June 23, 2025 • 14 mins
“It’s really hard to be happier than your unhappiest child.”
When one child is battling mental health challenges, the whole family feels the weight. In this heartfelt episode, Justin and Kylie answer a powerful question from a mum of four: How do I help my younger kids cope as their older brother struggles with depression?
This episode is a must-listen for families navigating the emotional ripple effects of mental health struggles. With deep compassion and practical insight, the Coulsons explore how parents can support siblings through confusion, grief, and change—without losing themselves in the process.
KEY POINTS:
- Acknowledge the Grief: Siblings often feel like they’ve “lost” their brother—even though he’s still physically there.
- Challenge Unhelpful Stories: Gently correct thoughts like “It’s my fault” or “He doesn’t love me anymore.”
- Explain Simply & Honestly: Offer age-appropriate explanations without going into detail or glossing over pain.
- Give Permission to Feel Joy: Let siblings know they don’t have to walk on eggshells or suppress happiness.
- Empower Them to Help: Involve siblings in small, non-burdensome acts of kindness to build connection and hope.
- Reinforce Connection: Help your struggling child feel included without pressure or guilt.
QUOTE OF THE EPISODE:
“No matter how angry you are, no matter how sad you are, our love for you is bigger than what you're feeling right now.”
RESOURCES MENTIONED:
- HappyFamilies.com.au – for parenting support and podcast submissions.
ACTION STEPS FOR PARENTS:
- Talk About It: Start a family conversation that names the reality and reassures: “This isn’t about you. This is something your brother is going through. And we’re in it together.”
- Model Calm Love: Your children are watching how you respond. Demonstrating patience and compassion teaches them resilience and loyalty.
- Create Joyful Moments: Take siblings out of the house for fun, connection, and relief from emotional tension.
- Invite Micro-Acts of Connection: Encourage simple, no-pressure gestures like watching a movie together or sharing a meme.
- Build Your Village: As a parent, find someone to support you—you don’t have to carry this alone.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Today on the Happy Families Podcast, what do you do
when you have a child experiencing all kinds of mental
health challenges and there are other kids around who are
being affected potentially in negative ways. Gooday, Welcome to the
Happy Families Podcast, Real Parenting Solutions every day. It's Australia's
most downloaded parenting podcast. We are Justin and Kylie Coulson,
(00:26):
and every Tuesday on the Happy Families Podcast, we answer
your tricky questions. Tricky questions about family, about discipline, about wellbeing,
mental health, relationships, screens, whatever it is. You can literally
ask us anything. We are up for the chat. We
think that we can be helpful if you'd like to
submit a tricky question. We have a really super simple
(00:47):
system at Happy families dot com dot you. You just
scroll down to where it says podcasts, click the record
button and start talking just like Kate.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Hi, my name is Kate. We have four children. The
oldest is eighteen. He's struggling with depression and hopelessness. He
has been an incredible kid for all of his life,
but he's really struggling right now. My question is really,
how do we as parents help our other children who
(01:21):
are aged fifteen thirteen and ten to cope with this
change in our eldest child, and as they try to
navigate his temperamental changes, his mood. He's just a different
(01:41):
kid now, and they miss their old brother, they miss
how we used to be, and it's really tricky to
navigate this for them and with them. I would love
any insight. We're trying all we can to help him
through this. In the meantime, we really don't even know
(02:02):
how to help you, Tiplings.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
I don't know about you, Kylie, but I'm almost crying
listening to Kate as she goes through what must be
one of the hardest things that a parent can ever
go through, and that is seeing a child's suffer. I
remember being asked in a Q and A once what's
the hardest part about being a parent, and I said,
it's seeing your children suffer. It's the hardest thing. And
I really appreciate that Kate's asking about the kids. This
(02:27):
is the selflessness of a mother, right, asking about the kids.
But you can hear this is hard for Kate. This
is so hard.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
You've really touched on the idea that as a mum,
everybody else's emotions are put first, right she's worried about
her eighteen year old, she's worried about her kids, and
yet you can just oh, you can hear it. Yeah,
there is so much weight Kate carries right now.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
I was going to say this later in the podcast,
as I was putting together some thoughts, I was just
going to say, as parents, it's really hard to be
happier than your unhappiest child, and you can hear it
in what Kate said. Okate, first of all, I just
want to acknowledge how incredibly, incredibly, incredibly hard this is.
