Reconnection, Not Perfection

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5 Simple Ways to Nurture Relationships

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Is it too late to fix this relationship? Start with TODAY.

"I feel like I've messed up this relationship beyond repair," said Jewel, mother of a precocious 4 year-old.  "I know I'm not where I want to be in my relationship with my daughter. I've made all sorts of wrong decisions and mistakes. What can I possibly do from here? Is it too late?"

Try as we might, many times we find that we're not where we want to be in our relationships with our children. Maybe we're snapping at them a little too often. Perhaps we're frustrated because they "should" be able to do more on their own by now, or maybe their temperament or behaviors just push us right over the edge.

We feel like we're failing. We feel hopeless. We wonder if it is possible to ever make this right. We wonder if we've ruined our children forever with our parenting mistakes and missteps. We feel trapped and responsible.


I was just reading a book called, In the Flow of Life, by Eric Butterworth this morning. It is a book I have often turned to when I'm feeling challenged on my own life journey. This is what I read:

"You cannot really make a wrong choice, a bad decision. Any step you take will lead eventually to your good, because a negative experience encountered will produce a sort of challenge in which to outgrow the kind of consciousness from which the choice was made, leading to a higher consciousness from which more constructive steps can be taken. So a wrong choice is a right choice at that particular time. Knowing this, you are free from the fear of bad decisions. You can stand still and believe that there is no decision to be made, only a direction to discover."

I guess for me, this means that I am consciously aware of my parenting decisions, yet I am not going to beat myself up when things haven't gone the way I'd hoped or planned. I can see those decisions as a part of my journey to a higher consciousness, rather than as a horrible mistake.

I've done plenty of things on my parenting journey that have created disconnection in my relationship with my kids. There have been lots of overwhelming and even traumatic events in my family that have left me breathless and directionless, feeling hopelessly lost. Yet, as I find my way out of the dense overgrown forest, I see that I am no longer in the same place. I can see more clearly where I am and where I'm going, knowing I am no longer where I once was. Thankfully.

We can't go back in time and change the past. But I know, and I see in my clients, that healing is always possible by starting with TODAY. This moment. Sometimes this moment means that we need to acknowledge events from our past that are still unfinished. Our past created the present moment and we can't simply wish it away. You know, just move on, keep on going, trying to forget the negative events in our lives. We are who we are because of what has happened in our lives until this moment. We are showing parts of our story in this moment. And so is our child. Maybe it doesn't make sense to us right now because we're only thinking about this moment and not the pivotal moments that have come before. In fact, the clues we need to move forward are always there in our stories, even if we can't readily see them.

We don't have to go on some long expedition to find our stuck points. They're showing up right now in the way we handle our stressful moments, the way we reach out (or not), what we feel in this moment, and how you express what you feel (or perhaps in what you don't express). The past isn't separate from the now. The past isn't something that you just forget about, setting your sights on what you'd like to create in the future. The past is living in today. But we can change our direction and our future course by being present in this moment. Healing past hurts and disconnections can only happen in this moment. By paying attention to the signs showing up in our lives pointing the way to those old wounds that need nurtured, for the places lacking connection in our current relationships that need healing, we create the possibility of a new relationship with ourselves and with others. We have a chance to create a new experience right now. To heal. To create love and connection with our partner, our children, our family, our friends.

Healing starts today. Are you open to that possibility?

Next week, I'll explore how we can use our present moment experiences to work through our stuck points from the past, particularly in our relationship with our child. I've been so blessed to support many parents on this journey into connecting with their child deeply through Integrative Story Sharing, based on the work of Ray Castellino and Mary Jackson of www.aboutconnections.com and www.beba.org.

As you enter into this new year, remember that it is full of infinite opportunities and possibilities for healing. And that healing can begin today! Here's to a fabulous New Year ahead!

If you're like many parents and are looking for additional resources to begin the new year, check out my New Year's sale. I'm clearing out inventory to make way for many new resources next year. When they're gone, they're gone! Best wishes for healing connection for you and your family in 2012!

A Simple Shift in the Parent-Child Dance

My son bared his teeth and moved his head in toward mine so that our foreheads nearly touched. For a split second, I thought he was going to bang into my head. With that realization dawning, I decided he was being playful and just moving in to kiss me. I reached toward him and kissed him. He then smiled and told me how much he loved me. A few minutes later, after he had gone back off to the other room to play, it occurred to me how differently that situation would have gone if I had decided that his action was a threat to me. How many times do our interpretations of our child’s behavior lead us down the path to more disconnection? Or toward connection?

            We interpret our child’s behaviors hundreds of times per day, mostly unconsciously. If things are generally going well with our child and with us, we’re more likely to have the patience and the wherewithal to interpret our child’s behaviors in a positive light. If we’re feeling overwhelmed for any reason, or if our relationship with our child is generally not going so well, we’re more likely to interpret our child’s behaviors in a negative light, regardless of the intention of the child. I’m not saying that our children are always completely innocent or that they don’t need to learn to communicate with us effectively to get their needs met. Rather, I’m pointing out that sometimes just a simple shift in our interpretation of what our child is saying or doing can make things go in a positive direction.

