In Episode 274 of our “May Month in Review,” we revisit Episode 272 on “Co-parenting in Divorce,” discussing ideal co-parenting goals, managing children when the ex-partner isn’t ideal, and knowing when to lean on legal processes, emphasizing self-recovery, self-care, and maintaining consistency with children. Finally, we review Episode 273 on the “Love and Logic” parenting approach, focusing on creating a high-structure environment with minimal power struggles and the importance of strong relationships in parenting.
Tune in to see May Month in Review Through a Therapist’s Eyes.
Links referenced during the show:
https://www.throughatherapistseyes.com/category/podcasts/monthinreview
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https://open.spotify.com/artist/3isWD3wykFcLXPUmBzpJxg
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Episode #274 Transcription
Chris Gazdik: [00:00:00] No, this is Through a Therapist’s Eyes with the May month in review. We are on May the 30th, 2014, and you’re going to be hearing us talk about the two shows that we did because we were getting caught up on all the shows that we did he say
Adam Cloninger: 2014? Did I hear him say that right? Did I say 14? I think you did.
Did he say 2014? I think he did.
Chris Gazdik: 2024. Okay. I know what year it is. I know who the president is. I know that, I know I could do serial sevens. Those are the things we do for, for mental status exam. Anyway now I’m all, all out of whack, Adam. Sorry. This is Adam Cloninger who hangs out with us at the end of the month.
How are you, sir? I’m good. Hope you are. I am now. It’s 2024. All right. And Neil Robinson outside of the. Curtain see it hangs out with us. How are you, sir?
Neil Robinson: I’m fantastic. Feeling a lot better.
Chris Gazdik: Welcome here. Yeah. You were sick. Yep. Y’all recovered, huh?
Neil Robinson: Yep. Me and my youngest 104. 5 fever.
Chris Gazdik: And you saw a whole, a whole season of [00:01:00] what on Netflix?
Nope, nothing. I slept. I pretty much slept for four days. Oh my gosh. So through a therapist eyes where you get Insights about therapy mental health and substance abuse but not being the delivery of therapy services in any way Got that book coming out volume two on marriage real soon very soon Super excited about that Subscribe to us click the buttons give us the five stars all that kind of stuff helps us out a lot Find us on apple iTunes, not iTunes, Apple Podcast, Spotify, all those good places.
Contact it through therapistize. com, where you email us. We do the YouTube lives on Thursday, which we’re on now. Listen, this is the human emotional experience, which we do endeavor to figure out together. Special thanks to Note we say from time to time, should probably all the time, but that intro music that you got come from Reed Ferguson, we’re still appreciative of him, he’ll come to
your party if you’re local here, and play for you, he’s an awesome musician, he created that intro for us, but he spells his name weird, R E [00:02:00] I D T.
F E R G U S O N dot com. So find them out. Readferguson. com. Appreciate you, Reed, for doing that. Creating it for us. And Neil, we’re all caught up on all the shows and everything, right? Everything’s published. Everything’s out. All the
Neil Robinson: podcasts are scheduled and everything’s packed and rolling.
Chris Gazdik: Tuesday mornings are the release days.
Yep. And we’re going to be Hopefully like clockwork for the rest of the year. Yep,
Neil Robinson: as long as my battery doesn’t die.
Chris Gazdik: Yes, don’t let the batteries die. Alright, let’s roll in with it. So if you’re new to the month in reviews, we review the months that we did of this, or the shows that we did of this month, and really we get to kind of some new content with it too, stuff we didn’t get to, so that’s one of the reasons why I enjoy that.
The love and logic show, especially that we did, I got stuff that we didn’t even get to. So it’d be good to go back and check that out because you’re going to get a introduce introduction to the love and logic, which is. A part of what I call the trifecta three big things in mental health that I use regularly emotion focused therapy [00:03:00] dave ramsey’s financial peace university, especially for couples and marriages and then The parenting love and logic we’ll take a dive into that So on the month in reviews we go down the rabbit hole with adam.
It’s always entertaining interesting scary sometimes. How would you qualify this one Mr. Clonager? Is this scary? Nah,
Adam Cloninger: nah, I really gotta come up with another better one. Cause I haven’t had any really good ones lately. So this is a weak one? This, I say it’s, well, I mean it’s an interesting one. It’s just not, it’s just not the, you know, one that’s gonna make you do the Whoa, whoa, nothing like that, so.
Chris Gazdik: What you got? Down the rabbit hole. Here we go.
Adam Cloninger: Something for you, Chris. You know, you said this endeavor to figure this thing out together. Yes, sir. I asked that from now on, when you’re
doing your sessions, that you say that, but you need to have a thing that you add to it. Okay. You need to make sure you tell people they need to say something in effect that It’s important for you to believe that we’re going to figure this thing out together and it’s going to get better The reason i’m saying that okay [00:04:00]
Chris Gazdik: is because and i’ll just comment there.
Yes It’s interesting that you say that because honestly, you know therapy is such a unique thing between science And then the artistic side of what we do and so I actually do have a spiel So if you convince me here, I haven’t added to my spiel for like five years But in the first session with me, I say a spiel and it, and it lays things out on like what to expect, how this works, what to expect for me, that sort of thing.
And so I kind of do say that, but not, but do you really beat in the fact
Adam Cloninger: that they really need to believe it’s going to get better? I mean, Maybe you will after you hear this. Okay, what’s up? Okay, so there’s an article from CNN, and it’s about I’m gonna read part of it. Symptoms of nine mental health disorders substantially improved under a placebo treatment according to a new review of 90 randomized controlled trials, known as the meta meta analysis.
It’s totaled [00:05:00] 9, 985 adults. They’re between 30 40 years old. Mainly
Chris Gazdik: just explain a meta analysis. So the listening audience will know like is in the research world, which I don’t do a lot in the research world, but you have to have some science behind what we do, of course, that is basically, they take like.
You know, as many research projects as they can find, they analyze all of them together, pull them all together and get summary statements and stuff. So that’s like a, a meta analysis of the topic that you’re studying. That’s what a meta analysis is.
Adam Cloninger: Okay. So just so you’ll know the disorders they had, they had I think, I think I said nine disorders.
Anyway, this is the ones that were included in the study. A major depressive disorder, mania, schizophrenia, OCD. Which I should say, we should have, should have did
Chris Gazdik: the basics. Obsessive compulsive
Adam Cloninger: disorder, attention deficit, hyper hyperactive disorder,
Chris Gazdik: ADHD,
Adam Cloninger: panic disorder, post traumatic stress disorder, and social social phobia.
Chris Gazdik: [00:06:00] Okay.
Adam Cloninger: Okay. So basically in this study, they gave some people tablets, right? And the results showed that a lot of people got better. So that’s why I’m saying in your spiel, need to make sure that people actually It’s important for them to know they have to believe they’re going to get better. This is going to work.
Chris Gazdik: So it’s, it’s, it’s interesting. You know, I wish Victoria were here actually to talk about this in, in sort of, you know, being younger in the field and understanding, I mean, so I do do that and, and, but I do it in a different way. Well, the way I kind of lay it out as a part of my, my spiel on what to expect with therapy is, is that, you know, what’s behind some of what I say is you’ve got to understand.
On session number one young therapist listening, you know, it’s not a sales pitch But there has to be an understanding that we really can figure this out together, which I have said in sessions many times It’s not just allowing [00:07:00] to say on the show because we there’s no immediate answers, but that, that, that, that there are things that we know about mental health.
There are remedies that can help us not remedy the problem, meaning take your bipolar away, but remedies and tools about how do we manage these things. And so if you go away from the first session thinking, this dude can’t help me. We’re not going to have a second session. So it’s kind of like, we need to make sure that we understand that not as a placebo, but just as a reality based, yes, there are.
