Transcription
[00:00:00] Casey O'Roarty: Hey, welcome to the Joyful Courage podcast, a place for inspiration and transformation as we try and keep it together while parenting our tweens and teens. This is real work, people. And when we can focus on our own growth and nurturing the connection with our kids, we can move through the turbulence in a way that allows for relationships to remain intact.
[00:00:27] My name is Kacey O'Rourke, I am your fearless host. I'm a positive discipline trainer, space holder coach and the adolescent lead at Sproutable. I am also the mama to a 20 year old daughter and 17 year old son walking right beside you on this path of raising our kids with positive discipline and conscious parenting.
[00:00:47] This show is meant to be a resource to you and I work really hard to keep it real, transparent and authentic so that you feel seen and supported. Today is an interview and I have no doubt. That what you hear will be useful to you. Please don't forget sharing truly is caring. If you love today's show, please pass the link around, snap a screenshot, post it on your socials or text it to your friends.
[00:01:13] Together we can make an even bigger impact on families all around the globe. I'm so glad that you're here. Enjoy the show.
[00:01:25] All right, listeners, welcome back to the podcast. I am excited to introduce my guest for today. I am talking with Dr. Paul Sonseri. Dr. Sonseri is a clinical psychologist and father of four who treats children and adolescents with serious mental health conditions. He is the developer of intensive family focused therapy, a highly effective form of family based mental health care.
[00:01:51] And his new book, Gentle Parenting Reimagined, How to Make It Work with Oppositional Kids is on sale right now. There is. So much. I'm excited to talk about with you, Dr. Sensary. Welcome to the podcast.
[00:02:06] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, thank you, Casey. It's a great honor and privilege to be here. I appreciate that. And you're more than welcome to call me Paul.
[00:02:12] That is totally okay.
[00:02:13] Casey O'Roarty: Oh, good to know. Thank you. Well, I would like to start with finding out a little bit more about you. I'd love to know what drew you to working with kids and teens. And by the way, thank you for your service because man, don't they need you right now.
[00:02:27] Dr. Paul Sunseri: I appreciate that. Thank you. So what drew me to it?
[00:02:29] So really just luck is the honest answer to that. So I went to school at UC Davis and I got my bachelor's degree and I was all of 21 or 22 years old and I needed to get a job in mental health. And I had no idea what I wanted to do or what population I wanted to work with. And in Davis, the town where I live, there was a program that worked with, we used to call them latency ages, like 10, year old kids.
[00:02:57] This was a residential treatment program. And for your listeners who maybe don't know what that is, that's a place where kids go to live 24 seven because their mental health challenges. And their behavior problems are so severe that they can't live at home with their families. And so it was the first job that I, that I replied to.
[00:03:17] And if I had replied to an advertisement for working with senior folks, I would be talking to you about that today, probably. So I just lucked into it. I had no real drive, I think, to work with kids. I hadn't really had much experience working with kids. I had two younger siblings, but that didn't really count, I don't think.
[00:03:35] So I started doing this job. And it was super challenging. Um, I had just no idea what I was getting myself into and nothing I had learned in school up until that point, even remotely, remotely. prepared me for this job. So these kids would, you know, they're super disrespectful. They would curse at me all the time.
[00:03:54] They would think nothing of picking up a chair and throwing it at me. I was hit more times than I can count, kicked multiple times. There's only been once, thankfully, just one time, but anything you can really imagine a kid doing, these kids would, would do. And most of the time when I was working, I would get them up in the morning and see them all the way through bedtime.
[00:04:15] So I really was a surrogate parent for them. And usually I was by myself with these six unrelated kids who had these issues. Occasionally I'd have a co worker. And I, I truthfully fumbled my way through that job for the first two years. I, I was a fish out of water, had no idea how to help them. And the people who ran the program, they were awesome, but they also didn't really know how to help the kids.
[00:04:39] It was just the blind leading the blind. And usually when something happened, say I got a chair thrown at me, I would try to do or say something in response to keep another chair from being thrown at me. And most of the time what I tried with these guys, nothing worked. It was just a complete bust. But every so often, I think really through chance alone, I would do or say something that actually worked.
[00:05:04] You could tell it was working because it settled the kid down, seemed less likely to me they were going to throw another chair. And so, I just would take note of those interventions and responses that seemed effective. And I would file them away in my toolbox and my toolbox started off empty. It didn't start to grow very fast because I would try other things that they didn't work.
[00:05:23] But over time with a large enough group of kids, my toolbox got bigger and bigger and bigger. I've worked with nothing but kids ever since. I'm in my 42nd year, I think now of working with kids and families and the kids that I work with, they have very serious mental health challenges. I'm the developer, as you said, of intensive family focused therapy, and as the name implies, it's a family based model of mental health care.
[00:05:47] And so the kids my colleagues and I work with are profoundly depressed, suicidal, self harming, or so anxious that they basically can't function in life. So a lot of the kids that we work with either refuse to go to school or barely go to school, or they've dropped out of school and haven't gone for months and months and months.
[00:06:05] So we do a family based model of care because they're now. decades worth of research that shows pretty clearly that that is the most effective way to help kids who have substantial problems. So that's the entire population I've ever worked with. I love it. I was terrible at first, as I said, but then I got better.
[00:06:22] And the things that I've learned is really the content of my new book because I don't think parents of difficult kids, really challenging kids. Have you ever been exposed to this information? I learned it as I went, but I don't think it's common knowledge among most therapists. What do you do when a kid tells you to F off, for example, or refuses to do their homework?
[00:06:40] So that's a little bit about how I got here and what I do.
[00:06:44] Casey O'Roarty: Yeah. And most of us, I would say that are raising teens, most of us identify as. and our parents, you know, we're like, well do the right thing or, and you'll be rewarded, do the wrong thing and you'll be punished. And so that's what we've got to hold on to.
