The parenting deep dive, Part 2: ‘Millennial parenting whisperer’ Dr. Becky to the rescue!

On this episode of Next Question with Katie Couric, Part 2 of our parenting deep-dive, Katie shares her conversation with clinical psychologist and parenting guru, Dr. Becky Kennedy. After exploring the historical, political, and cultural factors that make parenting today so impossible, Katie and Dr. Becky talk about the need to equip parents with support and training, just like you would any other critical job. “Parenting is the hardest and most important job in the world and it’s a job we have 24/7 for a lot of years,” Dr. Becky tells Katie. “And most jobs in this country that we value, that we think are important, we prioritize the people in those jobs getting training and resources. And parenting is the opposite. We’re like, just take this baby home from the hospital and we’re given nothing.” Dr. Becky shares her unique parenting philosophy, why she’s filling such a need at this moment, how to navigate screentime as people and parents, and so much more. Find out more about Dr. Becky Kennedy’s parenting support network, as well as her podcasts and her book, Good Inside: The Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be,” at GoodInside.com. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi everyone, I'm Katie Kuric, and this is next Question.
Today I'm sharing a special bonus episode and part two
of our parenting deep dive. In part one, New York
Times journalists Jessica Gross gave us some historic contexts for
the impossible situation parents find themselves in today and shared

(00:20):
the ways that work, politics, and our culture can do better.
We also heard from clinical psychologist and parenting guru Dr
Becky Kennedy, and today in part two, I'm sharing our
entire sweeping conversation. I was really into Dr Becky. You guys.
We talked about how she became the millennial parenting whisper,

(00:43):
what's behind her parenting philosophy, how to navigate social media
and screen time, and so much more so, settle in,
friends and enjoy Dr Becky with rate advice for parents
and really anyone out there. Dr Becky Kennedy, Okay, you've
become sort of this parenting phenom. And before we talk

(01:06):
about your advice and your approach toward parenting, I want
to talk to you about you. How did you what's
a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?
As my mom used to say, how did you get
into this? Whole line of work. Um, that's a great question.
I've always just found people to be so fascinating and

(01:26):
and honestly, probably like you, have been interested in people's stories. Um,
And I've always just kind of loved living in this
space between what I know is people like doing their best,
and I really have always believed people are kind of
inherently good, and then there's this whole range of behavior
as we all engage in that are like really not

(01:47):
so good. And so I've always like imagined this space
between people's identity and their behavior. And then I learned
as I get older, oh, kind of the space in
between a lot of it can be understood by psychology
and sociology and actually people a living of getting to
know people and understanding that space and helping people kind
of close that space and acting more in line with
their values. And so then I you know, studied psychology

(02:10):
at Duke and started a private practice after getting my PhD,
and clinical and adult psychology. And then as I became
a parent myself, I realized, in addition to kind of
the deep psychotherapy I like doing, I really liked working
with parents who weren't necessarily seeking therapy. They were actually
seeking kind of guidance for how to help the struggles

(02:33):
they saw with their kids. So a lot of these
parents would come to me and say, Yeah, I'm not
even looking for therapy for my kid. I just know
that I need to kind of brush up on some
skills because I don't like the way I'm interacting with
my kid. But I don't I don't know what to
do differently, or I know my kid is kind of
in the range of normal. Therefore they're having tantrums, their
tend they're lying to me. I don't know if what

(02:54):
they need is therapy, but I need help, just like
helping this whole system. And then that led me to,
you know, want to do a lot more you know,
kind of direct parenting work. And I feel like everything
really came together because parenting is not just this kind
of set of strategies or skills we can memorize, because
our own past and the way we were parented and

(03:17):
kind of our stuff just all comes alive. And so
that combination of thinking deeply about people, understanding why we
are the way we are, and then giving people very practical,
action oriented kind of help. Um, I was able to
do all of that with parents and then just wanted
to do more and more of it. Well, clearly you're
feeling a huge void I think in the marketplace. Although

(03:42):
if you go to the parenting section at any Barnes
and Noble, it is replete with, you know, all kinds
of parenting books. So what do you think it it
is about your approach? Becky? Should I call you Dr? Becky? Becky? Okay? Um?

(04:02):
That that really differentiates you from so many other people
in the in this arena. So I've reflected on this
question for a little bit because I've wondered it myself.
I've been to the parenting section too, Like there's like
a lot of action here, you know. Um. So I
think there's a couple of things from a parenting specific standpoint,

(04:25):
I feel like we've been fed these two models, neither
of which actually feel right to people. Where there's this
model of okay, change behavior, and kids do this bad
behavior and we need less of the bad and more
of the good, and so we have time outs and
we have punishments, and we have sticker charts and praise
and ignoring. And while that all makes sense logically, I

(04:46):
feel like all of us deepen our souls or like
this just this can't be it like, this doesn't feel good,
this doesn't feel right. I don't know about you, but
if my husband responded to my not so great behavior
by like giving me a time out or a sticker
or something, I would not feel great. And so nobody
likes doing those strategies. In fact, you talk about how
it's shaping behavior, not human beings. Yeah, I feel like

(05:08):
there's this like very very narrow way of looking at kids,
as if we can help young, impressionable children become fully functioning,
sturdy adults by just looking at what's happening on the surface.
It's almost like a Pavlovian attitude about parenting, isn't it is.
It's like, right, well, my kid keeps hitting their younger sibling,

(05:29):
and if I just scare them enough by threatening abandonment
to their room, or by having a scary voice or
kind of bribe them enough with stickers, then I will
fix my child. But we all know, well, what happened
to the jealousy that was driving that, or what happened
to the anger. Well, guess what, your kid's gonna feel
jealous and angry for the rest of their lives, probably
towards their siblings, but also just in general. So if

(05:51):
we're not building skills for those feelings, well, what's gonna
happen when your kids twenty and feels jealous of their
you know friend, or what's going to happen when they're
forty and are angry at their boss? Like, nothing good
because they've never developed skills. So that approach is like
purely logical behavior shaping, and to me, beyond it not
feeling good to me, there's also just an inefficiency like, wait,

(06:12):
you're missing out in all the years you could be
developing skills that kids actually need for the rest of
their lives. So I think there's a lot of books
and a lot of parenting approaches that fall into that category.
And then there's a lot of books and kind of
approaches that fall into the category of weight like feelings matter,
and like we need to see feelings and allow for feelings.
But I think sometimes on that side of things, people

(06:33):
feel limited because parents are thinking, okay, okay, but what
do I do in the moment? Like, but what do
I actually say? And okay, so you allow the feelings,
but what about when yeah, it results in lying or hitting,
Like I'm pretty sure I'm not supposed to sit back
and be like, my kid is feeling angry, how amazing,
Like that's definitely not right either. And so I think
our approach equally prioritizes yes, seeing feelings as real and

(06:56):
strong and important, but also something I call bodying authority
and really sturdy leadership and firm boundaries. And so it's
kind of a hybrid of these two approaches exactly. So
I think that feels good and then and then maybe
even more than that, I really think it's like the
first approach that is as much about self development as

(07:18):
it's about child development. And that's not a way of
saying it's parents fault at all. I don't think any
of the stuff is parents fault. I actually think it's
a way of saying, we have a huge opportunity here,
Like this is a parenting approach where you can grow
even outside your role as a parent, and you can
feel more healed and you can feel more centered and
more sturdy across the board, while at the same time

