Ep #51: Name It to Tame It Series – Part 4

Welcome to the Co-parenting with Confidence podcast. I'm your host, Mikki Gardner. And this is episode number 51, the Name It to Tame It Series, Part 4. [music] Welcome to Co-parenting with Confidence, a podcast for those courageous moms out there who wanna move past the conflict and frustration of divorce and show up as the mom they truly wanna be. My name's Mikki Gardner, I'm a certified life and conscious parenting coach with my own personal dose of co-parenting experience. Throughout my co-parenting journey, I have learned to become confident in who I am as a woman and a mother, and I am here to help you do the same. If you're ready to learn what it takes to become a great co-parent and an amazing example to your children, well get ready and let's dive into today's episode. [music] Welcome, friend. Thanks for joining me today. After working with so many moms, and yes, some dads who are on this co-parenting journey, I have definitely witnessed a whole host of feelings. And of course, right? Divorce is hard. It's not some fun, easy process that we go through and then we just turn a switch and we move on. No. Nobody wants to go through this. And sometimes it can feel so challenging and overwhelming because of all of the emotions we are feeling, often all at the same time. But too many times the moms and dads that I talk to, they think that they're alone in their feelings or that they're feeling the wrong things at the wrong times, that they shouldn't be feeling something, or they're feeling it too much, or they shouldn't still be feeling that way. And when you do this, you just shut down, you isolate, and ultimately you prolong your own suffering. And that's why I wanted to do this series so that we could really start to dig into some of the common feelings that we all feel during divorce and co-parenting, and to identify them and start to understand why they're present, how we can deal with them and how we can move forward. In the last couple of episodes, I've looked at a lot of emotions. And so if you haven't listened to 48, 49 or 50, I really recommend that you do. Because you cannot make change, you can't take ownership and you can't take control over anything until you have the language to communicate about it and to be able to communicate what you're feeling. And that's what this series has been about, giving language and context to some of the common feelings that we all experience. And today, we're gonna wrap up the series by looking at feelings we feel when we have been wronged. Those are anger, contempt, hate, and disgust. And I'm continuing to use Brené Brown's book, "Atlas of the Heart" because there is just no better source than Brené Brown. And if you haven't listened to her TED Talk, read any of her books, I really highly recommend that you do. She is a wealth of knowledge, so funny and really relatable. But she breaks it down so that it's understandable, and we feel less alone. So the first emotion that we're gonna talk about is anger. This is a doozy. This is one that, often, many of us feel. And a lot of times the average person who doesn't have the vocabulary or the capacity to be able to identify emotions, the ones that they can are happy, sad and pissed off. So it's mad, glad, and sad, those kind of basic emotions. But this is where anger falls in. Anger is an emotion that we feel when something gets in the way of what we want, and when we believe there is a violation of the way things should be. If that doesn't describe at least a large majority of how you feel a lot of the time, especially during separation, pre-divorce and post-divorce... We often feel like something has gotten in the way of what we wanted, and we're mad, we are angry. Anger is an active emotion. We wanna do something when we feel it, even when we're on the receiving end of it. And anger is one of those emotions that, it may or may not be a primary emotion, but there is often a lot behind it. It's not on its own. There's usually a flood of other things going on. Brené describes anger as she says, "Anger is a catalyst. Holding onto it will make us exhausted and sick, internalizing anger will take away our joy and our spirit, externalizing anger will make us less effective in our attempts to create change and forge connection. It's an emotion that we need to transform into something life-giving, like courage, love, change, compassion, and justice." So here's the thing, anger is an emotion that is necessary. And when I say necessary, it really is a way that we know that we're feeling something where we can start to take control of it and make change. But to do that, we have to understand what's behind it because it's not on its own. You don't just feel anger, there's often many things behind it. So what does that look like? Just to name a few, sadness, fear, frustration, guilt, disappointment, worry, embarrassment, jealousy, hurt, anxiety, and shame. So you can see there's a lot behind anger. And frankly, that's why anger is really a secondary or an indicator emotion, that can mask or make us unaware of other things that are behind it, those things that are much