Ep.18: The Importance of playfulness in your home

In this episode we talk about the importance of injecting more playfulness and silliness into your home. Abuse and abusers rob victims, children and adults alike, of their ability to be playful and silly. Adding more playfulness and silliness in your home creates core memories, allows your children to simply be children, and helps to regulate their nervous systems. 

Lots of easy, low energy but high impact, ideas here. 

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Transcript

0:01

Welcome everybody to The Survivor's Playbook. I'm your host, Chantel Contra, and this is the podcast for every survivor of abuse. If abusers can have a playbook, then why can't survivors also have a playbook so that you can learn to live lives you love despite what the abuser in your life does or doesn't do? And today. You have the privilege or you are unfortunate enough to be listening to me, myself and I, as we had an expert guest speaker inside of the collective this week to talk about playfulness. And the theme this week of everything that I'm talking about with my clients, my members inside of my newsletter that also is released on Fridays is playfulness because abusers and abuse rob us of our ability to be silly. To connect through play, not only for ourselves, but also really importantly with our children. So let's talk about playfulness and the power of playfulness, right? Because your job as a protective parent is to help build, maintain, foster, and rebuild connection with your children through safety and joy, while co-parenting with a narcissistic counter parent. Why does playfulness matter? As a protective parent, you are oftentimes managing crisis responses constantly on alert. That means you're hypervigilant because you know that even if it's calm right now, it is the calm before the storm and something is just around the corner. Why narcissists love to blindside people. They just love to do that. It's sport for them. And you are navigating the emotional fallout from the other home, which oftentimes looks like and sounds like children coming back on transition days or transitioning back to that parent's house being completely dysregulated. That could be that they're in fight mode, they're in flight mode, freeze or fawn, and you're having to help them co-regulate back to a parasympathetic state it helps to shift your home environment from survival mode to one of connection, healing, and safety through play, through silliness. Not only does this benefit your children so much, but it also benefits you because in today's society, even, adults who are single. Adults who are happily married, adults who are happily co-parenting with another parent who loves their children. Life is just so hectic. Expectations are so high for parents, for adults that we oftentimes forget to inject playfulness into our daily, weekly lives. What playfulness creates. It builds deep parent child trust. It strengthens secure attachment, develops emotional resilience in our children. Increases joy and drastically decreases anxiety, stress and overwhelm. Helps kid regulate their nervous systems. Now, any contact with an abusive person, be it parent or partner. Disregulates people, especially children. And so every touchpoint your children have with their abusive parent really wrecks havoc on their nervous system. And so your job as a protective parent oftentimes means managing this dysregulation, helping them co-regulate into that parasympathetic state. And it reminds them that this home. Is safe, loving, and fun, that they can be who they are. They can just be children. They don't have to worry about adult issues. They don't have to worry about your emotions. They don't have to manage the temperature in this home, right? You are the adult. You are their leader, and you're allowing them to just be kids. The reality of post-separation abuse not only affects the adults. IE you, the protective parent, but it also impacts our children. So children are often walking on eggshells in their other home. That's the reality. They're afraid to express emotions because they're being conditioned by their other parent in their other home to suppress any opinion, emotion, feeling, belief. What? Desire, need, passion, love, in order to get by, they become hyper independent, hypervigilant, and overly compliant. They become parentified and enmeshed. They become confused by the different rules, expectations, values, morals, ethics, and temperatures of each house. When you intentionally inject your home with more playfulness, you are giving them permission to be messy, to be silly. To be children, to be age appropriate, to be real, you are taking away their conditioned response to be more mature. How many of you have heard from, teachers, caregivers, a, whoever that your children is so mature for their age? Yeah, that's trauma. Trauma does that for children. They learn that they can not just be kids. That's not acceptable. They can't be heard. They can just be seen but not heard. And so your parenting, your house provides them with the opportunity to let down their hair, exhale deeply, put their shoulders down from up around their ears and just be kids. Your home becomes their soft place. Play communicates to your children that you are loved, that you matter here. That I actually enjoy you, that your feelings and quirks are welcome. This is the antithesis of every message they get from their other parent where they learn that they are not loved. That love there is transactional and conditional based on what they do. And I use the word loved with quotations'cause I really don't believe that abuse and love can coexist. They learn that they don't matter. Their needs don't matter. Their wants don't matter. Their opinions, beliefs and feelings, they do not matter. They quickly learn that this parent does not enjoy them. They only tolerate them when they do what they want them to do, the underlying message is that your feelings, your uniqueness are not welcome in this house. So your home becomes the antidote to this toxicity. It is the antithesis of all of this horribly unhealthy parenting. And I use the word parenting with quotes when it comes to a narcissistic counter parent. And these messages are like armor against psychological, emotional. And mental manipulation and abuse that they'll receive outside in the world, right? Our children are going to experience this type of emotional manipulation from several people in their lives, be it coworkers, be it, romantic partners, platonic friends, bosses, and they are definitely going to experience this