Become A Calm Mama

Darlynn Childress
  • 5.0 (28)
  • PARENTING
  • UPDATED WEEKLY
Become A Calm Mama

Become a Calm Mama is a parenting podcast where you learn practical parenting tools and strategies so you can stop yelling, feel more calm, and show up as the mom you want to be. Darlynn is the top parenting coach for moms who want to know exactly how to handle misbehavior and create a peaceful home. Darlynn is known for her practical strategies and a down to earth understanding of what it’s really like to be a mom raising kids in the 21st century. Over the past 15 years, Darlynn has dedicated her life to becoming the mom she wanted to be for my kids. In that process, she created a parenting model called “The Calm Mama Process” that helped her navigate every tricky parenting moment that’s been thrown her way. From hitting to bullying, from toddler meltdowns to teenage shenanigans, from missing assignments to college admissions, from getting kids to bed to getting kids out of bed, from kids not wanting to get out of the bath to middle schoolers that don’t want to take a shower, from kids fighting in the car to kids who drive their own car, she’s seen it all. Darlynn has taught her model to hundreds of moms since 2015 and when they apply the Calm Mama Process to their tricky parenting moments they have calm and peace in their homes. Their kids' behavior improves, their relationship with their children gets so much better, and they enjoy motherhood (most of the time!). Darlynn teaches her process inside her coaching program, The Emotionally Healthy Kids course, where you learn how to master your reactivity, teach kids how to manage their big feelings, and set limits that work. Each week she brings practical and simple strategies to the podcast so you can stop yelling and create a peaceful home.

  1. 3D AGO

    Raising Teen & Tween Girls with Girls Mentorship (pt 1)

    Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Jill and Mary, founders of Girls Mentorship. We’re diving into what teen and tween girls need and what they’re going through at this stage of life.  You’ll Learn: What makes teen & tween girls so awesome!Benefits and pitfalls of greater emotional awareness in this generation of kidsHow small shifts can make a big difference in identity and self-esteem5 ways to support the tween or teen girls in your life Listen in for tools to start helping your teen or tween daughter with her confidence, self-esteem, and emotional health. -------------------------------------- Today on the podcast, I’m joined by Jill and Mary, founders of Girls Mentorship. We had so much to talk about, we had to make it two episodes so you could get ALL the goodness out of our conversation. In this episode, we’re diving into what teen and tween girls need and what they’re going through at this stage of life. Next week, you’ll learn what you, as a parent, can do to support them. Jill and Mary are the founders of Girls Mentorship. They say, “Everywhere we looked, we saw girls struggling—grappling with confidence issues, battling negative self-talk, wrestling with poor self-image, and navigating the tricky waters of anxiety and depression. It hit close to home. Hadn’t we been in those exact same shoes 20 years ago?”  Girls were STILL missing the vital tools to rise about these challenges. So Jill and Mary decided to become the guides they wished they’d had - offering young girls the skills and support to build confidence, resilience, and self-worth. They now teach life and personal development skills to tween and teen girls so that they can become the brightest, most authentic versions of themselves. Life As A Tween GirlWith all the conversation about kids and anxiety and how much girls are struggling, it’s easy to forget about the beauty of this age.  Mary shares that girls this age speak their mind. They’re curious. They make you question things, and you get to learn from their questions, too. They’re experiencing all the firsts, and it’s really fun to walk that path with them and see their eyes get really big when they understand a concept for the first time or realize that they're not alone in what they're struggling with. Jill says they’re also hilarious, creative, and talented. They have access to so much information that if they’re curious about something, they will just go and seek it out.  And with a lot more awareness of mental health in today’s culture, these girls are genuinely curious about it. When they experience anxiety or other feelings, they now have words to articulate and express themselves, which leads to really rich conversations.    Mary says that when you’re talking about girls ages 10 through the teen years, the distinction between tween and teen isn’t all that big. She says, “the conversation doesn't really change much, neither does what the girls in particular are struggling with.” The differences come up in their maturity level, experiences, and what topics they’ve been exposed to.    Challenges for ParentsNo matter how old your kids are, you know that each stage comes with it’s own unique challenges. Two that we see come up most often are generational differences in the ways we talk about and deal with emotions and how the way we define success for ourselves can trickle down to our kids…whether we want it to or not.   Expressing Emotion - The Generation Gap We all agree that we’ve seen a shift in the way people express emotions from our parents’ generations to now.  Gen X parents wanted to act like everything was fine. Stuff the feelings down, and pull yourself up by your bootstraps.  Now the...

