Season 1 Episode 5
Summary
A culture is being set in your family, either consciously or unconsciously. This week we get into how to lead your family's culture with intention, how putting words to your values gives you confidence when other moms do things differently and how we can nurture non-judgmental communities. There's a lot of encouragement packed in - to offer compassion to yourself, cultivate empathy for other parents and hold respectful space for each other as each of us cares for our children the best we can...even when we disagree.
We take a listener question about what is effective "discipline" for a one-year-old / young toddler that may (or may not) surprise you :)
Join Very Good Mother's Club to be a part of our community and get your questions answered on a future episode!
Find Jess at Jessica Hover on Youtube and @jess_hover on Instagram
Find Layne @enquiryco on Instagram
Transcription
Jessica:
Hey you guys. I'm Jessica Hover.
Layne:
I'm Layne Deyling Cherland and this is Very Good Enough a podcast from Very Good Mother's Club.
Jessica:
Someone wrote and said, When did you get podcaster voices? I’m pretty sure that in the first episode, I still sounded a little sick. So my voice was a little more sexy than it usually should have been. Maybe I should be doing like the phone calls where people call me and I say things COVID edition for my Only Fans. I don't have an Only Fans, but if I had only fans, I wouldn't tell them.
Layne:
No that’s not for you. No we don't have an only fans.
Jessica;
Times aren’t that tough
Layne:
Times aren’t that tough-it took me a moment to process that.
Jessica:
Have I not told this story on here?
Layne:
You definitely said avocado nipples.
Jessica:
Oh, but I might not have dived in. Well, I'm about to dive in now. The nipple story that I'm going to tell you to start us off is not too huge of a story. It's just simply that Jules, my third daughter, she stopped breastfeeding just all on her own. She just was all done. And she is kind of like that- she's an independent woman. Always has just wanted to be like Wilson and Wilson is 15/16 months older than her. And so when she was less than a year old, she stopped breastfeeding. And I didn't feel ready for that. I breastfed Eloise for a long time like almost two years. Wilson I stopped breastfeeding when I got pregnant with Jules so I breastfed him until he was exactly a year old when I stopped. I wanted some time between him and Jules. And then with Jules, she just stopped herself and so I was looking into what I'm supposed to do. And I was given the advice to where no shirt or bra for a number of weeks and just put avocado on my nipples because Jules loves avocado and that she would come to the nipple to eat the avocado and that that would reengage her in the beautiful act of breastfeeding. And I laughed because I think okay, that's a beautiful method for those of you who want to do it, but I just want you to imagine that at this time of my life-I have Eloise home with us. I think it's like well, COVID was probably winding down at that point, Wilson is a toddler. I run a small business. I live with housemates and I'm supposed to for weeks walk around just as if it's for my only fans. Yeah, no. I absolutely was not going to do that. And the thing about my style on social media with parenting is, I love the non judgmental approach like what works for me and what works for you could look totally different, probably will and that's amazing to me. We're all going to have these different styles, but sometimes I do laugh at other people's styles even though if you came to me as a friend and we're like so I'm walking around shirtless for weeks with avocado on my nipples because I really want my baby to breastfeed again. I am a big empath. I have such big feelings that in the moment I would not laugh at you. I would maybe laugh if I like I had just imagine what that would be like for you guys- that took me by surprise. I didn't know where to go with that, but I do think that it's important to be very very open minded to everybody's parenting approach and acknowledge that sometimes things are funny, and I do plenty of funny things, desperate things to try and get my kids to do what's right. I'm sure over the time of our friendship I'll tell you something I'm doing to try and woo my kids into a certain behavior that you'll laugh at me for and that'll be welcome here. This is the safe place which brings us to our topic of the day, family culture, family culture.
Layne:
We want to kind of chat through the idea that each family comes with its own unique and individual culture that is cultivated within itself. The adults really kind of like setting that tone and finding the way-their way through like being a family and having a family. And this idea comes from my more professional training around this kind of stuff. As an early childhood educator, you're like so in family's lives and in their stuff. I mean, you're like changing diapers and snuggling children, you feed them and and it's this early stage of life when people are going through sometimes some of their first marital hardships and sometimes it's their first kid and sometimes it's a surprise one and she's like 42 and that was not her plan. There’s feelings and and families get sick and and pregnancies get lost and crazy things happen.
Jessica:
Sure.
I hugged Eloise's preschool teacher on multiple occasions when I got there crying over something that was happening in Spain. She was like an extension of our family by the end of our time. They're so yeah, you're right. It's so close. And then you're having to realize that what you have a whole classroom of people with different family cultures who believe I mean, as parents we probably are doing our best because we believe it's the best thing for our kids. And sometimes that can leak out into it's the best thing for our family so it must be the best thing for every family. And that's just not true.
