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Join me, Jess VanderWier, a registered psychotherapist, mom of three, and founder of Nurtured First, along with my husband Scott, as we dive deep into the stories of our friends, favourite celebrities, and influential figures.
In each episode, we skip the small talk and dive into vulnerable and honest conversations about topics like cycle breaking, trauma, race, mental health, parenting, sex, religion, postpartum, healing, and loss.
We are glad you are here.
PS: The name Robot Unicorn comes from our daughter. When we asked her what we should name the podcast, she confidently came up with this name because she loves robots, and she loves unicorns, so why not? There was something about the playfulness of the name, the confidence in her voice, and the fact that it represents that you can love two things at once that just felt right.
Welcome to Robot Unicorn, hosted by my parents, Jess and Scott.
I hope you enjoyed the episode.
Hi everyone, welcome back to Robot Unicorn.
Today we are joined with my friend and second time on this podcast.
The incredible couples therapist, Dr.
Tracy.
Dr.
Tracy, thank you so much for being back.
We're so happy to have you
Thank you so much, Jess.
I absolutely loved our last conversation together and I heard from so many of those in your community how much that
conversation resonated.
So it's just a joy and a privilege to get to sit and chat with you, my friend.
Yes, it's always great to chat whether on or off the air.
But I know our last conversation, which was about
Relationships postpartum just resonated so well with our audience.
I still get messages about our last conversation, by the way.
was so impactful and I know that today's conversation, which is going to be about setting boundaries with your in-laws, which is just it's a niche topic, but it is one that impacts
All of us, I think, if you have a partner relationship, whether you have a great relationship with your in-laws or whether it's strained, we all have to navigate this dynamic of this family that we've married into.
But before we get into that topic, I'm wondering if you can just introduce yourself.
Who are you and what is the core problem that you're obsessed with talking about right now?
I love that question.
I'm a psychologist and couples therapist and I always say to people, that's what you see on the front side of me.
You also see my social media space, my online communities, and behind the scenes, I'm someone who owns
the mental health clinic here in Ottawa Integrated Wellness.
I own that with my husband.
We're in business together.
We know what it means to talk about boundaries, not just with family members, but also within ourselves around managing
business partnership together.
I'm also a mom to two kids who are eight and ten now, which is I don't know how we reached ten already when I started
the social media space, right?
And then also just trying to navigate what it means to be a mother and a woman with her own identity.
So that's
who I am and the conversation that really lights me up right now, Jess, is opening the door to what so many women and mothers expect
experience when it comes to dealing with extended family members.
And I think this conversation is so timely and so important right now because here we are as a generation of mothers and parents doing something different than previous generations.
And anytime we know more information, we crave for different things, it can create tension with other generations.
And so I'm seeing more of that tension show up, not just between daughter-in-law and mother-in-law, but also how that then translates into a relationship because as a couple, the goal is for you to be on the same page.
So really what's
sparks me right now is having this conversation and helping couples feel solid in their partnership so then they can navigate those boundaries with family.
Absolutely.
Yes, I love that.
Nothing happens in isolation, right?
It's not just the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law not getting along, but it's the impact that it has on your relationship.
And when you have that solid foundation, you're able to have those conversations.
Would you say that you've seen a shift in the couples that you've worked with over the years where this is becoming more of an issue, or has this always been a challenge that you've seen?
Tell me a little bit about the motivation and the reason for writing your brand new book, which we'll talk about later.
Now Yeah, it's interesting.
Uh for almost 20 years I have seen this issue show up in my therapy room
And so the common issues couples struggle with are parenting, intimacy, and navigating your in-laws and finances
And that has been continuous throughout my career.
But what's different about the conversation now is that we know differently and we want differently.
And so thinking 20 years ago
Women didn't necessarily have the label of mental load or invisible labor as a front and center conversation that they're having with their partner.
They didn't talk about kinkeeping, meaning that they're the ones managing their partner's family on top of managing their own family.
Another term that's recently been researched is man keeping.
So this idea that you're navigating your partner's friendships and social connections.
And so really in the last ten years, these conversations have come forward and a lot of people are showing up in my office saying, I don't just want my mother-in-law to come over and fill my fridge with the pasta dishes that she's making.
And I don't want these comments anymore telling me that I shouldn't be parenting in this way.
And so I think a lot of women right now are feeling overwhelmed.
and tired and they want to be seen and they're not.
And that's where then this conflict shows up because they go to their partners and not all the time, but many of the couples I work with, they're not on the same
Page.
They don't know how to do this together.
And so they'll say to their husband, you know, hey, your mom showed up unannounced.
She came in.
She wanted to see the kids.
This doesn't feel good.
And can we set this boundary?
And then oftentimes partners will dismiss it or deny it and say something like, well, mom has good intentions.
It's not a big deal.
It's just five minutes.
And that's where they're really struggling.
Can you tell me a little bit about the experience of the male partner in this situation?
Like I can hear so many of my friends and what you're saying about the female
version, right?
How many conversations have I had with friends where they're talking about their mother-in-law?
Exactly that, dropping by a pasta dish, or you know what, she's bringing my kids these grandiose presents that I don't want in my house.
And
it's so important to her to get my children these giant presents.
I don't have space for them at Christmas time.
But what I notice when I'm having these conversations with my friends is that there's just this level of defensiveness and protection that
their husbands often have or their partners often have over their mother.
And it almost feels like when my friends say something to their partner, their male partner.
it's almost like a diss or it threatens this relationship with his mom.
Can you tell me a little bit about how you've seen that play out?
Yeah, let's speak from the male experience.
I think
That anytime we comment on someone's family member, what we naturally do is we get defensive to protect them.
And I think we even talked about that in the last conversation we had, but just how natural that is to get defensive and to say, well, that's my mom.
So we're protecting our families.
We're protecting our memories.
We're protecting our childhood.
And a lot of people will come in and say, I had a good childhood.
And it's hard for them to acknowledge that there was emotional neglect or there was these unhealthy family dynamics that were playing out in the family.
