Eps 180: Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis Discusses Navigating Trauma on the Parenting Journey

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Transcription

Casey O'Roarty 0:04
Hey, what is up podcast, listeners, I am so glad that you have found yourself at the joyful courage podcast. This is a place where we celebrate real and raw conversations about raising kids with conscious parenting and positive discipline. I'm your host. Casey o'rourdy, I'm a facilitator. I'm a parent coach. Most importantly, I am a mom of two teenagers, and I am walking the path of more mindful, intentional parenting right alongside of you. Please know that this podcast is created for you. I create it for you and for our community. And if you love it, feel free to share it with all of your family and friends over social media. Let's spread the word. Let's get as many people as possible listening to this show. Please write a review on Apple's podcast, formerly known as iTunes, and join the Patreon community, where parents, just like you are contributing just a small little amount each month to the show and enjoying perks like monthly webinars and community conversations about the content you hear on this podcast. Check the show notes for links and more details on all of that. I am so, so grateful that you are here and now enjoy the show. My guest today on the podcast is Dr Sarah Bergman Lewis. Dr Sarah was born in Seattle. She ventured beyond the northwest to attend Oberlin College, but after four years, was drawn back to the water and mountains of home before attending medical school, Sarah helped to found a middle school called the Seattle girls school. As part of her five years with the Seattle girls school, she did admission and taught sixth grade. Sarah attended University of Washington Medical School and then completed her pediatric residency at Seattle Children's during her second year of residency, she had her daughter, Anya, Madrona, and then took time after residency to be a mom and work part time doing urgent care at Seattle Children's Hospital. Ultimately, Sarah landed a primary care position where she has the privilege of partnering with families to care for their newborns up through the teen years. Last year, Sarah and her family went on an adventure to Guatemala for three months, where she worked in a local hospital and her kids attended school. Her family will return again this year for a visit and to help launch a partnership between a group of Seattle pediatricians and the Guatemalan hospital. Outside of work, Sarah is pursuing her yoga teaching training certificate, and enjoys learning about sharing integrative medicine tools with her patients. As part of collaboration between Odessa brown Children's Clinic and arc of King County, she is helping devise the curriculum for a Mindful self compassion course for Spanish speaking parents, which she will co facilitate in the spring. At the core of her life, Sarah is crafting a family with her husband Steve, who also works with children in the role of a nonprofit executive director. They are parents of Anya, an eight year old author and unicyclist, and Noah, a six year old Lego artisan and faithful father to a flock of stuffies, Anya and Noah keep Sarah inspired, learning in love and humble. Hi Sarah. Welcome to the podcast.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 3:29
Hi Casey. It's my honor to be here. I have admired the work you do and the community you've created, and I'm very happy to connect you. And I have had many conversations in my head in the car while I'm commuting. So it's exciting to connect and make it real today.

Casey O'Roarty 3:46
Yeah, both sides, yay, yay. Please let the listeners know a little bit more about you and what you do in the world.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 3:54
Sure. So of course, my primary role as a mom and then as a pediatrician, and those two I am working on, of course, all the time, side by side, both of them keep me on my toes and never bored. I am the mom, as you mentioned, to Anya, who's now eight, and Noah, who is six, they are thankfully, finally at the same school. So that's a great milestone for our family. And I work in primary care, which means I have my own patients in a pediatric practice, and it is hard and wonderful. I get to learn a lot from my patients, of course, and also from my kids who keep me honest. I'm drawn to what it means for wellness and a child and in the family. So a child is obviously part of their surroundings. You really can't separate a child from their environment. It. And so when I'm caring for a child, I'm caring for the unit that they are within, and I enjoy that very much. I feel like it's a grand responsibility, and I appreciate being given the opportunity. I like to define wellness in kids as beyond preventing illness in the what we do in the clinic, but really figuring out how kids can be their full selves and feel good in their bodies and their mind can ultimately, ultimately become happy and productive and resilient members of society. Yay.

Casey O'Roarty 5:39
Well, I think that we are aligned in that goal for sure. Yeah. And a really powerful way to get there is through supporting the parents,

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 5:48
absolutely. So one of the first things I usually say in one of our early visit with parents is that I'm a very pro parent pediatrician, and what I mean by that is kids, as we know Casey, do well in so many different situations, but really what a child needs most is to have a whole adult in their lives. So really focusing on what is going to work for that parent or that caregiver is where I spend a lot of my time because ultimately, I truly believe and witness daily that this is what is going to matter for the well being of the child. Yeah,

