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Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families Podcast. It's the podcast for the

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Speaker 1: time poor parent who just once answers now.

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Speaker 2: Hello.

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Speaker 1: This is doctor Justin Colton, the founder of Happy Families

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Speaker 1: dot com dot you, the parenting expert, co host on

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Speaker 1: channel Lines hit TV show Parental Guidance, and the author

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Speaker 1: of the brand new book The Parenting Revolution, which is

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Speaker 1: revolutionizing families around Australia and soon around the world. Release

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Speaker 1: for the US and the UK coming up in the

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Speaker 1: next couple of months. Every Wednesday on the Happy Families Podcast,

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Speaker 1: I have a conversation with somebody doing great things to

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Speaker 1: help families to thrive to be happier. Today is no different.

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Speaker 1: Today I'm having a chat with Brad Morgan. Brad is

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Speaker 1: the director of Emerging Minds. Emerging Minds as a national

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Speaker 1: organization that provides resources for children's mental health. You can

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Speaker 1: find them at Emergingminds dot com. You Brad, first thing

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Speaker 1: I want to start off with in this conversation is

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Speaker 1: mental health. Just generally, I mean, people use this word,

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Speaker 1: this term in all kinds of different ways. You're a

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Speaker 1: resource for parents of all all stripes when it comes

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Speaker 1: to their kids and their mental health. What do you

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Speaker 1: mean by mental health a good point.

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Speaker 2: I think what we mean by mental health is we

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Speaker 2: view mental health those emotional or relational skills and capability

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Speaker 2: that all people have that help them to function in

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Speaker 2: their everyday lives. And quite often know that you raise

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Speaker 2: there that it does get misused a lot to describe

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Speaker 2: quite frequently what we would describe as mental health conditions

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Speaker 2: or mental health disorders, all those sorts of things. So

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Speaker 2: when we talk about mental health, we think about the

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Speaker 2: full spectrum of human emotion and how good and functional

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Speaker 2: it is to have different feelings and they do or

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Speaker 2: play a really important role in everyone's lives. But the kids,

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Speaker 2: they're really important to supporting them as they grow and develop.

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Speaker 1: Great. So, Brad, I think that the work is really important,

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Speaker 1: and it's quite complementary to the work that I do.

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Speaker 1: You touch on a whole lot of things that I

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Speaker 1: tend not to just because our audience lets us know

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Speaker 1: what they need. But there's a whole bunch of stuff

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Speaker 1: that I could delve into, except there are people like

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Speaker 1: you who do it so well. For parents who are

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Speaker 1: listening to this Emerging Minds mental health, I want my

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Speaker 1: children to be resilient and flourishing. Why would they find

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Speaker 1: Emerging minds dot com dot are you useful well.

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Speaker 2: I focus is really on supporting families when they're experiencing

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Speaker 2: obstacles to parenting and perhaps in the way they want to,

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Speaker 2: or are experiencing some big issues that they know maybe

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Speaker 2: having an impact on their children and their every day lives.

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Speaker 2: So we're really there to help families when they might

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Speaker 2: be going through some really long term issues, such as

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Speaker 2: when a parent might be struggling with mental health issues

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Speaker 2: and that tends to keep going for a long time

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Speaker 2: just by the nature of them. When families might be

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Speaker 2: going through some really tricky situations in relationships with each

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Speaker 2: other or between partners, or there might be other issues

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Speaker 2: such as sort of ongoing physical health concerns where you know,

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Speaker 2: we will have to wrap around the parent or the

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Speaker 2: sibling or a child in the family who might be

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Speaker 2: going through some pretty tricky stuff as well. So our

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Speaker 2: work's really on helping families navigate through those tricky situations

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Speaker 2: that really just overwhelm them in a lot of circumstances.

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Speaker 1: So this is the podcast for the time poor parent

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Speaker 1: who just wants answers. Now, let's assume that there's a

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Speaker 1: reasonable portion of families who are listening to this conversation

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Speaker 1: and they are going through some tricky times. Resilience is waning,

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Speaker 1: Times are tough. Maybe it's some financial challenge. I mean,

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Speaker 1: it's getting harder and harder to pull through, especially colder weather.