Layne:
It's just not true. And it's one of the things that as a teacher, you have to like be able to really quickly inside of yourself set aside whatever your own personal culture like the family culture that you came from and your own ideas about what is the best way in your best practices for children, because you have to hold- though you are meshed with all their stuff you hold a professional space in people's lives. So you have to learn how to say, “I'm going to let all these different family cultures be here. In my classroom and also keep my own one a little bit back while I'm here because like I'm here to serve all of these families”. So there's this kind of like heightened practice that you have to really do.
Jessica:
while you're setting a classroom culture absent which is your own place of leadership and responsibility. That's interesting. I've never thought about you having to do that. I do something similar in working with many mothers doing, between speaking publicly to them or navigating these like coaching calls where we're getting these different styles and people bringing their way ,I'm having to very intentionally approach things in a non judgmental way. And you and I've talked about this before, but I also used to work for an international nonprofit and working with many different cultures internationally as well. You learn that people do things entirely different from one another around the world, and then it becomes silly to think, but this is the absolute best way. You're like, yeah, well maybe within your very small circle. That's the best way you've seen it done. But there are people across the ocean who do it totally different and they have a beautiful family structure with values that are really meaningful as well.
Layne:
I feel that the comparison to cultures, like the different groups of people throughout our world is a very, very helpful way to then kind of like translate this idea and drop in and think about how to be a community member in a world where each little family has sometimes a lot of criss crossing cultures, because we know when we look at anthropology and we look at people groups around the world, that they do really differ on a lot of the out workings of beliefs and values, so like the practices and customs and ways of life are super different, but we know because we get to look at people in such large groups that it's that each different people group values a little bit more this over a little bit less that where like, American culture tends to value independence in children, like very early and that's the thing that we want to build in is like self esteem and confidence and this like independent way of living, so we do lots of things out of that, whereas other cultures really value like tight family units they value in. In a way that is a little bit different than ours.
Jessica:
Even in their history, like their ancestors and their future generations in a way that's different from us.
Layne:
Right. That it's good that we all value dependency and interdependence. And the customs of these places look a little bit different because they value interdependence a little more, whereas we value it also, but a little bit less. So it's just the moving this sort of subtle moving of these knobs, if you will.
Jesscia:
if you can see, you can see the knobs that she's moving.
Layne:
One of the things I'm worried about in a podcast is that I am so physical in the way that I speak, which does come from preschool teaching of needing to like, command a room or to my body and get really big like it's a grisly.
Jessica:
That's why we don't waste a single movement and we post these videos on YouTube.
Because it's important that they're seen.
Layne:
Yeah, so for the listener, I'm addressing imaginary knobs of cultural values. And so in that same way, like if we could draw from the way that we now know how to like respect and value different like ethnic cultures if we could bring that back into our own communities and say, We all value interdependence and independence, we all value connection, we all value, like personal responsibility. We all value, personal health and wellness and growth and spiritual wholeness. Like everybody says yes to all these good things. The person you think is the parent who's like, the most different from you, doesn't not value, really good things that you do there. It's just differing levels of this is what's of primary importance to me. These are where my values land right now. And it really is just a very subtle difference in prioritization. But if we could remember that it's all coming from this very core place- everyone loves their kids. The people who are are genuinely like harmful parents love their kids and are doing their best
Jessica:
Totally. And I'm thinking through, if you and I do something totally different. And one of us might actually do it better. Say that one of us does it better and I come to you and I think I do it better. And maybe for the sake of this analogy, like I actually do it better. And maybe I'm coming at you so aggressively that there is absolutely no way you will hear me because I'm coming at you accusing you so now you actually have to defend why you're doing what you're doing. versus me coming where you're standing and like, Oh, okay from over here where you're standing. I totally see why you would do it like that. Can I tell you something that I've learned? That's a little different and it might help. And if you don't want to do it, that's okay. But if you do, I really think it would add some value to your life. That's such a different approach.
Layne:
That's so winsome, like, wins me over.
Jessica:
Yeah, exactly. And so then, then you have a conversation and then you could even say, Oh, actually, I've heard that before. No, I'm not interested. Or maybe if I'm more desperate, I'll try that. But right now what I'm doing is working just fine and I could still be right.
Layne:
That's not the thing I'm gonna work on right now.