Casey O'Roarty 6:32
and so today I'm super excited about our topic. Today we are talking about navigating our own self healing so that we can show up whole for our family. So talk to me a little bit about self healing and about the intergenerational challenges and trauma that we all carry, sure.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 6:54
So yeah, this is definitely a topic near and dear to my heart. I you know, as as we have all noticed, parenting forces us right down into the issues, and by the issues, I mean our own issues. So parenting pushes us to our limits. It challenges our core beliefs, and just really pushes us in all aspects of our life like no other arena. And this is you know, as you and all the listeners know this is challenging, and it's a huge opportunity. So basically, when we are showing up for our kids, we don't arrive, of course, in parenting as a blank slate, and that's okay. We come with what we've experienced thus far, and part of navigating parenting is being able to identify why we do what we do, and how we feel, what we feel, and how we're expressing it. Day to day. Parenting is, of course, you know, I was originally a teacher, and I don't actually feel like my job now is that different, and that sometimes I joke that I do parent teacher conferences just all day every day now, but it's, you know, it's teaching what I'm doing in the clinic, but what parents are doing day to day. And I firmly believe and have seen, that there are no parents out there that are not doing the best they can, that are not wanting things to be better for their kids. And what I have also seen is that in order to do that, it does mean stepping back and looking at some of the experiences that we have so that we can really be parenting from a place of more wholeness versus fear. So I can talk a little bit about some of what we're starting to understand about the brain and research behind you know how our own upbringing and life experiences shape us for the rest of our lives?

Casey O'Roarty 8:57
One of the things so I've seen Dr Dan Siegel speak a few times. Yeah, I talk about him all the time on the podcast. He was a guest. Yeah, no big deal. Yeah. I the last time I saw him speak, somebody asked him, you know, what is? What is one that, you know, what would you say is the most important thing that parents should do inside of parenting? And his response was, heal your own wounds. Yep, you know, and I work with a lot of parents who, and it's a continuum, right? There's, yes, I was raised by someone who's a little bit OCD and kind of yelled a lot, and definitely had some emotional regulation situations going on all the way to, you know, some pretty traumatic abuse parents who know in their hearts that they want to be different kinds of parents than the parent than their parents were, you know. And then we arrive, or, I guess our kids arrive, like you said, and really show us how deep the wounds are and how close to the surface that can. Conditioning and the behavior lives, and we find ourselves dancing inside of the fear and the self doubt. Am I the right parent? Am I doing a good job? Talk a little bit about adverse childhood experiences and how you know, because typically, parents that are listening this podcast, I'm not guessing are, you know, creating an environment where their children are experiencing adverse childhood experiences, but it happens, but more from the context of perhaps people that are listening that don't know about what the aces are or how it might be affecting them now, as they're working towards being the best version of themselves that they can for their kids. Yeah, absolutely.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 10:46
It is actually a really exciting time in neuroscience. You know, Dan Siegel is right there in it with his hindsight and his work, because there's really now data to back up beliefs that most of us have really intuited to be true all along, you know, and I have a mixed relationship with diagnoses and labels and that sort of thing, but, but ultimately, you know, this information, this science, gives us really important information that allows us to make the struggle, or Make the information of what's been going on a little bit less personal, in a way, in that, ultimately, you know, it's telling us that what we are experiencing is not, in fact, a character of law. This happened for a reason. And the best news, I believe, in parenting, is that, yes, this happened to you. This is not who you are, and this is now a great opportunity to do it different. It is by no means too late, and you're exactly the right person to be doing this work. So the ACEs study, Aces stands for adverse childhood events. It's, I'll tell you a little bit about the background of the study, because it's quite interesting. So back in the 1990s there was a doctor by the name of Dr Vincent Felitti, and he was working in California, and his specialty was that he was part of running a weight loss program for very obese individuals. And he worked really closely with these individuals in psychotherapy and otherwise, and he stumbled upon, as he describes it, a really interesting observation, which was essentially that those women who were in fact, in the category of being the most overweight would often be making huge strides in improvement, and in terms of losing the weight, doing the work, and then as they started to lose the weight at the very end, you know, at the program, they would quickly gain it back. And what he did is, you know, what any good scientist does, which is ask why? And he ended up finding out by talking to a couple of these women, and then, you know, validated it with talking to a much larger group, is that one of the factors that these women had in common was actually all having been the victim of sexual abuse at a young age. And the reason that was very important, for obvious reasons, is that, basically, the weight that they had gained was a protective factor. So, you know, he tells one story about that, I really stuck with me about how one woman had been losing weight and doing really well, feeling really good about her, her journey, and suddenly, and she lived on her own, and suddenly started gaining back weight, and she didn't understand why there not, had not been any Large traumatic events in her life, and he helped her trace back that she had in fact, been sleep, eating. And when this started was when someone in her office, a male, had commented on how good she was looking. And so this had triggered the pattern back of, you know, she had been a victim of abuse at a young age, and at that time when she for this individual, it was age 10. She had started to eat and gain weight to really hide herself. So he took this and he said, obviously, you know, this is a small group. We need to, you know, be able to reconstruct this and replicate this with a much larger study which he did so it was published in 1998 but the study was ongoing for about two years before then, and it was done with CDC and Kaiser and again in California. And they actually what they did for the study is they did a screening of what. Now come to be called aces of 17,000 individuals who are coming in just for a routine physical exam. And when they came in, they asked them, you know, about a number of life traumas. For example, if a family member was mentally ill, if a family had member had been incarcerated, child abuse, other other factors. And one thing that I think is super interesting about this study as well is that the study was most definitely done. The population of the study was primarily white, middle and upper class, college educated folks who are, you know, coming to do a well child check. And so what they found after this study, and this has since been replicated in many different ways by over hundreds of studies, is basically that the punchline, I think, of, is early childhood experiences matter, and it matters in very deep ways. So some of the statistics are pretty staggering. Actually, that came out of it, it showed what's called a dose response effect, which basically means that if there is a stressor, or, you know, if there's something that's happening, then the response to that is going to be in relation to how much of the stressor there was, or how much of the exposure there was. So one thing they found is the aces are extremely common. So more than half of the respondents had reported at least one of the aces. A quarter reported more than two having experienced more than two childhood aces, and then the category of four or more, they found is really those individuals were much higher at risk for a host of mental and physical issues in over a long period of time. So for example, for those with an ACE score, four to 12 fold increased risk for alcoholism, drug abuse, depression and suicidal ideation. There's also a graded relationship to other super common comorbidities, ischemic heart disease, cancer, chronic lung disease, skeletal fractures, liver disease. So the takeaway, you know, and this is, this is now a field that is really being moved forward. Dr Nadine Burke Harris is a pediatrician in the Bay Area who's wrote a book called The deepest well, who has been a really important leader in this field. The punchline is that the why matters. You know that what what we see on the surface and Casey, you talk about this all the time in terms of the behaviorist communication and the iceberg, what is going on on the surface is part of the story. And if we're going to get to true healing in ourselves, and then ultimately, how we're passing it on to our kids, it's going underneath the surface and really examining these issues, because the ACES is only the beginning of the story, and it's the flip side, the shadow side of resilience. And so to me, this is very much a starting place to name these and understand these. But this is not owning who somebody is. This is, you know, this is the part of the story. But you know, what happens from here is really the most important part.

