Therapy and Theology

Shea Hill: Hi, Friend. Welcome back to the Therapy and Theology Podcast, where we help you work through what you walk through. I'm your host, Shay Hill, and I'm so glad you're here joining me today for this ongoing summer miniseries we have on red flags. Guys, today's episode is super special because we have not one, but two special guests. So, you guys know our resident therapist on the podcast, Jim Cress.

He's gonna be joined today by two special guests, and their names are Bethany and Meredith. I can't wait for you to get to know them. So why don't you go ahead, pull up a notebook. This is a note taking episode, and we'll jump right in. First, you know we are all about equipping you with resources to help you even after an episode ends.

So, for this mini-series, make sure you download a free resource by Lysa TerKeurst titled, Is This Normal? 15 Red Flags You May Be Missing in Your Relationships. This resource will help you get honest about the effects unhealthy relational dynamics are having on you with a guided list to process through so you can tend to your own emotional well-being in a biblical way. Next, I thought it would be fun to share this review from one of you guys. Here's what this listener said.

I'm so thankful for this podcast. It has helped me work through so many issues in my life and enabled me to step outside of my whirlwind of emotions and plant my feet on the truth, the Word of God. I hope this podcast continues. You are changing lives. Guys, isn't that awesome?

We love hearing how therapy and theology is making a difference in your life, and we'd love to hear your story too. So, just leave a rating and a written review, and maybe I'll share it in an upcoming episode. Or you can even leave us a voice memo or a specific question by following the link to our listener mail in the show notes below. Lastly, we'd be so appreciative if you'd partner with Proverbs thirty-one Ministries financially to continue making the life changing content on the therapy and theology podcast. Simply go to proverbs31.org backslash give to make a one-time donation, or you can even partner with us monthly.

Now onto the show.

Meredith Brock: Well, hi, therapy and theology friends. My name is Meredith Brock. I am the CEO of Proverbs thirty-one Ministries. And most of you, I have not had the pleasure of getting to know because I'm not usually on the therapy and theology podcast.

I am usually on the Proverbs 31 podcast, but I could not miss out on the treat we have today. We have a really incredible guest with us. But first, you know the man, the myth, the legend himself, Jim Cress. Cress is here. You guys know him because he is our resident therapist on the podcast, but I'm also here with a new face and voice.

Her name is Bethany Hall. Bethany is the director of training and content at Chosen, who you guys may remember is our sponsor for this season of therapy and theology. She is a licensed family nurse practitioner specializing in complex developmental trauma and pediatric emergency medicine. She's a certified TBRI practitioner, and anybody who knows me knows I love TBRI. She's a former missionary and a foster adoptive mom.

Bethany brings both clinical expertise and deep personal insight to her work at Chosin. Not only does she have extensive experience with foster and adoptive families and children affected by trauma, but she is also a mom to three kiddos at home herself. Bethany, me and you both, I've got the three crazies at home too. Some of them might be wandering into my office during this episode. We'll see how it goes.

We are just so excited to have you here on the podcast today to talk through the topic of red flags in parenting. So, guys, that's a big one because we're not just talking about red flags with our kids. We're talking about red flags with ourselves too. So, I'm gonna dive right in, Bethany. Jim, are y'all ready?

Jim Cress: Oh, yeah. Ready. Do it.

Bethany Hall: Can't wait.

Meredith Brock: Okay.

Let's do it. So, Jim, my first question is gonna be for you. You often have said many of our adult relationships are family reunions. Can you unpack that for me just a little bit and tell me what you mean when you say that?

Jim Cress: Yeah.

There is so much that's going on unseen by people. What we don't work out will act out. And that's, I think, at any level of relationship. Then if you get in marriage, it can be more intense there. And then parenting with biological children, you get into attachment issues, you get into adoption and fostering.

Things can just begin to get a bit more complex. These things end up being multifaceted issues that need to be treated in multifaceted ways. So, it's as though and I think everyone listening or watching would have a time where they could relate. Like, who I say it this way. Whose face am I wearing?

I mean, this is about me till it's not about me. Churches, I've done a lot of work with church leadership and organizational people, and they're like, yeah. People are coming in and, you know, I've got this dual role. I'm the pastor, but I'm also like their boss or I'm the business owner, but I'm their friend. And that happens in in Christian ministries.

It just happens in relationships. So, we're, I believe, bumping up against family things, maybe some family things that I'm not recognizing in the moment. And it's about the person I'm talking with right now until it's not about that person. It's about some other characters who just happen to be in the room.

Meredith Brock: Makes a whole lot of sense to me, Jim.

You know, I think at one point in, I and I'm you guys could probably correct me with some of this research, but it talks about relationally where you maybe have create, experienced your first trauma. If you don't go back and heal that relational trauma, oftentimes, that's your emotional maturity that you carry into your future relationships. And that's significant, you guys, if we take a moment to even just pause and do the work of saying, okay. Where was that first initial traumatic emotional experience? For most of us, it's young.

