In this insightful & eye-opening episode of the Fresh Start Family show, Wendy Snyder chats about how to hit our most important parenting goals by keeping your nervous system chill. She kicks things off by talking about the usual struggles parents face, especially with those strong-willed little ones โฆ and then breaks down why it’s so important to ditch the fear-based, punitive tactics that only crank up the stress.
Throughout the episode, Wendy digs into why a regulated nervous system is a game-changer for parents practicing powerful positive parenting and she also shares how our own childhood experiences shape our reactions which then carry into how we parent.
Tune in to learn practical tips for spotting these patterns and get real, actionable advice on calming yourself. Youโll even hear Wendy share some vulnerable, personal stories about her journey from being reactive to more responsive in parenting, encouraging us all to be more kind to ourselves along the way.
Ready to parent with a settled nervous system?
What if you could be an effective, firm & kind parent WITHOUT relying on fear, force, bribery & rewards?
Imagine learning a new way of firm (AND kind) parenting so you can end painful generational parenting cycles and create family legacies & memories YOU are proud of?
All while getting your kids to cooperate with your rules and boundaries with ease.
IMAGINE โฆ
Parenting your kids with calm & confidence each day in a way that causes them to do whatโs asked of them because they WANT to (not because they HAVE to) โฆ because youโre helping to build essential life skills that have them behaving well & being respectful when youโre NOT looking!
The Firm & Kind Parenting Blueprint is your step by step plan & video training to help you build the family of your dreams. Click HERE to learn more now!
Episode Highlights:
- Recognize the influence of a dysregulated nervous system on parenting responses and the importance of healing it for effective parenting.
- Moving away from fear-based, punitive parenting tactics to foster a calmer, more supportive home environment.
- Incorporating self-calming and nervous system regulation practices into daily life as a parent.
- The value of surrounding oneself with a supportive community that cares about personal liberation and family legacy.
- Embrace self-compassion and understand that overcoming generational parenting patterns is a journey.
Resources Mentioned:
- Follow Wendy on Instagram
- Donโt miss the Unfrazzled 4 day FREE event – save your spot here!
Not able to listen or prefer to read along? Here’s the transcript!
0:00:29 – (Wendy): Well, hello there, families, and welcome to a new episode of the Fresh Start Family show. I’m your host, Wendy Snyder, powerful, positive parenting educator and family life coach. And today on the show, I want to chat about how we can achieve our parenting goals with a relaxed, nervous system. How can we do this when reactivity is something that I think so many of us, if we’re being honest, struggle with? So when my team and I pull our community, which is you guys on the podcast, I’m also recording here live on Instagram today, and also our. Our private students inside of our fresh start experience, when we poll everybody, we always come to really the same results.
0:01:15 – (Wendy): And that is when we ask you guys, what is really your biggest pain points in parenting? Oftentimes, or I will say the grand majority of the time, most of you say your number one struggle is with your strong willed kids, right? So the ones that are born, the button pushers, the ones that are, you know, just. It feels like they say no. Like it’s their job. They’re really good at negotiating. They have huge emotions.
0:01:42 – (Wendy): They feel on a very intense level. They go for what they want. They’re persistent. They just have high levels of courage and risk takers, and they learn by doing and all these types of things. You always say that that’s kind of your number one pain. Point is, if I could just get these kids to listen and cooperate easier. And I don’t want to rely on threats and fear and force and punishment and raising my voice and yelling. But these kids are really difficult, right? They can be a high, high level degree of difficulty to parent.
0:02:16 – (Wendy): And then second place is always. Number two is always, I wish I could be more responsive versus reactive in my parenting walk. So, um, basically it’s like the yelling, the not so gentle wrist grabbing, the aggressive tendencies, or the reacting, the fixing. For me, I became a door slammer. Um, I was never a door slammer before I had kids. And then all of a sudden, I had all of this, like, anger and rage that would come out of me when my little girl wouldn’t put on her shoes or keep her hands to herself, right? So that’s always been, number two is responsive.
0:02:51 – (Wendy): I want to be more responsive as a parent, but I just struggle with reactive tendencies. And then number three has always been, I would really love to learn how to discipline in a way that is different than how I was raised. So many of us were raised with punishment, fear. You know, if you make a mistake, there’s going to be a price to pay, and it’s going to usually involve getting hurt, harmed, humiliated or shamed. Right. And that was just kind of the classic model of what parents thought.
0:03:20 – (Wendy): Well, what parents were told, what parents were taught, that is the effective way to teach your kid an important life lesson and to get them not to behave again is basically you scare. You scare them, you scare them into submission or you make sure that they feel really, really bad about what they’ve done and feel the pain of their mistake. Now, we know so much more. We have so much more psychology and research and data about human development and the brain and just all of these wonderful resources and tools to help us do things differently. But that’s kind of usually how the row of when we tally or when we pull you guys, you say that those are your biggest pain points. So today, and really, this whole month here at fresh start family, we are focusing on that second segment, which is the responsive part. Right? How do I become more responsive as a parent so I can really handle the highs and lows of parenting?
