Speaker 1: Hello everybody, and welcome back to the Psychology of Your Twenties,
Speaker 1: the podcast where we talk through some of the big
Speaker 1: life changes and transitions of our twenties and what they
Speaker 1: mean for our psychology.
Speaker 2: Hello everybody, Welcome back to the show. Welcome back to
Speaker 2: the podcast. New listeners, old listeners. Wherever you are in
Speaker 2: the world, it is so great to have you here.
Speaker 2: Back for another episode as we, of course break down
Speaker 2: the psychology of our twenties today, we are here to
Speaker 2: talk about our families, to talk about parents and family
Speaker 2: dynamics and how they change in our twenties, or more specifically,
Speaker 2: I think, how they really begin to reveal themselves to
Speaker 2: us as we further into this decade. For many of us,
Speaker 2: you know, family is supposed to be the source of
Speaker 2: unconditional love and loyalty and support, and it's meant to
Speaker 2: be a safe haven. But what happens when that doesn't
Speaker 2: really match up with our experience and why is it
Speaker 2: that so many of us in our twenties really start
Speaker 2: questioning the role our families play in our lives and
Speaker 2: begin to unpack how they've shaped us for better, for
Speaker 2: awful worse, and how they will continue to shape us,
Speaker 2: So I really want to explore some of those common
Speaker 2: struggles that come with having a family and having strange,
Speaker 2: complicated parental dynamics and the nuances of it all. You know,
Speaker 2: I think it's really interesting that it's not black and white.
Speaker 2: It's not that you either completely hate your family you
Speaker 2: want to be a strange from them, or you have
Speaker 2: to completely love them. A lot of us exist in
Speaker 2: the gray space in the middle. So why is that
Speaker 2: the case? How do we navigate having complicated feelings towards family?
Speaker 2: And of course I wanted to bring on an amazing
Speaker 2: guest who is an expert on this to help us
Speaker 2: rethink the boundaries, family expectations, all of the above. These
Speaker 2: are very big, heavy topics, but they are so necessary.
Speaker 2: So I want to welcome on Gwendolen Watson. Gwendolen, how
Speaker 2: are you doing. Hi?
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me. I'm doing I'm
Speaker 3: doing great. I this was the highlight of my day.
Speaker 3: I was looking forward to this.
Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, thank you. That always makes me feel very,
Speaker 2: very happy. Just a little compliment to begin the episode. No,
Speaker 2: none of the listeners have probably met you before. Maybe
Speaker 2: they had, but so can you tell us a little
Speaker 2: bit about yourself and how exactly you became well a
Speaker 2: marriage and family therapist above all else.
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely, Yeah, I love I love reflecting on my
Speaker 3: journey to become a therapist because it's so aligned with
Speaker 3: some of the themes that we're going to explore as well. So,
Speaker 3: you know, I grew up in a family that had
Speaker 3: a lot of dynamics. I was one of four kids.
Speaker 3: My mom abstract painter, poet, you know, kind of very
Speaker 3: expansive woman from England, and I grew up in America
Speaker 3: and my dad was a tax lawyer from the South.
Speaker 3: So just already like how did that happens? That's a
Speaker 3: whole other podcast of how they mett Yeah, just growing
Speaker 3: up in that environment of a lot of different perspectives
Speaker 3: on values and life, and as a middle child. As
Speaker 3: I'm sure you've explored in past episodes, a lot of
Speaker 3: my development was around really noticing how to you know,
Speaker 3: have certain reactions from people, noticing what brought about a
Speaker 3: sense of joy, a sense of acceptance, and maybe what
Speaker 3: things would bring about a sense of anxiety from my parents.
Speaker 3: Part of that experience. Also, I'm an identical twin, I know, Oh.
Speaker 2: My god, you're a middle child and an identical twin,
Speaker 2: so you didn't even get to just be the only
Speaker 2: middle child to someone else was identical. Oh my goodness, racious. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So my my journey into my twenties, I felt like
Speaker 3: it was one of those first times of asking myself,
Speaker 3: you know, like how do I feel about something? What
Speaker 3: do I want? I studied art history and then jumped
Speaker 3: from that and went into Google worked in business development
Speaker 3: for almost a decade, and yet I found myself walking
Speaker 3: through the corridors, like walking through the cubicles, kind of
Speaker 3: keeping that that feeling of disconnection at Bay. I remember
Speaker 3: one time I walked into an empty conference room and
Speaker 3: found myself tearful and not knowing why. And it really
Speaker 3: was that, like I was starting to get in touch
Speaker 3: with this feeling of this isn't what I want my
Speaker 3: life to be. In that process kind of got in
Speaker 3: touch with the fact that my whole life I've been
Speaker 3: serving some type of helping professional role. And I've always
Speaker 3: been really curious relationships. I was a young kid curious
Speaker 3: about my parents' relationship. I was a young kid like
Speaker 3: trying to negotiate friendship struggles on the playground, and I
Speaker 3: was like a very highly sensitive, attuned, emotionally attuned kid
Speaker 3: and teen and young adult. So started to think about
Speaker 3: I think being a therapist is actually more aligned with
Speaker 3: what I want. And I remember calling my parents to
Speaker 3: share with them that I was I was embarking on
Speaker 3: this new journey, and in that moment, you know, I
Speaker 3: was really ready for them to be on the same
Speaker 3: page with me. And of course, as it happens, they
Speaker 3: were in shock. They had a lot of anxiety. You know,
Speaker 3: they had their a lot of their own stories of
Speaker 3: raising kids with you know, some like professional uncertainty, my
Speaker 3: dad's firm who was working for, like collapse and he
Speaker 3: had a mortgage with three kids at the time. There's
Speaker 3: just like these owns stories of their own experiences around
Speaker 3: sudden career change that were coming up. I was like,
Speaker 3: why would you like what like you're but you have
Speaker 3: so much stability, like and you're so good at it,
Speaker 3: like not there's no signs that you should change your career.