You know? It's middle school or younger. And if you haven't healed from that, you're gonna carry that right into whether it be friendships or your marriage or your coworking relationships. And so, it's not just a check the box kinda thing. I got over that.

It's something that we have to do.

Jim Cress: Nice bumper sticker.

Meredith Brock: Let's not do this.

Jim Cress: By the way too, which we've all imagined at any level of parenting, you get into marriage and then parenting at whatever level that is. And if developmentally, you are stuck at about between ages four to 14 or younger, then it's almost like at many levels, like kids parenting kids.

And I know you all know that.

Bethany Hall: Yeah.

Meredith Brock: That's absolutely right. Well, I'll tell a little bit of my story. And then, Bethany, I've got a question for you.

But for our listeners, our watchers, I am the CEO of Proverbs thirty-one Ministries, but I also have, like I said, three children that I have the privilege of raising. Two of them are biological. One of them is adopted, through the foster care program. And so, we have learned a lot in the last few years. He's five years old now, and so it has been, a road of learning how to love him.

But I wanna make it really clear what I wish that I would have known and learned what I know now because of what we've learned through parenting a child who's had a hard story. I wish I would have known that before I had my biological kids too because it really has so much to do with starting with you as the parent, as the adult, get, you know, healing yourself. And so, Bethany, I've got a question for you. First is, how do you see this, this idea of your adult relationships or family reunions? Right?

How do you say this see this playing out in the work you do with children and parents at your organization chosen?

Bethany Hall: For me, it's personal as well. Like you said, Meredith, I have three kiddos, one of whom is adopted. We also are walking alongside a whole slew of young adults that we came into relationship with while we were missionaries. And so, we're doing adult life and grandkid life, kind of what I would consider prematurely with adults that have significant trauma.

And there's a lot of data showing that people that have experienced trauma tend to be particularly drawn to caring spaces like foster care and adoption as well. So often, we see this dynamic where we have children who've suffered trauma, who are being parented, like you alluded to, Jim, who have suffered their own trauma and may have some emotional, capacities that have been limited or things they haven't worked through. So, we see that unhealed thing in our past definitely causes division and challenges in our homes. So I know on the therapy and theology podcast, y'all have talked a little bit about attachment and how it impacts, marriages and our romantic relationships, and this idea that the way that we were parented or our relationship with our primary caregiver creates this pattern in us, creates this idea of how we make sense of the world, how we get our needs met. And so, at Chosen, we see this idea magnified in the work that we do with families because we serve families who are loving children who all have attachment trauma or who have experienced loss or harm in the context of that parent child relationship.

And so, this idea that we do bring our past into our current relationships, our spouse relationship, and then alter our children, this can be I've seen it to be particularly true in this parent child relationship and even an added layer because it's not a relationship of equal responsibility. So, with our spouse, we can say, you know, we come in and you've gotta do your work and I've gotta do mine. Parenting, we've gotta do the work whether our child ever changes or not. And so, it adds this additional layer of responsibility and the fact that even more so, we can't get out of this. We're in this together for life.

Meredith Brock: So yeah. Man, that honestly leads us right into the next question that I think is at the heart of what we're getting at today together is that the relationship is not equal. The responsibility of parenting, it's not equal. And so, you've got to, Jim, like you said, do your own work, your own kind of healing, and hopefully, you get to do a lot of that prior to, taking on the responsibility of caring for a child. But I am one the first one to, like, say, it can also happen.

Your healing, your work can happen after you are in the active stage of parenting, guys. That's you're not it's not an end of the road. You can do it, and then it can be done well. But let's talk about those red flags that we see in ourselves. We're not gonna point the finger at anybody else.

K? What are the red flags that you see as parents? And, like, what do what do we need to do about them? You know? Like, where do where do we take them?

So, Bethany, why don't you take us away on that on that side?

Bethany Hall: Alright. Here we go. Right? Hardest part is looking at ourselves, but we're gonna start with ourselves and personal triggers.

So, the red flag of personal triggers. What is it that consistently gets that 10 out of 10 responses for me? Even if it's not an external response, I can feel my heart rate go up. I can feel my reaction start to come without thought. Mhmm.

And for in our house, there's a couple. Maybe these are yours. Maybe you have different ones, but maybe it's lying. Particularly, if you have a history of infidelity or betrayal in your parents or in your spouse or in in personal relationships, it can be something where your child may be lying about, you know, did they feed the dog and it just really burns you that your child would lie to you about something so stupid and you might feel these feelings of, do they think I'm an idiot or why would they ever lie about something so stupid and I can figure this out. So, it gets that 10 out of 10 responses.

Maybe Mhmm. It's not lying. Maybe it's for me personally, it tends to be really big displays of emotion. So, in my family of origin, we didn't do a lot of unpacking of emotions. We kind of my mom tended to look for the silver lining.

