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Welcome to Learn with Dr. Emily, the podcast. Where parents and teachers come together for neurodivergent youth. I’m your host, Dr. Emily King, child psychologist and former school psychologist specializing in raising and teaching children and teens diagnosed with autism, ADHD, anxiety, learning disabilities, and/or giftedness. Each week, I share my thoughts on a topic related to psychology, parenting, education, or parent-teacher collaboration, which you can read on my blog or listen here.
If you want to learn more about me and my online resources for parents and teachers, visit www.learnwithdremily.com. Let’s get started.
learnwithdremily.substack.com
Edla Prevette - 00:00:05:
Sometimes when you're sandwiched between your children and your aging parents, There's just not enough hours in the day. You can't do it all, right? And so, yeah, there's just so many overlaps. There's so many things to talk about. There's so many strategies and ways to take the edge off of being in this sandwiched generation where you're having to deal with these people that you really love. Right. And you want to do best by them.
Dr. Emily King - 00:00:34:
Welcome to Learn with Dr. Emily, the podcast. Where parents and teachers come together for neurodivergent youth. I'm your host, Dr. Emily King, child psychologist and former school psychologist, and I am on a mission to help everyone understand that nurturing neurodivergent children isn't about changing them, but about changing us. You can read more on my Substack at learnwithdremily.substack.com or listen here. So let's get started with today's topic. All right, y'all. Welcome to the second season of the Learn With Dr. Emily podcast. Today, we have Edla Prevette. Edla is a Licensed Mental Health Counselor in North Carolina. For over 30 years, she has worked with neurodivergent children and their families as a therapist, consultant, and trainer. But currently, she is focusing her attention on the adults who are sandwiched between their kids' needs and the needs of their aging parents. So, Edla, how did you come about refocusing your work? So tell us more about the shift from working with parents with their children to working with parents and their aging parents.
Edla - 00:01:40:
Well, it was sort of evolved over time. I had worked, you know, like you said, with people really across the lifespan. And then my clients begin to talk about their aging parents. And then. Simultaneously, I became a caretaker for my parents. So I was caring for my parents for about 10 years. And in different capacities. And then what I noticed during that time was that I was able to find a lot of information about wills and financial planning and like retirement communities and things like that, but I wasn't really able to find anything about the sort of day-to-day. Conflicts, crises, the, you know, the ability, the difficulties with communication, trying to get them to make different decisions. I couldn't find anything about that. And at that time, I was working as a parent counselor for people whose children were in birth through kindergarten age, and they would come in for advice from me about, you know, how to get their kid to sleep through the night or, you know, potty training or whatever. And I began to notice that some of the strategies that I used with. These parents as a parent counselor. Would work for my parents. And not in a condescending way, but in a similar fashion. So it just evolved. And then when my parents, both of them, passed, then it was really important for me to kind of put this out in the world. And my clients were starting to, my adult clients were starting to have more questions. So it was just sort of a natural evolution, I think.
Emily - 00:03:20:
Yeah, and I want to dive into that a little later. But first, I think I wanted to get your opinion of this generational difference you probably have been observing over time of working not only with parents, but also young children. And then, of course, over 30 years, you're going to see generational shifts. But. I get the question a lot of how do I talk to my aging parents about my neurodivergent kids' needs when parenting is so different because of generational shifts and perspectives are so different, education is so different. So what kind of things do you feel like parents need to think about and just be sure to say to their parents to help them understand their own kids?
Edla - 00:04:05:
Yeah, when I saw that you wanted to ask me this question, I thought, wow, this is loaded. We could talk about this for 30 minutes. But I think there's a few things that come to mind. One is, what is the involvement of the parents with your family? So if they live far away and you only see them once a year, then your communication or what you tell them is going to be different than if they're one of your caretakers, if they help care for your children, right? So I think that's one thing you have to consider. The second thing you have to consider is you get to choose as the parent. You get to choose how much you tell them. You don't have to disclose everything to your parents. Right? You are now an adult. And your job is to parent these children, right? So sometimes, you know, parents of neurodivergent children have to kind of have an armor on. So that they can advocate for their child. And you may have to do that with your parents. The other thing that I would say to think about is that Parents or grandparents, let's say grandparents, just to make it easier.
