Accepting, Regulating, and Tolerating Emotions with Dr. Alissa Jerud

Before we dive in: The breakdown of this episode includes a brief discussion of sexual assault. Please take care while listening.

Disclaimer: This transcript was generated with the help of AI and may contain minor errors or inconsistencies. Please refer to the audio for the most accurate representation of the conversation.

[00:00:00] Alyssa: You're listening to Voices of Your Village, and today I got to hang out with Dr. Alissa Jerud. She book Emotion-Savvy Parenting. I loved getting to chat with her specifically about anxiety and what it looks like to experience anxiety without being consumed by it and had to parent a child who is experiencing anxiety.

Alissa Jerud has a PhD and is a mom of two kids. She's a licensed clinical psychologist, a clinical assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania, and author of Emotion-Savvy Parenting, which is a compassionate science informed guide for relating more skillfully to painful, unwanted emotions in her private practice.

[00:00:46] Dr. Jerud specializes in highly effective exposure based treatment for anxiety related disorders, including OCD, PTSD, social anxiety disorder, panic disorder, specific phobias and generalized anxiety disorder. Additionally, she specializes in DBT, dialectical Behavior Therapy skills training, and particularly enjoys helping other parents learn research back strategies for accepting, regulating, and tolerating their emotions as well as their children's.

[00:01:20] Dr. Jerud also trains other clinicians in exposure based treatments and frequently gives workshops on anxiety, stress, mental health, parenting, and social support to companies large and small. Alright folks, let's dive in.

[00:01:39] Hey there. I'm Alyssa Blask Campbell. I'm a mom with a master's degree in early childhood education and co-creator of the Collaborative Emotion Processing Method. I'm here to walk alongside you through the messy, vulnerable parts of being humans, raising other humans with deep thoughts and actionable tips.

[00:01:56] Let's dive in together.

[00:02:01] What led you to your book, emotion Savvy Parenting? What? What brought you there? 

[00:02:06] Dr. Alissa Jerud: That's a great question. Really. I think it was one day I was having a conversation with my husband about how my approach to parenting, which is, you know, was very much rooted in respectful parenting, how it so closely aligned with the treatments.

[00:02:22] That I provide in my clinical practice. So I was talking with him about it and I was like, you know, I don't think like most clinical psychologists know much about respectful parenting there, there's not like the randomized clinical control trials that us in the, you know, clinical psychology world typically like to see.

[00:02:39] There aren't those for respectful parenting or, or types of parenting like that. Sure. And, but I was like, but this is so similar in so many ways to what, what I am talking about all day long in my clinical work. And he was like, you should write a book. And I said, oh, I should write a book. And I think that evening I went and I wrote an intro that I ended up not using.

[00:03:00] Um, but I, I kind of got excited about it and so Cool. That's what kicked it off. 

[00:03:05] Yeah. 

[00:03:05] Alyssa: Sweet. I love when, just like practice in everyday life is what spearheads it. That's like everything that's happened at seed has just been filling a gap that I've found. Yeah. And yeah, diving into that jazz, we're actually right now.

[00:03:20] In the process of partnering, hopefully with a university that has, um, a research center for early childhood programs to get the seed cert researched and having, I, I did research before like IRB research of the CEP method and now we're like entering into this process to have the seed certification, which is our professional development program researched.

[00:03:43] Um, and it's one of these where I just get to like step back and not be a part of the IRB process or anything like that and just say like, yeah, here's what we are saying the seed cert can do, and they get to do the research on it. And it's so much cooler to sit on this side than have to navigate the IRB process and all the data and all that jazz.

[00:04:04] I was like, ah, I like this seat. Actually hand it off to somebody else. I like 

[00:04:07] that 

[00:04:08] Alyssa: a hundred percent. It's so great. Um, yeah, we were just in knee deep in conversations about control groups and all that jazz, so, um. Yeah. But oof research, I have no desire to do it again. I love to have things researched. I'm very curious human.

[00:04:27] Mm-hmm. And am down to like find the funding to make those search things happen, but doing of the research, bless those humans. Yeah. 

[00:04:35] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. Bless these days 

[00:04:37] Alyssa: especially it's, it's 

[00:04:38] Dr. Alissa Jerud: hard to get in. Yeah. 

[00:04:39] Alyssa: Yeah. Totally. Totally. Uh, and you have two kiddos, so eight and 12 as you say. 

[00:04:45] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yep. 

[00:04:45] Alyssa: Sweet. Sweet. Yeah. Do you find that your work in as a therapist influences your parenting more, or that your parenting influences your work as a therapist more?

[00:04:58] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Oh, that is such a great question. I would say more that my work as a therapist has influenced my parenting. Yeah. I think the big thing for me is that so much of my work as a therapist is in helping people learn that they can tolerate. I. Painful, unwanted emotions and not have to give into the unhelpful urges that come with those.

[00:05:20] Mm-hmm. And I mean, I oftentimes that manifests in people trying to control situations, right? Like, sure, I feel anxious and uncertain about a certain outcome, and so then I wanna try to get certainty that things are gonna be okay, or that that person likes me, or whatever it might be. I'm trying to kind of control how things are gonna go.

[00:05:39] But ironically, those attempts to get control, backfire and make us feel even more out of control, more uncertain. And so I think, I realize, like in parenting, so much of what I initially as a parent was pulled to do was to wanna try to control and to wanna try to like get my kids to change so I could stop being so triggered so I could feel different.

[00:06:02] And I realized it was kind of, it was backfiring in my face, not effective at all. And then I, I saw that happening with the people I work with as well. And so, yes, I think that. What I do and my clinical work has very much influenced my parenting, which then in turn has influenced my clinical work too.

[00:06:19] Sure, 

[00:06:20] Alyssa: sure, sure. I love that. I similarly, I mean, I was, did my master's and did my research before I was a parent. Mm-hmm. And am so grateful because I feel like I got to dive into a bunch of work before I had kids in my space, in my face, um, on my body, in my body, all that jazz, and that it very much informs my parenting and also think it's been so valuable for me to be a parent and be in this work in terms of being able to understand so many of the nuances or even just like, man, I wish I could go back and tell my.

[00:06:58] 20 something or early 30 something self who had no kids. You have tons of time. Like I know you think your day is packed. Your day is not packed. Mm-hmm. You got so much time, sister. Anytime somebody doesn't have kids, it's like, oh, I just don't have time for that. I'm like, there's no way that's true.

[00:07:15] There's just no way. That's true. Yeah. That's what I wish I could give like Preki Alyssa, I think is just. Soak up all the time. You really got right now that's just your own. 

[00:07:28] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. It's not easy to find time now. No. Yeah. So I'll say it does. Our kids are getting older and last night there was an event for our daughter's school actually, that we were, somebody kind of gifted us tickets to go to.

[00:07:43] And so we went, um, and it was the first time we've ever done this, but we let our kids, they, we made dinner for them. They ate dinner by themselves and they tucked themselves in and went, did everything on their own. And we came home and they were just fine sleeping. So Jonathan 

[00:07:58] Alyssa: Knight would be so proud of you.

[00:08:00] Yeah, that is true. You would 

[00:08:03] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Well, yes. That you get more time as they get older. That is the nice 

[00:08:07] Alyssa: thing. Yeah, totally. Totally. And that's what we have like said so much. It's just like, it's all just a season and in this season, time is not something that's in abundance. Yeah. When you're working with families and on the like us part of this, the what is coming up for me so that they can show up with intention so that I can tolerate and navigate the hard stuff without needing to make it go away, which is what we all want, right?

[00:08:34] Like when we break this down in our work, we refer to it as coping mechanisms versus coping strategies, coping mechanisms being those dopaminergic activities. Like my favorite one is Facebook marketplace. I don't even have to get the thing. I'm just like, is it still available? Right? And like, whew. All right.

[00:08:51] Now I'm starting to like feel the dopamine and feel less of the hard and I can escape it for a little bit. And then our coping strategies being the, maybe it's connecting with a friend. Maybe it's moving your body, maybe it's taking deep breaths or having space, et cetera, that produce serotonin or oxytocin ultimately, but it takes longer the effects of that.

[00:09:14] Are longer than, oh, I just gotta hit a dopamine and now I'm get to numb my nervous system. When you're doing this work with folks, what is it that you see moves the needle most for people to be willing to tolerate The hard part? 'cause it, it's so hard to say 

[00:09:37] Dr. Alissa Jerud: yes to, right? Yeah. I think it's a really kind of really key lens shift that not everyone is able to make, right?

[00:09:45] Um, and so I, I should note that I, most of the people who I work with initially come to see me for. Anxiety of some kind. Yeah, sure. They have some kind of anxiety related disorder. So I'm really then getting into the nitty gritty of the rationale for the type of treatment I provide for anxiety, which is called exposure therapy.

[00:10:03] Um, but even when somebody's coming to me wanting help with emotion regulation, they're apparent and they're realizing they're, they're not able to keep their cool as often as they would like with their kids, or they're not parenting in a way that really helps them feel that great, they're feeling kind of crappy about themselves, maybe not showing up in a way that's in line with their values.

[00:10:21] A lot of what I'm doing is talking about how, again, just really like coming back to the idea that oftentimes the very things that we do to try to cope with uncomfortable emotions actually maintain and exacerbate those emotions in the long run. So it's coming back to that again and again for some people.

[00:10:39] Some people get it really quickly and they're like, oh yeah, I totally know. Um, I know what you mean. The irony of the very things that I'm trying to do is that they're, they're making life. So much harder for me making the things that I don't want to happen actually more likely to happen and they get it quickly.