And it's really tricky because here's a partner, here's a man, and his wife is coming into the family.
She's an outsider.
She sees the pattern that he is desensitized to
And so then a common scenario is she goes to him and she's like, oh, your mom's guilt tripping us.
It's not to say, your mom's a bad person.
How dare she?
Let's cut her out.
It's not even that.
It's just this
Oh, I think your mom's using this guilt.
And I often hear men say, No, that's not what she's doing.
This is just always what mom does.
And it's this it's this coping mechanism that I see for so many men, which is
we avoid, we don't enter into conflict, or we create distance from families.
And so before coming into this union, into this marriage,
What did he do beforehand?
We know that more men tend to be avoidant.
They push their emotions down.
I think we're changing this in terms of our children that we're raising today.
But for many men, they have learned to push the feelings down
They create distance.
And so maybe they weren't responding to mom's texts.
But now that he has a partner, and I often see couples in my therapy room around after the wedding or after a baby joins the family.
Because now suddenly his mom has expectations and she wants to come over.
She wants to be part of their life.
And that he in old ways would just ignore what she did
But that doesn't work for the union.
That doesn't work for the couple.
And I think what's really tricky is that a man will stand in his position and he looks one way to his mom.
And there's all of these legacy patterns, you know, maybe there's this codependency, maybe there's parentification, maybe there's a pattern of rigidity from um his mom that says, We always do Christmas on this day.
Thanksgiving always happens on this day, so you have to be here on Thursday.
So he looks one way and he wants to keep his mom happy.
Of course, we even as adult children get stuck into that old pattern of wanting our parents to still be connected with us and be happy with us.
And then he looks the other way and he sees his wife and sees that she's upset.
And oftentimes for many men, it's easier to turn to your wife
and to argue with her than to set boundaries with mom.
And that's really an interesting dilemma because then it breaks the connection between him and his wife.
And why do you think it's easier to argue with wife than to argue with mom?
Likely there's more felt security.
There's more connection is one possible reason.
It could also be that with mom, they've tried before and they feel dismissed or not seen, or they say, well, that's just mom, she's not going to change.
So it's kind of like we'll just push that to the side, out of sight, out of mind, we don't have to deal with it.
And so I do think then that it just becomes this more familiar pathway to argue with your partner than to have to take a new approach of setting boundaries.
And Jess, I say this to every single person I work with.
Our job here is not to abandon your families of origin.
And that is not what this book does.
This book is about bringing families together in a way that works for you so you're not growing resentful.
So you don't have those
thousand paper cuts that you go to the point of estrangement and cutting them off.
But we have to recognize that now as a couple, you have chosen your partner and now it's time to prioritize the feelings and the needs in your home
come to an agreement to create something that works best for both of you and then communicate that in a healthy, kind, respectful way with your family.
I love it.
And I think what you just said is so important because we actually have a lot of grandparents who listen to this podcast, which I love.
Shout out to all of our grandparents.
We actually have a lot of grandparents and I get messages from them all the time.
And so
I'm imagining the grandma who's listening to this, who is the mother-in-law, right?
Who's hearing you talk and being like, what?
Wait, I can't just say what I want Christmas
But what you just said is so important.
What you're working on here is not estrangement, is not let's not have your mother-in-law in your life.
is let's create this beautiful family dynamic where we all feel heard and seen and like our needs are communicated well so we can nurture this family and still have a relationship.
What would you say to the mother-in-law who's listening who clicked on this episode and
is struggling with this um letting her son go and I still want to be involved, but how do I be involved?
What do you say to her?
Do you do you speak to her in your book at all or would you suggest she read it
I absolutely suggest you grab this resource so you know how you can support your adult son and his marriage and how you can be part of their family.
I also have a section because this is one of my top questions that I get is how do I be that
Good mother in law.
How do I remain connected?
And so there's a section in the book that is gonna walk you through how to do this.
And
First, I just want to acknowledge the grandparents, grandmother who has clicked and listened.
You are already doing this work and open to this conversation.
So thank you for doing this
And I also want to just sit beside you.
And it kind of chokes me up a little bit, Jess.
I wasn't expecting this.
I am a mother to a son.
I know what it means.
to be his first hug and his first love in a way, right?
In in the sense that at this age right now, at this 10-year-old age
there's this beautiful bond where he comes in and he hugs me and wants to be close.
And then at other times he says, Hey mom, I know we're supposed to watch movies tonight, but my friend's at the park, can I go do that with him?
And I say, I totally get that.
I know how important your friends are.
let's plan for another time.
And I think it's so important for mothers to hear that we don't own our children and that we are constantly creating this sense of separation and individuation and autonomy.
And there's this balance here.
There's a balance of saying, I'm gonna turn you towards your life.
I'm gonna turn you towards your wife and towards your kids
because that's where you have to focus.
And I'm gonna also make sure we have these conversations around expectations and desires.
And to not wait on the sideline and have my feelings not addressed in some way.
Because I hear a lot of people
step back and then get resentful.
Well, why am I not invited?
Well sometimes you do have to kind of knock on your son's text messaging and call them and say, hey
I would love to be part of this right now.
Or can we carve out some special time together?
And so I think there's this balance here of recognizing that
We need our own identities as mothers.
We need to go and do the things that are gonna fill us up.
And we never stop being their mother.
And so having this united family and their strong relationship
means I'm going to first bring forward hard conversations.
I'm gonna also look at myself and say
How did I show up at that time?
What would it have been like for someone else to receive me that way?
And I say that wholeheartedly in the sense of I hear from so many new mothers.
who say, my mother or my mother-in-law came over and I felt like I didn't even exist.
That all the attention went to baby.
They sat on the couch, held baby, took pictures of them and the baby.
And I'm sitting over there or I was expected to serve and clean and cook.
And I felt invisible and nobody asked me how I was doing
And if that happened to be maybe a moment that you experienced, you can go back and take accountability and ownership for that to repair.
And at the same time, going to
your son and your daughter-in-law and saying, I want a relationship with you.