(07:40):
you're building resilience and your kids. And I think there's
just a feel good nature. I think there's an efficiency
parents like, oh, I can knock that both out at once,
like that that sounds good. Well that's interesting too, because
who's to say that first time parent or even a
second third time parent has all the answers. It is
really a kind of learn as you process. There isn't

(08:02):
really a handbook for handling this. No. I mean, this
is the thing that gets me super fired up. Um,
And I think it is such a larger sociological problem
that I feel like most raw to almost more than
any you know one parenting problem. This bigger problem, which
is parenting is the hardest and most important job in
the world. And it's a job we have for a

(08:25):
lot of years. Like your kids are older, you're still
a parent, Like you still parent. And most jobs in
this country that we value that we think are important,
we really prioritize the people in those jobs getting training
and resources. And not only that, Like if I think
about a surgeon, i'd ever go to because I would
think surgery is like another really important, you know, really
hard job. I would never see a surgeon who like

(08:45):
got their tips on Instagram, Like I'd be like, oh, okay,
like did you get training? And the surgeon who got
the most training, the surgeon who had ongoing support. I
think all of us would look at that surgeon positively,
not like what's wrong with you? We'd be like, that's amazing,
you know, when can I get an appointment? And with
parenting at the opposite, where we just take this baby
home from the hospital, we're given nothing. There's this bullshit

(09:08):
about maternal instinct. Right, So it's kind of saying, if
you are struggling, it's your fault, you know, as opposed
to if I am struggling, maybe I wasn't set up
to thrive, and maybe there are resources and support I
can then go invest in, not just for my kids,
but again just so I can feel more confident. So
I think you're right, and I think that's a huge
shift we need. We were talking earlier when we were

(09:31):
walking into the studio about generational trauma, and I'm so
fascinated by this, and it's something that I've thought a
lot about in the last year or so, and it's
surprising to me that this is now just getting so
much attention. And it's not it's it's trauma broadly defined.
In other words, how you were parented and what you

(09:54):
experienced as a child comes out when you're a parent.
And yet people don't understand that people don't look at
that and either correct it or reinforce the things that
were positive in their own childhood's. Talk to me about
how parenting styles reflect your own childhood experience and why

(10:19):
this is just now coming to light. I'm sure as
the psychologist it's something that you have been steeped in,
but the general public I don't think has. Yeah, and
I think it is still under talked about. Maybe right,
it's starting to definitely be talked about more. But absolutely
something I say often is without intervention and guidance, we
parent the way we were parented, and very few people

(10:40):
I know are like great, like I want to do
things exactly the same way, right, and so why is
this right? Well, we learn about what close relationships are
through our earliest attachments, right, We learn what's allowed, what
feelings are allowed, what feelings are safe, what brings me

(11:00):
closeness with others, literally, what brings my parents close, what
gets me loving looks and kind of validation Even when
you're an infant, that modeling is so critically important. Just
looking at a child, smiling at that child, reinforcing that
that child is loved unconditionally. So many kids don't have

(11:22):
that they don't, And there's this other narrative, right, like, oh,
they won't remember that anyway, Right, that's like something people say,
And yeah, I hope more more people understand a much
broader definition of memory, which is, you know, the most
important memories in my mind aren't the ones ever that
we recall with our words. They're the ones that were
just stored in our body and live out in our
behavioral patterns. Right. That's another form of memory. Right, So

(11:44):
I remember always that there was a dad I used
to see in private practice. He said, I don't remember
how my parents responded to my tantrums and hard moments.
How would I remember that? But this is a dad
who came to me because he's like, whenever my kids
are having a hard time and are upset, which I
now know is actually totally developmental normal. I know what
I want to say and do, but I gets scary,
like I yell and I send them away. And he'd say,

(12:07):
I don't remember how my parents responded. And I used
to almost like hold this in lightness, like what do
you mean you don't remember? Your memory just played out
like right there? You know, like I can tell you
what happened, right, not because I can see into the past,
you know that far, but because our tolerance for tough
moments with our kids comes from our parents tolerance for
those tough moments with us. So parents who say, yeah,

(12:30):
like it's really hard for me to stay calm during
my kid's tantrum or and my kid asked for something
over and over, it's really really hard for me to
stay sturdy. I get really triggered or reactive on some level.
We're reliving this bodily memory. We're probably in our childhoods,
you know, when we wanted something that was inconvenient for
our parents, which is most of the time with children, right,

(12:51):
because you want things and you can't have them. And
so when you want something and you can't have it
and you haven't yet developed regulation skills, you have a tantrum.
It's not a sign of being a bad spoiled kid.
It's a sign of how hard it is to want
and be denied, which is hard for us too. And
if that was responded to over and over, it would
have been responded to with some version of you know, oh,

(13:12):
you're crying, I'll give you something to cry about, or
go to your room, or you're spoiled or no TV
for a week, or you know, physical punishment of some type.
Then our bodies learned back to that word trauma. Wow,
I'm not allowed to want things for myself. It doesn't
learn I'm not supposed to ask for this game at
the toy store. Just learn something bigger, like when I
want something and other people say no, that is really dangerous.

(13:33):
So I should just put that away. I should stop
wanting things. I should suppress my desires exactly. But it
can also be I imagine the the inability to really
even deal with these things on a deeper level. It
doesn't have to be an anchor or punishment. It could

(13:54):
just be inadequacy, right in terms of knowing how to
navig ate these feelings. Yes, right, I think the feelings
that our parents can't tolerate in us. Either yes, there's
a form they punish you or they just like I
can't talk about that. You know, you come home really sad,
and you know, again, not one time, but over and over,

(14:16):
and maybe you didn't get punished. It wasn't like that,
but more no one no one asked you, like, no
one followed up. You were just kind of alone in
your room. Our body can't tolerate overwhelming feelings in a loneness,
and often we you know, kind of point the finger
at the feelings, like the feelings are the problem. The
feelings were never the problem. The aloneness is the problem.
I actually think that's what trauma is. It's tough experiences

(14:39):
encoded with a loneness, right, and so when we're alone
and overwhelming feelings, our body can't tolerate it. Where this
relational species. So going back to the intergenerational trauma and
how this plays out. It might not be punishment or
getting hit or even getting sent to your room, but
people say this all the time, like my family just
didn't talk about feelings like forget being angry, just like

(15:01):
feelings like sadness, disappointment. It was just that was never
on the table. Then there's a whole range of feelings,
a really wide range that you had to learn to
put away. So then you see feelings in your kids
and you're thinking, I want to be there when my
kid got cut from the soccer team, but like like
your body is like really struggling to go to their room.