[00:10:55] Again, there are moments where that, I feel like it's, it's not a one and done thing. It's not like you just get it and then forever more. Mm-hmm. You're like, okay, well I'm never gonna do those things again. 'cause we have those polls and those habits are ingrained. We've kind of gotten into the habit of trying to get rid of unwanted emotion.

[00:11:10] So there's gonna be the pull to go back to resorting, to those, those strategies. But that, that kind of buy-in hopefully is there early on and then we can just keep revisiting that rationale as needed. 

[00:11:22] Alyssa: So when you're working from the anxiety side and you're doing like exposure therapy mm-hmm. I. I'm a human who lived with anxiety that was trauma induced.

[00:11:35] I did, let me back up. I didn't grow up in a household with parents who have high anxiety, uh, which is a beautiful gift. Thank you mom and dad. That was lovely in that I didn't experience anxiety as a strong emotion or a driver for me until I experienced trauma and then I had like trauma induced anxiety.

[00:11:55] Yeah. And so it would all be like trigger related. Mm-hmm. Um, and for me getting through that and moving to a place where I now don't live with high anxiety and those triggers don't affect me in the same way. Exposure was huge. Yeah. And. So stinking hard. What is it that you do to support folks before you're like, all right, so I'll give you an example.

[00:12:28] One of my triggers was going into a basement. Mm-hmm. And so, but my, like, laundry in every apartment, for the most part was in a basement. I had to access a basement quite often and it was horrible. Mm-hmm. Like, I, it was so hard to do. And I'm curious, were, are there things that you do to lay the groundwork or the foundations for then being able to be exposed to triggers?

[00:12:57] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah, I mean, again, I think it, it's such a great question. It all comes back to the, the rationale for talking. So whether it's it, whether it's anxiety following a trauma and somebody mm-hmm. Has what we call post-traumatic stress disorder. 

[00:13:11] Alyssa Mm-hmm. 

[00:13:11] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Or it's anxiety that's showing up in a different way.

[00:13:13] Social anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, a fear of flying, which is kind of big these days with all the news around planes. However, anxiety is showing up. What I talk with people about is that we know that what tends to maintain and exacerbate anxiety in the long run is the presence of avoidance.

[00:13:30] And so that can be downright avoidance, just never going to a basement. Right. Like never going down into the basement. It could even be more subtle ways of avoiding though, where you go into the basement, but you're engaging in some kind of like, um, avoidance behavior as well in the basement. Totally. Yeah.

[00:13:46] So you're on the phone with somebody to make sure they know you're a, you're making sure the door is open and you know, all of those things. Right. And what I talk with people about is those behaviors are so understandable, it's so, so understandable to wanna avoid things like that. Right. Um, or to wanna do something to cope when you put yourself into a situation that's anxiety provoking.

[00:14:07] 'cause it helps reduce anxiety in the moment. The problem is in the long run, it kind of reinforces the message each time. You avoid in one of those ways that the only way you can cope with that situation is either to avoid it altogether. So if you think about going down to the laundry room in the basement and you decide, you know what?

[00:14:22] I'm gonna wait for my friend to do the laundry instead. Mm-hmm. Or my partner, or whatever it might be. You reinforce that, that kind of message to your brain that. That's unsafe. Right. You can't do 

[00:14:32] that. Mm-hmm. 

[00:14:33] Dr. Alissa Jerud: If you go to the basement though, and as you do so, you know, you reassure yourself, okay, this is like different or this is safe, I can, you know, that sort of thing.

[00:14:40] So you're kind of reassuring yourself in a different way or you are on the phone with a friend to make sure that if anything were to happen, they could jump in and help you out, whatever it might be. Same idea, you learn, the only way you were able to tolerate that is because of those other avoidance behaviors that were on board.

[00:14:58] Right? Yeah. So really getting people to see that and that ideally I wanna help people help break that habit of reducing anxiety through avoidance. So I wanna help them learn to develop a new relationship with anxiety where they learn, hey, I can tolerate anxiety right in full. 'cause anxiety's normal.

[00:15:14] It's natural. We're all gonna feel it. Even if, you know, maybe you're not a person who has an anxiety disorder. We all feel anxious at times. Totally right. So yeah, I think it's different. 

[00:15:24] Alyssa: To experience anxiety than to be consumed by anxiety. 

[00:15:27] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yes, exactly. Yeah. And learning that you can feel that anxiety and not need it to dictate what you do or don't do.

[00:15:33] Mm-hmm. But can instead show up and do all the things that matter to you that are important to you. Get your laundry done, even to be anxious. And so then from there it's about, you know, what else do we learn when you do these exposures? Like kind of helping somebody to learn to, to see all of the benefits of doing these exposures.

[00:15:50] When you do them, you learn the urges to avoid, oftentimes decrease when you don't give into them. It's like a mosquito bite that if you scratch it mm-hmm. You wanna keep scratching at it. But if you don't, that bite has a chance to heal. Same thing with, you know, anxiety. If you don't give into the urges to avoid, they tend to naturally subside on their own.

[00:16:08] And you learn the bad things probably are unlikely to happen. 

[00:16:12] Alyssa: Right, totally. Well, and I think like that's so much of it, right? Is the what our mind conjures up that is possible. 

[00:16:21] Yeah. 

[00:16:21] Alyssa: Is often way greater than what is going to be true or the reality. So the experience of going into the basement without any of the coping mechanisms and leaving and feeling safe for the first time is a new neural pathway for me.

[00:16:38] Right? It says, yeah, you can do this and be safe. Which prior to that, the neural pathway was you can't, and then every time I engage in the coping mechanism, that neural pathway strengthened. 

[00:16:50] Yeah. 

[00:16:50] Alyssa: And so when we are looking at this, I, I wanna spend some time on anxiety because I think it's something that so many people are living with and, and feeling controlled by.

[00:17:04] And then also it's something a lot of folks are concerned about with kids. Yeah. And so I wanna, I wanna spend some time here. Uh, we actually, we were just watching Finding Nemo with my 4-year-old, and he's a human who will like. Watch a movie and then he wants to watch it over and over and over and like absorb all the details and then he'll like be done with that movie for a bit and it'll be on to another one.

[00:17:30] And we've watched Inside Out and Inside Out Two we're on the scene for a little while and they were like the go-to movies for a bit. And now we're in a Finding Nemo phase. And in this last one I was sitting next to him and I said, do you remember when we were watching Inside Out Two? And Anxiety was there?

[00:17:51] And he was like, yeah. And he was like, Marlon is anxiety. And I was like, yes. Anxiety does seem to be in Marlon's Brain a lot and it seems to be controlling Marlon's Brain a lot. And he was like, not in Doris. And I was like, that's right, not in Doris. And he and I was like, what do you notice? And he. Said, Dory's having so much fun and Marlon's having no fun.

[00:18:17] And I was like, totally, it's very hard to experience anxiety and to be stuck in anxiety is not fun. Yeah, that's so true. And I was like, did you know that everybody will feel anxiety sometimes? And I said, you might feel anxiety sometimes when you feel anxiety. I wonder what you'll notice in your body. And he said, I feel scared.

[00:18:44] And I was like, yes, it is like feeling scared. And I said, if you're ever feeling anxious and you're feeling anxiety, if you need help, you can let us know and we can help you. And it just like, then we moved on from it. From there. He was like, all right, great. But it was one of those where I was like, yeah, already at four.

[00:19:03] Like he is, he's watching this. Mm-hmm. And he is noticing Marlon's not having any fun and door's having all the fun. I think we can paint anxiety then with a bad brush of you're not supposed to feel it. Yeah. And we've gotta make it go away. 

[00:19:21] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Mm-hmm. Yep. Yeah, I, I'll add to that, I think with anxiety, we used to think that we needed, in order for exposures to be effective, we needed anxiety to come down.

[00:19:33] Both during an exposure, but also with like in between exposures. Mm-hmm. Over time, we needed that anxiety, so going down to the basement that every time you went down there, ideally you should be less anxious and mm-hmm. If you were there for an hour, you should be less anxious at the end of the hour than at the beginning of the hour.

[00:19:48] But we actually have a lot of data now to suggest that that reduction in anxiety is neither a strong nor consistent predictor of treatment outcomes. Meaning people can get better even if anxiety remains high. And I think that comes back to that piece of learning. Hey, I can tolerate anxiety. And that's now what I think of as being the more critical ingredient or the secret sauce of this, of exposure therapy is learning to build those muscles for tolerating distress and also for tolerating uncertainty.

[00:20:17] Because, you know, people will tell me, for instance, with flying, okay, I, I took a plane ride and it was okay. So like I learned that that feared outcome doesn't always happen. Like my plane didn't crash, but what if the next plane, you know? Mm-hmm. What if the next is not okay? Totally. And so that's why I, I really think of, you know, with exposure, we're not just building those muscles for tolerating distress, but also uncertainty.

[00:20:38] Even when we get dis confirmation sometimes, you know, the fear outcome didn't happen this time, but who's to say what's gonna happen next 

[00:20:45] Alyssa: time? Okay. I'm curious. So when. We're looking at this. 'cause in my experience, I feel like my anxiety has come down with more and more and more exposures where I'm not leaning on coping mechanisms.

[00:20:57] Yeah. 

[00:20:57] Alyssa: And it, I definitely sometimes will still experience anxiety, especially in like a different basement. Sure. Or whatever. And the ability to tolerate the discomfort Yes. Has for sure increased. 

[00:21:15] Mm-hmm. 

[00:21:15] Alyssa: And also, maybe it's, 'cause I still have laundry in the basement. I'm going to the basement all the time.

[00:21:22] And I've strengthened that neural pathway so much more. Like I have, you're not flying on a plane every day. Right. And I feel like with more and more and more exposure, the neural pathway of like, yeah, you are safe here, has been strengthened so much that I do experience less anxiety. Yes. Does that make sense?

