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There are 6 common mistakes that create stress and overwhelm for working moms during the holiday season. During this mini-series I will cover each mistake and teach you how to correct it. In today’s episode I dive into mistake #4: not expecting big emotions. During the holidays, there will be more meltdowns for both you and your kids. It’s to be expected. Everyone is off rhythms and there is simply more expectations and demands on everyone. In this episode I share why it is vital for you to expect big emotions and create a plan to compassionately handle them.
Topics in this episode:
The challenge with transitions and why they cause big emotions.
What happens when you anticipate emotions.
Why normalizing emotions will help you this holiday season.
What is an effective plan for dealing with your emotions.
Show Notes & References:
Learn how to process and let go of stress and overwhelm all year long? Click here to schedule a free call to discuss coaching and how to stop reacting to life: www.rebeccaolsoncoaching.com
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Transcript
Intro
Hey, working moms. If you're just picking up the podcast this episode, you'll notice that we're in the middle of a series, the top six mistakes that create stress and overwhelm during the holiday season.
This is a six part miniseries to help you create a calm present and restful holiday season.
These are short, ten minute episodes that drop Mondays and Wednesdays. So there's a few bonus episodes during the series. And today we're diving into mistake number four.
You ready? Let's get to it.
Welcome to the Ambitious and Balanced Working Moms podcast, the place for women who want to balance their ambitious career goals with their life as a mom. If you're looking to feel more confident, decisive, and productive at both work and home, then this is the place for you. I'm your host, Rebecca Olson. Let's get to it.
Hello, working moms. Let's jump right into the fourth mistake that I see working moms make during the holiday season that causes extra stress and overwhelm. Today we're talking about mistake number four, which is not expecting big emotions either from yourself and most definitely from your kids.
Let me tell you a little story.
Two days before Thanksgiving break, my kids and I are sitting on the couch. It's like 6:30 in the morning, and I'm reading to them a magazine, which is just our usual routine. And to be honest, it's really one of my favorite moments with my kids.
And my son sort of makes this off collar comment, as any six year old does, as they say things that they don't really understand.
So I correct him and I explain to him the meaning behind what he had said and why it's important for him not to say that again.
Big emotions.
And immediately he starts screaming, I'm so stupid. And he runs to his bedroom and he slams to his door, and I can hear him sort of, like, yelling and shaming himself in his room.
Now, if this was your kid, here is what I would not want you to do.
I would not want you to think, oh, my gosh, why is he doing this? He shouldn't be doing this. We need to get out the door for school. I can't believe my kid isn't over this by now. This is such a problem. This shouldn't be happening.
In other words, I don't want your first response to be surprise coupled with the thought, something's wrong.
Now, this is actually a typical response for my six year old. He's a deeply feeling kid, and shame is very closely tied to feeling corrected and embarrassed. But I will be honest and say he hasn't really done this for quite some time.
And so while this is completely normal for him, it has not been normal over the last several months, except it's the holidays and whenever there's change and transition there is more emotion, particularly for our kids.
But it happens for us, too, as adults as well, and we're going to talk about that a little later.
Thanksgiving break was coming up, he was going to have nine days off school, which feels a little bit different as they prepare for a long break.
There's anticipation of the holidays of course, there was going to be a lot more emotion and there's going to be a lot more struggle during this time.
Our brains don’t like transition.
Our brains, like all brains, don't like transition. Our brains are wired for comfort and security. And the most comfortable, safe thing to do is to just keep doing what you've always been doing.
And it's why we as humans build a lot of routines and habits. It's why we put our kids on a schedule when they're really little so we don't have to think about it.
Routine and habit create comfort.
Routines and habits create a lot of comfort because our brain knows what to expect and our brain kind of knows what’s normal in times of transition.
Our brain has to put in a lot more effort to stay calm, effort to stay focused, effort to keep our emotions in check, effort to keep priorities top of mind for our kids.
They don't have the ability to handle the emotions of transitions, so they act out and they melt down and they throw temper tantrums. It's to be expected.
We see this a lot in our young kids, infants, toddlers, the transition from home to daycare or daycare to home or not hungry to hungry or awake to asleep.
Young children resist these transitions during the day. They fight them because it feels so uncomfortable to them. And so they cry and they resist because it's really all they know how to do.
It's how they know how to emotionally regulate themselves just to let it out in a bunch of crying and tears.
And so in the same way, even though my son is six, he doesn't yet have the tools to manage his emotions through transitions yet. He has a lot more tools than a toddler, but not the same amount of tools that I have as an adult.