Jessica:
I'm actually fighting another battle right now that you can't see and that's taking more of my energy. That's why my kid eats the way they do in front of you. And you know, there's so many other pieces and what we know is that parents are these tender souls trying to do a good job, trying not to be the reason their kids in counseling 20 years down the road. And we're all a bit insecure and we all when we find something that works, there is this sense of like, this is working, everybody should do this. What we have to be careful of is the next thing of and can you believe that those people do it differently?
Layne:
I think there are kind of like three sort of threads that I see through what you just said. One of them is unsuccessful communication, which is kind of its own thing, but then there's another one that's fear and then there's another one that is that excitement when something is working. Also, we live in a world now that is so public, we just feel like we can see each other all the time, and we can see way more of each other than anybody who ever lived before.
Jessica:
But there's still so much of the story we don't see.
Layne:
So there's this incredible fear and one of the one of the dark things that fear does is it makes us reactionary, like, you know, it causes us to feel under threat sort of all the time. Whereas if we could just say I feel afraid because it's so important to me that I take good care of this child like that would stay in a really beautiful, vulnerable, manageable real zone, but because we feel like we're so under threat, everything everyone else does, we've sort of reflected back on ourselves. And then it's very important, like our brain does this thing of parsing like am I on the right side and then everyone else is on the wrong side. Or they did something different now. Does that mean that old thing I was doing was wrong and I had to shift to them no well, great then I need to push their thing away from me.
Jessica:
It was like what I described before if I'm careful to listen to parenting content, because my mind goes crazy and I'm like oh my gosh, am I doing it wrong? I must be doing it wrong. Well what damage have I already caused? It's the fear just running wild.
Layne:
Oh gosh, yeah. The what damage have I already caused? When you get new information and you're like, Well, I didn't eat that way when I was pregnant so I guess I ruined my kids.
Jessica:
I found out people don't have sleepovers because it's the safest way according to some people, right? And when I learned that, Eloise had already had a sleepover and she's not asleep so some people don't have sleepovers, and they believe that's the safest way and that's really good. And so that caused me to reassess do we do sleepovers?
Layne:
If we could just start with like, everybody taking moment to picture the most reactionary mother that we know and say like, maybe that's actually the person that we know who's the most afraid?
Jessica:
Oh, yeah. That's sweet, right?
Layne:
Because it's helpful to just loves her children and is doing her best. Which then again, leads into the fear that creates this unsuccessful communication loop.Where we do want to be able to share and help one another and that eureka feeling of like, oh, I have a piece of knowledge that's going to change things. I should give this everywhere. Like that's also so beautiful and cool and exciting. But depending on where we're positioned, it either feels like a beautiful gift, or not for you, but you can celebrate with your friend or like an absolute threat to your house of cards that you're trying to hold together.
Jessica:
And something really empowering for the mom or dad, as the caretaker, the primary caretaker in your home is that you get to be a culture setter. You get to be the one who kind of defines, like, what are the values that you guys care about and live out? If we aren't intentional about setting the culture, the culture will still be set- a culture is still existing in your home. And so it's really an empowering thing, especially for the mom who's like oh, well now I'm here taking care of my kids, I pretty much never have anything to show for it. I work work work and I'm really tired and the house always feels messy even like cleaning it all the time or I'm always making food and cleaning up food. But if you can go into it like this isn't actually that different from working in a corporate world and or any other leadership position where you bring values to life in the way that you talk to one another and the way that you handle conflict and the way that you handle personal failure, or joy or celebration or holidays. You as the primary one in the home or primary ones get to define that for you guys and that's really fun and beautiful and I think something that you can tap into especially if you're in a season where it feels hard to see the fruits of your labor- tangible, measurable successes, is just setting the culture defining it for yourself, because then it gives you the framework for how are you going to handle something you don't have to always know what you're going to do in every particular situation. But if you have your values laid out as a family, then it'll be easier to guide you in a moment when you might otherwise be reactive. If Shaun and I have language around our values and our culture, then it helps us to talk about stuff that's happened throughout the day and how we chose to handle it-to navigate that. If Wilson is having a meltdown of some kind and Shaun is talking to him about it and then he removes him from the room and he comes to me he's like, Well, I did this because I want to help him understand that the way he acts affects everybody in the room. And if he's going to react in a way that is so loud or like maybe his sister, they're both toddlers- he's wanting to teach him that there's consequences to our behavior and even if we feel big feelings, that doesn't mean we get to just overhaul the whole rest of the family. We want to teach them emotional maturity, emotional stability, that you can have the big feelings but just because you feel something doesn't mean you take over the whole environment. And that helps us so then we talk about it more easily and even a little deep, a little more deeply than if it's just like, oh, yeah, I had a meltdown. I took him out of the room. Okay, and then I might be thinking, Oh, I would have never taken him out of the room. And he's like, Oh, I did the right thing. I took them out of the room. And the questions are like, Why or is there a better way? And a lot of times in parenting, you're just figuring out the better way. So maybe you do something for a time and then you're like that this isn't working so good. What's the next better way? The language around your culture helps to explain why you do certain things and then helps you to understand what needs to shift if it does.