Emily - 00:05:09:
I know, there are lots of parents and our parents and their parents.
Edla - 00:05:10:
Yeah, yeah, let's talk about the grandparents. Um... Is that you've got reasonable grandparents, you know, that are like interested and trust what you are doing and what you've got to say. And then you've got grandparents that just think they're old school, you know, they just don't think past. Well, that's not how we did it. You know, what was wrong with the way we did it and those kinds of things. So in that case, with those parents, you may choose how much you tell them or you don't tell them. So I think those... There's a little bit more I want to say about that, but I think. First of all, just kind of determining What is the involvement? You know, what is it that you feel like you are comfortable telling them? And then three, what is their temperament like? How are they going to take this information? So then you can pick and choose what you want to do, you know, what you want to say.
Emily - 00:06:03:
I think it's huge that you're just giving everyone permission that they can pick and choose because I think it doesn't occur to all of us as grownups that we are adults when we're in a relationship with our parents still, right? We still feel like kids even though we're 40.
Edla - 00:06:19:
Exactly. And that's often the clients that I work with. They're like, how can I set limits with my parents? I'm their child. And, you know, that's a whole other thing. But I think the other thing sort of along those similar lines is... Thinking about what words to use, right? So, Let's say that you have an autistic child. Some grandparents will hear that word autistic, and everything the child does or doesn't do is because he's autistic. You know he's autistic. You're like, oh, he might not do that because he's autistic. And you may want to choose different language. You know, he's socially uncomfortable or he's socially awkward or something that's a little less, I don't know, what's the word?
Emily - 00:07:05:
Clinical.
Edla - 00:04:06:
Yeah.
Emily - 00:07:06:
Yeah, that's true. So some. Grandparents will think of the word autistic or autism in a very different way, a different image that's under their mind because of the generational differences than, say, a parent who is 35.
Edla - 00:07:19:
Correct.
Emily - 00:07:19:
Very different images because of what we know and how this field is evolving. Right.
Edla - 00:07:24:
Same thing with ADHD, same thing with anxiety. So, you know, sometimes just choosing a different word to describe it, that softens it a little bit, for lack of a better way to explain it so that they may be more open to hearing what you have to say about that. I do think, though, that educating them about it is an important piece. And again, that would depend on your parents' temperament, but you can just say, these are some things we've learned. And I think the biggest thing is really to paint a picture for them. Like you mentioned, just generations, right, passing. Well, if you think about, I don't know, I couldn't even guess, 30, 40 years ago, open heart surgery was like, oh, my gosh. That was like a terrible, terrible thing. Well, open heart surgery is like not a thing. It's not that big of a thing anymore. Not like it was, right? And so to talk to your parents about, you know how open heart surgery used to be a big thing and now we've evolved. You know, give them something that they can relate to that's been part of their lives, that they've seen that. You know, that transition. Sometimes that helps too. And then I think the other thing is, you know, this has really blown up in the last decade. You know, I've been working a long time, and I think we've known a lot about neurodivergent children, but even the word neurodivergent's not been around super long time. But the other piece of that is, how much we focus on the strengths of children with ADHD. What is the upside of it? What is the upside of anxiety? What's the upside of autism? And by painting the picture of, wow, kids like this have all these things that they offer to us. I think those would be a lot.