(15:23):
You're like, I feel awkward, and then instead of kind
of pushing through that, in some ways, saying, Okay, I
feel awkward because I'm like the first one in my
generation to go talk about sadness with someone. Of course
that feels awkward. That's carving a new circuit. If we
don't push forward, then we kind of repeat that same pattern. Oh,
my kids seems fine, forget it. My kid then learns
I guess we're not supposed to talk about sadness. And

(15:45):
it continues when we come back the importance of repair
and why we all need to look at ourselves first,
h you filled a huge need during the pandemic. I

(16:10):
know before America shut down, you didn't have an Instagram account.
Now you have one point five million followers, a book,
a little bit of a many empire going. So why
do you think, Becky, you hit such a chord. And
by the way, I've never been so grateful to have
grown children then in the last few years, because hats

(16:33):
off to all the mothers and fathers, parents everywhere who
had to juggle and deal with so much. And I
love that. Shout out to everyone listening who had young kids,
who had teenagers, who had their first baby, who were
single parents, who are going through a divorce, who are
who were married and still like, no matter what, it
was hard, it was so hard. And actually the other

(16:55):
thing we were talking about before this was how important
it is to kids to to just name what's true,
to talk about the hard stuff. We often think we're
protecting them by not but I think we're actually increasing
a lot of their anxiety because again, then they feel alone.
So when you're confused and confused, nobody likes feeling alone
and confused. Those two things together are awful, right, So

(17:15):
I think during the pandemic, I think something that really
maybe like help me hit a stride with people as
I do. I think I've always been someone who has
never shied away from naming the hard, like even say
this is hard. We all yell at our kids, this
pandemic sucks, this is so difficult. You are doing an
impossible thing. You're a warrior. You did not mess up

(17:36):
your kid forever when you yelled. Here are some words
you can use. And I think during that time of
so much uncertainty, yeah, when people knew like okay, I
can go somewhere and there'll be someone who's naming something
that feels right on to what's actually happening in my house,
who's not telling me necessarily how to make it all better.
But who's just helping me tolerate how hard this is? Yeah?

(17:57):
I think we all needed that. And I think that
you were hearing the desperate cries of mothers everywhere. What
were they saying to you? What were they struggling with?
I guess just about everything, right, Yeah, I mean I
think that the biggest thing they were struggling with is like,
is is this tell me this is as hard as

(18:18):
it feels, you know, like, and it's one of my
core mantras for parenting is just this feels hard because
it is hard, not because I'm doing something wrong. And
I always think that when something's really hard, if we
can just validate for ourselves, Wait, I'm not a horrible parent,
Like this just actually is really hard to be home
with two kids in a pandemic or even at this stage,

(18:39):
this is really hard to manage through a tantrum and
a grocery store. We don't then layer on the self blame,
which goes into I'm a horrible parent. I messed up
this Forever. If people saw me, they want to believe
that I'm the type of parent. When we add that layer,
I think hard becomes impossible. And when we remove that layer,
which is the impossible, it's still hard. But hard is

(18:59):
is far too Here are two impossible. And you talk
about the need for repair, um, which you say is
something really important for people to understand. Can you tell
us what you mean by that? Yeah, I mean I
really think you know, for any parent or even nonparent
listening to this, I think the single most important strategy

(19:20):
to get good at in our relationships is repair. And
you know, I'm sure there's some actual definition for what
repair is. To me, I just think it's connecting after
a moment of disconnection. And we all know moments with
our kids, with a partner, with a colleague, we're like, yeah,
we're disconnected. It was not a feel good moment. Repairs
the act of going back and forming a connection again
after And if you think about what it means to

(19:41):
get really good at repair, well, there has to be
a rupture to repair. And I think this is actually
helpful to parents. Think. Okay, so the next time I
yell at my kid, I'm gonna try to remember this
conversation I heard between Becky and Katie being like, Okay,
I gotta get good at repair well. To get good
at repair after rupture. So okay, check I did step one.
I yelled at my kids, like I'm not not a
horrible parent. How to do that? To do the next step,

(20:02):
And then the next step is reconnecting first with ourselves
and reminding ourselves I didn't mess up my kid forever
like I can. I always think of repair. I can
rewrite the ending of that chapter, I can go back,
I can reopen that file, and when I do, I
essentially say, hey, that thing that didn't feel good, you
were right to feel that way, and that probably felt

(20:23):
scary or probably didn't feel good when I didn't understand
your side of things, and I'm sorry I yelled. I
always like to say to my kids, it's never your
fault when I yell, because kids, when we don't explain
things to them, they self blame to gain control, and
we don't. We don't want that for their future. And
then some version of I'm working on managing my feelings

(20:45):
just like you are, and I am really working on
doing better in the future. And when we do that,
we actually change the way the not so great memory
lives in a kid's body because surrounding the moment that
felt scarier when they felt alone or misunderstood. Would now
because I've rewritten that ending in the chapter, I kind
of surround that moment with the elements that we're missing

(21:05):
in the first place, compassion, connection, understanding, listening, And I
just like, I want every parent to know because we've
all had those moments and I'll have that again, and
I have them where I'm like in my bathroom and
I'm like, oh my god, I got I'm a kid,
or I can't believe I said these words, I promise
myself I would never say. And then we spiral as
if that defines who we are. And when we can
take a deep breath and say whoa repair is, where

(21:27):
it's at, repair is where it's at, repair is where
it's at, and go back to our kid, I mean,
it feels so much better for them. I think we
almost underestimate it feels so much better for us too.
And then we move forward in such a different way.
Your book is called good Inside a guide to becoming
the parent you want to be? So can you explain
in a nutshell? I think a lot of people who

(21:48):
follow you and who listen to your advice understand this.
But for the people who don't Becky, what is your
overall philosophy on raising children that that that kids are
basically inherently good. Yeah, I mean I believe you know,
same with adults. I really do believe we all have
this inherent goodness and as our kids are developing, being

(22:10):
able to see them as good inside is in no
way permission for their quote bad behavior. Right. Seeing kids
as good inside helps us separate And I always do
this on my two hands to make it concrete, like
they're good identity from there, not so good behavior. Right.
And I always think our interventions with our kids fall
into two buckets. Either we're looking at our kid as

(22:33):
a good kid having a hard time or a bad
kid doing bad things. Punishments, consequences, time outs are all
from the bad kid doing bad things bucket. And when
we see kids as good inside, then we have a
gap between their good behavior, their good identity, and their
bad behavior, and then we can actually intervene to help
them build skills versus send them away and add shame.

(22:57):
So I think this is an approach that sees kids
is inherent the good inside that allows us to build skills,
and that allows us to actually raise kids in a
way where we're developing all the skills they need for
adult Can you expand on the resilience versus happiness idea?
Because when I was raising my kids, there was a

(23:19):
lot of focus on grit, right, and how to how
to develop grit and effort should be praised rather than
the results. So tell me resilience versus happiness? Is that
sort of the same thing about that grit versus results

(23:41):
are not? Really? Yeah, I think it's like they're definitely
like close cousins, you know, so yes, grit, resilience, confidence,
they all have slightly different conceptualizations, but I think they're all.
You know, we'd all be like I'll take any one
of those that's good, you know, can me give me anyone?
We're fine? Um, So yeah, the resilience over happiness, I
think is is a really really important concept to think
about when we're raising kids, because there's this line I

(24:01):
hear a lot like don't just want your kids to
be happy? Or don't you want your kids to be happy?
And I'm always like no, And then parents often we
go to the opposite. They're like, oh, Dr Becky wants
her kids to be unhappy, Like, no, I don't want
them to be unhappy either. But when we focus on
happiness and childhood, we do something really tricky in terms
of kids wiring in stet up for adulthood, where every

(24:22):
time kids experienced distress, and what might distress be in
childhood Frustration like I can't finish this puzzle, or feeling
left out I wasn't invited to that slumber party, feeling
disappointed I didn't get that thing I want, I didn't
get the present that I wanted to for the holidays. Exactly,
so they experience various forms of distress in childhood, and