Casey O'Roarty 18:28
Yeah, I think that we get to decide what defines us absolutely. Yeah. Hi, listeners. I am interrupting this interview for a few minutes to talk directly to all of my friends out there that are parents of teenagers. Are you currently navigating any of the following with your teen? Lack of motivation, high emotions, disconnection, challenges with schooling, screen time, messy rooms, not contributing to the household. Are you trying to find your footing in the dance between offering support and letting go? This is such a tricky time, and without community, we end up feeling alone, hopeless, desperate and defeated. We all want to have a solid relationship with our kids, especially during the teen years. We are busy people, and the teen years throw us some crazy curveballs. It can feel isolating, it can feel really scary, and a lot of the time we just don't know what to do. And you all know that I am in it with you when I think about what I need to be the best parent I can be for my teenagers, a few things come to mind. The first thing is a quality like minded community of parents where I feel safe to be myself, share my fears and talk about the challenges that I'm facing with my kids, my. Commitment is to positive discipline, as you all know, and sometimes I feel wobbly about how that looks when I'm confronted by risky behavior, super high intensity emotions and the pulling away I experience with my kids. So I created the joyful courage Academy for parents of teenagers, this program is a space for us to learn and grow together, to get really clear about what we want most and where the gaps are in our relationships with our kids. It is learning and strengthening what we know about positive discipline while applying the tools to what is currently in front of us. It is growing and fine tuning our anchor so that when the ship gets real, we have a place to come home to to reset and reconnect. At the end of the program, you will feel a renewed confidence in yourself as the perfect parent for your teen. The next session of the joyful courage Academy parenting teens program will run from May 6 through May 31 I'm holding space for 20 participants only. The program includes content, a lively group discussion space and a one hour call with me. Go to www, dot, joyful courage.com/jc, a PT, and get your application in. Now, the window to apply closes April 7. You have less than two weeks to apply to be a part of the program again. The link is www, dot, joyful courage.com/jc. A, P, T, you can go to that link, get more information and apply to be a part of the next session of the academy. I really, really hope you take me up on it. It has been so powerful for the participants that are currently going through it. And I am just honored, honored, honored to serve you. Thanks. Like you said earlier on, information is so powerful. So you know, I know that there you can listeners, you can Google, and there's easy peasy tests to do to find out your ACE score. And you know, the reason to do that, you know, because it's sometimes it can get really discouraging just to feel like we can't get out from under our conditioning. Or, you know, I mean, for me, the podcast is all about conscious, connected, positive parenting, and I've worked with clients who feel like this is what I want, and I don't know that it's for me, because it's so challenging for me to access these tools, because I'm having these emotional experiences tied to the behavior of my kids and so and it's and I really, really, really want everyone that's listening to hear that this style of parenting, this way of being, this healing that Sarah's talking about, is for everyone. It gets it's for everyone. There's no like, oh, everyone except for well, you your trauma was too much, or your score is too high. Or, you know, we can all do what we can all take steps in, first of all, I think, becoming aware of what's happening, aware of what our drive is, and you know, and the why, like you said, the why that we feel the way we feel when our kids reject us, or, you know, the Why that we do take things personally, or the why that when there's Clutter and chaos, the inside of our body feels tingly and irritable and out of control, like there are dots that we can connect when we start to get curious about our experience, and instead of looking externally at well, if my Kids would just, or if my husband would just, or if they would just, and instead, look at, what is it, you know, you know, Oh, of course, that is a trigger for me, because, in my experience chaos, through clutter and mess, got me emotional abuse or physical abuse,