    40 min

  2. APR 3

    Simplifying Family Life with Jessica Etting

    Today, I've invited Jessica Koosed Etting onto the podcast for a conversation about family life, the mental load on moms, and how we can make things a little bit simpler and easier.  You’ll Learn: Why motherhood feels so overwhelming (it’s not just you!)Why your own parents might not be able to relate to your mental loadHow to reduce your mental load, involve your family, and feel more calm While perfection is impossible, there are ways to be more proactive and organized, so that we feel a little less pressure, stress, and overwhelm. --------------------------------------------- Jessica Koosed Etting is the co-founder and CEO of Jam, a pioneering family calendar app designed to dismantle mental load and make family life more efficient and equitable. She’s also a mom of 3 boys, ages 10-14.    The Mental Load on MomsYou know the scenario… You drive your kid to soccer (or whatever activity you’re going to) and get there only to realize they’re missing some important piece of gear or equipment. You get frustrated with yourself, your partner, or your kid, and you dump your emotions on them (i.e. yelling, arguing, blaming). Then, you get out of the car and pretend like everything’s fine, even though you know it was just a total shitshow. There’s this bit of shame or embarrassment that you forgot something, that you made a mistake.  As moms, there is a LOT coming at us - appointments, kids’ activities, assignments, shopping lists, to-dos, and all the expectations that come with them. In the digital age of parenting, information comes at you constantly from a ton of different sources. You’re getting emails (maybe from multiple schools), notifications from WhatsApp or other group messaging apps, text messages, and trying to keep it all straight. And because people are so connected, plans can be changed very quickly (and often!). It’s easy to look around and think that something’s wrong with you because you can’t seem to hold it all together. But it’s not just you. You’re not going crazy, and you’re not just a hot mess.  Motherhood is overwhelming. Information keeps coming at us, faster than we can process it. And we put so much pressure on ourselves to get it all right, all the time (aka perfectionism).  In case you aren’t familiar with the term mental load, it’s basically that ticker tape that’s constantly running through your head. It’s all the schedules, to-do lists, the things that everybody needs. The “what’s next?” that never seems to end. You’re carrying all the things that keep your family running inside your own brain. Jessica shares that, according to research, moms typically carry 90% more of this mental load than their male partners. It takes its toll, leading to stress, anxiety, depression, and burnout.  And it affects our relationships, too. You can’t be truly present with your kids, partner, or friends when your brain is constantly working. It’s like you can never turn it off and recharge. Plus, when you’re feeling stressed and anxious, you’re more likely to snap at the people you love.  In short, you get dysregulated. You can’t find that calm, connected place.   Simplifying Family LifeAs we talk about strategies to manage complex family life, keep in mind that a little grace and compassion for yourself goes a really long way, too. While perfection is impossible, there are ways to be more proactive and organized, so that we feel a little less of that pressure, stress, and overwhelm. Jessica and her sister, Amanda, created the Jam app to help with managing the mental load in a few ways:   Take...