(24:43):
then if they're wiring is whenever I feel kind of
the light go on for distress, I then wire next
to it the light going off to return to happy, meaning, right, oh,
you weren't invited to that party, I'm throwing you another one,
or oh I'll finish that puzzle for you, or or
I'll get you that gift. I'll give you that gift,
not because as a parent I've changed my mind, because
I actually I am just kind of scared of you

(25:04):
having a tantrum. Right then, that's also that instant gratification
which relates exactly too. We think about phones and we
think about video games, and we think about the obsession
with kind of scrolling, which is a lot of instant,
low effort, high gratification moments. This also relates to these
moments we're talking about, how do we deal with kids

(25:25):
in non screen time situations when they're frustrated and pointed.
It's also must be a dopamine inducing reaction that sets
them up for quick fixes. But that's exactly right. So
I think about this family I saw in the city,
and they were a very wealthy family. They were, and
they came to me when their kid was sixteen, just

(25:45):
the parents. They said, Okay, here's the situation. We flew
to Hawaii on this vacation and they're like, and we
didn't fly first class. We don't even think about it.
My sixteen year old had a full blown tantrum. Oh
brother the airport, right, which brings up like all these
entitled and right. But if you think about it, and
I took, you know, an inventory of this kid's childhood

(26:06):
and very well intentioned parents, This was a kid whose
life was all about having a quick fix and being
happy immediately. So when the body then starts to feel
frustration or disappointment, you're allowed to feel disappointed if you're
used to flying for a class. Sure, I think no
one blames that kid for feeling disappointed. It's just like whoa.
In my mind, I see, it's like that kid had
no skills to manage. Is the same as a two

(26:27):
year old having a temper tantrum when you say they
won't buy them Coco puffs in the grocery store. Right,
it's the same thing. It's just is more embarrassing to
a parent. Right, But this kid's body was wired with
feel upset. Where's the happy, where's the immediate fix? There's
almost then a phobia of frustration. But we've built that
in a kid. So the more we focus on kids

(26:48):
being happy in their early years, the more we've actually
set them up for disregulation and what looks like entitlement
or anxiety in adulthood. And the more we focus in
the early years on helping kids tolerate the range of feelings,
then they actually go into adulthood with skills to manage
all those feelings, which actually leaves more space to actually

(27:09):
cultivate happiness. Is this something that isn't the fault of
some of these parents. It's there, you know, we talked
about this before, but they're just passing down or are
they or they could be working in opposition to the
way they were parented. And I know you talk about

(27:29):
reparenting a lot, so what does that mean exactly in
these situations. I think there's so many forces that can
lead to this right and again, and none of them
are that these parents were bad, parents were malintentioned, or
maybe they didn't get things when they were little, and
now they feel like, I'm in a position that I
can give my child everything I didn't get. I think

(27:50):
that that's exactly right. And I always like with parents
to rethink um giving kids, you know, the things that
really matter, because yes, you know, people think on their
own childhood like I didn't I didn't get things right.
My guess is if you really look back in your
childhood and you remember, I didn't get the toy, I
didn't get the vacation, my guess is what felt bad
again wasn't just the not getting, but was probably a

(28:12):
home where it wasn't validated for you, you weren't connected
to right. And then if we fast forward to the
idea of I want to give my kids everything, like
what I want to give my kids is setting them
up to be fully functioning, confident, resilient adults. It's not
that I want to give them the thing on the surface,
the toy. I want to give them actually the skills
to manage not getting the toy, because I promise you

(28:33):
they're going to figure out, if they're confident, resilient, how
to get themselves quote toys. But what you can't just
figure out overnight is how to manage tricky situations. Yeah,
and so the reparenting I think that really matters is
really the act of of giving yourself the things that
you really always needed in childhood and never received. And

(28:54):
and there's something really powerful about being an adult is
we can now really in profound ways be the adult
for those Essentially, you know that that inner child in us,
or those inner child parts, we don't have to wait
along for our actual parents to give it to us,
because we're no longer is dependent on them because we're adults.
So it might be you know, sitting and noticing how

(29:15):
you feel, which sounds so soft, but it might just
be like I'm gonna take ten seconds and just say
to myself after I got a really difficult email from
my boss, I might say, you know, hopeck you wait. Pause,
I'm upset. That is upsetting to read. I'm allowed to
feel that way. I'm gonna figure out what to do.
But let me start by just validating my own feelings, okay,
and then I then I problem solved. I promise you

(29:36):
the parent who does that is going to be able
to show up for their kid if they want to
kind of quote be there for their kid, way better
than if they just try to memorize what to say
to their kid. Because when they actually do that kind
of act of reparenting, right, they're actually changing the circuit
in their own body, and so something different will activate

(29:56):
with their own kids. So it's almost like grabbing the
oxygen masks for yourself before you give it to your kid.
I mean, I know that's used a lot, it's become
almost to cliche, but getting sort of in touch with
your reactions are going to help you manage your kids. Yeah.
So here's an example from my my own life. Right. So,
I was definitely like a very quote good girl growing up, right,

(30:20):
which I've learned is a pleaser. I was a pleaser
exactly exactly, and like the way I always think about
that visually is I was you know, raising away, or
at least I you know, I internalized that I had
to gaze out before I gaze in, like who do
you want me to be? How can I make your
life easier? Way before I gazed in and thought like, well,
what do I want? What's in line with you know,

(30:42):
my own values? Things like that. So fast forward to
having my first kid, who is now eleven, I'm starting out, like,
you know, five six he just the most positive way
of saying is he really speaks up for himself right
the other way of saying it, which would be triggering me.
He was like why can't he ever take no for
an answer? Like why can't he be more people? Leasing?
Why can't he just notice that I don't want him
to have a sleepover and be like, mom, you know what,

(31:05):
You're a great mom, no problem, Sorry for asking, you know,
like that would be nice and he wouldn't. And I'd
find myself in these moments, especially when I was frustrated
or depleted with other things, saying things that I really
never wanted to say, like what's wrong with you? You're
so selfish, you're so spoiled, Like I'd say these things
in these moments, and I knew I wasn't going to
want to give him a sleepover, But I also know, Becky,

(31:26):
there's another way of saying that I could to say, Hey,
I'm done talking about this. My answer is no, You're
allowed to be upset. And the reason I couldn't wasn't
because I didn't memorize that script enough, is because I
was triggered. So one of the reflections I did was,
you know, when I think we see something in our
kid that bugs us, we think, how can we make
our kids more like us? Versus what am I seeing
in my kid that I probably had to shut down
in myself? And how can I actually almost feel inspired

(31:48):
by my kid because I probably need to grow always
like I probably need to grow that part of myself.
It's not like I need to make my kid more
like me. I almost need to make myself or like
my kid. And I was like, yeah, you know, no,
wonder it triggers me speaking up for something when I
or and no, that's something that I learned not to
do as a kid, and so I really did for
like these weeks I did this experiment. I was like,
I'm going to speak up for myself more, not to

(32:09):
my son, but I bet if I do it in
other areas of my life, it'll play out and I'll
be less triggered. So I remember being in a store
and I was returning something and they're like, sorry, it's
past the time you can return it. And I was like,
you know, I know what my son would do. I
was like, you know, can I talk to a manager
like I? I feel like I've been a customer for
a long time, and you know, I really feel like
this is in line with like what would be appropriate.
And I actually was successful and so like all different areas.

