#28 - Dr Naomi Fisher on Parental Burnout - The School Can't Experience

Episode Transcript
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Leisa Reichelt (00:05):
Hello and welcome to the School Can't
Experience podcast.
I'm Leisa Reichelt, and thispodcast is brought to you by the
School Can't Australiacommunity.
Caring for a young person who isstruggling to attend School can
be a stressful and isolatingexperience, but you are not
alone.
Thousands of parents acrossAustralia and many more around
the world face similarchallenges and experiences every

(00:25):
day.
Today I'm joined by TiffanyWestphal from School Can't
Australia, and we are delightedto be speaking with Dr.
Naomi Fisher, who is joining usfor a second guest appearance on
the pod.
Naomi is going to help us deepdive into the topic of parental
burnout, which is no doubt atopic very close to the bone for
many of us.

(00:46):
Well, I have some good news.
We're all about to get at leasttwo or three very practical tips
that all of us can start doingtoday, no matter what our
circumstances.
And no doubt you'll be pleasedto hear it's not breathing
exercises or getting out intonature.
I really hope you enjoy ourconversation with Dr.
Naomi Fisher.
Dr.
Naomi Fisher, thank you so muchfor joining us on our podcast.

(01:09):
We spoke to you last a fewmonths ago.
we're, we're what, two thirds ofthe way through the school year.
and everyone just feels a littlebit like at the end of their
tethers.
Honestly.
and we thought, who can we talkto about understanding burnout
from a parent carer perspective.

(01:29):
And, and you were an obviouschoice.
How do we know Naomi?
if we or someone that we know isexperiencing burnout as opposed
to just being a bit tired andfed up.

Dr Naomi Fisher (01:39):
Yeah.
So burnout.
The first thing to say isburnout isn't really defined as
a medical condition, which Iactually think is a good thing.
Because the way that the WorldHealth Organisation defines
burnout is they call it anoccupational phenomenon.
They basically say this is aresult of being in a chronically

(02:00):
stressful environment for toolong.
And there's nothing wrong withthe body responding that way.
It's basically the body's way ofsaying, stop Enough.
I cannot do this anymore.
And it's a functional response.
And that's why they say it's notmedical.
It's because it doesn't meanthere's any wrong with your
body.
Eliza Fricker did this lovelyillustration for one of our
books where there's a kind ofdemo of people holding up signs

(02:22):
saying, Stop! Enough! Go to bed!It's your body's cutout.
So basically burnout is when ourare in a state of chronic stress
for so long that we cannotanymore bring ourselves back to
a a sort of equilibrium.
So we all experience stress inour lives all the time and that,
you know, sometimes we might bekind of energised by that

(02:45):
stress.
Sometimes we are de-energised bythat stress, but we kind of go
up and down through our livesand that's normal, that's how
humans work.
But when are in a state ofchronic stress for too long, we
get to that point where we can'tbring ourselves back to
equilibrium.
So essentially, we never feelrelaxed So it's not anymore a

question (03:05):
of I need a couple of hours off and then I can breathe
out, or, you know, I'll go tothe spa and I'll feel a bit
better.
I'll have a nice chat with afriend and I'll feel better.
It's like no matter what I do Idon't feel any better Even when
perhaps a miracle happens and aproblem you've been worrying
about for a while gets resolved.
You know, maybe your child findsa educational setting they're

(03:27):
really happy at and you're like,my goodness, you don't relax.
It doesn't feel any different.
And it's that kind of state ofjust chronic I can't ever switch
off.
Which is your real red flag forthis is burnout.
Or heading into burnout.
Does that sound familiar?
Sorry, that's putting you on thespot there.

No, Of course it does.
I think the thing, it feelsdoubly familiar because a lot of
us have seen this in ourchildren.
So we've said, okay, that schoolneeds to stop, you know, for a
short time or a long time orwhatever the case may be.
And so we take them out ofschool and that stops, but that
doesn't stop it for us.

Tiffany Westphal (she/her) (04:07):
stop being a parent, can you?
And often our children arereally dependent on us for their
regulation needs, aren't they?

Yes.

When I took my son out of school and brought
him home, just recently, Irealized that actually before I
would worry about school, withinschool hours mostly.
When it was out of school hours,I didn't have to worry about him
not being at school, but nowhe's home educating.
I kind of feel I have to worry24 7 about what I'm doing and
not doing all that kind ofthing.

(04:36):
So it's like It's maybe lessacute, but it's very sort of
chronic.