This is not just about the kids.
I want to know you too.
because they need to be seen.
They need to know they matter.
And there's just there really can be this beautiful relationship that you develop with your family.
Oh, I love it.
I also was getting choked up when you were saying that.
And maybe, Tracy, this is because our kids are getting older.
And uh when Tracy and I met, all of our children were very little.
They were still toddlers and preschoolers and now look at us.
They're
ten.
But I find the older my children get and the more of these conversations I have with these grandparents, just from my lens as someone who studies child development and attachment.
I see what we call in the child development world this like frantic pursuit happening from the grandparent to the adult child
And I think it makes sense.
Like your entire life has been about nurturing your child and the relationship that you have and them needing you to take care of them.
And then they become an adult and they
have someone else that they are married to and they're starting their own life.
They have their own children to take care of.
And I think for the grandparents it becomes this, well, I still need them to need me.
This is how I've always loved them, right?
And it becomes almost
Frantic to a point where their state of alarm in their body is so high that they're like, no, you have to come to Christmas on this day.
They swing into rigidity rather than flexibility.
Yeah, they swing into rigidity because they're like
If I can guilt trip you, if I can have these rules in place, if I can make all this happen, then I won't lose you.
And I think what grandparents need to know, and I hope they take away from this part of our conversation is
Just because you're flexible on these roles that you always have had, it doesn't mean you're gonna lose your child.
And there's still a place for you.
Gordon Newfeld talks about this in my favorite way, which is as adult children, we still need someone to take care of us, right?
So
He has this waterfall metaphor, which I just love, which is like, in order to take care of our children, we need to be taken care of by someone else.
And so
potentially the grandparent role is tak still taken care of but just in a different way.
I just think that is so important and I really hope that
people come to this part in this conversation because even though you see your adult child separating from you, and I'm using separating in the psychological way that we understand that, the autonomy, the independence
All adult children still need to be seen and they still need to know that they matter.
And I often talk about how emotions and needs don't flow upward.
We don't ask our children to look after our needs
And so our parents should not be asking us to look after their needs.
That doesn't mean you don't get to share that you're upset that we're not having Christmas on the day.
And our adult child is not responsible.
for you with those feelings.
And here's something so important is that when you are in continuous contact with your adult child and you see them, you take interest in their life
You create a healthy relationship.
Your relationship is not hinged on one holiday event, and it's not precarious when they can't make it.
But instead you have a relationship that is supported in all of these other really beautiful different ways.
So then a grandparent can say, I understand that you want to create your own Christmas traditions now.
And so let's make another time.
that we can get together and do this in this way.
And I can't wait to be part of that.
Yes.
And it's gonna feel uncomfortable and clunky.
Yeah.
first I think for everyone in the family is as the adult children attempt to find out their own boundaries.
But eventually new norms do exist and there is beauty in finding new ways to support your adult child.
So
I know grandparents aren't maybe our number one audience here, but I was really hoping to talk about that for the grandparents who do listen and even for
the adult children who listen who are wondering how can this even look, right?
And for the people being like, well I still want my mom to take care of me.
Of course you do.
We all want.
to be taken care of.
And I just want to really, really briefly touch on this.
There are times when there is estrangement or there is this
relationship and it just it does become so toxic that they can't stay in your life.
I'm not sure if you touch on that at all in the book.
Maybe we want to just talk to that person who's listening.
And I know that's been our experience with one parent in in Scott and I's family and that is so difficult too.
And I always say to people, like, no adult child would ever choose to want to be estranged to their their parent.
It's the worst thing.
It's so so difficult.
So if we can just touch on that really briefly and then we can get back to to the other conversation.
There's this element in here where and I use this analogy in the book
that it can feel like death by a thousand paper cuts.
That there are often not a continuous experience of big moments.
Sometimes there are, but oftentimes these small micro moments and they become so painful that oftentimes it's
It's the analogy of the straw that broke the camel's back, that the adult child gets to that place of estrangement.
And what is really tricky
I'll touch on two pieces.
One is around others' understanding of it, and the other is around morality.
I'll start with the morality piece.
A lot of people have been stuck in that
what's the right thing to do?
And the morally right thing is you stay in contact with family because they're blood, they're family.
And I think as a generation right now, we're saying, well hang on, we're connected with so many people in so many different ways, which is a positive thing.
Social media has allowed that connection.
Social media has also created more conflict in the sense of family members posting online and not thinking of what the other person's needs and wishes are
So then when someone gets to this point of estrangement, they are stuck in this position of what's the right thing to do.
And I think now we're coming to a place, and I talk about this in the book, we really want to be living out our values and what matters to us.
And if we are feeling such significant impact on our overall wellness, increased stress, increased physical illness, mental difficulties.
Anxiety, depression, stress, every time we deal with a family member, how much longer do we keep doing that?
Especially
When you as a parent need to be well to be caring for your young children, they need you.
And so there's this generation right now where we're saying, I don't think I can keep being in this abusive relationship.
And then there's this other piece where family members will often come in and say, Well, how could you do that?
Because they see one small experience.
Or because they are hearing a different story, either one side of the story, or that story has been changed through people
And that's really painful.
So for people who get to this place of saying, I'm going to go no contact or even low contact.
I think I always want to come into this place of validating that you didn't come to this decision overnight and only you know the truth in your relationship and what you have tried repeatedly and that you're allowed to choose yourself
And your chosen family.
Yes, absolutely.
I love the permission there too.
And I think if people are in that, they know exactly what you're talking about.
Right, where you've tried for so long, you've set all the boundaries that you can set, and still you're getting ill, you can't take care of your kids, it's so all-consuming.
This is different than okay, we need to talk
to grandma because she's giving our child too big of Christmas presents and and I need to set a boundary on that, right?
Adding to this conversation, one of the things I talk about in the book are my six
types of mothers-in-law.
It's not a diagnosis label.
It is instead to understand how you can best communicate boundaries with the person that you're dealing with.
So understanding their behavior.
But then the other piece I talk about is three different daughter-in-law styles.
