Solo Parent Life | Single Parent | Divorce | Single Mom | Single Dad

One of the best things about this podcast is that we have such a fabulous community. I am thankful for all the comments and questions, and so this week I wanted to change the pace just a bit and tackle one such questions I’m seeing more and more often: How can I take care of myself while my children are away?

Ah, yes. Times of separation from our kids can be painful, uncertain, and difficult to manage. When we spend so much of our time and energy making sure our children are happy, healthy, and cared for, it can be jarring to not have those concerns 24/7. What can we do to take care of ourselves when we have this time? I want to show you in this episode that time away from your kids can be a gift in disguise. I’ll share some of my best ideas, and I hope to hear your self-care ideas in return. Together, we can do this thing!

Want even more cools ways to get involved? Sign up for the Solo Parent Newsletter, and find all the information about the Single Parent Summit coming up soon!   

In this episode:

• What are we doing for ourselves when our children are away?
• Understanding and working through the grieving process.
• Not just dealing with loneliness, but embracing it.
• Healthy habits you can use to work through childless times.
• How to handle anxiety when your kids are away.
• My suggestions for re-filling your bucket.
• Plan something to look forward to.

Books I love

Radical Acceptance by Tara Brock

True Refuge by Tara Brock

Links

Join the Newsletter on my Website!

http://soloparentlife.com/

When a marriage ends, the effects are far-reaching—from the emotional, psychological, logistical…and financial. I’m sure for so many of us, the last thing on our minds when we begin our Solo Parent journey is our finances. Eventually, the bills start rolling in, and we have to look at the bank statements up close. Houses get sold, finances that were once shared are no longer in a joint bank account. Who can you turn to when you start swimming in dollar signs?

Enter Shawn Leamon, host of the “Divorce and Your Money” Podcast. Shawn is a Financial Planner and guru who is passionate about being there for folks who are living through a difficult time. Separation and singlehood can bring us many complications, so Shawn is here to help. Let Shawn’s experience and savvy be your guide in this info-packed episode of “Solo Parent Life.”

• Shawn shares his first suggestions for post-divorce financial decisions.
• Putting your finances in perspective with the long-term.
• Hear Shawn’s three major goals for your finances.
• When it comes to reaching your goals, start somewhere and start small.
• Discussing the differences between the types of financial planners and advisors.
• Removing the fear out of finding a financial planner.
• The Big Question you need to know before choosing a financial planner.
• What is this crazy word “Fiduciary” and how can it impact your future finances?
• Interviewing as a free education process for the world of finance.
• Common money management practices. Get informed now!
• Preparing for all live events, both big and small.
• Start investing today with “Robo-advisors.”

Links

Find all of Shawn’s episodes and advice at

https://www.divorceandyourmoney.com/show/

Once you embark on the Solo Parent Life, there’s a period we all experience when we have to start making some mental shifts. Life as we understood it is changing. As daunting of a task as that might seem, it is also an opportunity to re-define your family. It is a chance to dive right into something new and better than before. That is just what Theresé Connolly did.

Theresé is a Mother to one boy and champion of Parents and Families who are ready to grow and develop healthy mindset habits together. Theresé was divorced shortly after relocating, and she found herself alone in a new place. Instead of letting life roll over her, Theresé decided to jump into her community through her son’s school and workshops. Now, Theresé is beginning a new journey as a Parenting and Life Coach. Ready to see how she did it all? Listen and find out!

• Theresé shares how she is refocusing her career post-divorce by shifting her focus from therapy to coaching.
• The challenges we face when co-parenting.
• Theresé shows how we can dive into our community and open ourselves up to ease the transition into the Solo Parent Life.
• Obstacles to co-parenting can be overcome through a strong community support.
• How our personal growth impacts what we can give off and support in others.
• Learning to be present by creating rituals about how we are in our home.
• What is a “Rose” and how can it help with bedtime? Theresé shares this simple technique.
• Learn a mindset of starting the day with gratitude.
• Parent Coaching and Life Coaching can create a sense of value and foundation.
• Create a Family Mission Statement to enhance your values.

Links

http://www.mindfulkidsandfamilies.com/

The school is ending, and change feels imminent. For a single parent, these times can be both amazing and lovely, but difficult and trying at the same time. Given that season's ebb and flow with the times, it is important to take time to pause and give gratitude for all the wonderful things we have in our lives. When you are living the Solo Parent Life, nothing could be of more importance than a community of good people to support and care for you. When that community reaches back out, well that’s just icing on the gratitude cake.

Amy Rice Jones reached out on a local single parenting group with how much the podcast has impacted her life. Her journey is inspiring and ongoing, and the kind of story worth sharing. Amy teaches us how to be present. Be present with your kids; be present with yourself. Join In with the big story this week, and take heart for this season of change and transition.