0:04:19 – (Wendy): Because we all know that parenting is not just rainbows and butterflies, right? It does include so many days where you just feel really stretched thin and your child is going to have misbehavior. That is the way of humanity, by the way. Human beings are going to make mistakes, right? Like, that’s just what makes part of what makes us human. And we all want to be able to handle those challenging moments or the conflicts or the moments when we really do need to redirect misbehavior.
0:04:51 – (Wendy): We want to be able to do it with grace and dignity and respect and be able to stay in a place where we behave in a way that we want our children to mimic. Right? And to be able to behave and speak and act in a way with our little human souls that we later feel really proud about instead of feeling guilt and shame or regret when we lay our head on our pillow at night. Right? Would you guys agree? So let’s just start off with our point number one. If we want to really achieve our parenting goals with a relaxed nervous system, what is the reality of where most of us are at today?
0:05:33 – (Wendy): And again, this is not going to be all of you, but those of you who can kind of relate to my story will really resonate with this. And I’m going to. I’m going to bring in some, some discussion around the nervous system today so you guys can actually understand what’s happening. Because I think as parents, we, and especially as women, especially as moms, we are just so good at beating ourselves up. And there’s a reason for that.
0:05:56 – (Wendy): There’s a reason for that. We’ll talk about that. But we can just be really hard on ourselves and feel like we should know better or do better, when really what we need is actually more compassion with ourselves. Because it makes sense why we are so frazzled, so to speak, why we feel so rattled when our kids misbehave. It’s a lot of times it’s because of the way our nervous system has been conditioned. So let’s just kind of state the facts and the reality of where most people operate from when they have a strong willed child. So let me put that in there, because not all parents struggle with reactivity. And I, in my six years of doing this, and really, I’ve been an educator for almost ten, but owning fresh start family for six years now and working with thousands and thousands of parents from all over the world, I’ve watched how a lot of parents can stay in a pretty responsive state and, like, not get into this zone where they’re like, why am I flipping my lid all the time? Who have I even become?
0:06:57 – (Wendy): Like, this is. This is not who I am, right? Like, I was never so frazzled and stressed before kids, and now I am. Most parents who don’t have a strong willed child can get through raising human souls without, like, having this be a big pain point. But those of us who are blessed with a strong willed child, this is, I think, the differentiating piece. Because the reality is, for most of us who have a strong willed child, since we weren’t really set up to understand, how do you influence a strong willed child, right? Most of us inherited the hand me down parenting toolkit, which is the classic four fear, force, bribery and rewards.
0:07:43 – (Wendy): So it’s all external control based, right? So if you want to get a little human being to do what you want, you just use one of those four things, right? You just threaten to take away their iPad, or you threaten to punish them, or you raise your voice and you intimidate them, or you go on the flip side of external controls, which is you basically trick them into submission, right? You care, you dangle the carrot and, you know, give them a jelly bean if they stay in their bed or go pee pee on the potty. And then everything’s going to fall into line, right? And it’s like, hell no, it doesn’t happen with strong willed kids.
0:08:18 – (Wendy): The classic for often we find in families, and this was absolutely true for us, is they made things worse. They did not cause Stella to just fall in line and keep her hands to herself or, you know, be respectful or be able to self regulate when she was upset. And instead of smacking her brother, step into the backyard, right, and take a deep breath, like, no, none of it. None of it was actually working.
0:08:45 – (Wendy): But the reality is, is many of us who have the strong willed child end up falling into those patterns where when anything happens, it feels almost like a panic sense, right, where you. It almost feels. It ends up feeling. Where it ends. Ends up feeling like every misbehavior is a fore alarm fire, right? So even if they’ve just spilled their milk or they’ve just rolled their eyes or they’ve just kind of had an attitude about picking up their toys, it can feel like, for many of us, this rush comes into our body, and all of a sudden, it’s just like, that’s where the yelling comes from.
0:09:27 – (Wendy): Or the, you know, the harsh tone or the finger in the face or snatching an iPhone out of a child’s hand of, like, that just almost feels like an uncontrollable. I will make you stop now because I cannot handle you misbehaving anything any longer because it’s just not okay. Right? Like, it is so outside of the box and outside of our comfort zone to air quotes allow a child to be unruly or disobedient or disrespectful or not be listening, especially if there’s people around that.
0:10:04 – (Wendy): The reality is, is we end up again, like, operating with this very frazzled nervous system. Because here’s the deal about our nervous system that I want you to understand. Our nervous system is designed to keep us safe. It is a magnificent, brilliant part of the human body design, but it gets triggered, and it will behave in a way that it knows how to behave, right? And so, you know, for me, I turned 47 yesterday. I had my 47th birthday.
0:10:35 – (Wendy): 47 years young. And so before I started learning this stuff, my body, for 40 years, because let’s just call it. Yeah, let’s just call it 40. It was really, like, 35 when I started stepping into the land of powerful, positive parenting work and nervous system regulation and started to understand what was going on inside of me, inside of my mind, inside of my nervous system. But let’s just call it three decades, right? So for three and a half, it actually was three and a half decades, my body had kept me safe and alive by seeing the world in a certain way, right? And a lot of that was because it was conditioned for the first 18 years of my life to watch the people who took care of me, which were my parents?