with their narcissistic parent. Okay, now many of you are probably like Chantel, how can I do this? I'm already running on fumes. I'm exhausted. I don't have anymore gas left in my tank. And I get that because abuse is exhausting. Post-separation abuse feels like endless barrage of manipulation, abuse, chaos, and confusion always flung at you when you least expect it. It's relentless and you are more than likely running on fumes, possibly even isolated. You don't have the right support. You may oftentimes be lacking the financial resources to take care of yourself, get extra support in your home, and also pay for things, right? So here are ways to add playfulness into your home that really do not. Take a lot of time, energy, take extra bandwidth from you or require any kind of financial investment. I want you to keep things simple, right? We live in a society where we look to Pinterest and we look to Instagram, and we see these lavish experiences, right? People's highlight reels of their perfect homes, their perfect parenting. That's bullshit. Most people don't live like that, and those people who do live like that can. Pretty much guarantee that they're not super happy people, that it's just for Instagram, right? It's for the likes, clicks, engagement. You do not have to compete with that, right? Playful doesn't mean elaborate activities. It means a lightened emotional atmosphere. This is the gift that keeps on giving something your child never gets in the other home, even if their parent. In the other home, is the Disney parent does all the quote unquote fun things. Disney World, Disneyland, all inclusive trips, ski vacations, right? This looks like Instagram perfection. But even those fun opportunities, those fun experiences and adventures are super, super stressful, anxiety inducing, and they are very dysregulating. Just because they're in a beautiful place doesn't mean this parent changes their behavior. They're oftentimes just as controlling critical, manipulative, abusive inside their home or on a beach in Mexico. Shared laughter also means moments of connection. This creates core memories for your children. Children don't remember. Where you go, they don't remember what you give them for gifts. What they do remember is how you make them feel. How they feel when they walk in your door. Our bodies pick up energy long before our rational brains are able to actually compute, right? So with people who are respectful and loving our bodies, feel relaxed and safe with people who are controlling our shoulders, go up our stomach, flip flops. Our heart starts to race. Our palms start to sweat. Our body does not lie. Even five minutes a day, every other day, whenever you have the extra, this matters, it actually counts. So for those days when you have energy and creativity is bounding and you just have the extra bandwidth, here are some higher energy ideas. Dance party in the kitchen. You can do freeze dance, build a blanket for it with movies, right? Kids love that kind of stuff. Even my older children like to build forts. And you can do special snacks, whatever you have on the pantry. If you have the bandwidth to create something with them or by yourself, do that. Or they can walk to the store and get themselves or with you if they're too young to go by themselves. Their own special treat. Obstacle course in the living room. Our expert therapist this week inside of the collective, talked about the floor's lava, and I think that's such a fun idea, right? These are low effort, really. It doesn't take a whole lot of effort and it certainly doesn't cost you any money, but these are like abilities for your children, times for your children to just be silly, to just play and have fun. A Yes. Night or a Yes Day or a yes Morning or a yes Afternoon. A yes Weekend based on the movie, I think it's called Yes Day. Where Kids Within Boundaries, we have reasons, right? There's like certain boundaries in terms of what they can spend, where you can go, where they get to choose everything. And I can. Stress. This enough. Children who are being coercively controlled lose their ability to control stuff in the other home. They have zero control, just like you did when you were partnered with this person, right? You have zero control over anything, and this gives your kids a modicum of control. Makes them feel in charge. It makes them feel important like they matter because in your home, your kids truly do matter. Hide and seek even teens like this. And if you don't have a lot of space, or you have younger children, some of the members inside the collective this week talked about hiding something. And you can do this as a team, right? Remember in your house, you also wanna foster connection between siblings if you have more than one child, because in the other home. It's very unlikely that children grow up to be close when they have a narcissistic parent. Why? Because from an early age, they're all competing for the breadcrumbs of attention and affection. This parent strategically and intentionally doles out when it's convenient for them, and so you can't be connected to someone that you're competing with a parent's affection for. So in your home. Try to create playfulness that also builds teamwork on those days where you are tapped out. But you would like to do something for your children, not only for your children, but remember, this is also for you because when you get into the silliness, it really just unlocks parts of you that you didn't even know were locked. It really helps to heal parts of you that you didn't know still needed healing. So for the exhausted, overwhelmed, stressed out. Burnt out protective parent. You can have silly voice conversations. You can start it. They can start it. They can lead. You can even create stories like this where they say one line and then you say another line. It doesn't have to be long. Two or three minutes, five minutes, you have extra energy. It doesn't have to be crazy card games in bed. It's a place where you don't typically expect to play a game or you could do it in a fort that you've built, or on the kitchen floor. It can be Uno Go Fish, trivia sticker attack. For younger kids, you lie down because you're tired and they get to decorate you with stickers. I've also seen, you know that picture of the parent who's lying down with a T-shirt, and if you feel like it, you can draw like. Roads on this t-shirt and your kids take cars or trucks and they drive them all over you. It's kinda like you're getting a massage. It might actually make you like giggle, and it certainly will give your kids the opportunity to be silly