Know that even when they’re adults. So I hear from you, adult parents, they’re needy and we have the habit of putting our kids’ needs above everything else, including our own needs, and especially as single parents, when we have all the responsibility that lies on us. So how do we live in a way that balances our needs and the needs of our kids? Today we’re going to talk about this using three main points. First of all, we’re going to talk about the different phases of needs. Second, we’re going to talk about the temptation of overcompensation, and third, we’re going to talk about the nuances of selfishness.
Thinking back to your early solo parent days, were you paying more attention to your own needs or mostly focusing on the needs of your kids?
That is such a good question. It’s so relevant, and when I think back to first becoming a single mom, I had sole custody. Their dad at that time was not involved. And what really comes to mind is that I’m not sure that I was meeting my own needs or my kids’ needs very well. That’s just a really, at the beginning. At the beginning, I was in such triage phase that I was going through the motions and I was checking the boxes on the tasks of parenting, but was I really attending to my needs inside and theirs? No, honestly, I wasn’t. I was just surviving.
So when we think about it as our children grow, of course they have different types of needs, and when we look at infancy and toddlerhood, the needs are physical. It’s a physically demanding stage for parents and single parents particularly. They rely on us to do all of their physical needs, what they need to eat, et cetera, et cetera. We’re doing so much for them physically.
And then as kids get older and they move into childhood or elementary school, this can be a lot about for single parents, logistically demanding where you’re balancing a schedule and your kids are learning a lot, they’re really busy, it’s very concrete, and so it’s logistically demanding. And then adolescence is an entirely new phase. Kids are searching for identity, all the hormonal changes, and this can be such an emotionally taxing time for parents navigating outbursts and for our kids. Absolutely. It’s a really emotional stage as they’re navigating those transitions and changes.
So before I started a solo parent, I started another organization called I Shine, which was really focused on tweens, like someone, anyone between the ages 11 and 10, 13. And there was a study done, I might butcher this a little bit, but I know I’m fairly accurate. They did a study on the amount of chemical changes in a body in that age group versus menopause. And there is more change chemically going on in our kids during that stage of life than there is in menopause. And we give a lot of focus. I mean, obviously I hit menopause years ago, but no, I mean we talk about that a lot, how it’s a really distressing time. It can be really difficult. I just want to put a pin in this point and say, listen, there is beyond the emotional, beyond just the typical stuff, there is so much biologically that’s going on with our kids at this time.
And at this stage, adolescence has been the most challenging for me as a parent to navigate with my kids. Each stage has unique challenges and we’re talking about that, but adolescence was particularly difficult for me. And so if that’s where you are, I’m with you, me too. And then as our children move through puberty and begin to develop more of their identity, early adulthood, which is where I’m at now, can be relationally taxing because we’re in that push pull of as they’re beginning to leave the nest, needing to be in a supportive role as a parent to be a source of comfort and unconditional love, but letting them have the freedom to navigate their own path. And that is challenging in its own way. And so I think the thing is each phase has delightful things about it and demanding things about it.
And I think the reason it was important to start, well, I know the reason it was important to start with this is identifying that if we’re talking about meeting our own needs versus our kids’ needs, we need to really take a look at one size doesn’t fit all. And to your point, Amber, I’ve got, I’m in the early adult stages with my daughters, and it is a completely different ball game. And when we try, whether it’s moving from childhood into adolescence, when we try to apply the same meeting of needs from one stage to another, it doesn’t work. And we get frustrated and our kids start distancing because the needs aren’t the same anymore. That’s why it’s really important to start with this understanding of, okay, where are my kids related to what they actually need? I might still be parenting as if they’re a child, and what they need is something a little bit different. And that has been the biggest transition for me with my kids moving into adulthood, having to walk alongside them instead of kind of hovering over them or whatever analogy you want to use.
And it makes me wonder too, I’ll kind of pose this question, maybe you guys know, maybe you don’t, but it makes me wonder if we aren’t willing to grow as parents into that, bringing them into that next stage, will we stunt them or should we be paying attention to where they’re naturally going and then help them along that way as they naturally grow? Do you know what I mean? Is it us pulling them along and saying, okay, it’s time for year 11 now and it’s time to move into adolescence, or are we just paying attention to what they’re naturally moving towards? And then, do you know what I’m saying? Yeah.
