Episode 21: "KNOCK IT OFF!!!" Millennial Moms & Gentle Parenting: Breaking Cycles Without Losing Your Mind

💡 Episode Description:

What does it really mean to be a gentle parent… when you’re running on no sleep, no patience, and were raised on “because I said so”?

In this episode, Kristina and Christina dig into what gentle parenting actually is (and isn’t), how their ‘90s childhoods shaped their default responses, and why trying to do things differently sometimes feels fake, frustrating — or like you’re about to explode.

Kristina shares a moment where she turned to ChatGPT for help mid-meltdown — and immediately got called out by her 6-year-old for being on her phone. (The irony isn’t lost on us.) They talk through those “I’m doing my best and it’s still not enough” moments, and how to parent from a place of connection… without losing your mind.

This episode is for every mom who’s googled “how to stop yelling at your kids” at 10 PM, the ones who feel guilty after snapping, and the ones doing the messy, beautiful work of breaking cycles — while still saying “knock it off” sometimes.

What Is Gentle Parenting, Really?

We break down the definition we wish we had when we first started:

Gentle parenting is an approach that encourages parents to guide rather than control their children. It prioritizes understanding the child’s feelings and needs, modeling appropriate behavior, and setting consistent, compassionate boundaries. It’s about teaching with the child — not doing things to them.

🧠 Key Principles of Gentle Parenting:

1. Empathy – Trying to understand what your child is feeling, even when their behavior is hard to manage
2. Respect – Treating your child as a whole person whose thoughts and feelings matter, even when they’re little
3. Boundaries – Saying “no” with love, and holding limits without yelling or threats
4. Modeling – Showing them how to regulate emotions and resolve conflict by doing it yourself

🛑 What Gentle Parenting Isn’t:
• It’s not permissive parenting (letting your kid do whatever they want)
• It’s not about being your child’s best friend
• It doesn’t mean never getting angry — it means learning to respond rather than react

💗 This Week’s Pink Spotlights:
• Christina: Roe mineral sunscreen powder with built-in brush — perfect for little faces. Thanks to @aloprofile for the rec!
• Kristina: Splitsapp – Splitwise by Peter (for keeping your life split and sorted). 