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 24:18
or just felt Out of control, right? You know, is linked to, yeah, yeah. I completely agree. I'd like to share a story from, and I see, you know, examples of this all the time, every day, yesterday. You know, six of these stories. But this one stuck with me, you know, because I think one of the things that's very difficult about the ACES is that brings out shame and trauma and things that we we don't want to talk about honestly. And, you know, I think that they're difficult conversations. And so this question comes up in medical offices now and pediatricians office of are we going to screen for ACES? You know, if this is something that contributes and is a high risk? Factor for a number of the medical issues that we're trying to prevent, it makes sense for us to be screening, however, what does that look like? And how do we do that in a respectful way, and again, a way that we're really honoring the journey that someone has been through and not re traumatizing, you know, doing more harm than good. But I feel like I'm often in my office realizing that the parent This is there anyways, and the parents mind whether we are talking about it out loud or not, and to really be able to help partner with a parent allows them to go that next step and really not be alone. So I a lot of the a lot of kindergartners the beginning of the year, as you well know, Casey, do struggle, and at the time that, you know, things, things can kind of get a little tricky, and there's a lot of messages going on for the kid and the the parents have their own narrative about what's happening. And you know, caregivers are really struggling at this time. So this little guy, he's a spunky little redhead, super fiery. He's five, and we had been working on this transition to kindergarten, and it had not been going well. Neither of us were terribly surprised, but it was harder than we even imagined. You know, this was a kid that was kicked out of three preschools, and at school he was a runner, so when he would get upset or scared, he would run. And that was hard. And so, you know, we'd start an evaluation for ADHD, and we were talking about another, you know, all the different avenues. And I'll never forget this one day, the child had to go to the bathroom, which often happens, of course, in the middle of the visit. And parents are always so embarrassed. But I'm just not surprised at all, you know. So again, that comes down to like, parents are like, Oh no, that what the doctor's gonna think. I didn't even let my kid go to the bathroom before. So not at all. Parent kids get nervous too, right? And they need to the bathroom. So of course, right in the middle of this really intense discussion, he's like, I have to go pee. So I was like, I'll just walk with you to the bathroom. So we walked down the hall, and I stood with his mom in the hall, and when he went into the bathroom, and the mom and the mom said to me, so do you think anything about what's going on for him has to do with that? He watched me be abused by his dad for the first four years of his life, and they had since left the situation. And the mom is, you know, inspiring and doing an amazing job of rebuilding this life, but her bringing that into that space first of all, the answers, yes, you know, yes, it does. And, you know, on, on multiple levels, right? So that child's, first of all, how the mom's interpretation, so when she sees that child acting out, the narrative she plays is, oh my, you know, many things. It's Dan TiVo. Called it the shark music, which I use a lot. I'm gonna gonna here we are, you know, uh oh, is he gonna be, you know? Is he gonna have the same aggressive tendencies?

Casey O'Roarty 27:53
Yourself,

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 27:55
exactly, here we are. We've been waiting for it. And, you know. So she's having that situation while the kid actually is yes modeling and on a deeper level, his neurochemistry is actually impacted, was impacted by what was happening to him during this time. So he does have a more heightened fight or flight situation in his body. So it makes absolute sense that the way he would interpret something like, you know, the teacher telling him what to do, and it wasn't what he wanted to do, he would feel in threat. He would feel scared, and his response would be far more exaggerated than the other kids in his class, because that is what's going on in his brain. So I see those examples all the time, and it always makes me think, like, Okay, this is getting at at it, you know, like, this is not all ADHD, all explosive behavior, all obstacle behavior, is not the same. And so when we get at what is going on beneath and why that's really the road to real healing,