Responses to depression. Yes, there really are ways to manage your OCD. There really are ways to be mindful and get in the moment when you, even though you have ADHD, which takes your mind to the 20 different directions. And so hopefully by the end of that first session, there is some semblance, some sense of hope, and I’ll tell you this even further.
Simply by talking about it, simply by being honest about it, getting that out of your system. Often times, the very nature of doing [00:08:00] that, it’s the opposite of where you begin. Because it’s terrifying to come to a therapy session the first time. It is very overwhelming and difficult. And by the time that you’re done, done.
Hopefully it’s like, wow, that wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be. This is manageable. This can be okay. Like maybe there is key word. You do want to play with the idea that there’s hope here. So I hope you never have a first therapy session with me and don’t leave there realizing there’s, you know, I’m not going to be perfect.
There’s not an immediate answer. I can’t take my bipolar or whatever else away. But we can talk about ways to manage this. There, there really is hope with substance abuse, addictions and everything else we deal with. So I think I’ve got that covered a little bit, man. Okay. Do you, what did you think about the placebo
Adam Cloninger: effect?
That was the next thing I was going to ask you about. I was gonna say, what do you think about the, I mean, I understand it was a clinical trial, but what, how do you feel about doing placebo effect and actual. Treatment. It happens. [00:09:00] All
Chris Gazdik: the time. I mean, you know, for a mental
Adam Cloninger: order.
Chris Gazdik: Absolutely. Listen, the mind is a powerful, powerful thing.
If you think you’re doing something to improve your situation by very nature of that hopefulness, you will be feeling better. But
Adam Cloninger: in this study,
Chris Gazdik: they gave him
Adam Cloninger: appeal.
Chris Gazdik: Well, well, that’s fine. You can give a pill. I can give you a book. I can tell you there’s a powerful Ted talk that I saw that helped people understand about weight loss.
There were, they took, they took a control group. And gave them a read off of a scene and then they took an intervention group. All of these people were house cleaners and they gave the house cleaners that were in the intervention group information about what they’re literally doing in their job. All of these house cleaners have been doing their job as they were people that were given the regular talk The control group did not lose any more weight The people that were in the intervention group that were given the [00:10:00] information simply information that said hey, you’re working out all day long Began to literally lose weight.
The, the power of positive thinking is a book that I read when I was a kid by Norman Vincent pale, and it was very influential because literally the way that you think about things dictates how you physically heal your body in medical interventions. Heart attacks, blood pressure, all of that stuff.
Tension, headaches, and all. If you begin to think positively, it powerfully, literally, physically changes your body. Neurologically, neuromolecularly, all of that. It’s crazy stuff. This sounds like another episode you can have. I mean Have you done one on that
Adam Cloninger: before? Anything like that?
Chris Gazdik: No, actually, not. The power of positive thinking.
Make a mental note, Neil. We, we will do on that. There’s, there’s a lot to that. So this isn’t as much a rabbit hole as much as it is like, yeah, understand what we’re doing with cognitive behavioral therapy, reframing your thoughts. That inherently [00:11:00] shows massive, measurable impact on your levels of depression, on your levels of anxiety, on your manic episodes, everything else.
It’s, it’s, it’s wild. Yeah, we, we know this about psychology because it’s been well studied. Placebos are same thing with medical. I mean, you’re less likely to have a heart attack taking a sugar pill. If you think it’s an interventive pill, you won’t have as many heart attacks. It’s it’s, it’s a, it’s a known thing.
It’s not a small or it’s not a large percentage. It’s a smaller percentage, something like 7 percent improvement or something with the placebo effect. But, but it happens across the board with all medical, everything.
Neil Robinson: Well, was that a shock for you, Adam?
Adam Cloninger: I thought it was surprising that they were using it for mental health.
Cause, in my mind, you have to be real cautious about that. I mean It’s things could get worse. Depending on what kind of mental condition they have. I mean, they could be psychotic or whatever, and [00:12:00] maybe they actually do need some kind of medication, but they’re given a placebo instead. Well, I mean, I think
Neil Robinson: that’s the benefit of like having it to be a controlled group so you can see what’s going on, right?
You know, you look at those, that’s what happens in
Chris Gazdik: the research world.
Neil Robinson: Well, and then it also goes back to the idea of like how many people need medication and they, they don’t think it’s working for them, so they stop taking, then it gets worse versus. People taking placebos thinking it’s working and they actually get better.
It’s still that same idea. The negative thought versus the positive thoughts, right?
Chris Gazdik: It’s a powerful, powerful reality. Good point. I didn’t think about that. So a shout out to Jack. Jack says, absolutely. He had fun on Memorial day. My question to you, Jack, is how do you know that? No questions asked. Neil’s just got a big smile.
We
Neil Robinson: were just talking about his kid’s soccer games. Yeah, his, his kid got done with his first soccer season. Oh, really? And so, I’m glad to see that his kid actually had a great time on soccer. You know? That’s awesome. As a parent, it’s all about like, we didn’t win any. It’s like, but we scored one goal. It’s like, but the kid had [00:13:00] fun.
Absolutely. And that’s, that’s the goal I think when, when you do those things. Particularly
Chris Gazdik: on that. So I got a current event that I wanted to go at as well, literally coming to work yesterday. I listened to a science versus episode as one of the podcasts that I listened to and I thought it was interesting.
Adam, I was actually going to suggest maybe we do this as the rabbit hole because so you got two for your book, I guess today guys. The, the, I didn’t see the date that it was published on there, Neil, but I’ve got it on the show notes.
Science versus. Recently published is the way I put it because I didn’t know the date.
I think it was like literally yesterday though Introducing science versus ozempic. Is it scarier than we thought? Do you know what ozempic is? Really? You haven’t seen the commercials. I’ve heard it. Oh, it’s quite the rave man. All of these Medications have come out injectable medications for weight loss Okay, and there are a few different types of these going out And [00:14:00] they did a science versus on it about a year ago because it was like all the rave, like who doesn’t want to buy something that makes you lose weight.
You’re right. And, and there’s, there’s lots of concerns about it because basically. What it’s engaging is the hormone system that controls hunger. So it’s kind of a hunger suppressant, but it’s had dramatic results of weight loss. Okay, so the concerns that have been raised lately, you could say, quote unquote, fear mongering, are that it’s really being now found that it’s been prescribed much more, causing muscle loss as much as weight loss.
Also, suicidality is being found as increased also gut troubles and like your stomach being paralyzed. So, so as with all medicines, it’s a, it’s a, it’s a big,
Adam Cloninger: long list of stuff that can happen. Yeah. Well,
Chris Gazdik: it’s the benefits versus the [00:15:00] risks. You weigh the benefits and what it does for you and the risks that it creates for you or the unintended consequences.
That’s the whole realm of medicine. So, have you heard about this, Neil? Ozympic and the weight loss rave going on? It was a
Neil Robinson: big thing with a lot of celebrities and stuff like that, yeah. Yeah. I haven’t heard about that. Now, the interesting thing about it is, there’s a lawsuit already out about it, so it’s kind of crazy how fast it went from a miracle drug to a lawsuit.
Like, that’s, that’s kind of crazy. Money will do that in
Adam Cloninger: a heartbeat.
Neil Robinson: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Cass, by the way, is agreeing. Like, you know, Oh, I love what you said, Cass. I’m coming to that, girl. So yes, ma’am. But she says, yes,
the power of thinking affects your life in so many ways. And it is, it really is a powerful reality.
But the, your second comment is reserved for a moment. So What do you think science versus is a cool show because they really take it’s
Adam Cloninger: a podcast
Chris Gazdik: it’s a podcast science [00:16:00] versus I love the show my buddy Adrian turned me on to it and they they cover science They take you know published articles and you know You know, answer questions that are all normal questions that people really have.