[00:07:01] I know just for some background, for you, my listeners know this story cause my daughter has so generously shared here with me on the podcast. But I had one of those kids who had anxiety and depression that got in the way. of her life and she dropped out of school in 11th grade and the two of us, while it wasn't intensive family focused therapy, we did dialectic behavioral therapy by the book.
[00:07:28] So it was her getting an hour of therapy with a therapist. Every week and then the two of us every week also doing a skills class with other Caregivers and kids and that was even at that point. I was already a parent coach I was already a positive discipline trainer and I was like, what the hell am I supposed to do here?
[00:07:48] like I mean, this is extreme and I felt very lost and Yes that whole system approach was so, even though it was just my daughter and I, my, my husband, my, she has a younger brother, they weren't necessarily involved, but it was very useful for she and I to move through. And it was a six month program. And you know, when it ended, I couldn't believe I was, I really wanted to just sign up for another six months.
[00:08:20] But Rowan said, no mom, she's had enough, she'd had enough and really things turned around. And it wasn't a quick turnaround. It was definitely a U turn of a barge. It wasn't a quick turnaround, but it was a significant shift in her, how she was experiencing herself in the world. And You know, even just recently, now that was five years ago, we had a text exchange and she wrote after venting to me about something and just listening and validating.
[00:08:54] She said, I'm so glad we did DBT. Like it's still is showing up in our relationship. And she recognizes like, I see you, mom. I see you using your skills with me. So thank you. Yeah, thank you. And so the intensive family focus, is that really what it sounds like? Just a more systemic focus on what's happening in the family versus just centering the child?
[00:09:18] What is it?
[00:09:19] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, let me see if I can explain it. I don't want to go on and on about it. My wife tells me I'm long winded, so I don't want to do that. But let me see if I can explain it. And at the same time, I'll share my perspective on kids with challenges, especially right now. And I think everybody knows.
[00:09:35] that we're in the middle of a mental health epidemic. It's been going on now for some time. It actually predates COVID, but we are raising a generation of young people that have never before in human history been this anxious, depressed and suicidal, like super common. And my first book really covers this.
[00:09:52] It talks about all of the causes and contributors to the mental health epidemic. It does a deep dive into family focused treatments and why they work. And I have some case examples in there. And then at the end of the book, I have an 18 point strategic plan for reversing the mental health epidemic. I do think it is entirely possible.
[00:10:10] So, when I work with a kid who, say, is hurting themselves and barely leaves their bedroom, Maybe isn't hardly talking to their family anymore, either isn't going to school or maybe goes but doesn't do any homework and isn't passing their classes. A lot of the kids that I've worked with have been placed in psychiatric hospitals, some of them many, many times, it's been going on a long time.
[00:10:34] So the way I see their universe is I don't think that there is anything necessarily wrong on the inside of the kid. I don't see this as a biologically based problem. I don't see necessarily that the path moving forward to help them will come from treatments that are delivered to them as an individual.
[00:10:53] So a lot of kids who struggle are sent to individual therapy. As if there's something that that individual therapist can do to, you know, radically help this kid and translate that into different kinds of behavior, improved behavior in the home. That's just one form. Medication, not to say that medication isn't helpful to some folks, but that it's an individually delivered treatment.
[00:11:15] There's, you have a brain thing going on. There are IOP programs, PHP programs, residential treatment falls into the ultimate individually based service. I don't see the universe that way at all. So I think what's happening with kids is we all live in situations and contexts, right? So when I find a kid who is struggling in that way, the first thing I do is an assessment.
[00:11:38] Well, what is happening to this kid? What is going on in their universe that may be contributing to their mental health condition, exacerbating it, what are the various components of their world, whether that's their peer group, whether that's school, whether that's family relationships, what is happening such that this person is struggling.
[00:11:56] And once you do that assessment and figure it out. Then it becomes a pretty straightforward process to know how to help them. So, as a concrete example, let's say a kid is fighting with their parents all the time. So, every day there are arguments and upsets, people are yelling at each other. Parents are just trying to figure out how to get this kid to school or to do their homework or to stop hurting themselves.
[00:12:18] The kid is maybe resisting some of those efforts to help, but it turns into a big powder cake. You know, it's hard to imagine a kid is going to recover from a mental health condition when they're fighting. They coexist with parents who are just so at their wits and everything is such a powder keg at home.
[00:12:35] Like, how can that kid get any better? So in the case of a family that is maybe reactive on both sides, you teach communication skills, how to navigate problems peacefully in a more collaborative way. You just dial the heat down in the home, which almost always has a positive effect on the kid. What's happening at school?
[00:12:53] I mean, if you rule out, say, a learning disability or some kind of a, um, cognitive problem that's contributing to them not doing well in school, which is usually not the case, most of the time it isn't one of those things, then what's getting in the way of them going to school? Maybe they're saying they're too anxious.
[00:13:09] Maybe they, this is a really common thing for kids to say, they have no motivation. I'm not motivated to go to school is a super common thing for kids to say, and you figure out what all those things are, and you mitigate that. Maybe, and likely, they've connected themselves to some sort of a peer group that is also struggling with depression, anxiety, and self harm.
[00:13:27] Usually that's done virtually, so if they're in their room, On a screen and they're miserable, they're very likely are communicating with other people who are equally miserable and then they get into this echo chamber, they force each other's to function. So we get in there, we mitigate those things. So you can see from this example, there's nothing wrong on the inside of the kid.
[00:13:47] What is wrong is what's happening on the outside to them. So that's why I don't think in a lot of cases with serious mental illness, kids benefit from individual therapy because individual therapists can't get them off the screen. Yeah. Yeah. Can't get them to school. You can have a lot of conversations about those things.