[00:21:43] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. And I think of that almost as being like a bonus side effect of exposure. Okay. It's not the goal, but it's what oftentimes happens or it's icing on the cake. It's like, it's this neat thing that like when you do something repeatedly for prolonged periods of time and you don't do anything to try to avoid that anxiety in any way, shape or form, it often does naturally kind of decline on its own.

[00:22:04] But that's not our end goal because as you noted, that anxiety is likely going to return at some point in time. And ideally, like you would practice doing laundry in a hundred million different basements, right. And at different times a day. And what all those things to help me, you know, um, strengthen what we call inhibitory learning.

[00:22:23] This like new pathway in your brain that says basements aren't necessarily dangerous. Ideally we'd wanna strengthen that learning by going into as many basements as possible. But the reality is you probably, yeah, I'm not going on 

[00:22:34] Alyssa: basement tours. Yeah, yeah. 

[00:22:35] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Exactly. Right. So, so we've gotta expect that that anxiety is gonna show up at times and hopefully it sounds like you have Right.

[00:22:43] Learned you can tolerate that and not need to try to escape it in any way. 

[00:22:47] Alyssa: Okay, so now I wanna pull this into parenting. Mm-hmm. Of like, as we learn to tolerate our own discomfort, our own distress and stress responses. I mean, unknown and uncertainty is, I feel like the highest uncertainty. Health, safety, probably our top three for anxiety, right?

[00:23:10] Triggers. Yeah. And which like COVID was the real shit storm of like, you've got a whole bunch of them here all at once, right? Yeah. We don't know when this is gonna end. We don't know what it is. We don't know how to prevent it. We don't know how to make it go away. It is a health risk. Am I safe? Right?

[00:23:25] Everything was just a nice recipe for anxiety. When we learn to tolerate that discomfort and experience those hard things without needing to make them stop or go away, then when we see it in our kids, right, they are melting down. Or for me it's that. Maybe their sensory needs aren't being met or they're gonna be responded to by an adult at childcare at school in a way that I know is going to be hard for them and I wanna save them from it.

[00:24:00] Right. The more we practice this mm-hmm then the easier it is for us to hold space for them. Yeah, 

[00:24:09] Dr. Alissa Jerud: yeah, yeah. 'cause I think oftentimes what is so hard for us as parents is like seeing our kids in distress. One, we worry that they may not be able to tolerate it, but also we might not be able to tolerate the distress that seeing them upset brings in us cracks our hearts open.

[00:24:23] Right. We feel as a percent not the case. Or it triggers something in us. We were like, we're flooded by their, their loud crying or they're whining or whatever it is, and we wanna try to make that stop. 'cause it's kind of driving us bonkers. 

[00:24:38] Alyssa: A hundred percent. I worry that. In like present day social media parenting where there's just so much discussion about parenting mm-hmm.

[00:24:48] That there's a desire to have our kids not experience any discomfort. Yeah. That we are going to make sure all their sensory needs are met, that they are not gonna feel left out. They will always feel included and like they belong. That they will feel heard and seen and valued and validated and secure and safe at all times.

[00:25:14] And that if not, we are going to turn to the school and we are gonna be a fierce advocate. We are going to talk to the grandparent, or you know what, they're not even going over to that person's house anymore because we're not doing that again. We're gonna pull 'em from the soccer team because of the way that the coach interacted.

[00:25:31] I, I fear that we are doing the opposite of this work. 

[00:25:36] Mm-hmm. And 

[00:25:37] Alyssa: are trying to create a little bubble around them where they don't have to feel hard thing. Right. 

[00:25:42] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. Yeah. I, I agree with you. It's concerning and I think ideally instead, what we would do is try to meet the kid that's in front of us. You know, like see them, what, what is helpful for them?

[00:25:55] Try to a reasonable extent, try to meet those needs, right. Without worrying about, oh no, but like, what if those needs aren't always met, accepting, they're not gonna always be met, they are gonna get upset sometimes, and that's gonna strengthen their muscles for learning that they can tolerate that distress, that discomfort.

[00:26:14] For sure. 

[00:26:15] Alyssa: Yeah. I think that's, it's so tough. I, I, I think so many of us didn't experience anyone being an advocate for us right now. We're, we're coming to you as adults in therapy and saying like, oh, help. I'm so anxious, or, I don't know how to meet my own needs. I don't know how to experience these hard things.

[00:26:34] And we wish someone could have. I think sometimes saved us from them or prevented them from happening or stepped in, and that, that would've felt like relief. Yeah. And so now there's this pendulum swing I feel like, to our kids. We're like, we are gonna prevent it. Uh, in a way that's, that's really scary for me.

[00:26:54] I even in my household, my two kids are very different humans. 

[00:26:59] Mm-hmm. 

[00:27:00] Alyssa: One is a sensory sensitive human who gets really flooded by stimuli and will take space and likes to, doesn't like to be on his own. He would like an adult present. Okay. Um, but not usually talking to him. He wants to control the play.

[00:27:16] He would like to be in a quiet, calm space where nobody's really touching him or close to him and just a reduction in stimuli, but where he feel still feels connected. My daughter is a sensory seeker, uh, who like wants music on to dance. To, and she wants to hug and snuggle and climb, and she wants to be in your space and in your face and, um, wants to feel included and connected.

[00:27:43] And she is so driven by connection in a way where he's really driven by sensory needs in a lot of ways. And he would choose being by himself and having it be quiet and calm over being with people and having, there be a lot of stimuli. And the worst thing in the world to her would be she's by herself.

[00:28:08] Like she just wants to be in community. And so we have these like conflicting needs often in the household, and we get to have a lot of discussions around our needs and what our bodies need and the awareness of our needs. 

[00:28:23] Yeah, 

[00:28:24] Alyssa: and I really see this as a really cool opportunity. Uh, to help them learn how to be in the discomfort.

[00:28:32] Right. To see that, yeah. Sometimes she's gonna wanna connect and he doesn't wanna connect with her and she's gonna keep trying all different ways to connect and he might not want to engage. And so what can she do in those moments? And a lot of scaffolding around that. And for him, that there's gonna be times where he wants it to be quiet and calm and to not have her in his space.

[00:28:55] And she lives in this house too. Yeah. And he doesn't control the entire environment. And so what does he do? How does he navigate that discomfort? Yeah. And what's available to him. But man, it's tricky. 

[00:29:09] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. It is tricky. But I love that you're seeing that as maybe, uh, an opportunity for, for learning and growth for both of them.

[00:29:16] Right. That I oftentimes frame those moments of discomfort, not as I think I. Oftentimes people see anxiety or other uncomfortable emotions as something bad to be avoided. Like, oh, you know what? It went well 'cause I actually wasn't anxious, or I actually wa didn't get, you know, triggered at all or upset at all.

[00:29:33] And from my perspective, actually, in some ways, the most powerful learning comes from those moments where we are uncomfortable, right? Um, I think of them as those golden opportunities to learn, oh, I can relate differently to this distress, this discomfort. And so your kids are, are lucky and that they have that opportunity to learn, okay, I can learn how to live along somebody who maybe sometimes does things in a way that makes me feel really uncomfortable and I can learn how to navigate that discomfort in a way that's skillful, that's not then hurting anybody else or, you know, that sort of thing.

[00:30:06] So, yeah. 

[00:30:07] Alyssa: Yeah. It has been cool to see, like he has specifically the 4-year-old has started to learn that. If he pauses what he's doing in his play and he turns to his sister and says something like, oh, are you curious about what I have? Or, did you wanna show me what you have? It just connects with her for a minute.

[00:30:28] It's usually about a minute of his time, and then she feels connected and included and then she's off and shell go and play and whatever. It's not like an insatiable cup if it's poured into, 

[00:30:42] yeah. 

[00:30:42] Alyssa: And in contrast, if he is like, no, go away. I don't want, I don't wanna see what you have. No, I don't want my slothy right now.

[00:30:50] Or, and he's just pushing her away over and over and over that she keeps coming back to try and get that need met. And we've just acknowledged that of like, yeah, she still wants to feel connected and it looks like she still doesn't feel connected. You get to choose what to do. I, yeah. Yeah. And it has been really cool to see him start to learn like, oh.

[00:31:13] If I turn and just give her some connection for one minute mm-hmm. Then she'll mostly leave me alone. Yeah. 

[00:31:20] Dr. Alissa Jerud: That's pretty amazing. And something I think that even as parents, we don't always realize, but sometimes that's all it takes with our kids too. Right. Just like a brief check, you know, moment of connection.

[00:31:29] Yeah. Um, when we feel so busy and pulled that we like, feel like we can't stop what we're doing for that one moment. Yeah. 

[00:31:36] Alyssa: Yeah. It's so cool to see, but it means like letting go of his wants and his needs. Mm-hmm. And it's a battery drain for him, right? It pulls from his capacity when he turns to connect with her.

[00:31:49] She is a battery drain for him and that is, it's a choice that he gets to make. Like, do I drain my battery a little bit right now, but then she go and leave me alone or. Does my battery drain more if I don't do that? You know? 

[00:32:07] Yeah. 

[00:32:08] Alyssa: Yeah. It's been cool to see him just like navigate that and learn that. Of course, with our like scaffolding and just pointing things out, we're just sitting on the sidelines basically saying like, oh yeah, it looks like she wants to connect.

[00:32:17] And sometimes he's screaming at her, I don't wanna connect with you right now. So it's not all rainbows and butterflies over here, but he gets to practice both and learn what happens next. 

[00:32:28] Yeah. 