My dad tended to just be a pull yourself up by your bootstraps. So there just wasn't a lot of emotionally sitting with things. And so, when my kids were little, it was the toddler tantrum in the grocery store. It just made me feel so anxious. I had these personal narratives of what everyone was thinking about me, and I wanted to shut that down.

Now that I have teens and young adults, same thing, but these excessively emotional teens, whether that's coming out in big loud burst of anger or lots of tears, I can just feel that 10 out of 10 response that may be out of proportion to the scenario coming up inside of me. So just recognizing those things that get us that big response, that trigger. Mhmm.

Meredith Brock: Jim, what about you? Can you share?

Jim Cress: Oh, yeah. I can share quite personally. I remember going to Dallas Seminary through seminary, and it may sound in humorous, and I didn't mean it that way. I said, I did not have to come to Dallas Seminary, we had kids at the time, to study hamartiology, which is the doctrine of sin, anthropology, the doctrine of mankind. Right?

I began to think about things we were learning literally in theology, and I thought, heck. I'm learning that at home. And not just about my kids' sins, but had the particular situation with my children, especially in my son and I have talked openly about this, my oldest son. This pressed buttons in me, y'all, I didn't know I had. And my own unhealed anxious attachment style wounds and my own trauma story, largely unaddressed.

We'd gotten into therapy, right about the time my oldest son was born, but, you know, it we were there eight years in therapy, truly. But I began to look at the how I was not responding, but I was reacting Mhmm. Redoing an action from my past. And there were buttons that my kids would press in me that I didn't know existed, and, therefore, I was angry at times and just you know? The I have six grandkids now, and this isn't the salient point of the day.

But what that has helped me with is I get to make so many living amends by being your granddaddy, and I'm far more aware I wish this Jimbo could go back in time to that younger Jim and just say, woah. Woah. Woah. I'm here to help you. There was just so much I didn't know.

And it wasn't just the book knowledge and all that. That was important, but the therapy work of really healing my trauma story. And, and I look back now, and I don't know if you've ever had this. You don't you might have it one day, but some of our listeners and viewers, I could not watch nor could my wife some of our early family videos. We've been married forty years.

Our kids are all adults. When you see me, I thought, dude, he the kid my son, he's just being a kid at the birthday party, wanting to mess with the cakes, and you could see me because sorry. You know, I wanted to have the perfect video for years to come. Yeah. And I'm getting upset and mad.

I don't do that. All I am, like, good night. Then I had to begin to have mercy on myself because then I was what I did to my kids, I was doing to myself. Condemning myself because when you know better, you can do better. But I had so many buttons pressed in me with our kids.

I relate so well.

Meredith Brock: Yeah. I mean, I there's a probably a long list of them, but the one that comes to my mind for me that's my trigger with my kids that I am this is very actively trying to work through this right now. And it's parenting three kids is being ignored. When I say something, I expect some children to listen or respond or acknowledge or something.

Bethany Hall: Yeah.

Meredith Brock: And it gets internally. I don't always show it externally, but internally, it gets a 10 out of 10 for me where my heart is racing, and I just see red. And I oftentimes, one of my little kiddos has ADHD. And, seriously, they can't hear me.

They have an audio processing type situation. And so, I've been told by doctors, half the time they can't hear you. You need to go touch them on the arm when you're talking to them. Yeah. But it didn't matter to me.

I was still like, and I had to be like, why is this making me so angry? Why does my heart rate go, you know, sky high when they don't listen? And at first, I wanted to say, well, it's disrespect. And then I was like, no. It's much deeper than that.

I was very ignored as a child. There you go. Completely neglected. And so that triggers that same feeling. But even in a for me, it was like in a hyper way because there's some belief deep inside of me that my children will listen to me.

And that's there's some pride there that I had to work through too, you know, but really recognizing for me, why is this making me so upset and doing the work of pausing and not just slapping to your point, Jim, a bumper sticker answers on it and saying that really shouldn't skyrocket me like it does. Why? Where is that really coming from? And realizing it's because of the neglect and being ignored as a child Yeah. I felt.

And it taps right back into it.

Jim Cress: And that's so Quickly too. Right? It taps back in quickly. It's like instant.

Meredith Brock: Yeah.

Bethany Hall: Yeah. I always joke around I always joke around with my husband, Meredith, that I was never an angry person until I got married and had kids, so it must be their issue. I was like, I was I was a cucumber when I was all by myself.

Meredith Brock: Right.

You know? It's true. It's true. It's so true. Jim, you have something that you always say about difference in personalities with kids, parents.

Jim Cress: Yeah. And that maybe nothing's necessarily wrong or sinful, but there's just a difference there. Let's talk about that for a minute. Yeah. I'd like to say naming, not blaming, just naming things.

And I have found I found again, we're anecdotal here for all of us talking about some of our own personal parenting stuff. And I found that if the child's personality was different than mine, that might stir up something in me, not blaming them. Oh, wait a minute. What if the personality type, whatever else might be there, both my oldest son and I, all three of our kids were diagnosed eventually with ADHD as was I. But the personalized type that was a lot like mine.