Casey O'Roarty 29:02
well, and I think that for our kids and for ourselves, right? Exactly? I used to teach a workshop to teachers around resiliency, and we talked about I shared everything that you just shared about the Adverse Childhood Experiences Study and Dr felitti's work. And I believe one of the slides that we presented, and I believe it was him that said, this is the problem we see, is often a solution to a problem that we don't know about. And, yeah, isn't that true? Yeah. And I think that that I'd like that to put that lens over our kids behavior, regardless of trauma and all the things right behavior really is always, you know, movement towards belonging and significance. That's something that I hold as a foundation as a positive discipline trainer. But also, yeah, when they're getting into mischief, yeah. Looking at it through. Okay, so, if that's true, that this is a solution to a problem I don't know about it's time to get curious.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 30:08
Yep, exactly. And are you asking the right questions? You know, Are you, are you looking in the right places, asking the right questions? Another really fascinating area that is, you know, quickly evolving in this area of things that we already knew about the brain, but you know, are now being proven by research, is the field of epigenetics. So there's a woman by the name of Dr Rachel Yehuda, and she is a neuroscientist who is a pioneer in this field. And this is a fascinating field, because it's basically showing us that all of these experiences that we have go deep so literally, down to our DNA and are passed on. And so she has done quite a bit of work with Holocaust survivors as well as 911 survivors. And basically, among the interesting things she's found is that the offspring of these individuals who are affected by this trauma are going to respond differently in subsequent experiences, difficult experiences of trauma. And so we're there's very smart leaders like Dr Yehuda working on this to understand, you know, we are given certain genetics in our DNA. But this idea of what is fostered, what is turned, literally turned on at the gene level, is important, and is, you know, something that is actually truly intergenerational. So again, I think that that is very important as it is deep. And these things are both universal and deeply personal, and it's only part of the situation. So I always think, you know, it's that again, the quote, dance Eagle, name it to tame it. I feel like that goes to parents as well. So understanding the why of why we show up, how we do and you know what our internal monolog. Monologs are what sets off our shark music. All of these are really going to allow us to come into parenting just more present, to actually be seeing what's actually there and responding to our kids through what is they are experiencing, and less through our own lenses, which are valid, but, you know, our own lens.

Casey O'Roarty 32:22
Yeah, and I'm just thinking about, you know, people that are listening, and by the way, listeners, if you're having moments of feeling uncomfortable listening to this conversation, and you know, just know that that could be your past experience being kind of dredged up a little bit. And take care of yourself today, and take a walk and get some fresh air. And know that, you know, when we talk about trauma and abuse, and you're somebody who has experienced that, it can be, you know, kind of just brought to the surface. So I want to honor that, but also for the people that are listening, who are like, okay, great, yes, there is conditioning, there's patterning, there's some deep wounds. I think the biggest piece is, okay, ask for help. Get some help. Would you say that that's kind of a starting point?

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 33:16
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think again, just like you're doing in parenting, you are getting to points where you need more resources, and that's okay, that's good. Luckily, you don't need to do this alone, and I think that it is a combination of listening to what's within you, but in order to do that, you you need the outside support absolutely, you know, I will sometimes bring this up in the clinic, or sometimes I, you know, just noticed, but I said to a mom who was going through, who had, I just had a hunch there was a lot more to her story than I had, you know, than we had yet discussed. And I just sort of off, you know, on one side, like, have you ever heard about this? You know, this is just an interesting idea. And she kind of got as far away what look and she was like, you know, my sister called me about that a couple of weeks ago, and she'd heard a story about that, and she said, This is what happened to us. And honestly, I was like, I can't go there. I can't like that. I don't have so, you know, I think that's the other thing. Is just honoring, like, just knowing it's there, knowing it can feel dark, it's not dark. But you know, this is part of who you are, and that's also very much a source of strength. So even, you know, but you have to have some capacity to be able to go in to do this work. And that's not, it's not always the time for that, you know. And so you talk about, and we know there, there are so many seasons to parenting, you know. And so I think it's also the last thing we want to do is beat ourselves up for not being able to care for ourselves, you know, and like, you know, and not being able to deal with our stories and deal so, you know, I think I'm a big fan of deciding like, when you're kind of like. Sleep or, you know, food battles, or any of that, deciding when you're going to consciously work on something and when you're not, you know. And this is not waiting for the other shoe to drop. This is not approaching this from fear this. This is there and you know. And it's also very much what gives you your courage and your and your strength,

