Bethany Hall (4:32)

Oh, yeah, ready.

Unknown (4:33)

Let's do it. Can't wait.

Jim Kress (4:35)

Okay, let's do it. So, Jim, my first question is going to be for you. You often have said many of our adult relationships are family reunions. Can you unpack that for me just a little bit and tell me what you mean when you say that?

Bethany Hall (4:53)

Yeah. There is so much that's going on unseen by people. What we don't work out will act out. And that's I think, at any level of relationship. Then if you get in marriage, it can be more intense there. And then parenting with biological children, you get into attachment Issues you get into adoption and fostering, things can just begin to get a bit more complex. These things end up being multifaceted issues that need to be treated in multifaceted ways. So it's as though, and I think everyone listening or watching would have a time where they could relate. Like I say it this way, whose face am I wearing? I mean, this is about me till it's not about me. Churches, I've done a lot of work with church leadership and organizational people and they're like, yeah, people are coming in and you know, I've got this dual role. I'm the pastor, but I'm also like their boss or I'm the business owner, but I'm their friend. And that happens in Christian ministries. It just happens in relationships. So we're, I believe, bumping up against family things, maybe some family things that I'm not recognizing in the moment. And it's about the person I'm talking with right now until it's not about that person. It's about some other characters who just happen to be in the room.

Jim Kress (6:09)

Makes a whole lot of sense to me, Jim. You know, I think at one point, and I'm, you guys could probably correct me with some of this research, but it talks about relationally where you maybe have create, experienced your first trauma. If you don't go back and heal that relational trauma, oftentimes that's your emotional maturity that you carry into your future relationships. And that's significant. You guys, if, if we take a moment to even just pause and, and do the work of saying, okay, where was that first initial traumatic emotional relationship experience? For most of us it's young, you know, it's middle school or younger. And if you haven't healed from that, you're going to carry that right into whether it be friendships or your marriage or your co working relationships. And so it's not just a check the box kind of thing. I, I got over that. It's something that we have to do.

Bethany Hall (7:04)

Nice bumper sticker.

Jim Kress (7:06)

Let's not do this.

Bethany Hall (7:07)

Imagine, by the way too, which we've all imagined, at any level of parenting, you get into marriage and then parenting at whatever that is. And if developmentally you are stuck at about between ages 4 to 14 or younger, then it's almost like at many levels by kids parenting kids. I know you all know that.

Jim Kress (7:27)

That's absolutely right. Well, I'll tell a little bit of my story and then Bethany, I've got a question for you. But for our listeners, our watchers, I am the CEO of Proverbs 31 Ministries. But I also have, like I said, three children that I have the privilege of raising. Two of them are biological. One of them is adopted through the foster care program. And so we have learned a lot in the last few years. He's five years old now, and so it has been a road of learning how to love him. But I want to make it really clear what I wish that I would have known and learned what I know now because of what we've learned through parenting a child who's had a hard story. I wish I would have known that before I had my biological kids, too, because it totally has so much to do with starting with you as the parent, as the adult. Get, you know, healing yourself. And so, Bethany, I've got a question for you. First is how do you see this, this idea of your adult relationships are family reunions, right? How do you say this? See this playing out in the work you do with children and parents at your organization?

Unknown (8:34)

Chosen for me, it's personal as well. Like you said, Meredith, I have three kiddos, one of whom is adopted. We also are walking alongside a whole slew of young adults that we came into relationship with while we were missionaries. And so we're doing adult life and grandkid life, kind of what I would consider prematurely with adults that have significant trauma. And there's a lot of data showing that people that have experienced trauma tend to be particularly drawn to caring spaces like foster care and adoption as well. So often we see this dynamic where we have children who've suffered trauma, who are being parented, like you alluded to, Jim, who have suffered their own trauma and may have some emotional capacities that have been limited or things they haven't worked through. So we see that unhealed things in our past definitely causes division and challenges in our homes. So I know on the therapy and theology podcast, y' all have talked a little bit about attachment and how it impacts marriages and our romantic relationships. And this idea that the way that we were parented or our relationship with our primary caregiver creates this pattern in us, creates this idea of how we make sense of the world, how we get our needs met. And so at chosen, we see this idea magnified in the work that we do with families because we serve families who are loving children who all have attachment trauma or who have experienced loss or harm in the context of that parent child relationship. And so this idea that we do bring our past into our current relationships, our spouse relationship, and then also our children, this can be. I've Seen it to be particularly true in this parent, child relationship and even an added layer, because it's not a relationship of equal responsibility. So with our spouse, we can say, you know, we come in and you've got to do your work and I've got to do mine. And parenting, we've got to do the work whether our child ever changes or not. And so it adds this additional layer of responsibility and the fact that even more so, we can't get out of this. We're. We're in this together for life. So.