And when we think about how we show up to families, we all bring in expectations and coping mechanisms.
We all have our own baggage that's going to show up.
And so it's interesting then when you think of some people who mother in law shows up at the door and says baby should have socks on.
For some people that can roll off.
For others, they have an expectation of how a mother-in-law should show up.
And I was also thinking about this in terms of how we experience somebody else.
So for example, I think of one of the women I worked with
where her mother in law would show up and ask questions about her life and be interested in her, but because of her early experiences of an intrusive parent who wouldn't give her that autonomy, who wouldn't give her space, or any time she said, I don't wanna talk about it
her parents would get angry and yell at her and call her names.
It felt intrusive to have a parent figure come in asking those questions.
And that was one of the pieces here where we don't just look outward hoping others are going to change because we can't change them
But this work and this tricky dynamic, this triangle that you're in, also requires us to go inward and to ask ourselves
Can I give this person a positive interpretation?
What would that look like?
How am I showing up with my expectations?
What is the intention that this person is coming here?
with and how does that match with what my boundaries and needs are.
So this is all part of that work that we need to be doing here.
Oh I love that.
Can you tell us what the three types of daughter in laws are?
So if we're listening, we can try and identify who we might be.
Yes.
So one of the common ones that show up is the good girl daughter-in-law.
And I also just want to normalize this because we show up in relationships
Naturally, as women, wanting to please, wanting to be brought into a family.
And so when you're asked to come to that extra family event early on, you're probably going to say yes
And I intentionally just called these styles because I wanted them to feel more fluid, that depending on what's going on in your life, you can transition and change throughout.
So then we also have the second type, which is the manager.
And managers, we need our managers.
They are our perfectionists.
They appreciate control and schedule.
And they know how things are gonna go.
And when you bring in other family members and systems, that can sometimes create tension and bumping heads
And then the third style is more of that collaborator, the one who can kind of balance both.
She doesn't lose herself, but she still also really has to work on making sure she communicates what she wants and needs so she doesn't get lost in the fold
And one of the real motivators for this book was because I kept seeing this binary experience for women.
They were either the victim.
So everything was happening to them.
They were pleasing, they were losing themselves, abandoning themselves, or they were the villain.
They were the ones who were holding boundaries, but then made to be the scapegoat.
told they were the problem, people would say we never had these problems in our family before you joined.
Yes.
Yeah.
And really this book is about you, and I love this expression, is you becoming the main character
Having that main character energy, getting a seat at the table, and really finding your sense of agency in this tricky dynamic.
I love it.
Giving yourself a voice again and
I think one of the things that you have said before, this may have been in your previous book, you can correct me, but you don't just marry your partner, you marry their family.
And I think that this is so true, right?
You we marry into a family and then yeah, you can you can get into one of those styles where you feel like you don't have a voice.
Can you talk a little bit about the experience of marrying into a family and and what you mean by that?
Yeah, and when you said when you're reflecting it back to me, I was thinking about how much deeper that expression actually is because
You marry your partner and all of their wounds that they bring into the relationship and they become your mirror.
They're reflecting back to you the stuff that you are trying to work out.
And oof, that is a layer of work.
And then on top of it, you're marrying into this family system that existed long before you joined the family.
And everything that happens in that system is for a good reason.
They have established their patterns.
And it's interesting because they're going to be part of your life.
And most people want that
And you have to then figure out how does it look now to create our own system and to separate from that system.
Again, not to exclude them, but to not repeat those old patterns.
And so one of those systems I think about, I label ten unhealthy dynamics that show up in families in the book.
One of the common ones I talk about is this pattern of denial.
And so perhaps you go to your mother-in-law and you say
You know, listen, when baby was born and you showed up, I felt like I didn't even exist and all the attention went to baby.
And your mother-in-law says, that didn't happen that way.
That's not how it was.
And I also say your in-laws are products of their own patterns, our own family, they're products of their own patterns.
And so they are breaking some cycles and they're repeating some of them.
And so then
Your mother-in-law comes in and she does this thing, she denies what your experience is.
That's one of those unhealthy patterns.
And then you go to your partner.
from that system and you say, This is really hard.
I want to have this autonomy and I want to have these boundaries.
And when your mother came over and questioned why I'm working so much and how I could possibly care for my family if I'm working so much, and then your husband says
Don't be ridiculous.
That's not what she meant.
And so then there's this repetition of that denial.
And as we touched on earlier, what's tricky about this is that your partner then has to
lower his defenses, get curious with you about your experience.
And even if he didn't experience it that way
He still needs to validate what it was like to be you in that moment.
Yeah, isn't it so fascinating?
So much of the tools that we teach for supporting our children.
Boundaries getting curious are the same things that we have to do to maintain all relationships in our life.
Hey friends, so at pickup last week our daughter asked Scott a truly kind of tricky question in front of her younger siblings.
Scott was telling me that when he heard a question like this, he used to panic, but this time he had a plan.
And he said to our daughter, thank you for asking.
Let's talk tonight when we've got privacy.
And that's a line that he learned straight from our new body safety and consent course at Nurtur First.
So this new body safety and consent course is taught by me.
So Jess, if you listen to this podcast, you know me.
I'm a child therapist and a mom of three, and I have taught body safety and consent education for years.
This course takes all my years of experience teaching this education and gives you calm, age-appropriate language for body parts, consent, and boundaries.
You'll learn how to teach your kids that no means no, you'll learn how to teach them to read facial cues, you'll talk about safe and unspeakable.
safe touch and you'll even teach them about their uh oh feeling.
There's guidance inside this course for the real life stuff like tickling that goes too far and even the difference between a secret and a surprise.
We made this course at Nurture First because research shows that body safety education helps kids speak
up sooner and we want that for our family, for Scott and I, but also for you.
So check the course out at nurturefirst.
com/slash body safety and to save 10% use the code
robot unicorn.
And just full disclosure here, we are the creators of this course and we're so proud of it.
As we've been talking and something that's a big theme is setting boundaries, right?