(32:32):
Instead of thinking my kids such a bad, spoiled kid,
I was like, let me reparent the part of me
that was such a pleaser and let me try to
speak up. I remember also I was on the subway.
I was like, really tired one day. Someone was taking
up two seats and I was like, hey, can you
move over? I really like to sit. That was definitely
against the people pleasing part of me. And then sure
enough it wasn't like I've never said those words to
my kid. But the trigger moments really changed from that

(32:56):
act of reparenting for me, and I think many in
my generation we were afraid of our kids a little bit.
We wanted them to like us. We wanted to be
their friends. And I think there was such a switch
and the parent child relationship from our parents too kind

(33:17):
of acknowledging feelings, but to the point where we just
wanted them to like us. So how do you get
out of that spiral? How do you do enough disciplining?
And I know that you want parents to be sturdy
and strong and no nonsense about some issues, but also

(33:39):
like that is a tough balance, isn't it, Because I
think parents see it as one thing or another. Right,
I want to be your friend or I am a parent, Right,
Either I'm the I'm the kind of disciplinarian or your buddy.
Right Again, it's like those two buckets were like, there's
gotta be something in between, and a I think there is.
So you know, I think a lot about what I

(34:00):
call family jobs, right, And I'm sure you see this
all the time. They are places you've worked, Like you
can never hire someone to do a job well unless
you've told them what their job is. And actually, I
think having clarity as a parent of like what is
my job? Like? What really what would I write down
in my job description? Is really important? Because without that clarity,
we can go to an extreme. So I think parents
have two main sets of jobs. So one is, and

(34:21):
you're kind of getting to this, it's validating and really
kind of empathizing with our kids feelings. That matters. That
actually is important because it's how kids learned to regulate
those feelings throughout their lives. Kids can never learn to
tolerate feelings that we can't tolerate in them. So when
we say you wish you could have that toy, Oh
you're really mad that I won't let you have that sleepover,

(34:44):
that really matters. But the other part of our job
mat are so much too, and that's setting and maintaining boundaries.
And I'm really bad at that. It's hard because it
goes back to I Fewer people please er people. Pleasers
don't set boundaries for themselves. They actually look at who
they to be for others, and they please others they
keep people happy with them. And sure enough, the best

(35:05):
way to keep someone at least in the moment happy
with you is to have no boundaries. You just kind
of float around. And by the way, it's easier and
easier to tolerate for a parent because saying no is
harder than saying yes, I think it's easier short term.
Well that's what I mean, right, But but it also
sets parents up for I think all this rage that
parents talk about because yeah, it's easier short term because

(35:29):
you just become a version of yourself your child in
the moment wants you to be. But if you think
about that, if you think about having no boundaries, if
you think about an egg with no boundaries, guess what,
there's no egg anymore. It's spilled out all over the place, right,
So the shell in an egg it's like super important
or else the egg ceases to be an egg. It
just doesn't even have an identity. So I think I
think one of the thing about boundaries that I like

(35:49):
teaching parents as parents, like, well, what about consequences and discipline?
I think true boundaries in somebody's like, they really replace
consequences because what a boundary really is is it's a
decision we make or something we do. But what's really
important is boundaries tell our kids what we will do,
and they require a kid to do nothing. And that's

(36:10):
really important because whenever we set a boundary, we need
to say to ourselves, okay, am I telling my kid
what I'm gonna do, and does this require my kid
to do nothing? Telling a kid stop jumping on the
couch is not a boundary. We think it's a boundary.
It's not because it would require my kid to get
off the couch to be successful saying to my kid, hey,
it looks like you want to jump. I can't jump
on the couch. Please get down, and then if they don't,

(36:31):
saying hey, I'm gonna come over to you it looks
like it's really hard to listen. I'm gonna take you
off the couch and put you on the ground and
you could go jump on the floor. Now that's boundary.
My kid will probably cry. But if I remember, wait,
my job is not just to see their feelings, which
would be hey, you want to jump, but also my
job is to set a boundary. Then at the end

(36:53):
of a day, even if I'm tired, I could say
to myself, Okay, I did my job well. I both
set boundaries when I needed to, and I empathized and
validated with my kids feelings. Instead of only doing one
part of that job, which, even if it's easier in
the short term, what leads to in the long term, right,
is kids really don't learn how to manage their disappointment

(37:15):
and frustration because they never had to tolerate it because
we kind of like would take it away from them.
When we come back screen time, bribing, and more parenting
conundrums with Dr Becky, I think we can't have this

(37:42):
conversation about parenting without talking about technology. I am so
happy I grew up without technology. I am so happy
that it was just coming to the forefront when my
children were little, and I see a huge difference between
my older daughter, who's four and a half years older
than my younger daughter in terms of the role technology

(38:05):
is played in their lives. I feel so bad for
parents trying to figure this out because they're also probably
having to deal with their own addictive behavior. So we
could do three hours on this, but how do you
help parents figure this out? Because I do think it's
having such a terrible impact on kids their sense of

(38:31):
self developing. There's not only it's it's sort of warping
their self esteem. It's not giving them inner strength, it's
giving them outer validation. I mean, what a mess, What
a mess. It's so true. So in no ways do
I have a complete solution for this. It's it's like
I always say, like every parent feels awful about their
screen time and technology usage in the house. So if

(38:53):
you feel awful about it, I do too. It's just
it's it's unwinnable. So I think there's a couple of
things I think about. Number One, let's talk about your
kids are young, right, So, you know, the thing with
screen time when our kids are young that I think
it's important to realize is it's just very very low effort,
very very high reward moments. It's just like, you know,
my kid can go like bing bing bing on like

(39:14):
an iPad and have so much fun, or just watch
something passively. And what I think we need to think
about when our kids are young is how important it
is to have screen time limits. And everyone's family that
will look different, but what the limit allows for is
for your kid to actually have more high effort, high
reward moments, you know, like doing puzzles and reading and

(39:35):
learning to interact with peers. It's hard compared to just
watching a show or you know, having a video game.
And so during these years and our kids are developing,
I always encouraging I always encourage parents not to only
think like how much TV is too much? Right, But
it's more well, do what can I preserve time where
my kid is actually learning the skills that they're going
to need to learn in terms of managing frustration and

(39:58):
things like that. So that how I think about when
they're younger. As our kids get older, I think one
of the most important things is just to develop an
alliance with our kids as early as possible. We can't
wait till our kids are ten or their team to
start talking about screen time. And we have to think
about this in a collaborative way with that with them,
because they're going to get to an age where probably
they do have a phone. And if that's the first

(40:20):
time that we say, hey, let's talk about your usage,
it seems too much like we don't have an alliance
to lean on. So even when your kids are I
don't know making this up six seven eight, I encourage
parents to sit down with everyone's devices away and to say,
let's talk about let's talk about screen time. Let's talk
about what you like about it, let me hear you
out what's your favorite part, and let's talk about why

(40:42):
it can be like a little dangerous for all of us. Right,
something I always talk about with my kids is do
you notice that no matter how much there is, it
feels like never enough. And I always say it feels
like it's a cop with a hole in the bottom
no matter how much screen time we have, right, we
think if we put in more, it's going to fill
us up, but it just always like it always always

(41:03):
comes out like those are the conversations that again we're
not fixing something. But now we have a common language, right,
because if we go into those teenage years with our
kids wanting to be on all the apps on TikTok,
on snapchat, on you know, and and we haven't to
that point talked about this stuff, then we definitely still can.