You're watching your firstborn absolutely clearly struggle, and you're simultaneously
(03:11):
trying to protect and support three other kids who are
no doubt confused and hurting as well. And the fact
that you're thinking of all four of your kids in
this moment just shows what a thoughtful parent you are
and the sacrifice that the parents make for their kids
all the time. Even as I heard you describing siblings
missing their older brother, I'm hearing a mum missing her
(03:32):
older son. That's actually what I'm hearing as well. It's
so real. It's so painful when depression changes someone we love.
The entire family grieves your younger kids are experiencing a
real loss. I mean, this is a substantive loss. They've
lost the connection, they've lost the sense of family and
wholeness that they're used to feeling, even though their brother's
(03:53):
still physically there. So we're going to talk about what
you can do to help them through this while still
supporting your eighteen year old. I've got three things that
I want to emphasize, although we could probably put together
a list of ten or twenty things if we had
the time for it. The first thing is just what
your kids need to understand, setting a foundation mentally for
the kids. The mind is an incredible storyteller, and it
(04:15):
tells helpful stories and unhelpful stories. Some of the unhelpful
stories for younger children might be this is what happens
when you get old. You get sad, life gets harder,
and things are horrible. That's an unhelpful story. Well, this
is my fault is exact. What a wonderful example that is. Yeah,
these unhelpful stories clearly don't do any good for anybody's
(04:38):
well being, and they're not in the direction that we
need to travel. They might be coming up with other
stories that are scarier than reality. They might think that,
like Kyli said, it's therefore they did something wrong. They
might think that their brother doesn't love them anymore. They
might think that something terrible is going to happen, either
to their brother or to the family. Yeah, and so
our job is to there's this thing called toxic positive.
(05:00):
Our job is not to become toxically positive and say no,
everything's fine and we're going to put on a brave
face and pretend like nothing's happening. That's not helpful. But
what we can do is we can validate their feelings
and then gently redirect them to examples of positivity and
success and support in their lives.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
I think at this point in the narrative, it's really
important that we actually acknowledge what's going on for the kids,
whether it's dealing with emotional outbursts or mood shifts in
their older brother, or whether it's the fact that as
a parent today I'm not managing well as a result
(05:39):
of what's going on. We don't need to go into
huge detail, but our children need to know that there's
an explanation to what they're feeling.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Right, I was going to go down a similar I
guess a parallel track and say that we want to
validate how they're feeling, but we don't have to over
explain everything. So I was going to say, if your
ten year old says, why is he always in his
room or in such a bad mood, you can just
say something like, well, sometimes when people feel really sad
or worried on the inside, they need some quiet time
to feel better. So we're we're not making excuses, We're
(06:14):
just giving a gentle explanation. We're validating how a child feels.
You can say to your child, it's okay to miss
how things used to be. That makes total sense, and
one day we hope that things are going to be
back to normal again.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
I guess where I was going with this is just
there's an overarching conversation that I would be having with
my kids to acknowledge that right now, your big brother's
really struggling. There's going to be lots of emotions and
lots of feelings around it, and mommy and daddy are
here to talk to you about those things. But just
understand this isn't about you. This is about your big
(06:48):
brother and what he's going through.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, yeah, I think that's what they actually need the most.
Now that you've clarified that and added some more to it,
it's not your fault. Our family is going to be okay,
loving people through difficult times. What families do, I guess
I probably even overstep before. You don't want to. You
don't want to overpromise and say, yeah, he'll be fine soon.
You don't want to say that we're going to go
back to exactly how things were, but you do want
(07:11):
to focus on building hope and building strength in the family.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
So I really just want to add something there. I
think about the experiences that we've had in our home
and the challenges that we've gone through with some of
our children, and I actually think that the most important
thing that we can do as a parent is to
show our younger children that we can love their older
(07:36):
brother in spite of his actions, in spite of his outburst,
in spite of everything. They're watching us, they're watching out
every move. The way we choose to respond to the
child who is struggling the most sends the biggest message
to them than anything else. It's actually not the bad
behavior of the struggling child, it's how we choose to
(07:58):
respond that gives them a sense of safety, security, and hope.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Yeah, I was going to add one of my favorite
lines is no matter how angry you are, no matter
how sad you are, no matter how whatever you are,
our love for you is bigger than what you're feeling
right now. It's just such a profoundly impactful line. Second
thing that I think we need to emphasize is that
our kids need to know that they're allowed to be normal. Okay,
sometimes it feels like they're going to have to walk
on eggshells. One person being depressed, one person being angry,
(08:26):
one person being stressed can shift the climate across the
entire family. Emotions are contagious. We talk about this all
the time on the pod, But your younger kids shouldn't
have to suppress their joy or tiptoe around on eggshells
because they've got a big brother who's having a rough time.