Jim Kress (10:36)

Yeah. And that honestly leads us right into the next question that I think is at the heart of what we're getting at today together, is that the relationship is not equal. The responsibility of parenting, it's not equal. And so you've got to, Jim, like you said, do your own work, your own kind of healing, and hopefully you get to do a lot of that prior to taking on the responsibility of caring for a child. But I am one, the first one to, like, say, it can also happen, your healing, your work can happen after you are in the active stage of parenting. Guys, that's. You're not. It's not a human end of the road. You can do it, and then it can be done. Well, but let's talk about those red flags that we see in ourselves. We're not going to point the finger at anybody else. Okay, what are the red flags that as parents and like, what do, what do we need to do about them? You know, like, where do, where do we take them? So, Bethany, why don't you take us away on that, on that side?

Unknown (11:45)

All right, here we go. Right. Hardest part is looking at ourselves. But we're going to start with ourselves and personal triggers. So the red flag of personal triggers. What is it that consistently gets that 10 out of 10 response? For me, even if it's not an external response, I can feel my heart rate go up. I can feel my, my reaction start to come without thought. And for. In our house, there's a couple. Maybe these are yours, maybe you have different ones, but maybe it's lying. Particularly if you have a history of infidelity or betrayal in your parents or in your spouse or in personal relationships. It can be something where your child may be lying about, you know, did they feed the dog? And it just really burns you that your child would lie to you about something so stupid. And you might feel these feelings of, do they think I'm an idiot? Or why would they ever lie about something so stupid? And I can figure this out. So it gets that 10 out of 10 response. Maybe it's not lying, maybe it's. For me personally, it tends to be really big displays of emotion. So in my family of origin, we didn't do a lot of unpacking of emotions. We kind of, my mom tended to look for the silver lining. My dad tended to just be a pull yourself up by your bootstraps. So there just wasn't a lot of emotionally sitting with things. And so when my kids were little, it was the toddler tantrum in the grocery store. It just made me feel so anxious. I had these personal narratives of what everyone was thinking about me and I wanted to shut that down. Now that I have teens and young adults, same thing. But these excessively emotional teens, whether that's coming out in big loud bursts of anger or lots of tears, I can just feel that 10 out of 10 response that may be out of proportion to the scenario coming up inside of me. So just recognizing those things that get us that big response that trigger.

Jim Kress (13:34)

Jim, what about you? Can you share?

Bethany Hall (13:39)

Oh yeah, I can share quite personally. I remember going to Dallas Seminary through seminary and it may sound humorous and I didn't mean it that way. I said I did not have to come to Dallas Seminary. We had kids at the time to study hermodeology, which is the doctrine of sin, anthropology, the doctrine of mankind. Right. I began to think about things we were learning literally in theology. And I thought, heck, I'm learning that at home and not just about my kids sins, but had the particular situation with my children especially and my son. And I've talked openly about this, my oldest son, this pressed buttons in me. All I didn't know I had and my own unhealed anxious attachment style wounds and my own trauma story largely unaddressed. We'd gotten into therapy right about the time my oldest son was born, but you know, it. We were there eight years in therapy, truly. But I began to look at the. How I was not responding, but I was reacting, redoing an action from my passion. There were buttons that my kids would press in me that I didn't know existed. Therefore I was angry at times and just, you know, I have six grandkids now and this isn't the salient point of the day. But what that has helped me with is I get to make so many living amends by being a granddaddy and I'm far more aware. I wish this Jimbo could go back in time to that younger gym and just say, whoa, whoa, whoa, I'm here to Help you. There was just so much I didn't know. And it wasn't just the book knowledge and all that that was important, but the therapy work of really healing my trauma story. And I look back now and I don't know if you've ever had this. You don't. You might have it one day. But some of our listeners and viewers, I could not watch, nor could my wife, some of our early family videos. We've been married 40 years. Our kids are all adults. And to see me and I thought, dude, he, the kid, my son, he's just being a kid at the birthday party, wanting to mess with the cakes. And you could see me because, sorry, you know, I wanted to have the perfect video for years to come. And I'm getting upset, mad. I don't do that. All I am like, good night. Then I had to begin to have mercy on myself because then I was. What I did to my kids, I was doing to myself, condemning myself. Because when you know better, you can do better. But I had so many buttons pressed in me with our kids. I relate so well.