Emily - 00:09:06:
Yeah, and I think, too, that what comes to my mind is two things. Number one is setting boundaries with our parents, which is the whole, like, how much do you say to them, but also how much do you communicate with them. And we, again, have a choice about, like, how much we share online. I remember, you know, talking to my extended family about my son when, gosh, I think it was before we were all following each other on Facebook. It was a long time ago. And I remember sending an email, like, before the holidays of, like, hey, this is what's going on. I want you all to understand him well, and I want him to feel comfortable. Please let me know if any of your kids, like, this was to my cousins, so these would have been, like, the second cousins all getting together at the holidays. But that was also in the context of, you know, aunts and uncles, too, understanding that. So those boundaries can be, you know, how you communicate, the limits you set. And then the second thing I was thinking of as you were talking is, a lot of neurodivergence, like all of it, is genetic. So it's very possible that some of our grandparents also have undiagnosed neurodivergence that they may not be aware of. And so not that we need to necessarily do anything about that, but just taking it into context as we're communicating with them is so important.
Edla - 00:10:25:
Absolutely. That was one of the things when I said we could just talk and talk and talk about this. And when I said the parents' temperament. That's like. Wink wink aka their own sort of neurodivergent characteristics. And I wanted to single back to what you were saying about setting limits. Is that, another thing that happens because as adults, you still feel like your parents' children. So if you have a good relationship with your mom, let's say, and you're worried about your kid or you're sad about something that happened at school, you know, you're going to call up as your mom's 40-year-old and you're going to go, mom, I'm so, you know, blah, blah, blah, this happened. Well, your mother, in this case, the grandparent, is still, you're still her child. So she's going to want to try to make it better and fix it. And so some, one of the limits that you sometimes have to set is. Don't go to mom and dad when you're sad and worried and all of that, you know. Find another village, you know, that you can access. And then I think the other thing you said, you sent an email to your family. Well, you know, you and I know what we're doing, right? So I like to tell parents that if you feel stuck, there's people that you can consult with. There's the Emilys and Edlas and all the people that you can consult with to kind of help you. How do I set a limit around this? How do I protect myself from, you know, the eye rolls and the smart comments or the, you know, confusion? So, yeah, I can.
Emily - 00:11:48:
Well, I definitely wanted to start this conversation with the foundation of thinking about the generational differences and potentially genetic differences and similarities of our kids and our grandparents. Because when we talk about being sandwiched in the middle of taking care of our kids and taking care of our grandparents, of their grandparents, often what happens is we're pulled in both directions and we're trying to work.
Edla - 00:12:16:
Correct.
Emily - 00:12:16:
So we've got parenting, working, and caregiving all at the same time. I see it a lot in my psychology practice that there are always seasons of life. But this season of life, I really wanted to highlight to let people know they are not alone. What would you say are the most important things to be aware of when you're living in that sandwiched generation between raising your neurodivergent kids and taking care of your aging parents?
Edla - 00:12:43:
I think probably the first thing. When you're sandwiched like that, and you mentioned sandwiched between your job and your children and your parents. But there's a lot of other sandwich pieces in there. Some people are even taking care of their grandchildren. And it goes on. So you have. A lot more complexity. Some people's may not have children. But the way that they're work is that they're traveling a lot, or maybe their parents live out of town, you know, and so that adds. All these different layers. But number one is to take care of your own mental health. That is just, it's got to be first because there's so much that you don't have control over whatever your sandwich looks like. That you really have to take care of your mental health first. You know, when I was my parents' carer, I had my therapist. I saw her every month because I had to have a place to like. I don't know, just keep me focused and sort of keep my tank. Somewhat full, right? So I think I think taking care of your mental health because of the burnout rate and the overwhelm is just, it's astronomical. It's just so much. And especially if it goes on for a long time, which often does. It can. It doesn't. Yeah, because. People are living so much longer. I don't know the statistic, but the number of people living over to 100 has really increased. And so people are going to be caring for their family members for many, many years. I think the other thing to sort of combat it, because there's not a lot you can do about the sandwich itself, but I think there's ways that you can combat it a little bit. And this doesn't have to do so much with you as a person. You know, you've got grandma on one end, you've got kid on the other end, is what I call sort of self-care snacks. What are those? Because, you know, you read a lot about, oh, self-care, you should do this and this. Well, if you're sandwiched, you don't have time for this and this and, you know, spend a day at the spa and, you know, whatever. So I call them self-care snacks. I love it. Where it's just like, just, you know, when you're in the carpool line, just sit there, you know, and just do some deep breathing or do, you know, whatever. If the kids are at soccer practice, just go walk or take a stroll around the block, you know, instead of trying to carve out. Because it's just hard. It adds another level of pressure. And then I think the other thing is carving out snippets of special time with your children and your parents. I remember so many days. My kids were teenagers, but my youngest one, it was like. I just had to give him a minute, right? And then I had to give my parents a minute, right? So everybody needs that little bit of connection. You know, encouraging, it doesn't have to be hours. It can just be a little bit of time, but just make sure you're real. Connected and real. Present with them.