Layne:
I love that. I think that that also probably helps you feel a little bit more stabilized on the fear front as well as in community. There's grounds to stand on. Because you've thought about where you want to stand. And like there's a way to I think dispel some of them.
Jessica:
And maybe you find the common value, like, oh, we do this because of this. And we do this and we actually share the same why but we do the what differently than what it is. And so then we could even put ours to the side and be like, Oh, I like yours better. we're accomplishing the same thing, but I love the way you're doing that. I'm gonna do it. But I'm on my third kid, and I've been doing this now for a while. There's way more confidence that comes now with me where maybe it's partially because Eloise is still alive and okay, so I have less like, Oh, I'm gonna, I'm gonna screw it. I'm gonna blow this whole thing up. You know? I feel less of that. Whereas I remember when Eloise was a baby. If I saw moms do things differently than me, the fear would take me over -I'm like, Oh my gosh, she's not eating properly. She's not napping properly or, you know, some people have the sleep setting like really light and bright and loud and then others do like blackout everything. And when you're inside of this new motherhood being like, well, what's the right thing and my child's actually not sleeping either way or you know, it just feels so overwhelming. So there is something to just the fact that I'm seven years in and three kids later and ease that I didn't feel even a year or two ago. I don't know. I just feel like it's worth saying to the new mom who's like I feel lost.
Layne:
Oh, yeah, we all we all have that need data to go on? Yeah, baby just got here. So thanks for nothing.
Jessica:
Yeah. So much of parenting is just guessing and hoping that it works. And if it doesn't, trying a different thing, and that's okay.
Layne:
There's a Wendell Berry poem called Mad Farmers Liberation Front. And it's crazy. It's a crazy poem. It's a manifesto really. And one of the things he says in it is be like the fox who actually… I have it oh my gosh, it's right here. Oh, it’s why it's on my mind because I was just looking at the it earlier today. It says be like the fox who makes more tracks than necessary, some in the wrong direction.
Jessica:
Oh my gosh. What? We should end the podcast- that was beautiful. Yeah, guys, we're gonna go in the wrong direction. That's all of life with everything. Calm down. I’m talking to myself now.
Layne:
Yeah, that's life. That's life. Make more tracks than necessary. Some in the wrong direction.
Jessica:
Oh my gosh. What? That was so good. I just want to end the podcast. That was great.
Layne:
That's why it's in, the notebook that I just grabbed is my, like, 24 year old me writing my whole philosophy of teaching basically to go at the beginning. It's a big giant binder of I mean, it's like a whole year's worth of preschool curriculum.
Jessica:
That's amazing. But it started with the poem that we all need it today. That was really beautiful.
Layne:
I'm glad you like it.
Jessica:
No, I think because what you guys can know is I'm a bit of a perfectionist. I'm a firstborn. I'm sure that that plays a role. I also experienced some dysfunctional stuff as a kid, I'm sure everybody can relate in their own way. And so you start to take on responsibility for things and want to get everything right because that's the secret to being happy and well is just do it perfectly.That is just never gonna happen. And it is a huge letdown if you live your whole life trying to do this perfectly. That's not real. That's not relationship. That's not no, it doesn't work out as a human.
Layne:
No, those same life circumstances of being a firstborn and having a few little dysfunctional areas in the early life has led me to like paralysis sometimes. This need to really, really get this right. So putting that poem in there I think was me as a super young woman trying to be like, this is so important. How do I and then learning you just try and be like, Well, yeah, not this way. You children, super sorry about this. I know it's inconvenient for you. I hope this doesn't cause a tantrum. But I need to turn this around.
Jessica:
That's right. Oh, you guys. I hope that was as good for you as it was for me. That was a really good time. Okay, one question. Oh, this is from sweet Rebecca from the community from very good mothers club online community. We have this amazing membership community. We do calls weekly. I would love for you to be a part of it. And that's where we're taking our questions initially is from those members. So Rebecca has an almost 20 month old Chloe, and she said hi, Jess and Layne. I already watched the first episode on YouTube and I loved it. What are your thoughts on discipline for an almost 20 month old? Chloe doesn't act out too much. But we have put her in timeout a couple times. But does she even understand it? It's a great question. I hear you. That's so confusing.