So, I was bumping heads, and that's the one that was far more palpable for me of having a son who was in many ways just like me. And I can go a little bit deeper in in my own journey with that is, if I had contempt toward him, it flew and Brene Brown and others have the research to prove it. It came up out of my own self-contempt. You know, you've heard me say on the program, self-hatred at my expense. Shame.

Self-hatred at my expense. What I didn't like about myself or what people mocked me or disrespected me on in childhood. I mean, look at Jimmy growing up with this undiagnosed, untreated ADHD. And with all that, it's like, so I'm bumping up against that, and I can take something small, like, you know, it's just a personality different where some somebody's other. Now we see that on a macro level in our culture right now.

Right? We're in a global mental health pandemic. Just a person has an opposite view of different ways, and we're in the amygdala of the brain, the limbic brain, just mad and going at each other just because they're different. So, I found that to be and I've seen other people in parenting, or it can be the opposite that I feel so bonded because this person is just like me, or I just like their personality being different. But having that self-awareness, which is key to go, woah.

Woah. Woah. Woah. What's this hitting in me with one of my kids? And being curious, not furious.

Meredith Brock: Yeah. I've found it's that self-discipline right there, Jim. Woah. Woah. Woah.

Woah. Woah. Why is and taking the time? Most of the time, you're in this parenting stage where everything you're hurrying, you're getting kids here and there and there, and now you're working and now they need this. And it's really hard to create the self-discipline of, like, no.

Something is happening in me that is not, equivalent to what is happening on the outside. I need to take the time to explore it. So good. Okay. Bethany let's talk about red flag number two.

What is it?

Bethany Hall: Alright. So red flag number two is when we reach for excessive control. So, when you start to feel the chaos mount or we feel like we're not able to get our hands around the outcome, oftentimes we reach for excessive control. And when our kids are little, it doesn't feel that abnormal because we have to control a lot of things that's natural to keep them safe and all alive.

Right? But as they get older and we lose some of that control and they have different external influences and they're not with us all the time, often that reaching for excessive control can be a fear-based response in us. Like Jim, you talk about the amygdala lighting up. If I feel like my child, I can't control the outcome of a certain decision they're about to make or a scenario, or I can't control how their decisions are gonna look at, like, reflect on me as a parent, oftentimes, we can start to reach for control. And unfortunately, that often backfires and it's us breaking relationship, at worst.

And at best, it still leaves us really just reaching for behavior modification rather than getting to the heart of our child and helping guide them towards repentance and a relationship with the Lord.

Meredith Brock: That's a hard one, Bethany. I'm gonna be honest. I think every mom on here listening is like, yeah. How do I tell the difference, you know, between the control that's appropriate, you know, like that that's maybe appropriate safety measures or whether that be emotional safety measures or physical safety measures.

Like, how do I know, you know, so it any guidance there because I'm sitting here thinking, you know, the age range that I have in my house is 13 to five. You know? And so, the different I'm learning with my 13-year-old, I gotta let go of some control. He's turning into a young man. You know?

I gotta let him be able to do and that's a different looks very different than what my five-year-old needs from me. You know? So maybe unpack a little bit what that how do you learn what the appropriate especially, again, going back to where we started, especially if maybe you grew up in a very controlling home and you don't know what it looks like to give appropriate levels of control in your, you know, family.

Bethany Hall: Yeah. I mean, I hope we could get to Jim because doesn't Lisa always say she brings the dysfunction, and you bring the clinical aspect.

So, I'd love to hear your thoughts, Jim.

Jim Cress: You both are doing great.

Bethany Hall; I can surely bring the dysfunction, but I would say, you know, I've done it poorly and I've done it well and I've learned from both. And so, I think a lot of it is what you alluded to. I think Meredith earlier is just being honest with our own internal world and our own hearts.

Like Mhmm. Oftentimes if I'll take the time to sit with the Lord and be quiet and ask him to show me, I can kind of usually flesh out this is coming because I am afraid or this is coming because I'm embarrassed or this is touching on something about me or my past versus control that I need to have with this child to help them be successful. So, it often the same decision, the same limit can come from a place of fear or can come from a place of necessity. And I think sometimes it really is just our own heart motives and asking the Lord to reveal that. But, Jim, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Jim Cress: Well, it will sound like an Instagram post, and it is one of my Instagram posts. I have a game controller as the picture on the post, and in it simply says I try to keep it simple. Right? When I try to control what I cannot control, then I will be controlled by what I cannot control. So, an old line is with our parenting, indeed, control what you can and let the rest alone.

Because I think there's limited amount of control that we can have and nuance into each kid the old line. Right? My mom and dad just looked at me and I behaved. I got in line. And, other kids are like, you look at me that way, it's game on.