Yes.
I absolutely know what you'retalking about.
Its a whole new set of worriesthat come in too, isn't it?
And also actually, just to bringit back to the children, if
they're really in burnout, thenwhen they come out of school,
there isn't always the kind ofrelief and bounce back that you
are hoping for.
So there can be more worry forthe parent because you're like,
I've made this major decision,which everybody thinks is a bad

(05:03):
idea.
Everybody's telling me is thewrong thing to do, but I feel
very strongly it's the onlyoption we've got.
And yet they're still reallyunhappy and they still don't
wanna leave the house andthey're still not coming out of
their bedrooms.
And also people often talk aboutregression.
They're like, you know, well, atleast when they were going to
school, sometimes they wereputting on a uniform, sometimes

(05:25):
they were getting out of thehouse.
Sometimes, you know, there was akind of routine to life, whether
they went or not.
And now we've stopped thatroutine.
And what is there instead?
And people sometimes, if they'regonna home educate, they have
this idea.
I met one family who are like,you know, took the child out of
school.
School ended on a Friday.
By Monday they had three tutorsbooked in.

(05:46):
They had classes that they weregoing to go to.
You know, they had this ideathey could seamlessly move into
what they thought of as idealhome education.
And of course what happened wasthe child was just like, no, I
can't do this.
There's absolutely no way that Ican go and have this, join this
class and do this, and all thiskind of thing.

(06:07):
And then the parents panic.
Because its like, well, what arewe doing?
We've taken'em out of school andwe're doing nothing.
We are actually doing nothing.
And I think, yeah, as you say, Ithink it's very, very high
anxiety for parents.
It's a massive responsibility,isn't it?
To have taken on, particularlyif everybody has told you not to
do it, which generally they willhave done.

(06:27):
That it's the wrong decision.
So you've taken on this hugedecision, you've got this huge
responsibility, and you don'tsee any results.
And I think that's one of thereasons that parents are so
susceptible to burnout is it's amarathon, not a sprint.
There very few things inparenting where you get an
immediate payoff, particularlyif your child is one who finds

(06:49):
life difficult, who finds schooldifficult.
So, you know, we kind of needthose moments of, I've worked
really hard for this and look,here are the results.
And you don't get that.
Because you don't get that.
there's never a payoff, isthere?
There's never a moment.
And I think parents,particularly in our culture at
the moment, where there's anenormous amount of comparison.

(07:11):
We've got these social mediaplatforms which are designed for
comparison.
People are posting pictures oftheir family and their
achievements all the time.
I remember when I was young,people used to send round
Christmas letters, the kind ofachievement letters.
We used to hate them.
my siblings and I would be like,aarrghhh, don't send something
like that out about us.
But now it's just all onFacebook.

(07:31):
So at least then it was just atChristmas.
But now every time you open upyour Facebook feed or your
Instagram feed, there arepictures of children doing
amazing things or gettingawards.
And if you are always thinking,and we are not, we are not, and
what's that going to mean forus, then that's gonna put you in
a state of chronic stress.
Because you are constantlyfeeling like you're lacking.

It is funny, I was talking my mum on the phone
the other day and she wastelling me about, a friend of
hers who is the grandfather ofsomebody who I follow on
Facebook.
And if you base what you knowabout that family on Facebook,
you're like, these kids, allthey're ever doing is outdoors,
sporting, and winning all themedals.
And their grandfather's going,'you know, those kids, they're

(08:14):
never off screens.
I dunno what's gonna become ofthem'.

That's interesting.
bet you they don't post thepictures of that, do they?

I have not seen a picture of the kids on
screens.

No, no.

No, no, no.
It is funny, isn't it?

We present this view well many people present
this view to the rest of theworld of what they think
parenting should be.

Yeah.
Naomi, what are some of themajor things that you are seeing
are contributing to carerburnout?

Well, I think it's often this feeling of being
in perpetual crisis.
So it's this feeling thatthere's always something going
on which you have to worryabout.
And particularly if your childhas been through years of school
not going well, then you oftenwill have been on this kind of
rollercoaster of, well, we'lljust try this.
Let's just give this a go.

(09:04):
And it's almost like you take adeep breath in, you cross all
your fingers and toes, you hopeit's gonna work out, it doesn't
work out, and then it's anotherone.
So you're kind of in thisperpetual state of adrenaline,
basically this perpetual stateof emergency response.
Gotta marshal my resources forthis big push.
But then it's just another bigpush and another big push.

(09:25):
So I hear a lot about that.

Tiffany Westphal (she/her (09:27):
Yeah, or something goes for a while
and stops.
That sort of unpredictability,that kind of holding one's
breath.
How long is this gonna last,until the next...

Yes.
absolutely.
that's part of therollercoaster, isn't it It's
that, oh my goodness, it seemsto be working well.
There's a honeymoon period.
Oh no, here we are back again.
I think that's a reallydestructive cycle for us as
parents to go through becausecontributes to this feeling, we
can never relax.
We can never stop.
We can never not worry becauseit always might go wrong.

(09:58):
The other things I hear about alot are other people.
So I hear a lot about thejudgment of other people.
The perceived kind ofostracization, it's not quite
the right word, but it's it'snot, I don't think it's
necessarily conscious on thepart of other parents, but it's
just this feeling of we are inthis different place, which
nobody really recognises.

(10:20):
We don't have the same things totalk about.
And when we talk to otherparents, the things that they
talk about just don't connect.
And so the social networks breakdown really quickly.

