Become A Calm Mama Darlynn Childress

“Fix it, change it, stop it, solve it” is a phrase I use often in my coaching. When you say it out loud, it captures that feeling we have as parents when our kids behave in a way that leaves us feeling overwhelmed, angry or worried. 
It’s an emotional and physical response to what our kids are doing, and our brain jumps in and tries to fix, change, stop or solve the situation.
Your Kid’s Big FeelingsThe most common time I see parents experience this reaction is during a Big Feeling Cycle. 
When your kid has big feelings, they might express them in ways that are overwhelming to you. 
The tendency is often to try to shut down their behavior. But because that behavior is a reaction to how they’re feeling, we end up shutting down their feelings, too.
The problem with jumping in to fix/change/stop/solve is that you miss an opportunity to connect with your kids and to help them connect with themselves and learn how to process their own negative emotion.
What “Fix it, change it, stop it, solve it” Looks LikeHere are some things I see parents do when they don’t like the way their child is expressing their emotion.
Minimizing. When our kids are upset, we want to say, “Oh honey, it’s not that big of a deal. It’ll work out.” 
This sounds like a nice thing to say, but your child is left feeling like you don’t understand. It feels like a really big deal to them. We want to validate the emotion and acknowledge the intensity of their feelings instead of minimizing it. 
Comparing. This looks like, “This sort of thing happens all the time,” or, “Other kids don’t complain about this,” or “This wasn’t a big deal to your brother.” It happens when you think their feelings aren’t warranted or justified. 
We’re trying to get them to think and feel differently but, again, we’re doing it by shutting down their feelings. 
Ignoring. There might be times when you need to take a break to calm yourself before dealing with a situation. Ignoring is different. 
This is another way of shutting your kid down, and it makes them feel unheard, unfelt, unseen and unvaluable. Your child might think, “Mom only wants to talk to me when I’m happy.”
Talking about their feelings is how they’ll learn to deal with them. 
Weaponizing gratitude. Gratitude is an incredible emotion. I love it. Weaponizing gratitude is when we use it to bypass negative emotion. 
You cannot get rid of sadness by thinking grateful thoughts. We have to feel the sadness (or anger or worry) and acknowledge it before we allow the brain to find another perspective. 
Indulging. Sometimes, you might try to change the circumstance to make your kid feel better. Maybe you tell them they can skip practice or promise to go get ice cream afterwards. 
Instead of letting them feel upset, indulging tries to give them a positive feeling so they forget about the uncomfortable feeling. 
Logic-ing. This looks like giving lots of facts, trying to logic them out of their feelings or explaining why the situation is their fault. 
Facts are facts, but giving people more information doesn’t solve feelings. We can’t think our way to a new feeling. We have to feel our way through it. 
Shutting down. When your emotion (anger, fear, sadness) gets bigger or more intense than your child’s, it’s common to try to shut them down. You have a big reaction to their big feelings. 
This often shows up as yelling or other big noises or movements to try to shift your kid’s behavior. It triggers fear, freeze or faint response or people-pleasing. It might work in the short-term, but it isn’t effective in helping your child become an emotionally healthy and self-regulated person.
What your...

We don’t often talk about fun ways of improving behavior, but today’s episode will give you some strategies to do just that. I’m talking all about how to be a more playful parent so that you actually enjoy your kids more.
We also all want to feel connected and create joyful memories with our kids. 
The moments we remember most are the ones that were emotionally charged. The memories aren’t about where you are or what you’re doing. They’re about how you FEEL. 
How do you want to feel this summer? Do you want to feel joy? Delight? Do you want to create memories that are filled with laughter and positive emotions?
If so, you’re going to want to chase play and decide in advance that you want to feel more joy. 
 
Playful ParentingGood memories happen when we are enjoying our kids. when we stop trying to get things done and instead be in the moment and just sit and enjoy something with them.
Being playful doesn’t require that you crawl on the ground playing with cars, dolls or building blocks. If you enjoy doing that, great! If you don’t, it doesn’t mean you can’t be a playful parent.
Being playful is more of an energy. You might be quick to smile, think delightful thoughts about your kids or notice something silly.
As adults, we are so focused on tasks, time and productivity. Kids don’t care about time. 
They only care about play. So if we can bring a little bit more playful emotion and energy into a scenario, it goes a long way.
 