more difficult to talk about. Because we do live in a world where it is much easier to say, "I'm so pissed off" than to say "I'm betrayed and I'm hurt." It's even easier to say, "I'm angry with myself" than it is to say, "I'm disappointed with how I showed up." So anger is present, but what is it masking, what is it holding behind it? And that's where you always wanna focus, starting to look underneath it. And a little bit later, I'm gonna talk about ways that we can sort of process anger. Because again, it's sometimes so overwhelming, we get so caught up in the anger. But when we just look at it... It's like an iceberg, if you are just looking at what's on top, the anger, we're missing everything underneath. And that's where the change and the growth can happen, that's where we can turn anger into something life-giving like courage, change, compassion, and love. So the second emotion that I'm gonna talk about here that Brené identifies as one of the things we do when we feel wronged, is contempt. Oh, this is a doozy. No, this is really interesting because she cites, and I really love the work of John Gottman and Julie Gottman. He's known across the globe as sort of one of the most premier marital counselors. But he can predict... He and is wife can predict divorce in a couple with a 90% success rate using what they talk about as The Four Horsemen. So why am I talking about something that's a strong predictor in marriage? Because often times, if the marriage has ended in divorce, there is a reason why. And if we have one or more of these Four Horsemen present, they can be the predictors of whether relationships will make it or not. So we're talking about it, divorce, it's already happened. But here's the interesting thing, when we get into patterns in the marriage, oftentimes when we're not aware, we take those patterns outside. We take them into the co-parenting relationship, and that's where I think contempt really comes in here. So the Four Horsemen that Gottman talks about is criticism, defensiveness, contempt, and stonewalling. So you can go through and look at all of those, but contempt is really an attacking your partner's sense of self with insulting or abusive language that communicates superiority. What does it sound like? "I learned to tell time when I was five, when are you gonna learn?" Something as simple as being late for a transition might come off with your ex being contempt or maybe you have the contempt. So contempt is one of the most damaging of the negative communication patterns, and that's why Gottman talks so much about them. So what do we need to know about contempt? When you communicate with contempt, the result can be cruel. Treating others with disrespect, mocking them with sarcasm are both forms of contempt. What does this look like? So it could also look as hostile humor, name-calling, mimicking, body language such as rolling your eyes or sneering. In whatever form, contempt is poisonous to a relationship because it conveys disgust and superiority, especially when it comes to moral or ethical. So contempt, simply put, says "I'm better than you, and you are lesser than me." So you can see very easily how contempt, when we feel wronged, when we feel that we have either been on the end of or we are dishing out contempt, it is a deal breaker. It is poisonous to a relationship. And when we're trying to co-parent in a way that is respectful and kind and cooperative, contempt cannot be part of it. Contempt results in distancing, ignoring, and excluding that person. Not considering their worth or their time or energy. And when we boil it down, the person feeling contempt often once or needs to feel better about themselves, and they do so by diminishing the person who is the object of their contempt. So let's say that contempt was present, maybe this was present in the communication during the marriage, and you're finding it present in your communication in co-parenting. There are ways around this. Just because it was present in the marriage doesn't mean that we have to continue it, just because your co-parenting partner uses contempt or feels contempt towards you does not mean you have to match it. One of the things that I work with my clients on on a daily basis is learning a values-based communication tool, it's a tool that I teach them. And really what it is, is it's a guidance system to ensure that you are staying on course and staying in integrity, no matter what the other person is doing. It is very difficult to have contempt thrown at us, and it is so toxic to feel it when we are feeling it. And so we really need to learn how to communicate in a way, that's the way we exchange ideas and information, that is based on our values. I talk about that a lot on this podcast, but the values are the things and the quality that you hold of highest value or esteem. Translation, the things that matter most to you. And when you stay aligned with those, you are in integrity, you are whole. And so really learning to take contempt and processing it and moving it out of your communication style, values-based communication is so important, and that's why I teach that tool to my clients