It's really important that we teach them to be considerate.
That matters, but they shouldn't have to be a slave
(08:49):
to it.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
So this is a little bit tricky because often we've
experienced in our home that the joy of other people
is actually a trigger for the person who's struggling the.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Most gravating for the person who's cranky and.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
It really grates them, whether it's just the added noise
or the extra chaos in the house or whatever. And
so I think that it is really important that we
support our younger children as they have their joyful moments.
And sometimes that may mean removing them from the house.
It might be just the backyard, it might be down
to the park, it might be to go to a
friend's place. But they should be able to have those
(09:25):
you know, beautiful positive emotions.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
They've got to have their own individual life. Yeah, yep.
So if they're having a day where they're having some
big emotions and things, I just think create some boundaries.
Your brother's having a really hard day today, let's be
extra gentle, or let's do that outside, or let's go
to the park, or let's go to a friend's house.
That's the way to do it. Otherwise everyone's walking on
eggshells all the time. After the break, one more big
thing that will make a huge difference when you've got
(09:48):
kids who are struggling. And a bonus tip on how
to support an eighteen year old through these challenges. Okay,
you've got an eighteen year old who's not doing well.
Depression anxiety, big angry outbursts. The younger kids are struggling.
(10:08):
What do you need to do? So far, we've talked
about how the kids need to understand what's going on,
We need to give them permission to be normal. The
third and final thing that I really wanted to touch
on in this podcast episode today is that it can
be really beneficial to get them on site and give
them appropriate ways to help. So often younger children are
going to look at their big brother going through this
(10:29):
struggle and say, I'm powerless. I see somebody that I love,
they're struggling. I don't know what to do, and every
time I do anything, I get in trouble for doing
the wrong thing. So I reckon if we can find
ways that they can serve, find ways that they can
contribute in the home, hopefully not building resentment but actually
building relationships, we'll get somewhere. A couple of examples, the
(10:50):
fifteen year old might send funny memes, or the thirteen
year old might say, Hey, I'm watching a movie, do
you want to come and watch it with me? No
pressure if he says no. The ten year old might
invite him to play a game every now and again,
and go for a walk with him and the dog.
The key message really around this is you can't fix
your brother, and that's not what our objective is here.
(11:11):
But we can show love in small ways, and that's
kind of where I'm aiming with this. They're not responsible
for cheering him up, they're not responsible for checking on
his mood. They're not even responsible for, I don't know,
telling you what they're observing. They're just responsible for finding
ways that they can integrate joy into the family through service.
(11:32):
I think that that's a reasonable thing to say. Let's
just try and make a difference here. The last thing
that I want to mention Kylie, just briefly, is that
when you've got an eighteen year old going through this,
there's a couple of things that he needs to hear,
and I just we've got to emphasize the importance of connection.
Here's what he needs to hear. Your siblings are asking
about you because they love you. They're not judging you.
You don't have to perform being okay for them. You
(11:55):
don't have to carry good about how this affects our family.
What we do want to see, though, is a willingness
on your part to work with our family so that
we can feel good from time to time. And the
reason for that is avoidance reinforces anxiety. Action reduces anxiety.
So if you can make some small connections, whether it's
joining you for family dinner and participating in the conversation,
(12:16):
whether it's watching a movie together once a week, whether
it's going on that outing and having that picnic at
the park bench, avoidance reinforces anxiety. Action reduces anxiety. So
that's what we've got for you today, Kate. We know
you're literally navigating one of the hardest parts of parenting
because you've got multiple kids with different needs, and it
(12:36):
feels like it's a family crisis. It probably I shouldn't
say it feels like it sounds like it really is
a family crisis. Bottom line is this, Your kids are
learning how families can support each other through difficult times.
If you have these conversations with them, they're watching you
show up for their brother. They're seeing you still caring
for them, and I think that's a really powerful lesson
about love and loyalty. So be patient with the process.
(13:02):
Healing is not something that is linear. It's up and
down all the time, and family adjustment takes time. I
think you're doing better than you probably think you're doing yourself.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
And if I can just add one little cave it, Yeah, Kate,
find someone to talk to. You don't have to suffer
through this alone. And you and your husband will be
carrying the weight of this in such a profound way.
