Are you sick of parenting like your own parents raised you (even if you try not to) and you’re effectively creating a divide between you and your own kids?

Are you so over your kids either having no respect for you, not listening to you, or feeling like you have to either bribe, yell at, or punish them to get them to listen?

Or have you perhaps been trying to heal the patterns your parents raised you with, and you’re now on the opposite spectrum where it’s like your kids are in charge and you have absolutely no control?

But most importantly, do you possibly also feel like you’re all alone trying to find new ways to parent because the coparent or partner in your life doesn’t see things the same way you do, nor want to do the work required to change?

I feel you. Truth be told, I’ve been through all of the above.

As a brand new stepparent, I used to spank the kids to get them to listen and ‘obey’.

I used to Yell. Coerce. Shame. Berate. Punish... it was all I knew.

I remember when the old way of parenting came crashing down for me..

My youngest stepson was potty training. He would do good for a while and then regress. My partner and I tried everything we could think of. But what we knew to try at the time was spanking when he didn't go on the potty, threatening him for pooping in his pull up, and oh man, a whole lot of yelling and shaming him into pooping on the potty instead.

Not at all surprising, but none of those things worked.

And it quite honestly felt like shit.

Around the same time, my oldest stepson acted out one day when the kids were home with me for the day. I yelled at him. I told him to go to his room and think about what he did. He yelled back. I threatened to take things away and that his Dad would deal with him when he got home. Not my greatest moment, but it did lead me to see what I needed to see so we could get to where we are now.

I can see looking back that what we were doing was parenting by instilling fear (and also that I was repeating that same patterns I saw and experienced in my own childhood), and it did not work one bit,

…and I’m honestly glad for that.

It's not to say that those ways are WRONG, but what I am saying is that it doesn’t work the way we want it to work.

And those ways were very present in our society and our upbringing… so it's just what we knew to do as parents.

Except that it didn't feel right AT ALL. My gut was tight when we treated the kids that way.

They didn't deserve to be treated like that. But it’s like I instinctively responded before even thinking about it.

Even though I had timeouts and spankings as a kid and I thought, “hey that's just what you do”.. I also had this feeling that they couldn't process their emotions or understand what they did wrong or how to cope with it, or “think about what they’ve done”

It all felt so WRONG in my gut, but I didn't know any other way.

And honestly I felt powerless to my instinct that would take over in those moments.

One day I stumbled on the concept of gentle parenting, and I gave it a shot.

However, I like many parents, thought at first that gentle parenting meant being overly kind so as to not pass on the parenting style my parents raised me with,

…and what I actually did was take a pit stop in permissive parenting because I didn’t know any better.

Which meant that the kids were walking all over me because I was afraid to hurt or upset them..

Real talk: Using a gentle voice while letting your kids get away with what they want & walk all over you while also lacking boundaries for yourself and for their own well being is NOT gentle parenting (although at first I very much though that’s what it was).

It’s a step ahead — and the opposite spectrum — from the authoritative style of yelling, berating, condescending, spanking, etc.. but it’s actually just passive parenting and it’s not the vibe either,

…as I’m sure you can tell if you tried it too!

I was trying to find my footing in gentle parenting without really knowing what it was or even knowing what to do, and effectively lost all control as a parent and had no boundaries because I didn’t want to harm the kids or hurt their feelings.

That didn’t work, as I’m sure you could guess.

Bed times ran late, I had trouble getting them to eat healthy, literally everything was a struggle and I felt defeated.

So I made a few tweaks.

Let’s just start by doing away with the term “gentle parenting” and replace it with a term I like to call “conscious parenting” .. it takes into account respect, love, compassion, understanding, and boundaries as core principles… both for yourself and for your kids.

But it also requires looking at and healing what you went through in your own childhood so you can be the parent your kids need from you.

Do you feel the difference?

The truth is that your parenting will trigger in you all the pains, all the generational / ancestral patterns, all of what you still need to look at and heal within you from your upbringing.

It’s something you literally can’t avoid no matter how hard you try.

And quite honestly it’s already happening, but when you’re not conscious parenting, you’re just sweeping those triggers under the rug.

Choosing this style of parenting is the point where you also choose to no longer carry forth the patterns that scarred you.. those wounds that still hold you back from being the parent you want to be.

Where you learn to love yourself, so you can show your children how to love themselves.

♡ Where you HEAL, so they can have the best version of you… and in turn you get the best version of them ♡

♡ Where you HEAL, so you can be who you came here to be… and they can be who they came here to be ♡

It’s about you no longer unconsciously projecting your pains, your past, and your generational patterns onto your children.

It stops somewhere, and for my family line.. it stopped with me.

And yours can stop with you too

And the beauty with this work is that not only do we heal it from going down the line,

We also heal it up the line by doing our own work to change the patterns we were raised with.

The other beautiful thing… is that we can also heal what we’ve already unconsciously passed down to our own kids.

It’s never too late to rewind and repair.

For the parent who is called to this work and this way of life, you’re called for a reason.

Let me say that again: It is never too late to do this work.

It’s not too late for you, or for them.