They’ve done so many different topics and it’s a fun little show, but it’s science based. So what do you think they found as they looked at their most recent studies on a Zempik with these problems that are totally, I mean, people are talking about suicide and, you know, losing muscle and all this kind of stuff.
Like, do you think they found, like, oh, this is not good or,
Adam Cloninger: yeah, this is fine? I would be willing to bet that a lot of the symptoms they’re complaining about, they would have had anyway.
Neil Robinson: I’m sure that they’ve probably, it’s probably not as widespread as they probably make it seem to be. The fear? Yeah, well the, well the symptoms, like they’re not as, probably not as bad as they seem. When you look at probably how many people take Ozempic is probably what they’re probably finding in their results.[00:17:00]
Chris Gazdik: So it was interesting because they, they took, you know, randomized controlled studies I believe, which is the creme de la creme in the academia world. I won’t get into what that looks like and what that’s about because it’ll take too long, but good studies that they, that really began to show that, contrary to suicidality, they were shocked when they studied through this and found less likelihood.
Of suicidality in people on a Zempik, which was very surprising to them. They thought they would confirm that yes, there is some impact on depression levels or there was negligible or no impact. And, but they actually found that there might be some anti depressant capabilities, which was like, I wonder if that
Adam Cloninger: could be because of the effect of losing weight though.
Chris Gazdik: Well, exactly. Like, you know, they
Adam Cloninger: feel better about themselves. Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: and, and you feel physically better, and you’re healthier, and you’re fit. Yeah, that, that, that’s some of what I thought, Adam, as well. I don’t know if we have an answer on that yet, but bottom line, seems to [00:18:00] be suicidal decrease, which
Adam Cloninger: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: I don’t know.
Also, and I’m curious, Neil, you’re, well, you’re both all into health and all. Did you know that when you lose weight, you have a high percentage of muscle loss? Yes. as well as fat loss. Like that’s a thing. Yeah, you can. So you have to be very purposeful about particular weight training, resistance training to build your muscles up or to keep them up because you’re losing when you lose weight, both fat and muscle.
And muscle all the time. Like it’s, it’s a pretty universal thing.
Adam Cloninger: Well, that’s like bodybuilders. I get through cycles.
Chris Gazdik: Well,
Adam Cloninger: Ray bolt cut Ray.
Neil Robinson: Did you know that Neil, that you lose weight yet?
Adam Cloninger: Yeah.
Neil Robinson: Yeah. Cause yeah. When you lose weight, your body’s looking for any calories it can find. You know, if you, if you’re doing.
If you’re not eating enough or something like that, it’s going to find what it can find. So whether it’s going to be fat or muscle, you’re going to do it. That’s why it’s really important. Like you stated, you still lift weights. You still do resistance exercises. If you just do pure cardio, that’s [00:19:00] why say you look at someone who’s training for a marathon.
When they first start, they might start running, you know, just to lose some weight. Well, by the time they train for three, six months, they’re nothing like they were. They’re a lot skinnier because their body is just trying to find fuel, which means they It’s muscles. It’s, you know, first it’s fat, then it goes muscle and go through that whole process.
So yeah, your body’s going to just use what it can for fuel if you’re not feeding it.
Chris Gazdik: I’m smiling because I just heard my buddy Dan Kovacevic on DK sports for Pittsburgh sports, another podcast I love to listen to. And he said that these guys that he came across in the recent times being inducted into Pittsburgh’s hall of fame type things.
We’re talking about major, huge linemen, totally being slimmed down because they’re way into yoga. Like their whole body structure is like thin runners now. And they were like bulked up three 50 muscle, you know, offensive, defensive Latin men, like, wow. So is, so there’s hope for me, [00:20:00] Neil, basically.
Neil Robinson: Yes. You just have to work out more
Chris Gazdik: and start yoga.
I’m not doing horrible. The thing that with Ozempic is, though, they, they found very much a whole lot of stuff with the digestion track. So, stomachs shutting down. They did nuclear isotopes in food, watching it with special cameras go through the digestion track. And people that are on Ozempic, Stomach’s digestion system, all told, is like double or triple or even worse, slower.
So, if you have a surgical procedure and you’re on a Zempik, that’s some of the problems. complicated circumstance, Adam, as you pointed out, there’s other factors that this really creates a problem because though you fasted because they don’t want you throwing up and whatnot while you’re under anesthesia, you still had food in their system.
They were finding with cameras and stuff. So also to the point that your stomach can [00:21:00] literally shut down, like get paralyzed. Also they would find and they Made a big funny gobble about this. What did they call it? I forget what they call it. Basically like when you eat, sometimes the food doesn’t break down in your stomach, just like a food processor.
They were talking about like the, the kale that is clunked up in your food processor when you made a smoothie. You ever, you ever make a smoothie and
have clumps of stuff that just didn’t get to the blades? Well, that clump of food is literally clumped up slimy and solid in your stomach. And they have to surgically remove it to get it out.
Or, actually, they said you could use Coke. I don’t know, they, they went crazy off the rails with this. But, bottom line, your digestive tract is like really pretty at risk, if not wrecked. So I don’t know. Where does this take you? It was just so clarify you
Adam Cloninger: meant Coca Cola, correct? Yeah, I was, I took
Neil Robinson: me a second to
Adam Cloninger: just so everybody will know.
He meant Coca Cola cocaine, but [00:22:00]
Chris Gazdik: if you want to lose weight, thank you for the cocaine. It’ll get you going. That’s for sure. So, so what, what does that land you at? I mean, Ozempic is quite the rage, man. It’s a big deal right now.
Adam Cloninger: It’s kind of like the placebo thing. As long as this, you know, monitor Bob. A good physician, man, I see no problem with it.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Yeah, I, I think for me, Cass stole my thunder. She’s got more to say. So expensive that the average person can hardly pay for it. Yeah, there’s insurance, there’s medical stuff. But you stole my thunder when you said, Leave your hormone system alone. That is uncharted area. It’s uncharted territory. I am so reserved about this as well.
You know, our hormone system is so much not understood. It is all over the place. We have hormones that control your heart rate and everything. Like, it is, it’s dealing with a system, Neal, that I just feel like we’re ignorant [00:23:00] about. I don’t want nobody messing with them. I don’t know. I’m so scared about
Adam Cloninger: that.
We already have other things that’s changing our hormones anyway.
Neil Robinson: But to purposely do it makes it kind of kind of crazy when you look at those processes. And, and we’ve talked about it before. It’s like you change one small piece of your hormone and then that showed that changes has such a ripple ripple effect in your body.
You know, my wife talked about she had thyroid issues and it was like maybe she didn’t get up to iodine, but then she found out it could have been because something else wasn’t processing. Like there’s all these things that your hormone system, your endocrine system just, They’re so, each part is so important that when you change one thing, Oh, man.
you don’t know what’s gonna happen. No clue.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, it, it, it makes me very, very weird. I just want way more information about all of it. I mean, I want to be all controversial and crazy with it. It’s a whole nother rabbit hole. Adam, but you know the whole transgender stuff that’s going on, you know, the hormone replacement with with [00:24:00] menopause and we’ve talked about that on the show men have Massive hormone changes when we get older as well.
Like it is a it is a crazy system. So I don’t know that I’m wanting shot up with that stuff, man. I want to
Adam Cloninger: lose my belly, but bull. I kind of a related side note as I was doing my rabbit hole research, I did read an article where they’ve they’ve discovered that since the fifties, Gradually the age where women start having their periods has decreased.
Say that again. The age at which women start having their periods is decreased. Yeah. So gradually it keeps on decreasing
Chris Gazdik: 11 years old, 10 years old. They’re
Adam Cloninger: talking like nine, eight, nine, eight now. Yeah. And then there was and the amount of time it takes for they start having a regular. Has increased, which is really, yeah.