Jim Kress (16:09)

Yeah, I mean, I. There's a. Probably a long list of them, but the one that comes to my mind, for me, that's my trigger with my kids that I am, this is very, actively trying to work through this. Right now, parenting three kids is being ignored. When I say something, I expect children to listen or respond or acknowledge or something. And it gets internally. I don't always show it externally, but internally it gets a 10 out of 10 for me where my heart is racing and I just see red. And oftentimes one of my little kiddos has adhd and seriously, they can't hear me. They. They have an audio processing type situation. And so I've been told by doctors, half the time they can't hear you. You need to go touch, touch them on the arm when you're talking to them. But it didn't matter to me. I was still like. And I had to be like, why is this making me so angry? Why does my heart rate go, you know, sky high when they don't listen? And at first I wanted to say, well, it's disrespect. And then I was like, no, it's much deeper than that. I was very ignored as a child, completely neglected. And so that triggers that same feeling. But even in a. For me, it was like in a hyper way because there's some belief deep inside of me that my children will listen to me. And that's. There's some pride there that I had to work through too, you know, but really recognizing for me, why is this making me so upset and doing the work of pausing and not just slapping, to your point, Jim, a bumper sticker answer on it and saying that really shouldn't skyrocket me like it does. Why? Where is that really coming from? And realizing it's because of the neglect and being ignored as a child. Yeah. I felt. And it taps right back into it so quickly, too.

Bethany Hall (18:10)

Right? It taps back in quickly.

Unknown (18:12)

It's like instant. Yeah.

Jim Kress (18:14)

Yeah.

Unknown (18:15)

I always joke around. I always joke around with my husband, Meredith, that I was never an angry person until I got married and had kids. So it must be their issue. I was like, I was cool as a cucumber when I was all by myself.

Jim Kress (18:28)

It's true.

Unknown (18:29)

It's true.

Jim Kress (18:30)

It's so true. Jim, you have something that you always say about difference in personalities with kids, parents, and that maybe nothing's necessarily wrong or sinful, but there's just a difference there. Let's talk about that for a minute.

Bethany Hall (18:44)

Yeah. I like to say naming, not blaming, just naming things. And I have found, I found, again, we're anecdotal here for all of us talking about some of our own personal parenting stuff. And I found that if the child's personality was different than mine, that might stir up something in me, not blaming them. Oh, wait a minute. What if the personality type, whatever else might be there. Both my oldest son and I, all three of our kids, were diagnosed eventually with adhd, as was I. But the personality type, that was a lot like mine. So I was bumping heads. And that's the one that was far more palpable for me of having a son who was in many ways just like me. And I can go a little bit deeper in my own journey with that is if I had contempt toward him. It flew. And Bernie Brown and others have the research to prove it. It came up out of my own self cont. Contempt. You know, you've heard me say on the program, self hatred at my expense. Shame. Self hatred at my expense. What I didn't like about myself or what people mocked me or disrespected me on in childhood. Me. Look at Jimmy growing up this undiagnosed, untreated adhd. And with all that, it's like, so I'm bumping up against that. And I can take something small like, you know, it's just a personality difference where somebody's other. Now we see that on a macro level in our culture right now. Right. We're in A global mental health pandemic. Just a person has an opposite view of different ways. And we're in the amygdala of the brain, the limbic brain, just mad and going at each other just because they're different. So I found that to be. And I've seen other people in parenting, or it can be the opposite that I feel so bonded because this person is just like me or I just like their personality being different but having that self awareness which is key to go, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, what's this hitting in me with one of my kids and being curious, not furious.

Jim Kress (20:42)

Yeah, I found it's that self discipline right there, Jim, of whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Why is. And taking the time, most of the time you're in this parenting stage where everything you're hurrying, you're getting kids here and there and there and now you're working and now they need this. And it's really hard to create the self discipline of like, no, something is happening in me that is not equivalent to what is happening on the outside. I need to take the time to explore it. So, so good. Okay, Bethany, let's talk about red flag number two. What is it?

Unknown (21:18)

All right, so red flag number two is when we reach for excessive control. So when we start to feel the chaos mount or we feel like we're not able to get our hands around the outcome, oftentimes we reach for excessive control. And when our kids are little, it doesn't feel that abnormal because we have to control a lot of things. That's natural to keep them safe and all alive. Right. But as they get older and we lose some of that control and they have different external influences and they're not with us all the time. Often that reaching for excessive control can be a fear based response in us. Like Jim, you talk about the amygdala lighting up. If I feel like my child, I can't control the outcome of a certain decision they're about to make or a scenario or I can't control how their decisions are going to look at, like reflect on me as a parent. Oftentimes we can start to reach for control and unfortunately that often backfires. And breaking relationship at worst and at best, it still leaves us really just reaching for behavior modification rather than getting to the heart of our child and helping guide them towards repentance and a relationship with the Lord.