very early on in the process. Because that's how we start to really change and how we navigate a co-parenting relationship in a different way, no matter what happened during the marriage. The next emotion that we're gonna talk about is disgust. Disgust often we think of as something we're disgusted by food or a smell, but we can also be disgusted by the people in our lives. Disgust is a really fascinating emotion, because with contempt, we look down on the other person and we want to exclude or ignore them. With disgust, inferiority isn't so much the issue, the feeling is more physical. We wanna avoid being poisoned by them, so to speak. It's almost this idea that I hear so many of my clients say, "But he's toxic. I have to stay away, I have to keep away, I can't let any part of it." And they're disgusted to the point that they're physically revolted by the idea of this person. Now, I'm not saying your ex isn't toxic, this is not what I'm saying. But we need to understand when we are feeling disgust, because it's being triggered by a feeling that something is repulsive or toxic for us, and we need to start to understand so that we can protect ourselves from what is actually toxic versus something that we're feeling. And feelings are just directive. They're not judgments, they're not law, they're not rules, they're just directive. It's, I'm thinking and believing something that is creating a feeling, and I'm choosing and acting from that, and that's why it's so important that when we're feeling disgust, when we're feeling this physical feeling towards the other person, it's really an opportunity to step back and look at, "What am I believing? What am I judging here? What am I holding on to?" And ultimately, when we do start to make those inquiries, then we can start to decide, "Do I like this? Is this serving me?" We don't have to take the feeling at face value, we can start to dive a little bit deeper into it. And that's the work that I help my clients do, and that's what I'm hoping that this podcast series helps you start to understand that these emotions are normal. We feel them, there's reasons that we feel them, and there's also ways that we can process them so we don't suffer from them. So the last emotion that we're gonna talk about is hate, and this is a really strong emotion. I don't know how many times I remember as a kid, "Oh, we don't say that we hate people." Or "It's not nice to say that." Or "We don't use that word." All of those things have made hate a really difficult topic. But what hate is, is a combination of various negative emotions. Including, but not limited to, repulsion, disgust, anger, fear and contempt. So when we're feeling anger, fear, contempt and maybe disgust, that's what puts us into this emotion of hate. And hatred has always motivated people for destructive action. Hate is not a place that we come from and make good decisions from. And so we wanna be very cognizant when we are in this place feeling this hatred, what do we do with that? The interesting thing about hate, Brené Brown found, is that it's actually fueled by our need for connection. She calls it a, "Common enemy intimacy." She says, "I might not know anything about you, but we hate the same people and that creates a counterfeit bond and a sense of belonging. I say counterfeit because the bond and belonging are not real, they're hinged on my agreeing with you and not challenging the ideas that connect us. That's not true belonging." So how does this come up in divorce and co-parenting? Well, how many times have you found yourself sort of maybe gossiping, telling a friend or an acquaintance about how awful your ex is? And then they commiserate and, "Oh my gosh, I can't believe that. Sounds like mine." And you start to build up this sense of connection based on this emotion that you're both feeling. This is where you have to be very careful, because when we confuse that bond, that connection that we're feeling... When it's built on the hatred of others, this is not true connection, this is not true bonding, and this is a dangerous place to be from. I'm not saying don't talk to people and don't get the support you need, but when we're gossiping, when we're doing it to fuel the hatred, to fuel all of those negative emotions, that's not healthy, it's not serving you or the co-parenting relationship or anyone else. So we all have these feelings inside of us. To suggest that we don't is unfair to you, because we all have these ranges of emotions. Why we wanna start to understand them and be able to identify them is so that we can start to process through them. We can't possibly be moving on, growing, changing, evolving, learning, if we're not willing to look at these things, even the hard things and the negative emotions that we don't necessarily want to feel. And this is why I wanted to do this series. This is the work that I do with my clients every day, to offer a safe space to process the feelings so that they don't end up leaking out and affecting your parenting, your relationships and your future. Divorce and co-parenting, it is a journey where we feel a lot of intense emotions. And at the same