Chris Gazdik: So they’re getting older. They start having menstrual cycles early, early, early, and [00:25:00] it’s not regulated really until later in life. What the heck? That’s really weird, man. Watch what food you eat. Hey, I do research, man. We have a registered dietitian at Metrolina psychotherapy that I want you to meet with because it deals with all this stuff and it’s.
It’s it’s important. Let’s get into our shows guys. So episode 232 72 we did co parenting in divorce And the questions that we were playing around with is is do you know the ideal co parenting goals? How to manage kids when your ex isn’t quote ideal And then when to lean on the legal process when you’re
engaged in this whole deal so Let’s maybe look at a couple of the questions we did.
You know, I got feedback on the show from a couple clients and they were really kind of happy that we took the track of like, Look, here’s the ideal things that we’re looking for when you’re in a divorce situation and trying to co parent your kids. Dot, dot, dot, [00:26:00] dot, dot. And Victoria kind of went down through a segment of that.
But then we moved over to like, okay, here’s the reality though. The reality doesn’t match the ideal very often. That’s just the hard and fast truth of how we’re realistically trying to deal with this such a challenging time in your life and all the transition. It is really hard to be ideal. So what are some of the things that comes to your mind, I guess, when you think of the ideal setup, like what are some of the things that you really want?
Like one kids gets punished at mom’s house, then the same punishment should be at dad’s house. You know, these kinds of things that we’re shooting for. That’s a good one. Right. What are, what are some of the things you come, come across your mind?
Adam Cloninger: The two parents actually communicating, which, you know, it’s an ideal, but.
Chris Gazdik: Right? Coordinated conversation. But that’s sometimes not really It’s tough! Yeah. Your emotions are all involved. You know, Or the ex is just [00:27:00] Nuts. Yeah, you know? Yeah, or the ex is just nuts. Namely, you’re the ex that’s nuts. Not talking bad about the other parent. Like, dude, you gotta be aware of what you’re saying.
Even when you’re talking to your buddies on the phone or, you know, this type of thing. What are you, what are you thinking,
Neil Robinson: Neil? Oh, I’m just thinking about my parents because they got divorced when I was like five and it’s funny because they actually did a good job not really badmouthing the other parent until I like turned like 20 something and then you start finding out like Your mom did this and your dad was this way So I’ve been waiting So, I mean because that’s one thing with my parents, you know Like I said because I they did get divorced when I was younger You know, and they both got remarried shortly afterwards.
So I have, you know, I basically two sets of parents and yeah, no, I, I do, you know, like I said,
Adam Cloninger: Yes, he may have just created a, no, no, no, no. [00:28:00]
Neil Robinson: But I can’t believe you told him that. I didn’t say what they told me, but no, it’s, it’s just funny. The dynamics of the relation when you’re an adult now versus when you’re a kid with your parents, but that’s a whole nother conversation.
But no, I, I think that’s, you know. Priority, you know, kids should be priority. You know, of course there’s communication skills that have to happen or at least some sort of communication, right? I think that’s key. I do like the don’t badmouth you at the other pair because you know, my wife’s a big fan of that because her parents got divorced when she was older and so that’s a whole nother dynamic as when she’s 18 and they get divorced and there’s a whole bunch of, that’s a weird situation.
But yeah, you, As a parent, you don’t badmouth the other parent because that kind of then Oh, it destroys the kid. It kills the authority figure that’s out there as far as that’s concerned. And I think it’s just not good for you to do. Besides,
Adam Cloninger: the other
Neil Robinson: parent would usually
Adam Cloninger: do a good enough job of doing that all by themselves.
Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: exactly. To your point, Adam, and we’re talking about what do we do when the other ex is not ideal, quote unquote. I [00:29:00] have an ironclad belief that I’ve, I’ve put out there and actually somebody told me today, they really appreciated it. It stuck with them. I’m glad it did because you know, when you have back in the eighties and nineties, at least in the States, I imagine around the world, it was, it was pretty similar that the women always seemed to get custody.
The dude had to go to the apartment and sit in the apartment and you get weekends with dad and it’s Disney. You know, we had this phrase, Disney dad. Yeah. You felt like the norm is very changed and, and, but even in that circumstance, when I started, you know, doing mental health work, you know, I was still kind of in that, that, that cultural reality.
And I would, I would tell dads like, look, it, it, it does feel like the kids are being turned against you by this X that’s crazy or negative or all the vitriol they
put out. But the thing is, is in time, Neil, even if one of your parents was. Totally trashing the other one. And the other one was like being, you know, ideal and trying not to do that.
The kid will gravitate towards the [00:30:00] healthy, you know, the mental health parent.
Adam Cloninger: It might take a while. They’re going to start figuring out. Yeah, they’ll see it. They’ll
Chris Gazdik: see it. So stay consistent, but you really got to be long term. I know people are acting all kinds of crazy when they’re in a divorce circumstance that will play out.
It’s just tough in the moment because it feels like you’re being destroyed by the other parent, and I, man, I’ve, I’ve seen that situation, and I tell you what, stop it if you’re being mean about your other parent to the kids, it’s, that’s terrible, it really is. When do you lean on the legal process?
Do you use the legal process? As far as raising a kid? Yeah. Custody, or All the, yeah, I don’t, parents alienation is a legal matter.
Neil Robinson: I don’t, so I don’t, I don’t know when, when I was growing up, I know at one point they didn’t go through the legal system and then at some [00:31:00] point my mom moved down here and my dad got the legal system involved because of my mom.
Something my mom did through the process. And so I think it’s better if you can possibly. Avoid the legal system. If you guys can be adult, but I feel like in some relationships, you have to have that checks and balances, you know, I think in the last conversations you talked about, you know, you know, well, you talked to, I don’t know if this one, but like, you know, getting the police involved, if there’s a major kerfuffle and having that proof of record, I think we’re talking more domestic violence, but in the legal system, when it comes to this, it’s like, I’ve seen where child support, you know, visitations, you know, those types of things, you almost need a conversation.
Court order or court, some sort of a documentation. I know when I was younger, my dad was giving my mom more child support. And then when my mom went to the court to try to do it, they actually court ordered him to pay less, which was hilarious. And so to me, it depends on your relationship. And I think you have to be.
You know, when you start seeing some stuff start slipping, [00:32:00] either you have to see why yourself and track as much as you can, but sometimes you have to get legal involved just because some parents can get very manipulative and then they’ll try to use the legal system for their benefit
Chris Gazdik: to hurt you. To me, it’s simple, Adam.
It really is about the safety and well being of the kiddos that that’s when you go. Right into that as as as needed if domestic violence is a thing or parent alienation, which is really really horrible But but you’ve got to understand you’re not necessarily as objective about it because you might interpret Oh, you’re being terrible to the kids when the other parents just Yeah, but
Adam Cloninger: I don’t know how you’re going to really do much about that from a legal system as far as, oh, she’s
Chris Gazdik: protective orders, domestic violence.
She’s talking
Adam Cloninger: bad about me.
Chris Gazdik: No, it’s email lists and, and, you know, people talking about their sex lives with their kids and you see that on texting. I mean, there’s some pretty heinous things that are going on that you [00:33:00] can get. I mean,
Adam Cloninger: again, but what are they going to do?
Chris Gazdik: Injunctions custody issues.
Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. If you’re, if you’re destroying the kids on a real safety level, either physically or emotionally, you need help because you’re not going to be able to intervene. On a napkin or ideally, you know, together, Neil talking with each other. So that’s where I land.
Neil Robinson: So I have one thing I want you to describe or parent alienation.
This was brought up on the last one and I was kind of intrigued cause I’ve heard that, but I was trying to figure out exactly what that was. So can you kind of elaborate a little bit more on that part of it? Cause like I said, the last show you guys talked a lot about, I’m like, I think I know what you mean, but I’d like a little bit more on the clinical side, like what that really means.