Casey O'Roarty 35:20
yeah, and resiliency, for sure, absolutely. And I think, too, that life has a way of, like, tapping your shoulder, yeah, and you get tapped enough times and it's like, Okay, I'm ready, yeah. Where does self compassion? Well, I mean, I know we're self you're talking about self compassion right now.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 35:38
It's right in there, though, but I think that's such a important word, you know. And I think sometimes it's even just saying that word, you know. So I think self compassion is all of this. So, you know, I think what it does is the self compassion piece, no matter how flooded you feel. Yesterday, I saw this mom who had this really difficult, you know, her birth did not go as planned. It was really difficult. Her child was in the NICU for some time. And as will often happen, she was there for the two month visit. And at the two month visit, she's just kind of starting to come out a little bit to realize just how kind of not okay, she was right. And, you know, I think that in those moments, it's just talking to yourself like you would to a friend, and you know, just this gentleness with yourself, of the self talk to yourself that truly matters. It doesn't take more time, it doesn't take resources or money, but it really matters. And in terms of just opening up for just how you're talking yourself, and then actually that completely translates to how you talk to your family as well. It was actually at this meditation retreat, and I love this example that I've thought of since, which is, if you the way you talk to yourself, if you say what you say, but at the end of it, say something like, honey or Sweetie, you know, so, like, if you're, like, seriously, like, you know, we're late, we're taking the kids late to school again, honey, there's something about it. Or, like, oh, look, the house is super messy. And, you know, like, you forgot the permission slips, sweetie, there's something that just softens it a little bit more nurturing and more accepting, and that's you know, and that's a process, you know, but it's certainly something to be practicing, and that is a big I think that's actually the most important step in this process

Casey O'Roarty 37:33
well. And my listeners know I talk about practice all the time, and it's not about practicing when you need it the most. It's about practicing when risks are low and when you're just out in the world doing your thing, so that in the high stress situations, you're more likely to be able to access and tap into

those positive mantras and self talk that shift you away from feelings of anxiety and self doubt and more towards like, Well, wait a minute, that's an old story, and I know that I can handle this. I know that I can find my feet right now, that I can find my breath and I can be in response to this situation, instead of letting the situation itself kind of drag me

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 38:26
exactly. It's so much starting where you are too, exactly as you're saying. So, you know, I think for that mom yesterday, it was like she was going to take a shower yesterday, you know. And like, I think of this, like, you know, the difference between a first child the second child or second subsequent is like, during the first child you're, you know, feeling like you can't even take a shower and like, what if they're crying and and then I just remember this distinct feeling with the second. When I was taking a shower with the second that I was like, fully enjoying the sound of the water, such that when I turned it off, I was like, either going to hear the screaming or not. But, you know, I think it's like those small acts of self compassion where you are. Maybe it's listening to what you the music you want to listen to in the car, you know, or making sure you get harder

Casey O'Roarty 39:16
and harder as they get older. Sure, no, I'm

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 39:19
sure you compromise, right? Yes. And then, you know, making yourself a lunch, like when you're making the family a lunch, you know, feeding yourself, you know, all those, all those things are the little stuff that really does add up.

Casey O'Roarty 39:31
So you mentioned to me, we're going to shift, and let's focus a little bit more on the kids again. So you mentioned to me that kids come very naturally, embodied meaning they show up to the world. Embodied. What does that? What does embodied mean to you? Yeah,

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 39:47
so embodied. I mean, it's, it's what it sounds kids are in their bodies, and it's something that is pretty awesome to observe, and inspiring, actually. Okay, it means that. Well, so I'll tell you a story, actually that relates to this. So my son, Noah, he was five at the time, and we'd gone to get a treat at a bakery, and we're sitting there and talking about what we were going to do for the rest of the day. And I said, Noah, I wonder what we should do for the rest of the day. I think to me, it's just really important that we do something in our bodies. And he, like, genuinely, he looked at me super puzzled, and he was like, I don't even know what you mean right now. Like, I have been in my body all day, and it was like, so much so that, like, this idea of being separate from our bodies, of not of like, mind body connection is so natural to kids that they don't see a difference. So one of my favorite things to do with my patients is that I will ask them where they feel their worry. So, you know, you know, worry or stress, and I don't give much explanation. And you know, okay, so you know where it's really important for me to know about you. And one of the things I'd like to know is where in your body do you feel you're you're worried? Do you feel it in your head, your heart, your tummy, your muscles, your bones, your skin. And I'd say like 90% of the time, probably like 95% of the time, kids will, without pause, tell me, and I usually know where, because it usually relates to what symptoms we've been talking about. So kids will say, my tummy, or, you know, Oh, my head, my heart, for sure. It's very interesting, because parents will sort of look at me quizzically as I'm asking the question. Being like, this is too hard a question. You know, we're like, but it's not for the kids. And then one of the things I do see that happens as kids get older is sadly, when they're not able to answer this question. So my hypothesis, my working hypothesis, around like, nine or 10, and that's when I start to ask that question, and they sort of look at me with a blank stare, like, I don't know what you mean, you know. Or they'll say like, I have no idea what you're talking about. And so to me, this is super important, and so much of my job as a pediatrician and a parent is to think about kids come with this amazing ability to listen to their bodies, to interpret what their bodies are telling us. They often need our help to do that, but to listen and to feel. And how do we maintain that? And how do we maintain that from a place for our kids of listening clearly without fear, and how do we protect them? So I my daughter, as I mentioned, is eight, and I feel I just, you know, again, trying to think, not from a place of fear, but I feel like we're on this cusp. And she is super in her body right now. It's amazing to me how she'll just, you know, say, Oh, my stomach's hurting. I, you know, I'm super worried. I need to go outside, you know, like she knows what she wants really well, and she's, you know, often my leader in that. But I just want to hold on to that and just want to protect that, like it's, you know, this, like gem. I imagine that. I just want to, you know this, right? And how do we do that? And I think that is a big question, and important work to do.