Emily - 00:15:35:
And I, of course, am always an advocate of having your own person and your own therapist, because I think when you're in the weeds, either with parenting your kids or caring for anyone, it's hard to figure out what to handle immediately and what to let go, because you lose perspective. And a therapist, if nothing else, lets you just talk and listens and then gives you a little bit of reality and perspective on it.
Edla - 00:15:59:
And sometimes you can hear yourself when you talk about it out loud. You can be like, whoa, I don't need to be focusing my attention there.
Emily - 00:16:05:
Yeah, and if that's not something people have access to, I always recommend journaling almost to yourself to really get those ideas out because you will hear yourself and hear like, okay, I'm spending a lot of energy about this thing that I can't control.
Emily - 00:16:22:
Correct.
Emily - 00:16:23:
You know, let's move on from that or try to let that go. So as we are caring for parents and raising neurodivergent kids, like you said before, noticing similarities between them isn't something, you know, to be offended by. It's just that at different life stages, we all struggle with memory, with language processing and word recall, with sensory things. And so I would love to hear what you notice in your work as the similarities. Between raising neurodivergent kids and caring for. Parents and how it's been somewhat surprising, I bet, to some people that they're accessing some of the same skills to take care of these two groups of people.
Edla - 00:17:09:
Exactly. I think the first and foremost is, I don't care how old you are, people need to feel heard. They need to feel understood. So I think for your neurodivergent children, as well as your aging parents, they need to feel like you understand what they're struggling with. And so all of the relationship-building stuff and the connection stuff that you read about and that we've talked about is really important for your aging parents so that when they're... Things in their lives are starting to change. They can't do as much or process as much. Have access to as much. They understand that you get it. Hmm, so I think that piece is the same on both ends of the spectrum. I think offering choices so that they have some autonomy. You know, like young kids want to do things, and we don't necessarily want them to do that, so we'll often give them choices so they have some sense of control. It's very similar, you know, to your parents. I've told this story about my dad didn't want to take a bath. To make the story quick, I went into the bathroom and realized it wasn't a safe place for him, but he was just sort of too proud to say that. So then I had to approach him about bathing a different way, and I gave him choices. And that's so similar to what you do for younger children or neurodivergent children. Setting limits and boundaries are very similar as needed. Driving is a big one that comes up, you know, with people. And, um, You know, sometimes you do have to set some limits and boundaries around them. I know some of the retirement communities, for example, have clauses in there. And say they have permission to take the ovens or the stoves out if there's any. You know, if there's any worry about that thing, just like you would do with a young child if there was something. That wasn't safe, then you'd set a limit or a boundary. So there's lots of similarities with that. It's just the content's different. And then I think sometimes there's just natural and logical consequences. You know, I got a call yesterday from a friend of mine and his. I don't know how old she is, 85 or so. She. Needs new hearing aids and he wanted to know how can I get my mom to get new hearing aids. I was like. You may not be able to get your mom to get new hearing aids. And then there's natural consequences to that. Right. But for us, as the children, it's so worrisome. It's like, if you would just do this, your life would be better.
Emily - 00:19:44:
Right.
Edla - 00:19:45:
But just like with the young kids. Go ahead.