Jim Kress (22:27)

That's a hard one. Bethany. I'm going to be honest. I think every mom on here listening is like, yeah, how do I tell the difference, you know, between the Control that's appropriate, you know, like that's maybe appropriate safety measures or whether that be emotional safety measures or physical safety measures, like how do I know, you know, so any guidance there? Because I'm sitting here thinking, you know, the, the age range that I have in my house is 13 to 5, you know, and so the different I'm Learning with my 13 year old, I gotta let go of some control. He's turning into a young man, you know, I gotta let him be able to do. And that's a different. Looks very different than what my 5 year old needs from me, you know, so maybe, maybe unpack a little bit. What that, how do you learn what the appropriate. Especially again going back to where we started, especially if maybe you grew up in a very controlling home and you don't know what it looks like to give appropriate levels of control in your, you know, family.

Unknown (23:37)

Yeah, I mean, I hope we kick it to Jim because doesn't Lisa always say she brings the dysfunction and you bring the clinical aspect? So I'd love to hear your thoughts, Jim.

Bethany Hall (23:46)

Both are doing great.

Unknown (23:47)

I can surely bring the dysfunction, but I would say, you know, I've done it poorly and I've done it well and I've learned from both. And so I think a lot of it is what you alluded to. I think Meredith earlier is just being honest with our own internal world and our own hearts. Like oftentimes if I'll take the time to say sit with the Lord and be quiet and ask him to show me, I can kind of usually flesh out this is coming because I am afraid or this is coming because I'm embarrassed or this is touching on something about me or my past versus you know what? This is the level of control that I need to have with this child to help them be successful. So it often the same decision, the same limit can come from a place of fear or can come from a place of necessity. And I think sometimes it really is just our own heart motives and asking the Lord to reveal that. But Jim, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Shay Hill (24:43)

Now let's take a quick break to share about our sponsor for this episode. Chosen Chosen is a non profit that equips parents and caregivers with tools to help children heal. As a parent to five children and now GG2, eight adore grandchildren, I care so deeply about children's hearts, how they process or don't process, their emotions, their struggles and a path toward healing. If you're a parent, maybe you've wondered why your child pushes away when you desperately want them to lean in. This is connected to a topic called Attachment Styles that we've discussed here on Therapy and Theology. As you explore both your own attachment style and your child, our friends at Chosen are here to support you with compassionate trauma informed guidance. I'm excited to announce they're offering an exclusive interactive webinar to help parents and caregivers gain insight into why certain behaviors are so triggering. Learn the different types of attachment styles and discover how to build stronger connections with your child. No matter what your own upbringing, you'll walk away with practical tools that can make a real difference for you and your family. And here's the best part. Because you're a valued therapy and theology listener, you get access for just $10. So take advantage of this opportunity and head to chosen care P31 that's chosen care back to register for the webinar that's chosen care P31. Now back to the episode.

Bethany Hall (26:26)

Well, it will sound like an Instagram post, and it is one of my Instagram posts. I have a game controller as the picture on the post, and it simply says I try to keep it simple, right? When I try to control what I cannot control, then I will be controlled by what I cannot control. So an old line is with our parenting, indeed, control what you can and let the rest alone. Because I think there's limited amount of control that we can have and nuancing to each kid. The old line, right? My mom and dad just looked at me and I behaved. I got in line and other kids are like, you look at me that way. It's game on knowing our kids, knowing the idiosyncratic nature and nuance to each kid and paying attention. We're going to keep going back to the internal, aren't we? To pay attention to what's going on in me, like that particular child biologically born and in your family or adopted or fostered, what is that hitting inside me and not what are they doing? And I believe strongly as parents, as adults, Even if you're 18, maybe developmentally you're 12, I don't know. But the buttons that kids get to press on us were installed in family of origin in our in our upbringing. There's no really old adult onset. So these kids are pressing stuff in me. I've often said it's like a Coke machine, as simple as I can make it that our kids will come up knowingly or unknowingly. Oh yeah, there are kids, they know exactly what buttons to press, but they're putting in quarter, 50 cents, 75 a dollar. And all of a sudden click and they were feeling provoked and they press a button in us for a Coke and we delivered it on cue, shaken up can of Coke and push all over them. And it's like to have that self awareness of whoa, whoa, whoa, right now I'm feeling agitated. I might as an adult need to call my own timeout. I may say, wait, wait, wait, what's this hitting in me? Then go over here to a spouse and process it and say what's going on in me that this kid is hitting in me? Personality difference or whatever and being aware. If I'm not aware of my triggers, then they're going to get triggered every time. Many of us in the field now call it more activation than you're triggered. I'm getting activated as where is this again? If it's hysterical, it's historical. Where might be some of the history of these buttons. And then last thing is, you know, why am I as a parent not blaming the kids at all? Why am I giving them all this power? They can walk up and go, three, two, one, boom. And out I go. I'm like, I want to have more emotional self regulation than that.