Layne:
Yeah, that's a really good question. No, she doesn't understand it. So that's just sometimes it's nice to have just like a really straight line. Nope. I just like it when people tell me the part that is very crucial and then go ahead and give some context. So no, they're different takes across the board on where and when timeouts. are useful and appropriate. For very young children it doesn't make sense. There is a role for like removal from the situation in a way that is connected to it. So really what you're doing with a 20 month old is there's no good and bad for her. There's no right and wrong for her- that just doesn't make sense that she's so new to existing and she's just really exploring her world. So what she's looking for are any ways that are successful to meet her needs. So what your job is to do is to show her what will be successful and what will be absolutely unsuccessful every single time. I don't know what kinds of behavior you're experiencing. OH gosh, I'm trying to think of an example.
Jessica:
Yeah, say because Jules is a similar age, a couple months older, but around that time they're seeing issues to maybe like snatching a toy from a sibling or family member or hitting or losing their mind crying throwing a tantrum in a moment that is not they're not hungry, they're not tired, they're just upset.
Layne:
Yeah, let's do those like playing with siblings playing with family members even playing with you Rebecca as the parent but like, close interactions with your family members, where there's like the snatching of the grabbing or the hitting register those kinds of things that are like little and quick, very impulsive, trying to get what she wants. It’s very important that she practices the feeling of frustration that for her if she's used a lot of it, okay, she's doing a lot of hitting hitting hitting like Jules is like hitting Wilson a bunch because she wants the thing that he has. For me I like I'm a quick scoot you away. Not in a whole separate room kind of thing, but it's a move you away from the thing so that you feel frustrated- absolutely can't have what you're trying for. And then the mentalizing of I see that you really want that toy. I love that you're playing with us. Only people who treat each other with respect are going to be playing here right now. So if you want to be gentle, then you can come right back and you bring it back in, you demonstrate the gentle hands. You say what you do want her to do, which if you're seeing this is like really actually not discipline. It's training. You're showing her like, do this. Oh, no, that was those harmful hands again, I'm going to scoot you away because I don't let anybody treat Wilson like this. I touch him gently and respectfully and if you're listening, I'm doing a lot of gesturing. Would you like to come try? No. Okay, that's no problem. You can stay there. As soon as you're ready to come back and play with us. You're very welcome to come back, we're playing in this way. We're not playing in that way. But you're very welcome to come back as soon as you. So it's very quick and clear and connected to what's happening. Because all you're trying to do is give her successful tools. So that hopefully Chloe will then just drop the unsuccessful ones because what she wants is the toy or to be close to you or to have or whatever, she was just looking for the ways to get her needs met in life. So make it really frustrating and unsuccessful. which I also want to be very frank with you there will be reactions too- you're gonna get tantrums sometimes you're gonna get some of those more negative reactions because she'll feel that frustration but her underneath drive is not to do the wrong thing or give you bad behavior, it's to get the thing that she wants. So in your relationship, you're creating it to be frustrating for these unsuccessful behaviors and it's really positive and immediate and sweet and good for all of these successful behaviors to dump the old tools and build the good ones.
Jessica:
Yeah, that makes so much sense. It's a weird time that she’s in because she’s almost at the point where some of this is clearer and easier. I know that for us with Jules, she's getting it a bit more but having older siblings in the house helps a lot in that way because Jules sees timeouts for other kids like Wilson you can't do that to Eloise go in the other room so then she's watching like, oh, okay, there's some there's a consequence you know, helpful, but when it's the first little one which Chloe's the first. It's all just going to be parents and child. I think if I remember right, Chloe, the childcare that she goes to during the day I believe is with a family member. So she's not in a preschool setting. Sometimes seeing the other kids also is helpful. But then can be a whole new challenge. And so anyway, that was fantastic. So guys, if you want to join our online community, get on the calls with us. You can be meeting other families you can experience in coaching from me and Layne is sometimes in there and other amazing moms. Dads are always welcome- we say that all the time. We've just found that dads are slower to join. So we're going to figure out the strategy there. But that is where we're taking a lot of questions right now. We also are retooling our website. So we say that you can go to our website and submit a question. I hope that that is true.
Layne:
Check! By the time you hear that probably is.
Jessica:
Yeah, but if not, you can definitely DM us privately. We're always looking for questions to answer but like the most effective way is get in the community because then we know you and can see and it'll be great. And we'll see you in a weekish.
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