what I mean?

SPEAKER_04 43:24

You can't handle how good he sounds he's the CEO of Costco, so the cheese department, exactly. So so you know, but it's like that's not why I had a well, I don't think not why I had to get it, but it wasn't so that I had some, you know, that he would be the most successful person on the planet. I just wanted to be happy, like in his body at certain points of his life.

SPEAKER_00 43:45

That's it, yeah. That's it, and you you're bringing in a whole other piece. Um, and now it just left my main mind because I have ADHD. That's how I roll. It will come back and I'll teach it impeccably when it does, but until it does, it's gone. But you had brought in another piece for me that made a lot of sense. Uh, so much sense, it's become embodied, I don't have to talk about it anymore. So, Evan, what's the much triggering thing for you?

SPEAKER_02 44:08

Yeah, I don't know. Um, I feel like it's too soon for me to I there's there's a person's always your answer, girl.

SPEAKER_00 44:15

You're like, I'm fine, nothing but remember we have to be. No, I'm not saying nothing bothers me.

SPEAKER_02 44:18

I'm I'm just saying that there's there's um he hasn't done anything specifically besides scream, like it's true, you know, probably the you know, he's too little. Um screaming in my ear a lot, and I was scared I was going deaf, but that's not necessarily that's not something he like did.

SPEAKER_00 44:35

You're responding to an actual biological subject, it's exactly that would have serious ramifications.

SPEAKER_02 44:42

Um but no, I I feel like I and um again, I I probably this this is definitely I can definitely blame you guys for this. I feel like I'm excited by the over couplings that he's going to highlight for me because the being able to see those things as an opportunity for self-growth rather than um, and again, not to say it's gonna be easy. I mean, obviously it's not. Um, but to know and have a frame for that and be like, you know, this is a lot for me right now, whatever it is. I'm gonna just I need a second, and then to sit with it and see that as like, well, this is the thing I need to work on that perhaps I wouldn't like. might not have even come into my awareness had he not brought it there. Um so again, obviously not to imagine that it's easy, um, but to kind of be reframing that as an opportunity to be able to look into those things. Um and also just kind of looking at like how um like you said with the there's just things that are out of our control. There's there's things as parents that we're just not going to be able to shield them from or whatnot. And especially um we've talked about this a lot too as kind of trauma as an initiation. Like um I mean I've done plenty of stupid things in my life um that just like my dad did so I'm sure that he'll do. Great example was driving across the country in the middle of the winter and my dad was like don't do it. The continental divide's gonna be closed it's gonna be freezing I did it the continental divide was closed I had to camp on a foot of snow um shocked it didn't get frostbite that he'll probably do the same thing. But but all that to say that um if we have the um opportunity uh whatever however you want to frame it um to be able to go through that and to like just the the value of experience just in general um that we can have from you know going through difficult things to not discount that that my hope is I can just kind of be there as a supportive person rather than a protective person, especially because I'm gonna I there's a pretty good chance he's probably gonna be autistic too. So to be able to um not shelter him but be able to be there to help support him and process what it's like to live in the world um rather than to create like a fantasy make believe place in the house and then you know he goes somewhere else and he's like what the hell's going on out there like yeah it's it's pretty crazy out there.

SPEAKER_00 47:16

If he was neurotypical it would be unethical you and Danny like unethical but it it's probably gonna be his big rebellion is he's neurotypical. So he's gonna rebel against you too. Um exactly but you know this is you're highlighting another important piece is that our children you know there's predictable rupture and triggers and activation in life like it is inherent to life to be triggered to be ruptured to have difficulties to have people treat you poorly to have heartbreak like that's all the initiation of being human. And again there's this task parents uh obligate themselves with of I have to somehow prevent this what if our task instead was I have to work on myself to have capacity to relate to it when it happens like to hold it and I think the greatest service we do to our children is let them make these decisions and have these massive ruptures and pains and whatever they trauma is whatever they go through, knowing they can rest with us at home, knowing there is this place that receives them because that's what pendulation is all about is I touch into the danger, the risk, the thrill, the pain of being human. And then I come back to the safe, predictable co-regulator my mother, my father, my parent whoever it is that holds me and sits with me and laughs with me and doesn't judge me for the experience. That's a really important developmental gift we get to give our kids because they start that the moment they leave our house to go to a grandparent's house, the moment they go to kindergarten the moment they go to school friends' houses like the moment they start leaving our like you said like our perfectly curated realm the thing that is most for them because we know them, they start feeling those ruptures early on. So instead of preventing them can we learn to respond to them with more capacity and I was reminded what I wanted to say when Marika shared that so many parents don't realize how codependent our nervous systems are with our children and grandparents as well. And so like Marika said when your son's doing well whatever that means for people and you see this like ah like they're at rest now it's an uncomfortable thing to admit but when most people do somatic work they realize I'm not actually wanting this thing for them I'm wanting it for me. Because if they're doing well or they're not heartbroken or they're happy I can rest at night and that's a massive disservice that we provide to people you know cloaked in empathy and love and all those things but the real reality is my nervous system can't handle when you don't meet my standards or when you're going through hardship. So I need you to change so I can go to bed at night. And then we'll never show up to them with a true unconditional form of connection or love or support. We'll be trying to change them because we're desperate for feeling settled in ourselves. And I think to really get that, that was also very inconvenient for me to admit is like oh who is this for do I want her to not make ticks at school for her or for me? It was it's actually for me because she has friends and they love the weirdness of her. They adore her. They feel safe with her because of those traits because we have a whole different culture we live in I live in a whole different part of the world and I grew up in. So it's a different even culture of kids who are receiving her. So it's really comes down to checking in with the the adult body that we're parenting from what's happening in response to our kids and am I parenting from this urgent stress response of fear and overwhelm or am I parenting from a place of safety inside of me? And that's really what embodied parenting is for me it's putting things in place and lifestyle in place so that you have a safety in your body and from there you're parenting your kids. What you do with that safety is going to be different from everybody. You know maybe you take your kids to three practices a week because you have capacity for it. Maybe you do none of that you don't have capacity but either way you have a safety in yourself that resonates and they can feel when they're around you. And that I think in the modern era with screens it is so important to create the capacity for your child to be disappointed because there's so many dopamine hits now that we didn't have growing up that they're really grasping for from an addictive place even and like a social place of wanting to be part of the crowd that you we have to learn to let them be bored and disappointed and that we'll be okay when they are or else it turns into fawning on our our behalf. So what's the final thing I cannot believe one person here didn't ask this question but hey guess where I guess no only I guess no one wants to know what we think about parenting. So point taken uh what's a final closing line? Anything that you think is important just in your own experience of parenting you want to impart before we close practices help you kind of like anything that feels good to end on.