We notice when people come into
School Can't Australia, thefirst thing is that sense of
finally connecting with peoplewho get it, who understand.
And just that sense of relief atfinally finding people who
understand and who it's safe totalk about these things with.

Yeah.

safety's a really good point, isn't it?
We were talking to a dad theother day and he was just
saying, every time someone saysto me,'what's your kid doing
about maths at home?' They'resaying it out of interest, but
he's just like, I just die ofshame, because I know how
they're gonna judge.

Absolutely.
So everything becomes a possiblethreat, doesn't it?
Just a, chance meeting in thepark can become a source of
threat because you are waitingfor those questions like, here
it's always'What about GCSEs?'GCSEs are the exams that our
young people take at age 16.
And even if you take your6-year-old out of school, people

(11:24):
will start asking you aboutGCSEs.
Don't know why.
It seems like a national worryabout what would happen if they
don't do GCSEs.
Oh my goodness.
But yeah, the gap between thereality, which might be a child
who has really, really struggledfor a long time and maybe
spending all their time on adevice at home and the

(11:45):
expectation of those around you,which is that if you're home
educating that you're sittingthem down in the morning and
you're doing your maths work andyou're doing your English, and
you're doing all the things youwould be doing at school.
So I think there's that gap,which really leads to social
isolation.
So the three factors that theWorld Health Organization sort
of, outlines as this main signsof burnout are, exhaustion and

(12:08):
low energy, feeling ofnegativity about everything, and
a sense that you can't beproductive in things that
nothing does anything.
So a sort of sense ofinefficacy, like whatever I do,
it doesn't make a difference.
I think this sense of I can't beproductive, I can never be
productive.
You can really see how thatcomes about for parents, can't

(12:30):
you?
Because part of parenting is youtry so hard, you know, the
analogy I often use with parentsis, you know, you can put an
amazing amount of effort intocooking the perfect meal for
your child and then your childwill say, couldn't you just make
me chicken nuggets?
You know.
There's no relative payoff forthe amount of effort you put in

(12:51):
and the results that you mightget.
In fact, it's almost theopposite way round.

And the very little positive feedback.
Nobody says to you, gee, you'redoing a good job of being my
mum.

No, no.
And you or Or other people saythat as well.
And actually when other peopledo say that, such an amazing
moment.
If your child isn't getting theplaudits, and the awards and the
achievements, then it's veryrare for somebody else to say,
wow, you are doing a reallygreat job.
When my children were verysmall, I took them on a train

(13:24):
journey once and it was a reallydifficult train journey.
I think my son was about threeand my daughter was a baby in
the sling.
It was just me on my own and Ibasically worked that whole
train journey to keep my son andto keep my daughter not crying.
And at the end of the trainjourney, an older woman came up
to me and she patted me andsaid, you are doing a fabulous
job.
And even now remembering it,this is like 14 years ago, still

(13:46):
kind of makes me feel choked upa bit because it was just an
amazing moment.
I almost just bawled that shehad recognized how hard I had
been working on that railwayjourney.
The sort of irony of parentingor the paradox of parenting is
that when it all goes well, yourwork's completely invisible.
And generally people don'trecognize it.

(14:08):
It's rare for somebody to noticethat invisible work that you're
doing.

Yeah, it's interesting that you say that,
Naomi, I had to quit my job tostay home and look after my son,
and a lot of people who I usedto work with they would say, oh,
your son's so lucky to have you.
You know, he is so fortunate tohave you as his mum.
And I cannot hear that.
As soon as they say, that kindof bounces off me because I also

(14:33):
think, well, it's'cause I hadthat job that maybe we're in the
situation that we're in.
And like it's just like blame,blame, blame, guilt, guilt,
guilt.
So I don't get any nourishmentfrom that at all.
I imagine heaps of other peopleare in a similar situation.

I absolutely hear you.
And actually that's somethingelse I wanted to talk about with
relation to parent burnout,which is that thing I start with
when I'm working with a parentwho I think is in burnout or
about to go into burnout, istheir own inner voice.
Their own self-criticism becauseit's pretty well ubiquitous.
I've found that with parentswhose child has gone through a

(15:07):
hard time or is going through ahard time, we blame ourselves
and we criticize ourselves andwe say, if only I had done this,
or if only I had, you know,stayed at home with them when
they were smaller or put theminto nursery earlier so they got
more used to other people or,did more maths with them earlier
so they were ready for school,did less maths with them so that
they weren't sort of already,there were infinite

(15:28):
opportunities to beat yourselfup in parenting.
Really, whatever you do, there'san opportunity to beat yourself
up.
And I think women particularlyare very good at this and this
inner voice means that you cannever get the payoff.
Because it's always, oh, wellyou just don't know the terrible

(15:49):
other things I've done, or youjust don't know how badly these
things are going.
And we do that to ourselves aswell.
It's very hard to feel, forexample, pleased with ourselves
for decisions that we've madewhen we've got that kind of
weight of anxiety about it.
So one of the things I'll oftensay to parents is, you took your

(16:09):
child out of school because yousaw that this was really not
working for them.
That is a really brave decision.
Well done.
How did you do that?
What enabled you to make thatdecision?
Seeing your child and being soresponsive to their needs,
despite all these other peoplesaying, oh, you don't wanna do
that, you'll ruin their lives.