[00:32:29] Alyssa: Uh, and it's, yeah, it's cool to see him like build that skillset and I'm like, you're gonna go out into the world and there's gonna be other humans in your space and I want him to have a skillset for that.

[00:32:42] When you were writing emotion savvy parenting, can you break down for us what the art tools are? 

[00:32:48] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah, sure. So the art tools are tools. Parents can use that to help them regulate their emotions. So this tools. Stand for, accept, regulate, and tolerate. And really they are skills that we can all use, whether we're parents or not.

[00:33:06] We can use them anywhere on the fly to help us more skillfully relate to painful, unwanted emotions, whether they're our own emotions or even our kids' emotions. And so I'm happy to talk more in depth about each of those, to whatever extent would be helpful. Yeah, please do. Yeah, dive on into 'em. Okay. So the first one, accept is really rooted in idea that, you know, I think so much of our suffering comes from kind of wanting to reject reality, right?

[00:33:34] We don't wanna feel that emotion, we don't want that uncertainty to be there. We don't want our kids doing whatever it is they're doing. So we're kind of like fighting that. And again, like we talked about, our attempts to kind of push back against reality oftentimes exacerbate our suffering. And so acceptance is really about.

[00:33:51] Learning to kind of accept things exactly as they are. The facts not, you know, we don't have to accept thoughts that may not be true necessarily. Right? Yeah. Like I don't have to, such a good distinction. Yeah, exactly. I don't have to accept that I'm a failure if I'm just having that thought, right. That I'm a failure.

[00:34:08] I can, but I can accept the thought I'm having. The thought that I'm a failure. Um, and I think with kids we can accept things that oftentimes maybe we think we shouldn't accept, that we shouldn't allow, that society tells us we shouldn't allow things like thoughts and feelings, right? Like, I can accept those things that my kids may be feeling or thinking, even if they seem completely unreasonable.

[00:34:30] Um, or that, you know, make no sense to me. I can accept even. Behaviors, as long as they're not hurting anyone or anything. And even if they are, maybe I don't accept the behaviors, but I can accept the feelings and thoughts that might be underlying those behaviors. I can accept people's words like what they're saying.

[00:34:49] I can, you know, even if I disagree with them, I can't unless I like, you know, wanna cover up my kids' mouths with duct tape. I can't stop them from saying the things that they might wanna say. So I can accept all of that. So it's, it's kind of about that, but coming back to that idea of like letting go of some control, um, and then.

[00:35:04] I, you know, using mindfulness as a springboard to acceptance, because mindfulness is all about accepting the present moment exactly as it is. So that could be anything that we're feeling with our, or experiencing of our five, or with our five senses, right? So what we're seeing, what we're hearing, what we're tasting, what we're touching, kind of accepting all of that without judgment, um, in the present moment.

[00:35:29] And so there are lots of ways you can go about practicing mindfulness, but it, it can be like a tool to help us get to that place of acceptance. 

[00:35:38] Alyssa: Love. Okay. Acceptance. I think one thing that jumped out at me there. That's so key is that we're not condoning. When we're accepting we're not condoning. Yeah.

[00:35:50] You're accepting that this is happening, that this is real, that you're experiencing this, that somebody's feeling something. Yes. I'm not then condoning the behavior. I'm not saying, oh yeah. And it makes total sense to then throw that thing at your sister. Right? Like it's not that I'm saying this behavior I'm gonna condone, I'm saying I understand the feeling that's driving it or the experience you're having and that that's true for you right now.

[00:36:17] And believing that to be true. And I think that's so hard to do. It sounds like such an easy thing that we talk about. It's like just accepting and it is so hard. 'cause I think for a lot of us. Those two things are tied that if I'm accepting this, I am giving it attention. I'm giving it life. I'm giving it breath.

[00:36:36] I'm condoning this behavior. Right? They have to know they can't do this thing. They should know better. Right? All these things from our childhood, I feel like pop up in that moment, that can really make acceptance hard to navigate. 

[00:36:50] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. Yeah. For sure. It can be very tricky and so it's easier said than done.

[00:36:54] That's why I talk about mindfulness as something like, ideally, the more we can practice mindfulness, even when not with our kids, right? Mm-hmm. Mindfully washing the dishes or going on a mindful walk where you're literally just paying attention to one. Thing in the moment. Not trying to have a conversation with somebody else at the same time, but just washing that one dish or just feeling your feet hit the pavement.

[00:37:17] That can actually like help tune our attention. You know, help us like strengthen that muscle for tuning into the present moment. And then when we do that repeatedly and like practice learning that okay, we can have those distracting thoughts or judgements that may come up. 'cause those come up for everyone, even people who've been practicing mindfulness for years and years.

[00:37:36] But you learn, you can notice those and then gently bring yourself back to accepting the present moment exactly as it is. And so I oftentimes talk with people, with parents, but also others too, about first practicing in those more kind of calm, mundane, everyday moments so that eventually those muscles get stronger.

[00:37:56] And you can use mindfulness as a tool. In more heated, more challenging moments where yes, again, you're not accepting, you're not approving or liking necessarily what's happening, but you can accept it and then from there proceed more skillfully. Yeah. Love, love, love, love. And then R 

[00:38:16] Alyssa: was 

[00:38:17] Dr. Alissa Jerud: regulate 

[00:38:18] Alyssa: regulating.

[00:38:19] Yep. Sweet. Let's talk about it. So, 

[00:38:20] Dr. Alissa Jerud: um, yeah, so it's. I think probably the first place I should start is that our emotions are much more complex than many of us realize. And so in my book, in my practice, sometimes I, I will talk about emotions as almost being like, like the ingredients that might go into a batch of cookies.

[00:38:38] So in a batch of cookies, you, you know, when you, when you bake the cookies, you take them outta the oven, you can't necessarily see all of the individual ingredients that go into those cookies. But, but there are a number of different ingredients. They're more complex and they may look on the surface, right?

[00:38:52] So I, I talk about emotions, you know, are made up of both what I call primary ingredients and secondary ingredients. And the primary ingredients are the ones that kind of like kick off that emotion, set that emotion, that emotion in motion, essentially like make it, allow it to fire. So there are. Three kind of primary ingredients and the emotion regulation skills can help to target those primary ingredients.

[00:39:17] So in order to have an emotion in the first place, first, usually there's gotta be some kind of a prompting event, right? Uh, in order for that emotion to occur. So if something has to happen, and that could be something like that your kids are doing, it could be that you've got a stomach ache, so something you're experiencing internally, it could even be a thought you had that then leads you to feel a certain way.

[00:39:37] But some, there has to be some kind of a prompting event. Then we have to make some kind of an interpretation of that prompting event. So, and the example I give often is, you know, if you walk by a friend on the street and they don't say hi to you, right? They, they just kind of pass on by without saying hi.

[00:39:54] You could have a number of different interpretations. You could think to yourself. Oh my gosh. Like what a jerk. How could she not say hi to me? Or you could think to yourself, oh my gosh, I wonder if, is she mad at me, right? Did I do something to upset her? Or you could think, um, oh, you know, there she goes.

[00:40:10] Like, she's always in her own world, and what do you know? She missed me because of it. And what you feel, the emotion that's gonna fire is likely gonna be different depending on your interpretation. And then there are also vulnerability factors, things that maybe you experienced right before the prompting event, right, right before you walked by your friend, or maybe even in the distant past that might color the interpretation you make in the moment.

[00:40:35] So things like, you know, I'm not getting enough sleep the night before. Maybe not having had a chance to drink your morning coffee or having gotten into an argument with your partner or your kid or something stressful at work or something more from the distant past. Again, a friend who maybe dropped you 10 years ago kind of unexpectedly.

[00:40:52] That might then change how you're gonna interpret your friend, not saying hi to you as you pass them by. So those are like the primary ingredients. And then the emotion regulation skills, we can use those to help us target the prompting event, the interpretations that may not be serving us so well, as well as the vulnerability factors.

[00:41:11] Love. And 

[00:41:12] Alyssa: you break all this down in your book. Yes. Yeah, exactly. Thank goodness. Yeah. And then the T of Tolerate. Yeah. Oh, the tolerate part I think is so hard. 

[00:41:21] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah, yeah, for sure. So, I mean, that really is about the idea that once the emotion fires, then we experience all these, uh, kind of like simultaneous instant changes in our bodies.

[00:41:30] So there are biological changes, there are physical changes. We have these action urges to act in certain ways. Um, we make certain facial and bodily expressions in the moment, and we also start to become aware that we're having an emotion, and then we start to experience what, like after effects of that emotion, right?

[00:41:47] If you're feeling a certain way, even once that emotion starts to dissipate, you may be a little more, you know, if you were angry, you may be a little more likely to see things in a way, you know, in a more defensive way. For instance, if you're feeling angry, um. So Tolerate is all about learning skills to target each of those components, each of those secondary ingredients.

[00:42:10] So one of my favorite tolerate skills is like really actually targeting the, the biological physical changes that happen in your body when you're experiencing a strong, unwanted emotion. So this is actually getting into somewhat of kind of coming back to what we were talking about earlier of a coping mechanism of some kind.

[00:42:27] And so I actually, this is a skill that I don't recommend when anxiety is a primary emotion because ideally, mm-hmm. This is kind of a long way of going about this, but I anxiety tends to pull for avoidance when we're feeling anxious. Yeah. We wanna avoid that anxiety. Totally. And unfortunately these skills can actually help to dampen arousal, which is pretty neat that they can do that.

[00:42:46] But when it comes to anxiety, that can actually almost strengthen that message at, ooh, what I'm experiencing right now, I can't tolerate. 