Casey O'Roarty 43:21
Well, I think too, you know that when it's something that you talk about as a family, when it's common language, to talk about our body, to say, Oh, I was feeling this way in my belly and my shoulders are tight when it's common language, I think kids have a better time holding on to it. I also think that something starts to happen when we come in with an agenda, which I am queen of this. My daughter is sitting on the couch across the room. Just gave me a look when she come in. She was like, when we come in with an agenda and there is a right answer, or I'm going to ask you this question, because I want to get to this point that I want to make. They pick up on that absolutely. So that's, you know, the other thing too is an, I don't know kind of answer is a safety piece for them, right? It's preservation. And the other thing too is, I think, when we start having these, you know, if this is a conversation listeners that you don't typically have with your kids, and all of a sudden you're asking them, or do you feel that in your body? The answer, I don't know, could also just come from simply like that is a weird question. Nobody's ever asked me that before. So I think that you know, genuine curiosity and one of my favorite things to coach parents around this, because often parents will say, Oh no, they don't. They don't want to talk about how they feel. They don't want to talk about or, you know, the answer is, always, I don't know, is simply to say, well, pay attention next time, because I'm going to ask you again. Because I'm guessing your body's giving you some signals. I'm guessing that you're having emotions. And that is also another little an easy way, yeah,

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 44:57
and it can be so frustrating. Mean, I know, to parents, and again, I, you know, certainly get this response from my own kids, but I don't know. But I think taking that at face value, that they actually don't know, you know, and that's okay, you know. And so you're going to help them learn. And so it just like you said, Casey, I talk about, you know, I sign homework a lot, and that I say, you know, like, okay, next time I want you to write down when you're feeling this way, I want you sometimes I'll say, draw a picture and show me what colors it is, or, you know, what this looks like in the body, but you know, it's interesting. We're we're teaching our kids, and this is, of course, teaching ourselves alongside, which is certain kids, for one, are just tuned more sensitively. And that is okay, you know. And I tell those kids that it in their body is very sensitive, and, you know, all the messages that their body's giving them can be used there. It's a superpower, and it can be used for good or it can be used for bad, you know. And so I think it's always like helping them sift that through so parents, you know, and I think this comes from a place of just not knowing what to do. I had a patient mom yesterday who was like, she just friggin keeps complaining of stomach pain. And I know that mom, what she's really saying is I feel helpless when my kid is complaining and I don't know what's going on and I don't know how to help

Casey O'Roarty 46:20
and that is uncomfortable. Like, I mean, we do lots of weird and wacky things as parents inside of that discomfort

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 46:28
Absolutely. And you know, I'm glad that you name that, because I think that is actually one thing practicing with our kids, that I truly believe in, this practicing with ourselves, is that being with discomfort like being with that idea that we can't always fix it, and that's all right, we can't fix it for ourselves. We're not just going to numb, you know. And they start looking, you know, scrolling down our phone again. This is uncomfortable because I think that this is what I see so often, and I have, again, a working hypothesis about, you know, among other issues, like the technology and you know that that sort of thing, why I'm seeing so much more, why all of us as pediatricians are seeing much more anxiety and depression, one of the big reasons, I do believe, is that parents, and starting from an early age, they don't have the capacity, they Don't feel empowered, or just sort of hold enough themselves to deal with what's uncomfortable. So when the 15 month old is, you know, having a temper tantrum, and we talk about the idea of individuation, and you're gonna they, this is a healthy they're exactly where they need to do you're gonna accompany them, not necessarily fix and that is when all those messages start, the shark music, all of that starts coming up for you. And that's right where you need to be. And it's not necessarily a quick fix. And your parent, your kids, don't need you to do a quick fix.

Casey O'Roarty 47:53
Yeah. I mean, this is a whole nother topic, but yes, you know, we're the first generation of parents that are parenting with the easy access of escaping through our phones, yeah, while also raising this generation of kids who've had a tablet or a phone handed to them from the beginning to calm or whatever, I mean, I can only imagine what it's going to look like 20 years from now when these kids are parenting, and, you know, it breaks my heart, yeah, and it concerns me, you know. And we have a we have some agreements. We have rules at our house, it's not always a free for all, although full transparency listeners, I make my kids look at their screen time regularly. I look at mine. We talk about it, and my son's screen time yesterday was six flipping hours. And even he was like, Oh my gosh. I'm like, Yeah, dude,

