169: How to take care of yourself first with Liann Jensen
Liann did not have an easy entry into motherhood.\xa0 Her first child\u2019s birth was pretty traumatic; it was followed by a miscarriage and then very quickly by another pregnancy.\n\n \n\nAnd then by COVID.\n\n \n\nShe was already overwhelmed and then everyone was isolated\u2026and suddenly Liann had a whole lot of anger that she hadn\u2019t seen before.\xa0 She didn\u2019t think things could be more difficult than they were in the immediate postpartum period\u2026and then they were.\n\n \n\nHer toddler, Hewitt, resented the new baby: Liann would be sitting on the couch nursing the baby and Hewitt is rolling on the floor shouting \u201cNO BABY!\xa0 NO BABY!\u201d\n\n \n\nTransitions weren\u2019t a problem before, but now they couldn\u2019t make it out the door to go anywhere.\n\n \n\nLiann doesn\u2019t deny that she was looking for a quick fix.\xa0 She wanted Hewitt\u2019s difficult behavior to stop, so she could stop feeling so freaking angry.\n\n \n\nShe listened to a few of my podcast episodes and realized that she had no self-compassion.\xa0 She saw that she could be compassionate toward other people in her life, but she was unable to extend that compassion to herself (and I know she\u2019s not alone here: this is incredibly common among the parents I work with).\xa0 Every time one of her children had a meltdown it felt like a personal attack on her worth as a person.\n\n \n\nIt wasn\u2019t a linear path for Liann to see things differently; she initially doubted that the new tools she was learning would be useful.\xa0 She was out on a hike with them when they started whining and she realized they were tired and hungry\u2026and so was she\u2026but how did that help?\xa0\xa0\n\n \n\nThen she started to believe that things could be different; that there could be another way. \xa0 She stopped taking everything so personally, which created space for her to be able to see what her children were asking for, instead of seeing their expression of needs as an attack on her for not having anticipated and met them already.\n\n \n\nAnd she also started to understand her own needs, and how she could meet these in ways that might seem unconventional, and that wouldn\u2019t work for everyone, but they worked for her.\xa0 And that\u2019s the important thing: it doesn\u2019t matter whether the solution they came up with would work for anyone else, just like the solutions that will work for you and your child might not work for anyone else.\xa0 What matters is that they work for the two of you.\n\n \n\nHear what the solution was that worked for Liann and her son after he\u2019d been demanding that she put him to bed and nobody else - as well as how she\u2019s learned to ask for and accept help from friends, and how she\u2019s no longer fazed by a baby who has covered every inch of themselves and their crib with poop.\n\n \n\nLiann experienced a number of non-cognitive shifts as she went through the Taming Your Triggers workshop, which is where you don\u2019t just believe something different to be true in your head, but that you take it on in your entire body as well.\xa0 At that point you no longer have to constantly remind yourself about what you\u2019re supposed to do in difficult moments, because the knowledge isn\u2019t just in your head - it\u2019s in your body as well.\xa0 Then it becomes part of the fabric of how you live your life with your child.\n\n \n\nWe can\u2019t know when and how these will happen, but I will say that almost everyone I\u2019ve seen really apply themselves in...