Hey , hey , everybody , Welcome back to Conquering Chaos . A Mom's Guide to Self-Care and Sanity . I'm your host , Sydney Crow , and today we have Mariah Huglin from Wisconsin . Welcome , Mariah .
Speaker 2Thank you , I'm excited to be here .
Speaker 1I'm excited to have this conversation . You and I were just kind of chatting before the show and getting a feel for what kind of direction this episode was gonna go in , and one thing that really stood out to me is your phrase intentional parenting . So why don't you fill the listeners in a little bit about , like , who you are , what you're all about and what intentional parenting actually is ? Okay ?
Speaker 2yeah , so again , my name is Mariah . My husband and I live in Wisconsin . We have three children Berkeley is nine years old , parker is six years old and Nash is three years old . And we are like in it right now because everyone is at a different like phase of growing up , but they're all still growing up Right , and growing up is hard .
Speaker 2So one of the things that my husband and I talked about a lot before we started a family was just kind of what kind of parents we wanted to be , and I remember specifically that it was . It was . It was almost like I had to like introduce him to the idea that , like , we could parent however we wanted to parent . You know , because everybody has a different childhood , obviously , and everybody grows up and has their own , you know , rules that they learned from their own family systems and their own personalities . And then you know you bring these two people together and it's like , okay , let's , let's raise children and it not .
Speaker 2Everybody has the same ideas about how that's going to be and I had very strong ideas about how it was not going to be , based on my own experience as a child and so having those initial conversations and just opening up his eyes to the fact that , you know , we don't have to do it the way that our parents did . It was , it was , it was good , it was really good . And I've seen the changes in him over the last 10 years , just being more open and more vocal and just more like I don't think patient is the right word . He is patient , but just more like slow with the way that he will manage things that come up with our kids like , rather than like , quick reactions . He'll kind of sit , you know , kind of sit back and just see how the situation is going to play out . And I think that that is important , you know , because there isn't one way .
Speaker 2You know , you have to . I always think about it . Like you know , teachers used to just teach one way , and if the students didn't learn that way , then they were the ones who kind of got lost in the shuffle . And I feel that these days , teachers are way more intentional about teaching children the way that they need to be taught , and maybe that's these kids over here learn this way and these kids respond differently . That is literally how we go about our parenting .
Speaker 1So do you find that you have different parenting styles for each of your kids ?
Speaker 2I feel like , gosh , that's a really good question . I feel like we present as partners always . You know , it's not like if mom says no , go ask dad you know , like we're always so important .
Speaker 2Yeah , it's always like like I've heard my husband say so many times like I'm on your mom's team , like I stand by your mom , like if she said no , like you shouldn't even be talking to me about this right now , and I think that's so important . But I feel like , for example , I have three children and my two girls . My two oldest are very strong willed , but they're strong willed in different ways . Oldest are very strong willed , but they're strong willed in different ways , and so the ways in which we help them like manage their emotions or manage like difficult situations is different , because they require different things . My oldest daughter is very stubborn and she it sort of presents as like anger , like she'll be very resistant and she'll get very escalated and then she'll just shut down . You know what ? It doesn't even matter , just forget it . And it's like it does matter . Let's talk about it , you know .
Speaker 2And then our little one , our six year old daughter . She's got the big feelings and so she'll cry . She cries 10 times a day . She is full of it . She's also like our family's , like ray of sunshine , like she has the biggest heart and she's the biggest friend and she's just she's . She's so big and so are her feelings , and so when we have to manage her , it's more gentle , you know it's . It's not , it's not tough love , it's . It's okay .
Speaker 2I can , I can hear that you're upset . I can see that you're upset , and it's okay that you're upset . What do you need ? Do you need a hug ? Do you need me to help you with whatever you're doing ? Do you want me to leave you alone ? Like ? Those are questions that we have to ask her in those moments because we don't know , and telling her to stop crying does not work .