What do you think of when you see this picture? What words do you associate with the expression on his face? While some may see a child who is scared, others may see an angry child. Others might see someone who is playful. And this is all just from a two-dimensional image.
We are constantly making observations, judging behaviors, and then interpreting what our children do—all in the blink of an eye. Many of these judgments and interpretations are based upon previous circumstances and how things worked out for us (or our loved ones) in the past. The primitive part of the brain is responsible for screening all things happening around us for possible threats. If I had allowed my amygdala (the primitive part of my brain responsible for the fight, flight, or freeze response) to take over in the situation with my son above, I would have fought back, run away, or frozen. Because I was aware of myself and realized that my five-year-old wasn’t really a threat, I was able to interpret his behavior in a different way that had a positive outcome.

            “My daughter is manipulating me!” “He did that to me on purpose just to make me mad!” “I’m the parent, and he needs to listen to what I say!” Phrases like these are common among parents, and they are remnants of another age in which we did not fully understand brain development and what is really going on in the minds of our young children. We often overlay adult thinking onto what we are seeing from our children, even when they are not capable of this kind of complex thought. These kinds of phrases only create more disconnection in relationships because the interpretation is a judgment that the child is wrong or bad. But what if we asked ourselves what is the best possible interpretation for what our child just did? When we start to shift our interpretations and change our language to give our children the benefit of the doubt, there is then the possibility of change!

            Our children are always doing the best they can do at any given time. This statement is not always readily agreed with when I say it to parents. But let me ask you this: Are you always doing the best you can in any given situation? (Not that you always handle things perfectly, but do you have good intentions?) Do you set out to do a lousy job and make everyone around you upset? I’d be surprised if you said yes. Our children want to please us, even if it doesn’t look like it sometimes. They need us to hold the higher consciousness for them, to know and feel that they are doing their best. They need our support and our guidance, not harsh words and criticism. 

Excerpted from Consciously Parenting: Creating, Nurturing and Repairing Relationships, 

Chapter 6: How We Interpret Our Children's Behavior, Publication date Spring 2012

Connecting When You Don't Have a Magic Wand

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Our Needs vs Their Needs? Is there a better way?

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Phoenix Rising from the Ashes

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Storytelling 101

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Chinese Handcuffs

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Sleep Training

I use gmail and it constantly has ads popping up that somehow pertain to something about the e-mail I've written or received. They are distracting to me and I try to ignore them, but find myself reading them anyway.

Today, there was something about infant sleep and how to help your child sleep through the night. I thought about it for a minute, then decided to click on it to see what the information being disseminated to parents said.

I read the advertisement. Very convincing. Yes, sleep-deprived parents are a problem. The answer is that babies must learn to sleep through the night using specific techniques. But as I read my free tips to help my child sleep better tonight (which I don't need because my child is 5 and sleeps quite well unless he isn't feeling well), I felt a twinge of uncertainty.

There were a lot of assumptions: 1. Babies waking up is disruptive to the parents. 2. Parents need their sleep and so do babies or there are major health risks for both. 3. The only healthy solution for parent and child is to train the baby to sleep. 4. One of the tips is to use a transitional object so that when baby wakes up alone, he will have this object that is "with him" to help him go back to sleep and be comforted.

This assumes that: 1. babies shouldn't be waking up during the night. It is simply a bad habit and it is the parent's job to teach them to sleep, 2. That there is something wrong if they are waking up and 3. That separation and disconnection are the answers. How scary and sad that this is what parents think sleep is supposed to be about.

For babies who are separated from their parents all day while their parents are both at work, the child is expected to spend maybe an hour with parents before he or she is off to bed for the night. Where is the bonding and connection? It is absent.

In The Continuum Concept, I was amazed to read about cultures that don't have all of the rules about what night time sleep is supposed to be like. I read about one group who would regularly wake up, tell a joke, everyone would laugh and then return to sleep. We would never think of doing this sort of thing. Once you're asleep, no one is supposed to disturb you.

But what does it mean to disturb one's sleep? I think this is more about interpretation than anything else.

If I look at my child's waking as a major inconvenience and I don't understand that there are biological reasons for young children to wake, both for frequent breastfeeding and to keep baby out of the deep sleep states that are correlated to SIDS according to Dr. James McKenna, mother-baby sleep expert, I would probably do everything I could to "fix" this "problem." But what if it is we who have the problem of interpretation instead of a problem with our baby?

What if we brought our babies into our beds (following safe co-sleeping guidelines) or brought them into our rooms at night, as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics for the first 6 months of life? We would find that our sleep states synchronized and we would naturally be waking when our baby was waking. It is much less disruptive this way than when baby is down the hall and the sleep rhythms are different.

What if we redefined what was disruptive and instead looked at this night time as precious time with our little ones who will not be little for very long at all. In fact, when I think back on the time with my little ones, I look back fondly on those nighttime feedings once I realized that I didn't have to even get out of bed anymore and could doze as my baby nursed. I enjoyed being close and knowing that my baby's needs were being met all the time, but that mine were not being forgotten, either.