(41:23):
But but it's really really hard. And then I think
the other thing that I think at any age around
technology is going back to boundaries. We have to be
willing to tolerate our kids not being happy with us, right,
And like that comes up over and over with screen time.
You know, It's funny because when I was on the
Today Show, we had a parenting expert named Dr Sylvia Rim.

(41:44):
She wrote me a letter recently which just reminds me
I need to write her back. But she talked about
parenting as an inverted triangle that it's always easier to
give kids more power and authority as they get older,
but it's very hard to reduce it once you have.

(42:07):
And I think the same goes with phones in screen
time or really any kind of positive reinforcement, right, or
it's not really positive reinforcement, um, any kind of I
guess freedom in a way, Yeah, I guess I would think.
I think two things about that. I think, Yes, of course,
it's harder as they get older, especially as they get

(42:27):
into those ages with their job is to start to
feel more independent and separate from us. So raining in
control when kids are developmentally supposed to be taking more
control is tricky. But but I think I think there's
another side that I say to parents often because I'll
her parents say like, well, you know, I gave my
kids this many hours of iPad use for my kid
is free reign over their phone, Like what am I

(42:48):
supposed to do now they're sixteen or now they're like
we're always able to say to our kids some version
of hey, I want to tell you about a decision
I've made that I know you're not gonna like. And
still I'm communicating to you, because it is super important
in terms of just keeping everyone in this family safe.
And I say this to my kids all the time, like,
my number one job is to keep you safe, and
I will always make decisions even if they're ones that

(43:10):
you don't like, because I love you that much to
tolerate your anger at me, to keep you safe and
put you on a path that I think is important. Like,
and I think we don't say that enough as parents.
So maybe someone's listening to this and they're like, yeah,
like I do feel like my six year old just
watches too much TV. What can I do? You can say,
you know, starting tomorrow you have this much TV instead.
I know that's a change, and I know that's probably

(43:30):
gonna be hard, and I'm already getting ready for the
what it's already over. You're the worst. I'm ready for it.
My number one job is to keep you safe, and
right now, a version of safety is having less screen time.
So we're going to make that change, even if you're upset, Like,
but hard to do that, and when your kid is sixteen,
it's harder. It is definitely harder. And I don't recommend,
of course, at sixteen, you have these unilateral moments. But

(43:52):
it might be saying to your sixth year old, Hey,
we need to have a family meeting because phone us
has gotten out of control, and maybe you think my
phone use has to It's like we're all at the
table together on our phones. I'm willing to hear that.
But what I know is we need some changes. I
know those changes are gonna be hard on everyone. I
also know where a family who can do hard things
when they're in everyone's best interest. So let's come to
that meeting with ideas. Let's go into that meeting knowing

(44:14):
we're each gonna have to compromise a little bit. And
let's go into that meeting knowing we all love each
other and we're going to figure this out. I feel
like that's a kind of leader, Like organizations make change sometimes, right,
Like it's kind of random and bring this up. But
I just read that amazing letter from the CEO of
Stripe announcing layoffs and what they're doing, and I mean,
just it was amazing lesson in starting this, like, here's
some not great news, here's news that people are gonna

(44:35):
not like the hear. But I'm gonna be direct. I'm
gonna tell you what's happening, and I'm also going to
tell you I have confidence we're gonna get to the
other side. And it was it's so holding to hear
a communication like that. And I think you're so right
about looking at your own behavior. Because my daughter came
over last night. I hadn't seen her for a while,
and she said, Mom, you have a real problem with
your phone. I came in and you barely looked up.

(44:58):
And I said, I just wanted to finish this in
Instagram posts that I've been working on, and like, she said, really,
you you have a problem. I think about this a lot,
Katie like, and it makes me it always actually I
try not to make it make me feel guilty. I
use it to be motivated to make a slight change
with my own kids. When I was a kid, when
I was my kid's age, right, my kids are five,
eight eleven, and I was with my parents, I would think,

(45:20):
like our parents, maybe this was you when you were
raising your kids. They had to work hard to be distracted.
For me, they would have had to open the New
York Times and read the paper to like block me out.
And now, like, if I think about the percentage of
time with my kids too, that kids look at their
parents and there's literally a phone in between them blocking
that connection. I think the percentage is like disturbingly high.

(45:42):
And then when we think about kids, behave your kids
need connection to feel safe more than anything else. They
want to feel close to us a very high percentage
of time, there's literally the screen they see the back
of our phones right before they see our face. Then
they get more just regulated, right. And so when I
think about that myself, what what I do? I literally
call it something just to make it fun and not
guilt inducing for me, I'm like, my kids need P

(46:04):
and P time. It's just play no phone, play no phone.
And I say that to my kids. Hey, you've probably
noticed I'm on my phone a lot. I'm putting it
behind two doors because I need two doors, Like one
doesn't work for me, of course. And I said, and
I'm all yours. We could do anything you want to
do and play dough, a game, whatever it is. And
I'm just fully present. And for any parent listening, you

(46:26):
don't have to say, Okay, I'm not gonna be on
my phone for a week. You can even say I'm
gonna give my kids five moments of this like PN
p time when I wouldn't usually in a day, and
it really does start to make a big shift. I
remember when Susan Surrandon and Tim Robbins were married, and
this was predated iPhones. They would not answer their phone landlines.

(46:47):
This is how long ago it was, between five and eight,
and I thought that's so great, Like they would just
push out any kind of external distraction so they could
really focus on your on their kids. And I you like,
that's something that's really important to do now more than
ever because it is so accessible and ubiquitous. I think

(47:08):
that's right, and I think for all of us. But
there might be a work emergency or something we can say,
like you know, well we can have a family emergy.
I mean there there's there is like this. I don't
an emergency. I'm not like such a I don't like
to like stoke fear. But like our our kids need
our time. We don't want it to get to a
point where there's an emergency with them, right, and we
have to protect going back to boundaries, like we need
boundaries around some of time with our kid for sure.

(47:31):
More with Dr Becky. Right after this, let me go
through a couple of quick questions, we got do it?
My type A friends have questions about what you call
df k s, Yes, deeply feeling kids. What do you

(47:55):
do if you have a deeply feeling child but you
are also a deeply feeling adult. That's a bad combo,
I'm assuming I don't think it's a bad combo. I
think that actually, this is like the highest percentage of
the members in our membership are just this. They like, yeah,
they're like I watched the Deeply Feeling Kids Workshop and
I didn't even realize how much like it was. It
was healing for me, you know, because I realized, you know,

(48:18):
the type of kid I was so deeply feeling kids
or kids who really do feel things more intensely than
other kids. I always think they have like bigger pores.
That's how I visualize it. So more comes in, and
somebodys are also scared of more of them spilling out.
And so if you have a deeply feeling kid and
you are a deeply feeling adult, and I like to

(48:38):
be a straight shooter, I'd say, like, actually that reparenting work.
Like when I in in our good inside system, the
Reparenting Workshop plus the Deeply Feeling Kids workshop are are
completely game changing for parents because it goes back to
what you're saying. I first, I have to kind of
do some of that rewiring and repairing and um, you know,
kind of work inside myself that helps me show up differently.