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Transcript

0:00

I'm Christina and I'm t and this is the Pretty and Pink Again podcast where motherhood meets rediscovery. Hello. Hey, how are you? So when this comes out, will it be your birthday? It will have been the day after my birthday, yes. Oh, the day after your birthday? Yes. So Oh wow. The big three nine. So crazy. Yeah. So we'll be out celebrating your birthday that day. I know, I know. We will. I know, which is so nice. It'll be great. We're gonna do a little girl lunch, and I'm really excited to celebrate. And honestly, I'm going into, so it's the last year of my thirties. Mm-hmm. I have like a couple months on you, and then you'll be in the same situation. But I'm really not scared. I'm not feeling any negative energy around it. I feel like almost, if I'm wearing it with a badge of honor like 39, I feel good and like solid. Honestly, I feel like I'm ready to go into my forties. Yeah. Like instead of being fearful of it, I really feel like I'm like, a lot happened this last decade, and I feel like I'm almost like ready for that, like complete fresh start of a new decade. But I'm excited. You have a new lease on life. Yeah. We went out for lunch for your birthday last year. Yes, we did. And you and I were not in good space. We were not, no. We were bad. No. It, this is a lot of where this podcast actually stemmed from. Yeah. Where some of those discussions that we were having. But it's insane to think about how far mentally I have come. Yeah. In that last year. I always like feel like whether it's like a new year or a birthday, I always try to reflect, I get very emotional. As. Things as time moves on, and especially like with the kids' birthdays, anytime there's like a kind of milestone something mm-hmm. like you're hitting a new something. Graduation that we're like, yeah. End of school year, that type of thing. For sure. I feel like it's time to reflect and that's what I've been doing the last couple of weeks is wow, I feel like such a different person. From that person last year going into 38, I was struggling a ton with my new identity and my new role and it, I just, I feel so far removed from that person in a good way. In a really positive way. I think that. Rediscovery is possible at any phase in your life. I think that it just goes to show our listeners that there's hope and like changing things. Yes. Like you can, yeah. Be uncomfortable. You can be like emotionally unstable. You can be depressed, you can be sad, you can be anxious, you can be overwhelmed, overstimulated. You can be all of those things leading you down this path. And you can say, all right, we need to make a change. Enough is enough. Enough is enough. And not to say that you and I don't on a daily basis call each other or go for walks and fme and storm off because you can't change every everything. Nope. And we're gonna talk about this today. Yep. We're gonna talk about it a lot. You can't change everything, but sometimes putting things out on the table. Create such growth. That then you feel sturdy For sure. And that's why you're going into this next year feeling like you're on solid ground. Yes. And I think that it gives you, it's a opportunity to pause and really look back and give yourself a lot of grace. So I do think sometimes when you can look back at something and really appreciate the journey it's helpful. And so that's what I've been doing as much as I wanna sometimes say, oh, not that much has changed. I'm still struggling with this, that, and the other thing. I No, you have changed. I really have. I've really grown in a lot of ways and. I'm really proud of you. Thank you. You have grown a lot. You're a good mommy. You're a good friend. Thank you. You're a good wife. You're daughter. I love you very much. Thank you. And I love doing this with you. I too know, love talking too to you every week. It's been, I'm mean, I like cry. It's been so fun. I know. It's it's been so impactful in my life to have you in it and to have these conversations and just like hearing people talk to us and listen to us about just what's going on in our personal lives, but not try to have all the answers. This podcast isn't about having all the answers. This podcast is about asking more questions. I know. Getting more, I feel like sometimes, which is so ironic. We're both like teary-eyed and it's I totally agree with that. I feel like sometimes we thought that we were gonna come on this podcast and try to find the answers and all we're doing is asking more questions. Yeah. But it's not in a bad way. It's not in a, oh, we don't have the answers. It's also just like recognizing, we're not reaching, we're not. There's a difference when you're like constantly reaching for the next thing. I'm not reaching for the next thing. No. I'm sitting in what I have and I'm trying to continue to grow. And I know you are too. I know. So this has been so fun. I know this has been great and I can't wait to celebrate yours. I don't wanna rush through the summer.'cause you, not the beginning of September, but tea is gonna be right behind me. Yes. Turning 39 very soon. And we are both 86 girls. We are. So my dad and I are 30 years apart, so are me and my mom. Exactly. It's always so easy to remember that because, so maybe you'll like this idea. So my dad he grew up in like the disco era. Mm-hmm. Like I'm sure so did your mom. And my dad talks about going to the disco. Yeah. The disco. Like it's a. Like it's a verb and out. It was going to the curb. Yeah, it was like going out to the club. Yeah. He would go out to the disco. So I said, dad, we should have a seventies theme, like combined birthday party and we can create like a club.'cause you'll be turning 40 and you'll be turning 70. We can create like a club. Like I love it. It'll be so fun. I love that idea. So I told my par, my mom and my sisters like, dad and I are gonna have a seventies theme party next year we're gonna have a disco. And they're like, yeah, okay. I'm That was your idea, not dad. I know, but I know. But it'll be fun. That will be so fun. And I love that. I love that. It's so cute when you are like. Exactly. Something apart from each other. If you're 30, if you're 20 years apart and it's like you can go, you can celebrate going into the next decade together. It's so fun. It makes some more fun and something else fun to look forward to in another. Yeah. That's cute year. All right, but today we're actually, you chatted about what we were going to talk about today. So we were on a walk just the other day. Yeah. And I said to you, I was like, sometimes I just wanna scream. Knock it off. Yep. Knock it off. I do scream. Knock it off. Yeah. Quite a bit. Rolls off the tongue very easily. Yeah. That's how I feel. Sometimes I wanna yell, knock it off, like with my kids. Like, Just, that's just what comes out. That was probably what was said to my me as a kid. And there's nothing wrong with that. There was nothing wrong in my opinion, with my, me having a fit walking into church. Because my tights were itchy. And my mom saying to me, knock it off. Instead of her being like, on her knees, sweetie, what's wrong? Are those tights itchy? I know tights can be itchy and uncomfortable, but we have to wear white tights to church. I wasn't in the mood to hear that. No, but what this new wave of parenting and gentle parenting, and I'm going to give you a chat, GPT recited version of what gentle parenting is because I don't know what it means. I know. I feel like we've Yeah. Been brought into