0:11:18 – (Wendy): How did they react when challenges presented themselves? Whether it was in parenting, career, neighbors, traffic, the news, whether, like, what is the body supposed to do, so to speak, whether it was what you say, what you do, how you think, the way you move, the way you act, the way you behave. I watched people I love and trusted, right, for 18 years behave in a certain way. So what happens? And we’re going to cover this a lot in our unfrazzled free day for live train free four day live training event that starts on June 24. So if you haven’t registered for that yet, make sure you do.
0:12:00 – (Wendy): You can just send me a DM on Instagram with the word unfrazzled or head to freshstartfamilyonline.com/unfrazzled. So we’re going to talk about this more there. But what happens is the body or the nervous system will actually soak up the feeling and the tone that was from your childhood, and it basically adopts the same feeling that was in your house. And so, for most of us, mistakes and misbehavior had a high level of danger associated to it. So there was so much unsafety when things weren’t going your way, when someone wasn’t doing what you wanted, or when there was conflict, when there was a disagreement about, you know, anything, there was danger. And so the body learned, the nervous system learned to go into protection mode.
0:12:56 – (Wendy): And so protection mode shows up in many different ways for a lot of us. Um, but in parenting it later down the road, ends up showing up in those reactive patterns. The yelling, the putting your finger in a kid’s face, the lecturing, the fixing. Right? Like, the fixing is so huge, too, that I want to talk to you about in a minute. But it’s just so interesting because for many of us, it can be a reaction that’s not even for the big ones. Right? So, like, when your child is about to run in the street, or does run in the street, or if your child’s going to hit their sibling, or about to touch a hot stove, right? Those are things we think of where we’re like, oh, it makes sense why we would have a strong reaction, and we would yell or grab a wrist really tight to get a child away from a hot stove.
0:13:51 – (Wendy): But for many of us, what we end up realizing is we’re reacting with this, like, very frazzled nervous system just to, like, the most simplest misbehaviors in our kids, right? So, like, yes, maybe they are refusing to get buckled up and you’re going to be late for church or they do end up winding. Like, winding up and chucking a Lego right at you or a sibling. But what is strange, if we’re being really honest, is how everything seems to ignite the same rushed emergency feeling in your body these days, even if it’s just when your child spills their milk or rolls their eyes.
0:14:36 – (Wendy): Right? And so I think a lot of us are like, man, how could it be that things feel so chaotic when you just have a little four year old that you’re just trying to get them to put their shoes on and a six year old that you’re trying to get buckled up in the car and, you know, whatever a teenager that you just need to, like, pick up their dirty dishes so mold doesn’t grow in their room, but it ends up just feeling so chaotic if we’re being honest.
0:15:01 – (Wendy): And so a lot of times, we’ll end up thinking like, this is not what we signed up for when we decided to be a mom. And what I want you guys to understand is, from a nervous system perspective, it just makes sense, because the truth is, most of us were raised with a parenting model that used fear and emotional manipulation tactics to coerce or force us into action or submission. And so, really, even the most loving and well meaning parents adhered to this model and didn’t quite realize the long term damage it would do to a nervous system, which, again, is perfectly designed to keep us safe but highly responsive to sensing danger.
0:15:50 – (Wendy): So, feeling rattled when kids misbehave is a result of a nervous system conditioned to believe there is always danger lurking. Does that make sense? So it ends up feeling like, quick, act fast, lay the smackdown. Jump in and save the day. Try to be an octopus with eight arms. Do it all or else you’re failing. Quick, go, go. There’s no time to think correct and discipline fast. Or else. Can anyone relate to this feeling?
0:16:23 – (Wendy): So, logically, we know that a child who refuses to eat their veggies or share a toy isn’t the same as a bear chasing us. But our nervous system reads it the same when it’s been been conditioned to respond to fear for 18 plus years. So, over time, our nervous system adapts the tone and feeling of our childhood home, especially when mistakes were made or presented themselves. And that tone that I’m talking about, that a lot of us experienced in our homes growing up were, was, was. And again, this is around mistakes, disconnection, or, like, this is around when there was a disagreement or a challenge, right? Which is part of being human.
0:17:11 – (Wendy): If you are going to be like, if you are going to be in a home with other human beings, there, there’s no getting out of having challenges or, like, making mistakes. That’s just part of being human. Right? So it’s not like we’re measuring. Did your home have more or less. Right? Like, it’s just the fact that all of us grew up in homes where there were challenges and there were mistakes made. So what was the tone when that happened in your home?
0:17:38 – (Wendy): Was it one where people felt, like, relaxed and it was like, hey, look, we all need to self regulate. We’ll come back together once we’re, like, to a neutral state where we can actually speak to each other with respect and I can teach you with dignity and grace. Because right now, like, I’m going to go take care of my emotions because I know I can’t be a great teacher when I have fire coming out of my head and I’m, like, tempted to hurt you, right? Like, I know I can’t be an effective teacher and nor do I want to do those things. So I’m going to go calm myself down.
