Expert advice for busy moms from a parent coach

This week I have a fantastic guest blogger!

I asked Sheryl Stoller of stollerparentcoaching.com  an experienced and wise parent coach for advice on how us busy moms can deal with all the demands and pressure we face.

In this era of supermom so many moms are exhausted and overwhelmed. What’s going on?

• Message Overload
• We are bombarded by messages. Only a mom with many clones(!) could successfully fulfill society’s many and contradictory demands and standards. Yet the messages are so compelling and pervasive that we try.

• Human behavior and physical limits
• We’re in survival mode for non-survival issues.
• The mechanism to avoid being killed in the wild required that we be alert for the next out-of-context thing because it could kill us.
• Today that mechanism is triggered by emails, tweets, adrenaline-fix-shows etc. as well as by real and present dangers.
• This ongoing heightened state depletes our reserves, exhausts our system and makes us prone to disease.

• Huge effort is required to counter the pressures we feel
• Our efforts to resist this fast paced, never-fast-good-smart enough world also drain us.

How does this overextended mommy syndrome affect our parenting?

• Poor decision-making
• Exhausted parents cannot possibly make the great decisions they would make if they were not exhausted.
• On high-alert, we react in fight/flight or freeze mode rather than whole brain thinking mode.
• In this overextended, exhausted, high-alert, and low reserves state, it is virtually impossible to be energetic, clear headed, and attentive enough
• To figure out what we truly believe is necessary to do right by our kids, to be good parents and to follow-through
• To effectively understand our child, build and communicate love and confidence, and be appropriately available when and how our child needs us.

• Harmful attitudes towards our child result when we are in this state.
• We have unreasonable expectations for ourselves and our child.
• It is too easy
• To measure and define ourselves based on our child’s behaviors
• To approach our child as a threat or obstacle that we need to overpower or avoid.
• Tolerance, patience, insight and compassion are hard to come by.

How does self-care impact our parenting?

• Better parenting decisions
• It’s a paradox. When parents do not practice self-care, they make more selfish parenting choices. Consider this: When we have not taken care of ourselves, what we say or do with our child is our brain’s attempt to figure out “What works for me in this moment with my child?”, not “What do I think is called for from me as a parent that is in my child’s best interest?”
• Optimizes the positive influence and impact we have on our children
• Modeling is the most successful teaching method to instill values and life-skills.
• When we take care of ourselves, we model for our child how to make choices based on what is healthy and wise for one’s own mind, body and spirit.
• The children who have learned how to listen to their own inner voice and needs, how to value themselves and how to do their own self-care are the ones who say “no” to everything from junk food to sex, drugs and alcohol, and “yes” to what enables them to know, grow and bring their gifts to the world.

• What a fantastic “Win-Win” for parents and children Self-Care is!

So, what would you say to all the super-busy moms out there?

• Notice
• Next time you lose your temper with your child, consider noticing how well you had taken care of and paced yourself beforehand.
• Next time you take a deep belly breath, exercise or eat healthfully, notice the effects on you and your child.

• Start with one doable step of self-care and continue on
• Find one thing to think about differently.
• For example, “When I eat, I am going to savor the taste and texture in my mouth, the fragrance as I inhale. I will let my whole body and mind think and feel pleasure.”
• Decide on and take the next “one step” you can take for yourself.
• Repeat.
• When you reach a plateau or decide to optimize your progress, reach out for support.

• Use Self-Talk
• Make time for silence, to hear your own inner voice. It enables you:
• To take advantage of the full capacity of you whole brain
• To notice your body’s and mind’s early messages
• To get clear about what messages and life-skills you are sure you want your child and the adult s/he is becoming to master.

• Remind yourself that by taking care of yourself:
• Your child will learn to do the same
• You optimize how well you take care of your family and how well they will know, grow and bring their gifts to the world.

• Know You Matter!
• The world needs the gifts of each child to flourish for the world to flourish.
• You need to flourish to enable your child to flourish.
• Your self-care is a requirement, not a luxury, for you to fulfill your responsibilities as a parent.

• Enjoy living life!

Sheryl Stoller, PCI Certified Parent Coach^® and founder of Stoller Parent Coaching, is creator of Whole Brain Living^TMand Parents Re-Group Calls^TM. She collaborates with parents, organizations and state planners to customize steps that create lasting positive changes in children’s behaviors, motivation and development. A gratified, seasoned parent coach and Oak Park, IL mother, she devotes herself to providing parents the effective support and guidance by phone and in person that get parents the results and life they want for their family. She invites you to contact her at sheryl@stollerparentcoaching.com

ninamanolson

Nina Manolson, MA, is the founder of Body-Peace®.She helps women end the war with food and body and finally feel truly at home in their body—as it is.

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