Speaker 2I can relate to that one . You know , and I was told to stop crying . My , my whole life , my childhood . My emotional needs were not met and I didn't know what that meant as a child , but I know now , as an adult , that it literally shaped the last 37 years of my life . Understand , you know where that came from and how I , like you , you , I sort of had to like rewire my brain , like it's okay to feel this way . Mariah , your feelings are not wrong . You're not overreacting , you're not being dramatic . Your feelings are okay and unfortunately , I mean I didn't figure that out until my late twenties , which is hard right , because at that point you know your brain and it really is rewiring your brain .
Speaker 1because when you get down to like the neuroscience of it all , you have neural pathways that have been built based off of your feelings , based off of your knowledge , based off of your environmental like stimulation , and you react in those moments based off of what your brain tells you is familiar . And so when you start realizing like this doesn't really feel right , to actually formulate a new neural pathway so that you can respond instead of react is huge , but it takes so much work .
Speaker 2Oh my gosh , it does not happen overnight and it's something that I have to continuously like , recommit to , because you can get comfortable and then those old , you know patterns will resurface . So it's definitely something that you know . Not being able to feel my feelings as a child like laid the foundation for how I made friends and how I behaved in friendships , partners that I chose , and how I behaved in romantic relationships . It really it . It shaped how I approach all things Like I need more , I need validation , I need the , the assurance .
Speaker 2I need to know that you still like me . I need to know that we're still friends , because I never knew at home like that I was . I always knew I was loved , right like my house was a safe home physically . I would not say that it was safe emotionally and it's difficult to talk about that because I do have a relationship with my parents still to this day . They're wonderful grandparents and I don't want to go on record being like my parents were awful parents . I had a horrible childhood , because that's not true . I just think that that generation of parenting was so tight and so rigid and I don't think that they knew that they were doing anything wrong .
Speaker 1Yeah , yeah , they did the best that they could with what they had Right , absolutely . I feel like I had a similar experience , like I feel like I had a loving home , I was safe , we were well-raised , like all the things . But there was a lot of times where , you know , I feel like I was taught to be the good girl , quote unquote and you know that meant that if things , if I had big feelings , we didn't talk about that out of the house . If I had things that were going on inside the house that maybe weren't , you know quote unquote the best situation you know everybody has . You know , certain things that happen behind closed doors , as every family does , but we , just you don't talk about that out of the house , you don't do this . There was no real avenue for me to work out my emotions as well . And so when you look back like you say that your parents are great grandparents and I have to agree my parents are wonderful grandparents Do you see them being different with your kids than you remember them being with you ?
Speaker 2yes , and I think that it's because they have followed my lead . Interesting , I think that from the beginning of you know , 10 years ago when we had our first baby , like I said , we have been very specific kind of parent and we've gone about parenting a certain way and when I what I mean by that is that I didn't like we did what worked for our family and if it didn't line up with holidays or birthday parties or you know whatever , we did what worked for our family . And I think setting the tone early on helped my parents kind of I don't want to say fall in line , but I think that it helped them , like adjust their expectations and then they , they figured out how to be a grandparent in that space . And I mean , let's call it what it is , it's boundaries , we have boundaries .
Speaker 1Yeah , yeah , yeah .
Now I'm really intrigued by the fact that you and your husband , like , had these conversations before kids . So you you've set out to be intentional parents . And what prompted you to do that at you know , at a young age ? Because really you were in your late 20s when you had your first and I feel like at that point I was still so emotionally unaware , like these were not conversations that my husband and I had . We've definitely fallen into more intentional parenting through our own experiences and having to support my daughters and all these other things , but it's very intriguing to me that you had the self-awareness to do this ahead of time , and maybe I'm the abnormal one , but what prompted that for you ?
Speaker 2So I love that you said the term self awareness , because I have just always been filled up with it , like I just have so much self awareness . My therapist and I talk about it all the time because she's like sometimes I really think like that's part of the problem . Like you're so self aware , I have a very strong intuition and I always have , and I think it has something to do with like how my emotions are and how my feelings are , like my my stomach tells me what to do , like I can . If I follow what's in my gut , it's almost always the right thing even if it ruffles feathers or you know .