0:18:12 – (Wendy): We’ll come back together. I want you to self regulate. Everybody makes mistakes. Mistakes are opportunities to learn. And there’s nothing wrong with you. You’re not an alien. And of course you’re going to be held responsible for your mistake. Of course we need to work out this difference. But right now, everyone’s heated. We’ll come back together once we’re down to neutral, and then we’ll work things out. Right? Like, did you have that growing up?
0:18:35 – (Wendy): Hell, no, I didn’t have that growing up. It was like if there was a disagreement or misbehavior or an argument, it was like, felt like it was the end of the world. Uh oh. Someone’s going to flip out. Someone. Someone’s going to get in trouble. Like, when I was little, my biggest memories are. One of my biggest memories is being chased around the fireplace with a paddle. Like, there was serious danger, right? So our little bodies were, like, brilliant. Like, when there is danger and when you are scared, like, and even if it wasn’t physical, I want you guys to understand that emotional harm is just as scary to a child. And so we learn to run from that, too. We learn to, like, fast fix it, do anything to avoid emotional pain and also do anything to avoid physical pain, right?
0:19:26 – (Wendy): But for most of us, we didn’t have that safety. We didn’t have that, like, neutrality and co regulation. Like, we had danger spikes. We did have yelling, punishments, shame. What’s wrong with you? What were you thinking? A lot of people had just heavy levels of disappointment. I expected better than you. Like, you know what you’re doing and you’re purposely choosing not to get straight a’s. Like, I expected more from you, right? Like, that type of disappointment is also something our body learns to fear and run from because it just is a lot, right? So you get the. You get the gist there.
0:20:11 – (Wendy): And so understanding that. That, like, you’re just not. Like, you’re not. Now that you’re a parent and you’ve been blessed with a strong willed child, you’re not just choosing to be a yeller. You’re not just choosing to be a not so risk, not so gentle risk grabber. You’re just, like, still operating with a dysregulated nervous system that is trying to keep you safe. And what we always say is that our brilliant nervous systems will choose a comfortable hell over an uncomfortable heaven. And what that means is your body will do what it’s used to doing.
0:20:53 – (Wendy): And so, again, when you’ve watched somebody react like a volcano to misbehavior mistakes or challenges or disagreements, your body just knows how to do that really fast because it’s never been trained, so to speak, to, like, get through discomfort and feel safe at the same time. Like, what I call the rainbow, so to speak. It’s like, take it, for example, a child who is having, like, a really big emotion about something, right? Like, maybe, you know, if you have a memory of, like, you didn’t get the cookie that you wanted when you were young or you wanted to stay later at a 4 July block party and you weren’t able to, and you had a really big emotional reaction to that.
0:21:40 – (Wendy): Most of us were not given the opportunity to, like, fully feel our emotions. We didn’t have parents who just, like, detached and just said, hey, I’m so sorry you’re upset about this. And, you know, if you need to cry, cool. But we’re going to go ahead and brush our teeth and get ourselves to bed. We can comfort you. We can hug you. It makes sense why you’re upset. You were having fun, and now we need to go to bed. And you’re not crazy for having this big emotional reaction. No.
0:22:10 – (Wendy): A lot of us had parents who were like, you better stop that crying right now or else I’m going to give you something to cry about and stop being ridiculous. We stayed at the party till 09:00 p.m. like this. You know, just stop it. Like, there was just a lot of stop it messages given to us growing up. Right. And before we become fluent in this work, that’s kind of what we tend to do with our children is just stop being so emotional, stop being so dramatic, stop being so difficult. And so we try to, like, put this band aid on the misbehavior by just, like, fixing it fast. Because we are so uncomfortable with the rainbow, so to speak. Especially, like, that top part of the rainbow when it is the most uncomfortable, where someone has made a big mistake, where siblings, let’s say, for example, are crying because one has hit another, and it’s like, just feels so out of control because it feels like you’ve taught these kids 17 million times how to work out their differences without hitting, right. And then here you are again.
0:23:18 – (Wendy): It’s a Monday morning, and once again, they’re fighting. There’s tears, there’s drama, and it just feels so uncomfortable that your nervous system is like, I can’t do this. I need to fix this fast. And so then you just snap back into the old ways of fixing, putting the band aid on, using fear force, bribery, rewards, whatever you need to, like, fix it fast. Does that make sense? So that is what I’m referring to as the comfortable hell. Because even though those of us who may admit that behind closed doors, we have reactive tendencies, which was, again, my story the first year, two, three years that I was learning this work. I was so highly reactive with Stella, and surprise, surprise, she was highly reactive as a toddler.
0:24:09 – (Wendy): But it’s like, it doesn’t mean that it’s going to go away overnight. It doesn’t mean that just instantly you’re going to snap your fingers and have a regulated nervous system one day. But it just means that having that awareness around why it’s happening can just help you bring in some of that self compassion of, oh, this makes sense. I’m not choosing to just flip my lid. It’s just my body, and it’s trying to keep myself, keep me safe.