(16:31):
You know, people have literallysaid that they, a one woman
said, her daughter was autisticand they had a pediatrician who
they saw, and she talked to thepediatrician and said, you know,
I'm thinking about taking herout of school.
And the pediatrician said, ifyou do that, you'll ruin your
own life and hers.
So unhelpful.
And also, a pediatrician doesn'tactually know anything about

(16:52):
Home Education beyond whatanybody else would know about
Home Education.
But because they're a doctor,its got an extra weight and an
extra gravitas, even though theydon't know anything about it.

Naomi, I have to say my inner voice is very good
at responding to yourencouraging note from before,
and I can tell you all thereasons why I shouldn't feel
good about that.
What do we do when we've gotsuch a well developed inner
voice of guilt and blame onourselves?
How do you start to unpick that?
Because this feels like reallypractical advice.

(17:25):
Easier than go out and have yogasessions every night or all the
other things Yeah.
How do we do this?

So I think the first thing is to recognize it
as an inner voice and not astruth.
Because actually, that's quite abig difference.
You know, if you believe yourinner voice, if you think that
it's right, then you are what wecall enmeshed with it.
You can't do anything about it.
It's just you.
Whereas if you are able to kindof cultivate what we call an
observer mentality, so you'reable to say, there's my inner

(17:53):
voice again, that's thatcritical inner voice again.
I like visual metaphors, so Isometimes think about those
fountains, which my childrenused to love and they were
small, you know, which just sortof spurt up water from the
ground.
and then the children run andplay in it, and then it spurts
up somewhere else.
And I like that kind ofmetaphor.
I'm like, Ooh, there's anotherone of those inner criticisms.

(18:13):
Oh, there's another one andthere's another one.
So that you are able to just seethem as part of your internal
process rather than somethingwhich you necessarily have to
stop.
So you know those fountains, youcan go and stand on them and you
can push it back for a while.
But actually the longer you dothat for, the bigger the force
gets and the more it's gonnaexplode when you take your foot

(18:33):
off.
And our inner thoughts are a bitlike that as well.
The more you kind of try andengage with them, the more you
try and rationalize yourself outof it, talk yourself out of it.
It can all become quitecounterproductive.
It can basically mean that whenit does come out, it comes out
bigger.

Yeah, it's really hard in the context
of so many of our familiesreport you know, impact on
mental health.
But also impact on physicalhealth.
In that context, they alsoexperience this really negative
sense of themselves as parents.
Their efficacy as parents If itwas just one of those things, I

(19:12):
think it would be easier.

No, it's so difficult and there are so many
different things going on, and Ithink one of the other things
that I suggest to parentssometimes is thinking about the
story that you are telling aboutyour life.
And the story that you tellyourself about your life,
because there are many, manydifferent stories that we tell
ourselves about our lives andsome of them are, I'm a terrible

(19:33):
parent and I've done all thesethings wrong.
And those ones, our brainsselectively attend to that kind
of information.
Our brains have evolved toselectively attend to negative
information and threat becauseour brains wanna keep us alive.
So, we have to deliberately tryand access those other bits of
ourselves, those other stories.

(19:54):
And sometimes I say to parents,how about if you write a story
and it probably not about you,because actually, if it's about
you, that will bring in allkinds of inhibitions.
But how about another parent whomakes the same choices that you
have made and write a story.
It doesn't have to be very longabout their life from a positive
perspective

Tiffany Westphal (she/h (20:15):
Mm-hmm.

Not because that's the only story, not
because you've gotta get thatone right, but just because you
are not making that kind ofconnection.
So for example, there was amother whose child was really
unhappy at school and she triedreally hard to help that child
manage to be happier at school.
She did all these things to tryand make her child happier at
school and none of it wasworking.

(20:35):
And so that mother made thebrave decision to take her child
out of school and everybody saidshe was doing the wrong thing.
So, do you know what I mean?
So actually write thatnarrative, kind of connect up
the dots for yourself.
When I got parents to do this,they sometimes, often they avoid
it initially.
They say, no, no, no, that won'tmake any difference.
I'm not gonna do that.
And I push them a little bit andsometimes we'll actually write

(20:57):
the story together.
And it's usually reallyemotional.
They usually cry.
Really it's, and it's likeyou're kind of accessing all
that repressed emotion that theyhaven't been able to think about
and access And you sort of ableto help people see you from a
different perspective.
And I think that's where thecommunity element is so
important as well, that when youare in the community with other

(21:20):
people going through it, usuallymothers or fathers, but mothers
particularly, are much morecompassionate towards other
mothers than they are towardsthemselves.
So sometimes just being able tothink about the story as another
person can mean that you can tapinto some of that.
Wow.
I have done amazing things here.