[00:42:53] Alyssa: Yes. Okay. So I 

[00:42:53] Dr. Alissa Jerud: don't recommend using these for avoidance in particular, but um, these are for those who might know a therapy called Dialectical Behavior Therapy. These are what are called the tips skills in DBTI use the acronym CARE 'cause I just find it easier to remember.

[00:43:10] And I think when we're experiencing strong emotions, we need to take good care, uh, to make sure that we're, you know, being as skillful as we can. So the first one is cool with ice. Next is activate your body. Then there's, relax your body and then exhale slowly. And so, or, and I should say, or relax your muscles for that R so I could walk you through some of those.

[00:43:33] But there are skills for like really rapidly reducing arousal, which can be really helpful when you know you're starting to get triggered by your kids, something your kids are doing. Sure, 

[00:43:43] Alyssa: sure. Well, and okay, so I wanna go into this for a second of like when you are doing this, when you are in the regulate space, there's a difference between I'm distracting myself out of it and making it go away as fast as possible, versus I'm gonna tap into some activities or engage in some processes that are going to help me regulate so that I can.

[00:44:11] We separate sensory and emotional regulation in our work. So we have the sensory component of, um, sympathetic versus parasympathetic nervous system. So how are we moving into a space where we can be able to access more of our brain? And it doesn't mean that I stop feeling sad. It doesn't mean I stop feeling anxious or feeling scared or feeling embarrassed or whatever.

[00:44:36] It just means that now I. Can be with that emotion in a way where it's not overtaking me. Yes. And so that's what I'm hearing in this work is in alignment of like, we're gonna tackle that sensory piece first. We're gonna regulate that nervous system so that then you can be with this emotion without being consumed by the emotion.

[00:44:57] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yep, exactly. Yeah. So those care skills are really fast acting, but they're not also, they're not like long-term solutions, nor do they get rid of the emotional altogether. Sure. It's like they turn the temperature down on the emotion a little bit. Totally. Take the edge off. But then it 

[00:45:10] Alyssa: allows you to access the emotional 

[00:45:12] Dr. Alissa Jerud: regulation component.

[00:45:14] Yes, exactly. Then to be able to use other skills that take up more cognitive resources that you might not have when you're completely flooded. Totally. 

[00:45:21] Alyssa: Yeah. No, we, we do this too. We just categorize 'em a little differently. Yeah. And I think often what we see as a challenge for folks is they wanna jump right into the cognitive piece.

[00:45:34] We wanna jump right into talking about it and sharing about it. And even asking a kid like, what are you feeling? What's coming up? You, what happened? Mm-hmm. And it's so cognitive and have a really hard time pulling back and just focusing on sensory regulation first so that we can access any of the rest of it.

[00:45:52] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. Yeah. And I talk in my book a lot about how emotions, I see emotions as being kind of like, like storms, right? Yeah. Um, and they're both for us and our kids, they're kind of, sometimes we, they, we feel really strong emotions, kind of, they catch us off guard, almost like an unexpected rainstorm that comes and, you know, in a rainstorm you can't like.

[00:46:14] You can't necessarily like see all that clearly always, right. You're kind of caught up in the storm just trying to cope with that storm. And so I think with kids and you know, when your, when your kid is clearly caught up in an emotional storm, it's probably not gonna be the time to try to reason with that.

[00:46:29] Right. Because they can't totally, they can't think clearly. And so, yes, exactly. Like kinda maybe waiting until the storm has passed entirely before trying to have a processing conversation of some kind to talk about what happened. So real, 

[00:46:42] Alyssa: I love that comparison. We actually have a quote in tiny Even's, big emotions from Brandi Carlisle about like learning to finding the eye of the storm and like learning to, to dance in the eye because the eye of the storm is where you're not in the storm.

[00:46:56] Yeah. You can see the storm, but you are not in the storm right now. And how like that's our goal as the adult in this scenario. Is to be able to allow the storm to exist around us while not being in the storm. Yep. I love it. Yeah, 

[00:47:13] Dr. Alissa Jerud: it's tricky even though sometimes, right? Like our kids may be having their own storm and we may be having our own storm separately.

[00:47:18] A hundred percent, right? Yeah. But then we need to do something to make sure that that storm isn't completely sweeping us away For 

[00:47:25] Alyssa: sure. So that 

[00:47:25] Dr. Alissa Jerud: we're not doing something that's gonna then heighten our kids' dorm as well. Ideally. Of course. And, and just, I should also note like we're not gonna be perfect at that.

[00:47:33] Sometimes we're gonna do things that's gonna make life so much harder for us and for our kids. Of course. 

[00:47:39] Alyssa: A hundred percent. Yeah. I jump into my kids' dorms every day at some point throughout the day. So yes, just this morning we were. I am my 4-year-old, just, we woke up early and we're, from the moment we said our first words to each other, I was like, Ugh, there's a vibe here.

[00:47:58] And he was spicy. And uh, it was about maybe 45 minutes into the morning with him and my husband popped in, we have a like at home office and he was like, Hey, do you want a hand? And I was like, yes. Can your hands please come over here to this child? He goes, I need to walk away from this child. And it just, yeah, I had that by 45 minutes in.

[00:48:22] I was in his storm. We're in each other's storms and I also was at the point where I'm like, we gotta get out the house and we got 10 minutes left and we gotta get out the door, you know? 

[00:48:34] Dr. Alissa Jerud: And that is right there though, like, coming back to that prompting event, the primary ingredients you went after the pri, the prompting event there, like the prompting event was.

[00:48:42] You know, something was happening in the dynamic with you and, and your kid. Mm-hmm. That wasn't working for you. It was, you know, and so you said, okay, like maybe, maybe you tried some other things that weren't working. You decided, okay, I need a break from this thing, the, the situation that is triggering me at the moment.

[00:48:57] So you asked for help. That's pretty awesome there. Love help. And we're gonna all need that at times. I love that. And sometimes it won't be available and we may stumble through as a result, and that's okay. Like ideally these skills are skills that you can. You know, keep coming back to, they may not always work a hundred percent of the time and the more you use them this again, the more likely it is that you're going to be able to use them down the road the next time around so that you can take a more loving road and not necessarily let your emotions that you may be feeling in a moment kind of call the shots.

[00:49:29] Alyssa: Totally. And knowing that, like, I'm so glad you hit on the perfectionist, like the time recently where I was solo with the kids and I, my daughter had been up a bunch the night before and I was just tired and didn't have a lot of capacity. Yeah. And there was no one to tap out to or ask for help from. And I ended up texting my best friend and I was just like, just doing c plus parenting over here right now and honestly not going for a B today.

[00:49:58] Just gonna try and hang at a c plus and get to rest time and. Have him watch a show while she naps and I'm just gonna close my eyes. Yeah. And allowing that to be fine. Like, I'm not being the best parent I could be this morning. And it's fine. Yep. 

[00:50:17] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. I, oh my gosh, I'm so glad you said that. 'cause I think we, we all have those days where we're, we're not gonna show up as our best selves.

[00:50:24] And I think the key is like, are we ideally, are we giving ourselves grace on those days? Just like our kids aren't always gonna be at their best. Can we allow them to fall apart? Can we allow ourselves to fall apart? And then maybe think afterward. Not that day when you're caught up in some kind of a storm of some sort, but like afterward, huh, what was going on that day that left me so emotionally vulnerable.

[00:50:44] Might there have been any skills that I could have used to be a little more effective sleep? I was just tired. Right? It's like, yeah. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. That's, maybe that wasn't something you could have done, you know, sometimes Totally. You may be sleep deprived and there's nothing you can do about that.

[00:50:59] But just knowing that then, and. Accepting it might be a little, that helps to give myself 

[00:51:03] Alyssa: grace, right? I think we live in a world right now where it's just like there's so much desire to continue to grow and do more and do better. And what's the next level and what's the next step. I think there's not enough, just like acceptance of, you know, I'm not trying to do better today.

[00:51:22] You know? Yeah. Like I'm tired and I am reacting in ways that aren't my favorite and maybe tomorrow I won't be as tired and she will have slept better and, and or I'll have someone else I can tap into 'cause it'll be a weekend, day, whatever. But circumstantially today, it's okay if I did this day over again and was just as tired and did all the same things, like that's 

[00:51:48] Dr. Alissa Jerud: okay.

[00:51:49] Alyssa: For 

[00:51:49] Dr. Alissa Jerud: sure. Yep. 

[00:51:50] Alyssa: Totally. You know? 

[00:51:51] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yeah. And you probably, you will, right? You'll probably do totally a million more days like that. Oh, plenty More tired 

[00:51:56] Alyssa: days to repeat those. 

[00:52:00] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Great. Yep. Yep. And that'll happen. And you know, maybe at some point in time like change will or some kind of like movement in a direction that feels better for you will happen.

[00:52:11] And if it doesn't, you can be easy on yourself. 'cause when we're beating ourselves up, it doesn't actually help move us along anyway. 

[00:52:18] Alyssa: No. And I just think it's, relationships aren't ruined in a day. You know, like I'm not going to from one tired morning ruin my attachment with my child. It takes so much more to jeopardize that attachment than one tired morning.

[00:52:36] And I think there's a just a lot of misconception and fear around that sort of jazz of like, well, if I drop the ball today. Or this morning and I don't co course correct for the next time and I ke and I drop the ball again and I'm tired again, and I'm reactive again. Yeah. Then this is what it's gonna mean.

[00:52:57] We're very good at forecasting. Right. And being like, well, when they're 16 then they're not gonna come to me with their hard stuff. Right. Right. Because I was tired that morning when they were four. Yeah. 

[00:53:07] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Yep. And I think that comes back to the, like again, our kids can tolerate distress. They can tolerate that being perfect.