0:24:40 – (Wendy): And even though it doesn’t actually feel good when I yell, especially later at night, when I realized that it was just a dropped cookie on the floor that the dog ate, like, I didn’t need to scream so loud and scare my toddler, right? Like, one of my biggest stories I often tell is when I came into the bathroom one night. I think Terrin was, like, four years old, and I was juggling bathtubs. So I had kids in two bathtubs because my kids were always, like, big fighters, and I was like, it’s just easier to put them into two bathtubs than it is to try to, like, monitor them, like, keeping their hands to themselves. It just felt like it was going to be a more relaxing half hour. And you guys know, if you have little kids, we will do anything to find relaxation in that five to 07:00 hour. Right? Like, you’re just at the end of the day, and you’re just so tired, and you just want to, like, have your kids be joyful and giggling instead of fighting and dramatic. So, anyways, my little guy was in the guest bathroom. Stella was in my bathroom, and I was just kind of going in between bathrooms to make sure they. They stayed safe.
0:25:50 – (Wendy): And I had told Terrin before to only put a little drop or two of the bubble bath. I remember at the time, it was like this Burt’s bees organic bubble bath, and I just bought the big container to save money, right, like, if you buy it in bulk. And it was like, I don’t know, it felt like it was, like, $17 or something for this big bubble bath, which felt like a big investment right at the time. And I came in, and I just remember seeing bubbles everywhere. And he looked at me and kind of smiled and was like, look, mama bubbles.
0:26:20 – (Wendy): And he had poured the entire freaking thing in the bathtub. And I just remember flipping out and screaming and being like, I told you not to do that. And he’s always been, like, my more sensitive. Um. I mean, his heart is so huge. Every single one of our children have the most incredible, unique, like, superpowers, but Terrin’s superpower is his heart. He’s just like his father. Like, he cares so deeply about people. But, of course, in this. In this moment, he was so hurt that he shook. He literally flinched and shook. And then he looked straight at me, and he just started bawling, crying, and I was like, oh, my gosh, what have I done right? That feeling of, like, what is wrong with me? And so I went into my bedroom, and I just cried.
0:27:19 – (Wendy): And I just remember saying to myself, like, what is wrong with you? What is wrong with you? Like, it’s not that big of a deal. You just literally freaked out on your little boy, and at the same time, also juggling the thoughts of, like, but it was $17 worth of bubble bath. And, like, I’ve told him before. And then the other thoughts of, like, I’m just so tired. I want to give up. I want to run away. I’m just, you know, why is parenting so difficult?
0:27:46 – (Wendy): And then I got my tears out, and I went back in the bathroom. I mean, it was probably three minutes, but it felt like an eternity. And I went back in the bathroom, and I was like. Because by this time, I had learned what? Like, that humility was a strength, right? And so I had learned, thank God, that taking responsibility and making amends with my children was such a form of true power as a parent. And I walked in, and I was like, Terrin, I am so sorry. I was like, oh, my gosh.
0:28:14 – (Wendy): You did not deserve to be yelled at like that. And I am very sad and mad that the bubble bath is all poured out, and you never, ever deserve to be yelled at. That is just mommy learning to heal my nervous system and handle challenges with dignity and grace. And he just looked right at me and he said, mama, it’s okay. Everybody makes mistakes. And that was, I think, one of the earlier moments where I realized, like, wow, I’m really.
0:28:54 – (Wendy): I’m really changing things in my home for my little boy already at, like, three or four years old, to be giving me that message that there was nothing wrong with me, that I was not an alien, that I wasn’t broken, that I shouldn’t air quotes, know better. I just was, you know, I just was a human, and I had made a mistake. Everybody makes mistakes, mom. Stella also delivered, like, a really beautiful message to me once that also helped me realize that, like, helped me just bring more and more self compassion and walked me off the ledge. She said to me one time after I was, like, flipping my lid and trying to put them straight to bed at, like, a very early hour, which used to be, like, one of my big go tos when I had reactive behavior as a parent.
0:29:46 – (Wendy): She looked right at me. She held my hands. I think she was probably, like, seven. It was, like, right around the same time of that bubble bath thing, because the kids would fight, and I would get so triggered, and I would just, like, get so angry. But she looked right at me. She held my hands, and she said, mama, please, please don’t do this. She said, we can still start fresh tonight, and we don’t have to go to bed like this. And she said, look, I’m only been a mom for seven years.
0:30:12 – (Wendy): And she said, I sorry, I’ve only been a kid for seven years, and you’ve only been a mom for seven years. We’re just figuring this out together. Terrin and I are going to learn from this. I think they probably had hit each other or something. She said, we’re going to learn from this. Trust me. And you’re learning. We’re in this together. My kids, like, and again, by this point, I was like, oh, I’m doing a pretty good job. I might not have my reactive tendencies, like, completely chilled out yet, but holy smokes, I am teaching my children something that I never had at that age. Right?