    45 min

  3. MAR 27

    Radical Action (Part 6 of the How To Heal series)

    Over the past 5 weeks, I’ve walked you through the hierarchy of healing and how to go through the phases of healing I call radical self-love, self-trust, honesty, listening, and acceptance. Today, we finish the series with radical action - the part where we DO the things that actually improve our lives and create the lives that we want. You’ll Learn: How to hold both contentment and a desire for changeThe 3 types of action (and which is best)How to chase the glimmers in your lifeA surefire way to know if you’re taking the right actions5 enemies of aligned radical action and how to overcome them Radical action doesn’t have to be big. In fact, sometimes a lot of the big actions in life start with really small changes. In this episode, I’ll show you how to figure out what you ought to be doing and how to overcome the obstacles that come up along the way.  ---------------------------------------------- I also want you to keep in mind that any action you take must be rooted in radical self-love. This isn’t meant to be some giant checklist you now have to do. If all you ever do is learn to fall deeper and deeper in love with yourself, you have already won.    Taking Radical ActionRadical action is about making a commitment to changing an area of your life where you are not satisfied.  This typically happens in three areas: Your relationship with yourselfYour relationship with othersYour relationship with the outside world The first part of action is simply committing to the change you want. Then, you decide which actions will support your goal and commit to those, as well. Let’s take a closer look at these 3 relationships. Your relationship with yourself. This includes your mental health and the way you talk to yourself. It is internal. If you're feeling anxious, depressed, directionless, or trapped and you don't have contentment, then this is something that you might want to work on. You might decide that you want to improve your mental health, experience more meaning or purpose in your life, or commit to your own peace and contentment.  Your relationships with others. Maybe your marriage isn't working, or the way you're parenting your kids isn't working. Maybe you have some toxic friendships or some family conflicts.  Your goal might be something like, “I want to have a happy marriage,” “I want to be a more calm parent,” or “I am committed to setting better boundaries with my in-laws.” Your relationship with the outside world. This includes how you contribute to the world and how you feel in the world. This can also encompass your relationship with time, money, your environment, etc.  If your home is messy, cluttered, and it’s driving you crazy, let’s take radical action to make your home function better for you. If you are constantly stressed and overwhelmed about money, you can commit to finding peace around your finances and managing your money in a healthy way.    Step 1: Define the change you wantWe can’t create the lives we want unless we know what we want, right? So the...

    39 min

  4. MAR 20

    Radical Acceptance (Part 5 of the How To Heal series)

    When we set out to create positive change and healing in our lives, those actions must come from a place of love and trust in ourselves. The key is practicing radical acceptance of ourselves and our circumstances.  In this episode, you’ll learn: Why we struggle to accept realityThe truth about acceptance and taking actionReal life examples of challenging circumstances and how we can be more accepting of them4 steps to practice radical acceptance The faster you can accept the hard things in life as reality, the faster you will be able to get into action and take the next right step. ------------------------------------------- As you move through your healing journey, you may have experienced times when you made a decision to change something in your life. You made a checklist or a set of rules to follow, but then you didn’t end up making as much progress as you wanted. You thought you just must not be good at healing or taking control of your life, so you gave up. Often, this happens because your actions are rooted in shame, guilt, buffering, or trying to avoid pain. To make positive change, you have to come from a positive place. This starts with our previous steps of radical self-love, self-trust, honesty, and listening.  The next step in the hierarchy of healing is to accept where you are, accept your current circumstances.    Radical AcceptanceAcceptance is the idea that you are okay with what’s happening in the present moment. You don’t need to judge the moment or your behavior. It’s saying, “This is the way things are right now and that's okay.” We’re often afraid to fully accept our circumstances because we think that if we’re okay with how things are, it implies that we don’t care. That we’re powerless, defeated, and we’ll never take action to improve or grow. But the opposite is true. Acceptance is not about excusing yourself from responsibility or giving up. In fact, the faster you accept your current reality, the easier it will be for your nervous system to calm down and to problem solve. It will be easier for you to show compassion to yourself and get into action. It reminds me of the Buddhist saying that “Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.” There are facts, and there are our interpretations of the facts. Often, it’s what we make things mean that hurts us the most. And it is entirely unnecessary.  Imagine that you’re sitting in horrible traffic. It’s unpleasant and uncomfortable to be sitting there waiting for so long. But when you become frustrated, angry, and try to resist it, that’s where suffering comes in. You are adding more pain to the moment. Instead, you can choose to accept that there is always a lot of traffic on that particular road, you plan for it, and take different actions (e.g. driving a different route or leaving earlier).  When we struggle because we believe something should be different from how it is, we’re fighting reality. When we resist our feelings, ourselves, and our experience, we create suffering. Acceptance is going with the flow, and it’s what you see in people that seem to be at peace, even when things are chaotic.    Accepting Other People’s BehaviorRadical acceptance applies to other people’s behavior, as well. Maybe your spouse or partner committed to doing something and didn’t follow through. Or your kids are misbehaving. You can choose to accept that they are acting the way they’re acting.  Of course, as parents, we also have a responsibility to teach our kids better ways to behave, manage their feelings, get their needs met, and demonstrate their emotions. So, we do have to take action (more on that next week).  For example, you’re going...