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Speaker 1: Cost of electricity and heating, food prices are high, Petrol

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Speaker 1: prices are high, cost of living, mortgages, rent through the roof.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it's really it's tough. Many of the families

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Speaker 1: that are struggling, and probably listening to this podcast, they're

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Speaker 1: not just struggling financially, but also, as you said, with

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Speaker 1: mental health challenges or maybe there's some alcohol abuse. I

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Speaker 1: had to chat with a dad just the other day

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Speaker 1: who went overseas to get away from life. His family

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Speaker 1: is not in a good way at all. But he

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Speaker 1: found that while he was overseas his alcohol problems because

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Speaker 1: he didn't have the same structures in place over there

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Speaker 1: that he had right here that could help him. So,

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Speaker 1: when you're talking to families who are going through these

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Speaker 1: challenges financial, drug related, mental health issues, what are the answers,

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Speaker 1: What are the things that they can do? If you

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Speaker 1: were to give me maybe your top three, and obviously

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Speaker 1: every context changes, but what are the most important things

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Speaker 1: that you think families need to be equipped with to

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Speaker 1: get through these times?

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Speaker 2: You know, I think something we really focus on is

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Speaker 2: family developing a dead understanding of what the issue is

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Speaker 2: that they're experiencing and actually having an open way of

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Speaker 2: communicating about that. So, for example, we know, you know,

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Speaker 2: many parents struggle with depression. For example, what that means is,

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Speaker 2: you know, it slightly varies for every person experiences it,

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Speaker 2: but some of the things they might experience it is

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Speaker 2: quite a lot of tiredness, They might add a short

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Speaker 2: few so the anger might be more abrupt at times.

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Speaker 2: And what we really encourage is for families to have

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Speaker 2: some communication about what that means for everyone in the family.

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Speaker 2: So for kids in particular, what do they notice about that?

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Speaker 2: So I've noticed that's not getting out of bed that

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Speaker 2: much these days, or it seems to we really cross

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Speaker 2: every time I do something really small one that wasn't

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Speaker 2: like that in the past. And what you're seeking to

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Speaker 2: do in that space is for parents to feel confident

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Speaker 2: to actually explain to their children what might be going

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Speaker 2: on for them. That there's a language that they have,

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Speaker 2: but we really don't encourage it to be one conversation.

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Speaker 2: That's sort of this idea of how do you help

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Speaker 2: families make meaning of these situations over time, and by

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Speaker 2: creating a space for that to happen, what we find

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Speaker 2: is that it actually helps children children make sense of

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Speaker 2: that because quite often children often blame themselves or feel

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Speaker 2: like they're responsible for causing those issues that others experience

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Speaker 2: in the family, but sometimes also think they're responsible for

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Speaker 2: fixing them, so they might change the way they relate

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Speaker 2: to their parents or other family members if that's an issue.

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Speaker 2: So helping them make sense that making sense together, I

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Speaker 2: guess it's a team is something that's really important in

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Speaker 2: that area as well.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I love that, it's practical, so important. The other

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Speaker 1: thing is, Brad, it's so hard, right, I mean, if

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Speaker 1: you're dealing with depression, you're feeling all the stress and

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Speaker 1: all the horrible stuff. How hard is it to sit

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Speaker 1: down and say to the kids, we've got to get

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Speaker 1: clear on what's actually going on here. And yet that's

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Speaker 1: exactly what's needed. I mean, I love it, and yet

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Speaker 1: I'm struggling with it. But you're so right having the

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Speaker 1: conversation it requires the adults to be the adults.

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Speaker 2: And in circumstances where maybe you can't feel like you're

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Speaker 2: you can have that conversation with kids is knowing things

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Speaker 2: like depression exists for quite some time, and there's periods

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Speaker 2: of wellness where you become a bit better, and then

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Speaker 2: you have periods of quite being unwell again. We really

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Speaker 2: encourage you having conversations some of those key other adults

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Speaker 2: in your children's lives as well and you trust as well,

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Speaker 2: but to help them actually shape up the story for

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Speaker 2: children as well. So it might be you know, a

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Speaker 2: grand parent or a partner, or it might be an

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Speaker 2: auntie that you go Actually when this is happening, I

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Speaker 2: do find it hard to talk to my kids about this.

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Speaker 2: But here's some things that would be messages that would

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Speaker 2: be great for you to share with our children if

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Speaker 2: you come in contact with them, just to help them

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Speaker 2: make sense so they're not feeling like they're responsible for

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Speaker 2: this as well.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a powerful idea, creating the village, bringing in

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Speaker 1: those additional adult resources that are potentially going to hold

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Speaker 1: the thought together while part of it is crumbling underneath.