[00:14:03] But if you get in there and you go right to the source, the people who love this kid the most, their parents, they have a massive amount of influence over their kids, their lives, their well being and their behavior. And nobody ever, is going to love that human being more than their parents do ever. So we go to the people who have the most influence.
[00:14:21] We teach them some of the skills that they need to turn the situation around. So that's the idea behind a family based form of treatment. And that's why we think it's so effective.
[00:14:30] Casey O'Roarty: Got it. I love that. And I so appreciate that. And when I think about. you know, Gen Z. And I just saw the phrase Zalpha for, I'm guessing that's for those like, in between Z and alpha.
[00:14:46] I mean, you know, I think about, and something that I wrote recently just in my own social media post for, you know, promoting my podcast is some of the things that are real for teens today simply didn't exist. Like their attachment to their screens and we can't relate to that. And so trying to navigate it with nothing to reach back to and say, well, how, what was useful for me?
[00:15:16] I mean, it's just, so I do, I appreciate so much looking at the external and figuring out how can we, what are the tweaks in the external that can influence, because we're, it's all a dynamic, right? The dynamic is real and alive and how we respond and what we say, what we don't say, what our messaging is.
[00:15:37] Unless we're really conscious of what we're doing, it's a lot of shooting from the hip, especially when we're talking about our most, you know, challenging. hurting and really are most discouraged is really the word that I would use the deeply discouraged kids.
[00:16:01] I love the title of your new book, Gentle Parenting Reimagined. How do you define gentle parenting? What does that mean to you?
[00:16:09] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, I think, as you know, and probably a lot of your listeners know, the idea of gentle parenting has been around for a while now. It goes back about 10 years. So I'll describe it in its purest form, and then I'll.
[00:16:18] Talk about why I wrote the book and why I think it needs to be reimagined for challenging kids. So gentle parenting is all about relationships. It's all about forming the closest, most loving relationship with your kid that you possibly can. It emphasizes being in tune with your kids, spending a lot of time with them, being empathetic and warm.
[00:16:38] It's, it's all about connection, right? And I think that is a great. thing. And also unlike previous generations, there's less of an emphasis on punishment and consequences and more when something goes wrong, trying to lean in and really understand that kid on an emotional level. So that's in its purest form.
[00:16:56] That's what it is, but it has been criticized rightly, I think, because. Some people view it as just letting your kids get away with murder, right? You no longer set limits with them. You're not firm in situations where you, where you should be. Saturday Night Live did a great skit on this of a dad driving his daughter through the airport who eventually just curses at him in the end, right?
[00:17:19] So I think it's, it's been criticized for that. So I can't, I think it kind of opens itself up to that. And what I know too. First, I love the idea of being a gentle parent, and I think every parent I've ever met likes the idea. Like, who wants to be harsh or unkind or punitive towards their kids? Some people, yes, but fewer and fewer of those parents these days, I think.
[00:17:40] So, I love that, and when I became a father, that was my commitment. I'm going to be one of those dads that has a good relationship with my daughter. I want my home life with them to be loving and relaxed and kind and I think you can pull that off. It's especially easy to pull that off when you have an easy to parent kid.
[00:18:01] It was just more naturally going to follow directions and more naturally is going to respect your authority. I happen to get four of those, so I totally lucked out. Oh yeah, for sure. But a lot of parents get something very different. What they get is a kid who is more naturally strong willed, more inclined to be oppositional.
[00:18:19] A kid who, because they're oppositional, often then Can be disrespectful to their parents. They yell and scream and say mean things kids refuse to do pretty much anything That's asked of them Mornings tend to be a nightmare because a kid won't get out of bed and you have to drag them through their routine and are Always late a lot of parents give up asking these kids to do chores because it always turns into a fight Many of these kids won't do their homework, and so they have a bazillion missing assignments, and they're barely passing their classes.
[00:18:50] And here you have these parents who are kind, loving human beings, who have a skill set that is perfectly fine, adequate for an easy to parent kid, right? Works just fine. But when you've got a harder kid The typical skill set that most parents have doesn't work at all, right? And so they're left feeling frustrated and angry.
[00:19:09] You know, a lot of my parents, they wake up in the morning having no idea what horrible thing is going to face them that day. And this child that they're raising, who they love so deeply is just off the rails. So I wrote the book because. I do believe gentle parenting has a lot of merit, but I don't think in its traditional form, it's going to be particularly effective for the harder kids.
[00:19:30] And for your listeners who are raising one of these kids, maybe you have tried it and given up on it because it really would be a bust, I think. So all the things that I've learned through the years, working with so many of these kids, that toolbox that I mentioned that has gotten so big now. That's really what's contained within the book.
[00:19:47] It's nothing but practical advice. If your kid curses at you, here's what you do. If they're not doing your homework, here's what you do. If you want them up to an alarm and out the door on time in the morning, here's what you do. And every intervention that I describe in the book is what I call battle tested.
[00:20:04] These are real world interventions that work with actual kids. These are not things necessarily that I've read in the book. There was nothing included in there that I haven't done many, many times, either myself. Right. Top parents to do. One of the things that gets me when I listen to parenting influences, when they talk about stuff is they talk around the issues.
[00:20:24] They talk about things that are important, like self care and giving yourself a break, deep breathing for parents, all good stuff. That's not going to change a kid's behavior. It will do nothing to change their behavior. And so I like concrete ideas that are practical and effective. And so I've not come across another self help book.
[00:20:42] that is this kind of a roadmap for parents? Because I have this really unique work experience that most therapists don't have.