Speaker 3: And in that conversation, you know, from their own anxiety,
Speaker 3: they you know, they said they had strong reactions and
Speaker 3: it was quite hurtful for me at the time. You know,
Speaker 3: now we've we've moved through it and I can see
Speaker 3: the two sides of the story. But in that moment,
Speaker 3: you know, I just was shocked that something that felt
Speaker 3: so beautiful to me was landing for them as so scary,
Speaker 3: such a bad idea, definitely not what I should be doing,
Speaker 3: and you know, like giving up that I was really
Speaker 3: losing and giving up as opposed to opening and gaining
Speaker 3: like a new chapter. So it was one of those
Speaker 3: moments where I had to be at peace with even
Speaker 3: though they're not on board, I'm on board, like I'm
Speaker 3: on board with myself, and I can give them space
Speaker 3: to come around. Like if this is true, if I'm
Speaker 3: really becoming a therapist, not to please them or to
Speaker 3: please anyone else, If this is really my vocation, then
Speaker 3: I believe in myself to put in the work to
Speaker 3: make it happen. So yeah, that was a long, long
Speaker 3: winded answer. But now I'm in private practice. Now I've
Speaker 3: had a couple different experiences as a therapist with different populations,
Speaker 3: and I get to work with adults and couples and
Speaker 3: families and support them in the navigation of relationships, which are,
Speaker 3: as you said in your intro, so nuanced, so complex
Speaker 3: and really I think the best catalyst for growth for
Speaker 3: all of us as human beings.
Speaker 2: That's a really beautiful start, and I think that it
Speaker 2: ties really perfectly in with what we're talking about today,
Speaker 2: which is doing what's best for you versus what your
Speaker 2: family thinks is best for you, having not so much conflict,
Speaker 2: but different opinions in families, disappointing your parents. But speaking
Speaker 2: of family, why do you think so many of us
Speaker 2: start really questioning the reality or what family should look
Speaker 2: like in our twenties. What is it about our twenties
Speaker 2: that really makes us start reconsidering how we were raised,
Speaker 2: how we grew up, and maybe some of the resentment
Speaker 2: around that as well.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean again, this is assuming that you
Speaker 3: lived with your family of origin the whole time and
Speaker 3: then kind of left home in your twenties, which I
Speaker 3: know isn't the case for everyone, but assuming that progression,
Speaker 3: it can be. You know, when you're living in an environment,
Speaker 3: the ability to question what's happening, there isn't always space
Speaker 3: for that. That takes a pretty secure and strong, safe
Speaker 3: environment to be able to outwardly name and question certain
Speaker 3: patterns or certain behaviors or certain values that are happening
Speaker 3: within a family system. So in your twenties, once you're
Speaker 3: left home, there's literally the oxygen to pause and say,
Speaker 3: hold on a second, like, what are the values that
Speaker 3: really aligned for me?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: And sometimes there's this beautiful quote that I love for
Speaker 3: ACT therapy, which is acceptance and commitment therapy, which says,
Speaker 3: in our pain, we find our values, and in our values,
Speaker 3: we find our pain. And I think a lot of
Speaker 3: twenty in your being in your twenties is that invitation
Speaker 3: where you have the space, you often have the time
Speaker 3: to pause and say, what did I experience that did
Speaker 3: have pain that maybe at the time I minimized or
Speaker 3: know kind of brushed away or repressed or just didn't
Speaker 3: even notice, just thought it was just kind of normal.
Speaker 3: What did I experience that had some pain connected to it?
Speaker 3: And what does that tell me about what I really
Speaker 3: care about? Some of our values are adopted and kind
Speaker 3: of carried forth down the generation from our families of
Speaker 3: origin and down the generations, and some of them are
Speaker 3: in reaction to or kind of like a renewed value
Speaker 3: that is in contrast to values that we were raised with.
Speaker 3: So you know, I'm going on a little bit of
Speaker 3: a tangent myself, but I think that in your twenties
Speaker 3: there's there's actually that space to pause and to reflect
Speaker 3: and something that I also love thinking about for folks
Speaker 3: in their twenties, we talk a lot about you know,
Speaker 3: you've probably heard a lot on social media and just
Speaker 3: if you're in your own therapy, you're inner child. And
Speaker 3: I love introducing the concept alongside your inner child of
Speaker 3: your inner team who's like a freaking badass and and
Speaker 3: wants to question things and wants to you know, like
Speaker 3: kind of like isn't afraid to maybe disrupt the status
Speaker 3: quo or to push back about things. And your twenties
Speaker 3: is kind of the first time when you get to
Speaker 3: integrate your enter team because you're not you know, you're
Speaker 3: not living your teen years. You're able to kind of
Speaker 3: feel into that that team side, that hold on a
Speaker 3: second side, right, they're like what do I care about?