To me, it’s paying attention. I don’t know. I mean prompting, if we’re sensing that our children are underdeveloped in a certain area, then it’s not bad to prompt. But I don’t know that that’s like a meeting of needs. It’s more like responding to what either organically happens or it’s being prompted in growth.
I really think it’s both/and. I think that there are times we have to call our children up toward growth, and I think there are times we just want to support them where they are. I will say that not being present to recognize and notice, that is where it got really difficult for me with adolescents. I was still parenting with a lot of desire for control
At a time when my kids were needing more relationship, more understanding, and more insightful parenting versus my hope, what I wanted to happen, which was make it be easy and fit in the mold and just do the right things. And that incongruence in me was hard for my kids.
Let’s talk about the temptation of overcompensation.
Well, I feel like we talk about this quite a bit, and it’s because it’s so tempting. It is. That’s what we do. I know I’ve done it, but we’re just often overcompensating, which pours all of our energy, time, and resources into our kids. We’re doing that because of guilt, feeling like we owe our kids something. I mean, I know for me it’s like Jack isn’t at fault here. It’s not his fault that we’re divorced, but he is the collateral damage as a result of what’s happened. And so yeah, that guilt plays a huge, huge piece in me wanting to coddle him, make sure he’s comfortable, not experience any more hurt than he has to, blah, blah, blah. And the fact that we live in a community where it’s mostly intact families and this whole idea of ideal childhood where he doesn’t have both parents at home like other kids do, he has to leave and go to his dad’s every other week, and we unnaturally are only spending 50% of the time together. That’s not natural. So I know I do that, and then my grief causes me to overcompensate too and wanting to fix the emotions.
I remember it overcompensating because I kept us busy. I don’t think I was ready to face the pain of this painful loss of marriage and the family I hoped for. And so I kept us busy. That was my overcompensation,
All those areas I felt guilt and just because of what my kids had been through that I really overcompensated and coddled way more. And I want to say this as I’m hearing this talk, and you said at the beginning, Elizabeth, but overcompensation is born out of concern and care most of the time. I think. So recognize and give yourself grace too. We all go there out of an abundance of wanting to either make up for something or to protect them from something. I overcompensated, speaking of getting into the adolescent years because I was so afraid of the consequences of what might be happening. So I wasn’t paying attention to the needs. I was just overcompensating. I was afraid. I was afraid of where it was going to lead. And so I definitely had a problem with that.
We demonize those of us who are divorced and have a co-parent. We demonize the co-parent so often. I know I have and do at times that I feel like the overcompensation happens in that I feel like I have to be the best parent I can be, which of course I want to be, but I overcompensate for the lack of parenting on the other side and take on too much because I feel like he’s not doing his job or I know that Jax isn’t getting what he needs over there. And so I feel like I have to make up for the quality of parenting that’s happening 50% of the time. And so I end up overcompensating in that way too. You know what I mean?
So this one bit me pretty badly because I was overcompensating in a way that I thought was positive spiritually because I was the only spiritual example for my kids. And so I hit that message pretty hard. I beat that drum pretty loud, and it really had a boomerang effect on my kids. And at the time, I really thought it was the right thing to do. In hindsight, I would do that differently if I could.
To your point, Elizabeth, as you were talking about this 50 50 thing, for those of us that I had full custody, Amber, I know you pretty much did too. And for those in our PALS groups, those that have lost the spouse to death, you are it. And I felt like I was it. And so I definitely tried to make up and overcompensate because there wasn’t someone else in the household and they needed that. But what I’ve learned is that overcompensation really interferes with important lessons for our kids without going through everyday challenges on their own. It limits their growth and it does not set them up for success. And it hinders self-advocacy and resilience.
And I’m not saying throw your kids into the deep end, but you have to look at both things you have to look at. Yes, of course it’s tempting to overcompensate. Of course, they’ve been through a hard time. Of course there’s no one on the other end sometimes for some of us, but what we’re doing is actually creating limiting beliefs in them and not setting them up. The first podcast I ever did was with Sissy Goff, and she pointed out I was trying to meet all the emotional needs of my daughters, and she introduced me to this idea of emotion, emotional entitlement, which ties into this, which is basically where you teach your kids inadvertently that it’s others’ responsibilities to meet your emotional needs. And they start becoming entitled to expecting that that’s what people do, and that is not equipping them for good relationships, for good future relationships or just dynamics. And I know that I was guilty of that.