    36 min
  5. Getting Sober [Confessions]

    MAR 18 · BONUS

    Getting Sober [Confessions]

    My healing journey began as a 19 year old, wandering drunk and alone on a beach in San Felipe, Mexico. This is the story of my first attempt at healing and what I learned early on.

    52 min

  6. MAR 13

    Radical Listening (Part 4 of the How To Heal series)

    Welcome to part 4 of the How To Heal series. In this episode about radical listening, you’ll learn strategies for listening more carefully and trusting your intuition and inner wisdom so that you can build a better relationship with your core self. You’ll Learn: How to practice radical listening with compassion The 4 parts within you that you are listening toExamples of patterns that might not be serving you5 steps to radical listening and a deeper understanding of yourself The closer you move to your authentic, core self, the more content you will feel. This truest version of you feels peace no matter what is happening.  ------------------------------------- Healing is really about wanting to feel better. To feel freedom, joy, gratitude, peace, safety, and calm. To be kinder to yourself, become a good friend to yourself, notice your patterns, and make small changes to influence them. Those are our goals here. As my mentor, Martha Beck, says, “Your true nature, the part of you that always remembers what it is meant to be and never stops trying to be what it is, no matter what happens to her. Your birthright is to feel peace and joy and gratitude and love. And in your core, you carry all of that.”   Radical ListeningThe goal of radical listening is to find your inner guidance to move away from the patterns that you've created to protect you from pain and toward new patterns that help you get what you actually want.  We all have patterns in ways that we think, feel, and act. We need to look at them and ask ourselves where they’re coming from. Are you trying to avoid pain? Are these patterns protecting you, or are they sabotaging you because you don’t think you’re worthy of feeling freedom, love, peace, and joy?  The statements we’re working with as we learn to radically listen are: I will listen to my needs and wants and see those as valid and important. I will listen to my intuition and trust my inner wisdom.   Who Are You Listening To?When you practice radical listening, you are having a conversation with yourself. But who are you talking to? In his book No Bad Parts, Richard Schwartz outlines four parts that live within each of us:   Your Inner Child You may have wounds or patterns that you developed in childhood. These were really important to you as a kid, but they might not be necessary now. These wounds are often based on attachment or authenticity.  Perhaps you were conditioned in childhood to believe that you don’t matter or that your needs aren’t important. Or your need for security and attachment wasn’t met, so you didn’t feel safe. You may have been told all sorts of negative things about yourself. Or you were taught that you had to look or perform a certain way in order to be loved, valued, and accepted.  For example, I grew up in a household where it often felt like there wasn’t a grown up. As a result, I developed patterns of hypervigilance, overthinking, overplanning, overstructuring, and then getting easily dysregulated when things weren't going to my plan. Now that I am the adult, I’ve had to teach myself (and my inner child) that I am safe. The grown-ups are here. Were you taught that your value depended on your grades, performance in sports, or how nice you were? Did you hear that you were dumb, ugly, mean, selfish, lazy, rude, or a problem? What messages did you hear in childhood that you might still be acting out today?  Maybe it’s time to look at those messages and examine them. Where’s the evidence?    Your Pain Our wounds and patterns can also come from culture - religion,...