Knowing our kids, knowing the idiosyncratic nature and nuance to each kid and paying attention. We're gonna keep going back to the internal, aren't we? To pay attention to what's going on in me, like, that particular child biologically born and in your family or adopted or fostered, what is that hitting inside me? And not what are they doing? And I believe strongly as parents, as adults, even if you're 18, maybe developmentally, you're 12.

I don't know. But the buttons that kids get to press in us were installed in family of origin in our in our upbringing. There's no really old, adult onset. So, these kids are pressing stuff in me. I've often said it's like a Coke machine as simple as I can make it.

Then our kids will come up knowingly or unknowingly. Oh, yeah. There are kids. They know exactly what buttons to press, but they're putting in quarter, 50¢, 75 a dollar, and all of a sudden click. And they we're feeling provoked, and they press a button in us for a Coke, and we delivered it on queue, shaken up can of Coke and all over them.

And it's like, to have that self-awareness of, woah. Woah. Woah. Right now, I'm feeling agitated. I might, as an adult, need to call my own time out.

I may say, wait. Wait. Wait. What's this hitting in me? Then go over here to a spouse and process it and say Yeah.

What what's going on in me that this kid is hitting in me? Personality difference or whatever and being aware. If I'm not aware of my triggers, then they're gonna get triggered every time. Many of us in the field now call it more activation than you're triggered. Yeah.

I'm getting activated. Is where is this again? If it's hysterical, it's historical. Where might be some of the history of these buttons? And then last thing is, you know, why am I as a parent not blaming the kids at all?

Why am I giving them all this power? They can walk up and go three, two, one, boom, and out I go. And I'm like, I wanna be have more emotional self-regulation than that. Mhmm. Mhmm.

Meredith Brock: One thing I have learned over the years, and I am not great at it, guys, but it is something that I have given myself permission to do over the last few years, is when I start to one, fostering in myself an awareness of when I'm start the quarter's been dropped in. Yeah. We're at 50¢ now. The level's starting to go up inside of me that in order to teach my children who I expect to be regulated people, I need to show them that sometimes I get dysregulated and here's what I do. You know?

And so, we've, I've tried to say, hey, guys. I am about to lose my patience. I need to walk away for a few minutes. I need a few minutes to go in the other room and to just have a minute. K?

Mom needs a minute. And by hopefully, I don't do it perfect because y'all sometimes that all four quarters go in and they hit that button. Oh, here she comes. You know? But trying, especially lately with my little guy, like, I he needs help.

He needs to learn the skills of self-regulation. And one of the best ways to learn it is to see your parent do it, you know, and give permission to, oh, I can feel it. It's starting to go up. I need to take a minute. You know?

And so, permission granted to all the parents to say, you know what? Watch this iPad for a minute. I need to separate myself so that I can calm down. So, permission granted all across the room. Okay.

So, these are some heavy things, guys. We talked a lot about really doing that self-work, recognizing, you know, whether it's a trigger or you're starting to get activated. Maybe you're seeing, yikes, I do have some control issues that are stemming from fear. How do parents start to begin recognizing these or maybe they're listening right now to be quite honest and saying, I'm good. I don't think I have any triggers.

Like, I don't have any control issues. Help them or help me even begin to recognize the red flags in themselves. Like, how do they

Jim Cress: by the way, do you know if those parents are alike alive, seriously, or do they have a pulse? I If they don't have any triggers? I don't know.

Meredith Brock: I mean, I guess they're out there. But they might be out there, Jim.

Jim Cress: I'm just I'm gonna guess that maybe there's some They're anomaly.

Meredith Brock: Yes, they really are. Maybe they're parenting plants.

Or They're AI. They're AI parents, I guarantee you. Yeah. So how do we begin recognizing, the triggers in ourselves, and where do we go from there? So, Bethany, do you wanna start?

Bethany Hall: Yeah. I mean, I think the hope is really just circling back to what we keep saying, and that is being curious about what's going on in our own hearts. And I think it's easy to either, like you said, get too busy. So, we're not even able to notice the triggers because they're happening and they're happening and they're happening and in the moment, we think, man, I should maybe go to therapy about that or, man, I should talk to a friend about that and then we get busy. So, I think we can fall off on that side.

Or Jim, you alluded to it earlier. We can just get stuck in shame of like; I'm the world's worst parent. I have all these triggers. I yell. I'm, you know, I'm not break, and I've just failed and I'm ruining my kids.

And either one, we get stuck. And so, trying to sit in that middle spot, you know, Paul Tripp said something in one of his books that I love, and he talks about how the Lord parents us as we parent our kids. And it was just life changing for me because if in that moment I can go, God, I am in such need of your grace as I do this thing, and tell my kids, guys, mom is in such need of grace as I do this thing because I'm still learning and I'm still growing. And your sin of selfishness is my sin of selfishness. It just looks different.

And so, this idea of, like, we're all in this together. We are all sinners. We are all looking to the Lord to help us, but it helps me to stay curious. It helps me to be honest with myself because there's no shame. The Lord has taken the punishment for it.

