Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Hello, everyone. Welcome to this special edition of the hand on hand parent club podcast. I likely don't need to tell you <laugh> that parents' lives have been a little turned upside down just a little in the last two years. Um, many of us are really just trying to find our bearings. Uh, things are still a little topsy turvy and uncertain. Um, it's, it's hard to know, uh, what is solid ground and what's not in front of us. Um, and it's really hard to, to know what we need, what our families need, um, to get us the things we need, um, right now, um, let alone thinking ahead for the next season. Uh, there, it's no secret, there's too much on the shoulders of, of parents right now. And you might even be wondering or worrying, like, am I doing something wrong that, that things are as hard as they are. Um, or that I I'm, I'm not able to feel like I can stay on top of stuff. Um, and I assure you, there is nothing wrong with you. You're you're not making a mistake here. You are just woefully under supported.
Speaker 1 00:01:17 Yeah. And maybe you just need a little bit of self care.
Speaker 0 00:01:22 <laugh> self care, it'll solve all of your problems. <laugh>,
Speaker 1 00:01:30 I'm telling you as a single parent, you know, when I was really, when my son was young and, and then we, and I was really struggling, like trying to, you know, uh, uh, bring in the, the, in, you know, keep us afloat financially and, and help him, you know, when somebody said, you know, you just need a little self care. <laugh>. I mean, I wanted to run, I, I thought I better run screaming from this room, or I might just, I don't know, give them a raspberry, you know,
Speaker 0 00:02:03 I might do worse <laugh>. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:02:06 But, um, but I'll, I will tell you, um, what I found the hand in hand tools, and I found the, particularly our unique and powerful tool of, of parent to parent support called listing partnerships. That to me became my lifeline. That became my, like, if I could just get, you know, my son had had a huge tantrum, a huge upset. I had listened to him all the way through. He was now, you know, um, he was back in his thinking brain. He was happy. He was, you know, bipping along and I'm a wet noodle. I'm like, what, what just happened if I could get just like five minutes of listening, time, someone to listen to me to exchange listening time for just five minutes, that would refuel my tank. That would recharge me. That that would be like, that was just a tiny little bit of, of nurturing me that, um, then I could, I, I was available and I, I could be present and I could go on with my day and I was ready for the next upset,
Speaker 0 00:03:20 You know? And it's, it's, it's, it is, I mean, self-care is a wonderful thing like who wouldn't, you know, I'd love a massage every week. I, I would love to have, you know, an an hour or two to myself to just pursue something creative and fun
Speaker 1 00:03:39 Read,
Speaker 0 00:03:39 Read. I could, I could read more than a sentence <laugh> that would be great. Um, but it's, it can just be hard to come by. So in these times, when refueling and recharging opportunities for parents are kind of few and far between it's IM it's helpful to look for, where am I gonna get the most fuel for the least amount of, of effort or time? Um, for me, uh, you know, coming out of the pandemic, um, to, to where, you know, we, we can be with each other more often. I, I knew in my mind that community is important connection with other humans is important, but, you know, I'm also kinda introverted. And so the, oh, the getting back to interacting with other humans has been an, an awkward process to say the least. So something I did for myself that is self-care, I consider it self-care, um, over this past summer was, um, I wanted to make, um, finding community accessing community in encouraging more human connection, more easy, easier for myself.
Speaker 0 00:04:59 Um, so I just, I, I knew that that window of time, when a person stops by or drops a kid off for a play date or whatever was a golden moment where I could say, do you wanna come to the back deck and, you know, have an, have some iced tea, uh, or lemonade with me. And we would have a 20 minute great check-in conversation, commiserate, whatever, whatever we needed. Well, the kids oriented themselves. And so for me, my self-care was have lemonade, have ice tea, um, have a little snack, like a bag of pretzels available at all times, so I could feel, and, and let's sit outside. So we're not in my, who knows what my house looks like that day. Um, so I knew those things were set up and ready and, and less effortful. So I removed a barrier to accessing community for myself. And while it wasn't, you know, a, a deep, wonderful listening partnership session, it was a chance to be with another human and see another human and feel connected to another human in, in person that was really meaningful for me. And, um, fueling for me over the summer.