    38 min

  7. MAR 6

    Radical Honesty (Part 3 of the How To Heal series)

    In this third installment of the How to Heal series, I’m talking about radical honesty - why it’s important, what happens when we’re not honest with ourselves, and how to get more honest. You’ll Learn: What it means to be radically honest Why it’s so hard for us to be honest with ourselvesSigns that you might have some healing to do4 strategies to increase your self-awareness and honesty You can't heal from anything until you’re aware of what it is that is causing you pain. Listen to learn how. --------------------------------- In this healing process, we’re trying to tap into our most pure state of being, where we have a deep sense of peace and wholeness so that we can be okay no matter what is happening around us.    Why Honesty MattersYou can't heal from anything until you’re aware of what it is that is causing you pain.  Often, we are unwilling to look at our patterns and our pain because it creates a discomfort in us that we don't know if we can handle. But the truth is, what you resist persists. If you resist your pain, it will stay.  Being willing to really look at ugly, hard, difficult things about ourselves and our lives requires us to be radically honest with ourselves.  Ultimately, you’re healing yourself so that you don’t harm your kids. Because, in full love and safety, yelling at your kid, shutting down, or being rough with their body hurts them. I want your children to grow up and not have to heal from childhood wounds. Now, everyone is gonna get hurt in childhood. In life, pain is inevitable. It's how we deal with pain, how we talk about pain, and how honest we are that actually creates the healing in real time. When you start to get honest with yourself, you’ll probably start to notice some clues. Thinking negatively and critically of yourself… Feeling despair, discontentment, discomfort, anger, resentment, confusion, or lack of clarity … Behaving in ways that hurt you or others (like your kids)... These are all really good indicators that you might have something to heal from.   Why Honesty Is So HardI think of radical honesty as being willing to admit how you are thinking, feeling, and acting - even when it’s uncomfortable. Being honest about your pain is the key to healing your pain.  So, if honesty is so important, why aren’t we honest with ourselves and each other about our pain? We often don’t even realize how cruel we’re being to ourselves with our thoughts, we don’t understand why we’re feeling or acting the way we are.  We also live in a society that tells us we should be happy all the time (good vibes only😒). And we’ve taken a lovely thing like gratitude and weaponized it as a way to bypass negative emotion.  Maybe you feel ashamed if things aren’t going well - embarrassed because you think you should have it all together. Sometimes, we’re scared to get honest about what we’re really thinking and feeling, especially if they’re negative thoughts about our kids or our life. We’re afraid that if we have a problem, we won’t be able to fix it - and we also won’t be able to ignore it anymore. And what I see more than anything is that most people are simply unaware. They’re just not paying attention. They're going through life a little bit unhappy, a little bit dissatisfied. It’s all just kinda meh. Sometimes it all feels too big to deal with, so we avoid feeling the pain by shutting off awareness.  Pushing the pain away actually blocks you from getting a life filled with hope, healing, love, joy, peace, and all the things we...