motherhood with this new wave. I, it's not new anymore, but I feel like it's just, it's different in how I think most people our age were brought up. I agree. I agree. And. I'm curious to know what the official definition is, because I think the word gentle is probably a little bit misused, or like misunderstood, I guess would be the right word, right? But is gentle parenting. All right, so I looked it up. What is gentle parenting? This is an approach that encourages parents to guide rather than control. It prioritizes understanding the child's feelings and needs, modeling appropriate behavior, setting consistent compassionate boundaries, and it's about teaching with the child, not doing things to the child. We gotta unpack with that.'cause it's a mouthful and it's what does that mean? The first thing is that kind of sets me off is prioritizing your child's feelings and needs. Okay. I think all of us always put our kids first. But when I am constantly prioritizing their feelings, what is that then gonna result into them when they're an adult? Are they gonna be a complete asshole thinking that they come first? I guess that, or am I taking it too far? No, I think that actually brings up a very good point is this is a I'm assuming it's not a new way of parenting. I'm assuming this has probably always been some people's way of parenting. But I'm curious, since it was adopted, I would say by like the millennials. What. I'm always looking for the success story, right? Right. We even said this with the 90 summer. Yeah. It's is this an aspiration? Is there actual data to show that this is the best way to do it? 25 year olds that have been gentle parented that it's had a profound impact on their lives? Right. And that they are like pillars that this really works. I think that we just are always looking for,'cause we always, we're always looking for the answer. Yes. And we are always looking for the hack and we're always looking and it's is this helping or hurting? And who is it helping or hurting? And are the children that are. Parented this way? Are they coming out superstars? Is this the optimal way to be? Is this the optimal way to parent? Because what, based on the data? Correct. Based on the end point. Are there adults, like you just said, are there 25 year olds that have been parented this way? Where now this makes sense? Like where now you can say, you know what, these people are a plus. They can control their emotions. They know how to do all of the things. The correct way. They're emotionally mature. Is this the gold star of parenting and where are the parented kids to prove this? That's I guess where because what you and I are seeing right now are friends, us friend A and B of Yep. Who are really having a hard time doing this. So that's what we're seeing. That's what data we have collected. Yes. And research shows like we are the research, we are the Guinea pigs. I am the mother that is really struggling to incorporate this into my day-to-day life. Yes. And we're both very good parents. You said it, it's like our kids are our priority. Mm-hmm. That is not up for debate. I think especially when we're looking at each other, we know that's a fact. So Correct. But fact, I totally agree with what you're saying, that a lot of this comes at the expense of the parent. And I think that. We're always trying to do things different. We spent our entire podcast last week talking about how we're trying to change how we speak to other women so that we've spent the past 20 podcasts, trying to adapt ways to enhance what we already feel at our core. We're not stuck in our ways. We are very open to suggestions I'm open to advice. I am open to therapy. I'm open to everything, but you can only try something so many times and then tell yourself like, this doesn't all feel good. So from this list, there are things that I like. And there are things that I don't like. I have to ask you because you've been a mom almost a decade ahead of me. Was this something that you did off the bat, like with your kids as toddlers? Was this something that you integrated or did you go, this was also, I think, before the social media really took off. This is a newer term to me personally. So when Joseph was born, he's 12. If he wasn't doing something, I'd say no. I would use the word no. Okay. No, don't do that. No. Get off the couch. No, don't do this. I would use, no. And Joseph has some of that fear-based parenting in him. So something hot? No okay. I think that's okay. And then there were also some things like, oh, you wanna play with this and you can't, all right, let me do a switcheroo and use this. A little bit of both. A little bit of both. But it wasn't to, I wasn't being, I wasn't trying to use gentle parenting because maybe you didn't know of it. I didn't know of it. Okay. So you were just going with what came natural to you, maybe the way you were parented or a little bit a little bit of a mix. When do you think that this kind of entered your sphere? So I think when I had the twins. My older son was going through some like tricky times and I was trying to help him. So this was introduced into my realm to help him through these tricky times. Right. And then now fast forward, present day, this is really when I've been hearing this constantly For sure.'cause one of my daughters also is like a deeply feeling kid and I'm trying to help her and this doesn't always help her. No. This sometimes thinks, makes her think like some parts do and I'll go through like some of the different parts, but some of it I think just sets her off even more. For sure. And sometimes when I say to her, you will not like riding in a car for an hour. Nobody likes riding in a car for an hour. Knock it off. I love the knock it off magically. Yes. Maybe I give her a little bit of the being seen, but that's it enough. We're done here. I dunno. I think that this is a very mixed message and I think that because, and I know we always say that we're not a parenting podcast, and so we're not trying to, I guess we're dissecting the way we parent in how it then affects us as moms or like the parent. Because I do think that some of this is misunderstood. I think I heard the term gentle parenting. I've been a parent for like almost three and a half years. I heard the term gentle parenting even before I became a parent, and I definitely misunderstood what that meant. I think at its core. It probably makes a lot of sense. Mm-hmm. But I think the way we interpret that, or the way at least I go about gentle parenting is that it's adding extra pressure onto myself. That I'm not doing things the correct way, that I'm gonna end up, if I parent the way it comes natural to me, that it's going to end up with like long-term effects on my kids. And I think in some ways it could be improved for sure. But I also think in some ways your knock it off statement. Is the way it needs to be handled. I also think sometimes what rolls off my tongue is no, no. Like this is not up for debate. No is a sentence, I'm the adult. I don't need to get down on your level and explain every single thing. No means no. And so sometimes I think taking on the brunt of that pressure is exhausting and it's adding more shit to our plates that we always talk. We're trying to like remove and lighten it up a little bit. And I think that this feels very like suppressive. And. It's exhausting, right? It's exhausting. And then I think that then the added layer of guilt of I'm not gentle parenting. I'm not doing what's in right now. Am I causing damage to my kid by not