SPEAKER_03 52:09

It's been really helpful for me to be able to distinguish when I am empathizing with my child versus when I'm enmeshed with my child and there is an important distinction and we I think oftentimes we conflate enmeshment with empathy but there there is a distinction and um we can conflate enmeshment with love and there is a distinction.

SPEAKER_02 52:37

Yeah well said I'd say just the um the permission to give myself some space in fact there's such an idea that like you already said like to to like push through things when they're difficult or just like knowing that like okay when I'm overwhelmed I'm checking in be like okay I just need 30 seconds a minute even just to walk away go to a different room just create some physical space just to be able to even and not even necessarily to change what I'm feeling but to even just get a sense of like okay I am really overwhelmed right now. Even just that little bit of space I feel like is is super super helpful for me to be able to um even just catch that at the moment.

SPEAKER_00 53:20

Yes yes I call that interrupting the trauma response like really feeling the energy pausing pulling away and being able to sit with it instead of act from it right away.

SPEAKER_04 53:31

Mine's a lot like Evan's except that I I because I go into freeze so often I need to go tell someone else um especially if it's like I got news from my son or or I'm you know we're sort of back in a pattern or something like I used to just want to fix it right away or throw money at it or do you know just like get it out get it away and now I usually it's my husband but it's like I try and take the time first to like get grounded before answering or before you know or just having someone to talk to about it um has been good because I was used to just isolating and doing it on my own sort of with the shame too you know and so now it's been so nice to go like I'm super overwhelmed like this is what's going on and just have like a sounding board and really uh get grounded before before making any decisions or reaching out.

SPEAKER_00 54:27

That's a great example of finding co-regulation as a parent before trying to act because it is so common like I was saying the way the nuclear family has evolved into of just being one or two people that are raising one or several kids it's like you need more co-regulation to be able to have the capacity to show up to a child. And historically you'd have literally a dozen bodies to rely on so we need to create those dozen bodies still even if they don't live in the house with us like on the phone or online someone you can just reach out to that can hold that with you then you do feel something settled and then from that settled place you get to parent and that's what we're trying to teach people. So oh wait I also was gonna say is it finding the now I can feel feeling the now feeling the now that's really helpful too yeah that's a really good one when I'm like yes yes going into the future of like oh my god he's gonna be homeless and he's gonna be doing this and all that are like what if they get pregnant what if they you know what I mean yep yeah it's like ooh I gotta I gotta get back to what's like actually real and present that's that's a helpful that's a great little bonus one to end on because when you are seeing the future fear of what your child is going to go through because of what's happening now you parent them as they're as if they're experiencing that in the future and it's incongruent. So your response is too big too powerful too overwhelming for them based on the situation. And when I think of like Lyra making the the face doing the ticks while we're watching a movie it's like okay here I am my beautiful house here's our cats here's this sweet little girl cuddled up we're watching a movie like this is so tender and beautiful. This is not what I'm imagining in my mind. So the feeling the now is such a brilliant way to also interrupt that trauma response and then actually parent from now not from the thing you're fearing the future. Well if you go to the episode details everyone listening you can see the link for the embodied parenting group it begins October 6th it goes for six months you have the uh wonderful mentorship of Camille throughout the whole six months so she'll be there uh on circle you can reach out to her one-on-one so she'll help custom tailor what we teach to each individual circumstance and we really invite everyone to join i mean we have had grandparents we have had nannies we've had people who can't get pregnant who just want to do this they can relate to themselves and children better we have uh you know uh teachers I don't know is there anyone I'm missing aunts uncles uh we've uh to to the same point like not even just people who can't get pregnant but people who aren't even intending to get pet pregnant but they want to reparent themselves yeah yeah so really is there's no like closed door you don't have to be a parent or a biological parent even you can anyone's allowed to join to learn this um the outline the info everything is in the link below so we're gonna hop off now and we're gonna speak to our members on it privately on the other side thank you all for being here and it was nice to have the whole team we haven't had the whole team for a while thank you all that's the end of today's episode take a moment to notice where you feel the episode take a breath into that place maybe even put your hand over it and let whatever wants to come up come up. And remember our bodies speak through sensations. What's yours saying right now for more information on any upcoming events please visit holisticlifenavigation.com and feel free to check out my YouTube page where you can watch any of these episodes leave a comment and even request a future topic for me to dive into I'll see you next time