Jim Kress (29:13)

One thing I've learned over the years and I am not great at it, guys, but it is something that I have given myself permission to do over the last few years is when I start to one fostering in myself an awareness of when I'm start. The quarter's been dropped in, we're at 50 cents now. The level's starting to go up inside of me that in order to teach my children who I expect to be regulated people, I need to show them that sometimes I get dysregulated. And here's what I do, you know. And so we've, I've tried to say, hey guys, I am about to lose my patience. I need to walk away for a few minutes. I need a few minutes to go in the other room and to just have a minute. Okay, mom needs a minute. And by hopefully I don't do it perfect because y' all sometimes that all four quarters go in and they hit that button. Oh, here she comes. You know, but trying, especially lately with my little guy, like, he needs help, he needs to learn the skills of self regulation. And one of the best ways to learn it is to see your parent do it, you know, and give permission to, oh, I can feel it, it's starting to go up. I need to take a minute, you know. And so permission granted to all the parents to say, you know what, watch this iPad for a minute. I need to separate myself so that I can calm down. So permission granted. All across the room. Okay, so these are some heavy things, guys. We've talked a lot about really doing that self work, recognizing, you know, whether it's a trigger or you're starting to get activated, maybe you're seeing. Yikes. I do have some control issues that are stemming from fear. How do parents start to begin recognizing these? Or maybe they're listening right now, to be quite honest, and saying, I'm good. I don't think I have any triggers. Like, I don't have any control issues. Help them or help me even begin to recognize the red flags in themselves. Like how, by the way, do you.

Bethany Hall (31:21)

Know if those parents are alike, alive, seriously? Or do they have a pulse if they don't have any triggers?

Jim Kress (31:29)

I don't know. I guess they're out there, but they might be out there, Jim. I'm just. I'm gonna guess that maybe they're anomaly. Yes, they really are. Maybe they're parenting plants.

Bethany Hall (31:41)

They're AI. They're AI parents, I guarantee you.

Jim Kress (31:45)

So how do we begin recognizing the triggers in ourselves? And where do we go from there? So, Bethany, do you want to start?

Unknown (31:55)

Yeah. I mean, I think the hope is really just circling back to what we keep saying, and that is being curious about what's going on in our own hearts. And I think it's easy to either, like you said, get too busy. So we're not even able to notice the triggers because they're happening and they're happening and they're happening. And in the moment we think, man, I should maybe go to therapy about that, or, man, I should talk to a friend about that. And then we get busy. So I think we can fall off on that side or, Jim, you alluded to it earlier. We can just get stuck in shame of like, I'm the world's worst parent. I have all these triggers. I yell, I'm, you know, I'm not. I'm not modeling, taking a break, and I've just failed and I'm ruining my kids. And either one, we get some stuck. And so trying to sit in that middle spot, you know, Paul Tripp said something in one of his books that I love, and he talks about how the Lord parents us as we parent our kids. And it was just life changing for me because if in that moment I can go, God, I am in such need of your grace as I do this thing and tell my kids, guys, mom is in Such need of grace as I do this thing because I'm still learning and I'm still growing. And your sin of selfishness is my sin of selfishness. It just looks different. And so idea of like, we're all in this together, we are all sinners, we are all looking to the Lord to help us. But it helps me to stay curious, it helps me to be honest with myself because there's no shame. The Lord has taken the punishment for it. So I can freely say, man, I have an anger problem and it's rooted in this thing that really hits my button. And so I can ask for help about that, I can ask the Lord, I can ask a counselor. I think that frees us to see these as opportunities rather than, you know, I'm just going to ruin my kids lives or to have to say, well, I don't have any of those. We can get honest because of grace.

Jim Kress (33:43)

That's good. That's really good. My husband likes to say to my 13 year old, and I don't know where he got this, but I think it's so smart. He says, look, buddy, I've only been a parent as long as you've been alive. I've never done this before. And so I'm like, it's true. Just like you're learning how to be a young man, a human being, we're still learning how to be parents. We've never done this before, you know, And I think again, permission granted guys to say things that like, I don't totally know how to do this. So that's good, that's good. You talk a little bit too about connected parenting, Bethany. What is that?

Unknown (34:18)

Yeah, so some people call it connected parenting, some people call it authoritative parenting. But it's just this idea of balancing, you know, you're a TBRI fan, Meredith. This idea of balancing structure and nurture, it's not falling off either side of the cart. And I think all of us tend to have kind of our zone. My husband is very structured. He keeps us from being broke, giving away everything we own and eating ice cream every day. And God love him for it, you know, and I am the connector. And so I help him kind of tone it down sometimes and we kind of bring those two pieces. But this idea, this phrase that I'm going to say is so important. Proximity increases tolerance. So when we feel close to somebody, we put up with a lot more trash from them than when we do not feel connected to them. And so the weird thing is, is that when I'm most wanting to Reach for control or I'm most irritated with my child. What I most need to do is to work on that connection because they're going to be able to tolerate me better and I'm going to be able to tolerate them better. If we can say, hey, we're on the same team, we love each other and we're going to get through this. It's going to really just create ripple effects into all the other conversations we have to have into all the other boundaries that proximity increases our ability to tolerate, you know, with our spouse, but also with our kids. So just spending that time connecting with them when we least feel like it sometimes can produce the harvest, even if our heart's not initially in it. So same thing with the permission granted. Permission granted to do the right thing even if you don't feel like it as a parent.