validating their feelings all the time? Like that guilt eats away at me, and then it's another thing that I get frustrated about, right? So on this list here, the key principles of gentle parenting. The first one is empathy. Trying to understand how your child is feeling and when their behavior is hard to manage. Okay? I think that we both do that. Yeah, all the time, for sure. Day in and day out. Respect treating your child as a whole person whose thoughts and feelings matter. Then number three, boundaries saying no, but with love and holding limits, without yelling or threats. But then number four is very interesting, and that's modeling, showing them how to regulate emotions and resolve conflict by doing it yourself well, when by the time you get to number four. Modeling this behavior with controlling emotions. First of all, that's a whole loaded statement in itself. It is. I don't know why you always have to control your emotions. I know. I don't understand why it's not acceptable to have outbursts. I think I have outbursts all the time. I know. I think that some of these approaches make a lot of sense to me. Totally. I connect to them. Yes. So I think that obviously, number four, which it says you, it takes a while to get to that point, but I do think that it's healthy for kids to see you go through the whole range of emotions. We've talked about this. Yes. We've actually talked to. Therapists and psychiatrists about this, on this very podcast about how that is, okay. So kids, it's okay for them. It's angry and upset and frustrated. It's healthy for them to see and then repair after so that you're not a robot. So that they don't just see the happy mom all the time, or the calm mom like, because then they are not gonna know how to do anything. They're not gonna know how to go through the range of emotions. So we've heard it firsthand from our experts that have been on this podcast that it's okay for them to see you frustrated, for you to say that out loud. I'm frustrated. I don't know what to do right now. And then I. For them to see you and they've used the word repair to repair that and work through all of those emotions. So I really like that aspect of gentle parenting. Yes. And I think that to me, I do try to model that. If they do see me have an outburst, then they are going to see the repair from that. So if I am weak and I have the outburst because I'm a human being, then they at least get to see the other range of emotions, me working through it, me coming back down, I apologize. I'll say Mom was very frustrated. I'm sorry my voice got loud. I'm sorry if that scared you. They do see that, they see that whole range of emotions, but where I struggle a lot is the constant need to validate every single thing all of the time. Like I keep using the word it's exhausting, it's emotionally draining, it's physically draining it. It's a huge time suck. It just really is and honestly, I'm really not finding success there. Yeah. And I think, granted, I have toddlers, so I feel like it always goes back to that, but I'm not seeing any sort of success with that. Right. Well, Before we hopped on this podcast, I talked to my sister Nicole and we read Anxious Generation i've always wanted to read that. It's a great read and I'll give like a little brief summary of it. It, or at least my what I've extrapolated from that book. But when I was talking to my sister about this topic, she is a middle school teacher and she's a special ed teacher and she deals with a lot of behavior issues. Yeah. And the part of this gentle parenting that she struggles with is that now she has middle schoolers who are at that 12, 13-year-old age who. Constantly need to have their feelings validated. And what she is now seeing is a generation of kids who think that their feelings come first. What's missing is that self-regulation piece for them, right? Because of all of the validation that they've been given. The anxious generation outlined the two major changes that sort of occurred in like the mid two thousands that there's like overprotection from the real world. And how I think it connects to this podcast is that we are completely dysregulated ourselves and we're raising kids in this like pressure cooker, and you even said it earlier that your head is spinning sometimes because you feel so guilty that you're doing it the wrong way. We have access to all these different methods and all these different ways and this way may have some success, but we're really struggling applying it. Day to day, I really am. I really am. And like we've talked about other hacks and ways that we're trying to do this. I've shared like the good inside app that I've used, when I'm dealing with a kid that's having a meltdown situation, how I'm supposed to act and it. The issue that I'm having is that, yes, we spend most of our time here talking about ways we wanna better ourselves, and we want to grow and we wanna improve and we want the best for our kids. But sometimes I feel extremely fraudulent in the way that I have to handle things because I'm always worried about how this is going to impact my kids. And my question is for other generations, so I know we have a range of listener ages on here, but did other generations have go through life like so worried all the time? Like I'm really curious. I know that at the, at their core, I'm assuming our parents probably wanted the best for us and worried about our feelings and deeply cared about our feelings. But I wonder if they dealt with the same level of like pressure and. Guilt associated with it because it literally truly eats me alive. Every single day I am like, did I do this right? Is this messing them up? And I think that then you're inundated back with, like you're saying, because you're just in this sphere of like reels and tiktoks and parenting advice and all this. It's, it is just so much. And I then see a reel, right? It's like it knows, right? Like it knows I've had a bad day, and then I'll see a reel about. Dealing with toddlers and gentle parenting. And then I'll see all of the things I did wrong in that situation according to gentle parenting it. And it will say oh, you're supposed to hold your cool, you're supposed to get down on their level and validate their feelings and do and it go, you go through the range. And I know all of the ways that I just effed up completely. And so then I sit with that and it sits on my chest and it's very heavy. It's a heavy feeling. Yeah. And then you feel like, crap. How are you supposed to enter the room? Light is a feather. And float around your children and model, patience. When you feel so guilty and so heavy from thinking that you're failing, it's hard to put, it's put one foot in front of the other, it's to the next day it's, and start fresh. So I wanna go over, what gentle parenting is not. Yes. Because again, I think that, and it might even be, if you think about it, like all the information that. Is out there. Like here we are, we're a podcast. We're not experts. We bring on experts sometimes. But if you think about the type of content that circulates out there, the content that you're consuming might not even be coming from like a scientific place. There's anybody could get on a reel and just rattle off information that, they're taking a specific way. So sometimes I even get a little bit wary of like where this information is coming from, but like in the moment, you're not strong enough to think through that. So you just sit with all the things that you did wrong. Well, In this moment, after we've