[00:53:12] And I think for us as parents, right, like my, my big thing, like what I hope in my book to do is really help people learn how to. Ideally be the most skillful they can possibly be, knowing that they're not ever gonna be perfect. Right? Mm-hmm. And we're always gonna, you know, our emotions are gonna get the better of us time and time again.

[00:53:31] How can we start to increase that emotional agility, though, so that like, 'cause it, it feels better to be honest. Like the more totally, you know, emotionally skillful we are, the better we feel in general. It's, it's good for our well wellbeing. Totally. So, yeah. Can we accept that we're gonna mess up time and time again and still try to, you know, learn skills, practice skills to maybe allow us to be a little more skillful down the road, knowing that we're never gonna get it just right all the time.

[00:54:00] Alyssa: For sure. I love this. Thank you, Alyssa. I hope folks head on out and snag emotion savvy parenting. Thank you for writing it. Thank you for serving us with this work. Where can folks find you and connect with you? 

[00:54:14] Dr. Alissa Jerud: Uh, well first I just wanna say thank you for having me. It was so fun getting to chat with you and, uh, people can learn more about me on my website, alyssa jar.com.

[00:54:24] Alyssa: Awesome. We'll link that out. Thank you so much. Stay tuned after this note from our sponsors. Rach and I will be right back with the breakdown

[00:54:36] Rachel: For the first time ever, I'm gonna volunteer at, um, the kids' school field day. 

[00:54:43] Alyssa: Okay. 

[00:54:44] Rachel: Yeah. 

[00:54:44] Alyssa: That's a whelming experience for you. 

[00:54:47] Rachel: It's gonna be so overstimulating, but, and Cody usually does it, but like he, it's harder for him. He went on a field trip with her last week, like he's not gonna be able to take another like, personal day to do this.

[00:55:00] And Nora's like, I really want you to do this, so I'm gonna, um, good. Yeah. It'll be fun. 

[00:55:08] Alyssa: Good. I What's your plan for yourself? What do you mean? Like for regulation support? 

[00:55:17] Rachel: Oh, I don't know. Um, I don't know what my job will be. 'cause there's like different stations. Cody usually does like the wet sponge activity and I really hope that's not my assignment 

[00:55:27] Alyssa: last.

[00:55:27] Yeah, right. Um, wait, what time do you have to be there? 

[00:55:30] Rachel: I don't even know yet. 

[00:55:32] Alyssa: Okay. 

[00:55:33] Rachel: Could you like do a workout in the morning? Maybe? I don't know. It might just be that like, when we get home, I just. Let my kids have screens and go into my room for a while. Yeah. Yeah. Hibernate for a bit. Yeah. It'll be outside, which will be great.

[00:55:49] That's helpful. Yep. I loved 

[00:55:50] Alyssa: Field Day as a kid. 

[00:55:52] Rachel: Oh, same. It was like one of the best days of the year. 

[00:55:56] Alyssa: Love. So this is actually maybe like helpful for people to hear that you're not super sensory sensitive. You wouldn't be in like the negative two side of sensory sensitive, but you're for sure sensory sensitive.

[00:56:09] You have way more sensitivities than you have, uh, seeking categories and you loved it as a kid and now you'll have a good time, I'm sure, but it will drain your nervous system. I think this is one thing, we went to the science museum the other day and there was a field trip of kids there. Uh, it was also like a rainy spring day.

[00:56:31] So we're, we're walking into just like a very full science museum, right. And, and. Sage fully enjoyed his time there. And even on the way home, my mother-in-law was with us and on the way home, she was like, wow. Well, he navigated a lot of that with more ease than I feel like he typically does in such a busy space, especially inside.

[00:56:54] And then he was an utter disaster for hours. 

[00:57:00] Rachel: Mm-hmm. 

[00:57:02] Alyssa: And it's like for the sensory sensitive humans, it's not that you hate the thing that's overstimulating necessarily, it's the crash afterwards sometimes. 

[00:57:14] Rachel: For sure. Like I would go home as a kid and like not wanna do anything. Like I would go into my room and just be there.

[00:57:21] And honestly that's probably, and maybe be a brat. Oh for sure. I'm sure that I was like, um, oppositional and because like dinner time was like a big thing in my childhood. So like, I would've been like, I don't wanna come to the table. I don't wanna, I don't want that. Make me something else. Yeah. I would've just been unhappy.

[00:57:40] Um, and honestly it might be like that the sweet when I, as an adult, but you know, my kids now, I don't think I would've taken this on. In fact, I refuse to. When Abel was still really young, it was always like, Nope, dad's gonna do that. 'cause I was just like, there's no way I can do that. And then have Abel on my body.

[00:58:05] I. Totally constantly. And like my reality's a little bit different now, I can tell them like, guys, I've gotta go take like a half hour and just read my book and then I'll come back out and we'll hang. 

[00:58:15] Alyssa: Yeah, there's six and 10. Right. So it's just like a different bit of flexibility around that. It's, it's 

[00:58:21] Rachel: such a different world, honestly.

[00:58:23] Alyssa: Um, 

[00:58:24] Rachel: and 

[00:58:25] Alyssa: I, I don't, it's less physical, right? So like when we were talking about our next book, big Kids, bigger Feelings, I was just chatting with somebody about this where there's like this myth that the. Early years, you know, they're so physical, they're so demanding, they're so hard in a such a physical way.

[00:58:45] And also emotionally with the tantrums and the meltdowns or whatever. But it's such a physical experience. And then teenage years are so hard emotionally and in that attachment and relationship, and there's this myth that there's this just like harmonious, glorious middle ground where kids are just collaborative and things are like easy.

[00:59:07] And you get to just pump the brakes and things are easy. And that is why we wrote big kids bigger feelings because we've had so many folks reaching out in this age range of that, like kindergarten to fifth grade range being like, excuse me, why is my 8-year-old a teenager? Like, what is happening? And it's not physical like it is in those early years.

[00:59:33] And it's different than the teenage years, but there are so many parts of this age range, that kindergarten to fifth grade that are developmentally a lot and it shows up in so many different ways in your relationship. All of a sudden attachment starts to shift a little bit. Inclusion and belonging become so important for a child that we start to see new behaviors and challenges and a lot of really adult triggers start to pop up of, uh, I don't wanna play with you, or That's my best friend and I'm now doing things that they wanna do.

[01:00:08] Even though maybe it's not true to my values, it doesn't feel good for me. And like the navigating of that is less physical. Still a different hard. For 

[01:00:19] Rachel: sure. And I have like, I've got a kindergartner and a fifth grader, so I'm like on either end of that where like with Abel, our big challenge right now is him like navigating, so the beginnings of like social relationships being important to him and caring about what his peers think while still having some of those, like more like toddler preschooler outbursts, that can still happen.

[01:00:42] Where like for example, I wouldn't let him take the fluoride toothpaste into the car because I, there's nowhere to spit and I wouldn't let him bring a cup. And then he was like, why are you so rude to me? You're so rude to me every single day. And like full tears, you know? So like still some of those, but then other times he like wants to be independent and cares what his friends think.

[01:01:02] And then Nora, on the more like tween side of things, it's the mood swings and the emotions that seem to just like turn on a dime and. Yeah. Feeling like sometimes I have a little teenager happening. 

[01:01:21] Alyssa: Yeah. All this to say that like now you can tap out and like read a book for a little while and they're still hard on either end of it, right?

[01:01:35] That your kids also are gonna experience field day and they're gonna have their own reactions, nervous system wise to field day. And even if they come home and they kind of like veg out on a screen so you can reach your book or whatever happens there after that, after that screen, when you do come back to them.

[01:01:55] There's gonna be stuff for you to navigate always. And I think that's important for people to hear, right? Like, yes, my mom was very good at self care. 

[01:02:04] Rachel: Hmm. 

[01:02:05] Alyssa: Like she, I'm one of five kids, we didn't have money and she would just say, I'm gonna go close my eyes. And she would just sit on the couch and she'd close her eyes and you knew not to wake her up unless there was a fire or like an actual broken bone, you could see.

[01:02:23] Mm-hmm. Not even like a perceived broken bone would be a woken, only 

[01:02:28] Rachel: a compound fracture. 

[01:02:30] Alyssa: Right. And uh, I look back at this and I'm like, that was so rad. But with it came, yeah. She knew when she opened her eyes. That some stuff had gone down, right? Like we had been left to be bored children and figure things out.

[01:02:51] And at one point I got in an argument with my brother and I chucked a shoe at his head and he ducked and it made a hole in the wall, right? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And like things like that had happened while she was taking a nap. Yeah. And so I think there's this idea that like, oh, I just wish I could, and there's always a, yeah.

[01:03:11] While just yesterday actually Mila was napping and so Sage was like chilling and I was like, I'm gonna do the dishes and listen to my book. And I just needed a minute to just listen to my book. I'm a sound sensitive human and so when we're in control of sound, it's regulating. And I had not been in control of the sound all morning with my tiny humans.

[01:03:35] It's like I just need to listen to my book and like feel in control of some sound for a minute. And Zach had run to the store. And Sage found a block of styrofoam from like a package. Oh. And he was like, mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And I was like, buddy, we cannot play with that. It is gonna get everywhere. It's gonna be a disaster.

[01:03:53] And I just knew I didn't have the capacity for it. Mm-hmm. And he was like, can I bring it to my tool bench in the basement? And I was like, you know what? Yeah. Mm-hmm. Later this is gonna be future of Zach's problem actually. Um, and asked Zach to clean that up later, but this is going to give me time to just listen to my book and knock, get any requests and whatever.

[01:04:16] And it did. It was glorious. He went down to his work bench, he's got his tools in the styrofoam. The basement is a disaster. 