Chris Gazdik: Basically. Extensive or severe situations that you’re downing the other parent. Ideally, you don’t want to say anything bad about the other parent. [00:34:00] Realistically, you’re going to blow off some steam. They’re going to overhear some conversations. You’re going to trash the other parent. Because you’re pissed off, you’re getting divorced.
It’s stressful. So that, you know, we don’t want it. It’s not ideal, but it’s realistic. It’s going to happen. I’m talking about, like, entering into lies with your kid. You know, I’ve had parents tell their kid, Go to the other parent’s house and play. Pretend like you’re sick so you don’t have to stay there.
Tell the step mom this. Don’t get her a step mom Mother’s Day card. Or Don’t do anything she says. Lie. Disregard the rules. Absolutely, you don’t have to go to bed. She’s not your mother. She’s not your mom. All that kind of stuff. It’s like, That gets to the level of alienation.
Neil Robinson: Oh, okay. So see, I was thinking it was more of the parents, like one parent completely like neglecting the kid, but this is actually where the parents instructing the kid to basically alienate from the other parent.
Like, here’s a tip. You just
Chris Gazdik: don’t need to share your sex life with your 13 year old child. I got a new boyfriend and Oh, it’s cool. Yeah, [00:35:00] yeah, yeah, yeah, no, Adam, you don’t do that, man. You don’t, don’t do that. You know, I mean, the kid needs to just be a kid. They’re just. Dealing with the massive transition and, you know, let them, let them be with that.
I want to spend time that we didn’t get as much on the show too. And then we’ll go to the love and logic. After the dust settles, everything’s settling down. You’ve been divorced. You’ve got the custody agreements. How do you manage this to, to recover? Like the kids are like taking a deep breath. Like, wow, I got a whole new norm here.
What do you need to do in order to get well after divorce? How do you manage that?
Adam Cloninger: Just continue on. Okay. You just gotta continue on. Everybody has
Chris Gazdik: How though? What do you do to get well? How do you How do you cope with this? Just You talking about as far as the kids? Kids to parents?
Really, after the dust settles, you know, what are we [00:36:00] trying to do in co parenting as you as a parent to get be well?
I’ll give you a couple and then you can add because I’m sure you can figure
Adam Cloninger: before you because you’re going to take the ones I’m thinking. Got to get it in there real quick. So you want to make sure that the environment the kids in is safe. You want to make sure you’re, you’re not only physically, but mentally.
Tell them to go to a comedy club, Adam. Yeah, that’s always good. I mean, as far as a parent, I mean, you just gotta, I guess, kinda like we said a while ago, you gotta have belief that just, you know, things are gonna get better. You just gotta keep, you just gotta keep on, Go with that. Keep on
Chris Gazdik: driving on it.
How do you accomplish that? Because you don’t feel like things are going to get better. Sometimes I’m, I’m, I’m, you know, I’m a man, I’m in a fricking apartment. I don’t have my house. I don’t have my wife. I barely see my kids. I can’t afford it. She’s not here. [00:37:00] So she’s not here
Adam Cloninger: though.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. So that’s
Adam Cloninger: good.
Yeah. Positive thinking. Yeah. Find a good thing about it. You know, positive thinking is powerful.
Neil Robinson: Well, I think, you know, one of the things is when you get in those situations where you’re no longer in. In a relationship now you have your focus needs to be like you said on yourself. You know, we’ve talked about parenting many times where it’s, you have to, you have to be your best self to be the best parent for your kid.
That’s it. So, so really in this case, when things go to, you know, things go to hell and You’re the, like you said, the dust settles. Well, what do you, what can you do about it? You’re no longer with this person anymore. You have your kids, you still have to take care of yourself. So that way, when you get your kids, you can take care of them.
And so to me, once the dust settles, it’s all about reevaluating yourself.
Chris Gazdik: Yes. Self care, self recovery, looking at self talk, like you’ve got to understand what happened to you, what led to all of this, what your part in all of the issues [00:38:00] were, how can you be better, how can you grow, talk to friends, there’s so much that you need to do, particularly if you’re in the unenviable situation of being a single parent.
That is one of the most difficult jobs you can have it feels like it’s all on you And you’ve got to be able to kind of lose the blame that you’re putting on yourself forgive your partner x as well You gotta let go of the resentment. You can’t just sit there and stew. Well that B did this to me. Well, like you’ve got to get to a place where you, you let go and you forgive.
I mean, you know, and then you can get into helping the kids, you know, more because you can’t help what you can’t help yourself. Like that becomes really important. All of Neil, you’re on point and Adam, you said the same thing, like, you know, The last thing, and one of the big things I’ll mention for each kid is, you know, lessening the burden of the kids.
They feel like they have, and we talked about this one a [00:39:00] little bit on the episode when we did it the other day. You know, kids feel like they have to compartmentalize things. You know, Neil, you’re like, well, when I’m with dad, I’m with dad. I can’t be with mom and dad. And when I’m with mom and dad. Mom, I need to be with mom and not dad.
And Oh God, what do I do? I’m getting married. Who do I invite? How’s mom and dad going to do being in the same room? Like, Oh, and it goes on and on for the rest of your life. Like decrease the need for compartmentalization is the goal.
Neil Robinson: Well, I told you, like I said, in my wife’s. If parents got divorced when she was older for the first probably three or four years of our marriage, we would have two birthday parties for the kid because it was still fresh and raw.
And then finally, after about five years, my wife’s like, I’m having one party. If you guys show up, you guys choose to be adults or not, but here’s what’s going on. And so, or you can both leave, right? And I think that’s important. I think, I think it’s good to have that now. I do think when, you know, I’m thinking about my life growing up with both.
Both sets of my parents, you know, I wouldn’t say I compartmentalize, but I did [00:40:00] learn in one house. I could be one way, one other house. I could be another because there were different standards at the house, but I could still, I felt comfortable both way. You know, either way I looked at it, my parents were kind of amicable if things ever came up.
Never needed to happen, but no, I think, I think the compartmentalizing it towards like, really that separation’s a problem. Like I said, I had two different households that were completely different. My mom’s house was a lot more lax. My dad’s house was more, more structured. My
Chris Gazdik: parents did not get along at all.
It was not pretty. Still wouldn’t be. I mean, we went through an unfortunate death of my sister, actually, more than recently. I still had like feelings like, Oh wow, I bet mom and dad’s going to be here. How’s that going to go? Wow. And it went well, everybody behaved, you know, it’s years and years now later, but there was still that like buzz in my head.
Like, Oh, you know, what kind of drama coming up here? This should be interesting. Let’s grab our popcorn, you know, [00:41:00] but it went, like I said, it, everyone would be
Adam Cloninger: the only time I had anything like that was when during graduation.
Chris Gazdik: High school. Yeah. Graduation mom and dad celebrating. Yeah. Yeah. Did somebody go crazy?
Adam Cloninger: Yeah.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Cloninger: It was a wreck.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. I mean it
Adam Cloninger: both cases. Both of them graduated. Both cases are wrecked.
Chris Gazdik: Oh, your kids when your kids graduated. Oh, and then your parents were no, no, no. Me. Oh, I’m
Adam Cloninger: the divorced parent.
Chris Gazdik: Did you act crazy, Adam? What the heck? No, not me. Not me. Okay. What happened, man? Tell me off the air.
Alright, let’s move on to Love and Logic episode 273. Now this is, this is a cool episode. And I’m, I’m, I’m, we’re purposely going to do something very different today than we did in the show. There are very, very few things that I re do content on. We re do content on emotion focused therapy. We’ve re done content kind of recently on moral courage.
