The CALM Parent - with Katie McKenna

You did the work to understand your childhood – so why do you react in ways you swore you never would?

The CALM Parent is for the parent who had to grow up too fast — and knows exactly which parent they don't want to become.

The roles were reversed – your parents were the ones who needed regulating, but you were the one who had to do it.

This is how it ends with you.

Katie McKenna is an Accredited Psychotherapist, Author of the Sunday Times Bestseller 'You're Not The Problem', Host of 'Beyond Survival' - The Therapy Podcast, creator of The CALM Method, and Mother of four.

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The CALM Parent - with Katie McKenna

Trailer

August 21, 2026 • Katie McKenna

0:00 | 3:16

This isn't going to be another podcast handing you scripts written for someone who had a calm parent to copy.

In this trailer, Katie McKenna — psychotherapist, mother of four, and author of You're Not the Problem — introduces The C.A.L.M. Parent: the podcast for the version of you that's not calm, not regulated, and sick of being told it's about willpower.

Three minutes on the gap between knowing who you don't want to be and knowing what to do instead — and why this podcast starts with you, not your kid.

The CALM Parent is for the parent who had to grow up too fast — and knows exactly which parent they don't want to become.

The roles were reversed – your parents were the ones who needed regulating, but you were the one who had to do it.

This is how it ends with you.

SPEAKER_00 0:00

A lot of parents I work with know which parent they don't want to be. But the truth is that they were never shown what to do. And a lot of parents can swing completely the other way and can end up overdoing, over-functioning, over-emphizing for their kid. And so this is the reason why I wanted to make this podcast. This is the reason why I wrote the CAM method. When you grow up in hypervigilance, when you grow up in trauma, your fears are different than somebody that grows up in CAM. If you're waking up dreading the day, if you're dreading bedtime, if you're dreading asking your child something, I want to be able to name that dread and then to go deeper to reduce that dread because this is what we bring to our kids. This is what our kids notice and this is what they feel. And in the same way that there's a predictable pattern of behavior for the child if they grow up in a dysfunctional family system, there's a predictable pattern of behavior, then how we will parent. And I think the shame and the guilt can silence parents because they're so scared to admit the thoughts, the feelings that they have or what they're struggling with. And especially for the child that's grown up in dysfunction, because any sound or semblance or tone that I may sound like my narcissistic parent, it can put the parent into even more shame. So these are the things that I want to name on the podcast. These are the real life situations that I want to talk about, the real life power battles and power struggles that a lot of parents don't even realize that they're in. And what's different as well with this podcast is that the focus is not solely going to be on your child. This is going to be about you. This is going to be about you and your needs. And I want to know, are you able to identify them? Do you know what your needs are? If you do know, do you express them or do you feel guilty? I wonder when was the last time that you had fun? Is that something that you prioritize? Is that something that you do often? Or is that something that you plan to do, but something always that's just more important gets in the way and you're not able to do that? Or is that this something that you don't even prioritize? Because even the thoughts of putting yourself first makes you feel too guilty and you're not able to do that. I wonder what your relationship is with rest. When was the last time that you were able to take time just for yourself to sit down? And are you able to do that? Are you able to sit down and chill? Or do you think that you have to finish everything first before you're able to sit down? Reducing your baseline. So now you have more capacity when your kid doesn't listen or does the really frustrating thing, that you have more capacity to deal with it. And by dealing with it, this is not about letting them away with it. This is not about capitulating. This is not about passive parenting at all. This is about that you are in your adult space, that you are regulated, that you know exactly what's your responsibility and theirs, so that you can parent from that place, so that you can hold that limit with them in a calm place, and that this is not up for negotiation. It's about working with your nervous system instead of against it, so that you're able to operate from a place of calm and be able to operate knowing those fears and work with your own nervous system and to be able to trust your responses and not let fear take over and operate from that.