I think it’s just one of the realities that resilience Dr. Deborah Gilboa says, we often get in the way of that because many of the consequences, we’re trying to prevent unhappiness, struggle, not excelling, working hard, no guaranteed results. Those things are great teachers for our kids, and they’re not life-threatening. It just feels that way. And so that’s a direct quote from her. And I know I often thought so much was reliant on me instead of letting my kids experience failures and challenges that could teach them things in life.
Well, because I think about the times that Jax is having a hard time, he’s dealing with something, struggling with something emotionally, physically, mentally, whatever. It also strain on us because we’re the collateral damage them for the pain they’re experiencing. And so how can I mitigate that? So not only is my child not having to experience the pain, but I’m not having to sit there and hold the pain with them. I’m not having to be in it with them or the pain that I feel as a parent that my child’s going through pain. And so it’s very natural that we wouldn’t want to see our kids go through that. But it’s almost that we have to ask too, how uncomfortable am I willing to be for the benefit of my child?
So a big thing with this too is that overcompensation can lead to burnout. If you haven’t listened to our episode on burnout, definitely go back and do that. But yeah, we have to avoid things that our child can do for themselves. We need to let them figure things out, sit back, watch, guide as needed. Don’t check out completely, but let them do that. And then another piece of this is going back to what I was saying just a second ago, when emotions are running high, how can we stay grounded and be that emotional support so that they can move forward, build the resilience, know that everything is going to be okay, emotions are just emotions. They’re guiding us somewhere. How can we work together to solve this problem? That sort of thing.
Let’s talk about the nuances of selfishness. We think of selfishness as a bad thing.
I definitely think of selfishness as kind of a bad word, but I had to very much reframe this for myself and think about the idea that it’s way more nuanced than we think Selfishness can look like self-advocacy, not being a toxic people pleaser, not being afraid to disappoint others. When we think about being selfless, it can lead to mental and physical burnout. We’re doing too much for others and not paying enough attention to our needs. And for me, this was a message I had growing up, one of 11 children, always to put others before myself that benefited the whole family. It was a team thing. You pull your own weight. But I started to internalize the message that selfishness is bad. I can’t pay attention to myself. I can’t take care of what I need. And as a grownup, I have had to rewrite that message to say, I matter too. I don’t matter more than my kids. I don’t matter less than my kids. I matter too. And even now, that still feels uncomfortable to say, but it’s valid. We all know you have to put on your own oxygen mask before you can put one on your children, but it’s not always easy, and it was about being selfless.
Selfish was the opposite of that. And I found it interesting. There was a study in the Harvard Business Review that talked about leaders, and it says if leaders selfishly take care of their feelings, it will benefit not only them, but everyone around them, including the companies they lead. And as we’ve talked about before, thinking about solo parent as kind of a job, it is so important. You can’t just take the care of the people that you are leading. You have to take care of yourself because you’re not going to be effective. And that is not selfishness. You can call it selfishness, but it’s not. It’s just actually in that way, we are serving our kids if we are selfish in that way,
It is important and maybe even, hopefully over time, speak up for what they need and say, Hey, actually, Jax actually, a couple of nights ago, I was like, Hey, I gave him the option, Hey, do you want to go to church tonight to youth group tonight, or do you want to stay home? He’s like, no, I think I just need a night at home to chill with you. Can we just have a night together? And I was like, yeah, we can do that. Totally. So that’s what we did. And hopefully that’s because he’s learned through me through watching, Hey, this is what I need to do. And honesty has been a big piece of what I do with him, especially the older he gets about saying, Hey, exactly that. Hey, I really need a night to just chill and not talk tonight. You can do whatever you want to do. If you want pizza rolls for dinner, have pizza rolls. We’re not cooking, we’re just going to chill. Or Hey, I need to go to bed early tonight, or whatever. It is
As we acknowledge our own needs, we model for our kids the ability to acknowledge theirs and then teach them how they can respond appropriately, whether to ask for help or to redirect in other ways, to have those things that are important, stay a priority. If it’s rest, if it’s socializing, whatever it is,
The idea of replenishing ourselves is so important. And we’re talking about balance. And I think it’s also seasonal in a sense that it’s never going to look the same day to day. There are going to be times that you feel more depleted than other days, and there are going to be times that your kids are going through crazy stuff and you feel so it’s a matter of paying attention to that as so much of what we talk about is the nuances of things. It’s not an actual, this is the textbook, what you’ve got to do. The bottom line is replenishing and taking care of yourself as a way to take care of our kids.