I really like applying Ross
Greene's,'Kids do well if theycan' to ourselves and say, you
know, well I did the best that Icould with the knowledge, the
resources, the supports, theadvice that I got.
I was doing the best that Icould and to.
Uh, I often talk to parentsabout self-compassion and just

(22:01):
that permission to have learnedfrom the journey.
And you know, hindsight can be adreadful kill joy because if we
could go back and do things ofcourse we would do them
differently.
You know?
But it's best to focus on thefuture and the hope and the

(22:22):
optimism and just, to live inthat moment, I find.
And to look with compassion onthe past.

You reminded me of something I saw, on Instagram
of a woman who gives her innervoice another name, and her
inner voice will say somethingand she'll be like, not today,
Hilda.
We don't have time for that.

Yeah, Eliza drew an illustration of a little
sort of gremlin on a mother'sshoulder, always saying, oh, you
haven't done that very well,have you?
And someone else would've donethat much better than you.
Um, and that helps too, if youare a visual person, draw it.
being able to do that, createsthat distance, which is only a
small thing to start with, but Ithink is the start of being able

(23:03):
to develop some moreself-compassion.

I think if you combine that with that whole
idea of would you say this to afriend?
if your friend was in the samesituation, would you say these
things to them?
Of course you wouldn't.

No.
Would it be helpful?
would you think it would behelpful to

It's not kind.

like this The other thing actually that I find
can be helpful if in that kindof distancing thing and not
fighting with your inner voice.
'cause the fight with your innervoice gives it more space.
And that's often what peopletalk to me about.
Like, you know, have thesethoughts and I'm like, I wish I
didn't have these thoughtsanymore.
I want'em to go away.
And actually when you do that,you're kind of shining light on
those thoughts.
So one of the tricks that Isometimes use myself and I

(23:41):
suggest other people try isactually just saying, thank you.
We've got brain or Hilda, orwhatever it is.
I know you're trying to keep mesafe.
Thank you, but that's okay.
I got it right now.
So the kind of meeting thatthreat response,'cause the thing
is that when, your brain isgoing to, ah, this is dangerous,
this is a terrible situation.
You need to do somethingdifferently.

(24:01):
And your response is right.
I'll do some deep breathing.
Try to calm down.
Your brain thinks there's anemergency, so it's gonna up the
ante rather than turn it down.
If someone comes running up toyou and says there's a burning
house down there, and you'relike, just take some deep
breaths.
you know, go and have a bath.
it's not gonna calm them down.
They think there's a burninghouse down there.
So you need to kinda say, thankyou for letting me know.

(24:23):
You've passed on theinformation.
I've got it.
Which actually does enable youto breathe out a little bit
more.
But it's not easy.
And it's, it's actually, youknow, I think of it like you're
trying to retrain your brain,basically.
You're trying to help yourselfsee the other ways of seeing
things.
Bring an air of self-compassionto yourself, that's a necessary

(24:45):
first step before you are ableto think about.
And how could I then physicallylook after myself?
You know, we often skip to thephysically look after yourself,
go and get some exercise or goand meet with a friend, all that
kind of thing.
But if you are beating yourselfup because you think you're
doing a terrible job and youthink that you absolutely don't
deserve any time off becauseyou're doing it so badly, you

(25:07):
are not going to be able to dothat.
I mean, quite apart from thephysical difficulties of
organizing that which areconsiderable for lots of
parents, there's a kind ofmental block as well.

Yeah, that's great.
'cause I think that is one ofthe big issues people are like,
oh, well if you wanna get out ofburnout, you have to like.
Go and have a big rest, takesome time off, go do yoga.
No, you can't.

There's one other thing that I think parents
can do, where whatever theirsituation is, which is control
the inputs that are coming intoyou.
So I've talked a bit aboutsocial media and comparisons.
Most parents that I meet willspend quite a lot of time
scrolling on social media,because they're exhausted and
worn out, and the only time theyget are these little envelopes

(25:52):
of time, and they might beinterrupted at any point.
So social media fits into thatperfectly.
The problem with that is that ifyou ask them, they'll say,
actually, I feel worse afterthat than better.
And it's because I've seen allthese things that I'm not doing.
Or sometimes you see a lot ofoutrage, don't you?
I mean, there's all sorts ofthings that you see on social
media.