0:30:49 – (Wendy): So, anyways, so that is just the first step, you guys, that I want you to be aware of is understanding a looking. Like, really looking at where you’re at from an honest perspective and just admitting, okay, so I have reactive tendencies. Again, like, whether you are a door slammer or a not so gentle wrist grabber, I do have some pretty intense stories that I tell openly and honestly because I want.
0:31:17 – (Wendy): I care more about you guys not feeling alone, then I care about being judged. But I have written an article. You can google it. It’s called I left bruises. And it. It was a reactive moment after my little guy, that same sweet little boy, who’s now almost 14 years old, had a meltdown in the middle of the street after he had, like, this, like, steroid treatment for his asthma, because he would always get, like, really bad asthma after he got a cold and he was having a complete meltdown in the middle of the street, would not come home. He was, like, demanding to go to his friend’s house, and.
0:31:53 – (Wendy): And I remember the moment where I was, like, dragging him home, and I I just remember in the moment I chose, it was not like I accidentally, you know, like, how we’ll candy coat stuff a lot because we feel so much shame about it. I I don’t candy coat it anymore because I don’t feel shame about it. I have regret, and I had guilt, and that’s why I made amends, and that’s why I created this company, fresh start family, to help other families not have the same things happen over and over again.
0:32:21 – (Wendy): But I don’t have shame about it. So I will tell you that in that moment when I was dragging him home, trying to get him in the house, I purposely chose to, like, push harder as I was squeezing his arms. I just really remember that moment. And it wasn’t until, like, the next night he was in the bath, another bath night with my sweet little boy, that I looked down, and I saw my fingerprint marks on his bicep.
0:32:49 – (Wendy): And again, like, another moment of just, oh, my God, what is wrong with me? And I’m pretty sure I was, like, maybe might have even been certified to teach at this time. So don’t think that just because you’re a certified educator, like, you snap your fingers and all of a sudden, these reactive tendencies are gone. But I just remember thinking like, wow, what’s wrong with me? And then because I was knee deep in this work and had children who were actively reminding me, mama, there’s nothing wrong with you.
0:33:18 – (Wendy): You’re just healing. You’re just learning. You’re just doing things different than the way you were raised. I was able to again make amends after that night, make sure my little boy understood that he never deserved to be hurt or treated like that and learn and continue to heal my nervous system. So I stopped having the reactive pattern like that. Right. So I do want to talk to one thing before we move on is, you know, when it comes to the reactive tendencies or that frazzled state.
0:33:50 – (Wendy): So a lot of us, I find that a lot of you that find me and resonate with my voice and my work, you do have those, like, aggressive tendencies, right? But then there’s a lot of you who your reactive tendencies are more the freeze or the fun. So you are more like, you quickly go to the people pleasing, or you quickly go to permissiveness, giving your kid whatever they want. If they just stop crying or if they’ll just stay in their bed, maybe you’ll nurse them till they’re four years old. If they just stop crying or go to sleep.
0:34:28 – (Wendy): Some of you have more of that. You’ll do anything to stop the pain of the uncomfortableness because you feel so, your nervous system feels so safe, but your reactive tendencies comes out in more of the fixing and the doing. And then there’s some of you also who it comes out in the just control. Like, there’s a lot of control. I see this show up a lot with kids with, like, eating and clothing and school habits, right? So the parent ends up like the dysregulated nervous system and the reactive pattern show up in the high levels of control, which in the long term end up causing a child to not learn how to take care of themselves, which is problematic, too.
0:35:17 – (Wendy): So there’s all different types of reactive behavior. And I hope that you’ll be able to resonate with at least some part of that, because again, I just find such power in humility. And if you want your children to be able to respond versus react to challenging situations, whether it’s with their sibling or a classmate, or when they don’t get what they want, or you say, no, you can’t play another iPad game, you’re going to want to look at your own habits first and help yourself change, because that’s going to give you the most power as a parent.
0:35:56 – (Wendy): Okay, second thing, if we are really wanting to achieve our parenting goals with a relaxed nervous system is we want to just see the challenge as an opportunity. So what would it look like if your life was absent of that challenge? Pain or suffering. Right? So we just kind of put in. We wrapped it in a bow, so to speak. Why it is so painful to live with a dysregulated nervous system. Right. I will tell you also, for me, it translates into my body. Like, I’ve always struggled with headaches, and when I am stressed, my headaches come on. So for many of us, not only is it just like that feeling of, like, oh, I feel out of control and I feel guilty and shameful when I lay my head on my pillow at night, and I don’t want to hurt and harm and scare my kids into submission, but I keep doing it.
0:36:51 – (Wendy): It’s not only that, but a lot of times, it’s like, also the physical manifestations that stress inducing parenting tactics can bring in. So you just. I just want you to picture for a moment, and what’s fun is I now get to sit here and share with you more of what it feels like to kind of sit at the mountaintop, so to speak. Because my kids are almost 17, almost 14 now, and we’ve been doing this for 14 years, right? So we represent, like, what it looks like to have high levels of fluency, of powerful, positive parenting. So relationship based, firm and kind parenting strategies tools. Compassionate, discipline, regulated nervous system throughout challenges.