[00:20:49] Casey O'Roarty: Yeah. Well, and it's interesting, like some people overlap gentle parenting and what I do, which is positive discipline. And one of the pillars of positive discipline is kindness and firmness at the same time, right?
[00:21:03] And so it is absolutely relationship based. But it also has this, you know, how can we create a sense of freedom within structure, right? Like everybody's going to contribute and we're going to create a system for chores and your voice matters. Your contribution matters. We're going to figure out how to create a win win and there aren't great models, right?
[00:21:26] There aren't great models. So well meaning parents are like, oh, yeah, positive discipline. And then. Because maybe we've come from a family of more authoritarian rule, and we want to do it differently. We swing hard into the kindness without being really comfortable with creating boundaries and expectations and holding the firmness and the structure.
[00:21:48] So, You know, and as our kids, because it's a continuum, right? There's the easygoing kids, there's the oppositional kids, and then there's all the kids that live between those two. And as we get closer to oppositional, Firmness can start to feel more, for the parent, I think, a little bit more punitive, right?
[00:22:09] Which is not what we want. And so holding a firm line, holding a no, without making it about blame, shame, or punishment, it can feel really tricky. So I'm really excited to get my hands on your book. Okay. So are we talking about kids? So I know there's the phrase, Oppositional Defiance Disorder. What do you think about that phrase?
[00:22:34] Is it a thing, or are these just tough kids that are reacting and responding to the environment that they find themselves in?
[00:22:42] Dr. Paul Sunseri: That's a great question, and as a psychologist, I am not one that tends to lean in heavily on diagnosis, right? All a diagnosis is, is just a name that you give behaviors that tend to cluster together, right?
[00:22:55] The problem is, My profession talks about diagnoses sort of in the same way a physician will talk about a diagnosis, but they're not the same thing at all. So when a physician diagnoses liver cancer, that's a real thing, right? It's you can test it, open somebody up and there it is. And you know what the treatments are for it.
[00:23:14] That's a real condition. But in my line of work, it's really just. descriptions of behavior. So yes, there is a diagnosis oppositional defiant disorder, but it's just a kid who's stubborn, maybe stubborn beyond the normal range says no more often than they say yes, probably is also emotionally reactive. Is that a disease?
[00:23:35] No, it's just that kid in that situation behaving that way. I'll tell you a story about this. So I was working with a boy and he was very, very stubborn and oppositional. And the dad asked to come see me one day and this was years ago. And he said, I really want to show you something. I think I figured out what's wrong with my son.
[00:23:55] And in my head, I'm thinking, well, tell me because I want to know too, right? So he comes in, it was so sad. It was this piece of paper that he printed off of the internet. It said oppositional defiant disorder symptoms. And then he goes, I think my son has oppositional defiant disorder. And so I had to explain to him as gently as I knew how, that's not really a thing.
[00:24:15] That's just a name that we use to describe the stuff that your son does. We already know that he's doing. It tells us nothing useful about. How he got to be this way, and even less about what to do about it. So I don't use diagnoses with kids. Parents ask me, I'll share them, right? But I just don't think there's anything beneficial that comes out of that.
[00:24:34] You got a hard kid. That's the truth of it.
[00:24:36] Yeah.
[00:24:36] Dr. Paul Sunseri: And they didn't ask to be this way. They just are, right? They don't wake up in the morning thinking how they're going to torment their parents. They just do. And they don't like being that way. I've never met a kid that likes misbehaving and calling their parents or whatever.
[00:24:49] They don't.
[00:24:50] So
[00:24:51] Dr. Paul Sunseri: what kids need And this is what I love about positive discipline. What kids need is in the love, kindness, warmth, compassion, all the good things, but they need boundaries. They need limits. Every human being comes into the world trying to figure out where are the limits, what's okay for me to do and what isn't.
[00:25:08] And what kids really depend on are their parents to put up those limits. Like this is it, you can't go any farther than this. And the kid will touch and press against those limits. And if those limits are firm, not outrageous or mean or punitive, but firm, the kid falls back and takes relief from that.
[00:25:24] It's like, all right, now I know the problem is. You can set a limit with an oppositional kid, but how do you enforce it? You can tell a kid 20 times to take out the trash, but if they're not doing it, how do you make that happen? So parents seem fine with setting limits, but where they struggle with, well, how do I enforce those limits?
[00:25:40] And that's my work.
[00:25:42] Casey O'Roarty: Yeah. Well, and I love that and listeners, you couldn't see, but Paul had his hands up as we create limits. I had a parent in one of my classes years ago, before I even had teens, before my dark days of parenting and adolescent. And she said, you know what I'm hearing you talk about is really our job is to be the container to contain.
[00:26:06] And their job is to bounce around and figure out and feel. Where the walls of the container are and when I think about the difference between being in a pool and being in the ocean I feel a lot safer in the pool because I can see where the walls are. I know how far I can go. Whereas in the ocean or, you know, kids that, my parent can't handle me.
[00:26:33] That's a scary, I imagine that's a scary place to be. I must be so difficult or so out of control or so messed up because my parents can't even hold it together. My parents can't even handle me. So, I can see how that could feel like a free fall and continue to influence. You know, how that kid is seeing themself as an individual and as well as a person in the world.
[00:26:58] So tell me a little bit about holding limits and what it looks like in the context of really wanting to hold relationship. And even as I say that I think that and you tell me if this you find this to be true. Parents who are really committed to relationship find that conflict or disappointment or anger somehow means, well, we're not in relationship if you're mad at me because I'm holding a limit.
[00:27:25] And so. Do you find that? Do you know what I'm talking about there? Yes.
[00:27:28] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, here's the thing. If your mission is guided by the belief that if my child gets angry with me, then I'm not having a good relationship with my child. You're causing yourself a world of problems, right? I, sometimes when you set limits with kids, they're going to get mad, right?