(48:59):
And then deeply feeling kids really do need different strategies
and other kids because they reject kind of most of
the things that help other kids. And there's nothing there's
there's very little. I'm as proud of is our Deeply
Feeling Kids Workshop. It lays it all outstep by step
for people. Okay, so people should watch that if they
need to know more about it. Um, have you gotten
much backlash to this sort of good inside philosophy, which

(49:23):
is basically a rejection of original sin, right that people
are inherently good? I mean it's hard to think that,
especially in the world we're living in right now, Becky.
So what if people said about that philosophy? And I
guess you got into it a little bit with Glenn
and Doyle a little and I every once in a while,
not too often, get a d M that says something

(49:45):
like this is at odds with like my deeply held
religious beliefs. You know, Um, you know, and I'm not.
I don't have great knowledge of religion. That's definitely not
where I you know, flex so um. But but other
people have said, you know, a big part of our
approach is this idea of holding multiple truths at once,
this idea of two things are true, which are electic

(50:06):
thinking dialectic thinking, and it relates to holding boundaries with
kids even you know, like, wait, two things are true,
Like I'm in charge of this decision, you're in charge
of your feelings. Like we're both doing good job. But
I think the idea that babies are born with inherent
goodness and that also we all need a lot of
help along the way, right we all? You know, to me,

(50:27):
that's how we can hold those both at once, or
to bring out the good in us, even if it's
not all good, that's exactly right, to bring it out,
that's exactly right. One person wants to know what's what
are the best ways to incentivize and reward good behavior
and hard work and discourage slash punish bad behavior, bad attitudes.

(50:47):
And I think she's asking this because she relies quite
heavily on bribery, and she says, I don't think that's
great yeah, I mean, and I think I do see
this a lot like the sticker charts, the rewards, the
prize is that you get this for doing your homework.
You know what it leads to understandably as kids who
has say older say like I'm not doing that, Well,
what's my prize? What are you gonna give me for

(51:08):
cleaning up my room? What are you gonna give me
for doing homework? I don't think any of us want
to be in that situation when our kids are older
and so bribery these kind of quote incentives, which really
just means external incentives. I think. I think we shoot
ourselves in the foot the more we use them. And
so it goes back to changing things. Like we can
always say to our kids like, hey, I've been doing
this for a while, and you know what I'm stopping.

(51:29):
I'm stopping. And here's why. I know you have it
in you and I know you want to be a
good student, like even if homeworks hard, like you're you're
a good kid, you like learning things. I know you
have responsibility in you and you can be a responsible
member of our family. And just like you see me
cleaning up my room, like I know you have it
in you to do that. So I think first, like

(51:50):
I often think about this visual like I need to
see the good in my kid before they can access
it themselves. And actually, every time we like bribe the kid,
we kind of say, like, I think you're someone who
needs to be coerced into doing a good behavior doesn't
feel good, actually, but I do think that when kids
are really little. I have a friend whose child had
to wear a mask for an interview and they wouldn't

(52:12):
let the child apply or be a part of a
program without that, And my friend bought her son a
toy in order to get him to wear a mask.
I mean, it's some stage developmentally kids don't really understand
reason and you can't really reason with them. But I

(52:34):
actually think kids never listen because of reason. I don't
think a lot of times we do either, I think,
I mean, that's a bigger topic talking about, like why
kids cooperate and listen. And certainly I'm not rigid. There
are moments of course you're like I need this to
happen with my kid. It's this one off thing. I too,
would give myself plenty of permission to be like, hey
do this, I'll get you ice creams, please do it.
Of course we have those moments, but I think we

(52:54):
have to ask ourselves as parents, is this something one
off I give myself permission to do here there, or
this in general? This strategy that I'm using over and
over and over to get cooperation from my kids, or
to have my kids do things that they clearly don't
even have intrinsic motivation to do. Like my kid does
not do their homework unless I offer them candy at
the end, Like, well, that's different to me than Okay,

(53:16):
I need them to put their seatbelt on on the
airplane and avoid a big tantrum, and I'm just like,
here's all the snacks in the world. Do it. So
I think I think that's like a different category. I
think though we do need a different system, and it's
a system, it's not a moment for understanding why do
kids cooperate? Why do kids do things they don't want
to do? Why do kids do homework? What's getting in
a kid's way of doing homework? Probably not that they're

(53:38):
not getting a prize. I wonder if they have frustration
tolerance skills, Do they have the skills to organize and
plan things? Do they feel stupid compared to the other
kids in their class. Are they perfectionistic and they're worried
about getting things wrong? So without a bribe, how do
you get kids to cooperate? So are you saying you
find the root causes of their lack of cooperation? I mean,

(53:58):
I think, why do any of us cooperate? Right? Like,
why would I go get my husband a glass of
water when we're both sitting on the couch if you
asked me versus saying like, get yourself water? Right? Um? Well,
I think it has to do with how how seen
we feel by someone, how connected we feel the state
of our relationship in that moment, and in a lot
of situations, the skills we have. Right. So, if my

(54:19):
kid isn't cleaning up their room, let's say that that's
a situation, and I'm like, okay, I'll give you dessert
or whatever. I'll give you this bribe if you clean
up your room. I'm not actually getting to like, well,
why it's not just cleaning up the room. Why aren't
they doing something that I want them to do? Right? So,
maybe part of it is organization, Like they need help,
they need a visual on their on their wall, right, Okay, well,

(54:39):
after you get home, you put your book back away,
you clean up your room, we have dinner. I don't know,
there could actually be an organization skill that's missing. Maybe
my kid feels so controlled by me and we get
in fights so often that not cleaning their room is
there one way of saying like fuck you, you know,
basically on my own person, and this is one area
of my life I can control, So I'm just gonna

(55:00):
not clean it up to send you the message. Then
I would say we need a very different intervention, right,
that's like, okay, well what needs you're pairing in your relationship?
And I think these things we hear it as parents,
and I know I rolled my eyes to him, like, oh,
that seems like so much time. I was going to
say it sounds exhausting, but but you know what's really
exhausting is when we bribe and punish and reward our
kids way through their first thirteen years of our life,

(55:22):
their life, and then we have a thirteen year old
who we have no relationship with, and those kids do
not talk to us about social media. Those kids do
not respect a curfew. Those kids do not tell us
when they're in dangerous situations with other kids, because for
thirteen years of our life we've been bribing them and
coursing them instead of developing a relationship with them. And
when you develop a relationship with them, which does not

(55:42):
mean giving them everything they want, there's a lot of
again firm boundaries while recognizing the validity of their reactions.
Then we get to a situation where we can say
to our kids, hey, I notice you're not cleaning up
your room. And here's the thing, Like, there must be
something getting in the way. And you know, in our
house we take these things seriously. You have some stuff
in your room we have to take care of. I do.
So let's just get to the bottom of this together.
What might make you clean it up, what might make

(56:04):
it easier? Like and and then like literally, this does happen.
It's not a fantasy where kids are like, oh, look,
I just always forget okay, what a schedule? Help? Oh
it's no fun. I know this is not you know,
it's not that fun. Would it be a little more
fun if we, like, I don't know, put on a
song in our house and like kind of we had
music on and you cleaned your room at the same
time I cleaned my room. You know, like, let's think
about this together. I mean that's just in general, dada

(56:24):
of collaborative problem solving, which number one is more effective?
Number two preserves your relationship with your kid, and number
three actually sets them up to develop the skills they
need so when they're twenty and up and out of
your house, they can function as adults. This is the
last question. I mean, I could talk about this all day.
It's really interesting, um, And it's making me think about

(56:46):
all the things I did wrong. No, no, no, no wrong.
Rethinking is not about being wrong. It's about considering new
ideas that that makes sense to you. Now, that's all
if they do. Um, one person who went through a
contentious divorce, and apparently, I guess a lot of people
with young kids got divorced post pandemic. Um, she asked selfishly.