Speaker 3: When do I want to speak up side? But that
Speaker 3: it's not kind of ruling the ship the same way
Speaker 3: that you know that you're living that in your teens,
Speaker 3: but you're also dealing with all the things you're dealing
Speaker 3: with in your teens. So your twenties there's a way
Speaker 3: to kind of feel into that and kind of integrate,
Speaker 3: like what part of me is in touch with my
Speaker 3: values and maybe what part of me is a little
Speaker 3: bit of my inner team, like just wanting to have
Speaker 3: fun or wanting to make mistakes or wanting to do
Speaker 3: something off the cuff and spontaneous and against what people
Speaker 3: expect of me. And so yeah, I think the twenties
Speaker 3: it's a beautiful, beautiful time that there's so much space
Speaker 3: for all of that. But it is it's a really
Speaker 3: unique time to you know, I say, it's kind of
Speaker 3: like you're giving birth to yourself, that you're allowing yourself
Speaker 3: to come into your adulthood.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I feel like, wow, that's all coming up
Speaker 2: and you're having what is a really huge transformation into adulthood. Yes,
Speaker 2: you have the oxygen to look at your family differently,
Speaker 2: like you have the breathing room. And you also start
Speaker 2: to talk to other people about their experiences as well,
Speaker 2: and I think become a bit more independently educated about
Speaker 2: what may have benefited you more, what family dynamics maybe
Speaker 2: should have looked like. And with that that can bring
Speaker 2: up the resentment of as well of why didn't I
Speaker 2: have the childhood like that, was that not meant to? Like?
Speaker 2: Was I actually not meant to be treated that way?
Speaker 2: And a big question, which you talked about before, is
Speaker 2: the push towards individualization. And I think a big question
Speaker 2: around becoming an individual is how would I do that differently?
Speaker 2: You know, my parents set an example, but as an individual,
Speaker 2: how would I have done that differently? And how will
Speaker 2: I do it differently in my own life with my friends,
Speaker 2: with my kids, with my family. And sometimes that brings
Speaker 2: up some heavy stuff when you begin to really realize
Speaker 2: the ways you've perhaps maybe been let down, hurt by
Speaker 2: your parents or family, maybe disappointed in the past. What
Speaker 2: kind of reactions do you think people tend to have,
Speaker 2: because it's a very hard realization. I think whether you
Speaker 2: have it as a teenager or as a in your twenties, like, oh,
Speaker 2: my family is a perfect and I'm just going to
Speaker 2: have to live with that. What are some of the
Speaker 2: reactions we initially tend to have towards that realization?
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean I think you named it with that,
Speaker 3: that experience of it's kind of an experience of grief
Speaker 3: and of loss, like a loss of what you wish
Speaker 3: you had had, and with grief with any type of
Speaker 3: processing loss, Like the reactions really run the gamut, right,
Speaker 3: like that it is so individual. For some people, it
Speaker 3: might be that feeling of you know, a feeling of anger,
Speaker 3: of irritation, or of sadness. You know, I do a
Speaker 3: lot with parts work, so kind of thinking about the
Speaker 3: different parts of yourself, and I think when you're talking
Speaker 3: about integrating a story of what happened in my past
Speaker 3: and how do I feel about it, my approach is
Speaker 3: always to make space for all the different parts of
Speaker 3: you and how all the different parts of you might feel.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: There might be kind of an intellectual wise part that says,
Speaker 3: you know, while like this is the way that I'm
Speaker 3: gonna you know, think about it, like clearly X y
Speaker 3: Z happened, and kind of uses intellectualization to find a narrative.
Speaker 3: And there might be that you know, that inner you know,
Speaker 3: maybe boundaried or angry part that really just wants to
Speaker 3: be in touch with anger and be in touch with
Speaker 3: like that wasn't fair. Sometimes that anger part is connected
Speaker 3: to a sense of justice like it shouldn't have been
Speaker 3: that way. And there's often a young part that is
Speaker 3: in touch with fear or yeah, just you know, fear
Speaker 3: or shut down or just quite quiet, you know, sitting
Speaker 3: in the quietness of an experience. And so, you know,
Speaker 3: I get I get this question from clients sometimes like
Speaker 3: am I supposed to feel this? Or how should I feel?
Speaker 3: And I always want to invite you know, actually, there
Speaker 3: are so many parts of you that are experiencing this
Speaker 3: processing of what family means or what happened that I
Speaker 3: wish hadn't happened. So how can we actually make space
Speaker 3: for all of those parts of you? And notice if
Speaker 3: one part and one side of you is really holding
Speaker 3: the microphone no pun intended, as we hold our microphones
Speaker 3: with one side of you, I does. If one side
Speaker 3: of you is really speaking quite loud, let's give it
Speaker 3: that space. Let's let it air out how it felt.
Speaker 3: But let's also notice the other sides of you that
Speaker 3: maybe have something to say as well. Yeah, soste, Yeah,
Speaker 3: go ahead.