And and setting boundaries to make our family work.
our our like immediate family structure and in general.
But Scott and I were talking about this as we were prepping for this interview.
We were like
Boundaries, boundaries, boundaries.
Everybody's talking about boundaries right now.
I'm sure you see this as well on social media.
It's the talk
Personally, I feel like most people are a lot of people are talking about boundaries and it's not actually a boundary what they're talking about.
Uh so I'm wondering for the listener if I can get you, Dr.
Tracy, the expert.
to please define what a boundary is so that we can talk about how we set those with our family because I think we need a clear definition
And this is all in step four of my Vault method.
So I have a five-step method in my book that's going to support you, regardless of what family member you're working with.
A boundary is what you are or are not willing to do
And it's all about you and nothing about the other person.
And so what happens for so many of my clients is they come in and they say
She didn't respect my boundary.
And when we break it open, it's actually a request.
They're making requests of the other people.
Don't show up unannounced.
Don't comment on our parenting.
Please don't ask us.
Right?
And they wrap it up really well.
They do the nice language.
It's kind.
It's compassionate.
We're really struggling in parenthood right now.
We're trying our best to learn this complex way of parenting that is so different from ourselves.
So please don't ask us about our parenting styles right now.
And then that's a request because you are asking someone else to do something differently.
When instead the true boundary is what am I going to do?
When you bring up parenting, it's my decision whether I want to talk about this or not.
And so then we see the styles of boundary settings.
So people who are more porous in their boundaries will answer the question
we'll get into that argument, we'll then feel resentful over time.
They say yes when they mean no.
And then they swing over to the rigidity in boundaries.
And the rigid boundaries that are
has no flexibility, doesn't consider who they're speaking with.
It's always like, nope, I'm not talking about that.
Or nap time is 10 a.
m.
, not 10.
02, or it's two stories only at bedtime
Don't pick up the third bug, right?
I'm just thinking of some silly examples that I really clutched on to.
So then we think of the healthy boundary setter.
And the healthy boundaries include considering
who you're setting the boundary with.
And it asks you yourself, what kind of relationship do I want with this person?
What do I know about this person?
And how can they respond to what I'm going to share with them?
We don't over explain our boundaries.
We don't feel we owe the research and rationale to the other person.
We don't doubt ourselves.
We might still feel guilt because guilt shows up when our values are in conflict, but we trust ourselves that this is what we need to do.
And so then when that parent comes and says, Why are you sleeping this way?
Why are you doing this?
Instead of saying, Well, the research
And here's what people.
And then I follow this great account.
And you should follow nurtured first too because she's really right right like so here's other things.
Here I'll pull it up and I'll show you.
But instead that boundary sounds like
I know how much you love being grandma, and this is a conversation that I don't really want to talk about because it still feels so hard for myself
Hey, have you been following any of the football this season or for us Canadians the hockey?
Right.
So then you're saying what you are willing and not willing to talk about
And it the same goes around the holiday table when the topic of body image or bodies come up or politics, what will you do in that moment?
Are you going to put down your fork and knife in a really angry, frustrated way and saying, why are you always talking about these things?
I told you before.
Or do you do a bit of that self-boundary work, which says
Actually I'm gonna go to the table to the bathroom right now.
I'm gonna splash cold water on my face.
I'm gonna vent to my group text because I know they'll be on the other end and say, I can't believe my mother-in-law is talking about
finishing the plate before having dessert and that's not how we do it and and then I go back to the table and that's how I look after myself.
So boundaries are about ourselves and how we show up in relationships
Yes, I think that's such an important clarification because there's so much boundary conversation and I'm hearing this from my clients as well.
Like
Well, I read a post on setting a boundary and so I told my mother-in-law, X, Y, and Z, she's not allowed to do it, but she keeps doing it, and now I'm mad because she doesn't respect my boundaries.
When it's like, well, if we pull back, a boundary is something that we are able to do.
And so it's exactly what you said.
Like I'm not gonna have that conversation.
I don't want to talk about
politics at dinner.
I'm gonna change the subject.
And if it keeps coming up, I might just walk away and go to the bathroom and and leave or, you know, go outside for a walk because that's not a conversation I'm willing to partake in.
And
that doesn't mean that they're not gonna still try.
And so it's something that we need to feel confident about internally.
And you mentioned the holidays when this episode airs, the holidays are coming right up.
Can we talk a little bit about boundaries around the holidays?
I know a lot of parents are anxious with the holiday season coming up.
They're gonna see their families.
Your work is gonna be incredibly important.
It's the perfect time to read your book and to listen to this episode.
How do you suggest a couple enter into this season, especially if they know that there's always these things that come up, always these things that are pushed or ways that they feel uncomfortable?
How can they set up the holiday season for success?
I remind couples that families are consistent and predictable.
And so if there's been a comment about parenting choices or if there's been something where you felt criticized about in the past or a family member acts in a certain way
you can prepare yourself for that.
It's likely going to happen again.
And the reason you likely struggle so much with it is because you feel frustrated it happens again, hoping that they would change in some way.
And so I think where this piece is, and I walk people through in this book, but you and your partner need to have a conversation ahead of time.
And it's not a how do we go to the extreme?
It's more about how are we on the same page here?
What's the thing that doesn't feel good for us and how are we going to do that together?
Who's going to say it?
Will it be you or me?
Or if we're accepting who this family member is, do we not say anything and then we make a plan for how we address it with our children after
So we take time ahead of family events to do this planning.
It doesn't need to be a long conversation.
It's just 10 minutes.
During the event, you have a way of nurturing each other.
I had one couple where she would send a text to him and he was just right on it.
And it was just so fantastic the way he showed up.
Didn't question her, didn't deny her experience, just showed right up, said, Okay, yeah, here mum, pass me baby, and away they went.
Okay.
And then after, after the event, take time to talk about what you did well together.
And that's really about you and your partner coming back on the same page.
And maybe even talking about what should we do next time?
Or can we even recognize that we got through this hard moment
together and did it differently and just really being on the same page.