Jim Kress (35:51)

Right.

Bethany Hall (35:52)

I think it's important too, as often as we can as parents is to. And it's easier for me to see now as a grandfather, a granddaddy of six to watch them and my. We don't analyze our kids, officially analyze our adult kids parenting styles. We sit back one degree removed and watch it. And to look for command free demand free time with their kids so literally within boundaries that there's a time that this is not about move left, right, up, down instruction. It's a command free and demand free zone where everybody can kind of breathe and just be. And I encourage parents, anyone watching or listening today, within your boundaries to look for how do we have that command free demand free time that everybody's just kind of chilling, not, not on duty with a bunch of rules right away.

Jim Kress (36:42)

That is some wisdom, y'. All. And that is hard. Can I be honest? For me as a person, I am a structure, productivity driven mom, you know, and so it's really, it's been hard for me as a parent to not always be in that kind of demand command space where it's like, okay, now it's time to get ready for dinner. Okay, now it's time to clean up dinner. Okay, we're done with dinner. Now it's time to go ahead and do homework. You know, and I heard in a workshop a few years ago about, you know, and I think we've all heard the importance of playing with your children. Like play. It's good for their learning, it's good for your connection. And I found myself especially with little toddlers, like that's super hard for me. Like, it's really hard to tap into my imagination that way. And I'm just Again, just going to throw out there something that I learned in hopes that it will help another mom out there. A trick I learned is to narrate what they're doing. You're not really playing with them, but you narrate. Like when my kids would, like, have their little Batman toy or their little Barbie toy, I would be like, okay, you do it, and I'll say what they're doing. And I would just be like. And Barbie walked upstairs and she couldn't believe it. The house was a mess. And I'm not actively moving the little guys or doing anything. But it was just like an easy way for me to enter into play with my kids that I don't even. I learned it in some random workshop that I was like, that I can do. I can narrate what is happening with the action figures, because it's almost even still for me, I'm like, still kind of commanding something, but it's the figure, not the kid, you know, Or I would be like, okay, now you're going to pretend like they're doing this. And it just helped me move out of that command demand space and into that. To your point, Bethany, connection.

Bethany Hall (38:36)

And there are. There are therapists that make a good living off that called play therapy or sand tray or whatever else. And it's very, very helpful. And the kids often will just open up. And I used to do that by differently, but putting up when I was counseling kids and teenagers. I have a basketball, still have a hoop in my office, and I'm not gonna sit and talk face to face like this. We'd shoot three pointers and talk or use some art stuff and just kind of goof off. And I found, man, they'd open up and tell you all kinds of stuff because they were distracted from just the thing. They weren't being. Come right at them like that. It's quite effective.

Jim Kress (39:11)

Yeah.

Unknown (39:12)

Decreasing that intensity. Yeah, for sure.

Jim Kress (39:14)

Yeah. So good. Okay. We've talked about our own personal red flags, and that's where we got to start. Y' all so important. Do your own work before you, you know, and sometimes you have to do it alongside your kiddos work too, Right? And so let's talk about recognizing some red flags in our kids. Bethany, you work with kids, you see them day in and day out. What red flags do we need to know as parents?

Unknown (39:40)

So the first one we want to talk about is unusual behavior or when your kid is just not acting like themselves. So this kind of red flag, something feels off. And this could be a momentary thing, but I'm going to encourage you to look for patterns in two areas, frequency and intensity. So every teenager tends to have some moody moments. Right. That's just kind of par for the course. Every toddler has meltdowns, but if you have a child that the frequency of it is happening more than you would say that your other mom friends or, you know, the people that you know, it's happening more frequently, it's an everyday occurrence, or the intensity. So it's lasting for hours. You know, Meredith, as an adoptive mom, you know, when you're talking to somebody who has a biological child who hasn't experienced trauma, it's not always apples to apples. People are like, oh, yeah, my teenager has meltdowns. And I'm like, well, some of the teenagers we work with, you know, they're threatening physical harm or they're taking doors off the walls. And it's just not apples to apples. And it's not comparison game. That's not what I'm saying. I'm just saying we want to look at the frequency and intensity to say if something's a red flag. You know, every kid might have a behavior, but if it's much more frequent or much more intense than a neurotypical child or a child without trauma, then we start. Want to. Want to start asking questions and perhaps getting a professional involved in the conversation.