Benefits of PlayfulnessSupports learning and growth
Through play, kids try and fail. They explore, create and develop mastery. 
If you have a kid who has a tendency toward perfectionism or is a bit more strict with themselves, bringing in a little silliness frees them (and you). They don’t have to do everything “right” because there are no rules in playfulness.
 
Behavior
We get so serious about behavior sometimes. I talk a lot about limits, boundaries and consequences. But when our goals are for life to be easier, for things to go smoother and to have more joy and fun in our lives, play is a great way to do it.
When you’re playful, you’re close and in connection with your kid. It makes them feel safer and in a better mood. 
 
Processing negative emotions
Play is also helpful for releasing emotional distress for some kids. It isn’t about discounting their feelings, but more about testing to see if they’re open to a smile or a giggle. 
Playfulness can be the release valve that turns tears into laughter, which is also a great way to process negative emotion.
 
Attention
When you’re playful, it naturally brings your kid’s attention to you, which gives you an opportunity to set your limit or say whatever it is you want them to hear. 
Your kids are craving for you to play with them. They are craving your joy. They're craving your delight. They can't wait to see you at the end of the school day. They want your eyeballs on them.
We love being in connection with our people, and our kids want that, too.
 
11 Ways to Be a More Playful ParentFollow giggles and smiles
Notice when your kids are smiling or giggling and come alongside and join in that playful energy. 
 
Be exaggerated
It’s hard not to smile when you see someone being goofy. Singing, pretending to fall, pretending they’re really strong or doing a silly dance are all great ways to make kids giggle (or roll their eyes if they’re a little older 🙄).
We want to watch the line here so we don’t cross over into mocking. But you can join in with them in a funny voice, going alongside their emotion...

On this episode of Become A Calm Mama, we’re going beyond the problems with modern motherhood from last week’s episode and into the details of parenting on your own terms. 
There is a lot of pressure to fit into society’s expectations, but the way we’re told to measure performance in motherhood can actually be harmful to our kids and to us as moms. 
The goal isn’t to “perform” as a mom or to prove to others that you’re a “good” mom. This is what leads us to burnout, overwhelm and guilt.
Instead, I want to help you prioritize your child's emotional health, focus on building strong relationships with them and create a family and community that aligns with your values. 
Parenting FearsThere is a lot of fear and worry in parenting. Things like…
I don't want my kid to grow up and not like me, not like themselves or not be liked by others.
I don’t want my kid to not know how to be in the world or how to be successful. 
My kid isn’t going to be okay.
To alleviate our fears, we often try to do everything “right”.
We think that if we do everything perfectly, our kids won't experience pain or discomfort. They won't have any negative experiences, and you will have done your job as a mom. 
But that's not how the world works. You cannot prevent pain or discomfort. 
Your job as a parent is to give your kids the tools to navigate negative emotions and negative circumstances when (not if) they happen. 
And one of the best ways we can do this is by letting them know they’re okay exactly as they are.

Parenting On Your TermsRather than parenting from fear, let’s parent from a place of leadership. 
The first step to parenting on your own terms is deciding for yourself what is important to you.
I frame my parenting experience in terms of three goals:
My kids’ emotional health and wellbeingMy relationship with my kidsMy own mental and emotional wellbeing
So when I make parenting decisions or decisions about how we spend our resources (i.e. time, money and energy), I always look at them through these three lenses. 
There are times that I’ve had to drop some expectations on fitting in or showing up in a certain way in order to protect my kids’ emotional health or my relationship with them or my own mental wellbeing. 
Sometimes, this looks selfish from the outside.
But it also allows me to go back to what matters to our family. The goals I’ve chosen for myself help me to look at a situation and ask, “Where are my kids right now, and what do they need help and support with?” 

External v. Internal ValidationThere are all these external ways that society judges our performance as moms. Things like your kids getting good grades, being kind to everyone, dressing well, being athletic, creative or funny.
These are things that society and our communities value. The reward is fitting in, being able to obtain resources and favors and connections because we (and our kids) show up in a way that is socially acceptable. 
And if you don’t perform in these ways, there is a cost.
The fear of not being accepted or our kids not being accepted brings up major insecurities, and it can feel really scary to choose our goals over these social norms because we may not be accepted.
The problem is that when you work really hard at earning that social capital and acceptance, you put a lot of pressure on yourself and on your kids to perform at a certain level.
We’re afraid of how our kids’ emotional health will be affected by not being accepted. But true emotional wellbeing is internal. It comes from deep self love. 
What your child really needs from you is to feel unconditional acceptance from their parent. Inoculate them from social harm by giving them the belief that