And if you're going to be able to show up
for your other kids, it's going to require a village.
(13:35):
So whatever that village is, whether it needs to be
professional or whether it's just a close friend that you
can just have some downtime and share your heartache because
you're so often, you know, kind of putting on a
big brave face for everybody else. I think it's really important.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
We really love you. Tricky questions. Thanks for submitting that one, Kate.
If you have a tricky question, you can send it
to us at podcasts at happy families dot com dot
you just record a void and shoot that through, or
visit happy families dot com dot you scroll down to
the podcast section and press the button that says record
so that you can talk to us. The Happy Families
podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. Mim
(14:13):
Hammonds provides research and a host of other support. If
you'd like more information and resources about making your family happier,
visit happy families dot com, dot a
Today on the Happy Families Podcast, what do you do
when you have a child experiencing all kinds of mental
health challenges and there are other kids around who are
being affected potentially in negative ways. Gooday, Welcome to the
Happy Families Podcast, Real Parenting Solutions every day. It's Australia's
most downloaded parenting podcast. We are Justin and Kylie Coulson,
(00:26):
and every Tuesday on the Happy Families Podcast, we answer
your tricky questions. Tricky questions about family, about discipline, about wellbeing,
mental health, relationships, screens, whatever it is. You can literally
ask us anything. We are up for the chat. We
think that we can be helpful if you'd like to
submit a tricky question. We have a really super simple
(00:47):
system at Happy families dot com dot you. You just
scroll down to where it says podcasts, click the record
button and start talking just like Kate.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
Hi, my name is Kate. We have four children. The
oldest is eighteen. He's struggling with depression and hopelessness. He
has been an incredible kid for all of his life,
but he's really struggling right now. My question is really,
how do we as parents help our other children who
(01:21):
are aged fifteen thirteen and ten to cope with this
change in our eldest child, and as they try to
navigate his temperamental changes, his mood. He's just a different
(01:41):
kid now, and they miss their old brother, they miss
how we used to be, and it's really tricky to
navigate this for them and with them. I would love
any insight. We're trying all we can to help him
through this. In the meantime, we really don't even know
(02:02):
how to help you, Tiplings.
Speaker 1 (02:04):
I don't know about you, Kylie, but I'm almost crying
listening to Kate as she goes through what must be
one of the hardest things that a parent can ever
go through, and that is seeing a child's suffer. I
remember being asked in a Q and A once what's
the hardest part about being a parent, and I said,
it's seeing your children suffer. It's the hardest thing. And
I really appreciate that Kate's asking about the kids. This
(02:27):
is the selflessness of a mother, right, asking about the kids.
But you can hear this is hard for Kate. This
is so hard.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
You've really touched on the idea that as a mum,
everybody else's emotions are put first, right she's worried about
her eighteen year old, she's worried about her kids, and
yet you can just oh, you can hear it. Yeah,
there is so much weight Kate carries right now.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
I was going to say this later in the podcast,
as I was putting together some thoughts, I was just
going to say, as parents, it's really hard to be
happier than your unhappiest child, and you can hear it
in what Kate said. Okate, first of all, I just
want to acknowledge how incredibly, incredibly, incredibly hard this is.
You're watching your firstborn absolutely clearly struggle, and you're simultaneously
(03:11):
trying to protect and support three other kids who are
no doubt confused and hurting as well. And the fact
that you're thinking of all four of your kids in
this moment just shows what a thoughtful parent you are
and the sacrifice that the parents make for their kids
all the time. Even as I heard you describing siblings
missing their older brother, I'm hearing a mum missing her
(03:32):
older son. That's actually what I'm hearing as well. It's
so real. It's so painful when depression changes someone we love.