 Show Highlights:

• The leaps of faith towards living with another single family, and the support that it has given along the way.
• Struggling to leave a career in order to support her family.
• Changes in how we interact with our kids and becoming “present” with them.
• The importance of self-care as a single mom: daily meditation, guided imagery, and moment by moment mindfulness.
• The value of Life Coaching, therapy, and exploring courses on wellness to help balance your life in single parenthood.
• The trickle down effect of mindfulness towards your children.
• Teaching children to feel the full range of emotions.
• The importance of connecting with a broader community by joining groups on Facebook.

Are you struggling to figure out how to work your finances so that you can build a really solid financial future for yourself and your children? If so, you will really benefit from listening to today's show, with Tanya Steinhoff, a Financial Advisor and also a local mom!  Listen in, as Tanya helps you understand how to take ownership of your financial life.

It can be really hard to make the right decisions about money, over time, as the children get older and things evolve and change. Tanya works with young families and also with single mothers after their divorce, helping them to understand their money and budget. She shows them a good way of thinking about how to budget and helps them to move forward with the different phases that everybody seems to go through, in their journey towards retirement. Listen in today, as Tanya talks about some things that would be helpful to you, as single parents and offers you a great number of resources and books to read, to build a good, solid financial future.

Show Highlights:

• Tanya talks about her background and about what she focuses on, in her business.
• How Tanya actually helps people and the services that she provides.
• The importance for newly divorced women to understand that they need to take responsibility for their finances.
• Great books to read to help adults and even kids understand more about finances and investments.
• Why Tanya really believes in educating people about their money.
• How Tanya helps to get her clients get up to speed on budgeting and cash flow.
• That some people struggle to come to terms with a new lifestyle, after a divorce.
• Not talking to your kids about money, or your financial limitations will eventually do them more harm than good.
• You really need to understand and move beyond the baggage that you carry from childhood, around money issues. 
• Tanya's ongoing assistance for her clients
• Tanya's focus on her client's human capital, and it's real worth to them in their career, or to make money.
• Why you need to have an Emergency Cushion and how to create one.
• Some great tips for investing.

Links:

Tanya's website: www.redwoodgrovewm.com

Tanya can also be found on Facebook, Twitter, and Linkedin.

Books: Prince Charming Isn't Coming by Barbara Stanner

           The Elements Of Investing by Burton Malkiel and Charles D. Ellis

           Raising Financially Fit Kids by Joline Godfrey

Do you feel like your lawyer can give you the best financial advice during your divorce? Today’s guest thought so too and ended up making some very costly mistakes. Her mistakes motivated her to become a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst so that she can help others avoid the mistakes she made.

Melanie Johnson lives in Austin, TX and her firm specializes in helping people who are going through divorce sort out their finances and plan for their financial future. Clients may be trying to figure out how they are going to survive with reduced income or may be trying to figure out how to pay for college and other aspects of their children’s lives. Melanie specializes in making sure you are covered financially in every aspect of your divorce. She uses the facts and the numbers to show you the real cost of decisions, so you can make the best ones for you and your children!

Show highlights:

• Melanie can enter the picture at any point in the divorce process.
• With divorce, you get one chance to get your finances right before the papers are signed.
• Even though your divorce attorney is working for you, they don’t have the best answers about your money, so you need additional expertise on your side.
• Why you want to look for a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst to help you through the divorce, rather than just a Certified Financial Planner.
• Examples of assets that are commonly forgotten in a divorce and how they are valued.
• One consideration of home value in a divorce that is often overlooked and could be very costly. You want to be prepared for changes in the real estate market!
• Even if you pay the bills in your relationship, you may not have a complete picture of your financial assets. There could be 401K’s, IRA’s, Health Savings accounts or other assets you have no idea exist.
• Things you need to be aware of when considering the cost of staying in your home for the sake of your children. You don’t want to miscalculate and end up squandering your retirement nest egg just to stay afloat.
• Kids can always get a loan for college, but you can’t get a loan for retirement. Don’t sacrifice your retirement for your child’s college education if you can’t afford to!
• Documenting post-divorce expenses before you sign off on the divorce papers, it almost always helps the situation.

Resources:

Melanie’s Website - www.divorce-financial-solutions.com Second Saturday Divorce Seminars - austindivorceworkshops.com or secondsaturday.com

Have you ever felt like you are a bad parent? Maybe you’ve felt this way because your child is having a meltdown in the store and you just won’t give them what they want. There are lots of other situations on a daily basis that can test our limits as a parent. Today’s show will offer some alternative methods to help your child through these moments of discomfort, in a way that will make it easier for you to parent in the long term.

Today’s guest is Taylor Ross. Taylor is a local parent consultant and I wanted her to come on the show today and talk about her role in consulting with parents and what she does to help parents stay connected to their children. She’s specifically talking about how to deal with those uncomfortable moments as a parent. 

Taylor has a passion around having relationships that build connection and trust and parenting is her specialty. She helps in a variety of situations, such as behavioral issues or family dynamics.  She offers guidance and support to parents struggling to find a connection with their child when they are struggling with difficult emotions.  She helps families build a more connected and loving relationship between the parent and child.  