And again, we're not going into that conversation venting saying, oh my gosh, your mom is, you know, I can't believe she did this again and she's crazy.
It's more of a, what was that like for you?
Here's what it was like for me and here's what we did really well.
I love it.
I love the debrief.
I think that's so important and we often forget.
Especially in the busyness of parenting, we forget to process what has just happened.
I love to kind of go over a sp
a scenario and just imagine how, okay, how does this actually play out?
So but I'll give you a scenario and then maybe we can walk through what this could look like in real life.
So I'm picturing a family I know the family of origin on the husband side of the family has very different political views than the couple themselves.
And so every time they they go and they get together with their family, it has ended up either being this big argument about politics
Or it's just this resentment inside.
The family, there's a lot of love there, but the couple just doesn't know how do how do we enter into this
time and we stay with them for a week, how can we do that without arguing the entire time?
So they want to have a conversation ahead of time to kind of think about how can we set boundaries, what is this going to look like for us
How do you imagine their conversation ahead of time going?
There needs to be this element not just saying, why are we doing this?
What's it rooted in?
But also what is the important pieces for our time together?
So let's highlight what that is.
Is it that we're all sitting in the living room and opening gifts together?
Is it that
It's the afternoon walks together or the trips to the park with the kids, that kind of experience.
So can we see those good parts there
The other piece too, Jess, that I hear what happens for a lot of couples is they go and for listeners who are listening, I'm putting one hand and I'm putting the other one collapsed on top of it.
is we go and we merge with families.
We lose ourselves.
So you stop your wellness routines, you stop the rituals that help you feel good, you stop feeling connected, you go for a week
And I had one client say, you know, family is kind of like chicken.
After three days, they start to smell in the fridge.
So it's kind of this idea of like, you know, it's hard.
to be this separate family and then to go and merge under the roof of your other family.
But you can set expectations ahead of time saying, hey
We love this time together and we want to make this week feel good for everybody.
And so maybe they do an outing, maybe they plan that there's some self time, couple time, maybe there's a date the couple can go out, they can leave the kids.
Maybe it's about halving out even the four of them leaving the grandparents and going somewhere else.
I assumed four of them.
Sorry, I don't remember if you said they had two kids.
Yeah.
Four is okay.
Yeah
That's fine.
So so they got they go out as a family unit and come back.
And so there's kind of there's this like we're still going to live our life, but we're coming and going.
But you have to make this decision ahead of time.
And then also too, because everybody has expectations
You have to get ahead of it and talk about those expectations.
And so if it's his family, he's gonna call mom and say, we can't wait to see you.
We're so excited for this time.
That reassurance to parents is so important because it tells them you matter.
And it says we want to be there and we we cherish this time.
And then you're also going to talk about how that's going to look for you.
The question here though is what are you going to do around those disruptive conversations?
And also, too, if it's happening in front of the kids, that doesn't feel good
And so you might say to your mom, he might say to his mom, listen, mom, you know, in the past few times we've visited, there's been some explosive conversations around the table and those don't feel good.
And so if that does happen, we're going to end dinner
And then we're gonna go out for a walk, a family walk, and we'll leave you guys to do to finish that conversation yourself.
And again, and I didn't say this earlier, boundaries require you taking action
And so you then are not gonna stay at the table.
You're gonna say, all right, kids, we're gonna go have a walk.
And you're not gonna say, oh, because grandma and grandpa can't get it together and they're fighting again
We don't need to add that layer on.
This is just you saying we're not willing to sit through this and we're going to go.
Because here's the tricky piece.
And and I also see this happening with families, and it's a challenging piece for mothers-in-law.
In the sense that they're the emotional and family regulators.
They hold all the relationships together.
It's like the matriarch.
So are you calling dad and having these conversations?
Hopefully.
Hopefully you have it with both
And you say to both your mom and dad, hey, listen, politics conversations, these heated explosions at the table don't feel good for us.
And we would like us to sidestep these conversations.
It's not feeling good for our holiday visit there
That being said though, Jess, I know so many families can't hear that feedback.
And so then it's more about you just taking the action.
Because if you go into that conversation and give them feedback, I'm kind of like it depends on who you're dealing with, right?
So we're kind of going two roads.
One road is you can have the conversation with them ahead of time, and the other road is you can't because it doesn't go anywhere.
And in that scenario then
You still know what your boundaries are ahead of time.
The next scenario, though, is if things continue to progress this way, families are asking themselves,
Does this work for us?
Does it work to stay for a week?
Or do we need to adjust how long we're there?
Or do we start staying somewhere else at an Airbnb or a hotel?
Because we're looking after the needs of our family as we grow and evolve, not so that we're not spending time
But so it starts to look different and everybody then gets to feel good.
And I also want to just preface this.
Anytime you're asserting boundaries and changing things, expect this first time to be difficult.
Most times then it will change after that, but it will be hard, and families aren't necessarily happy when you change
Yeah, I think that's important to say just because the first time was hard for them, that doesn't mean every single time is going to be tough.
When you make any change, it's always hard.
And it's important to almost anticipate some pushback at the beginning
And know that you've had these conversations and you feel good about the boundaries that you're setting, right?
So it goes back to exactly what you were saying.
It goes back to your own values and making sure that you feel aligned with
your values in the boundaries that you're setting.
But I loved how you gave so many examples there.
Like I love the walk example.
That's something that I've done, you know, not
necessarily with family, but just in general when a conversation comes up and I know it's not productive and I know it's not going anywhere and it's people who just want to be mad about something, a boundary I have, no matter what setting I'm in, is I don't participate in that
I'm not interested in discussions.
I don't aren't going anywhere where we're talking or gossip.
Like that's another thing.
I'm not interested in gossip.
And so something that I do in those conversations, I just stand up and walk
Away.
I don't make a big scene about it.
I don't say, hey, how dare you talk bad about this person?
It's just a personal boundary that allows me to live within my values and feel good about the conversations I'm having.
And so I love that you brought that up.
We're a family walk.