0:37:36 – (Wendy): Doesn’t mean you’re perfect, but it just does mean that we represent, like, over a decade of practicing all of this at a high level. Now we get to show you what it looks like, and I get to talk about what it looks like to have teens who are thriving in the world after being raised with all of this type of strategies, mindset, tools, all that kind of stuff. Right? But you, many of you, are just going to have to imagine it.
0:38:04 – (Wendy): What would it look like if you really felt confident that when your child spilled their milk or pulled the dog’s tail or the kids were fighting and you might still feel scared that they’re going to hurt each other, but you felt confident and relaxed with how to handle that misbehavior in a way that brought calm into the chaos instead of adding chaos to the chaos. Like, just imagine what would it look like if you became more of, like, the firemen, so to speak, where you’re bringing in water and you’re putting that on the fires and it’s just de escalating.
0:38:48 – (Wendy): Things are settling. There becomes more peace and safety in your home. Your children start to take responsibility for their mistakes on their own without you forcing them or shaming them or making them say, I’m sorry. They start to just come to you and say, hey. After I took a few minutes to calm down in my room, I realized I don’t like the way I spoke to you, or I’m going to go make amends with my brother.
0:39:18 – (Wendy): Or they feel confident, like, not succumbing to peer pressure once they’re teenagers. Right? Like, how would it feel if you watched your children become very empowered in other ways besides fighting and arguing, right? So many of you who have power, kids, you’re stuck in cycles where the fighting that you’re doing with your kid is actually a way that’s making them feel powerful and making you feel powerful.
0:39:46 – (Wendy): Traditional punishment is like a classic pseudo way to feel powerful. That is such false power. So it never really feeds your true need to feel powerful as a parent. It just makes you feel in the moment like you’re puffed up and you’re powerful, when really in the end you feel completely powerless. Right? That is such a huge part of our work here, is we teach parents how to have true power in your discipline.
0:40:10 – (Wendy): But just imagine, like, you are confidently disciplining in ways that teach important life lessons with grace and dignity and end up causing you and your child to feel closer together after a big challenge happens instead of like, pulled apart or disconnected. Can you picture that? I know for a lot of you it might feel hard because you never had it as a kid. And then as you’ve gotten older, it’s like. It just kind of feels like, well, this is just the way it is, but just imagine. And if you want, just look to me and listen to my stories because we really are in this stage of life where we’re just thriving with our kids and we’re watching our kids thrive in the world, be able to handle challenges with that dignity and grace that we’ve worked so hard to model to them over the years. And now we’re at the point where we’re watching our daughter go for with gusto, a d one beach volleyball scholarship. She actually has some calls this week with coaches at her top two schools.
0:41:19 – (Wendy): And it’s just so wild to watch this little strong willed girl who I was so worried was going to be an outcast, was going to get kicked out of school, was going to be the, like, just the death of me and like, I was going to be stressed out from now into eternity because of Stella. Now, just to see her taking that beautiful, strong will and using it for such good in the world, there’s a good chance that she’s going to be able to score beach volleyball scholarship. In beach volleyball, they don’t give full scholarships. They don’t get many full scholarships. So she’ll.
0:41:57 – (Wendy): There’s a good chance that she’ll be able to use her strong will and her tenacity and her perseverance and her courage and her risk taking capabilities to really go for the beach volleyball scholarship, but also to go for a music scholarship to kind of supplement the other part of these very expensive tuitions at these schools that she wants to go to, because that’s been part of her strong will journey is we. We got her into drumming when she was a kindergarten, and she became a very proficient, high level drummer, which is very rare and unique, right, for women.
0:42:33 – (Wendy): And so it’s just wild now sitting in this place where not only is she thriving in the world and in her friendship groups and sports and music and school, but she’s also, like, just so wildly connected to us and feels safe. And, of course, that doesn’t come without mistakes. There are moments of discipline, there are disagreements. There are long discussions around behavior and what we learned from mistakes and how we’re going to do things differently tomorrow.
0:43:02 – (Wendy): But it just feels so good. And I’m really thinking that this is going to be my biggest accomplishment in life, is raising my children with this type of relationship based, connected, abundantly safe environment in our home. So can you picture it? So seeing the challenge as an opportunity and just getting in touch with what it would look like in your life if that pain and suffering was absent for you is a really great way to get what you want when it comes to parenting with a regulated nervous system.
0:43:44 – (Wendy): Okay, next point is you’ve got to learn how to show yourself compassion again. It makes sense how you got here. Automatic or autocratic upbringings create stress nervous systems. They just do. You guys, there’s no way to get around it. If your parents use the classic model, fear, force, bribery, rewards, external controls, punishment, shame, disappointment, it makes sense why you have a stressed, dysregulated nervous system and why it needs healing. Right? Bring compassion to yourself. It’s not your fault.