Speaker 2And so growing up I always felt like something was off , something is wrong here . I like I don't , I don't feel physically good because my emotions are not being met and it doesn't make sense to me . I don't understand why that is . You know , you , you live , you grow up around these grownups and they're your safe place , right , and and I think , well , I hope that that children understand , you know , have that . I hope that most , all children have that as their safe space at home with their parents . But , like I said before , there is a difference between being physically safe at home and being emotionally safe at home . And I think , because I wasn't emotionally safe , like I've just always needed that and always thought how do ? I've always been chasing that my whole life , right , and so when I decided to become a mother , it was like , okay , I have to do this different , I have to be . I have to be the mom that I didn't have , but the mom that I needed . Yeah , and you know I read interesting because I read something recently that said like as a parent or no , as a daughter I ? It's interesting because I read something recently that said like as a parent or no . As a daughter , I forgive you , but as a parent , I could never understand . And that hit so close to home for me , because it wasn't like when I was growing up , everybody in my family was calm and I was like the dramatic one , yelling and crying all the time . It was chaotic , it was functional chaos . And so when you have a grownup , who's taking care of you and who's responsible for your wellbeing , yelling at you but then telling you that like you can't yell or like like that sends mixed messages , that's not , that's . That doesn't make sense , you know . And so I didn't , I didn't understand that in my little child brain I was like , wait a minute , like you're yelling , like you're being , you're calling me dramatic , like you're being dramatic right now , and so it always felt like I was not allowed to be who I am and it and it always felt bad . And so , growing up , my friendships were not good , my relationships were not good , and I always just knew that . And so , you know , when I was 23 , I went through a really difficult breakup and it resulted in , while the breakup resulted because of an unwanted pregnancy , and I I figured out in those , in those moments , like who my friends were who my support network was , and I didn't have anybody . I didn't have a support system . I had a support system if I was doing what they wanted me to do Going out to the bar , yeah . But if , but , if I was not making those making choices and living how I was expected to , I was alone .
Speaker 2And I think that that is really like when I was 23 , 24 , that's when I really was like you know what ? This is not how I see my life . This does not feel good . It has never felt good . There has to be something else and I just got really , really intentional about therapy and being honest with myself . You know , is this person a good person for me to be around ? Do I have a healthy relationship with my parents , or do or change , or do changes need to be made there ? So I kind of went into myself and did the work . Wow , and I'm still doing the work . I don't think it ever ends . I think we're always growing and evolving . You know , I'm 37 . Almost I'm not the person that I was when I was 23 . But when you say , how did you have those conversations at such a young age ? How did you even think to have those conversations ? It's because of how I've felt my whole life . Something had to change .
Speaker 1Well , and it's really , I mean , awful that you went through that at a young age , but also quite the blessing that you were able to do that at such a young age . And I'm sure it wasn't easy . I mean , anytime you have to go in and do the deep work and get introspective and really peel back the layers of what life is looking like in today and what you intentionally want it to be like . It's , you know , I mean it's . It's hard for a 30 or 40 year old to do that . It's really hard , I think , to do that when you're young . But what a blessing to be able to go through that and then really start such intentional living at a young age . And I don't think that that's a very common situation , you know . You know .
Speaker 2I was actually just thinking that you said like it's hard to do at any age , and I think most people don't do it . Most people avoid change because it's hard , yeah , yeah .
Speaker 1And I mean really , at the end of the day , if you want to level up and be in the like top 20% , it's you have to do the work Like it , doesn't . You can't just live go through life avoiding it and hoping for the best , like oh . You can't just live go through life avoiding it and hoping for the best , like oh maybe it'll change one day .
Speaker 2like no , yeah , it doesn't , it doesn't change . And like I don't want to look back on my life and and feel like I didn't say the things that needed to be said or I didn't stand up for how I felt and and advocate
for myself . I think that's one of like the things that we talk about with our children the most is like advocate for yourself . Like recently we were making dinner and I think we were having gosh , probably like a hamburger , a sloppy joes or something , and we didn't have buns , we only had bread .