[00:27:46] Why? Why not? If you're telling them that. They need to be in bed by a certain time. What kid wants to do that? Or if you say it's time to get off your phone and do something else, like who's enthusiastic about that? If you're going to set limits with your kids, you have to know sometimes you're going to step in it with them, right?
[00:28:01] They're going to get angry. They're going to sometimes raise their voice, but just no part of good parenting is telling your kids no. They want you to do that. It doesn't seem like it, but they really do. Well, I love the metaphor, the pool versus the ocean. And if you're okay with that, I'm gonna steal that from, I love it.
[00:28:17] So let me just describe how I see all of this when it comes to enforcing a limit, setting a limit, just I need you to get all your homework turned in on time, please. That's setting a limit. But how do you get them to do that? So first of all, there is nothing in my book that is punitive. And when I think of the word punitive, I think of harsh.
[00:28:35] overly controlling, sometimes mean spirited, but there are consequences that I describe in my book that are none of those things. They can be delivered in a, in a loving, warm, but firm way, but they're not punitive in any way. So let me give you an example of this. And I think most of your listeners would agree that there's nothing punitive about to say, but it's effective.
[00:28:56] So let's say you have a kid who. Is refusing to do their homework and they'll give you all kinds of reasons why they're not doing it. It's too hard. I didn't didn't know what the assignment was and I already turned it into my teacher and why do I have to go to school anyway? High school is stupid. I mean, you'll get all those things that I call red herrings, which are really just ways of distracting you from the essential point, which is I need and expect that you turn your homework in on time.
[00:29:21] I don't think this is an outrageous expectation. I think all parents in the world share that same expectation, but the kid will find it to be the most outrageous, unfair thing that they've ever heard of in their lives. So when you. Set a limit. You don't need your kids to agree that that's the right thing to do, right?
[00:29:39] But you do expect them to listen to you and to do the things that you've asked. But what if they don't? What if you set the limit and you've talked about school and all the good things that most parents do? What if they continue to not do their work and now they're racking up the missing assignments?
[00:29:53] The way you make that happen is First, you strategize and the strategy that I think is most effective for this would be to sit down with the kid and say something to them about this. Actually, Casey, can we, can we do a role play? Can you be the kid? It's so much easier for me to talk to the kid.
[00:30:09] Casey O'Roarty: Yes. Oh, I love a role play, Paul.
[00:30:12] Cool, cool.
[00:30:12] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Not everybody does, which is why I asked for permission. Hey, so Casey, what's the deal with you and your homework? I know you've got a bunch of missing assignments.
[00:30:20] Casey O'Roarty: I mean, it's just, it's just stupid. It's, it's busy work. I don't understand why I have to do it.
[00:30:27] Dr. Paul Sunseri: So is it fair to say it's something that you just, it's not really high on your priority list?
[00:30:30] You don't care that much about it?
[00:30:31] Yeah,
[00:30:32] Dr. Paul Sunseri: for sure. That's kind of what it seems like to me, too. But I have made it clear to you that I do expect you to do your homework and turn your assignments in, right?
[00:30:40] Yeah.
[00:30:41] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, what are you going to do about this? Because I'm not, I'm not going to waiver from that. And I don't think I'm crazy as a parent to want my kid to do their homework.
[00:30:47] But I recognize the fact that it's not something you want to do. And we have talked about this several times. So I think we need a better plan. So what, what do you think? Would work. Do you have any ideas?
[00:30:57] Casey O'Roarty: Well, I mean, my teacher is really dismissive and. It just, it really feels like pointless work, Dad.
[00:31:06] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Yeah, do you think the only time that something has a value is when you see a point in it?
[00:31:11] Casey O'Roarty: Yeah.
[00:31:13] Dr. Paul Sunseri: So you think people should never have to do anything unless they believe that it has value to them directly?
[00:31:19] Casey O'Roarty: I mean, that, I mean, I guess. That makes sense. You don't
[00:31:24] Dr. Paul Sunseri: see space in life, like say you have a job, for example, and your boss tells you to do something, even though you don't agree necessarily with what you've been told, and you might think it's busy work.
[00:31:33] Would you be able just to say to your boss, I don't think I'm going to do it because it seems useless to me. Is that how it works, do you think? I
[00:31:39] Casey O'Roarty: mean, probably not. That would
[00:31:40] Dr. Paul Sunseri: probably get me fired. I think that's true. So homework is kind of the same way. You may not see a value in it, but it's one of those things kids need to do.
[00:31:46] So back to my question. Since we've talked about this a bunch of times and you're still not turning in your assignments, what should I do? I have some ideas, but I want to hear what your thoughts are.
[00:31:54] Casey O'Roarty: Well, what if I do the assignments that feel like are useful and some of the assignments that feel like busy work, I just take the zero?
[00:32:06] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, I don't mind if every so often you choose not to do a less important assignment, but what I would want is. By every so often, it's kind of a rare thing. The problem is, when I look in on your grades, you're not doing hardly any of them. So I don't think you really fall into that category. But I'll tell you what, I'll make you a deal.
[00:32:24] If you start doing your homework on a regular basis and turn it in every once in a while, if you don't do something, I'd be willing to overlook that. So I don't think that's necessarily a practical solution to what's going. Can you think of anything else? Other than just doing it, of course, which is an option.
[00:32:38] Casey O'Roarty: Um, I don't feel like my teacher really likes me. Well, do
[00:32:43] Dr. Paul Sunseri: you think it's still possible to turn in your homework, even if your teacher dislikes you? Do you think your teachers must like you in order to do your homework? I'm not seeing the connection.
[00:32:52] Casey O'Roarty: Well, it's kind of like I'm sticking it to her if I don't do my homework.