Emily - 00:19:47:
As you talk, I'm thinking more of like teenagers than very young kids. Like you can't make teenagers do stuff. And they don't do it because you said so. They do it because they figure it out that the natural consequence is that I don't like this, so I'm going to do it. And then once they figure it out, of course, they never admit that we were right in the first place.
Edla - 00:20:08:
Exactly. And just like your parents don't admit that you were right in the first place.
Emily - 00:20:12:
Well, and that's just the pride of it, right?
Edla - 00:20:13:
Oh, absolutely.
Emily - 00:20:14:
And, just like not wanting to admit that they didn't figure it out first.
Edla - 00:20:18:
Right. Absolutely. And it's funny you said teenagers because, you know, aging parents will kind of flip-flop between sometimes act like teenagers and sometimes act like toddlers. And so you have to pull out some of these skills that I just talked about and put them, you know, on an adult, you know, mature, respectful. I don't ever want to sound like you're being disrespectful to your parents. Condescending to them, there's ways that you can get them to cooperate without. Shaming them. But yeah.
Emily - 00:20:47:
And it also makes me think about frustration tolerance in different ways. So like when I think about neurodivergent kids being around, what it really is, is you're in an environment where you're aware that people are able to do stuff you can't do.
Edla - 00:21:00:
Oh, yeah.
Emily - 00:21:01:
Right? So like in school, you know, so many of our kids that struggle with anything in school related to executive functioning or processing speed, they notice that they can't do it as fast as other people. And that's a lot of the time where their frustration and negative self-talk can come from and depression. So yeah. What do you see in older populations?
Edla - 00:21:23:
The exact same. They'll start. I think probably the most common thing is they'll start isolating themselves socially. Because they can't keep up with the conversation. You mentioned sensory issues, which I've got several blogs written just about that. Because as the hearing changes, they may not need hearing aids, but just as the hearing changes, all the extra noise in a social environment makes it really challenging. For them to carry the conversations. So sometimes they'll begin to isolate themselves, which then creates another set of problems. And then, you know, sometimes they'll push through. But it's a similar thing. They'll start saying, well, what's the point? And I even mentioned the friend of mine that was asking about his mom and the hearing aids. I mean, she's... What if she's just lost hope? What if she just feels like, what's the point? And then that's a different conversation. It's not about... Hearing aids, it's about mental health. Right?
Emily - 00:22:24:
Exactly.
Edla - 00:22:24:
So it's exactly. I think you even did a workshop today on the negative self-talk. Right? And it's a similar thing. They're just like, what's the point? You know, I can't. I can't drive. I can't hear. You know, Nobody wants to hang out with me. Because if you watch at family events that the elderly people and the neurodivergent kids are kind of left to the side a little bit, and everyone else engages.
Emily - 00:22:48:
So what would you recommend for parents who notice that at family gatherings or just kind of notice that there's some withdrawal with the grandparents in the family?
Edla - 00:22:59:
As the adult child?
Emily - 00:23:00:
As the adult child.
Edla - 00:23:00:
Yeah, as the adult child, I think it comes back to the one thing about just saying, Mom, I've noticed, or Dad, I wonder if. To see what you can get out of them, because then you can connect with them, that whole idea of... Trying to understand and trying to empathize with them. Because once you do that, then sometimes you can talk about how we can solve this problem. I've got a workbook that everyone can get for free, and it talks exactly about that. How do you... I call it the bookend technique. And it's like, how can you talk to them in such a way that you can get some information so that you can then problem solve, so that you can then support them, right? And they'll be more cooperative. But it's really gathering information. I'm not a Why are you doing that? You never used to do that. Why aren't you coming here? Because that just makes them withdraw even more.
Emily - 00:23:54:
Which we know from parenting our nerd, our anxious kids. It just makes us feel bad or makes them feel worse. So it-
Edla - 00:24:03:
And it stops the conversation.
Emily - 00:24:05:
Yeah, I was gonna say it squashes collaboration. Yes, and communication. It just stops it. And we wanna keep it as open as we can and help the grandparents know that everyone is caring about them.