(57:09):
I'd like to know how you manage kids who have
to live in two totally different houses because of shared custody.
How do you help them reset when they get to
your house if where they're coming from is so different.
I bet a lot of people are talking about that sadly. Yes,
so I'd want to say that Number one I wish

(57:30):
I could do full justice to this. Obviously, this is
like a complex situation that there's not one quick easy
answer to. And actually, time and divorce is something I
care a lot about because of course it happens to
a lot of kids. So a couple of just quick
ideas about it. Number One, it's totally normal for kids
to struggle in those transitional moments they are living, leaving
one world with one set of rules and something they've

(57:51):
adjusted to in that relationship, and they have to make
a complete switch. Right, It's like a different house, it's
different rules, it's different parents. It's so just understanding, Okay,
my kids, not my kids, not like a difficult kid.
This is just a lot. And that doesn't mean you're
messing up your kids. I think we we we do that.
We're like, oh so I'm messing up my kids forever,
They're gonna be messed up for It might be helpful though,
if they're similar rules in each house, right, And I

(58:15):
think the reality, especially if it's a contentious divorces, it's
hard to communicate, right, So, um, so just understanding that
because then what happens is when you get your kids
in your house, right, instead of saying like okay, dinner time,
You'll be like, you know, I'm gonna I'm just gonna
build in like fifteen minutes of like having a hard
time time. I'm just gonna like build it in so

(58:36):
I don't add my own frustration. So knowing that really
helps Number two. I think this is really important. Communicating
with our kids directly about this change without needing to
fix it. Just naming it is key. And I think
a lot of times as parents we don't communicate until
we have an answer. With our kids. They don't often
need answers, they just need someone to name what's happening.

(58:56):
Just I always say name what's true. So saying to
our kids, hey, it's probably tricky to go from dad's
house to my house. Right, It's probably hard to go
from one house and they do things one way and
they have to get in the car. I know it
wasn't too long ago before we all lived in the
same house and I have two and that that's hard,
and I get that that, but that does to a
kid's body. Is it just makes a kid feel like, ah, yes,

(59:19):
that is what's happening for me. Somebody understands me. I'm
not alone in this experience. This can be talked about hugely,
hugely helpful. I think that one of the things I
tend to do is I'm a fixer. And I think
we've touched on this a lot in this conversation. But

(59:40):
sometimes you just in order to make kids feel seen
and heard. That doesn't mean your default is fixing. And
I'm always trying to solve problems, and sometimes people just
want to be heard and seen and and share their
feelings with out and that have their feelings validated. That

(01:00:03):
is a really bad habit of mine. I'm like, Okay, well,
what are we going to do to solve this problem?
And then sometimes it exacerbates the feelings of anger and
frustration because I've automatically gone to how are we going
to make this better instead of just sitting in the
discomfort of having someone upset. And I think that's like

(01:00:24):
I think, I think all of us do that. And
to me again, in these hard moments, visuals really really help.
And you said a word that evokes a visual for me.
So when people are really upset and I tried to
do my kids, I'm less good at doing at my
husband working on it right like I picture him, or
you can picture your daughter like sitting on a bench,
literally sitting on a bench, and it's the bench of
whatever upsetting thing happens, and the bench of I wasn't

(01:00:46):
invited to this, or the bench of this thing at
my workplace didn't go the way I wanted, or I
don't feel successful. I don't feel successful. That's a great example.
I'm sitting on the bench of not feeling successful. And
if everyone thinks about their urges, we often have the
urge to do one of two things. Either want to
yank them off that bench because we see a like
happier bench, so we say things like, but look at
this and what about this and think about it this way?

(01:01:08):
Or why don't you do this exactly right? So what
what that images is like? We find them on the
bench of not feeling successful, and we like try to
yank them off, or we try to convince them. I
always think like their bench isn't their bench? We're like,
but what are you talking about? You have a great job,
right and like so either way, Katie, going back to
that theme of a loneness being the hardest thing the
next on the bench next to on the bench, that's

(01:01:29):
exactly right. And I think as a parent or as
a partner. You just know. You don't need someone to
tell you. You just know internally, like the way you're responding,
you know whether you're sitting with them or you're taking
them off, because sitting is someways it's so simple, that's
so hard you say, like, oh, I'm glad you're talking
to me about this, or tell me more, or that

(01:01:50):
I mean or that sounds really hard, like to feel
that way right, or oh like well when does that
come up for you recently? I want to learn more
about out it Like it's just yeah, you're literally sitting
on that bench, and that's that's what people want. And
I actually think that's what resilience building is because then
you're child. The next time they feel that they have

(01:02:13):
literally encoded your support around them, they're less alone. And
I always think you can't take away the hard, but
we can always take away the alone. And every time
we fix it, ironically, the next time a kid feels
that way, all they remember is being alone on the bench.
They don't remember our solution because they just wanted someone
present there. So yes, all of us can be me too,
can be a little bit better at bench sitting. I

(01:02:35):
wonder why I'm so bad at it. I wonder if
I have a hard time dealing with my own sadness
and my own bad feelings about myself, and you make
yourself off well, which can go back to intergenerational patterns
like well, okay, if that's hard for me to sit
and feelings, and again, problem solving can be super I'm

(01:02:56):
like that too. I'm quick to action and that can
work for us, but sometimes sometimes not. And so yes,
if people had a hard time sitting on our benches
with us, we have a hard time sitting on our
own we see in our kid we have a hard
time sitting with them until we make some small shifts
and then end up making really powerful intergenerational change as
a result. Well, I can see why you're called the

(01:03:18):
parent whisperer whatever people call you. I don't know who
actually called me that people call me that somebody does,
but Dr Becky Kennedy. The book is called Good Inside,
a guide to becoming the parent you want to be,
And also I would add the person you want to be,
because these are skills that you can use every day

(01:03:39):
with all the important people in your life. I completely agree.
Thank you, It's been such a treat to talk to
you hope it's not the last time. Next Question with
Katie Kurik is a production of My Heart Media and
Katie Kurik Media. The executive producers are Me, Katie Curic,

(01:04:00):
and Courtney Litz. The supervising producer is Lauren Hansen. Associate
producers Derek Clements and Adriana Fasio. The show is edited
and mixed by Derrek Clements. For more information about today's episode,
or to sign up for my morning newsletter, wake Up Call,
go to Katie Currek dot com. You can also find
me at Katie Curreic on Instagram and all my social

(01:04:22):
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