[00:32:55] Oh,
[00:32:55] Dr. Paul Sunseri: I see. So it's like you punishing your teacher for your perception that they don't care for you. Well, that may be true, and it is certainly possible that some of your teachers don't like you, but I still want you to do your homework anyway. So any other ideas?
[00:33:08] Casey O'Roarty: I
[00:33:08] Dr. Paul Sunseri: mean
[00:33:10] Casey O'Roarty: What are your ideas, dad?
[00:33:11] Dr. Paul Sunseri: How about this?
[00:33:12] What if we did this? Tell you what, this is kind of a crazy idea, but this is probably what I'm going to do. What if you come home from school, and maybe whatever fun stuff you typically do, like access to your phone, or your Xbox, or whatever, what if you come home, and all of that stuff is turned off, and then I turn it back on, once you've done your homework, what do you think of that idea?
[00:33:33] Casey O'Roarty: I do not love that idea.
[00:33:35] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, why not?
[00:33:36] Casey O'Roarty: Because I want my stuff.
[00:33:38] Dr. Paul Sunseri: But I want you to do your homework. Why would somebody get privileges when they're not taking care of their daily responsibilities? Don't you think, like, responsibilities come before fun? That's how I run my life, by the way.
[00:33:49] Casey O'Roarty: I mean, I guess, yes.
[00:33:52] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Okay, so that seems sort of In order of things. So why don't we do that? I'll be coming home from school. Everything is turned off. And again, I will gladly turn your stuff on as soon as you knock out your homework. And given how behind you are, why don't we just say, why don't you do a minimum of five assignments every day?
[00:34:08] And if you do five assignments every day, you're going to get caught up fairly quickly. And by the way, I would need to you. See those assignments completed before I would count it as done because sometimes you haven't always been super honest with me about this. So you can send me a screenshot, you can call me into your bedroom and I'd be happy to look at it before you submit it.
[00:34:25] So five assignments a day, then the screens are yours and then you'll be all caught up. I think this is a great idea unless you have another one.
[00:34:32] Casey O'Roarty: Well, how about I do three assignments a day and There's a snack for me.
[00:34:37] Dr. Paul Sunseri: You're welcome to have a snack anytime you want. I'll leave that part of it up to you.
[00:34:42] Well, why don't we start off with three? I'm okay with that. Seems like a reasonable compromise. What if though you don't do any homework that day? What, what should I do?
[00:34:50] Casey O'Roarty: Well, it sounds like you're not going to let me have my phone or my
[00:34:53] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Yeah, it's true, and I probably won't give any of that back to you until you start completing assignments the next day.
[00:34:59] So let's just say you go four or five days without doing any homework, that would be four or five days without a screen of any kind. As long as you understand that and can live with it, then I think we have a solid agreement here. I mean, okay. Fantastic. I appreciate you being so agreeable with me. This is awesome.
[00:35:14] And by the way, you're an excellent negotiator. I was going to go with five assignments and you talked me down to three. I think that's amazing. So you're a pretty easy kid, right? So the kids that I work with would go F you. I
[00:35:24] Casey O'Roarty: felt easy. I didn't want to be easy. I wanted to give you a harder time for sure.
[00:35:29] Dr. Paul Sunseri: You did okay. And you threw a lot of the nonsense arguments that a kid typically would. My teacher doesn't like me. I mean, all that stuff, none of that matters. You still need to do their homework.
[00:35:37] Yeah.
[00:35:47] Casey O'Roarty: And I noticed as the kid, it felt like there was a very, I felt your firmness. I felt the structure and I could feel that you were holding some space for freedom within that structure. I could feel Even as I also kind of felt a little trapped into like, God damn it, I'm gonna have to do my stupid homework.
[00:36:10] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, that's the whole idea. And you notice every nonsense argument you threw at me, I just poked a big hole in it. It's ridiculous. Yeah. Yeah. You know, not everybody likes you, and you're gonna have bosses and other people in the world who take a disliking to you, but you still need to do. The stuff that's not going to carry much purchase with me, not the kid is actually being targeted by a teacher.
[00:36:28] That's a whole different thing. I don't think that happens. Let's do a quick variation. So be a little bit harder. So, um,
[00:36:34] Casey O'Roarty: you want me to be harder?
[00:36:35] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Yeah, I'm going to ask, you know, I'm going to say, so here's what I was thinking that, you know, maybe we could just, you come home from school and you know, all of your screens are off until you, you knock out those assignments.
[00:36:45] So what do you think about that? Just tell me to F off. I'm never going to. Yeah,
[00:36:48] Casey O'Roarty: that's fucking stupid, dad. I don't care about my homework and I don't really care about you. And I'll just walk out the door with my phone.
[00:36:55] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Just a quick aside. I, I, I remember a few podcasts. I can actually curse.
[00:37:03] Good for you for paving the way. So wait, I'm sorry. What did you just say that you're not, you're, you're not going to turn in what?
[00:37:10] Casey O'Roarty: No, I'm just gonna like, maybe I just won't come home. How about that? Like, you cannot control my phone. Well, what makes you think that I can't? Because it's mine.
[00:37:22] Dr. Paul Sunseri: I mean, literally, it's yours?
[00:37:23] Like, you bought it for the cell plan? Well, I mean, ugh. I do, actually. Okay,
[00:37:28] Casey O'Roarty: you pay for it, but you know what? Take it then. I'll go Get a burner phone.
[00:37:33] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, you could, but I'm not sure that's necessarily going to give you what you want. I think you want your phone and you want your gaming system and you want your privileges.
[00:37:42] You can just say, heck with all of this and go get yourself a burner, a flip phone. I suppose that's an option or we could come up with a solution that actually works. So can we finish the conversation or in a space where you can finish this out with me? Cause I'm not quite done.