(26:12):
And so actually saying, right,I'm going to think really
carefully about what I kind ofallow into my space, apart from
my child and my family, where Ihaven't got the same level of
control really.
So when I'm bringing somethingin, I'm gonna think about what
that is.
And it might mean just deciding,you know, this group is
nourishing for me, these arenot, and I'm going to just not

(26:33):
check them.
Or these WhatsApp groups.
Not helpful for me to know whateverybody else in my child's
class is doing.
I'm just not going to check.
I'm going to delete, Whateveryou need to do.
Personally, in my case, I neededto get rid of all of my
notifications.
Because I found notificationsall the time, kept me in this
kind of state of high threat andalert and it was quite hard work

(26:55):
to get rid of everynotification.
Your phone really wants to sendyou notifications all the time.
And it took me, quite a while,but being really deliberate
about it.
And one of the ways to do thatis to think, when you do have a
moment, think about what kind ofthings would I like to be doing
that I might find morenourishing?
And they don't have to be bigthings.
It might be podcasts aboutthings you enjoy, not,

(27:16):
necessarily about parenting.
It might be audio books, itmight be puzzles or crosswords.
Make yourself a list and thenwhen you do have a moment of
time, go to that rather thandoing what almost certainly your
natural inclination will be,which is to go and start
scrolling on social media.
Because that is something youcan control.
You can say, right, I'm just notgonna have these comparisons

(27:38):
right now.
They're not helpful for me.
And I can control more what'scoming in for me.

Fantastic.
That is great advice.
Tiffany, I think you wanted totalk about the systemic impacts
that create burnout in parentsand carers.
Do you wanna talk a little bitabout that?

Yeah, those are much harder things to
think about because you haveless control.
But noticing them, I think andacknowledging that they're
problems, they're stressors, issometimes part of the problem.
We just have this expectationthat that, it won't be difficult
to deal with the school.
How do you manage all the stuffthat's hard and is it okay to

(28:19):
take a break from it?.

Yeah.
There are so many systemicpressures which push people
towards burnout.

The messaging from government too,
about attendance and how, it'scrucial that your child has a
90% attendance rate, or they'redoomed.

No, we have exactly the same messaging.
People send me pictures all thetime of things like, you know,
five minutes a day missed, andyour chances go down in life.
It's like, what?
When you think about thisrationally, it doesn't make any
sense.
And what's it meant to be doing?
It just makes people feelterrible when it's not going
well.

(28:59):
At some point you have to bethinking, is this helpful for
us?
Is this not helpful for us?
So I think it's okay toprioritize.
It's okay to be saying, right,these are the, we have to do
this.
Even if we really don't want to.
And then these ones are notgonna do them right now and
we're gonna kind of take somecontrol and say, sorry, this
isn't possible for us right now.
That's really difficult and Ithink many of us who have

(29:22):
children who aren't suited toschool, it's sometimes the first
time where we've really had tobe the bad, the bad guys are
quite the right word.
I mean, often lots, lots ofpeople I talk to, got through
school by being good, bycomplying, by, playing by the
rules.
And now they've got this childwho isn't playing by the rules.

(29:43):
These implicit rules of, youmust do this, we must go there.
And it's really hard for peoplewho've spent their whole life
being good.
To suddenly not be good anymoreand not to be perceived as good.
to be saying, actually no, wewon't do that.
You've got a kind of peoplepleasing group of people who've
got through life a certain wayand then their child is very

(30:05):
clearly showing that thatstrategy is not gonna work
anymore.
And actually it kind of blowsopen a lot of things about the
system, doesn't it?
It makes you see a lot of thingsabout the system that you didn't
see before.

We find ourselves as a community
questioning so many things thatmany of us have taken for
granted about what's the purposeof education or what is the
nature of discipline andcompliance and coercion and
rewards and consequences andwhere does all of that fit.

(30:38):
And just to question everysingle aspect of parenting and
the meaning of childhood andeducation.
There's labour involved in that,you know.
It's stress to be unpackingthose things that most of the
community takes for granted andto be pushing those things too,
because we have to, or it'sgonna kill our kids.

Yeah.

combine those two things together of all of
that work to understand Andthen, standing up to authority
figures who you spent all yourlife trying to please and trying
to educate them on somethingwhile they are disdainful of
what you're saying.

And that's I think why connections between
parents are so important andparticularly connections with
parents who are maybe at adifferent stage of the journey
to you.
I think there's something sopowerful about parents who've
come out of the other end of theeducation system can look back
and go, you know what, it wasn'ta disaster that we did this.
The book I'm writing at themoment, is for teenagers and

(31:37):
it's called The Teenagers Guideto Taking Control of Your
Education.
It's self-help book and Iinterviewed 17 teenagers for it.
Some of them had never been toschool, but most of them had
been to school a bit and thenhad stopped going they were
between 14 and 19.
One girl said to me, you know,everyone thinks it's such a big
deal not going to school.
It's not such a big deal.

(31:58):
And I think I just wanted tomagnify voices like hers.
'cause I think there's somethingso powerful about hearing that
from a teenager to whom thishappened, been through that
experience.
And it's the same with parents.
There's something so powerfulabout parents who've got older
teenagers or their kids are nowin their twenties and they can

(32:19):
see that life beyond school isthere.
'Cause the one blessing ofschool as an institution is that
you do age out of it.

Yeah.