The entire family grieves your younger kids are experiencing a
real loss. I mean, this is a substantive loss. They've
lost the connection, they've lost the sense of family and
wholeness that they're used to feeling, even though their brother's
(03:53):
still physically there. So we're going to talk about what
you can do to help them through this while still
supporting your eighteen year old. I've got three things that
I want to emphasize, although we could probably put together
a list of ten or twenty things if we had
the time for it. The first thing is just what
your kids need to understand, setting a foundation mentally for
the kids. The mind is an incredible storyteller, and it
(04:15):
tells helpful stories and unhelpful stories. Some of the unhelpful
stories for younger children might be this is what happens
when you get old. You get sad, life gets harder,
and things are horrible. That's an unhelpful story. Well, this
is my fault is exact. What a wonderful example that is. Yeah,
these unhelpful stories clearly don't do any good for anybody's
(04:38):
well being, and they're not in the direction that we
need to travel. They might be coming up with other
stories that are scarier than reality. They might think that,
like Kyli said, it's therefore they did something wrong. They
might think that their brother doesn't love them anymore. They
might think that something terrible is going to happen, either
to their brother or to the family. Yeah, and so
our job is to there's this thing called toxic positive.
(05:00):
Our job is not to become toxically positive and say no,
everything's fine and we're going to put on a brave
face and pretend like nothing's happening. That's not helpful. But
what we can do is we can validate their feelings
and then gently redirect them to examples of positivity and
success and support in their lives.
Speaker 3 (05:19):
I think at this point in the narrative, it's really
important that we actually acknowledge what's going on for the kids,
whether it's dealing with emotional outbursts or mood shifts in
their older brother, or whether it's the fact that as
a parent today I'm not managing well as a result
(05:39):
of what's going on. We don't need to go into
huge detail, but our children need to know that there's
an explanation to what they're feeling.
Speaker 1 (05:49):
Right, I was going to go down a similar I
guess a parallel track and say that we want to
validate how they're feeling, but we don't have to over
explain everything. So I was going to say, if your
ten year old says, why is he always in his
room or in such a bad mood, you can just
say something like, well, sometimes when people feel really sad
or worried on the inside, they need some quiet time
to feel better. So we're we're not making excuses, We're
(06:14):
just giving a gentle explanation. We're validating how a child feels.
You can say to your child, it's okay to miss
how things used to be. That makes total sense, and
one day we hope that things are going to be
back to normal again.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
I guess where I was going with this is just
there's an overarching conversation that I would be having with
my kids to acknowledge that right now, your big brother's
really struggling. There's going to be lots of emotions and
lots of feelings around it, and mommy and daddy are
here to talk to you about those things. But just
understand this isn't about you. This is about your big
(06:48):
brother and what he's going through.
Speaker 1 (06:50):
Yeah, yeah, I think that's what they actually need the most.
Now that you've clarified that and added some more to it,
it's not your fault. Our family is going to be okay,
loving people through difficult times. What families do, I guess
I probably even overstep before. You don't want to. You
don't want to overpromise and say, yeah, he'll be fine soon.
You don't want to say that we're going to go
back to exactly how things were, but you do want
(07:11):
to focus on building hope and building strength in the family.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
So I really just want to add something there. I
think about the experiences that we've had in our home
and the challenges that we've gone through with some of
our children, and I actually think that the most important
thing that we can do as a parent is to
show our younger children that we can love their older
(07:36):
brother in spite of his actions, in spite of his outburst,
in spite of everything. They're watching us, they're watching out
every move. The way we choose to respond to the
child who is struggling the most sends the biggest message
to them than anything else. It's actually not the bad
behavior of the struggling child, it's how we choose to
(07:58):
respond that gives them a sense of safety, security, and hope.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
Yeah, I was going to add one of my favorite
lines is no matter how angry you are, no matter
how sad you are, no matter how whatever you are,
our love for you is bigger than what you're feeling
right now. It's just such a profoundly impactful line. Second
thing that I think we need to emphasize is that
our kids need to know that they're allowed to be normal. Okay,
sometimes it feels like they're going to have to walk
on eggshells. One person being depressed, one person being angry,
(08:26):
one person being stressed can shift the climate across the
entire family. Emotions are contagious. We talk about this all
the time on the pod, But your younger kids shouldn't
have to suppress their joy or tiptoe around on eggshells
because they've got a big brother who's having a rough time.
It's really important that we teach them to be considerate.
That matters, but they shouldn't have to be a slave
(08:49):
to it.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
So this is a little bit tricky because often we've
experienced in our home that the joy of other people
is actually a trigger for the person who's struggling the.
Speaker 1 (08:59):
Most gravating for the person who's cranky and.
Speaker 3 (09:01):
It really grates them, whether it's just the added noise
or the extra chaos in the house or whatever. And
so I think that it is really important that we
support our younger children as they have their joyful moments.
And sometimes that may mean removing them from the house.