So, I can freely say, man, I have an anger problem. And it's rooted in this this this thing that really gets hits my button. And so, I can ask for help about that. I can ask the Lord. I can ask a counselor.

I think that frees us to see these as opportunities rather than, you know, I'm just gonna ruin my kids' lives or to have to say, oh, I don't have any of those. We can get honest, because of grace. That's good.

Meredith Brock: That's really good. My husband likes to say to my 13-year-old, and I don't know where he got this, but I think it's so smart, is he says, look, buddy, parent as long as you've been alive.

I've never done this before. And so, I'm like, it's true. Just like you're learning how to be a young man, a human being, we're still learning how to be parents. We've never done this before. You know?

Again, permission granted, guys, to say things that, like, I don't totally know how to do this. So that's good. That's good. You talked a little bit too about connected parenting, Bethany. What is that?

Bethany Hall: Authoritative parenting, but it's just this idea of balancing. You know, you're a TBI fan, Meredith, this idea of balancing structure and nurture. It's not falling off either side of the cart. And I think all of us tend to have kind of our zone. My husband is very kind of our zone.

My husband is very structured. He keeps us from being broke, giving away everything we own and eating ice cream every day. And God love him for it, you know, and I am the connector. And so, I help him kind of tone it down sometimes. And bring those two pieces.

But this idea, this phrase that I'm gonna say is so important. Proximity increases tolerance. So, when we feel close to somebody, we put up with a lot more trash from them than when we do not feel connected to them. And so, the weird thing is that when I'm most wanting to reach for control or I'm most irritated with my child, what I most need to do is to work on that connection be able to tolerate them better if we can say, hey, we're on the same team, we love each other, and we're gonna get through this. It's going to really just create ripple effects into all the other conversations we have to have, into all the other boundaries.

That proximity increases our ability to tolerate, you know, with our spouse, but also with our kids. So just spending that time connecting with them when we least feel like it sometimes can produce the harvest even if our heart's not initially in it. So same thing with the permission granted. Permission granted to do the right thing even if you don't feel like it as a parent.

Meredith Brock: Right.

Jim Cress: I think it's important too as often as we can as parents is to and it's easier for me to see now as a grandfather or granddaddy of six to watch them and my we don't analyze our, our kids officially analyze our adult kids' parenting styles. We sit back one degree removed and watch it and to look for command free, demand free time with their kids. So literally within boundaries that there's a time that this is not about move left, right, up, down instruction. It's a command free and demand free zone where everybody can kind of breathe and just be. And I encourage parents, anyone watching or listening today within your boundaries to look for how do we have that command free demand free time that everybody's just kind of chilling, not on duty rules right away.

Meredith Brock: That is some wisdom, y'all, and that is hard. Can I be honest for me as a person, I am a structure, productivity driven mom, you know? And so, it's really, it's been hard for me as a parent, to not always be in that kind of demand command space where it's like, okay, now it's time to get ready for dinner. Okay. Now it's time to clean up dinner.

Okay. We're done with dinner. Now it's time to go ahead and do homework. You know? And I heard in a workshop a few years ago about, you know, and I think we've all heard the importance of playing with your children.

Like, play. It's good for their learning. It's good for your connection. And I found myself, especially with little toddlers, like, that's super hard for me. Like, it's really hard to tap into my imagination that way.

And I'm just, again, just gonna throw out there something that I learned in hopes that it will help another mom out there. A trick I learned is to narrate what they're doing. You're not really playing with them, but you narrate, like, when my kids would, like, have their little Batman toy or their little Barbie toy. I would be like, okay. You do it, and I'll say what they're doing.

And I would just be like, and Barbie walked upstairs, and she couldn't believe it. The house was a mess. And I'm not actively moving the little guys or doing anything, but it was just like an easy way for me to enter into play with my kids that I don't even I learned it in some random workshop that I was like, that I can do. I can narrate what is happening with the action figures because it's almost even still for me. I'm, like, still kind of commanding something, but it's the figure, not the kid.

You know? Or I would be like, okay. Now you're gonna pretend like they're doing this, and it just helped me move out of that command demand space and into that to your point, Bethany.

Jim Cress: Kind of and there are there are therapists that make a good living off that called play therapy or sand tray or whatever else. And it's very, very helpful, and the kids often will just open up.

And I used to do that by differently, but putting up when I was counseling kids and teenagers, I have a basketball. I still have a hoop in my office, and I'm not gonna sit and talk face to face like this. We'd shoot three pointers and talk or use some art stuff and just kinda goof off. And I found, man, they'd open up and tell you all kinds of stuff because they were distracted from just the thing. They were being come right at them like that.

It's quite effective. Yeah. Decreasing that intensity. Yeah. For sure.

Meredith Brock: Yeah. So good. Okay. We've talked about our own personal red flags, and that's where we gotta start y'all. So important.