It doesn't always have to be this big scene or this big like, you said that like then we get back into that same argument that we don't want to be in
We don't want to keep playing out the old system.
And oftentimes that old system gets activated when you point things out.
when you then vocalize something.
And it really is more empowering when you can say, what do I want to do here?
Where's my agency and choice and how can I do
And I think about this too through the lens of again like the child development, attachment lens of this battle that we all have between
authenticity and belonging.
Like we all want to belong to our families of origin.
Every person wants to feel that sense of belonging.
And as you get older, you have your own beliefs and values.
And so sometimes it feels like to be authentic means I'm no longer going to belong.
So I have to pretend to agree with you on religion or politics or all of these big topics because I want to belong.
And so I love how you phrase this conversation.
The very first thing you do is say, I'm excited to be there.
I want to be with you.
I still love you.
Right.
It's that attachment piece.
It's the belonging piece.
Like I want to belong to this family.
And it's okay that we have different opinions.
I can still belong and have different opinions.
So I love that what you're really coaching is
leading that conversation starting with attachment, starting with belonging, and then from there being able to show up authentically.
It's really beautiful.
There's this element in here as well about teaching others the both end
And I don't want to overgeneralize, but I do find that there are many people who struggle with this concept of holding to truth.
And when we can't have that flexibility of holding the both end, that is where families start to veer into the unhealthy patterns
And instead of being able to say, yes, mom, it's okay that you're upset.
Like, you know, it doesn't feel good.
I see that you're upset about this.
And this is the boundary we're creating.
I mean, you wouldn't say it that way because I I do encourage people, don't use the word boundary.
It like creates this resistance inside of others, right?
So yes, mom, I know you're upset.
I can hold space for that feeling.
And this year we need to be home in our own space for the holiday season.
And we can't wait to do it in a different way.
And that's
It's just this modeling to them.
And Jess, I know a lot of people when I do this work in therapy, especially with their parents, there's that often initial resistance.
I again have to parent my parent and how exhausting that is.
And I always bring people back, ask yourself what's really important to you and do this from a place of your values.
Yeah, I love that.
Yeah, I get the resistance too, right?
I think sometimes adult children are exhausted and they're like, I don't want to have to have this conversation again.
So it totally makes sense.
And yeah, I think tuning in with your values is so important.
I have another just very quick scenario question before we wrap up.
So let's say you're at Christmas and grandma insists on hugging all of your kids.
She has to hug them.
If she can't hug them, she's like
What do you mean?
I'm a grandma.
They should all hug me.
In that moment, how are you in the real time responding to your mother-in-law who's doing this?
You get to be the leader.
You are the parent to your children still.
And so if they can't use their voice
you use the voice.
And in that moment, it's likely not one to go into a lot of detail because maybe you're at the door or you're first getting in, your kids are having a lot of feelings.
And then perhaps it's even this idea of I'm going to use my kids' voice and they don't want to hug right now.
And that's all you're going to do.
You are just going to firmly speak for your child in a loving and compassionate way so that you're modeling it to them.
We don't need to go into this
Ah, mom or mother in law, how many times do we have to tell you, like, you know, we're doing it this way.
It's just a we know, grandma, we know you love to give hugs and
Emily is not gonna have a hug right now.
I love it.
I think sometimes we can totally overcomplicate it and be like, how do I tell them I'm I'm doing a boundary and it becomes like, oh, you're very clearly in therapy
You know, I can tell 'cause you're just having like I feel like I've seen this before, right?
Where it's like, well my therapist
said that I need to have a boundary around this.
So blah blah blah.
And then they're even more defensive because they're like, wait, why are you in therapy about me?
It's like taking all emotion out of it
You know, and what would a child do?
A child would say, I don't want a hug, and they'd walk away.
Right?
Yes.
Like a child who has found their voice will tell you, I'm not in the mood for a hug.
And that's all that it is.
And that's all you have to say.
And the piece here, Jess, is that as the parent, you have to be ready to hold the discomfort because you're holding it between your child and mother-in-law.
And your mother-in-law now might slip into old patterns of using the kind of guilt language or maybe victim
victim type stuff of oh nobody loves me or oh I do so much for the family and nobody even hugs me or worse she gives you the silent treatment for the rest of the dinner which just
is so incredibly painful.
We do not grow out of that brain experience of the negative impact of the silent treatment.
And so you there are going to just
Close your gate, protect yourself, and trust that you are teaching your children something so powerful.
Like I am as I'm speaking with you, my hand is on my heart because this is where I go to just ground myself and to say
It's okay.
It's okay if others are uncomfortable.
Change doesn't happen if you're not uncomfortable.
You're doing this for your kids.
And wow, you're doing it for your younger self.
Oh, it's so beautiful.
I love that.
It's just so, so, so much.
I love what you said about think about the way your child says it.
Right.
This is so much of my upcoming book that I'm writing.
I actually just wrote a chapter, and in the chapter I cover this exact scenario where a child just so confidently will say, I don't want to hug, and that's it
They don't go into a long explanation.
They're able to say, stop, don't touch my body, or hey, I don't I don't want to hug right now.
And they just move on, right?
And somehow we've
we've lost the wisdom of being able to say that.
And so for me, when I am setting a boundary that protects my own children, I think about protecting their wisdom, their ability to
speak confidently to set their own boundaries so to speak, like they're not thinking it's a boundary, but it is.
And I want my children to be able to continue to have their strong voice.
And so it's a lot of actually me learning from them to be like
And that's okay.
And they don't like they know grandma still loves them.
They know they still love grandma, even if they say no to a hug.
Five minutes later, when it's not forced on them, they might just run up to grandma and give her a big hug and a big kiss on the cheek, right?
So I think
we can learn a lot from our children and also I find with a lot of parents even if they won't do it for themselves they're motivated to want to do it for their own children and so
I love that you keep bringing that up, right?
Our kids are our priority and and we do need to set boundaries that protect them.
There's another layer in there as well is that if you miss it
If grandma's right in there and she gives them a hug and your kids are pushing away, you as the parent always have that connection with them.