and playful. Lip sync without getting up the wrong word game, where you purposely say the wrong word and let them correct you again. It's the gift that keeps on giving because there is no way. An abusive parent will ever not be right, will ever allow their children to correct them. Children quickly learn that this parent is put on a pedestal and you must worship them. You must thank them for everything they do because they are the perfect, the smartest person in the room at any given time. So if you're imperfect, if you allow them to correct you in a silly, playful way, you give them another gift. Two minute joke challenge where you're just trying to, come up with silly jokes. You can even Google them. You each google your own jokes and, or they can be riddles. My kids love riddles. You can try to do riddles together. Now, while you're doing this, your body is resting, but connection is still happening. Silliness is still happening, playfulness is still happening. Your children. Gets to experience childhood in a stress-free, safe, and fun way. Now, for those teens deserve more, play too. Even teens who, live in healthy homes, either with a happily married, parents or who you know, live in a divorced setting with two happy co-parents. Teens in this day and age are forced to be adults and far more mature because of social media, I think. And so let's give our kids the opportunity, our teenage kids, the opportunity to also be silly and playful, and you're meeting your teens where they are, right? So this might look like meme review nights where you guys review memes together on the couch in your Jimmy Jams while eating popcorn and having their favorite drink. Sushi or pick whatever is their favorite food dinner picnic on the floor, right? You can put out a blanket in the kitchen floor, the living room, and just eat their favorite foods while asking them fun questions. Would you rather questions? Video game nights where they coach you on their favorite video game. Doesn't have to be something that you like, but what this shows your teams is that you care about them enough to be immersed in their world and they get to teach you something. Drive through dessert adventures where you guys pick some drive through places close to you, and if you have a team that drives, they can drive and you order one dessert in each place and you all share them in the car, you can write tiktoks together, but they have the final say again. You're meeting them where they need to be met with things that interest them play is respect for who they are and who they're becoming. Some trauma sensitive notes. Your children may in fact feel guilty for having fun. They might struggle to relax because they're hypervigilant and they're being forced to be far more mature than their years. They might be. Again, hypervigilant and waiting for the other shoe to drop. Because even if the other home does quote unquote fun things like those fun adventures to Disneyland or all-inclusive resorts, they're high stress, high anxiety. They might appear to be fun and be disguised or sold to something fun, but that parent still is controlling everybody in those dynamics no matter where they are, be it their house or. A resort in Costa Rica. That's okay. Keep the door open. Softly playfulness is an invitation, not a demand, and keep revisiting it in a very gentle, low pressure manner. Remember, as protective parents, we believe in high love, low pressure. It's the opposite of what the other house is doing. Where there is high pressure, low love. So as a protective parent, you already have the weight of the world on your shoulders, and you already have so much to navigate. I know. I see you. I understand. So I want you to release the pressure. You don't have to be the entertainment committee. You don't have to be a Pinterest perfect parent. We don't need that. That's not realistic for the average parent, let alone a protective parent. You don't always have to be upbeat and energetic. In fact, it's important for our children to see us, in the whole gamut of every emotion and feeling. Hopefully they're positive ones, but if they're not, if you get angry or you're impatient or you lose the plot and you yell, you repair in a genuine way. Something they never get with their other parent. Kids don't need, quote unquote, a fun parent. What they do need is a parent who is safe enough. To laugh with, really laugh with not those posed Instagram pictures where the children look perfect and they're all smiling, but their eyes are dead. The smile does not actually reach their eyes in your house. They get to snort when they laugh, they get to belly roll. They actually get to just be kids. So in homes affected by narcissistic abuse. You are the antidote to that toxicity. You are the normalizer for the abnormal behavior that happens. You are the safe space when the other house is unsafe, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, psychologically, sometimes physically. Every giggle you create builds emotional armor for your children. Repairs what the narcissistic parent tries to destroy. And shapes who they become long term. I never want you to, for a single second, doubt the impact of your presence, your engagement, even when it's low energy on your children, on their development, on them thriving. On them becoming the kind of adults that you want them to become on them. Understanding what real love looks like, feels and sounds like you truly have so much more power than you're probably even aware of right now in this instant, I guarantee it. And so on those days where you have low energy, do low energy activities. On days that you have more energy, invest more time and energy into those days, but try to create more opportunities for your children to experience childhood that is full of silliness and playfulness and laughter. Because abuse and abusers and abuse of parents really rob their victims of the ability to find humor in life, to be playful, to be silly. Don't forget that you are exactly what your children need to not only survive this, but to thrive through this. Thank you so much for listening to The Survivor's Playbook. If today's episode helped you feel less alone, more confident, more empowered, and more educated, please share it with others who might need it. And if you are ready for deeper support, you can join my monthly membership or grab free tools and resources on my website. All links to these are in the show notes. Remember, your clarity is your power. Your calm is your resistance. You are not crazy. You are not alone, and you are not powerless. Until next time, keep going. I see you.