Simple Families

I frequently hear from women who are diagnosed with ADHD after entering motherhood. Those who are diagnosed with ADHD often struggle with executive functioning. In short, executive functioning is our ability to plan, organize, and coordinate life. And as you know, parenthood has a way of pushing our executive functioning skills to the max. In today’s episode, I’m chatting with Yakini Pierce of ADHD Love. Yakini and her two children are diagnosed with ADHD and she’s sharing her journey and work with us.

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I find it confusing when we are told that as parents we need to set boundaries. We need to hold our ground. But so often when we do that, we end up in power struggles. 

Power struggles can happen in any relationship. They are especially common in the parent-child relationship. It happens anytime the parent and child both want their way…and they refuse to back down. As a parent, I don’t want you to back down. But I want you to practice meeting your child in the middle. I would ask if power struggles are a thing in your house, but I already know they are. Because essentially, raising children is one gigantic 20+ year power struggle as we are launching kids off to be independent humans. We are slowly letting go of control little by little by little and handing over the power every day. Some days it’s a smoother transfer of power than others. 

Even though power struggles are present constantly in the parent-child relationship, don’t always have to be messy and complicated. Especially if we can catch them early and strive to hand over a little bit of that power to balance things out. Today, I’m introducing a 3-step approach to do it simply.

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Today, we are discussing interoception. If you don’t know what that means, you aren’t alone. You might be surprised to learn you know more about it than you realize. Interoception is sometimes called the “Eighth Sense”, it’s the sense of the entire condition of the inner body, including hunger, temperature, pain, and the need for the bathroom. I’m joined in conversation with Occupational Therapist and Interoception Expert, Kelly Mahler.

Today’s Sponsor:

Recess, use coupon code SIMPLE20 for 20% off your first purchase.

Get in Touch with Kelly

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The COVID vaccine is going to be available for younger children in the coming weeks here in the U.S.. I don’t know about you, but this has been on my mind for some time. Today, I’m sharing my decision-making process. This episode may or may not resonate with you–and that’s okay. In this chat, I’m joined by NYC pediatrician Dr. Kelly Fradin. I walk through my own decision with her and she answers questions that listeners submitted to me.

Links to Get in Touch with Dr. Fradin:

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Parenting is one of our most important jobs in life. But we also don’t get formal performance reviews like we do in the working world. Sometimes that can leave us guessing. 

How am I doing? You want to know, right?

Since there isn’t a formal review process, we tend to look to the world around us to evaluate ourselves. One common way that we decide whether or not we are doing a good job is by looking at our kids happiness. If the kids are happy, we must be doing okay. Right? If they are unhappy, we must really be botching things up, right?

Or sometimes we look at the outcomes of parent-teacher conference, the kid’s grades, or grandparent commentary

Often, these things can result in a lot of self-doubt for us as parents. 

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Today I’m bringing you a live recording — Your simplicity questions answered!

We just moved into a new house. We’ve been renting for almost a year and found a permanent spot right down the road. Even though it’s not a far move, it’s been a big move. Big life transitions like this can feel really out of control. There’s always unexpected stress. Unexpected tasks. Unexpected emotions. 

If it feels like you are constantly “Putting out fires”. Jumping from one crisis to the next. Like parenting is one big uphill climb—you can never find that easy, flat road. You don’t feel like you have a baseline to return to in times of struggle. Then this episode is for you. 

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Back-to-school season can feel busy and stressful–especially this year. In today’s episode I’m answering some of your back-to-school questions. Heads up, next week I’ll be starting a one-week special offer on Simple Families Foundations.

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As adults we are accustomed to a certain type of communication. Usually, it involves spoken word and it’s fairly civilized. That’s not always the case when it comes to communicating with our kids. 

Our children are still developing the ability to regulate their emotions and tolerate frustrating circumstances. The result is that often they communicate with more emotion than we are used to as adults. Kids get louder and more excited. Kids often get angrier and yell more. They get sad and cry more. 

These big emotions can be very triggering for us as parents. And what happens is that we get upset about the way our child is communicating and we completely lose sight of the message they are trying to get across. And when we miss the message, things tend to escalate. Things tend to spiral. 

The post Hear the Message appeared first on Simple Families.

We all need to move. But in this busy world, it doesn’t seem easy to make time and space for movement. As our culture has become more sedentary, this topic is increasingly important for all humans–but especially for parents. Our children’s brains develop through movement. My guest today is Katy Bowman of Nutritious Movement. Katy is sharing a bit about the history of movement and how changes in our society has shifted our natural tendencies. We are talking about her new book Grow Wild and how to get kids moving outside–even when there is a lot of whining!

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