I often say to teenagers who are really
despondent, It's like, you know,when you get to in our country,
17 or 16, they won't have you atschool even if you want to go,
you know, it's a bizarre systemwhere you have to be there
between these ages, but now onceyou're too old, that's it.
You know, you, they won't letyou back in.
So it is going to end, thispressure.

(32:48):
And there is gonna be a timewhen actually you don't even
have to mention to other peoplethat you didn't go to school if
you don't want to.
You don't have to make that partof your story.
We haven't talked about my storyhere, but I think I talked about
this last time I was on yourpodcast about the years that I
really struggled with school asa teenager.
Now, I have to deliberatelybring it up.

(33:09):
People don't know about it.
And they assume that couldn't bethe case for somebody like me
because I've gone on to achieveand I've got degrees and you
know, but so my kind ofstruggles at school.
They're just like a side notenow.
Whereas at the time they werekind of the center of
everything.
And I think that, that, whyconnections between parents are

(33:32):
so important and finding thosestories from other people.

Asking for a friend, Naomi, if somebody is
feeling burnt out and theirstrategy is, I'm just gonna keep
pushing through this until Idon't need to do it anymore,
How's that gonna work out forus?

Well, that strategy will only really works
if there is actually going to bean end in sight.
And usually for parenting thereisn't one.
But I think that's a trap thatlots of parents get caught in.
I think I talked about that atthe beginning.
This kind of trap, we'll trythis and this will be the
solution.
We'll get this and this will bethe moment that will solve

(34:08):
everything.
And so you put enormous effortinto whatever it is, this new
thing that's going to be theanswer with the kind of idea in
the back of your head that, atsome point I'll be able to stop.
And with parenting, that doesn'tusually happen.
Because there's always somethingelse coming up.
So I think we have to change ourmindset to think like, okay, it

(34:31):
continues to be as hard as it isright now for the next
potentially, 10 years, how can Imake it sustainable for myself?
Because the parents are thelinchpin of all of this.
We know that if we are thepeople making it all happen,
that means that we have to lookafter ourselves because we want

(34:53):
to still be there and be okay todo this in 10 years time.
I try and sort of help parentsthink that actually this is
looking after their child tolook after themselves.
It's not taking time out.
It's maintenance.
Basically it's maintenance work.
You need to maintain your ownmental and physical health so
you can continue to be theexceptional parent that you are

(35:16):
needing to be for your child.
And again, often the way to helppeople think about that is say
if this was your sister or yourfriend would you be thinking
yes, they just need to pushthrough and I'm sure they can do
it.
And, uh, they never, they neverthink that somebody else can do
it.
It's only with ourselves that wehave this idea that we are
different and we can pushthrough under any circumstances.

(35:37):
So my advice would be you can'tthink about it as a time of
short term crisis, which isoften what we get into that kind
of mindset.
This is a short term crisis,just gotta push through this.
it's just life and there's lotsof ups and downs and it's like a
never ending rollercoaster, youneed to work out how to make
that rollercoaster.
I hate rollercoasters by theway, I get sick on them.

(35:59):
But how you, how, how am I gonnamake this sustainable?
We need to make it okay forourselves, even when things are
going wrong, which is verydifficult.
I'm not saying it's easy at all.

Exactly.
I'm in wrapping up mode rightnow.
So Naomi if there's somethingthat you wanted to say that we
haven't covered yet, now is thetime.

No, it's been really nice to talk to you about
it actually.
'cause I think.
We don't spend enough timefocusing on parents and on the
parental journey, we alwaysstart talking about the kids.
It's so easy to go to that.
And I think that's the case whenparents meet up as well.
It's so easy to be talking aboutthe children and so hard, to
talk about our own journeys.

(36:37):
One of the things actually wedidn't talk much about that I
think is really important withparental burnout is shame.
There's so much shame about whatis happening to your child,
what's happening to you, andthat shame is a block for
ourselves for our compassion,but it's also a block towards
being open with other peopleabout how things are.

yeah.
Just a few thoughts about shame.
Shame is so powerful and solimiting.
Sometimes the shame is about thelife that I don't have, that I
think that I should have.
I've had to give permission tomyself to have a messy kitchen.
You know, there's a cleanupright before we're cooking.

(37:16):
That's the way it is at ourplace There's clutter
everywhere.
and I've just had to let go ofsome of those things in order to
still have energy to do all theco-regulation and the connection
and the being there with my kidand having the energy, because

(37:37):
that other stuff is an energydrain too.
I've made that choice to justlet go of that stuff.
But I still carry this sense ofshame that I should have a clean
house, and that I'm being judgedfor it.

And yet you've made such a deliberate, good
decision there.
When my children were younger, Idecided for myself that whenever
there was a choice between thehouse and the children, I would
always choose the children.

I'm choosing me in that moment too,
and saying,

yes.

I don't have energy to do it all,
so what am I gonna do?

You're being realistic about where you think
your energy are best spent.

Yeah.