had time to sit in it, we don't need scientific data or an Instagram reel to know certain things work for our children. Certain things don't, and certain things feel good inside and certain things don't. It's true. And. Like sometimes you have to also account for how things feel and to how, and like you said, how things work for your family, you and how things work for my family. I guess you it goes back to just owning that and being comfortable with it. As a new parent though, I could confidently raise my hand and say that I feel like we're dipping our toes into this world. You always say like the first few years you're a custodian to your kids. Like you. Oh, I love that. Because it's such a good, like it's a way to think good mutual where it's just. It's just because that's what you're dealing with. And then when the kids start getting a little bit older, you really start taking on a more active parenting role. Mm-hmm. How you would, identify how to parent somebody. When they're little, you're just worried. So much more emotional. Yeah. You're worried about like feeding and cleaning and you're doing all the things to keep everybody going, to keep everything clean and then they get a little bit older. But I wanna go back to what Gentle parenting is. Not, is not because we dug this out. It's what we think. Yes. Because I think that some of the information that we're consuming is incorrect. And I also think that adds. To the weight that we've been talking about. So what gentle parenting's to point out is not, it is not permissive parenting. It is not letting your kid do whatever they want. And that was a big thing that you said on our walk the other day. Yes. That you will not allow for that. You will not allow your child to walk into somebody else's home and just run in No wild. And if they want something that's, I, what I struggle with right now is the curiosity. So it's the, oh, I wanna play with this little appliance, right? What is this little mixer that looks fun? And it tur everything turns into a power struggle right now with a three and a half year old. It's it's constant. No, you cannot play with that. That is not a toy. And I try to hold that boundary, but it becomes a power struggle. And it goes back and forth where sometimes I just wanna give him whatever he wants to stop the tantrum. Because the curiosity, unless it's a completely unsafe thing to play with. But it's yes, I know that it's stemming from curiosity, wondering how things work. I'm sure a lot of little boys, and maybe even some little girls, but my son is very like into how things work. Yes. So he likes like a fan. Like it's oh, it's spinning. How does it work? I'm interested in something. He likes seeing how the coffee machine works. That's how his mind works. He wants to see everything. He's curious and that's great. Except no, sometimes you are, you're not allowed to touch something and I struggle with the having to validate that all the time because me saying to a three and a half year old all the time, that is not a toy. It is not safe to play with, doesn't register. So sometimes I end up finding, which I said at the beginning of this podcast, no means no, I don't have to explain myself any further. We're done with this conversation and that's where I wanna end it, except a tantrum ensues. From that, right? And so what it is not is permissive parenting. So I think that I'm doing that correctly if I'm looking at this list, right? Which we had to dig for. What is it not? Yeah. Or like the ways that you might misunderstood what gentle parenting is. It is not about being your child's best friend. I like that too. Like I like keeping that boundary clear of I am the adult and you are the kid. And so I think that sometimes goes back to the right. So you can still, I know better than you do. So this is the end of the conversation, right? So you can still offer empathy support, try to understand their feelings, but still you have the final say, yes, this is what I think is safest, best decision for you at this time. Yes, that is my job, right? My job is I'm the parent and I am here to keep you safe and to help us go through life, right? In a safe and happy way. I am not here to be your best friend. And I totally agree with that, right? And then it is. It also doesn't mean never getting angry. It's about learning how to respond to anger constructively. So when I look at this, I don't think I'm doing a shitty job. That I'm actually, I actually agree with all three of those. Yes, 100%. So I think that putting that out there, because I don't know, I can only speak for what I see in terms of content, but that is not the type of content that I'm inundated with. No, you're inundated with, I'm in the first four that we said it is. I am inundated with this. I would call it extreme gentle parenting where it is gentle, it is not boundaries. It's, and so maybe I'm consuming the wrong content, but it's also that's what I'm seeing. And so that's what we had. Flooding had a for the what? It's not, yes. We had to didn't just pop up. No. So that's a good reminder. If you guys are just as confused about gentle parenting as us, or if you ever find yourself like beating yourself up over how you acted, I think that like literally, we'll put this in the show notes again so that you can read through this. If you're having a bad day and you handled things the way that you felt was a correct way to handle it. I love this. Read these last straight I wanna read this to myself. It is not permissive parenting. It is not about being your child's best friend. And it is not about never getting angry. And I think that to me, just like reciting those lines or hearing them makes me feel it. Like light immediately lightened me. Immediately. I love that. That should be your new mantra. I know. So why doesn't this feel so natural? And why is it hard to override our default settings? Because it's how duh Yes. It how we were brought up. It's how we're living our life. Yep. And I will say that I feel when I grew, you know, I do feel like I got a mix. Like my mom has always been like a very like emotional, sturdy leader. That's how you always, I love that. Say it. And that's how I think of my mom. She's always been someone I can go to. She listens to me vent. She, would always validate me in certain ways and was never like my best friend growing up until I became an adult. Like she was still Yeah. You earned that. She was still to be her equal. I like that. You earned that. Yeah. As you grow you can become best friends later in life. But she was my mom, like I, I wouldn't have called her my best an authority. She was friend, grown up. She was an authority and no meant no. And I knew that, and especially even with my dad, I feel like he never had to explain himself. No was no. And it was just like, now that I'm an adult. I understand the reasons why. No meant no. Like I remember a couple of times him just saying no and I'm not explaining myself. And yeah, it took me a handful of years to get to the point where I can understand why he would be uncomfortable with certain situations. But that's it. So I guess I'm, again, going back to the we don't have enough, like I don't know enough people that can come from the other side of things and say, oh, I was from the generation where, my feelings were always validated and everything got explained to me. And how are they viewing things now? You're saying that we're hearing some people are coming forward and saying that they don't know how to handle certain things? So I think