time, we are expected to show up and take care of our kids. But the only way we can do this is when we are actually processing and finding compassion for ourselves and the feelings that we're having. So I do wanna offer one tip because we talked about some big emotions today, I don't know anybody that loves to feel any of these or admit to them. So often, especially women, we're not supposed to feel anger, according to society, and I'm using air quotes. Or contempt or disgust or hate, none of that. Not... "A good mother wouldn't do that." How many times have you sort of felt that or had that expectation on yourself? But the fact is, we do feel all of these emotions, and there is a reason. Again, anger can be a catalyst when we're willing to look at it. I'm not saying that we have to run around being an angry person, but we can't deny it, suppress it, or ignore it. And so I wanted to offer you an actual tangible tool that you can use to help process some of these emotions. So let's take anger, let's say that you have something come up where you have a lot of emotion, maybe there's an interaction with your ex that you are really, really angry about. Maybe something happens at work, maybe you don't get something that you really wanted, but you are really feeling intense anger and possibly disgust or contempt or any of these feelings. What I want you to do is a five-minute emotional release. So what does this look like? You set a timer for five minutes, you have yourself in a room away from other people where you feel safe to process emotion. So you set the timer for five minutes and then you release the anger in any way that you need to. This can also work for sadness or, really, any big emotion. But you set the timer, and then you release it. What does that look like? If you're feeling really angry and you need to physically get it out, maybe you punch a pillow, maybe you scream into a pillow, maybe you go do a punching bag. When my son was little, I used to give them a phonebook when those things existed and let him shred the papers out of it. Whatever it is, you give five minutes and you just release the emotion. If you need to cry, you cry. If you need to yell, you yell. But you get it out. Then when that timer goes off, I want you to settle yourself down, sit down where you are, put your right hand on your heart, your left hand on your lower belly and take three really deep breathes in and out. And if you need more than three breathes, you take more than three breathes until you feel calm and you feel centered. And then I want you to say to yourself, "I cannot change this. I can choose how I experience this. What do I need right now?" And then you breathe in and out until you can hear the answer. Whatever it is, I want you to move towards it. When we breathe and we find our center, and we are quiet and we listen, we are hoping to hear our intuition. That is that deep, quiet voice inside of you. That's the voice of the Divine inside of you who will never steer you wrong. Maybe what you need is to speak up, maybe what you need is a break, maybe what you need is to move on. Whatever it is, you start it one step at a time, based on what you need. Not to change the other person, not to get the result that you want. But just, "I've released this emotion. I cannot change the situation, but I can change how I experience it. So what do I need to help myself move forward?" This is such an important thing to be able to start to do, to start to just identify our feelings so that we can communicate them. And that was really my hope for this whole series, is to normalize these things so that we can be liberated from the prison of un-expressed emotions. Because every action or inaction, every decision, every dream we let die, every dream we go after, every relationship we either nurture or kill is based on how we're feeling, how we think we will feel when we have something. We cannot think our way to happiness, we cannot force ourselves to act a certain way for a long-term period of time. It is only through being aware of and learning how to accept our feelings and move through them that we can find the agency to move forward and to make the change towards the life that we truly desire. So that's the show that I have for you, I'm so grateful that you're here with me. Thank you for listening, thank you for being here, and thank you for the work that you're doing on yourself. You and your children are deserving and worthy of this, and so keep going. And if you need help, I'm here for you, just reach out. And if you know someone who could benefit from today's episode, I would be so grateful if you would share it with them. You can text it to them, email them the link or take a screenshot and share it on social. If you do share it on Instagram, please tag me, I'd love to connect with you there. Thank you for spending this time with me, I'll see you next week. And in the meantime, take really, really good care of you, friend. [music] Thanks for listening to Co-parenting with Confidence. If you want more information or resources from this podcast, visit coparentingwithconfidence.com. I'll see you next week. [music]