[01:04:22] Rachel: Mm-hmm. 

[01:04:23] Alyssa: And 10 outta 10. It was worth it. But I didn't get that piece by just being like, but you know what? I need to listen to my book for 20 minutes. And. He, he was just like, okay, mom.

[01:04:35] Like there's not a world in which that happens right now. 

[01:04:38] Rachel: Never. Never. No. I mean, nor is 10. And yesterday, LOL my request was to be able to finish folding the laundry without being interrupted. Um, and so as I am doing that, at one point I look out and Nora is in roller skates, but standing on my bed. So her roller skates are on my sheets.

[01:05:00] Ew. Um, and then she's also like trying to take another blanket to do something else of it. And I'm like, okay, pause. Um, you can't have roller skates on my sheets where I sleep. That's gross. And second of all, I, I don't have the capacity for you to be just like taking blankets and doing things with them.

[01:05:18] The other thing that happened was I found one of my like, nicer pieces of jewelry on the steps to the basement, and I'm like, guys, no. Um, we need to chat here. Okay. How did that end up on the steps of the basement? So there was like a lot of, um, I don't know, like I didn't touch it and I'm like, you guys, nobody's in trouble.

[01:05:38] I just wanna know how it got from my nightstand to the basement steps. So then it was like, Nora was like, well, I brought it out into the kitchen. And it's a bracelet. I brought it out into the kitchen and then the next thing I knew it was on the floor and then Abel found it and he was using it to like fling towards his matchbox cars and it slid under the door to the basement, and then neither of us did anything about it.

[01:06:00] I'm like, okay, fair appreciate the honesty. Um, you can't use my bracelet for that. I have other bracelets that you can use, but, um, not that one. But yeah, it's just like anytime I'm trying to just do something and it's not even something for myself. I'm trying to fold laundry for you rascals and something's going on, there's always something that I'm coming back to.

[01:06:22] Alyssa: Oh, that's it, man. So when I look back and I'm like, Margaret was so good at self-care, it came with a cost and she was just willing, she was like, this, it, she ran a cost benefit analysis, right? Like, this is worth it. The ROI of me not taking requests and closing my eyes on the couch for 20 minutes is worth whatever I'm opening my eyes to.

[01:06:44] Rachel: Mm-hmm. 

[01:06:46] Alyssa: Absolutely. Also, I have one, um, thing to air that I'm just annoyed with and I can't figure out how to troubleshoot. You know, I have a child size head. Yeah. And I have been searching for like, maybe I just need kid headphones, but there the audio quality isn't as good. But like, can we talk about this gap right here of just like, I, I feel like I'm wearing, I almost like some sort of alien situation where I just, I can't find headphones that just fit nicely and then it's uncomfortable on my ears and it slides back constantly because it just doesn't fit right.

[01:07:23] Rachel: Yeah. I don't, all of the kid headphones have like decibel limits that are so low that you, they literally, that's why don't work. Yeah. 

[01:07:32] Alyssa: I need, um, uh, an adult brand to make small head headphones. Mm-hmm. That I can, if anyone works for one of those. Brands. Uh, speaking of which, I went to a meta event. Uh, I was invited to this event.

[01:07:50] It was lovely. It was like a celebration of moms and it was an, a bunch of, I hate this word, but influencers mm-hmm. Um, who are moms. And it was a very nice, like, showering of, of us. And, and a lot of folks who were there are folks who also serve moms, like serve and support mm-hmm. And make content for moms.

[01:08:11] And there was an incredible like, gift bag as we were leaving of things. And one of the things is the new, like meta ray bands with the AI in them. And I'm like, what a great gift for an adult size head. Like, this is so nice. I, I, I tried them on and in certain angles I feel like it's fine for me, but ultimately I'd love to see them.

[01:08:39] Okay. I'll send you a picture of me and then picture, yeah, like a selfie. Mm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I, I think like there's a lot of things about them that I was like, oh, that's cool. Like if you're traveling and you have them on and there's a sign, you can say, can you translate that to English or to whatever? And that part's cool.

[01:08:59] I'm still learning about them. Uh, but yeah. Anyway, a child side, its head man. Yeah. Really gets you. It does get, you can't just buy sunglasses at a store unless they're kids sunglasses and then they've got like Elmo on them.

[01:09:20] No, thank you. Who are we chatting about today? We're chatting about Alissa. Oh yes. Loved this episode. I have her book here. Emotion Savvy Parenting, right? That's this one. Yeah. She's a 

[01:09:33] Rachel: lovely human. Yeah. Um, I. One of my like favorite parts out of it was talking about how the goal isn't necessarily to make anxiety go away or stop happening, but to learn to tolerate it.

[01:09:49] Yes. Um, 'cause I think like if when you're working from a place where your goal is either for yourself or your children to never experience anxiety again, then you get into this or any emotion. Totally. Any hard emotion. Um, then you get into this like cycle of like feeling like you're failing and then there's shame and why can't I do this?

[01:10:11] Um, and it's empowering, I think to just be like, yeah, anxiety's gonna happen and I know what to do when it does. 

[01:10:20] Alyssa: Yeah. It's a difference between experiencing a feeling versus being consumed by a feeling, you know? And like that's the goal with all of our feelings, is to be able to experience them without being consumed by them.

[01:10:34] And anxiety's the one that. We often anxiety and I feel like grief or sadness are the ones we most frequently get consumed by. 

[01:10:44] Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yeah, it, yeah, it was just really interesting for me. So my diagnosis is OCD, but for much of my childhood and early adolescence, it was misdiagnosed as generalized anxiety disorder.

[01:10:59] And all of my therapy felt like the goal, the end goal, would be for me to no longer experience anxiety. Um, and that wasn't happening. And there was a lot of, like, like at one point I told my parents I didn't wanna go to therapy anymore. It wasn't working. Um, and it actually wasn't until I was experiencing postpartum depression with Abel and I was giving my psychiatrist like my history and like explaining things and.

[01:11:32] You know, talking about my symptoms, my experiences, and she was like, um, that's not anxiety. That's OCD. And I was just like, whoa. What? And you know, one of the things that she said was like, you will likely always experience some iteration of OCD and there are so many like tools that we can build into your life and there are medications that can help, but your goal shouldn't be to never experience it again.

[01:12:05] And that was really like a paradigm shift for me. Um, yeah. And took so much pressure off of me that I didn't realize that I was carrying around all the time. Um, and interestingly, OCD used to be in the same category as anxiety in the DSM five, and it no longer is, um. Which is also interesting to me. But yeah, I think knowing that it's okay for hard feelings to continue to be a part of your life mm-hmm.

[01:12:43] Is so freeing in a way. 

[01:12:45] Alyssa: So freeing a lot of the anxiety that I experienced for most of the time that I was like being consumed by anxiety was trauma related. Mm. Trauma response. And, you know, I was just talking about Amy Griffin's book, the Tell, and I don't know if you've read it yet, but it is really like a, an account of her, she was abused throughout all of childhood by one teacher?

[01:13:15] Teacher. A teacher. A teacher, 

[01:13:15] Rachel: yeah. Okay. I just read that a couple months ago. Yeah. It's 

[01:13:18] Alyssa: so good. Yeah. And um, she had the like psychedelic, uh, like recall of this and yeah. What was what? Um, one of the things that really hit for me in reading that book was there were so many nuances that I did that were just a part of my life until I started navigating therapy.

[01:13:42] And this, for instance, like when I was raped, nobody knew where I was right there. 'cause I was supposed to be in a spot and I had lied to my parents to go to another place. And so nobody knew to look for me, that I like wasn't where I was supposed to be. And so then as an anxiety response, as a coping mechanism.

[01:14:09] Anytime I'd go anywhere, do anything, I would just let somebody know in a way that just became a part of my day where I wouldn't have even clocked it as like, I'm anxious or this is a coping mechanism. I'd leave work in when we were living in Boston, you know, over a decade after this. And just text Zach and be like, on my way home, see you in a bit.

[01:14:31] Just things like that so that somebody always knew to expect me somewhere. Mm-hmm. Right. And as part of my work in therapy, one of the things that we ended up working on was that of what would it look like for you not to tell somebody to just get in the car and drive home? And at the very beginning of doing that work, there were times I had to pull over.

[01:15:00] Because I was so anxious, like, well, what if something happens? What if, whatever? And, and navigate the physical symptoms of anxiety that I had developed, coping mechanisms that kept it at bay, right? Mm-hmm. But it was still controlling my life in so many nuanced ways. 

[01:15:23] Rachel: Yeah. 

[01:15:24] Alyssa: And that was one of the like last things we worked on.

[01:15:27] 'cause there were so many things that were so much bigger than just letting somebody know where I was. Yeah. But, but when we worked on that part of the anxiety, it was one of those where I was like, oh, I still don't know how to be with it without being consumed by it. Mm-hmm. How to notice I feel anxious getting, because then it started to be like when I'm going out to my car after work, I would feel anxious just leaving works.

[01:16:03] I knew I wasn't gonna tell somebody where I was going and they weren't gonna expect me. Yeah, like anticipatory anxiety. Correct. Yeah. Correct. And that I had to like really practice experiencing it, navigating like getting home, all that jazz before I got to a place where I could experience anxiety without being consumed by it.

[01:16:32] That was one of my like last big things that I worked on that I remember realizing, wow, I've done so much work and I still don't know how to experience anxiety without being consumed by it. It's a beast to navigate, to take on. It is a beast to 

[01:16:48] Rachel: navigate and, and what's difficult about when. It is consuming you is that you have to expose yourself to the things that trigger that feeling in order to create those new neural pathways of like, I can drive home without texting somebody.