Do your own work before you, you know and sometimes you have to do it alongside your kiddos' work too. Right? And so, let's talk about recognizing some red flags in our kids. Bethany, you work with kids. You see them day in and day out.

What red flags do we need to know as parents?

Bethany Hall: So, the first one we wanna talk about is unusual behavior or when your kid is just not acting like themselves. So, this kind of red flag, something feels off. And this could, this could be a momentary thing, but I'm gonna encourage you to look for patterns in two areas, frequency and intensity. So, every teenager tends to have some moody moments, right?

That's just kind of par for the course. Every toddler has meltdowns, but if you have a child that the frequency of it is happening more than you would say to your other mom friends or you know, the people that you know, it's happening more frequently. It's an everyday occurrence or the intensity. So, it's lasting for hours. You know, Meredith, as an adoptive mom, you know, when you're talking to somebody who has a biological child, who hasn't experienced trauma, it's not always apples to apples.

People are like, oh, yeah, my teenager has meltdowns. And I'm like, well, some of the teenagers we work with, you know, they're threatening physical harm or they're taking doors off the walls. And it's just not apples to apples. And it's not comparison game. That's not what I'm saying.

I'm just saying we want to look at the frequency and intensity to say if something's a red flag. You know, every kid might have a behavior, but if it's much more frequent or much more intense than a neurotypical child or a child without trauma, then we start wanna start asking questions and perhaps getting a professional, involved in the conversation. Yeah.

Meredith Brock: That's a good word. And I think that I've learned as a parent, there is intense for one child is very different than your other one, but they're both normal.

Like, they're this one's intensity is just they live at a level nine, and that's okay. That's their normal, this one down here. And if they go to a level 12, all of a sudden and are kind of staying there, that's the, oh, something's happening. You know? Where this one stays at a level five and they go to a level nine and then back down, that's okay.

You're just having a minute. You know? And so, looking for those patterns, like you said, where it's like, if it goes up, you know, don't you can't compare apples. They're not apples to apples. They're all different.

Jim, you have something that you say about parental regret that I think would help our listeners. So, unpack that for our family.

Jim Cress: Yeah. I, I wrote an article for, the publication I write for called the Christian Counseling Today from the American Association of Christian Counselors. And the article was simply I titled it, parenting your adult children rising from regret to resiliency.

Because even if they're toddlers and now they were and now they're teenagers, the level of parental regret is looking back, you know, driving far less in the windshield before you, but in that parental regret rearview mirror and thinking I could've done this different had I known this, and I didn't know anything about attachment. Or we used to do this discipline or this modality of parenting and all that and structure and having that regret and still then, in a way, living in such a regret that keeps you from being present in the moment. And it might keep you in a relationship. We know for every rip, there needs to be a repair. And to be able to say or the relationship will rupture.

And to be able to say, I can go to my kids. I've talked to a lot of parents who have been saying, have you ever made amends to your kids? Whether they're little kids, adolescent, teenagers, adults? No. I go, then I would be found faithful to go to your kids at any level and say, you know what?

I did get activated there. And for God's sake, literally for God's sake, do not say, see what you made me do? I mean, you made me mad. You did this. When people use the language, you made me or it made me, that's victim language.

That's childhood language. Right? So, the idea of just taking ownership and looking and saying, of course, you hurt your child or, of course, you have some parental regrets. There's only probably two things you need that you owe and owe to your kids one day, and that's an education and therapy. It's like, my kids have to go to therapy.

No. That's a good thing. But, parentally, even if they're adults, to circle back and say, you don't have to go to therapy for that. But to say, what are there is there any ways that I hurt you or mess some things up or I wish I'd done this better? And usually, the last person we forgive is ourselves.

So that's the parental, regret. If I had more time, which we don't have, I would say if you keep yourself in prison, locked in the prison of parental regret, and you can't almost believe that you did it, be careful because I believe you're now entering the realm, ready, of idolatry. It is an idol versus saying you get to be human as a parent. Most of us at one level probably did about as good as we could do if you had everything in there and to forgive yourself and seek to make amends and repairs with your kids.

Meredith Brock: That's a good word.

It's a good word. Okay. Let's talk about red flag number two with our kiddos. What do we need to look out for? Red flag number two is fear or shame-based behaviors.

Bethany Hall: So, this, like you said, Meredith, looks different in every kid. And, Jim, I know on this podcast, you guys have talked about that limbic system or the amygdala activation, and it causes all manner of bad behavior in our kids and in us. Bad behavior in the first part of the podcast. And in this one, we just want to be aware when our child has a big behavior that's based in that fear or shame-based response. So, we can look at it fight, flight, freeze.

Then a kid fight might be yelling or cussing or slamming doors or getting physical, right? Flight might be literally running away, but flight can also look like flighting into my phone or gaming and just avoiding the situation, right? And then freeze going back to the trigger the beautiful trigger that you mentioned, Meredith, which can also be one of mine, which is that, are you even listening? Like, is this mic on feeling with my it's that freeze. Right?