Speaker 2: Oh no, I was just gonna say, like, I think
Speaker 2: anger and grief are like the two big ones, and
Speaker 2: like anger and grief are the two big ones that
Speaker 2: are very hard to process. And I've often found that
Speaker 2: if you just ignore them and you say to yourself,
Speaker 2: I have no right to be angry or I need
Speaker 2: to put away this anger and just pretend like everything
Speaker 2: is normal. And that's very relevant, especially around the holidays
Speaker 2: when we're recording this. That does not make it better,
Speaker 2: and that does not make it more bearable because you're
Speaker 2: still minimizing. You're still minimizing for other people. Right, any
Speaker 2: like emotional reaction you're having to being disappointed by your
Speaker 2: family or disappointing your family is a reaction that I
Speaker 2: think needs to has a full life cycle. Right, there's
Speaker 2: a birth of it normally, like when you are a
Speaker 2: child or when you're a teenager. Then there is the
Speaker 2: life of it when you're really really feeling that emotion,
Speaker 2: and eventually the emotion might die or it might become
Speaker 2: a bit weaker, more fragile. Sometimes that does take time.
Speaker 2: But also you can't put it into a box and
Speaker 2: expect that it's not going to want to break out.
Speaker 2: So I really like what you're saying, Like you need
Speaker 2: to give space for every single reaction that you're feeling
Speaker 2: towards your nuanced family dynamics. When when it's the case
Speaker 2: that you still have to be you know, be present
Speaker 2: with your family obviously, don't you might not want to
Speaker 2: cut them off. You know, especially around the holidays, there's
Speaker 2: a big conversation of people being like I have to go.
Speaker 2: I'm going home for Christmas, and I just know that
Speaker 2: this stuff is going to come up. I'm predicting that,
Speaker 2: like I'm probably going to fall back into old patterns
Speaker 2: with my family. How do you navigate that? How do
Speaker 2: you make sure that you're still like looking forward and
Speaker 2: looking to heal rast perhaps back in the same environment
Speaker 2: that caused you the paid in the first place.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I guess I want to name that.
Speaker 3: Even the word family means so many different things for
Speaker 3: so many different people, right, And that although there is
Speaker 3: a quite common experience of when we're back with our
Speaker 3: families of origin, we suddenly find ourselves like feeling fifteen
Speaker 3: again or feeling quite young, like you know when to end.
Speaker 3: I mean, even me like peaking at forty, Like the
Speaker 3: same thing happens to me, Like I Thanksgiving, I was like, God,
Speaker 3: I just I really just feel like a fifteen year
Speaker 3: old again. So like that felt experience is psychologically normal.
Speaker 3: I don't know, I'll surphrase it like it's a shared
Speaker 3: experience that a lot of people have. And you know,
Speaker 3: going home to family there. It's such a spectrum, So
Speaker 3: I want to I want to I guess I want
Speaker 3: to offer empathy to folks who are listening to this
Speaker 3: conversation that for some people, you might be going back
Speaker 3: to family where you know there are we don't get
Speaker 3: to choose who our parents are. You know, it is
Speaker 3: possible that you have parents that, for their own reasons
Speaker 3: and their own things that they're struggling with, have consistent
Speaker 3: and character logical ways of dismissing or hurting you physically
Speaker 3: or psychologically. And there's other people who going back to family,
Speaker 3: you know, they're going back to parents who are trying
Speaker 3: their best and still disappointing. Right that might be showing
Speaker 3: love through their like only know how to show loves
Speaker 3: through anxiety or no, only know how to show love
Speaker 3: through criticizing, And then it's intentional to say that they
Speaker 3: love you, but in actuality like they're telling you why
Speaker 3: are you wearing that Christmas dinner? And it's like really, job,
Speaker 3: like exactly have you not yet? Yeah? I can't believe
Speaker 3: you broke up with that person. They were the only
Speaker 3: person who cared about you, you know, like there's yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm wanting to normalize the spectrum right and say that
Speaker 3: although there's a common experience of going to the home
Speaker 3: for the holidays, like you know your truth, you know,
Speaker 3: you know, like, am I dealing with a family that's
Speaker 3: rough around the edges and imperfect in the way that
Speaker 3: humans are imperfect? Or did I grow up in an
Speaker 3: environment where when I turn home, I really have to
Speaker 3: be cautious around what it means to navigate safety and
Speaker 3: navigate this moment. Of course, some people by that if
Speaker 3: they really are returning to homes where they've seen a
Speaker 3: long enough pattern of you know, whether it's humulation or
Speaker 3: being put down or really just feeling that like intentionality
Speaker 3: of power and control, they might not be going home
Speaker 3: for the holidays. They might be finding chosen friends and
Speaker 3: chosen family to be engaging in the holidays with. But
Speaker 3: I guess what I offer to my clients is pausing
Speaker 3: to think about what do you want and what do
Speaker 3: you need for me? Whenever there's times when I'm going
Speaker 3: home for the holidays and there's certain things that are
Speaker 3: quite sensitive, Like it feels kind of like soft belly
Speaker 3: type of yeah, like a soft belly up sensitivity. I
Speaker 3: don't know if that metaphor makes sense, but I might
Speaker 3: say that what I need is to not discuss the
Speaker 3: certain things that I know, like are quite that I'm
Speaker 3: quite protective around, you know, So I have that awareness
Speaker 3: in advance, and if people are bringing it up or
Speaker 3: asking me about that, you know, I'll kind of respond
Speaker 3: with with kindness, but just say like thanks for asking,
Speaker 3: I'm not ready to talk about that or you know today,
Speaker 3: and I don't have the space to talk about that today.