I know kind of tying back to the overcompensation piece, identifying what overcompensation is and what it isn’t will really help us. And I even think about Jack saying, Hey, mom, can you do this for me? Fill in the blank. Whatever it is. I’ve started being a little more careful about just jumping to it and saying, because for a long time I would say, yep, I’m on it. I can do whatever you need kind of thing. And now I’m like, no, you’re just being lazy. And I don’t say that to him, but I’m like, no, you can do that yourself. It’s definitely balancing out.
But there are times where he’s like, I can recognize if it’s just a true need, feeling a little neglected. Or he’s feeling like last night, knowing today, he’s going back to his dad’s house last night, he was requiring a little more from me. And so knowing that that’s the thing, and that’s okay. I am willing to do that, to fill that need of having extra time together, having extra physical touch, having extra whatever it is, that’s okay in those moments. But then also balancing that with, nah, I’m not going to go downstairs and do that thing for you when you can actually do it yourself. You know what I mean?
So also we just really have to ask for help. And this is something that we harp on all the time because as single parents, we don’t ask for help, but it’s actually a really good model for our kids to show them that it’s okay to ask for help from other people, but then also we need help too. And that’s okay. And so we got to do that.
Takeaways
- Our children’s needs are constantly changing as they grow, and we need to be aware of what they are and adjust accordingly.
- It’s extremely tempting to overcompensate as a solo parent and our kids’ needs become the biggest priority. I think we’re all guilty of this in one shape or another.
- Selfishness is more nuanced than we think. Many times our selflessness leads to negative results, and we have to start putting our oxygen masks on and caring for ourselves in order to meet their needs.
Listener Question:
What has been your favorite stage of parenting and why?
I think it’s mostly that I just cherish so many things of different ages and stages. And actually, I have a friend who just had a baby and it’s going to be her only one. They’re not going to have any others. And it was a very hard pregnancy for her. And they weren’t sure that she was going to carry the baby to term. It was a whole dramatic situation. But sweet baby boy is born, he’s healthy, everything’s great. And she’s like, I want to soak up every single second. And I’m like, please do. Because that’s exactly how I felt knowing that Jax was going to be my only one. It was a very hard road to having a child. And I just like, oh, I just want to soak up every single second. And so that’s how I feel about it. It’s like every single stage and age has something so special and so unique about it that I just want to hold onto it, hold onto it all and hug it all. But I will say if I’m looking at other kids, taking out my parenthood thing, if I were given the opportunity to go hang out with some kids, and whether it’s teaching them or being just babysitting, whatever, three to 4-year-old boys are my favorite,
Absolute favorite. And girls too. I mean, I just don’t have a ton of experience with girls. But three to 4-year-old boys are just so fun, so full of wonder. They’re so active, everything’s amazing. Everything’s fun. Everything’s possible. And they’re wild. And it’s exciting, and I just love it.
Well, I think you all have hinted at what just rings really true for me, but is such a kind of corny answer. Every single stage has a beautiful gift that I really wanted to hold onto in every single part, the sweet little baby stage and the wonder stage, or when my kids were in an elementary school and we got to do a lot of fun activities. I loved all the active stuff, like let’s go to the zoo and let’s go hiking together and let’s go splash in the pool. And now my kids are adults or soon to be, they’re turning into adults and they’re thoughtful, and I love to have great deep conversations with them. And I sometimes think, Hey, they were listening after all, and that’s pretty exciting. So there’s something beautiful about every stage no matter where we are. And if we can hang onto that, I think that really
Is a beautiful thing. So this is what I told my friend the other day. I’m so grateful that we have these little phones in our pockets that can capture so much too, so that we can hold onto it because I feel like don’t blink. It’s so easy to just miss it, miss it all, and then forget it all. And especially the older I get. We were talking this morning, Amber, about how our memory is fading. And so anyway,
I like this question because it took me back. I don’t have a favorite overwhelming favorite, but I like this question because it makes you remember. It makes you dig. And I think if I had to answer, if I had to answer, I think it was when my oldest was 12, my youngest was nine, so it was before all the hormones kicked in, but it was about three years after the divorce when the memories that we made together were just the sweetest. We felt like a tribe. And that was my favorite. That was probably my favorite time of my life. If I have to look at the overall, just even though in the midst of tragedy and difficult things, there was something so beautiful about that time, I think that’s where I’d land.