I think we did, didn’t we, Neil? Or is [00:42:00] that coming? I can’t, Something about courage to do something. Yeah, we did. We, we did, we, we did,
Neil Robinson: we did more courage. We were revisited a few times ago
Chris Gazdik: because there are these, there, there are only a handful, like probably one hand of things that I like to do that with because it’s so impactful.
This is one of them. Love and logic literally is something that totally metamorphosized in a lot of ways. The way that I engage, you know, parenting in my own. Parenting relationship with my kids. You ever hear of this, Adam, at all? Love and Logic? I’m not sure. Yeah, it was new to you. It, it, it’s, boy, how should we go through?
Neil, what do you remember about what Love and Logic is? Do you, can you concise it? Can you condense it? Is it hard to do that? I’m curious what you heard listening to it.
Neil Robinson: I could come up with a sarcastic response for what I originally thought it was. I want to hear this. Cause when I originally heard it from him because he did his little spiel about it, it was like, you let [00:43:00] your kids do whatever they want and then you passive aggressively fix their problems.
That’s, that’s how I understood it. Because he, he, he says, he says it so much, he kind of left out some of the key parts and like, wait, hang on, what does this really mean? And so really the idea is here, I’ll do it
Chris Gazdik: now. So the, the logic line is little Johnny could do anything that he wants to do. As long as he doesn’t cause a problem for somebody else, parent sees that there’s a problem you pointed out.
Hey, little Johnny. You got a problem there, you need to fix it. Little Johnny maybe fixes it, hopefully, but likely doesn’t, and then you kind of say, okay, well, no problem, don’t worry about it. You come around on the back end, right, we’ve talked about it, Adam, and you come around on the back end and you create solutions to their problems.
Neil Robinson: Passive aggressively.
Adam Cloninger: It is not passive aggressively. You talk about this on the episode where you had the parenting styles.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. We did. We did. So what do you, what did I leave out there? Neil, what do we need to [00:44:00] add?
Neil Robinson: No, I think it’s actually, cause I’ve thought about how my wife raises kids and she has her birth to kindergarten education, and she’s very smart with kids.
I actually talked to her about, you know, Victoria had her question about what do you do about her kid who hits right now? And so I asked my wife and my wife’s response is, well, I need to know more about the situation, blah, blah, blah. I’m like, okay, whatever. But no, I think, I think the best part about near the love and logic is you really give.
And you talk about you give your kids the ability to, you empower them to make decisions and you help guide them to understand, do critical thinking, to understand processes and also to be aware of, like I said, I like the fact like you can do whatever you want as long as you don’t affect someone else. I think it’s very good when you, when they have to understand I’ve crossed a boundary.
Now I’m, I’m in or I’m interfering with someone else, right? I think that’s really good for them because I feel like almost nowadays with. They’re so egocentric. They don’t understand what’s going on. I think, you know, if you, if they actually truly understand that, like, okay, I want to do [00:45:00] this. Okay. Well, what does that mean?
Okay. Well, if I do this, then little Susie, I’m going to take her toy or whatever, and she doesn’t want that to happen or like being socially aware of what your, the effect you have is very powerful. And I think that’s great, but I do think there needs to be some, you know, to me, I’m big on structure and obedience and those types of things.
And so it’s like. Where do you find that balance of doing it for them and making, not really doing it for them, but instructing them more versus having them do more critical thinking on their own? Yeah,
Chris Gazdik: you’re, you’re, you’re absolutely on point. You, you, you heard a lot of the things. I mean, as a matter of fact, this particular time that we went through it, I actually chat GPT and what are the highlights of the love and logic philosophy?
And we went down through them. They did a really good job of. adding a lot of those types of things to, to the basic ideas of love and logic. Because unfortunately, previous to me finding this, I got into power struggles all over the place. I mean, it’s like kids doing something wrong. We all know in our adult brain are doing something wrong.
So we need to tell them what to do. And then if they [00:46:00] don’t do what we tell them like to do, like they’re robots, then we’re going to take their toys away and give them privilege loss. That’s essentially what parents do, you know, You’re screwing up. So you’re in trouble and now you’re punished. And then we’re expecting people to learn from that.
It doesn’t work. So it’s really looking at your relationship between you and that child and how you help that child critically think and problem solve and make decisions. So that’s what I started to say. Aaron was on the show one time. It was really, really cool to have him on. We were talking about high school graduation a year ago or two.
And said, yeah, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve told you before, Aaron, right? Like make good decisions. And he’s like, oh yeah, more than once. Cause he’s heard it all the time. Every time he’d leave the house, I’m like, all right, man, have a good time. We’ll see you later. Make good decisions because you need to learn how to do that.
Yeah. And he, you didn’t make good decisions sometimes. I’m
Adam Cloninger: thinking [00:47:00] of a comedian statement, but I won’t say it right now.
Chris Gazdik: Oh, now you might have to clean it up to say it. Now I’ll have to tell you after the
Adam Cloninger: show.
Chris Gazdik: We got like a long conversation after the show at this point. Yeah, this is going to be a good one
Adam Cloninger: because there’s a comedian that said the same thing, but he said it way different.
Do you know which one?
Neil Robinson: No, that’s what I don’t know yet.
Chris Gazdik: Okay, so what I want to do instead of really dive deeper on love and logic, I want to refer you to episode 273. If you’re a parent, listen to it. Seriously, if you’re a parent, check it out. Even if you’re a step parent, for sure. Check it out. If you’re a grandparent, check it out.
If you’re dealing with kids at all, this is A total different way of managing. Well, if you’re a grandparent,
Neil Robinson: then you don’t have to worry about it. You just give them candy and toys and you’d go from there, right? You need to help the parents. Also,
Chris Gazdik: you’re still a parent, grandparent. We didn’t get a lot of discussion about the other points though, that I want to go back into generalizing these things, applying love and logic to these different things.
So let’s look at [00:48:00] a higher. Level look at like what creating a structured environment looks like how do you really deal with? With power struggles because you do know what power struggles is enemy number one in in parenting So, how do you create a high structure environment? don’t have a huge amount of time that I wanted to spend on this because It it takes a long time to describe what we did with with one of these situations That that you know, I knew we needed to have structure in in our family’s life You And J 1 took his decision making to the next level.
And my older son, when he decided he was going to move from his J 1. J 1. When he was Yeah. As his nickname affectionately has given by me. So, he, he decided he was going to take his bedroom and he was going to move all of his stuff and he moved his bedroom into the bonus room. I remember this. You remember this?
Yes. You remember when it was going on. Yeah. I mean, I remember you calling me. You won’t
Adam Cloninger: believe
Chris Gazdik: this. Like, [00:49:00] what are you doing? This? Like the kid can’t make the decision on his own. Where’s rooms going to be? That is the parents home. Like you need structure. So what do you remember about that? I struggled with this.
You can, you call him and you’re going to believe what they’re doing. He just took the room. Like, yeah. I come home from work one day and all of his stuff’s in the bonus room. I’m like. So, I have plans for that bonus room. Was it weeks or months, Adam, that I struggled with this? Do you remember? I feel like it was at least a couple of months.
I didn’t think it was that long. Yeah, it was a while. It was maybe, maybe, How old was he? I don’t really remember. I mean, he was moving into teenage years and his bedroom was small. I get it. Ultimately the bonus room was, was bigger and he needed more space. I was thinking it was like 14. It was, I feel like he was pretty close to driving if he will.
I think he was a little over 14, 15, [00:50:00] maybe even 16. I mean, he was older, but you know, Hey, you’re causing a problem, Aaron. Oh, no, there’s no problem here. No problem at all. I’m like, yeah, there really is a problem. You’re causing problems for all of us. Like, we use this room for other things. This is what the room was designed for.