Show Highlights:

• Ways parents can take care of themselves and connect when their child is having strong feelings
• Ways you can teach your kids how to have a healthy relationship with disappointments.
• It is important to be able to give yourself an “out” when you aren’t prepared to parent compassionately in the moment.
• Just because we hold a boundary, doesn’t mean we can’t be empathetically connected with our child in the moment.
• The uncomfortable moments in parenting are opportunities to connect and deepen our parent/child relationships.
• Ways to be kind to yourself and engage in self-care.

Connect with Taylor:

thepracticeofparenting.com

[email protected]

My guest today is Jax Anderson, of Psykotherapist.com. We are in a Facebook group for therapists together that focuses primarily on marketing, especially through videos. Jax’s work is primarily with teens, and she’s created some cool videos about how to talk to your teen, along with other helpful resources for parents, teachers, and counselors. Two topics that Jax is passionate about are helping 8th graders transition to their high school years, and how to manage a bullying situation. Join us!

What you’ll hear in this episode:

• About Jax: she’s a Scorpio from Wisconsin who started her private practice in 2014, and she fell into work with teenagers in the second phase of her counseling career, after a short stint in law enforcement
• The difference “being real” makes with teenagers
• How we give teens a safe place to be themselves: Be congruent
• The “adults-in-training” perspective
• Preparing teens for high school: The worksheets and topics in Jax’s summer series
• Why repetition is CRUCIAL for teens
• The biggest topics for teens entering high school:
  • Making/maintaining friends
  • Managing a bully
  • Communication
  • Confidence
• The value of role-playing and modeling
• How to deal with bullies: don’t ignore them, use sarcasm, and don’t stay and engage them
• Learn the best responses to a bully
• What a bully wants: to feel superior

Resources:

www.psykotherapist.com (Visit Jax’s online store, watch videos, and check out her blog!)

Does your teenager have anxiety? Being a teenager is hard enough, but add to that peer pressure, social media, school testing and relationships, and it’s no wonder that many of today’s teens are facing a very real battle with anxiety. 

If you'd like to learn how to become a pillar of support to your teenagers, to help them through this really challenging time in their lives, listen in to today's show, and find out from Robbin's guest Lorraine Platt, who is with Teen Solutions.

Lorraine and her husband, Richard do some really good work with teen girls and boys and their parents. Today, Lorraine, who is both compassionate and a wealth of knowledge, talks about the hot topic of teens and anxiety. Listen in now and find out how you can really support teens, with all that they have coming to them.

Today, Lorraine talks to Robbin about:

•The high levels of stress for teens today.

•Where she becomes concerned about the stress turning into worry.

•What she sees coming up with teens who are battling with stress.

•The most important message that you can give to your child: You're enough and I love you exactly as you are.

•The need for boundaries with parents and teens, to create a sense of safety.

•The need to rest and integrate and recover from the necessary stress.

•The importance of healthy downtime in teen's lives.

•That boredom has value in stimulating creativity.

•A good boundary to use- taking away your teen's cellphone at night.

•That it's never too late to create boundaries with teens.

•How important it is for your teen to feel connected to you and supported, if they're experiencing anxiety.

• Finding balance, to relieve anxiety.

•Creating the space for your teen to hang out with you... and not with their cellphone.

•Ways that teens tend to try to have control and slow things down in their lives.

•Why teens tend to resist so much.

•That the expectations placed on teens today are higher today than they were in the '70's and '80's.

•Ways that you can begin to connect meaningfully with your teenager.

Links:

For Robbin's Infographic, go to: www.soloparentlife.com 

For Lorraine's blog, go to: www.teensolutionstherapy.com

My guest today is Cindy Witteman, from San Antonio, Texas. She’s a former single mom of three girls who has created a non-profit called Driving Single Parents, Inc. She finds and donates a car, with the license, tax, and title paid, to a needy single parent. Single parents often find it difficult to secure resources and support, but Cindy’s inspiring story shows what can happen with a heart to give back and help others. Join me for Cindy’s story!

What you’ll hear in this episode:

• How the non-profit grew from her personal experience with single parenthood and the need for transportation
• How Cindy finds and chooses the single parents
• The qualifications for recipients: A valid Texas driver’s license, car insurance, and a single parent
• How Cindy hopes to expand the program and gain more funding
• The first recipient, John, who lost his wife and his leg in an accident
• Why single parents often feel alone and without help
• How this program can be duplicated in other communities
• Cindy’s first idea of providing child care for single parents, and why that didn’t work
• How the idea of providing vehicles came about
• The situation when walking, biking, and public transportation are simply NOT options
• How to make donations to help
• Being a single parent: when people stop answering your phone calls

Resources:

www.drivingsingleparents.com

Email Cindy: [email protected]

Call Cindy: 210-251-5666

Donate to Driving Single Parents here!