You influence them the most.
And so you can circle back to it at another time.
Maybe you're out for that car ride.
And you know, I know for my highly sensitive kid, it's hard to get some of these things out.
So car rides are really great or side-by-side activities.
And so then I might say, hey, like
You know, I noticed this comment came out from from grandma.
How did that feel for you?
Or whoever it is.
And that is a really great way of processing what they're feeling.
And then also you being able to give them a voice for next time.
You're allowed to say no.
I just want you to know that or we even talk about play dates, you know, hey, like if you're at someone's house and you want to go home, you're allowed to ask that parent to call me right away.
And I'll it's just this empowerment
And I think sometimes too, some of the swinging as parents right now is we've gone into a bit more of this rigidity and anxiety.
And so we're watching and monitoring and we're trying to control everybody else.
As a way of keeping us and our kids safe.
And that's, I mean, it's important to keep our kids safe, but it's also recognizing that that safety is built in the home.
And you can teach them all of that as well.
so that they understand they can't like you cannot control other people, but you and your children together can create those boundaries and plans.
Hey, what do you want to do next time when grandma just comes up and like smushes your face and gives you all those kisses on your face?
Does it feel good for you?
Do you like it?
What do you want to do next time?
How can I support you the next time?
Yes, I love that.
Yeah, I love the permission slip for
parents if you didn't get it right in the moment or you didn't get in there quick enough or you froze because of your own wounds and and and issues.
That doesn't mean that your child's just gonna totally lose their wisdom and they'll never say no to a kiss again.
I love that idea of that conversation.
As we wrap up,
Is there one principle from your book or or one thing that you can I I hate the one thing question by the way, Scott always asked me, but I told him I would do it this time
Every time he asked me at the end of every podcast, I'm like, Scott, come on, one thing, you know me.
I I have to give seven.
Um but as
families approach the holiday season.
Is there something from your book or from any of the work that you've done that you would say, make sure you think about this in terms of your families and setting boundaries and and all of the things we just talked about?
I think it really comes down to this teaching in the book, which is around shifting from you versus me to you and me against the problem.
And really viewing that you're on the same team.
You both have the same values.
Most couples have the same values
And now you're just trying to work at this together.
And when you can say to each other, we want to navigate this, we want to have good holiday memories.
then you lose the it's you against me, you lose the playing singles and tennis, and then you're on the same team playing doubles.
And that just is this like nervous system regulator.
It's this like
Ah, we're in this together.
And that is just everything.
Because of course, when you feel like a solid team, you do feel more secure, more resilient.
And you can navigate all of the stresses that come your way.
Oh, I absolutely love that.
I think of the early days in my marriage to Scott where
Yeah, we would both have our ideals of how holidays would go and the things that we wanted to do.
And it definitely felt like a me against me situation, right?
Like these are my traditions, this is what I want
These are his traditions and it was always just this like we want to both do our own thing and we want the other person to like it and not complain about it
But shifting to we, which is what we've done over the years, and our family and what works best and looking at both of our values and trying to make everyone feel seen and heard while still making a compromise
that's the absolute best thing that you can do for your marriage and for your children too.
So I I I love that and I really encourage listeners to first off read your book, of course, but to hopefully take some of these these tools.
Final question
This is something different.
So you you can tell me what is something in your field, so your field of psychology, being a clinical psychologist, that despite years of doing it, just still feels magical to you
Still lights you up, still gets you excited.
Oh.
When a couple comes in and they haven't spoken to each other in days and it's tense.
at the start and there's anger and it's loud and it's hard and then they leave it feeling different, feeling connected.
And it it just gives me tingles thinking about it.
And this couple recently expressing their gratitude to me and just having that moment of knowing how hard relationships are, but also it just
When you break it down and peel back the layers, we're all just looking for connection.
And that's what we do in my room.
And they walk away feeling more connected.
It's not not everything solved
That's the work that we're doing.
But it's just this like closing my therapy room door, like closing the office door, saying bye to them, watching them out walk out.
And it's
that moment right there where nobody gets to see it.
I just know it.
But I'm so connected with myself, with the work I'm doing, with how people show up in my therapy room and how they're vulnerable with me.
And
It just lights me up.
I will never stop doing this work, Jess.
Like it's just amazing.
I have goosebumps, you saying that.
I'm just picturing the couples leaving your office just so much lighter and
Oh, you're so so incredible at what you do and your passion really shines through and I think it's so telling that you're still doing this work with couples, even though you you're doing so many other things, you're writing books, you're you're doing talks, you're doing
But your heart for couples is just so clear in the work that you're doing and that really shines through.
So thank you.
I know our audience is just gonna really love this.
I love it.
I always learn so much new things every time I talk to you as a clinician, but also as a mom who really values what you have to say.
So thank you so much for being here, Tracy.
Oh, thank you, Jess.
Do you want to just end with telling us uh we've been talking about the book the whole time, but where can we find it?
Give us the title.
Let's hear about the book.
Okay, so for listeners, my book is called You, Your Husband and His Mother
And it's create a healthy relationship with your mother-in-law and your spouse in five simple steps.
And it's available on all formats.
Anywhere that you get your books, I always say people go to your local independent bookshop because they're just amazing.
Grab the books there.
But yeah, here it is
It's so beautiful.
Look at the cover and the topic.
I just first off, I picture this on every therapist bookshelf.
Like I know it's gonna be on mine to give to my
Clients and also in all of our homes, because no matter how beautiful your relationship is with your in-law or even your own mother, we all can use
these tools to kind of figure out how to make a family system that feels nurtured and loved for all of us.
So I love it.
Thank you so much, Tracy, for writing this book and for being willing to come and share about it today.
So thank you again.
Thank you so much, Jess.
Hey friends, thank you so much for listening to today's episode.
We are glad that you are here.
If you enjoyed today's episode and found it interesting, we'd really appreciate it if you'd leave a rating and a review.
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Thank you so much for listening and we can't wait to talk to you again next time.