Babies and children pick up on our emotional states. If we are stressed, they will be stressed. And stress does not help anyone get back to sleep. When we look at ourselves and our own feelings and interpretations about our struggles with our children, and release the stress we have around those situations, sometimes that is enough to change the situation entirely. That means that we can make it different and we don't need to buy another book about sleep to make things different in our lives. Imagine that! We can be our own expert or our own life! We can focus on connection instead of disconnection and make our lives work for us! How empowering!

The answers are within you and you don't need another expert to tell you what to do. Turn inward and connect with yourself. Connect with your baby. That's where the answers are!

Happy sleeping...

Beyond Reasoning to Connect in Relationship

It doesn't matter what the situation is specifically. We have all been in situations as parents when we want something to change, probably our child's behavior or attitude. Perhaps it is a child who won't go off into the classroom at the start of the school day who comes to mind. Or a child who won't do as we ask. These situations are confusing and frustrating for parents who are working to parent from a relationship-focused place. We've never seen what it looks like to approach situations like this from any other way than bribery, threats, or force. ("I'll give you ____ if you go inside easily." Or "You won't be able to do ____ if you don't do it." Or "Here, just pull him off of me and put him into the classroom.")

Yesterday, this situation was in the forefront of my mind when I agreed to help a neighbor with her 4 year old daughter while her mother flew to her grandmother's funeral. There had already been numerous changes (her mother left, she was moved to several different places already, and now she was separating from the people she had stayed with last night and her sisters so that they could go to school) and she was clearly done with that! She had reached her window of stress tolerance. She made it nearly to the front door of my house before she turned around and went the other direction. In a corner near the garage, she stayed and cried while her sisters and another neighbor tried to reason with her.

We do this sort of thing all the time: try to reason with those who are not in a place where reason is effective. I watched as bribery, threats, and the question of force all came up, though none of it was working. She still was in the corner by the garage and clearly had no intention of leaving. What to do?

When we're upset- or in any sort of emotional state- reason and logic do not work. We need someone to validate our feelings, to connect with how we're feeling. But many of us are afraid to do that. We don't want the feelings to grow stronger. We want them to stop. But we don't recognize that the feelings will stop if we can work our way through them. The only way out is through, not shoving the feelings down and pretending that they don't exist.

I suggested that her sisters say goodbye to her because they were starting to get worried about being late to school, so they said goodbye and went on their way. I moved in closer to her and said, "I'm sorry this is so hard." No explanation of why. No bribes. No threats. And I felt it with her. I had experienced others leaving when I was a child and I know how that feels. She started crying harder. I stood nearby. I didn't try to make it stop. When she calmed a bit after about a minute, I said, "It is hard being away from your mom right now." She cried harder again for about half a minute, then visibly relaxed. I said, "When you're ready, I would love to have you come inside. I know you'll let me know when you're ready." I stood nearby for another minute before I moved away just a bit. She started playing with her dolls, still standing outside in the cold in front of the garage door. Within a few minutes, she headed into the house on her own.

What happened? When children (and adults, too!) are given some space for their feelings, to have someone just be there and listen, they are capable of working through things on their own. Bribes, threats, and force get in the way of children learning to do that on their own. The outside chatter seems to only muddle things more, rather than helping someone find more clarity so they can make a good decision. We want our children to make good decisions on their own, so we try to manipulate things outside of them to make that happen. It is only when we step aside a bit and allow their own process to unfold that they will truly learn to do this for themselves. When we use bribes, threats, and force, children make changes out of fear. When we keep the relationship in the forefront of our mind, amazing things can unfold.

Think of the last time you were upset. Did you need someone to validate you and connect with how you were feeling? Or did you need someone to try to fix it, or to reason with you? We all need connection. We just need to remember that in the moment.

Just want to fix it?

My oldest son woke in the middle of the night unable to breathe and was coughing a really croupy cough.  He doesn't normally wake up in the night and come in to me, so I knew when he came in that this was something different.  He has a lot of stressors in his life right now and I know this is part of what's going on with him.  I can see that some of it is emotional, rather than purely physical and I want to fix it.  I want him to feel better.  

So, I got out of bed and tried to figure out what it was that was bothering him and what I could do to help him.  I pulled out my homeopathics and set about trying to figure out, through my groggy middle of the night brain, what it was that he needed.  Try as I might, I couldn't figure it out.  Where was this coming from?  What did he need?

I was so busy searching for a solution that I realized that I had moved away from him.  I was off in my own little corner in my own little world trying to fix it.  Yes, maybe there was something I could give him that would make him feel better.  But maybe I just needed to be there for him to support him, laying beside him and knowing that this is simply where he is in this moment on his own journey.

As mothers, we want to make it better, easier, for our children.  We want to take the pain away.  But that is simply not always possible, especially when it comes to our children's emotional pain.  Sometimes our children are just communicating that they need our presence.  And that is the best thing we can do for them, knowing they will find their way through it if we are just there for them emotionally.

Be open to what your child is communicating with you today and strive to be emotionally present- that is the most healing thing you can do for your child on his journey.  We can't always fix it, but that's okay.  Connection is what really matters.  Thanks for the lesson, Zack.