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Speaker 2: And I guess the other bit we really encourage within

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Speaker 2: families is actually to recognize the strength that they do have.

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Speaker 2: I think quite often there's a lot of stigma and

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Speaker 2: shame that sits in families when they're experiencing these challenges,

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Speaker 2: and that in itself can actually be a barrier to

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Speaker 2: communicating about that and navigating that together. So hence that

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Speaker 2: open communication is something that's really important. But the other

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Speaker 2: thing that communication can help is it provides permission to

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Speaker 2: navigate and problem solve together. So it's not just talking

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Speaker 2: about what the problem is, but it's also actually having

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Speaker 2: a way to connect and go, oh, well, we can't

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Speaker 2: get that done today. How else are we going to

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Speaker 2: get that done? And it might not be the parent

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Speaker 2: that's done well, that's navigating that. It might be the

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Speaker 2: other soundly members, But it just helped to create a

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Speaker 2: gets the space and navigating and problem solving. And as

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Speaker 2: I said, humans are very relational in the way we

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Speaker 2: navigate our situations, and those skills and feelings that we

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Speaker 2: have can help us navigate some of these pretty tricky situations.

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Speaker 1: Really appreciate the practical advice that you're sharing. Brad Morgan

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Speaker 1: is the director of Merging Minds. You can find them

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Speaker 1: at mergingminds dot com dot au. Right now, having a

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Speaker 1: look at the website, Practical strategies for childhood bullying and

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Speaker 1: helping your kids through that, how to engage the well

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Speaker 1: being of the whole child. There's also a couple of

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Speaker 1: things that caught my mind that I thought were really

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Speaker 1: valuable here in terms of guiding principles for child mental health,

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Speaker 1: the importance of cultural and spiritual identity, trauma informed ideas

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Speaker 1: to help prevention and early intervention, really understanding relationships, strengths, vulnerabilities, resilience.

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Speaker 1: There's resources for practitioners, there's resources for families, there's resources,

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Speaker 1: resources for researchers, and even organizations really really great to

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Speaker 1: talk to you about this. And Brad, like I said,

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Speaker 1: I wanted you to be here on the Happy Families

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Speaker 1: podcast because you've got resources that we at Happy Families

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Speaker 1: just haven't had the capacity to develop and create, and

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Speaker 1: you're doing great things. I've actually just clicked on a

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Speaker 1: one more page here, the Family's page itself, and I

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Speaker 1: love what you've got here. A resources for parents with

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Speaker 1: mental illness, resources for families going through natural disasters, anxiety,

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Speaker 1: supporting your babies well being. I mean, this stuff is

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Speaker 1: it's the everyday things that parents struggle with when resilience

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Speaker 1: is at stake, so really appreciate the conversation. Is there

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Speaker 1: anything that you want parents to know about that we

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Speaker 1: haven't covered off as we've chatted about Emerging Minds dot

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Speaker 1: com dot AU and the resources that you have for

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Speaker 1: children's mental health, I.

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Speaker 2: Think just to highlight all those different topics you said there,

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Speaker 2: and our real goal is we've really learned from families

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Speaker 2: going through some pretty tricky stuff alongside the professional really

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Speaker 2: how they navigate through these really tricky times and the

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Speaker 2: resources that they're really voice of parents in many circumstances

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Speaker 2: actually helping those that have been there, how they've navigated

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Speaker 2: and what they've learned through that that they like to

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Speaker 2: share with other families. So yes, definitely have a look

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Speaker 2: at those resources and see what might be useful for

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Speaker 2: your family, and to say there's always more coming because

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Speaker 2: there's always new things and new challenges that families are facing.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Emerging Minds dot com dot you. Brad Morgan is

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Speaker 1: the director of Emerging Minds. Thanks for joining me on

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Speaker 1: the Happy.

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Speaker 2: Family Podcast, No Worries, Thank you for having me.

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Speaker 1: The Happy Families podcast is produced by Justin Ruland from

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Speaker 1: Bridge Media. Craig Bruce is our executive producer, and more

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Speaker 1: information about making your family stronger, happier, more resilient. Obviously,

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Speaker 1: there's all the resources at Happy Families dot com dot you,

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Speaker 1: but it's definitely worth having a look at the great

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Speaker 1: work that is happening at Emerging Minds dot com dot

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Speaker 1: au as well