Printables

Inside: At the age of 31, with two boys to raise, with a nursing career, and in the middle of training for a half marathon, a stroke was not on my agenda. But this is what it taught me about how to love your children.

Within three months, my world turned upside down.

I’d had a cryptogenic stroke, which left me with Broca’s aphasia and apraxia. Aphasia and apraxia are just fancy medical terms for saying that my expressive communication – speaking and writing – was devastatingly affected.

At the age of 31, with two boys to raise, with a nursing career, and in the middle of training for a half marathon, a stroke was not on my agenda. Strokes very rarely affect someone of my age, but more important than my age was the age of my two children: 4 years old and 15 months.

My kids were much too little, and they needed their mother.

This was taken two weeks after my stroke when I was allowed my first day pass out of the hospital.

This is what was left of me.

Three days after my stroke, the shock had subsided and the gravity of what disabilities I had been left with came into focus. As much as I tried, communication with the rest of the world was not coming back as easy as I would have liked.

My sister was at my bedside, as she was most of the time that I spent in the hospital. We were working on my speech rehabilitation, which was essentially what you would learn in early elementary school. She was reading out sentences that I was supposed to attempt to write.

I sat cross-legged on my hospital bed with a note pad, trying to write “The dog was black.” I couldn’t do it.

After what seemed like an hour, I scribbled “dog black.” I knew that wasn’t correct. I knew I had missed the connecting words of a sentence, but I had no idea what they were. My internal dialogue could say this simple sentence, but when I opened my mouth or put pen to paper, all I could muster was “dog black.”

…

Kristen Traverse

Kristen is is mother of two amazing young boys, a Registered Nurse, and a speaker and educator on compassionate healthcare. She’s extremely passionate about bringing more meaningful moments to families, and she loves teaching children about mindful compassionate communication and reminding them how amazing they truly are. Follow her at KristenTraverse.com or on Instagram.

kristentraverse.com/

Did I Say “I Love You” Enough to Last a Lifetime?Read More

Inside: What’s the secret to enjoying motherhood when the daily work of motherhood drags you down? Thanks to recent brain research, we now know the most effective and powerful way to take charge of this mom autopilot mode so we can enjoy motherhood.

I stood outside my kids’ bedroom door, smiling as I listened to them wrestle and laugh while they were supposed to be putting their pajamas on.

During the day, I’d checked off a handful of items on my to-do list, I’d gotten my kids where they needed to go on time (well, mostly on time), and no one was sick or seriously injured.

Today seemed like a win.

But then my smile slipped, and that relief and gratification started to fade away. New feelings of emptiness and guilt settled deep in my gut.

Bonus: As a bonus for joining my weekly newsletter, download a free cheat sheet of 7 quick fixes to help you enjoy motherhood.

Here’s What I Realized

After a full day of being a mom to my sweet young kids, I didn’t take the time to stop and be fully present with them. I wasn’t enjoying motherhood.

Instead, my thoughts of daily tasks and to-do’s took control of my day.

• I didn’t tune into the excitement in my daughter’s voice as she told me all about her solo in the upcoming school concert. How did I forget to pull dinner out of the freezer again?
• I missed taking a pause during our naptime story to appreciate my 3-year old’s dimple that’s already starting to fade away. Just two more minutes until freedom!
• I didn’t enjoy the 15 blissful minutes where all three of my kids played with kinetic sand – without fighting. What a mess! I’d better go get the vacuum.

Why Regret Keeps Coming Back

I start out every day with the best intentions of finding time to connect with and enjoy my time with these little people who also happen to be my favorite people.

Papers to sign, field trip money to send, lunches to be made – and that’s just the first three minutes of the day. So much to do and never enough time to do it all.

When you’re caught up in the current of day-to-day tasks, it can feel more like being pulled in by an undertow.

But I don’t want to spend motherhood pulled under and dragged around by all the doing at the expense of being with my kids.

So my question became: What’s the secret to enjoying motherhood when the daily work of motherhood drags you down?

The Biggest Hurdle to Enjoying Motherhood

From my training as a family therapist, I know that our brains are wired for survival. They keep us going, even under stress. This means we can perform many tasks throughout the day without thinking much about them. In the span of 10 minutes, we can chop veggies for dinner, mediate a sibling fight, and restart the laundry in the dryer (again).

…

Angela Pruess

Angela is a licensed clinical therapist and has a passion for helping each and every child meet their full human potential. She helps parents raise emotionally healthy kids by explaining the heart and science behind a child’s developmental and emotional needs at Parents with Confidence. Follow Parents with Confidence on Facebook.

parentswithconfidence.com/

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Inside: Family goal-setting doesn’t have to be formal or weird. Here are the best steps for how to set family goals and make it fun for everyone, plus the “gotchas” to avoid.

One night a while back, my husband and I collapsed on the couch after wrangling our three kids to bed. We passed a pint of Ben & Jerry’s back and forth between us, decompressing about the day. We talked about…

• How we still needed to pay the bills that have been sitting on the counter for a week,
• Whether our toddler turning three next year will help her tantrums or make them worse, and
• How two out of three kids willingly and happily eating Brussels sprouts isn’t all bad – but getting our preschooler on board for three out of three would be epic.