sometimes it's not up to a child to understand every single thing and why decisions are made and why the answer is no and why things are the way they are. It's not their job now. It's not their job. And. So I have a couple examples of why I don't think this is coming natural to me and why it's not particularly working. Tell me in my life. One of my kids, is having a very hard time controlling her emotions and I don't expect her to be calm at all times. Just like I can't be calm at all times. No. But she's having a very hard time controlling herself and what it's then doing is like upsetting the whole family. And then it's very just hard in general for her because her siblings get mad at her and then we get mad at her and it's just it's just like a vicious cycle. So I had her see this therapist and the therapist said to her, you can be the president of your emotions. That is a lot to put on a 6-year-old. Like you are the president of your emotions. Doesn't even know what that means. So the next day, Nick and I are out for the day and she's with my mom and she's. She's calling us constantly and calling us constantly, and she's telling my mom, Nani, I am the president of my emotions. And she's taking it as no, I'm the boss. I'm the boss. Oh. So my mom must have said to her something along the lines of no, you are not the boss. Nani's the boss. I'm the authority. I'm in charge. Like the whole thing. It's a power struggle now. Became a power struggle. The whole conversation got misconstrued. What the therapist was trying to teach her was, you are in control of yourself. Don't tell yourself you can't calm down. You do have that opportunity to turn it around, but by saying you are the president of your feelings. Took it to another level for a 6-year-old for sure, because she didn't understand it. So she's calling Nick and Nick says to her, remember, you are the president of your feelings. And you know what she said to us? I don't wanna be. Like, she was basically saying to us, I wanna have it. I don't wanna have control. I want you to fix it for me. I'm only six. I know I can't control this. I want you to do this for me. It's almost so yes, I, okay, so she said it herself, whether, and she didn't even mean to say it because look what she said, I don't wanna be the queen anymore. Its too much her, she wants us, us to say, you need to go into this calm room with your squishy and have your snack. You need to chill out. That's what she is looking for. She's looking for the firmness. And sometimes I think to this point, it's, it is a little gray. It's not really there's, it's a little grays. I know that it's supposed to be boundaries and it's supposed to be all these things. But again, I think that we're being misguided with, because I don't think that some of these practices are, they're not like. Defined enough, right? There maybe it's it is it's opening up a lot of room for interpretation. It's, and it's confusing everybody. It's very confusing. So then fast forward to the next day, we're hearing how the day,'cause Nick and I left them the girls for the night with my parents. And my mom really has a hard time with this because this is now so far removed. It would make sense, and I'll start here first. So my mom, I think like your mom was a very emotionally sturdy leader in my life. And I think since I've had kids, I've seen her become anxious and I think it's hard for her to watch her daughter, who she thinks is a sturdy leader, become an absolute effing disaster. She sees me like, lose it. She sees me melt down. She sees how hard it is to parent in this day and age, and I think it's really hard on her to see her kid. Constantly messing up or feel like she's messing up, feeling like she's messing up. She feels, she's constantly I don't know how you're doing it. I don't know how you're managing their schedules. I like, I feel so bad, blah, blah, blah. Did I fail you? Did I not do things right? She's a confident woman and now even she's second guessing herself. She probably felt like she raised a very confident daughter who is very sure of herself.'cause you've said that, you've said that you really didn't experience a lot of anxiety until you became a parent. And so I do think that it's hard for generations to then watch their children have to parent. Like you said, in this day and age, and maybe try to like decipher a different way to do things and like we're just wrestling with a lot. We are. Good point. And then I do think that it must be hard for our parents to see us struggling, in this role. Yeah. And I do think that then you would take that upon yourself to be like, did I do something wrong? That's exactly, she's doing what we're saying we're doing now. Where like you're taking on, you're empathetic, you're taking on the feelings of your kids. You're feeling like you messed it all up. Like she's still doing that. Because she's still a parent. She's still your mom. You're always gonna be Yeah. A parent. Doesn't matter how old your kid is. So my daughter was in a mood, and so she's having now another meltdown. She never regulated. She keeps asking me and asking me, and screaming. And I said, hang on a second. So we went into the Good Inside app that you had suggested to me a few weeks ago, and there's like an AI bot, chat bot component of that. And I typed right into it I'm in the car with my daughter. I wrote the whole scenario. Yeah. And so then I said, all and I started reciting what it told me to say, and she started screaming at me and said, you can't even talk to me. You need the phone to talk to me. You need the phone to tell me what to say. That pissed her off even more. So I Now you're looking like you don't have the answers. And I'm also that's not confidence to her. I'm not sturdy. Yes. Mother. Whereas I think if I had probably just said to her, I don't know what to say right now, and we're in the car. And when we're in the car, we need you to stay quiet. And once I can process this, then we'll discuss it later at home we'll have a conversation. And that's what would've come natural to me. What didn't feel natural to me was pausing and validating her feelings and saying, okay, I know that this is frustrating you. I know that you're hot and I know that you're tired and I know this and I know you don't like being in the car rides for 30 minutes, but in order, like none of that was coming natural. No. And neither did the response at that moment. And I think what's so frustrating and she didn't like it either. Yes. Is that's what I was gonna say, that it doesn't always work. And so it's very, it, I think that it would be very different if we came into this whole thing where we're trying to better ourselves and do things a different way for a variety of reasons. And if we saw. The success of that happening and we saw this was actually helping our children and it was actually doing a lot of good for them. I think that it's just like anything else, when you see success with something, it's easier to continue on. Yeah. It's motivating. You can buy into it. I think what's happening, and I'm very curious, I want this to be a discussion because this is something that we talk about all the time. I want our listeners, we wanna hear from you. Do you feel the same way as us? If you're finding success in this, is it easier to keep going with it? Because I keep saying, I know I'm in the toddler phase, but I'm not having success with this. So to me it's just like with anything else, when do you pivot and start doing something else, right? Like, how long does this