[00:37:54] Casey O'Roarty: I'm not going to have this conversation with you right now.
[00:37:56] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Fair enough. But we need to get through it. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to turn all your stuff off as of now. And when you're ready to come back and have a conversation with me, you let me know, you know, where to find me. Unless you want to finish now.
[00:38:07] Casey O'Roarty: Screw you.
[00:38:07] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Okay. I don't take it. Turn it off.
[00:38:09] It's fine. Totally fine with me. And that what the kid is doing right there is bluster. That's bravado. Lots of kids say. Well, I don't care about my phone anyway. You know what? That is probably the thing they care about the most. And any kid who's without their screens is going to be unhappy and miserable, even for 10 minutes.
[00:38:27] So let that kid bluster with me and say he doesn't care. He's like, I'll see you later. And I'm going to keep your stuff off. Literally keep your stuff off until you come back to me. And we finished this conversation in a respectful way. Go ahead and end the conversation with me. If that's what you want, but I don't think it's going to work out.
[00:38:43] And
[00:38:44] Casey O'Roarty: what about those kids? Cause we're talking about the, the rain, like the end of the spectrum. Like, what about those kids that then are physically destructive, intimidating? Like, what do you, how do you support, what do you, what do we do with, I didn't have one of those. My tough stuff was like more of a withdraw than it was a come at me.
[00:39:09] Sure. Um, but what do we, what do we, what do parents do who have kids that have that physical response?
[00:39:15] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Great question. So I'll ask you, what do you believe or suspect is the function of that behavior? The out of control physicality? What, what does it bring to the kid that is useful to them?
[00:39:28] Casey O'Roarty: What does it bring to the kid that's, when they Flip out.
[00:39:33] Well, they know that they're going to intimidate, they know they're going to bully or intimidate the parent into giving in. Yeah,
[00:39:38] Dr. Paul Sunseri: 100%. So they are going to intimidate their
[00:39:40] Casey O'Roarty: parents, even if they're just totally dysregulation. Cause we talk about dysregulated and we kind of lose that prefrontal cortex. But I guess it's more of kind of an emotional response.
[00:39:50] I,
[00:39:51] Dr. Paul Sunseri: I, I don't know. My experience with kids is they don't lose their temper when they're in good moods and everything is going their way.
[00:39:59] Casey O'Roarty: They don't. For sure. Yeah. They
[00:40:00] Dr. Paul Sunseri: lose their temper usually because they've been told no about something.
[00:40:05] So
[00:40:05] Dr. Paul Sunseri: the vast majority of aggressive kids that I work with, this is not so.
[00:40:08] something that they can't control, although they'll tell you that all the time. It's simply that they've learned through reinforcement by threatening and intimidating their parents, or even getting physical with their parents, their parents back down, and they're far less inclined to set limits. So the, you have to power through that and quick caveat, if your kid is being physically aggressive towards you, do not attempt to change anything without going to see a knowledgeable therapist who can walk you through these things.
[00:40:34] Physicality is a big deal. Or if you try to settle this with the kid and they hurt themselves, that's a big deal. You need more than a self advocate for that, you need a therapist who can help you. Yeah.
[00:40:41] Casey O'Roarty: And, and, and, you know, just acknowledging all of you that are listening, like no shade to the dynamic that has developed in your household either.
[00:40:50] I mean, it's. Contrasting temperaments can really create some intense situations, so I just wanted to say that as well. I totally
[00:40:59] Dr. Paul Sunseri: get why parents would feel intimidated and back down. It is a normal human thing to do. But when you back down because a kid is raging at you You're giving them what they want.
[00:41:10] You're feeding the dragon and you're teaching them, that kid, to get what you want. All you have to do is bluster and intimidate and then I'm going to give it to you. Now the kid is in the power position and the parent isn't, which is the worst place for a parent to be. So with a raging kid like that, There are two interventions that have to occur and you have to implement them simultaneously.
[00:41:30] The first one is you disengage from a raging kid. You never talk to them. You never have a back and forth with them because usually parents try to sue the kid or appease the kid. They're, they're doing some sort of a back and forth, which actually is what keeps the rage alive. So what I encourage parents to say is I can not have a conversation with you when you're yelling at me.
[00:41:50] Or as soon as you calm down, I would be happy to talk with you about this again. You say it, you turn your back and you walk away from them. You have to completely disengage and never re engage again until the kid is fully settled and back online again. You're teaching them basically that they will only get your attention when they're not raging, right?
[00:42:08] Because you, that way you take away all the reinforcement that comes from the parental attention given towards the rage episodes, which reinforce the rage episodes. If worst case, you can go to a bedroom and close and lock the door. Worst case, if the kid is attacking you, I highly recommend that parents pick up the phone and call the police.
[00:42:24] You need to send that kid the message that this does not fly. It doesn't fly in the world. And when you strike an adult, that's a crime. Law enforcement is going to come out and they will do whatever they're going to do with you, which in most cases is just talking them down and then leaving again.
[00:42:38] Just
[00:42:38] Dr. Paul Sunseri: send them a really clear message.
[00:42:39] You may not put your hands on me. Yeah. Second intervention paired with disengagement is there's a big penalty to be paid for those rage episodes, right? That would be a kid who does not get access to their screens, right? That's just the rule in this house that when you have one of those Tantrums slash dysregulations and you yell and you carry on and I have to walk away from you That is not a day.
[00:43:00] You're gonna have access to your screens You may only have access to your screens on days where you don't rage at me And you basically do everything else, like you do your homework and you're nice and all those kinds of things. But you only get your privileges in the absence of that negative behavior.