It might be just the backyard, it might be down
to the park, it might be to go to a
friend's place. But they should be able to have those
(09:25):
you know, beautiful positive emotions.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
They've got to have their own individual life. Yeah, yep.
So if they're having a day where they're having some
big emotions and things, I just think create some boundaries.
Your brother's having a really hard day today, let's be
extra gentle, or let's do that outside, or let's go
to the park, or let's go to a friend's house.
That's the way to do it. Otherwise everyone's walking on
eggshells all the time. After the break, one more big
thing that will make a huge difference when you've got
(09:48):
kids who are struggling. And a bonus tip on how
to support an eighteen year old through these challenges. Okay,
you've got an eighteen year old who's not doing well.
Depression anxiety, big angry outbursts. The younger kids are struggling.
(10:08):
What do you need to do? So far, we've talked
about how the kids need to understand what's going on,
We need to give them permission to be normal. The
third and final thing that I really wanted to touch
on in this podcast episode today is that it can
be really beneficial to get them on site and give
them appropriate ways to help. So often younger children are
going to look at their big brother going through this
(10:29):
struggle and say, I'm powerless. I see somebody that I love,
they're struggling. I don't know what to do, and every
time I do anything, I get in trouble for doing
the wrong thing. So I reckon if we can find
ways that they can serve, find ways that they can
contribute in the home, hopefully not building resentment but actually
building relationships, we'll get somewhere. A couple of examples, the
(10:50):
fifteen year old might send funny memes, or the thirteen
year old might say, Hey, I'm watching a movie, do
you want to come and watch it with me? No
pressure if he says no. The ten year old might
invite him to play a game every now and again,
and go for a walk with him and the dog.
The key message really around this is you can't fix
your brother, and that's not what our objective is here.
(11:11):
But we can show love in small ways, and that's
kind of where I'm aiming with this. They're not responsible
for cheering him up, they're not responsible for checking on
his mood. They're not even responsible for, I don't know,
telling you what they're observing. They're just responsible for finding
ways that they can integrate joy into the family through service.
(11:32):
I think that that's a reasonable thing to say. Let's
just try and make a difference here. The last thing
that I want to mention Kylie, just briefly, is that
when you've got an eighteen year old going through this,
there's a couple of things that he needs to hear,
and I just we've got to emphasize the importance of connection.
Here's what he needs to hear. Your siblings are asking
about you because they love you. They're not judging you.
You don't have to perform being okay for them. You
(11:55):
don't have to carry good about how this affects our family.
What we do want to see, though, is a willingness
on your part to work with our family so that
we can feel good from time to time. And the
reason for that is avoidance reinforces anxiety. Action reduces anxiety.
So if you can make some small connections, whether it's
joining you for family dinner and participating in the conversation,
(12:16):
whether it's watching a movie together once a week, whether
it's going on that outing and having that picnic at
the park bench, avoidance reinforces anxiety. Action reduces anxiety. So
that's what we've got for you today, Kate. We know
you're literally navigating one of the hardest parts of parenting
because you've got multiple kids with different needs, and it
(12:36):
feels like it's a family crisis. It probably I shouldn't
say it feels like it sounds like it really is
a family crisis. Bottom line is this, Your kids are
learning how families can support each other through difficult times.
If you have these conversations with them, they're watching you
show up for their brother. They're seeing you still caring
for them, and I think that's a really powerful lesson
about love and loyalty. So be patient with the process.
(13:02):
Healing is not something that is linear. It's up and
down all the time, and family adjustment takes time. I
think you're doing better than you probably think you're doing yourself.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
And if I can just add one little cave it, Yeah, Kate,
find someone to talk to. You don't have to suffer
through this alone. And you and your husband will be
carrying the weight of this in such a profound way.
And if you're going to be able to show up
for your other kids, it's going to require a village.
(13:35):
So whatever that village is, whether it needs to be
professional or whether it's just a close friend that you
can just have some downtime and share your heartache because
you're so often, you know, kind of putting on a
big brave face for everybody else. I think it's really important.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
We really love you. Tricky questions. Thanks for submitting that one, Kate.
If you have a tricky question, you can send it
to us at podcasts at happy families dot com dot
you just record a void and shoot that through, or
visit happy families dot com dot you scroll down to
the podcast section and press the button that says record
so that you can talk to us. The Happy Families
podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from Bridge Media. Mim
(14:13):
Hammonds provides research and a host of other support. If
you'd like more information and resources about making your family happier,
visit happy families dot com, dot a
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