Jim Kress (41:00)

Yeah, that's a good word. And I think that I've learned as a parent, there is intense for one child is very different than your other one, but they're both normal. Like, this one's intensity is just. They live at a level nine, and that's okay. That's their normal. This one down here. And if they go to a level 12 all of a sudden and are kind of staying there, that's the. Oh, something's happening, you know, where this one stays at a level five and they go to a level nine and then back down. It's okay. They're just having a minute, you know, and so looking for those patterns, like you said, where it's like, if it goes up, you know, don't. You can't compare apples. They're not apples to apples. They're all different. Jim, you have something that you say about parental regret that I think would help our listeners so unpack that for our family.

Bethany Hall (41:54)

Yeah. I wrote an article for the publication I write for called the Christian Counseling Today from the American association of Christian Counselors. And the article was simply. I titled it Parenting your Adult Children Rising from Regret to Resiliency. Because even if they're toddlers. And now they were. And now they're teenagers. The level of parental regret is looking back, you know, driving far less in the windshield before you, but in that parental regret rear view mirror and thinking, I could have done this different had I known this, and I didn't know anything about attachment or we used to do this discipline or this modality of parenting and all that and structure and having that regret. And still then in a way, living in such a regret that keeps you from being present in the moment. And it might keep you in a relationship. We know for every rip, there needs to be a repair and to be able to say, or the relationship will rupture. And to be able to say, I can go to my kids, I've talked to a lot of parents who have been saying, have you ever made amends to your kids, whether they're little kids, adolescent teenagers, adults? No. I go, then I would be found faithful to go to your kids at any level and say, you know what? I did get activated there. And for God's sake, literally for God's sake, do not say, see what you made me do? I mean, you made me mad. You did this. When people use the language you made me or it made me, that's victim language. That's childhood language. Right? So the idea of just taking ownership and looking and saying, of course you hurt your child, or of course you have some parental regrets, there's only probably two things you need that you own owe to your kids one day, and that's an education and therapy. It's like, my kids have to go to therapy. No, that's a good thing. But parentally, even if they're adults, to circle back and say, you don't have to go to therapy for that. But to say, what are there. Is there any ways that I hurt you or mess some things up or I wish I'd have done this better. And usually the last person we forgive is ourselves. So that's the parental regret. If I had more time, which we don't have, I would say if you keep yourself in prison, locked in the prison of parental regret, and you can't almost believe that you did it, be careful, because I believe you're now entering the realm ready of idolatry. It is an idol versus saying you get to be human as a parent. Most of us at one level probably did about as good as we could do if you had everything in there and to forgive yourself and seek to make amends and repairs with your kids.

Jim Kress (44:35)

That's a good word. It's A good word. Okay, let's talk about red flag number two with our kiddos. What do we need to look out for?

Unknown (44:42)

Red flag number two is fear or shame based behaviors. So this, like you said, Meredith looks different in every kid. And Jim, I know on this podcast you guys have talked about that limbic system or the amygdala activation, and it causes all manner of bad behavior in our kids and in us. So we kind of talked about our own bad behavior in the first part of the podcast and in this one, we just want to be aware when our child has a big behavior that's based in that fear or shame based response. So we can look at it. Fight, flight, freeze. In a kid fight might be yelling or cussing or slamming doors or getting physical, right? Flight might be literally running away, but flight can also look like flighting into my phone or gaming and just avoiding the situation. Right? And then freeze. Going back to the trigger, the beautiful trigger that you mentioned, Meredith, which can also be one of mine, which is that. Are you even listening? Like, is this mic on feeling with my kids? That's that freeze, right? And so when we look at just the behavior, it can be so frustrating. But if we see it for what it is, hey, that behavior is a fear or a shame based response, that kid is activated. It's going to help us engage in a very different way. So understanding. Like you said, my first job as a parent when I notice that my kid is in their amygdala is to keep myself calm, because that is contagious, right? Those big emotions, they can easily ooze over to me. My youngest and I have this trick called the jello wall. Just put up your jello wall. Don't let those negative emotions ooze into you. And so trying to keep myself regulated is job number one. And then step two is, how can I help this kid get out of that fear based response? How can I connect? How can I get him a drink or a snack? How can I get some proximity so that they have the ability to get in the part of their brain that they need to be in to make a different choice? But none of that happens if I'm not recognizing the behavior for what it is. If I'm just playing what I call behavior, whack a mole. You know, they just always do this or they always do that. Versus wow, that was a big amygdala response. How should I then in kind respond versus being reactive?

Jim Kress (46:48)

Yeah. Wow. I'm just here to tell you, like, that is such wisdom, such good advice.