Speaker 3: So I kind of have in advance. I've kind of prepared,
Speaker 3: like what do I need for my own heart and
Speaker 3: soul to have that boundary? And what do I also
Speaker 3: need for my own body? You know? For me personally,
Speaker 3: I can't drink alcohol around the holidays because I am
Speaker 3: a quite emotionally open person and if I have even
Speaker 3: half of a drink around families who then say a
Speaker 3: comment that they mean well, but lands's criticism, I flood
Speaker 3: much more easily. So like I'm also thinking about my
Speaker 3: own body, like what do I need for my own
Speaker 3: body that I can't negotiate? And then outside of that
Speaker 3: is the wants, like what do I want for the holidays?
Speaker 3: Of course, I want to laugh and connect with my
Speaker 3: siblings and with my parents, and I definitely want there
Speaker 3: to be moments of shared vulnerability. Those might happen, they
Speaker 3: might not, you know, so helping differentiate between like our
Speaker 3: wish kind of like our wishless like our wants, our hopes,
Speaker 3: and then our needs, like where are the places that
Speaker 3: I really want to prioritize the boundaries and my energy
Speaker 3: around supporting myself with those boundaries and one of the
Speaker 3: other things that are more about me experiencing the the
Speaker 3: You know, there's moments in the holidays where we have
Speaker 3: that feeling of disappointment because we had high expectations or
Speaker 3: high hopes for what it might look like and it
Speaker 3: maybe it looks a little bit differently, And those are
Speaker 3: kind of the wants, like did I want to have
Speaker 3: this really heart to heart meaningful conversation with so and
Speaker 3: so on Christmas morning?
Speaker 2: Maybe?
Speaker 3: And maybe it didn't happen this year, but maybe it'll
Speaker 3: be another year. So that's yeah, that helps me differentiate
Speaker 3: between what to really put my energy behind.
Speaker 2: I love the idea of having like a wish list
Speaker 2: for your family Christmas or your family holiday. My other
Speaker 2: thing is that I go in with really low expectations,
Speaker 2: really really low expectations. Yeah, and I also make sure
Speaker 2: that I have first say, I know what I don't
Speaker 2: want to talk about with my family, but I'm back home,
Speaker 2: and I actually I know it sounds like it's so simple,
Speaker 2: but I really do say like I'm not talking about
Speaker 2: it this please and thank you, Like I'm not going
Speaker 2: to talk about that with you. There's and if we
Speaker 2: do like I'm gonna leave. Sorry, bye, I'm gonna leave.
Speaker 2: So you can either have my company or you can
Speaker 2: have your answer to this question, which one would you
Speaker 2: like more? And the other thing I do is I
Speaker 2: have like a little bit of an escape. I have
Speaker 2: a huge family, and yeah, huge family. It's a big,
Speaker 2: complicated situation. So I also know that I need like
Speaker 2: my own time and space to get away from it,
Speaker 2: otherwise I will literally explode. We're gonna take a little
Speaker 2: bit of a break, but that I want to talk
Speaker 2: about how we can communicate the ways in which our
Speaker 2: parents or our family have disappointed us in the past.
Speaker 2: After this short break, alrighty, we are back with Gwen.
Speaker 2: So this is a complicated question that I get asked
Speaker 2: a lot. How do you ring up the times in
Speaker 2: which your family has disappointed you in the past or
Speaker 2: hurt you. Is it worth even bringing it up in
Speaker 2: your twenties or should you just not say anything and
Speaker 2: just go on and build your own life and know
Speaker 2: that you can't hear what's been broken in that well? Basically,
Speaker 2: what is the best alternative to navigating a past situation
Speaker 2: that you feel is still holding weight for you where
Speaker 2: you feel you want to say something about it?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's you know, what you're talking about is like
Speaker 3: how to have What I'm hearing in the question is
Speaker 3: how to have a repair conversation. I think that there's
Speaker 3: when people are saying they want to share, there's a hope,
Speaker 3: there's a hope that they'll feel seen and that there
Speaker 3: will be a feeling of accountability or of empathy for
Speaker 3: what you experienced. So whenever there's a repair conversation, the
Speaker 3: first question is, you know kind of like the are
Speaker 3: both sides ready? And I think what's really challenging is
Speaker 3: sometimes you're ready for that conversation, and whether it's a
Speaker 3: parent or a sibling, they might not be ready for
Speaker 3: many reasons. Right. It might not be they might be
Speaker 3: going through something really stressful in their life. There might
Speaker 3: just not be in the right mindset, and so sometimes
Speaker 3: the first question is how can I tolerate my readiness
Speaker 3: while the other person isn't yet ready? And so if
Speaker 3: that's the case, and I rarely think it rarely works
Speaker 3: when when that type of conversation is forced, you know,
Speaker 3: when it's like I need to have it. So we're
Speaker 3: having this conversation when there's that feeling of it's happening.