We, we have limited resource of space. So, this is a problem. It’s literally causing a problem for all of us. So
What
Chris Gazdik: are some of the things? I mean, what would you do if a kid just took over a room? Like, how do you, how do you create consequence for this? How do you come around the back end and fix the problem that he’s creating?
Neil Robinson: You just
Chris Gazdik: make him put
Neil Robinson: his crap back
Chris Gazdik: in his room. Power
Neil Robinson: struggle. Some, you know, you just make him do it. Like if it came into my house and my kid would do it, I would make him move his crap back in there and I would basically, right
Adam Cloninger: then,
Neil Robinson: right then immediately. That, and that’s just a little. So here’s the thing.
My, when my kids were younger, my wife would say, you need to clean up your stuff. Yeah. Okay. Well, I don’t [00:51:00] want to claim my wife would literally grab their hands and make them pick up their stuff.
Chris Gazdik: How are struggle
Neil Robinson: just to prove that they have to listen. Yeah. And that’s to me, like the fact that it went on months, I’m like, how did that even happen to me?
And my, no, it’s just, but it’s one of those in my head. I’m like, cause with our kids, the way that we’ve done that, it’s like. That’s not acceptable as a parent. That’s not acceptable to me. And this is where, this is where I struggled with the love and logic when I talk about passive passive aggressively solving it.
And so on my side of my household, of course, this is just my household. This would be different for you. This is different, but with, if, if my kid would literally do that, we would basically, you know, take care of the situation right then, because we don’t, if it’s that blade now, if it’s slowly, like. Oh, he’s slowly moving his crap into another room.
It’s like, wait, what just happened is like a month later, he’s like, now he’s in the playroom doing like what I’m like, wait, when did this just start happening? And you have to do it, but it’s just, you know, to me, it’s you set authority early on, you set [00:52:00] respect early on. And I think about that now with my boys, both my kids are bigger than my wife, but they respect her because we’ve set thick and we have.
Going to your thing. We have a good relationship. We’ve built a good relationship. It’s not really yeah There’s a
Chris Gazdik: crashing down on the kid exactly. So
Neil Robinson: it works for me
Chris Gazdik: because of our relationship See, let me jump in though because and this is to be defensive in any regard But it’s it’s it’s it’s to explain like this was shocking this this was like so weird To have him go that far into a direction like It was on, like, Adam heard me talk about it.
Remind me. What the heck? What is this?
Adam Cloninger: Remind me again, what was the bonus room being used for?
Chris Gazdik: I was just, it had TV in there and, you know, the kids would come up and hang out with their friends and I think we, I think we It wasn’t a storage room though. No, it’s not a storage room. It was a functional room for everybody, whoever wanted it to hang out.
I think at one point we had a bed. Ping pong table in there and you know, it was, it was just a community room. I probably played my video games up there, you know, I [00:53:00] know I, you know, I went out to the building to hide from everybody, watch my tv. But, you know, it was just, it was just a function, multifunctional room.
So ultimately, to get cut to the chase a little bit, we, we didn’t typically heat that room, so the heat got turned off and he was freaking cold. Okay? That’s the solution to the problem. Like, I’m not paying to heat this. Also, the TV is not just for you. It was a nice big screen TV. The TV got gone. Okay? I didn’t have to take the doors off.
Everybody, every parent wants to go take the doors off and stuff. That was next. I was, that was gonna happen. That was eventually. We, we, we had bugs that came into there. Like, you know, also, I’m not spraying extra, Spray for the bugs that come in there up through the storage thing because there are built in closets because he didn’t talk
Neil Robinson: to you You didn’t plan it like right because I think I think even talked about like after everything was said that he put that back And I was like eventually didn’t he go back into that room?
What? Yes But, but then there was, there was talking about it. There was consideration. There’s all these things that come into it. And so we planned
Chris Gazdik: it, [00:54:00] we agreed it was a room that he could use. And, but he went back to his bedroom. Like he has, he needed to, there needs to be the authority of the parent in the home.
But how do you go about that without power struggles? And I don’t want to say this on the air, but he could be a hothead. Like, you know, yeah, there’s, Real conflicts that people go throw into blows with their kids on stuff when you get into power struggles, particularly with teenagers. So, we don’t want that.
I would have to hurt him, you know? Like, it would be bad.
Neil Robinson: If he starts it, you gotta finish it. It would happen. I would go down. I’ve, I’ve had an, I had an issue with Mason where we were just messing around, but he got a little bit overaggressive and I had to use certain authority. You go back and you like, I just basically shoved him because I’m like, okay, you have to understand.
And luckily in my house, man, luckily we, we wrestle, we have wrestlers. Matt. So every once in a while when he’s practicing, I’ll come out there and I’ll just be like, I’ll be dying. But
you get [00:55:00] big, you start your
Neil Robinson: dog. Yeah, exactly. It’s like, you’re like, God, thank goodness. I got 60 pounds on this kid. Like, yeah, but, but no, and I think that’s the great part about that thing is you didn’t buck from.
Like you didn’t turn the heat on, you didn’t do those extra things for him. You’re not going to go through that. You’re not going to consider it. So it’s like, here’s the consequences. He has to deal with because he didn’t think about the consideration. Right. He moved back out. Then you guys, as adults, now you’re talking about, Oh, maybe months
Chris Gazdik: later.
Neil Robinson: Right now, any months later. So I think it’s a great learning experience for that whole process. This is
Chris Gazdik: the way that you deal with your boss. This is the way that you deal with your authority figure. This is the way that you deal with the law. This is the way, because, you know, lawlessness is, I mean, you know, gosh, what happens when kids feel like they can create their own structure?
We see that on the streets. We see that’s what happens to protest. Oh, bad protesting. Absolutely. I’m
Adam Cloninger: serious. Yeah. I think it’s sad that when people have, we have these protestors and it’s being, they do set this illegal. [00:56:00] You know, burning stuff and everything, and it’s considered acceptable as long as they think they don’t agree with it.
No, it’s against the law. You’re creating, it’s against the law. You’re creating your own structure.
Chris Gazdik: Every,
Neil Robinson: everything that comes
Chris Gazdik: through this. Yeah. You can’t, you can’t live a society like that. You want to be a good citizen and a healthy individual. Love and logic absolutely does this without getting bloody, you know, with your teenagers or Massive power struggles just kill parents heads.
It hurts your heart. It’s terrible. You know privilege loss is tough It’s a tougher way to go when you’re just going, you know heavy handed on, on kids and ruling over them is it really doesn’t, it doesn’t work that well. And he learned a lot from that. You know, he learned a lot from that.
Neil Robinson: Yeah. There’s a lot of stuff with parenting that you can, you can definitely do.
Like I said, with my wife and her experiences of like, there’s, there’s so many tactics you can do besides privilege loss. There’s so, there’s so many things that you can do as like redirection. There’s things that you can do rewards versus. [00:57:00] Proof is lost. There’s all sorts of stuff you can do choices.
Chris Gazdik: Victoria talked about.
Neil Robinson: Yeah, that’s a great one. You know, it’s like she said, you know, it’s like you can go to bed in five minutes or 10 minutes, right?
Chris Gazdik: You’re still going to bed, but you’re going to go to bed, skip to bed. We can crawl to bed. We can monkey crawl to bed, whatever we’re doing, but we’re going to bed and we’re going to read.
And
Neil Robinson: that goes back to, you have a lot of authority. Authority figures that says, do it now, no matter what it’s like. But then that causes the power struggle that causes that really doesn’t help your relationship.
Chris Gazdik: Honestly, Neil, as you say, that occurs to me, if you have a boss that comes to you and says, do this report now, by the end of the day, how do you feel about that?
Neil Robinson: You don’t do the report by the end of the day.
Chris Gazdik: No, I’m not going to do the report. I’m in now. I’m going to get passive aggressive to go there. No, fire me. You know,
Neil Robinson: no, it’s. It’s kind of like the opposite of the, what is it? Beating shall continue till morale improves? That whole sticker?