Unknown (46:57)

But it's so hard having done it wrong so many times. So just everybody, every listener, be aware. I learned that because I played behavior whack a mole for a long, long time.

Jim Kress (47:10)

Yeah, well, so let's end on that, guys. If self regulation is the goal, right, as the parent, you're saying your number one responsibility is to self regulate before you can deal with what you're doing. Jim, Bethany, give us just some. A tip, some kind of practical thing to help our listeners right now. Because a lot of them, I can guarantee you, myself included, is like, you want me to what? Excuse me? And so let's give them that one first step that might help them do that.

Bethany Hall (47:45)

I'll go first. And that is, you know, we have a paper in front of us. Write down your triggers, folks. Write down your activation points. Write down if it's hysterical, it's historical. Meredith gave one earlier. Mine was, I felt disrespected as a child. So when one of my children overtly disrespected me, man, it was all over me. You've got to know your triggers. You have to have that awareness. Once we prepare, in times of strength, for coming, times of weakness, sit with a therapist or a good friend. Everything's not always about counseling to sit down and say, what are my activation points? What are my triggers? Have that awareness. Know that in your brain. Research that if the amygdala and limbic part of your brain gets fired where it's fully involved on fire, it takes 20 to 30 minutes for that to calm down. So you have to have that awareness. And you feel yourself like the quarters in the Coke machine. You know your stuff. I feel it. Take a break. Drink 4 ounces of water, can lower anxiety, put ice in your hands. I mean, we can get it all kind of practical therapeutic techniques. And guess what? Easier said than done. For what in life is not easier said than done? If you want calm, bring calm. If you want calm, be calm. And the more your system, the brain's a gps saying, where we going? If you say, I've got tools here to remain calm or to take a time out when I need to, you'll find it'll work for you. I promise you that.

Unknown (49:09)

Yeah, and piggybacking off of that, I mean, that is just such gold, Jim. And I would say, you know, scripture says that out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks, and that we are changed by the renewing of our mind. And so all of our behavior makes sense. Whatever you're choosing to do that you don't like is rooted in a thought, a belief and emotion that has to be unpacked. We cannot just double down and do better. And I tried that so many years of like, I just have to do different and have a behavior part for me as an adult. Right. And really it's, it sounds like you said it sounds like an Instagram post, Jim. But it's going to, Lord, and saying I'm believing wrong things about my responsibilities or about myself or about my past or, you know, I have emotions that I haven't overturned to you and I need to work through. Help me to recognize them. And Then that Romans 12:2 Help me to renew those and to think differently and to fill myself with your thoughts and your truth so that I can then out of that overflow respond. So trusting those things to the Lord, I think is has been so critical for my journey. And it's so easy when we have kids, like in our line of work with really big behaviors to just go, it's all on the kid. Like you said, Jim, I've been so guilty of that. Like, my kid has 90% of the puzzle. I'm not going to focus on my 10. But any 1% that we can do, which we have full control over, is going to create ripple effects in the lives of our kids. And so it's hard. But doing our own work is just so critical.

Jim Kress (50:36)

Amen, guys, this is what a great conversation. And I just want to say to all the parents out there, like, hang in there. You're doing holy work by raising those kiddos. And it is not. You don't have to be perfect. That is what the gospel is for. It's for us imperfect, incapable lovers of Jesus. That's all we got to be. And he will fill in the rest. So hang in there, parents. Thank you both Bethany and Jim, for being here, giving your wisdom. I really believe that this conversation is going to help a lot of people out there. So thanks for tuning in. Therapy and Theology family. We hope that you have found today's episode helpful and hopeful.

Meredith Brock (51:19)

Thanks for tuning in today. Don't forget to download your free resource titled Is this normal? 15 red flags you may be missing in your relationships. We've linked it for you in the show notes below. Therapy and Theology is brought to you by Proverbs 31 Ministries, where we help you know the truth and live the truth because it changes everything. That's it for today's episode. But before you go, I want to tell you about a powerful way you can help Proverbs 31 ministries bridge the gap for even more listeners who need access to trusted therapy and biblically sound theology. Since launching this podcast, we've impacted hundreds of thousands of listeners. Here's what one of them said in a recent review I'm so thankful for this podcast. It has helped me work through so many issues in my life and enabled me me to step outside of my whirlwind of emotions and plant my feet on the truth, the Word of God. I hope this podcast continues. You really are changing lives. The Therapy and Theology Podcast is one of the many free resources we offer because listeners like you make it possible. So today I want to invite you to be a part of our listeners stories. To be a part of the life change that happens every single day because of those who say yes when they're asked to give. Because when you give, you help another soul know and live the truth that truly changes everything. You can give a donation today at proverbs31.org backslash donate.