Speaker 1 00:06:15 You know, I love about that. Emily is like, you presented it as a, to do, like, I did this thing for myself, but first of all, it was tiny. Yeah. You know, one of the things that we talk about in this podcast is one small thing. So that's like one small thing that Emily did for herself in order to be, um, available for community. And, and, and I, and I bet there is a, you know, a bunch of things that you let go of, like, I'm letting go of whether my house looks perfect to have people over, I'm letting go of, you know, that I of, of putting out a spread, um, or, you know, it's pretzels,
Speaker 0 00:06:53 People,
Speaker 1 00:06:53 Pretzels <laugh>. Yes, very, yeah. Um, and, uh, they're good enough for the airlines. They're good enough for my
Speaker 0 00:07:02 <laugh>
Speaker 1 00:07:03 And, um, and, you know, letting go of like, um, just things needing to be like perfect in order to have people over yeah. Or order to, to connect with friends. And so at hand in hand, um, we thought that we would, uh, create an opportunity for you to find community for you to rest to you, for you, to refuel for you to recharge, um, in a really simple, easy way. Um, and so we've created this virtual retreat for you that we're calling the, the hand in hand recharge. Um, and, um, we, our intention, our purpose is that you can rest for a minute. You can take stock of what it is that you need and what can really help you and your family, um, recover from the last couple of years and to find more ease and maybe E even joy and fun in your parenting.
Speaker 1 00:08:08 So that's why we created this virtual four day retreat, not as one more thing to do, but as a place to go to rest and receive, you know, as, as, as parents and particularly as moms, um, we're giving, giving, giving, giving, giving, and we may not have, we may not be very good at receiving. We may not have a practice of receiving. So we want you to come for these four days or whatever, little bit of it that you can, and really receive our love, our appreciation, our listening. We're gonna listen to you and support you, and we're creating a nurturing, supporting community. So you don't even have to leave your house. All you need is a, a phone or a computer and an internet connection. You know, you can come as you are, you can come in your jammies, you don't have to worry about childcare. You know, you can just hang out at home and let us pamper you.
Speaker 0 00:09:07 So, um, wherever, however, whenever you can pop into this community, we do have some live things going on each day in the community. And if you can make it to those, please do, cuz that live connection really, oh, it just turns up the volume on that feeling of, of connection. So make it to the live event if you can.
Speaker 1 00:09:30 And if there, if not, they'll be, they will be recorded. So you can access the recordings.
Speaker 0 00:09:35 We'll pop recordings in as soon as we have them into each day's materials. So we're gonna have a central place for you to find listening partners. Um, we have these fun workshops planned for you. If you can make them, we have Q and a sessions. If, if you just want to ask some questions, clarify things, customize it. So it actually can fit in your life. Um, and just find support from, from other parents too. There's an activity feed where you can, um, you can ask your questions, you can respond to other people's questions with your ideas, um, with your, um, with, with how you've tried using the hand in hand tools in certain situations. So come and feel supported, be in community. Um, all the materials are right there in the community, uh, where you can watch at your own pace. If you have one day, you could watch everything. We're gonna put everything up on day one. So it's right there. Um, or you can spread it out over, um, the four, the four day experience. So whether you come for one call, uh, and just pop in or pop in for some tips on lightning, your load, think of us as your place to come for parenting provisions. Like come get what you need. And then head back into family. Life, feeling more prepared for whatever is is coming next.
Speaker 1 00:10:55 So our one small thing for you this week is to come join us September 21st to the 24th for are the special, the special hand in hand experience our parent virtual retreat, the recharge we'll see you there. Bye-bye
Speaker 0 00:11:14 Thank you so much for tuning into the hand in hand parent club podcast, please like, and subscribe to hear more and to connect with us between these episodes. Come on over to hand in hand parenting.org to join the parent club where you can get coaching classes and live support.
Speaker 1 00:11:27 Come join our vibrant community of parents in the parent club who are committed to getting the support they need to be the parents they wanna become. We'd be honored to support you too. This podcast and the parent club are part of hand in hand parenting, a nonprofit organization that supports parents all over the world. We are here for you when parenting gets hard.