Speaker 3: Now people come in defensive and that feeling of being seen.
Speaker 2: It's just there.
Speaker 3: There's a lower chance, let's put it that way, there's
Speaker 3: a lower chance happening definitely. So if if the other person, oh,
Speaker 3: did I cut you off?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 3: No, okay, if the other person isn't ready, then the
Speaker 3: question is how can I have this conversation, you know,
Speaker 3: in in therapy or with people who are going to listen.
Speaker 3: For some clients I've done, you know, writing letters, letters
Speaker 3: to themselves, like writing letters to their past selves, different
Speaker 3: like creative expressions that it's not the same thing, but
Speaker 3: it helps them tolerate that difference, that like that waiting
Speaker 3: period of this other person isn't ready yet, and and
Speaker 3: also tolerate the fact that there's no guarantee you know,
Speaker 3: the other person might not ever be ready. There are
Speaker 3: some parents who say, you know, the past is the past.
Speaker 3: I don't want to go back there, right, And so
Speaker 3: that's unfortunately that that that's part of relationships is that
Speaker 3: we we only have control over us naming what we're
Speaker 3: wanting and what we're needing, and we can't always control
Speaker 3: the other person wanting to engage. But if you have
Speaker 3: a sense, you know that they're naming things like I
Speaker 3: want to deepen my relationship with you, or you're feeling
Speaker 3: really distant, like I'm wanting to kind of form our
Speaker 3: adult our adult relationship of a parent child relationship. Then
Speaker 3: starting by just naming, you know, kind of your intention
Speaker 3: for the conversation. A lot of parents are avoid conversations
Speaker 3: like that because there's an anxiety and there's a pain
Speaker 3: around the fact that you can't change the past. So
Speaker 3: if there's a naming of hey mom or hey dad,
Speaker 3: I want to share my experience because I want to
Speaker 3: have an authentic connection with you. I want you to
Speaker 3: know what I went through and I understand that you
Speaker 3: can't change the past. I really kind of I'm just
Speaker 3: hoping to feel seen and feel heard by the person
Speaker 3: that I had this experience with that can kind of
Speaker 3: create a foundation for a deeper empathetic conversation, like maybe
Speaker 3: more success. There also are a lot of people who
Speaker 3: have these conversations in therapy. I'm more and more that
Speaker 3: I'm seeing a couple therapists who are also supporting parent
Speaker 3: child diads. So like holding the space of a two
Speaker 3: persons conversation with adult children, because a lot of adult
Speaker 3: children have stuff they want to talk about, and a
Speaker 3: lot of parents are feeling a little confused and sometimes
Speaker 3: bewildered that they don't understand why this energy is coming
Speaker 3: from their adult child and they want support figuring it out.
Speaker 3: So there are lots of different spaces for these types
Speaker 3: of conversations. But I would say, yeah, like may being
Speaker 3: your intention and then knowing that like your parent might
Speaker 3: be quite surprised, they might be kind of a little
Speaker 3: caught off guard, and it might be multiple iterations of
Speaker 3: this type of conversation. I will share from my personal
Speaker 3: experience that I had conversations like this with my dad
Speaker 3: when I was in my twenties and he was you know,
Speaker 3: he was the breadwinner, he was working a lot. There
Speaker 3: was four kids and a family. So some of the
Speaker 3: things that I wished he had understood was what it
Speaker 3: was like to have a parent who was contributing a
Speaker 3: ton but not physically or very emotionally present, and how
Speaker 3: there was that feeling of loss around that, and every
Speaker 3: time I tried in my twenties to express this it
Speaker 3: came off critical. He was kind of like, WTF, Like,
Speaker 3: I like, you know, I gave you so much. I
Speaker 3: tried my best, like and it never it just created
Speaker 3: more disconnection. And then during the pandemic it's being forced
Speaker 3: to be on zoom, we started having like zoom chats
Speaker 3: where it was finally at the right time and place
Speaker 3: for us to have that conversation, and it was really
Speaker 3: really beautiful, you know. He shared authentically and tearfully about
Speaker 3: what it was like to be on client calls while
Speaker 3: he was hearing me me and my sister be sung
Speaker 3: Happy Birthday and blow out of birthday candles and he
Speaker 3: was being pulled in and had to miss that. And
Speaker 3: I shared authentically about how it really felt like my
Speaker 3: focus was on my mom and I didn't have a
Speaker 3: focus on my dad, and how that lack of connection,
Speaker 3: like I didn't feel connected to him, and that was
Speaker 3: like really weird to just be connecting in my adult
Speaker 3: life with him.
Speaker 1: And.
Speaker 3: We both leaned into it with a lot of honesty
Speaker 3: and authenticity, and it was clumsy, but now I can
Speaker 3: really say like we're building something I knew that I
Speaker 3: never thought would happen. It's quite it just has its
Speaker 3: own beauty and it's a new chapter. So it took
Speaker 3: us a lot of time to get to that. And
Speaker 3: I guess that's what I want to normalize, is that
Speaker 3: sometimes it's both people have to live more life until
Speaker 3: the conversations can happen that go the way you want.