Speaker 2And my older daughter was like well , I'm not eating a hamburger then . And I was like Okay , do you want to go to the store ? And she just looked at me and she was like no , if I'm the only person who cares about the buns , like we don't have to make a trip to the store . And my husband's like Berkeley , do you want to eat a hamburger tonight for dinner ? Do you want to have it on a bun ? We can run to the grocery store and literally get hamburger buns . Like that's not the end of the world . And he's like advocate for yourself , like it's okay that you're the only one .
Speaker 1Everyone will probably eat a bun If you come home with buns .
Speaker 2We'll all use , you know , and it was just like a like that's such a small little situation , but that shows her to speak up .
Speaker 1Yes , I love that .
Speaker 1That's amazing Because a lot of times too , as parents , you get into like the thick of it , right , you're , you're coming home from office or you're like I work from home but you're like all of a sudden it's like , oh , we got to make dinner and you think everything's and you're missing one ingredient and it's like I definitely should be a little bit more intentional , like I really love this word .
Speaker 1So you were talking about earlier with me , before we started the show , about how you you've had to kind of see the changes through your husband and how this was definitely more of it seemed like it was more of you pushing intentional parenting and and you mentioned earlier on the show that it was really eyeopening for him to see that you didn't have to parent the way that your parents did . Tell me a little bit about that relationship and that dynamic a little bit more , and so the listeners can see cause I think a lot of people , when it comes to parenting especially , you're not necessarily always on the same page . Even if you're presenting a united front to your kids , like parents need to , you're not necessarily always on the same page . So fill me in a little bit on that .
Speaker 2Yeah , and you know we're not perfect and we don't always agree , and a lot of times we're not on the same page and we have to have those conversations without the children , because sometimes I don't understand his perspective and sometimes he doesn't understand mine , and so the only way that we can figure out like the best way to approach whatever is going on with the with kids is to to figure that out before we , you know , sort of go forward with it . And so you know , my husband is your typical like white male in America . He works really hard , he gets paid well , he has job security like he came from , you know , a normal whatever . That means family , mom and dad , three , three kids .
Speaker 2There wasn't a lot of , I think . I think the word is choice . I feel like growing up it didn't feel like he had choices , I feel like it was just like this is what my dad did , and so this is what I'm doing , or this is what is expected of me because I'm a boy , so this is what I'm doing , and I don't think it made him a monster by any stretch of the imagination . Like he's not a , it's not like he's all about , like men , like masculine , you know it's not , it's not that . It's just that it never occurred to him that there were choices .
Speaker 1It never .
Speaker 2Yeah , so it's like I'm trying to think of like a good example His parents re-agreed into him yes , Okay , so that's that's what it is . It's like the rules that we grow up with , right , like our family systems . Everybody's got like these rules of how we're going to live and and what we're going to talk about and how we're going to handle problems and how we handle conflict . All of that is is we learn that behavior in our childhood home and then we take that and we're now adults and it really works or it doesn't . And I feel like my husband didn't ever consider that he was allowed to change some of those rules for himself or his family .
Speaker 2And I am such a like it's funny because I'm like an introverted extrovert or maybe that's backwards Like I heal in isolation , like I recharge in isolation , but I also like , like to be social on my own terms .
Speaker 2But I feel like I'm the one who's like the advocate , like I'm the one who's like okay , we have to talk about this , or I'm the one who like brings like the different perspectives to the table initially , and then , after he thinks about it a little bit , he's like huh , and then he'll have thoughts , and so I think it's just that when he was growing up , he was the oldest and he did what was expected of him .
Speaker 2He graduated from high school , he went , went to college , he got a job , like he did the right thing Correct , yes . And I spent my whole life chasing approval from people that were never going to give it to me , not because they didn't approve , but because it didn't occur to them to tell me that they approved . And so I just had different . I just had big feelings . I had big feelings and he didn't Like . For him he's like I don't wanna like , he doesn't wanna talk about conflict , he doesn't wanna face conflict , he would rather not talk about it . And that's how he was raised and he accepted that In my family there was a lot of conflict and a lot of chaos all the time , and I didn't accept it .