Edla - 00:24:17:
Right.
Emily - 00:24:18:
So related to that is what do we do when our kids start to worry and notice about their grandparents? How can we talk to them? Let's just chat about kind of developmentally appropriate ways to explain what's happening, maybe with dementia or cancer treatments or things that, any specifics.
Edla - 00:24:38:
Yeah, that's the first thing I would say about that. It depends on the age of your kid. So when my parents began the decline and I was really having to care for them more, my boys were like teenagers or young teens. And so. I could tell them a lot more and they sort of noticed what was happening. It was just sort of a natural evolution. It wasn't a whole lot to tell them. And then when my dad was diagnosed with vascular dementia near the end of his life, I just told them. You know, I just told my boys, this is what it is, and this is what you see, and this is what it looks like. It was a little bit confusing, like even for my sister. She didn't understand because Dad had a script, right? So every time she'd call, she'd go, what you been doing? And he had this script that he would say. So in person, so she didn't know that he was struggling, right?
Emily - 00:25:26:
Is that a strategy you had given him or who gave him that?
Edla - 00:25:29:
No, that's just what people that start to, when they have dementia-related things, a lot of times they'll script, which sounds like some neurodivergent.
Emily - 00:25:36:
So that was just a strategy that he had come up with.
Edla - 00:25:38:
He had used, it was like a masking, it's like a masking strategy. So all that to say, then I had to educate not only my children, but my, right? When, you know, some wanted to hear it more than others, but that's a conversation for another day. So the other thing I would say, if they're young, younger, then connect it to something they know, you know? So the first thing that came to mind was glasses. Like if they've got a friend in their class that didn't wear glasses and now they do wear glasses or you didn't wear glasses and now you wear glasses. And you kind of talk about, you know, our bodies are always changing and sometimes we need a little extra help and, you know, something sort of benign like that. You know, that's kind of hard to tell, but that's where I'd start. And then the next thing is give yourself permission to not answer immediately.
Emily - 00:26:31:
Yes. We all have so much more time to think about all of this than we think we do.
Edla - 00:26:35:
Yes. So when they say, why does granddad do blah, blah, blah? Then you can go, that's a really great question. You know, let me think about that and I'll get back to you. So then you can think about how old is this kid? How much can he take? If he's neurodivergent, is it going to make him more? If he's anxious, it'll make him more anxious. If he's neurodivergent, there might be a different. Issue, I mean, autistic versus ADHD, then you may have to address it. Differently. So I think I think those would be the main tips that I would have.
Emily - 00:27:09:
And one thing that comes to my mind is because I've worked with children who need education in general about acute versus chronic illnesses because they worry that they can, let's say, catch cancer or they worry that. You know, the next time they get sick, they're never going to get better.
Edla - 00:27:30:
Right.
Emily - 00:27:30:
So they don't have experience, right, with this. We have to explicitly teach them, especially because, you know, it would be super rare for them to have a peer that had cancer.
Edla - 00:27:40:
Correct.
Emily - 00:27:40:
We all have different frames of mind about experiences we've had. So I think explaining some of those things, if you think they're going to be anxious about this.
Edla - 00:27:50:
Yes.
Emily - 00:27:51:
And adding in just what's relevant to their experience.
Edla - 00:27:55:
What they need to know.
Emily - 00:27:56:
Because you don't need to tell them all the things.
Edla - 00:27:58:
No. And I'm so glad you brought that up because I think another piece of that, there's so many great children's books.
Emily - 00:28:04:
Yes, there are.
Edla - 00:28:05:
About all of this, right? That you can. Read to your children, read with them. And then the other thing that I, and I forgot about this strategy, but I think it would work great for this, is when if your child asks you a question about their grandparents, flip it back and say, well, what do you think is going on? So then you can get an idea of where they're coming from because they might not be thinking about what you're thinking about.
Emily - 00:28:31:
Yes. I do that with the sex talk.