I think being able to own that to say, my
kitchen, and I'm talking aboutmy kitchen here, not yours,
Tiff, but my kitchen is a state.
I have chosen that because mypriorities are my children and
my emotional wellbeing.
That's different to my kitchenis a state because I'm a

(38:35):
useless,

Yeah.

a useless person, which is often the
narrative that we've got in ourheads.
And I had to work reallyactively for myself to let go of
those.
The state of my house reflectson how worthwhile a person that
I am.
One of the things I used to sayto families when my children
were younger and people wouldsometimes come round, I would
say to them, I'm not gonnaapologize for the state of my

(38:58):
house.
I see the way that my house isas a kind of about what it's
really like home educating inour life right now.
I hope that maybe it might makeyou feel a bit better about the
state of your own house.
People really opened up when Isaid that, people would say, oh,

(39:18):
it's such a relief that yourkitchen floor is sticky But I
think making it a choice andnaming that choice for yourself
is really powerful because thenyou are saying, this is a
decision I have made.
Rather than, this is because I'minadequate, which is what most
of us jump to.

I used to pretend that my house was just
like that because of somethingthat had happened that day or
that week.
I'm really sorry.
It's just been a particularlybusy week.
I've stopped apologizing, but Ilike your idea of going this,
I'm deliberately doing this.
Naomi, you kind of impliedearlier that you do a lot of
work with parents and that mademe think of something else,
which is like parents investingin their own mental health

(40:00):
through therapy.
I went to my GP the other dayand she wrote me a mental health
plan because she could see I wascoming apart a little bit on the
day that I went and saw her.

Lots of people are very nervous about seeing a
psychologist or a therapistbecause they're worried they'll
be told to send their child backto school.
Or that the psychologist willimmediately be like, what?
Your child doesn't go to school?
And actually the judgment andshame will come into the therapy
room.
that is really difficult.
It's hard to invest in your ownmental health, isn't it?
it's not at all easy.
I think therapy has a place andcan be helpful for some people,

(40:31):
but I don't think it's the onlyway to look after your mental
health.
I think even doing somethinginformally, like if you've got
somebody who really does get it,another parent say, let's make
time once a week where we havean hour and we can just each
talk for half an hour.
You know, both ways and justhave a bit of time of reflective
listening.
But sort of deliberately settingup something like that for

(40:53):
yourself

Yeah.

can be a really important first step towards
something changing.

Definitely and the School Can't Australia
Facebook peer support group forparents is next level at that, I
have to say.
So Thanks to everybody who ispart of, that and participating
in supporting each other there.
Any resources, Naomi, that youcan think of that we should be
recommending to parents who arefeeling the burnout?

I do have a, I do have an online course called
burnt Out by Parenting, I dolive webinars, which.
I do a couple of times a month.
And then I also sell those asprerecorded courses, on my
website.
If you prefer a live event andlots of people do, I think
particularly if you're quiteburnt out, actually it can be
hard to do somethingprerecorded, even though I've

(41:42):
divided them up into littlesections and tried to make them
easy to watch.
But sometimes it's easier, justknow, right.
It's live.
I need to go now and I get a fewpeople from Australia, so my
timing must be okay.

I've dialed into a couple and yeah, it is, great
just to see flood of people inthe comments just going, oh my
God.
Me too.
Me too.

Tiffany Westphal (she/he (42:00):
Leisa, can.
I just give a plug too forCarers Gateway and, the carer
service providers in each stateand territory in Australia too.
I think, it's worth parentsreaching out to those
organizations to request supportif needed.
It's free.

Alright then.
Thank you so much Naomi.
It's been an absolute pleasureas usual.
Really, really appreciate youtaking the time.

Thank you very much for inviting me.
It's been a lovely be back herewith you.

We'll see you next time.
Well, I really hope you'refeeling a little bit better
after spending some quality timewith Dr.
Naomi Fisher, and I hope youhave a few ideas of things you
could be doing today to startyour own self-care.
I personally will be working onthanking my critical inner voice
for their help and asking themto stand down a little bit more
often.
I have put links to all thingsNaomi in the episode notes, as

(42:50):
well as a link to the CarersGateway for our Australian
listeners.
There's also links to SchoolCan't Australia, where you can
find so many resources andsupports to assist on your
School can't journey.
If you found our podcasthelpful, please take a moment to
share or subscribe.
Or for bonus points, give us arating or a review.
This really does help us get thepodcast in front of more people

(43:10):
who have School Can't kids, andwho haven't found our community
or the information that weshare.
If you have some feedback for usor a suggestion for a future
guest, please drop me an emailto schoolcantpodcast@gmail.com.
I would love to hear from you.
If you are a parent or carer inAustralia and you are feeling
distressed, please remember youcan always call the Parent

(43:31):
Helpline in your state.
A link with the number to callis in the episode notes.
Thank you again for listening,and we will talk again soon.
Take care.

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#28 - Dr Naomi Fisher on Parental Burnout

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#28 - Dr Naomi Fisher on Parental Burnout