And so, when we look at just the behavior, it can be so frustrating. But if we see it for what it is, hey, that behavior is a fear or a shame-based response. That kid is activated. It's going to help us engage in a very different way. So, understanding, like you said, my first job as a parent when I noticed that my kid is in their amygdala is to keep myself calm because that is contagious.

Right? Those big emotions, they can easily ooze over to me. My youngest and I have this trick called the Jello wall. Just put up your Jello wall. Don't let those negative emotions ooze into you.

And so, trying to keep myself regulated is job number one. And then step two is based response? How can I connect? How can I get him a drink or a snack? How can I get some proximity so that they have the ability to get in the part of their brain that they need to be in to make a different choice?

Happens if I'm not recognizing the behavior for what it is, if I'm just playing what I call behavior whack a mole. You know, they just always do this, or they always do that versus, wow, that was a big amygdala response. How should I then in kind respond versus being reactive?

Meredith Brock: Yeah. Wow.

I'm just here to tell you, like, that is such wisdom, such Mhmm. Good, advice, but it's so hard.

Bethany Hall: That's from having done it wrong so many times. So just everybody every listener be aware. I learned that because I played behavior whack a mole for a long, long time.

Meredith Brock: Yeah. Well, so let's end on that, guys. If self-regulation is the goal, right, as the parent, you're saying your number one responsibility is to self-regulate before you can deal with what you're doing. Jim, Bethany, give us just some a tip, some kind of practical thing to help our listeners right now. Because a lot of them, I can guarantee you, myself included, is like, you want me to what?

Excuse me? And so, let's give them that one first step that might help them do that.

Jim Cress: I'll go first and that is you know, we have a paper in front of us. Write down your triggers, folks. Yeah.

Write down your activation points. Write down if it's hysterical, it's historical. Meredith gave one earlier. Mine was I felt disrespected as a child. So, when one of my children overtly disrespected me, man, it hit it was all over me.

You've gotta know your triggers. You have to have that awareness once we prepare in times of strength for coming times of weakness. Sit with a therapist or a good friend. Everything's not always about counseling. To sit down and say, what are my activation points?

What are my triggers? Have that awareness. Know then your brain research that if the amygdala and limbic part of your brain gets fired where it's fully involved on fire, it takes twenty to thirty minutes for that to calm down. Mhmm. So, you have to have that awareness, and you feel yourself like the quarters in the Coke machine.

You know your stuff. I feel it. Take a break. Drink four ounces of water can lower anxiety. Put ice in your hands.

I mean, we get it all kind of practical therapeutic techniques. And guess what? Easier said than done for one in life is not easier said than done. If you want calm, bring calm. Yeah.

If you want calm, be calm. And the more your system the brains of GPS saying, where are we going? And you say, I've got tools here to remain calm or to take a time out when I need to. You'll find it'll work for you. I promise you that.

Bathany Hall: Yeah. And piggybacking off of that, I mean, that is just such gold, Jim. And I would say, you know, scripture says that out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks and that we are changed by the renewing of our mind. And so, whatever you're choosing to do that you don't like is rooted in a thought, a belief, an emotion that has to be unpacked. We cannot just double down and do better.

And I tried that so many years of like, I just have to do different and have a behavior part for me as an adult, right? And really, it's it sounds like you said, it sounds like an Instagram post, Jim, but it it's going to Lord and saying, I'm believing wrong things about my responsibilities or about myself or about my past or, overturned to you and I need to work through help me or recognize them. And then that Romans twelve: two helped me to renew those and to think differently and to fill myself with your thoughts and your truth so that I can then out of that overflow, respond. So, trusting those things to the Lord, I think is has been so critical for my journey. And it's so easy when we have kids, like in our line of work with really big behaviors to just go, it's all on the kid.

Like you said, Jim, I've been so guilty of that. Like, my kid has 90% of the puzzle. I'm not gonna focus on my 10. But any 1% that we can do, which we have full control over, is gonna create ripple effects in the lives of our kids. And so, it's hard, but doing our own work is just so critical.

Meredith Brock: Amen, guys. This is what a great conversation. And I just wanna say to all the parents out there, like, hang in there. You're doing holy work by raising those kiddos, and it is not you don't have to be perfect. That is what, the gospel is for.

It's for us imperfect, incapable lovers of Jesus. That's all we gotta be, and he will fill in the rest. So, hang in there, parents. Thank you both Bethany and Jim for being here and giving your wisdom. I really believe that this conversation is gonna help a lot of people out there.

Shea Hill: Thanks for tuning in, therapy and theology family. We hope that you have found today's episode helpful, and hopeful. Thanks for tuning in today. Don't forget to download your free resource title, is this normal? 15 red flags you may be missing in your relationships.

We've linked it for you in the show notes below. Therapy and Theology is brought to you by Proverbs thirty-one Ministries, where we help you know the truth and live the truth because it changes everything.