So of course he's just going to be more dysregulated and emotions are going to fly.
The mistake I see a lot of working moms make is not to expect this during the holidays. At the first sign of a tantrum or a meltdown that feels unusual, they think, oh, my gosh, what's going on? This shouldn't be happening. Why are they doing this? They're too old for this.
And when you don't expect that your kids are going to have big emotions and you feel sort of thrown off by it, then your kids sort of feed off of your surprise.
And rather than showing up with compassion and as the connected mom you want to be, you show up with judgment and anger.
And no human likes to feel judged and likes to experience anger, right? And your kid can totally smell that like a mile away.
There will be more emotions during the holidays.
There's going to be more meltdowns.
There's going to be more resistance.
There's going to be more emotional dysregulation.
It is normal. Everyone's out of rhythm. I want that to be your first response. Take a moment and really think about how differently you would show up to your kid having a meltdown.
If you expect that meltdown and you think it's normal, maybe even a memory comes up as you think about that, right? Like, oh, yeah, my kid hates going to bed, and I always expect that he's going to throw a temper tantrum at that time.
And because I always expect that and it feels normal to me. I show up stronger as a more sturdy parent with more compassion and love.
Oh, I know you don't want to go to bed, sweetheart. It's really hard to have an earlier bedtime than Mommy and Daddy. I love you so much. I can't wait to see you tomorrow. Can I snuggle with you even a couple more minutes?
Normalize and expect big emotional meltdowns.
Now, not sure if that's how you would handle this or that's what you would say to your kids, but you could just feel the energy. The response would be completely different when you normalize and expect your kids to have a meltdown versus when you don't.
So expect big emotions from your kids this holiday, it would be a mistake not to.
Now let's talk about your emotions. You have a lot more tools to regulate your emotions than your kids, but it still requires a lot of effort.
You might get snappy, argumentative, even angry or explosive at times during this holiday season. It makes sense, right? There's a lot more going on. There's a lot more balls that you're juggling. There's a lot more effort being put in to manage your schedules and your tasks. And your to do list is quite literally twice the size, right?
So of course you're going to have some big feelings in the middle of the holiday season. It's not a problem. It's totally normal.
The question is, what are you going to do when you notice those big feelings?
Ideally, when you notice the signs that they are coming up - nobody's anger volcano, as I like to call it with my kids, explodes instantaneously. There's a period of buildup of pressure that leads to the volcano exploding.
And that's the ideal time that you want to be noticing your big feelings and doing something about them. So how are you going to take care of your emotional self in that moment when you notice your big feelings are coming up?
Take a walk.
Grab a journal.
Lock yourself in your room.
Take a shower, a bath.
Breathe deep ten times.
Tell your kids, I need ten minutes to myself.
Lock yourself in a closet if you have to.
You need space and a plan for what you're going to do with that space when you notice your big emotions are creeping in.
Now remember, your emotions are simply vibrations in your body, and the big emotions feel very uncomfortable.
Do not push away your big emotions.
What I don't want you to do is to ignore those really uncomfortable vibrations because they feel so uncomfortable, and stuff them away or push them down until you either explode or melt down later.
That's what we don't want. That's the unhealthy way of dealing with your emotions.
Creating space to emotionally regulate.
Instead, I want you to expect that you're going to need some very intentional emotional regulation during the holiday season a lot more than you usually need. And I want you to have a plan for how you're going to help yourself get regulated.
It would be a mistake to not expect big emotions from yourself and to not have a plan for them.
Now, if you notice that this is a pattern for you, like not just during the holidays, but during normal life as well, your emotions seem to be constantly dysregulated.
You get angry. You snap at your kids way more than you want to. You're sort of living with this low level or even a high level of stress and overwhelm constantly, you're thinking, there's no other way…
I'm telling you, there's another way.
You can be an ambitious and balanced working mom. You can have both.
That's what we talk about in this podcast, having a both and life. A life where you have a demanding and fulfilling career and a very present and connected home life.
If you want to make 2024, the year where you learn how to stop operating from a place of stress and overwhelm, where you have a life that includes time for yourself and rest and connection with your family that you're always prioritizing, then now is the time to make that commitment.
Schedule a free call with me.
There's still time to get it in before the end of the year where you will learn more about coaching and exactly how we are going to make that work for you.
All right, working moms, let's normalize our emotions this holiday season. Let's expect them and have a plan for them.
Until next time, let's get to it.