“When we start our garden, the kids will be so excited to eat what they helped grow,” Ty said. “Just watch. I bet she’ll be way more into veggies after that.”

Oh, I thought. The garden. The corners of my mouth slipped down.

We’ve been talking about starting a backyard veggie garden for years. It started when we got an all-in-one garden kit for Christmas one year, and the kids had an absolute blast watering it and checking on it everyday.

On the day they saw sprouts peek out from the soil, you’d have thought we just told them we were moving to live inside the Cinderella Castle at Disney World. But then the cats dug up every last plant, and we had to pitch the whole thing.

I want to start a new garden, Ty wants to start a garden, and the kids can’t wait to start a garden.

And yet, every time the dang garden comes up in conversation, it stresses me out.

Bonus: Download a free worksheet that will help you get your kids excited about setting family goals.

Here’s the Problem With Setting Family Goals

Dreaming about your future is supposed to be fun.

But when you’re so overwhelmed by your neverending mental to-do list that you can’t even get around to paying three measly bills that have been sitting on the kitchen counter for a week? Dreaming about the future is just One More Thing to add on top of your overflowing to-do list.

Earlier this year, Ty started making plans for our garden – reading Square Foot Gardening cover to cover, sketching out where our garden would go in the backyard, figuring out which supplies we’d need.

But every time the garden came up in conversation, I bristled.

I didn’t want to talk about it because I had a million must-dos to worry about before I could think about a nice-to-have bonus.

One kid is overdue for a well-check, we need to check Craigslist for a bassinet before our newest little one is born, the kitchen cabinet where we keep all the art and craft supplies is on the verge of turning into an avalanche every time we open it, and on and on. How can I take time away from all that to plan a garden?

Then He Did Something Brilliant

One night after dinner, we all sat around the table, taking turns asking questions from our favorite set of family conversation starters.

…

Kelly Holmes

I’m a mom of four, a recovering perfectionist, and the author of Happy You, Happy Family. Parenting is hard enough without all the guilt we heap on top of ourselves. So let’s stop trying to be perfect parents and just be real ones. Sound good? Join my mailing list and as a bonus, you’ll get 25+ incredibly helpful cheat sheets that will ease your parenting struggles.

happyyouhappyfamily.com/

Why Family Goals Will Make Your Life Easier As a Parent—And How to Do ItRead More

Inside: Play one of these quick family bonding games for an emergency dose of connection. You’ll reset the collective mood and immediately reconnect as a family.

One night not long ago, we had the triple threat – three simultaneous emotional breakdowns from three of our kids:

• One girl had a bruised heart because of less-than-kind words spoken to her.
• Another kid was impatient for something she’d asked for and wasn’t getting fast enough in her opinion.
• And the toddler was just plain annoyed that while we talked her sisters through their emotional upset, she was getting absolutely zero attention.

The stress of the emotional firestorm got to me and my husband too, and we started speaking in short, clipped tones to each other. Part of that is because it’s impossible to speak in full sentences and be heard over a tantruming toddler and a sobbing preschooler. But it’s also just hard to keep a positive attitude when everyone else seems to be unhappy at the same time.

When big emotions swirl at high speeds through our family, I feel like crawling under the covers with a pint of Ben & Jerry’s and loading up an old Buffy episode.

Bonus: As a bonus for joining my weekly newsletter, download a free cheat sheet of 30 simple ways to connect with your child.

Photo by Donnie Ray Jones

But I Learned the Hard Way

Ignoring a negative interaction only delays the inevitable. Because when you crawl out from under the covers, the deep rift between you and your child will still be there. It doesn’t magically disappear just because you tried to ignore it.

But a while ago, I came across a fix for this situation that actually is magic.

Science shows that to have a happy relationship in spite of the negative bits, you need a ratio of five positive interactions to every one negative interaction. If you have too few positive interactions to balance out the negative ones, you’ll end up with an unhappy, unhealthy relationship.

Which means that to repair your relationship with your child after a negative moment, you need five positive interactions to balance out the negative.

It’s called the Magic 5:1 Ratio, and it works because of the power of connection.

In fact, research shows that when it comes to the wellbeing of both parents and kids, quality moments of connection are most important of all.

Related: Why Every Parent Should Know the Magic 5:1 Ratio – And How to Do It {Printable}

Here’s the Problem

Research shows the bad mood of one person can bring down the mood of everyone else in the family.

In other words, when you have a disconnect with one child, that can throw off the mood of another child or your spouse – or even everyone in the family.

This means that sometimes, your Magic 5:1 Ratio efforts need to cast a wider net.

…

Kelly Holmes

I’m a mom of four, a recovering perfectionist, and the author of Happy You, Happy Family. Parenting is hard enough without all the guilt we heap on top of ourselves. So let’s stop trying to be perfect parents and just be real ones. Sound good? Join my mailing list and as a bonus, you’ll get 25+ incredibly helpful cheat sheets that will ease your parenting struggles.

happyyouhappyfamily.com/

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