Speaker 2: I really I think that's a really beautiful reminder you
Speaker 2: have to live more life before you can have the
Speaker 2: conversations you want to have. And I really appreciate that
Speaker 2: you said at the beginning, you can't have this conversation,
Speaker 2: this repair conversation, unless both people are ready, and I
Speaker 2: guess also unless you know what you want to get
Speaker 2: out of it, right, because sometimes if you go to
Speaker 2: a parent and you're like, all I want is an apology,
Speaker 2: you might not get that. And so if that's I think,
Speaker 2: going into a repair conversation, you have to want something
Speaker 2: that you'd be ok with them not being able to
Speaker 2: give you. In a way, so you have to be
Speaker 2: okay with them, maybe not apologizing, maybe not being able
Speaker 2: to say, yeah, I totally messed up there, because I
Speaker 2: think maybe ninety percent of the time a parent isn't
Speaker 2: going to say yeah, I messed up, because that's not
Speaker 2: how like human ego works. And for you know, being
Speaker 2: a parent is sometimes the biggest thing that anyone's done
Speaker 2: in their life. I think it's the biggest thing that
Speaker 2: most people do in their life, raising a child, raising
Speaker 2: your family, And so you know, they don't want to
Speaker 2: acknowledge that they were maybe a failure at that thing,
Speaker 2: even though you're sitting across with them saying like this
Speaker 2: hurt me, this was painful. All I want from you
Speaker 2: is to acknowledge it. Giving that up is means giving
Speaker 2: up a sense of accomplishment for them and a sense
Speaker 2: of pride as well. I also think that when you
Speaker 2: talk about both people need to be ready. I think
Speaker 2: about emotionally immature parents for whom that's going to happen,
Speaker 2: like there is never going to be an acknowledgment from them.
Speaker 2: They're probably never going to be ready. I've seen it
Speaker 2: so many times with people who you know parents have
Speaker 2: passed away, and they've never had the conversations. So I
Speaker 2: like that you've offered this alternative. If there is a
Speaker 2: way to give yourself closure, There is a way to
Speaker 2: take everything that you've experienced and not need the acknowledgment
Speaker 2: of the person who's perhaps caused it. You just need
Speaker 2: to acknowledge it yourself and find and find a way
Speaker 2: to you know, make it part of your story, but
Speaker 2: not the defining part. So how do you think that
Speaker 2: we can find closure ourselves if we maybe aren't speaking
Speaker 2: to our families, if we have emotionally immature parents, if
Speaker 2: a parent has passed away and the effects are still there.
Speaker 2: How can we bring about closure when it comes to
Speaker 2: complicated family dynamics for ourselves.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I mean they Yeah, it's such a good question.
Speaker 3: I I'll just to name the with the dynamic of
Speaker 3: emotionally immature parents, I like to think about like there's
Speaker 3: some parents who, as you're saying, like just aren't interested
Speaker 3: in in that level of growth. And there's also some
Speaker 3: parents who want it but are in their own prop
Speaker 3: like it just catching up, like they're playing like way
Speaker 3: catch up, you know, So kind of like differentiating between
Speaker 3: parents who aren't interested in authentic, vulnerable relationships where there's
Speaker 3: a safety to be honesty and the parents who really
Speaker 3: want that but are just kind of like in kindergarten,
Speaker 3: like they're like they're like playing catch up and they're
Speaker 3: you know that it's kind of if you can hold
Speaker 3: that like, Wow, they're they're doing They're doing the emotional
Speaker 3: growth that I started when I was in my twenties,
Speaker 3: but they're starting in their.
Speaker 2: Six seventy, you know.
Speaker 3: So I do believe in the human spirit, when the
Speaker 3: human spirit wants growth, that it can happen at any age.
Speaker 3: But as you said, there are some people who just
Speaker 3: aren't interested in in that shift and that that's their choice, right.
Speaker 3: So to your question, you know, I find that I
Speaker 3: really really believe in the power of healing in relationship,
Speaker 3: and it doesn't always happen in It doesn't always happen
Speaker 3: the healing that you want to happen with maybe your
Speaker 3: parent might end up happening in other relationships, So that
Speaker 3: that kind of broadening the view of you know, when
Speaker 3: I'm thinking about what was the wound, what was the
Speaker 3: dynamic that happened in between you and your parent, and
Speaker 3: what was the underlying wound? Maybe it was your parent,
Speaker 3: you know, telling you how you should think or how
Speaker 3: you should feel, and so listening for that theme as
Speaker 3: it's coming up in other relationships, maybe with a manager
Speaker 3: at work or maybe with you know, a friend or
Speaker 3: an intimate partner. I'm seeing what it's like to sign
Speaker 3: your voice, to name your truth and to navigate, you know,
Speaker 3: that that dynamic with someone where maybe they have a
Speaker 3: little bit more space to to to hear you and
Speaker 3: to see you. So you know, although you know, I
Speaker 3: wouldn't I wouldn't recommend like seeking out, you know, although
Speaker 3: this happens like seeking out a like a parallel relationship
Speaker 3: and you know, kind of enacting like the enacting what
Speaker 3: didn't happen with your parents and enacting it in all
Speaker 3: future romantic relationships. I think when there's a consciousness around it,
Speaker 3: like what are your wounds and when you see those
Speaker 3: things show up with the right people who want to
Speaker 3: be holding that space of really understanding where you're coming from,
Speaker 3: you can have really really healing moments where they offer
Speaker 3: correctional experience. Sometimes that happens in therapy, sometimes that happens
Speaker 3: in other relationships. But I would say knowing, yeah, knowing
Speaker 3: your themes know your wounds, like know what needs didn't
Speaker 3: get met, and listen and notice for one that's showing up.