Why are modern moms so burned out? What is the problem with modern motherhood that has us feeling overwhelmed, inadequate and guilty?
In this episode, I’m talking about the big picture and the expectations around motherhood to help you understand why you feel so overwhelmed. 
Because it's not just that your kid is spitting out their food or not cleaning up their room or didn't put their shoes on or got a bad grade or hit their friend or did something wrong at school. That's not actually why we're so overwhelmed. 
We have created a dynamic in our society where the expectations are too high on moms.
Guilt in MotherhoodI’ve had a few conversations recently with moms about guilt. May is a crazy month when it comes to kids. There are extra activities and school events that parents are expected to be at. Some of these pop up last minute or happen in the middle of the workday.
Of course, you get to feel sad if you’re missing something, but there’s this other layer of guilt that seems to come along with it. 
And I think this is often where the burnout and overwhelm begin. Unrealistic expectations lead to sadness and guilt. Then, we criticize ourselves for feeling that way. And we don’t take the time to process any of those negative emotions, so they kinda hang around. 
Our society has created an ideal mother and a dream of motherhood that has been presented to us primarily through social media. And the standards just keep getting more and more intense. 
Unrealistic Expectations in MotherhoodIn modern society, as a mom, you're responsible for SO MUCH, and it wasn’t always this way. 
Education
Modern moms get the story that your child's education and academic achievement is on your plate. Parents have been told that there's an ideal standard that you should strive for. And if you don't strive for it, you aren't helping your kid reach their potential.
If you didn’t get them into the “right” school and you're not doing homework with them and reading with them every night and monitoring their schoolwork and checking their grades, then that means you're not a good mom.
Previous generations didn’t have access to most of this information. But now that we do have access, it becomes our responsibility to monitor it.
Most parents are not child development experts or teachers, but we’re expected to know and do all this stuff anyway.
Food
You know the story…feed your kids healthy foods, watch their sugar, have family dinners, but also only feed your kids things they like.
We feel bad because our kids like junk food, but they’re offered it all the time. And then if you don’t want them to have junk, you get labeled as “that mom”. 
It’s too much to manage. We can’t compete with our society all the time. 
Screens
The same thing happens with screens. Everyone is telling you not to let your kids do too much screen time, but no one is telling us what is too much and there are all these other “rules” we’re supposed to follow when they do use screens.
Our kids love screens because they’re fun and interesting and great. And you know what? So do we.
Setting limits and boundaries around screens is a challenge on its own, and then they bring tablets and Chromebooks home from school anyway.
All the activities
We’re already trying to balance academics, education, diet and screen time. But they shouldn’t just do school! Kids should also…
Play sports to develop social skills and leadership and move their bodies.Do something creative, like art or music.Have some kind of religious education (if your family is religious).Learn another language, especially if you speak a language other than English in your family. 
But then your kids...