0:44:19 – (Wendy): You shouldn’t know better. You just met me, right? Or you’re just learning. It’s going to be a journey, and that’s totally okay. The biggest thing is you just want to step in to learning and start actually doing the work to heal your nervous system instead of just being like, oh, well, that sounds nice, right? Like you actually want to do it unfrazzled starts June 24. Is going to be such a great opportunity to do that again. You can just dm me the word unfrazzled on Instagram. I’m at fresh start, Wendy. It’s a really easy way to get registered for that free four day live training for 1 hour live trainings.
0:44:57 – (Wendy): You can watch the replay. You don’t have to be there live, even though there is massive magic in being there live. So just keep that in mind. Okay, number four I have for you is to achieve your parenting goals with a regulated nervous system. You are going to want to learn self calming and nervous system regulation practices and really be in a state of both proactive nervous system regulation and, like, understanding how to signal safety to your nervous system in those heightened moments. In those moments of triggers.
0:45:36 – (Wendy): So. So both are very important. So it’s like you want to be consistently putting gas in your tank, so to speak, right? Like, I’m just about to wrap this podcast episode and head to a doctor’s appointment right now, and I will not get to my doctor’s appointment if I don’t have gas in my car. So as far as, like, taking care of your body and practicing signaling safety throughout the moments of life, um, are just as important.
0:46:06 – (Wendy): I would actually say even more important because then when it’s time, when the milk does spill, when the kids are fighting and scratching each other, when, like, whatever happens that you feel triggered and you need to actually, like, self regulate fast, faster, I should say, like, the practice you’ve done in the proactive moments or. Yeah, the proactive moments. That’s what’s going to cause you to actually be able to have success in those moments where you need to, like, bring yourself down a little bit.
0:46:36 – (Wendy): Signal safety, which then gives you access to your creative brain. So then you can critically think, how am I going to solve this problem in ways where you can remember the tools that I’ve taught you versus just snap into that comfortable hell that I spoke about earlier. So it’s important that you actually learn and start incorporating self calming and nervous system regulation practices, which we are going to be diving so deep into this fall.
0:47:07 – (Wendy): Inside the fresh start experience, we’re going to have four months of targeted and specialized workshops on nervous system regulation practices, especially when it comes to parenting. So it’s going to be so good. Okay, last one I have for you today, number five, is if you want to reach your parenting goals with a regulated, healed nervous system you’re going to want to surround yourself with a community that cares about what I call personal liberation and development and building a family legacy of their dreams. Right? So a lot of us are in communities where people are just not interested.
0:47:48 – (Wendy): It’s just not on their radar. Maybe they don’t have a strong willed kid. Maybe they don’t know your pain. Maybe they just, like, they don’t care about breaking painful generational cycles. Maybe they’re just, like, not interested in, like, exiting the indoctrination that many have received that you have to hurt and harm your children in order to be a godly parent or raise good, kind human souls. Like, there are going to be lots of us have a lot of people around us who just are not interested in learning and growing and evolving.
0:48:19 – (Wendy): And then there’s you who you are. Like, you have something deep down inside of you that’s like, I really care about thriving as a human being, about not just surviving, but actually enjoying my days with my kids. I really care about learning how to influence them with grace and dignity instead of fear and force. Like, for so many of you, you’re just, like, you cannot continue living your life in a way that just, like, doesn’t feel right with your heart and your moral compass.
0:48:51 – (Wendy): So it’s just so important that you find good mentors that have what you want, which I am honored to hope that I hold right, that you can look at what I’ve created both in my own personal parenting journey and in the community that I’ve built at fresh start family, and really see that it’s not impossible. Right? Like, there’s that statement of, it always seems impossible until it’s done. Well, we’ll show you how possible it is, right? We have hundreds and hundreds of families within our fresh start experience that have really done it right, that are operating and parenting in a way that they’re like, man, this feels so good.
0:49:29 – (Wendy): Our success story document is now thousands of pages long that is just filled with hash. Success story. Here’s another example of how good it felt today. To not have to, like, scare my kid into submission or flip my lid when the siblings were fighting or the kid got out of his bed again. So, like, do you have that community that you can surround yourself with, um, that is also interested in healing and regulating their nervous system?
0:50:01 – (Wendy): Okay. It really is not crazy for you to think that you can create the family legacy of your dreams and that you can end painful generational cycles. It’s just. And then again, it’s just the best feeling in the world. So surround yourself with people who are also interested in that. And again, unfazzled is just the best opportunity to do that. We will most likely have a few thousand parents in engaging and doing unfrazzled with us, and it’s just going to be so, so good.
0:50:28 – (Wendy): So that’s a wrap, you guys. I’m going to head off to my doctor’s appointment. Thanks for being here with me as we chatted about how we can achieve our parenting goals with a relaxed nervous system. I love you guys. Thanks for listening. And now’s the perfect time to go get registered. Freshstartfamilyonline.com/unfrazzled or just shoot me the word unfrazzled in a DM on Instagram. I’m reshartwendy.
0:50:51 – (Wendy): All right, I will see you back for the next episode. And also inside of unfrazzled very soon.