Speaker 3: I do really believe that there's a way that you
Speaker 3: talked about, like the life cycle of an emotion, there's
Speaker 3: a life cycle of stories that like they make themes
Speaker 3: come back up, and when they come up, we have
Speaker 3: an opportunity to give ourselves the space and the power
Speaker 3: or the compassion or the backbone or the softness that
Speaker 3: we wish we had experienced in the past. There's this
Speaker 3: beautiful phrase that I love, which is wherever you go,
Speaker 3: there you are. And so I think it's the same
Speaker 3: with relationships. You know, whatever happened in past relationships that
Speaker 3: didn't get to be fully resolved, fully metabolized, it's going
Speaker 3: to show up again, and this time you might have
Speaker 3: a little more wisdom, a little more tolerance, and the
Speaker 3: person might have a little bit more space for that
Speaker 3: experience to unfold in a very different way. So yeah,
Speaker 3: I'd say have faith and what it looks like to
Speaker 3: continue to practice authentic, vulnerable relationships for yourself and with others.
Speaker 2: Even if you can't do that with your family, like
Speaker 2: you said, you can do that with friends. You can
Speaker 2: do that with mentors. You can do that with partners, boyfriends, girlfriends.
Speaker 2: One of the big things for me that I think
Speaker 2: is so healing if you can't have those conversations in
Speaker 2: that closure really with family is being able to say, well,
Speaker 2: that's not going to be passed on and that's not
Speaker 2: going to be how their relationships work. No one is
Speaker 2: hopefully going to come to them at sixty and say,
Speaker 2: you know, you cause me this hurt, you cause me
Speaker 2: this pain. There is a lot of closure, I think
Speaker 2: in healing yourself and in breaking the generational chain and
Speaker 2: saying all that work that they were maybe unable to do,
Speaker 2: I have now done it. And so it's kind of
Speaker 2: like cutting off the head of a disease, right if
Speaker 2: perhaps you know whatever it was that has been passed
Speaker 2: down through your lineage, because often the way that your
Speaker 2: parents or your family has interacted with you is the
Speaker 2: way that their families interacted with them. Even if you
Speaker 2: don't have children, right, knowing that your relationships, you know,
Speaker 2: your personal relationships won't have this dynamic. The relationships you
Speaker 2: have with nieces and nephews won't have this dynamic. The
Speaker 2: relationship that you have with your partner won't reflect that
Speaker 2: that maybe your parents had in their marriage. Like that
Speaker 2: is an incredibly healing thing. So I have one more
Speaker 2: question to ask you, and it doesn't even have to
Speaker 2: do with family. It's just something we ask every single guest,
Speaker 2: which is, if you had one piece of advice, a
Speaker 2: bullet point piece of advice for someone in their twenties,
Speaker 2: what would it be like?
Speaker 3: Take it one step at a time, you know what,
Speaker 3: one day at a time. Even with what you were
Speaker 3: naming about not wanting to repeat generational trauma, like, we
Speaker 3: each make one chain, like small changes in the in
Speaker 3: the patterns of the families that we are born into
Speaker 3: and future generations, whether those are relationships or our own
Speaker 3: biological or raised children, future generations are going to make
Speaker 3: little shifts that that we don't have to do it all,
Speaker 3: but we can be proud of what we are doing.
Speaker 3: So yeah, little changes. I like that.
Speaker 2: That's a beautiful piece of advice to end things with. Gwen.
Speaker 2: I want to thank you so much for coming on
Speaker 2: to talk about a pretty deep, meaningful, vulnerable conversation and
Speaker 2: a vulnerable topic. Where can the listeners find you? How
Speaker 2: can they learn more about your work?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, my website is www dot Gwendolynwatson dot com
Speaker 3: and I'm on LinkedIn posting about mental health, parenting, emotions,
Speaker 3: all the stuff that we think doesn't get discussed in
Speaker 3: corporate environments. I'm doing it on LinkedIn, so feel free
Speaker 3: to connect with me there and yeah, continue the conversation.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Everything will be linked in the episode description as always,
Speaker 2: And I just want to thank you guys for listening
Speaker 2: to this episode. If this is something that you're really
Speaker 2: dealing with this holiday period, oh my goodness, you are
Speaker 2: not alone. You are not alone, and there are so
Speaker 2: many amazing resources out there as well that I'll also
Speaker 2: leave in the episode description. Make sure that you are
Speaker 2: following along and that you give the show a five
Speaker 2: star review. Wherever you are listening, you can also continue
Speaker 2: the conversation. If you have thoughts, feelings about this episode,
Speaker 2: you can DM me on Instagram at that Psychology podcast
Speaker 2: And we're taking further episode suggestions, but until next time,
Speaker 2: it stays safe, be kind, be gentle to yourself, and
Speaker 2: we will talk very very soon