go where we're just gonna gentle parent, I'm gonna continue to do what comes. Unnatural to me. I'm gonna have to completely go against what I want to do at the core of me. And if I'm not seeing success with this, how far does this go? We just keep doing this to ourselves. It's just a cycle of, I'm feeling invalidated. I'm trying to validate you. How far does this go? You have to think of life as like a buffet, which, I don't really even like buffets, but I like when I just get like my plated meal and I like a little of everything and you like a little of everything, but. Life is like that buffet. You have to take the little bits that you like. Yeah. And then put back the things that you don't like and you have to accept some of the natural shifts. And that's maybe what this can be. Yes. Maybe we can leave some of it in on the curb, and then take those three key parts of what it's not and almost like can like tailor it to that tailor. Tailor it to that. Yeah. Like when my husband grew up, they had one TV in the family room and whatever the dad wanted to watch on TV is what the family watched and nobody said anything. Okay. Things have evolved a little bit and now people don't even watch TV as a family. Or the kids have a say in what to watch. I'm just saying like some things can evolve and change, I guess my long-winded. Point of that is that I still like the idea that the father or the parents controlled what was on tv. I know the little kid should not be controlling what's on tv. And I think that what sucks for our generation is that if that was how you grew up, right? Yes. And then now it's the opposite where it's like you grew up with parents that controlled everything in the household and now you grow up with kids who I know they're not supposed to, but kids who control everything in the household you're just stuck in this place where you feel, and that's why to me, this feels so fraudulent. It's when is it about me? Yeah. When is it about us, the parents? When are we in charge? Like when do we feel like this will come a little bit more natural? And I think part of it is. Letting your kids be in charge of little things to make them feel powerful, but ultimately knowing that you are Oz, you are the one Right. Controlling everything. I know. And so that's why I think sometimes when I think of the examples of okay, you're supposed to let them pick the blue cup or the green cup, or how do you want the banana peeled? Do you wanna peeled all the way down? That's what I was thinking. Yeah. Was some of those examples of like how you can involve the kid to feel like they're right. You buy the clothes, but they get to put them on their body and put them out. But again, I'm not finding success in this. This could very well be because my kids are too young for this. But I'm very curious to hear what other parents like truthfully no bs. Is this working for you? And then me, and we're not sitting here like completely shitting on it. If it's working I would love to know. But I do think that you raised such a good point of like, some things work for families and some things don't. Like I think that sometimes and everybody's kids are different. I think at different phases things can work different. Like you have to be on your toes and adapt to things. But like right now, I'm not finding a lot of success in this. And also even if your kids were thriving and they were doing great, if you are not feeling great about it, then that's not success then that's not successful's not successful. You're right. So I think that there's two parts to it. Yes. It's collectively as a family, you have to feel good about what's going on. So that's very interesting usually we have some takeaways, right? Like we always do listen, what are the takeaways from the text? I think my takeaway is that you and I really have a hard time just in general remaining calm. Yeah. And those are two things that we are working on. But we're not perfect. We're trying hard to remain calm and it's hard to model calm one. It just doesn't come natural, to be calm. And we're trying to not make our daughters like be calm and meek and quiet. We're trying to teach them that there are boundaries. No means no. And again, your daughter's little, she's a toddler. So the outbursts are different than like my daughter who's a little bit older. But it's really hard to model these, don't have outbursts when I keep having outbursts. It is, and this just goes back to what we keep talking about when we said at the beginning of the episode, sometimes our. Podcasts are less about finding the answers to things and they're just continuing to open up more questions. Yeah. And so I feel like I hate to leave it on this, but I don't think that we have a ton of takeaways because we're both just not really finding a whole lot of success in this gentle parenting approach and we're tending to want to lean towards what comes more natural for us. And I think that we just have to do that. Yeah. I think that's just, we try, we do our best. We remain calm when we can. We recite the mantras that feel best to us. Mine right now that I've adopted is, this is temporary and. It will go back to what it's supposed to be or it will go back to a calmer place. Usually I can't even get to that point in my, when I'm reciting it to myself, I just say, this is temporary. It will pass. This is temporary. It will pass. When I'm in the middle of something where both kids are screaming and I just can't figure it out, like that's what I say to myself. So I don't really think that we have a ton of takeaways all the, it's just listen to yourself and I guess you do have to trust yourself at the end of the day. Yeah. You have to trust your gut. If it doesn't feel good, it doesn't feel good way. No and don't yourself in the fraudulent position. And if you end up reverting back to tactics that were used on you, then it is what it is. Like we're all here and we're all doing our best and our parents all did their best. One of the things and no one's perfect. One of the things, one of the things in that book, anxious Generation, a takeaway that I loved from that book was that we. Try to give our kids everything that we didn't have when we were kids. But what we forget to do is give them what we did have. What worked, and just things that we had in life. If you grew up middle, lower class, and now you grow up like, upper class. I'm just using that as like a random example. You are not giving your kids that strong work ethic to propel the to get a job when you're Right. Like a paper route when you're 12 or things like that, you're forgetting to give them what you did have. So there were things that didn't work for me growing up. Yep. But there were things that did. Yes. So instead of just trying to give my kids what I didn't have, yes. I need to give them what I did have. Yes. Okay. And what I did have was a mother and a father who said to me, knock it off. There you go. And it worked.'cause it, and it works sometimes you all, you need. As an adult. Even like when I'm spiraling sometimes all I need is someone to just be like, stop enough. Like it's because not everything has to be a thing. I love when you say that this, we always say, I love when you say. So I do think that sometimes that's a perfect way to end this topic is first of all we're gonna say, knock it off. I'm gonna adopt that.'cause mine is just stop it. Stop it. Actually my daughter Layla goes, now she'll go stop it. And I'm like, yeah, you're adopting that. And like also not a bad thing for you to