Speaker 1Does that make sense A hundred percent ? You know , and I think it's really interesting to like this notion of we can do things differently , right ? There is this whole generation that you and I are a part of , where we talk a lot about generational healing , right , and it's so important for us . You know , now that we know better , we can do better for our kids .
Speaker 1And I think our parents , like I said earlier , it's like they did the best with what they had when they had it .
Speaker 1But as more time is going on and more evolution and more information is coming about , like early childhood and brain development and these neural pathways and emotional intelligence , you know , it is really important that we do that healing . And I don't think it's a generational healing in the sense like we all went through massive trauma and like all of these things . It's just now we're healing that piece where it's like we can do things , things differently . It's not like , oh , my parents did this this way and this is how I was raised , so I told you so , like the amount of times that I heard , because I said so when I was growing up , like , and every once in a while that phrase flies out of my mouth and I'm like , oh , yeah , we'll stop . Like , yeah , as I said , so let's pause and explain this , yeah , so I find myself even now like my kids will glass over because I'm giving such long-winded explanation and you like lose it halfway through .
Speaker 2You're like what are we even talking ?
Speaker 1about yes , yeah , so I mean it is interesting and you know , you and I were talking about how men in general there there's this like shift right , and so I pulled the statistic that I saw the other day where it's in 1982 , they pulled dads and 43% of them hadn't even changed their own kid's diaper , like had never changed a diaper their dads almost half of them and we're now less than 30 years from that point and the most recent poll was done in 2020 . Sorry , from this poll , and only 3% have not changed the doctor , and I think that that's so like such a staggering revelation on what we're talking about with this generational healing , because we are all , as a society , like doing better . It is so important for dads to be present , and it's not just daddy daycare , like I've had that I'm like no , it's not daddy daycare , it is like literally just parenting . So parenting , just parenting , full stop . I love this notion that you have brought to the table today .
Speaker 1Intentional parenting is definitely a phrase that I will find myself using more and more frequently , so I appreciate that . Looking at having the listeners out there , is there one piece of advice that you would give them ? Just mom to mom or mom to dad . What would you say like the key piece of advice for intentional parenting ?
Speaker 2Oh , this is so funny . So usually when people ask me if I have advice for moms , I say drink water and hire a cleaning lady , because I feel like those are two things that really changed my life as a mom just intentional parenting . I tried to remind myself that , like and I remind my kids to like , just because I'm the grown up doesn't mean I'm right , and just because I'm the grown up doesn't mean I know the answer . You know , like you are growing up and you have ideas and I'm interested in those ideas . And the way that we figure out life is by talking , and so it's going to take longer to solve this , whatever problem we're having , because we're going to talk about it . But it's so much more meaningful . But it's so much more meaningful .
Speaker 2And when my husband and I talk about , you know , it's that crazy thing where , like , your kids don't behave at home , but then you send them on a play date and like they're angels , and then you're like what happens at home , you know ?
Speaker 2But it's like they're comfortable here , right , they're going to be crazy at home because they know they're safe and they're loved , and so when we have a particularly hard day , and then we put the kids to bed and we're both like , oh my God , like and he'll tell me like I had this conversation with Berkeley and she said this and I just couldn't believe it . And yeah , I was talking to Parker Like we always come back to , like the fact that what we are trying to do is raise functioning adults , right , like mentally , physically functioning adults that can add value to the world and to their lives .
But also , at the end of the day , we want them to want to come back . We want them to be the college students that bring all of their friends to our lake house on the weekends . You know , like we want , we don't want our kids to have to heal from their childhood the way that we had to , and so it's harder and it takes longer , but it's more meaningful and it it feels better .
Speaker 1I love that so much and I resonate with so much of that right we've always talked about . We're like we just want to be the house , like come here , have the kids , like get , get involved in their life and and being intentional with that , because , you know , sometimes we have to have those really hard , long drawn out conversations but at the end of the day , like we feel really connected after the fact and so I love that . That's a huge piece for you guys too . Mariah , thank you so much for being here today and thank you guys for tuning in where we help you conquer the chaos one day at a time .