Edla - 00:28:33:
Yes.
Emily - 00:28:33:
I do that with religion.
Edla - 00:28:34:
Yes.
Emily - 00:28:35:
I do that with any type of diversity or thing that's happened, like school violence. We have all kinds of things in our mind that freak us out and we almost overshare sometimes. But asking them, what have you noticed?
Edla - 00:28:49:
Right.
Emily - 00:28:50:
What are you worried about? And that's your starting point.
Edla - 00:28:52:
Yes.
Emily - 00:28:52:
And don't worry about all the things that are going on in your head that, oh, they're not wondering about that. They're just wondering about, I can answer that question.
Edla - 00:29:01:
Correct. And then you only answer that question.
Emily - 00:29:04:
Right.
Edla - 00:29:04:
You don't elaborate.
Emily - 00:29:05:
Right.
Edla - 00:29:05:
And then see where they go.
Emily - 00:29:06:
And then you just wait for more questions. I always say just go until the questions stop.
Edla - 00:29:10:
Correct.
Emily - 00:29:10:
And then move on.
Edla - 00:29:11:
Yes.
Emily - 00:29:12:
And then later there'll be more questions, but don't keep going. You'll get yourself into a hole.
Edla - 00:29:16:
Yeah. And then you're like, why am I still talking?
Emily - 00:29:19:
Right.
Edla - 00:29:20:
That's funny.
Emily - 00:29:20:
Okay. So I do want to circle back with self-care. I know we talked about it a little, a little bit, but all of this that we're talking about, as you can imagine listening to this, and if you're listening to this, you're probably living it, of this is not sustainable, especially if we're not taking care of ourselves. And sometimes when we're taking care of aging parents, it is a chronic illness. It is something that can last years or decades. And that can be completely overwhelming.
Edla - 00:29:53:
Yes.
Emily - 00:29:54:
So I'm curious if there are any other ideas of just kind of more sustainable self-care. I love your snacks idea. I always, I often, you know, will tell parents to have those like little five minutes is actually a really long time.
Edla - 00:30:09:
It is.
Emily - 00:30:10:
To do-
Edla - 00:30:10:
Use it intentionally.
Emily - 00:30:11:
To, you know, have that moment in the car or whatever it is. But I'm just thinking about what are some things that parents can make routines that are sustainable or cutting things out of their life that are not needed or really thinking about where they're spending their energy.
Edla - 00:30:25:
Right. Well, there's, I mean, some of this will be a little bit of a repeat of what I just talked about. But one thing that works for me really well is to use my calendar. Right? And when I use my digital calendar and I color code it. And I don't, let's say purple's self-care and there's no purple on my calendar. Then it's like. I have to figure this out, right? If I'm scheduling an appointment for an aging parent or for my kid, And it's like, I've got six appointments this week. I need to kick that down to the next week. You know, sometimes just having a visual representation in front of you, right? I love that. And. And kind of having, creating your categories, your self-care category, you know, your special time with your kids, special times with your aging parents, you know, school, whatever, all the things. Kind of approaching it in a structured way, it really helps. And then I think... You know, it just depends if, you know, know your own personality. Like, I'm pretty extroverted, so I've got to have some social interactions, right, with my friends and just laughing. Where someone else might be really introverted and they're just like, I just want to be at home and read a book. Mm-hmm. Right? And neither is right or wrong. It's just knowing yourself and kind of what you need. And then I think with the self-care, it's so important to be intentional about it. Whether it's a weekend or whether it's five minutes. It's like, really using it. Intentionally to fill you back up.
Emily - 00:32:01:
Definitely. I'm an introvert which people are surprised about because I talk a lot but yeah I think of it like energy. And I actually, I love the visual calendar idea of looking at the colors. I actually have two columns in the Notes app on my phone that's energy in and energy out. And I constantly move stuff around and put them in there and make sure it's either balanced or it's closer to energy in. Because I know that when I start feeling off, I go to that list and I'm like, yep, my energy out list is too long. And sometimes we can't control it that we have done five doctor's appointments that week. And those are the things that are non-negotiables. So we need to get something else off of our plate. So I love those ideas.