[01:17:07] Mm-hmm. And I can be okay, and I am still safe in my body. Um, yeah. One of my OCD compulsions is reassurance seeking, which it's very easy to reframe as just having conversation. Right. Break that down what reassurance seeking is. Sure. So like one of my, um, like OCD things is contamination or like infection or whatever.

[01:17:36] So this existed before I had cancer and then obviously got pretty bad post-cancer because during my cancer treatment I actually was at really high risk of infection. Um. So it'll be like, it could be me or it could be the kids. But if somebody has, like, let's say somebody gets hurt and they have like a cut, my mind will start to ruminate on like what will happen if that becomes infected and like what will happen if my child or myself needs antibiotics?

[01:18:07] Will somebody get c diff? What if the bacteria is resistant? What if it turns into cellulitis? Or what if there's red streaking? Like all of these things, right? So one of the things that I will do is talk to Cody about it and, but it's a compulsive behavior. It's not just like, Hey, do you think that looks okay?

[01:18:25] And then like, moving on. It's more like. Do you think that will get infected? Um, do you think the bandaging is good? Should I take it off and look at it again? Should I check it for red streaking before we go to bed? 'cause they're already asleep and like if it started to have red streaking, we should probably like go to the doctor.

[01:18:39] Like that kind of obsessive type stuff. 

[01:18:41] Alyssa: I I've experienced it on vacation. 

[01:18:43] Rachel: Totally. Yeah. And so when, for a long time I was, I wasn't recognizing it as a compulsion, right? Mm-hmm. It was just like, I gotta talk this out 'cause this is my brain is like telling me this is a real danger. Yeah. When I am not experiencing OCD in an acute way and one of us gets hurt, I can wash it, bandage it up and move on with my life, right?

[01:19:13] Mm-hmm. Um, and so now when I am feeling myself want to go into like a reassurance seeking pattern, Cody will actually like, say like, Hey, this isn't rational. They're not in danger. We don't need to talk about this anymore. And that's like a good, and not like in a mean way. Totally. 

[01:19:31] Alyssa: It's like a signal for you 

[01:19:32] Rachel: at this point.

[01:19:33] And then I'm like, oh, yep. Totally. I was getting into that like rumination, reassurance seeking cycle. Yeah. Nobody's in danger. Totally. And I'll literally just say to myself, if that looks like we need to see a doctor tomorrow, we'll make an appointment with the doctor. 

[01:19:50] Alyssa: Yeah, perfect. And that's it. And then you can go to sleep.

[01:19:54] Rachel: Oh yeah, totally. But it's like I have to, for years I didn't recognize that pattern. Um, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I just have to say to myself, like, with the information that I have in front of me, everything's fine. 

[01:20:10] Alyssa: Yeah. 

[01:20:11] Rachel: I don't need to think about this anymore right now. And that's me on medication. If I wasn't on medication 

[01:20:16] Alyssa: totally.

[01:20:18] Rachel: All bets are off, 

[01:20:20] Alyssa: Lord knows. 

[01:20:21] Rachel: Like it could get cray. Um, and like I can laugh about it, but in reality it's like, it's real takes over my life a hundred percent. Um, and so Cody and my sister can both kind of like point it out to me in like a kind loving way of just like, yep, this isn't something that we need to keep discussing.

[01:20:41] Like, we're good. Mm-hmm. 

[01:20:43] Alyssa: Um, 

[01:20:44] Rachel: and now I'm able to be like, yeah, but thanks for pointing that out. Like, this is getting ridiculous. 

[01:20:50] Alyssa: Yeah. I'm curious how it's gonna come up for me down the road with my kids. I don't want to hover and I want them to know that I'm there in a safe place to land, but I, for instance, like I will not let anybody have access to like track my phone and know my location.

[01:21:15] It's like a thing. Some people do. I don't do that either. Yeah. And like that past Alyssa would've been like, this is perfect. Like I don't even have to let people know where I am. They can see it at all times. And now I'm like, oh no. I would use that as a coping mechanism. And also I don't want that for my kids, which I think I will have parts of me pop up down the road, especially when they are closer to the age that I was when I experienced trauma.

[01:21:49] Absolutely. That I will have to do a lot of work around because is I see the pull toward like, yeah, I want, I want my kids' location tracked on their phone so I can see where they are at all times. Like I understand the pull to that and I, especially for 

[01:22:07] Rachel: teens, I am like, that's gonna be tough for me.

[01:22:10] Alyssa: That's what I'm saying. Like it's the teenage years that I'm like, I totally see that. 

[01:22:14] Rachel: Mm-hmm. 

[01:22:15] Alyssa: And. I don't wanna do that. I want them to be independent from me and for me not to be checking up on their location. I want them to be able to have the freedom to make mistakes and go places maybe they shouldn't go and not have me hover over them and be able to listen to, hopefully we can build, we've got some foundations in place and they can listen to their body sometimes and sometimes they're not gonna listen to, or what did say, you say this weekend?

[01:22:44] Well my body is saying no and my or my body is saying yes, and my head is saying no, and it's so hard to listen to my head. And I was like, totally, I've been there, man, that's so good. Like sometimes that's gonna happen though, right? Like sometimes their head's gonna say no. Their body's gonna say yes, they gonna listen to their body and I want them to make those mistakes in the world.

[01:23:03] I want them to go out and do that. Yeah. And I think that I'm gonna have parts of me really pop up and have to resist the urge to do things like track their location. 

[01:23:14] Rachel: Totally. I mean, I, for me, my reasoning is a little bit different, but I feel the same way. I had a lot of codependent like patterns mm-hmm.

[01:23:24] With my parents, especially my mom. And I know that there's a part of myself that's for like, my safety anxiety is gonna pop up and I'm gonna wanna know where they are all the time. A hundred percent. Um, and I also don't wanna track them, uh, because I don't want to have that like anxious attachment Codependence.

[01:23:47] Yeah. It will become obsessive for me, where like I'm checking it all the time and, oh, that she didn't tell me that she was gonna stop there and like, what is she doing and who's she with? I don't. Want that to be a pattern in my relationship with them. But I know when they're teens, there's gonna be a huge part of me because it's just so easy to just turn on tracking.

[01:24:06] Right. It's just such There. 

[01:24:08] Alyssa: Right there. Yeah. Yeah. It's like when some of my friends got caller id 

[01:24:13] Rachel: mm-hmm. 

[01:24:13] Alyssa: At their house. 

[01:24:14] Rachel: Yes. 

[01:24:15] Alyssa: And I was like, oh no. Like we are like, that stinks. Right? That when that friend of mine would say they were going to one place, they had to go there and call from there because it was gonna show up on the phone, you know?

[01:24:33] Yes. And I'm so grateful, even with the trauma and all the whatever, I, I am so grateful that I had the freedom I had in childhood. I, I look back on my childhood and things, I'm really, you know, the legacy blessings, legacy burdens and that for me is a blessing. The freedom that I had to go and be a kid and not be checked up on.

[01:25:00] And, you know, I think of like Jonathan Heights work here of the anxious Jen and yeah. When we are anxious parenting and are checking up from an anxious attachment perspective and from that place of codependency and from the US part of like, I need to know that you're safe. Mm-hmm. It's gonna breed anxiety in our kids.

[01:25:22] Right. My husband said at one point he was like, I distinctly remember the first time that I like consciously have a memory of, oh. Maybe I'm not just safe in the world Hmm. Where one of his parents was traveling and said, I'll let you know when I get there safely. Ah. And he was like, I just have this memory of like, oh, it had never occurred to me that you wouldn't get there safely.

[01:25:46] Hmm. Right. And statistically speaking there, we're gonna probably get there safely. Yeah. That like letting somebody will let this kid know if I don't get there safely is gonna happen anyway. Right. Right. And yeah, I just, I, so I think of that and I am, I'm so grateful that I had that freedom in my childhood and that's one of the legacy blessings.

[01:26:16] That's one of the things I do wanna pass on and kind of repeat from my childhood. And I'm gonna ha there's so much available for us to know where kids are at all times right now, and I'm gonna have to really be mindful of that for myself. 

[01:26:31] Rachel: Yeah, same. I, um, so we, you know, recently I've started letting Nora, there's a walking trail, like a bike trail mm-hmm.

[01:26:39] Near our house. And if she is with her friends and she wants to go on the bike path and like, go to the end without us and 'cause it like ends at an ice cream shop, um, we've let her and awesome, you know, I have these two like fighting parts of me and one is like, this is so good for her. This is so important.

[01:26:59] Like, research shows that this is really good for kids. And then part of me, so the walking path like, uh, parallels some water, you know, ES water, no knows how to swim, but the water has a current. And so there's this other part of, and of course water safety, she knows, stay away from it, whatever. I've done my due diligence, but there's part of me that's like, but what if something happens?

[01:27:21] You know? And I have to be like, yeah, no, she's 10, she's responsible, she is ready to do this. And it does give her like this boost of, and she is, she tends towards anxiety and it does give her this boost of like confidence and independence that she really needs. 

[01:27:38] Alyssa: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I, I love that as a practice and just recognizing that the challenge in this has nothing to do with the kid and everything to do with us.

[01:27:50] Rachel: Absolutely. 

[01:27:52] Alyssa: So real, thanks for tuning in to Voices of Your Village. Check out the transcript at voices of your village.com. Did you know that we have a special community over on Instagram hanging out every day with more free content? Come join us at seed do and dot. So SEW take a screenshot of you tuning in.

[01:28:13] Share it on the gram and tag seed. And so to let me know your key takeaway, if you're digging this podcast, make sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode. We love collaborating with you to raise emotionally intelligent humans.