Adam Cloninger: The flogging shall continue until morale improves.
Flogging shall continue till, yeah, morale improves. I think that’s the short answer.
Chris Gazdik: Parenting is really about relationship. I guess we’ve spent a that in here a little bit, but [00:58:00] it really is about a dynamic and a beautiful and a loving and a validating a supportive environment where you’re relating to another human being, teaching them life lessons.
If you’re not managing your relationship and you really are authoritarian, people have been physically abusive under the idea of discipline, belts and welts and bloody, Bruises, like under the eyes of you will listen to your authority. Figure me. And it’s a horrible relationship. If you have a good relationship built on solid mental health and just healthy things, kids are gonna listen to you.
Neil Robinson: Yeah, the whole, you know, you get
Chris Gazdik: more flies with honey than you do vinegar. Kids are gonna listen. And they’re gonna learn. And they’re gonna grow. And it’s good stuff. What, what makes parenting really hard? We didn’t talk about that at all. I was really curious what the two of you would come up with. What do you think I mean by, Parenting is really hard.[00:59:00]
What, what makes it harder? What are one of the things that makes parenting the hardest? They don’t always go as
Adam Cloninger: you planned. Certainly. You love, nurture, and try new things, and then they just don’t want to clean their room, or take the trash out, or
Chris Gazdik: Right.
Adam Cloninger: Do the dishes, or
Chris Gazdik: Pick
Adam Cloninger: up the sticks, or any number of
Chris Gazdik: normal things that people do.
Help
Adam Cloninger: you on Saturday. Flush the toilet,
Chris Gazdik: for crying out loud. Gosh, one towel is good enough for like three days at least. You know, Neil, what do you think makes parenting super the other parent? No, that’s what I’m thinking
Neil Robinson: now. I mean that, I mean, there is a lot of that because my wife and me have very different ideas and personalities.
And then of course our kids have very different personalities and stuff. And so, yeah, you know, that has a
Chris Gazdik: joke, but that’s what I’m going for.
Neil Robinson: Yeah, I mean, the reality [01:00:00] is, is you have two people that two different opinions trying to raise, raise, raise another human. It’s like, it’s very hard because And you’re passionate about it.
Mm hmm. Because you care about your kid and you want the best for them and, you know, the wife might be way, raised one way with a different personality than the husband might be, you know, you Also, there’s
Chris Gazdik: not really a right way here. There’s nothing really perfectly right or perfectly wrong about how to Parent a kid boy.
Everybody’s got opinions about this. Oh, yeah. I’m supposed to people who don’t have kids. Oh
Neil Robinson: Well the new parents that’s what I love. I think it’s fun to listen to Victoria It is about her two year old is you don’t know anything yet. You’re still like, oh, he’s hitting that’s cute Yeah, you know so but no, I think that’s your hundred percent.
I think I mentioned it too. It’s it’s it’s always hard It’s always changing. It’s every year It’s a whole nother whole nother struggle and then like I say when you have a second kid, you just start over You Yeah. You can’t totally different kid. You, you, you can’t do any, [01:01:00] you can’t have a match arc. My kid’s completely different thing.
Like it’s just what
Chris Gazdik: worked in the first time does not work in the second. Again,
Neil Robinson: my, my oldest, I had to get at the wrestling mats, put him in his place and he’d be fine. My youngest, you look at him cross and he’s, he’s hurt for the rest of the day. It’s like, come on, grow up, get it, get a spine. Oh, give him a hug, Neil.
I give him hugs. And then I usually suplex them, but that’s okay. At least on a couch, right? Yeah, you know, we have mats, but no, and I, and I think that’s, I mean, no wrestling mats.
Chris Gazdik: Okay. Very thin
Neil Robinson: mats. No, I got thick ones. The thin ones didn’t work. We tried that, but no, and I, I think it’s very hard. It’s always changing.
That as you pointed, Alex, like, you know, you never, you expect it. You could have one kid, they’re great for a week, they do everything right and then the next week they do nothing like, it’s like it’s so hard. Everything’s wrong. Everything’s wrong. They don’t put the dishes away correctly. They didn’t wash the things or they like, you have to ask ’em a hundred times when last week they were [01:02:00] great and everything that they were on top of.
It’s like so frustrating as a parent.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah, it, there, there is so much to be frustrated about and, and the challenges, I mean, it, it, it can be daunting, especially if you’re a single parent. I tell you, there’s a whole kind of hope out there though when you’re really even a single parent feeling overwhelmed and super stretched.
Like your relationship with your kids is one of the closest relationships you can have in your life. Second probably really only to your spouse. These are, these are close relationships that have a lot of emotions. Flying and you know, it’s a, it’s a wonderful thing. It’s, it’s, you, you don’t have any other relationship with another human being where you’re actually responsible for this kid until they’re 18.
But yet you sure powerless over what they’re deciding to do. And I think people are struggling. I mean, people, parents don’t know what to do. I, and, and I guess that this little ramble leads me to say also like, you know, when I had this going on with my kid moving rooms, I mean, I went to my [01:03:00] friends. I mean, I went to you, Adam, and I was like, what, what, you know, and people will give you objective feedback and help you make decisions.
I mean, you do not need to do this in a moment. You know, if I come home and he’s moved into his room, the worst thing for me to do at that point, when I was pissed off, overwhelmed, confused is roll up to the room right now and say, Get your crap, put it back in that other room right now because I am not in a facilitated place to deal with you and it would have gone, it would have gone bad.
It would have gone bad. See it take your time minute. Take a minute. Take a day like figure it out Avoid power struggles. It’s they’re gonna be
Neil Robinson: with you for 18 years. You don’t have to rush through it Right, but I do think we did talk about some of the parenting stuff I think the idea of reaching out to other parents that you know that you can talk to that you can talk to You can commiserate with, you can get some feedback.
Talking to your own parents is also something to talk about. Like, yeah, it’s cause you always have, you always have you and your spouse. [01:04:00] If you, if you’re still married, single parent, of course you, you need to find some other outdoors, if possible friends, family, but that’s, you know, it takes a village to raise a child kind of situation.
Utilize that village to help you with your kids. And it’s still up to you to make those ultimate decisions with what, what you think is right for your household, for your kids, your family. So take all the advice you can take and then figure out what works best because you, you can’t take anything just.
On face value, you have to understand what your kids are like. You have to understand, is this really going to benefit us? You know, you have to make that effort. And that’s the other hard part about parenting. You have to think and you
have to adjust and you have to adapt all the time. And so, so when, when you see, you know, parenting advice, you should be a gen, you do gentle parenting.
Well, my kid doesn’t work well with gentle parenting. So we’re going to try something else. It’s like you have to understand those dynamics and that’s what makes it so hard because there is no rule book. It’s all, you always have to think about. Neil, little Johnny is going to let
Chris Gazdik: Sally drive her car down to [01:05:00] Charlotte.
Wouldn’t that be okay? How old are they? No, nobody else needs to drive our, your car. There’s always something new. Closing thoughts, winding us out of here, Adam. You know, parenting’s a heck of a thing. Would you have changed anything? I mean, you know, and how you go about doing parenting.
Adam Cloninger: Maybe I can’t think of anything off the top of my head though. The spouse. No, I’m just kidding. That was the only thing I was thinking. I said, maybe I could have got out of that a little bit earlier.
Chris Gazdik: Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Cloninger: That both would have been better off.
Chris Gazdik: All right. So listen, we’re going to wind out of here. We’re going to see you next week with some new content, some new shows in the month of June.
But we appreciate you hanging out with us, sticking in. And hopefully we’re learning a few new things. Click the like button, do all that good stuff to help us out if you like the show. We will see you soon. Take care and stay well.