Edla - 00:32:48:
I want to piggyback on what you just said, non-negotiables. There's a Ross Greene's book, The Explosive Childhood, does an exercise about the negotiable, non-negotiable, not worth it. And it's looking at your list, and you think there's a whole long list of non-negotiables, but if you really look at it, some of the things you can make negotiable, like you can kick the doctor's appointment down to the next week.
Emily - 00:33:13:
You can.
Edla - 00:33:14:
You know, sometimes. I mean, sometimes you can. It's something you have to do, but there's things that you can shift that can be negotiable, just in a different context.
Emily - 00:33:23:
And I think that's another generational thing, of the commitment. Like, are, you know, there's a generational shift of like, I know my parents' generation of like, you said you were going to do it. You better do it. It is non-negotiable. And really, you can reschedule anything.
Edla - 00:33:40:
Yes, you can.
Emily - 00:33:41:
Most anything.
Edla - 00:33:42:
Yeah, where my dad's thing was, if you're not five minutes early, you're late.
Emily - 00:33:45:
Yeah.
Edla - 00:33:46:
And, you know, so it took me a long time to just go, it's okay if I'm five minutes late. The world's not going to come to an end, right?
Emily - 00:33:52:
It is okay. Yeah.
Edla - 00:33:53:
Generally, 99% of the time.
Emily - 00:33:55:
Right.
Edla - 00:33:55:
Oh, the last thing I'd say about that is making sure that you have a village of people.
Emily - 00:33:59:
Yes.
Edla - 00:34:00:
Because sometimes when you're sandwiched between your children and your aging parents. There's just not enough hours in the day. You can't do it all, right? And so... For some people, it's hard to ask for help. But most people will help you. If you need somebody to pick your kids up and carpool, they'll do it. If you need somebody to take your mom some food, they'll do it. Right? And so just creating a village and then accessing a village, I would jump on that too. So yeah, there's just so many overlaps. There's so many things to talk about. There's so many strategies and ways to take the edge off of being in this sandwiched, you know, generation where you're having to deal with these people that you really love.
Emily - 00:34:43:
Right.
Edla - 00:34:44:
You know, and you want to do best by them.
Emily - 00:34:46:
Right. Well, how can listeners learn more about you and your work and what you're offering to parents?
Edla - 00:34:53:
They can go to my website, edlaprevette.com. They definitely want to grab the free workbook that I created. That'll be a great jump start. It's called The One-Eighty Bookend Technique. It's got three steps. With details and scripts and examples, and that'll really immediately help reduce some of the conflict and then increase some of the cooperation and the communication. I also offer coaching. I'm going to have a group program coming up this spring that I'm working on. And I've got blogs. And, you know, they can just contact me. There's lots of different things. They can also follow me on social media, Facebook, Edla Prevette. No, that's not it. One-Eighty with Edla Prevette.
Emily - 00:35:39:
We'll just put it in the show notes.
Edla - 00:34:40:
Yeah, One-Eighty with Edla Prevette on Instagram.
Emily - 00:35:43:
Yeah, and then we can link to some of those children's books we mentioned that are helpful. So we can compile a list and put some of those in the show notes.
Edla - 00:35:51:
That's a great idea.
Emily - 00:35:52:
Thank you so much for being here.
Edla - 00:35:53:
Oh, it's so fun. So easy to talk to, Emily.
Emily - 00:36:03:
This has been Learn with Dr. Emily, the podcast. For more resources, including both parent, teacher, and school resources, visit learnwithdremily.com or read my Substack at learnwithdremily.substack.com. This podcast is edited by Earfluence. All information discussed on this podcast is for educational purposes only. If you have immediate concerns about your child, please reach out to a mental health or medical professional. I'm Dr. Emily King, and we will keep learning together next week.