As we move through the journey of motherhood, the way we experience Mother’s Day, and what we need from it, changes. Today, I’m reflecting on my own experience of how Mother’s Day changes over time and connecting to different stages of motherhood. 
Different stages of parenting are challenging in different ways. When they’re younger, what we want most might just be a break from our kids, but as they get older we might crave more time with them.
Very early on, I realized that I wanted to create a day that worked best for me, so I started to create an intentional Mother's Day. 
And I want to give you permission (and tools) to create whatever it is that you want for your Mother's Day experience.
Mother’s Day Over TimeMy oldest son, Lincoln, is almost 19 years old. I’ve been reflecting a lot lately, including thinking back to the past 18 Mother’s Days I’ve experienced. 
My needs have changed over the period of time that I've been a mom. And what the caregiving to my kids looked like had a lot to do with what my emotional needs were at that time. 
And I can look back at the different Mother's Day choices that I've made and I can see how those different needs showed up. 
When I first became a mom, it was really important to me to create some sort of family dynamic. I wanted to have this idyllic version of our family. I wanted to create a cherished memory on Mother’s Day, and I was trying to create this Instagram-worthy Mother’s Day that I had in my mind (before the actual days of Instagram).
A few years in, I realized that this Mother’s Day thing wasn’t working for me. I wasn’t getting my needs met. So, I started to think about what I actually wanted and needed out of this day? How did I want to feel? 
In those early years, I just wanted to be alone. I wanted to shop, get a cup of coffee, lay in bed and be in my house by myself. 
And I know it might feel strange to you to have a Mother’s Day where you don’t spend time with your kids, but if they’re little, you might be spending a LOT of time with them every other day. 
Once the kids were in school, I started to notice that I was really craving time with my friends, with other mothers. So maybe we’d do something as a family in the morning, and I’d go have coffee or dinner with friends.
I also noticed that I wanted to be more active, doing things like going for hikes or to the beach. I wanted to get outside and move my body. There was also a season when I wanted to spend time with each kid alone on Mother’s Day.
And as my kids got into middle school, I started to notice that my experience of Mother’s Day, and motherhood in general, was a little bit less about my needs because my needs were already being met pretty well.
This year, I want to go on an adventure and do something totally different with my teenagers. We spend less time as a full family lately. Our kids have jobs and school and social lives. I want us all to be together just having fun.
I share all of this not because you need to do the same things that I did, but because sometimes as moms, we’re not even tuned in to what it is we want and need.
If you had a whole day to do whatever you wanted, what would that look like?
Your answer will give clues to what kinds of activities you’re craving or missing. 
Mother’s Day BoundariesNow I’m guessing you are not the only mother in your life. Maybe your own mother, mother-in-law or other women close to you are celebrating Mother’s Day, too, and they want you to be a part of it. 
This becomes a little complicated once you’re a mom yourself. It’s hard to satisfy your own needs AND you mom’s needs. 
My maybe unpopular opinion…The person who is currently raising children should have dibs on Mother’s Day. You can celebrate with your mom or mother-in-law on Saturday or next...

Today I'm tackling the topic of screens, screen time limits, devices, all of it. And I am going to help you feel better about your kids’ device use. This is a master class on managing screens in your family. So grab a pen and paper and get ready.
Let’s be honest - we all love screens. 
I love lots of things, like nature, my friends, my kids, my dogs. And I really like being on my phone and watching TV. 
But the fact that our kids also love devices drives us crazy as parents. We know devices are fun for them, but we’re annoyed when they won’t put them down. We worry about them getting too much screen time, and we don’t like the way they act when it’s time to stop. 
Why Screens Are HardI see a lot of parents that are really worried that their child is addicted to screens. They ask for device time frequently, and then they don’t want to stop. We use this as evidence that they’re addicted. 
Parents also have conflicting feelings around screen time, which can be really confusing. 
We feel compassion because they want to connect with their friends and have something to do. But then we feel guilty because we don’t know if we’re doing the right thing or how much screen time is too much.
When you’re feeling worried, frustrated, annoyed, guilty and confused, you aren’t going to make the clearest decisions. 
What We All Want When it Come to ScreensWhen it comes to our goal for parenting with screens, I’m guessing that you want your family to feel balanced and connected to each other. You want screen time to be a part of your life, but not completely consuming your life. You don't want it to be everything your kids do.
I bet you also want there to be less fighting when you say no to screen time or when it’s time to stop. 
And you also probably want to feel really clear about your rules around screens and to see that it is possible to implement them with more ease.
5 Obstacles Parents Face Around Screen TimeYou judge your kid’s desire for the device
When they ask for screen time, you feel upset by their desire. 
The truth is, we all love our devices, and screens are an easy way for the brain to be entertained or distracted. It helps us get rid of that uncomfortable bored feeling. 
Their inability to put down the device on their own does not mean your kid is lazy, unmotivated or anything else. Video games and social media are designed to keep the viewer engaged and keep them coming back. 
The pull of the device is natural.
Thinking your kid is “addicted”
This is one that I hear a lot. Not only is it not true in the vast majority of families, but this thought creates fear in you and makes the situation more emotionally charged. 
If you are thinking that your kid is addicted, you're going to look for evidence of that being true. 
Evidence like:
They ask for it all the timeThey don't like to get offThey seem physically affected by screensThey prefer screens over being with peopleThey don't know how to stop
But instead, I want you to think that the desire for devices is normal. It doesn’t mean anything has gone wrong. 
Kids like things that are fun, and being on a device is fun. Wanting something doesn’t mean someone is addicted. 
Your kids not being okay with being bored
When you start setting limits around screens, your kid is going to have big feelings. If your child isn't okay with being bored, it's going to be a big issue for you at the beginning because their brain does not know quite yet how to shift into something new.
When kids are bored, they feel uncomfortable. I call this the Boredom Gap. 
The good news is that the more time they spend away from devices, the more...