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 48:51
you did that. So again, progress over perfection. Casey. So you know the fact that you had that built in, though, that you looked at that time him, seeing that six hours is so much more powerful than anything you could have said to him, you know. And

Casey O'Roarty 49:06
I didn't even need to be like, Oh my god, he was visibly like, whoa. And I can we looked, you know, in the technology now we can look. And I said, look. So between three and eight o'clock, every one of those hours you had, you were logging in, like, 40 to 45 minutes, and he was just like, Oh my God. I'm like, How do you feel? Like, that feels kind of gross.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 49:27
Yeah. No, totally. And kids get this too, if we talk to them about early enough. And this is the thing about, oh my gosh, yes, I could talk about the screens. I know we're not gonna go. One more thing, you know, but is that, well, it can't be overestimated over it's big, yeah. So, um, you know, I and kids, actually, again, this goes back to being embodied. They you want them to start to notice how they feel right? That they feel yucky after they've been on their phone for a long time. They feel yucky after doing Fortnite for. Three hours, you know, like so you want them to be noticing that, because, you know, you want them to be doing things. And I always say this to them, especially as they're getting older, not just because someone's telling them to, but you they are in charge of their body, you know, and that you want them to notice those things. I have kids all the time who kind of throw their parents under the bus without meaning to but we'll be talking about screen time, as we do in all visits, and they'll say, you know, well, it's just that's just that, like, I don't get to talk to my dad ever because he's on his phone. However, I will say I have that happens all the time. Yesterday, I had, like, a really striking conversation that, you know, was really disturbing that we were talking about, there's, of course, so many colds and, you know, crud right now. And this little guy, a three year old, had bronchiolitis, which is a, you know, really bad cold. And I'd said, Okay, so the rest of the family have to wash their hands and just be careful about the other siblings and do what you can. And the mom really, matter of factly, said, like, Well, okay, that will only be a problem the little one, because the older kids never come out of their room. I was like, Oh, that's so sad. But on the other side, parents and kids and you know, families are just amazing, and that when you give them this information, they do often make changes. And so that same family that the dad that you know, this is a single dad, and the sister had said, you know, Dad's always on his phone, it was really touching and inspiring, because they came back to the next visit, and they said, and I hadn't even brought it up, and they said, just so, you know, we have times where it's like two hours in the evening where we all put our phones away. And I was like, that's amazing. That's progress. So, just so

Casey O'Roarty 51:45
everyone knows, I was gone for like three hours last night at a speaking gig. So, okay, so

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 51:52
yeah, okay, look ahead. Yeah,

Casey O'Roarty 51:54
in the context of everything that we've spoken about, Sarah, what does joyful courage mean to you?

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 52:02
Oh, gosh, so joyful. Courage to me, means being all in, you know, with the good, the bad, the ugly, the brutal, as Glennon Doyle mountain calls it, it is being willing to feel that discomfort and really trusting that it's going to go to a better place, and that it does give you those really joyful moments and those transformative moments, even if it so. My My daughter the other day, as we were leaving, you know, I was being less than ideal, less than my best self, going out the door, and she looked at me and she said, Remember, mom, Peace begins with ME. That's like, Oh shoot. But so true. And that's, you know, where it's like, okay, we're, we're, we're gonna be okay, you know, like, for sure, yeah. So

Casey O'Roarty 52:52
if listeners would like to find you, where can they find you?

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 52:57
So really, the best way, at this point is through my Instagram, which is my name, Sarah Bergman Lewis, or on Facebook, and then if, if listeners would like to connect, to delve more into issues or with questions, they can email me, which is Sarah Bergman [email protected],

Casey O'Roarty 53:16
great. I'll make sure all of those links listeners are in the show notes, Sarah, thank you so much for coming on.

Dr. Sarah Bergman Lewis 53:22
Thank you, Casey, it was a pleasure. I really appreciate it.

Casey O'Roarty 53:30
Joyful courage, community, thank you so much for tuning in each and every week. Big thanks and love to my team, including my producer, Chris Mann at pod shaper, be sure to join the discussion over at the live and love with joyful courage group page, as well as the joyful courage business pages on Facebook and Instagram. Subscribe to the show through Apple podcasts, Spotify, Google Play, iHeartRadio, really anywhere you find your favorite podcasts. Also, I mentioned Patreon at the beginning of the show, check it out. Www.patreon.com/joyful, courage. This is where you can contribute to the show and take advantage of patron perks like content rich monthly webinars and deeper discussions about what's being shared on the podcast. You will like it. Www, dot, P, A, T, R, E, o, n.com/joyful, courage. Any comments or feedback about this show or any others can be sent to Casey at joyful courage.com I personally read and respond to all the emails that come my way. So reach out. You can also sign up for my bi weekly [email protected] just go to the website, sign up for that, take a breath, drop into your body, find the balcony seat and trust that everyone is going to be okay. Big Love to each and every one of you. Have a beautiful rest of your day.

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