know, to say, God, stop it. Knock it off. Like it's okay. Means no, no means no. These are okay phrases. And if we've gotten. Gentle parenting all wrong. And like we've just tended to, sorry. You know, Like we did it. We're go, we're doing our best and have been inundated with so much information. It's confusing, right? Because I know, I'm sure experts are gonna come on and say, what are you talking about? This could be like social media's form of gentle parenting. Maybe. We'll, maybe we'll call it that. Yes. We'll call it social media's form of gentle parenting. That's the perfect way. But I do, I think that's, I think that you just wrapped it up perfectly. So say it again, just so that give your kids and yourself not only what you didn't have in your childhood, but things that you did have too. The things that worked for you. The things that worked for you. Okay, so closing out. We're gonna chat. Quickly about our pink spotlights of the week, which is a little something that's making each of our lives a little bit better this week. So t what is yours? So yesterday, unfortunately you couldn't make it. I know. I'm so bumed. I had to listen. I was so busy with work. I know. Which I'm happy you're busy. I know. So yesterday we went to the Hamptons for the day. And we did, it was actually a great, it was a great trip. I was a little leery.'cause it's not easy to get to the Hamptons. No, it's it requires like a hot skip and a jump. Literally. Like literally. But we took the ferry and it was a great day. It's it could still be a day trip. It's just that there's a lot of steps. It was a day trip. There were a lot of steps, but actually once the steps are broken down it's not bad. It was totally manageable. The ferry is a great way to break it up because you can get something to eat. You can you're not driving so you're can like, yeah. It feels like you're on vacation. Tune out. Yeah, it's pretty, whatever. So there was five of us that went. So one person like booked the ferry, one person put gas in the car, one person paid for lunch, one person got coffees, one person did this. And sometimes you're like, oh, whatever. I'll absorb this, I'll absorb that. And then one of my girlfriends said, my husband used the splits app all the time. Why don't we download the splits app? I think it's called Splitwise. Okay. And I'll create a trip and I'll put all of our names in. So basically whatever I paid for. I just put the amount that I paid in there. So you paid for coffees, right? Yeah. Someone paid for gas. Gas, whatever. Yeah. And then who, somebody paid for lunch, somebody paid for dinner, somebody paid for the ferry, somebody paid da, whatever it was. And then at the end, once everything has been inputted, you put settle up. And what it does is let's say I owed you$20, right? And then you owed somebody else$40 and that person owed me$60. You might only have to end up paying just. Me like a dollar or something. Oh, so that everybody gets back. What? So it's fair? Yes. It makes it easy. Oh, okay. And it makes it easy. Oh, I love that. So you can also put your credit card right into the splits app. Yeah. Or you can just settle up and then Venmo. So you can hit settle up and that'll send out payment. Or you can hit settle up and then send out payment however you want. Oh, that makes so much cash or whatever. Oh, I love that. It was great tip. It was awesome. Especially for a big group, because everybody usually ends up paying for certain things. Yeah. But it's not always. But this, and sometimes you like feel, sometimes it's okay, yeah, there's a Venmo request for$20, right? Not that I feel stupid doing that. Oh, I love that. But this I don't feel bad doing because everybody is inputting what they did and then it's easy. And then I love that. That's so great. So mine is gonna be a little bit of a repeat from when we had Lauren on from a low profile a couple weeks ago, because she actually recommended this and I grabbed it right away. It was powdered sunscreen for the kids. And so we obviously used it on our trip and it has been great. So it was a very good recommendation. It's from the brand. Row, I believe is the brand. And it's literally a, has a little brush. It almost looks like a makeup brush and then the powder sunscreen is underneath it. So you just click it and it disperses into the brush and then you can brush it on. And so it is so great for the face for the kids. My kids like squirm and they don't like sunscreen. Nobody does being applied especially to their face. And I feel like some of the white mineral sunscreen, it's so hard to spread and. And like work in, so it's just, it ends up being like a workout for me to put it on both of the kids. So they actually really like this. Because I can get it in their ears on their hairline where it's it's not making a huge mess. It's also great for touch-ups. So I've been loving it. And we didn't use it on the kids yesterday, and Layla ended up like we put regular sunscreen on her face and she ended up like crying a little bit and it got into her eyes. And so I was like, we wouldn't have had this issue if we remembered the powder sunscreen. It was just in one of the other bags. So I was like, fluffy brush is fun too. It's fun. Yeah, they laugh. Like when we put it on them. And so it's great. It I wouldn't necessarily use it over their entire body because it's not like a huge amount of it, but it's so great for like tricky places or the face especially. But and for Touchups, I think it's just absolutely great. We will make sure to put that in the show notes if you have like young kids or even I guess for yourself. I feel like it's just nice. I've actually used one too, for myself. It's like a setting powder, and it's been great. That's why I was like, oh, I know that actually works well. Yeah. I have one from Den and it's actually it's powdered sunscreen, but it has like a what is it? Like a setting powder, I don't know if it's a setting powder. Oh, okay. Or if it's just that it's maybe does it absorb, has a color. Oh color. It has a color to it. Color, almost like a bronzer. Oh, okay. Cool. Yes, exactly. Thank you. Cool. I like that. It's like a bronzer cool. That you can just, oh, I love that on your face and love it. Whatever. So that has been, that was a great recommendation. So I'm piggybacking on somebody else's pink spotlight, but I love it. It was literally wonderful. She shared influenced, she influenced, yep. That's her job. And it worked and it was it's really great. So I'll put it in the show notes for you if you guys wanna grab it. Yeah, it's wonderful. Alright, thank you guys. We will be back soon and we have some really great guests coming on. Yes. For some parts of the summer. It's tricky in the summer. Yeah. Nailing down schedules and everybody's with their kids and so yeah, that's okay. We have enough to talk about. Yeah, we clearly do. We clearly have enough, we clearly do to talk about, but let us know, you guys can text us at the bottom of our show notes. You can hit the text button. And so if you have any recommendations for episodes that you wanna hear about last week's episode was a listener request. So we love diving into topics that you guys wanna hear about too. And then definitely let us know, you can even text us some of your responses to this episode. Yes. If you guys gentle parent, if you're frustrated with it, if you have any advice on how to tackle things, you know what Instagram parent Yes. If you Instagram parent. Yes, for sure. So thank you so much. We'll see you guys soon. Bye. Bye.