    33 min

  8. FEB 27

    Radical Self Trust (Part 2 of the How To Heal series)

    This is part two in my How to Heal series. Today, we’re talking about radical self trust and how to build more confidence and trust in yourself.  You’ll Learn: How past emotional wounds show up in the presentWhy building radical self trust is so important for healing and creating positive changeHow to be your own grown up3 strategies for building radical self trust When I think about trust, I believe the entry point is when you have an experience of feeling really safe with somebody. So, let me ask you… Is there anyone in your life that you feel completely safe with? That you can say or admit anything to (even the shameful, embarrassing, negative things), and you trust that they can handle your vulnerability with unconditional love? In this episode, I’m going to help you become that person for yourself. So even when the hard stuff comes up, you know that your love for yourself will never change. ------------------------------------ How to Heal is a 6-part journey for healing from emotional pain, figuring out what’s not working in your life so that you can make small changes to be less reactive, feel happier, and show up as the Calm Mama I know you want to be.    What Are You Healing From?In this context, I'm talking about healing from emotional pain - going back and looking at moments in the past when your core emotional or physical needs were not met.  Understanding these core emotional needs is also super helpful as a parent. These are tools to help you heal your past and parent your child in the present so that they don’t have the same wounds to heal from. The core emotional needs are really questions we’re trying to answer: Am I safe? This is a big one for kids. Babies and young children are incredibly vulnerable, and they know that they are not able to take care of themselves. They need adults to keep them safe.Am I loved unconditionally? When we tell our kids that we don’t like something they’re doing or the way they’re behaving, they often take that to mean that they are bad. They can’t separate themselves from their behavior. It’s up to the adults in their life to let them know that they are unconditionally loved and accepted.  When you experience moments where you feel unsafe or unloved, core wounds can form, and they show up later in our behaviors.  There were definitely times in my own life when I did not feel safe. I experienced abandonment when my dad left our family. I experienced sexual abuse as a child. My mother had depression and undiagnosed ADHD, so she was not always available for me and sometimes chose men that were not safe for me.  I started to decide that the world is not safe. When I looked around, I saw that adults were unreliable. They hurt you. They leave. Later in life, this core wound showed up as hypervigilance, constantly scanning for hazards, being controlling, looking to see if I fit in, and lots of insecurity and anxiety. If you have felt that you aren’t loved unconditionally, you might notice that wound come up as people pleasing, pushing others away, over-performing, perfectionism, or over-planning.  We develop these coping strategies, often even in childhood, to help us deal with the pain and discomfort. As a parent, when these old wounds are aggravated by life circumstances or your kid’s behavior, you might find that you react really intensely.  Overreaction is a good indication that you have something to heal from. Something is triggering you, and you might want to change your reaction.  This is the WHY of healing. You see that you are reacting in ways that create pain for yourself or others. Your past emotional wounds are...

    36 min
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About

Become a Calm Mama is a parenting podcast where you learn practical parenting tools and strategies so you can stop yelling, feel more calm, and show up as the mom you want to be. Darlynn is the top parenting coach for moms who want to know exactly how to handle misbehavior and create a peaceful home. Darlynn is known for her practical strategies and a down to earth understanding of what it’s really like to be a mom raising kids in the 21st century. Over the past 15 years, Darlynn has dedicated her life to becoming the mom she wanted to be for my kids. In that process, she created a parenting model called “The Calm Mama Process” that helped her navigate every tricky parenting moment that’s been thrown her way. From hitting to bullying, from toddler meltdowns to teenage shenanigans, from missing assignments to college admissions, from getting kids to bed to getting kids out of bed, from kids not wanting to get out of the bath to middle schoolers that don’t want to take a shower, from kids fighting in the car to kids who drive their own car, she’s seen it all. Darlynn has taught her model to hundreds of moms since 2015 and when they apply the Calm Mama Process to their tricky parenting moments they have calm and peace in their homes. Their kids' behavior improves, their relationship with their children gets so much better, and they enjoy motherhood (most of the time!). Darlynn teaches her process inside her coaching program, The Emotionally Healthy Kids course, where you learn how to master your reactivity, teach kids how to manage their big feelings, and set limits that work. Each week she brings practical and simple strategies to the podcast so you can stop yelling and create a peaceful home.

Information

  • Creator
    Darlynn Childress
  • Years Active
    2022 - 2025
  • Episodes
    174
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Copyright 2025 Darlynn Childress
  • Show Website
    Become A Calm Mama

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