[00:43:14] And once the kid loses their privileges because they've done something fairly egregious, like attack their parents, they have to earn those screens back. They're not taken away for a set or finite amount of time. It's not like you've lost your phone for a week, which I highly recommend that parents don't do.
[00:43:29] It's a total bust most of the time. Yes, they will, unfortunately. You're going to have to earn your screens back, and you can start right now if you want. The way you earn them back is you could accept the consequence, you could be nice, you could get yourself back on track fairly quickly, all of those things will work in your favor.
[00:43:44] But I'm not going to return this stuff to you until you basically have earned them back through positive behavior. And when you start doing this with kids, every one of them says, well, for how long? How long have I lost my phone? And the answer to that is I have no idea because honestly, I can't predict how quickly you're going to turn this around, right?
[00:44:03] You can wow me starting right now. You could be super sweet to me for the rest of the day, which I would love, but let's say you don't. Let's say you're mad about this and you just can't. Decide you're going to be mad for four or five days. That's fine with me. You be you, but you're you can wait five days and then start earning your phone back.
[00:44:18] Whichever works better for you. I'll let you decide on that. So the only way they get their privileges reinstated is by giving you the opposite behavior that they engage in to lose their privileges in the first place. It's highly effective, but you have to do both of these. You have to do disengagement and privilege restriction.
[00:44:33] Casey O'Roarty: Yeah. And do you, so I'm listening to you and I'm thinking, about all the other, you know, cause I know parents that are really in it. It's like, tell me what to do. Tell me the formula. And there's so many extra layers to this as well. Like the culture of talking about coping in the family. Like, how are we modeling?
[00:45:00] Regulation. How are we talking about disappointment when the answer is no for something that we want? How am I, as mom, talking about my own frustrations as I'm driving and somebody cuts me off and I really want to flip them the bird, but then I do take some breaths and I do remember that everybody's got their own story to tell and who knows what's going on with that person, I'm going to find some compassion, like, I'm thinking about, yes, disengaging, and yes, and even like the pulling back of the privileges and replacing it with, let's talk about making amends, let's talk about What you can do differently.
[00:45:39] I mean, and granted, I'm remembering too, as you said, when it's the most extreme, like we're also bringing in a team and Finding some really skilled support, but maybe a few notches down from that is also like What's going on with connection here? How can we reconnect? Over the next couple, I was just working with a client today who, her child had snuck out and got into some mischief and fairly typical teen, like, I don't think you can handle this, so I'm just gonna keep it under wraps.
[00:46:13] But of course, they're terrible at keeping things under wraps, as I was as well as a teenager. And so as she was talking about, I'm gonna ground her. I said, well, you can look at it through that, like, this is what I'm going to take away because you made a mistake, or you can look at it as, we're going to, like, tighten things up and spend some time together and reconnect and figure out what's getting in the way of you being able and willing to be honest with me, to ask for what you need.
[00:46:43] You know what I'm thinking in positive discipline and Adlerian theory, actually, is that whole idea of what's going on under the surface. What are the beliefs behind the behavior? So I'm curious, too, I guess I'm getting to a question here, like, would not, you know, so for a kid who has a pattern of exploding, you know, I would think that it would be important for the parent to say, so, okay, buddy, when everybody's calm, like, sometimes things get really hot here at the house, and I find myself getting in your grill as you get more out of control.
[00:47:17] And what you're going to notice me doing from now on, what I'm going to practice doing is disengaging. And really that's giving you space. to get your shit together so that we can have a productive conversation. Right? And depending on how that goes, there could be some consequences on the other side.
[00:47:34] Cause I think, I mean, on one hand, I wouldn't want to create a situation where a kiddo, cause we do, I mean, parents lose our minds too and we don't behave well. Right? And so I wouldn't like, there's that. And again, like thinking about toddlers not having the skills to navigate their flood of emotion and then imposing consequences on them versus like, Okay, what are we going to do differently next time?
[00:48:04] How can we reconnect? I'm just kind of in the muck of all of this stuff and would love to know what you thought.
[00:48:10] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, I can see, and you have a lot of ideas and, and I love all of them. Lemme see if I can answer the question to the best of my ability,
[00:48:16] Casey O'Roarty: whatever the question actually is. I'm not sure, but there you go, between the lines.
[00:48:20] Um,
[00:48:20] Dr. Paul Sunseri: first of all, you know, if you have a kid who struggles with emotion regulation, it, it really is important that you model for them how you want them to respond in a situation. So if you're a reactive parent who raises your voice kinda loses your cool. I don't know how you can get that kid to do something differently if you're modeling exactly what they're doing, right?
[00:48:41] It doesn't work. And I do think with practice, you can get better at no matter what the kid is doing or saying right in front of you, that you have a pretty confident matter of fact, demeanor and your response is just straightforward, right? A little bit of
[00:48:55] Casey O'Roarty: trouble.
[00:48:55] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Yes, exactly. Benefit the most when you can do that.
[00:48:59] And I think parents look the most powerful when they could just come back and say, look, I'm not happy with what you just did. You're not yelling, but you're telling for the kid that snuck out that example. Well, see, if that was a one off, I don't think I would even give them a consequence to be honest. So this was a kid who was getting good grades, did well in every other aspect of their life.
[00:49:20] And then I discovered that they had snuck out, maybe went drinking. That's a conversation. It's like, let's talk about this. I don't, that's, I don't want you to do that. And here's why. And I'm just going to assume that that was. a momentary lapse of reason on your part and that this is not going to happen again, right?
[00:49:37] So if this is how I'm going to respond to it, but if this is not a one off and this happens again, you can darn well expect I'm going to give you some consequences. You're going to be grounded. You're going to lose your car. You're going to have to spend the weekend here at home with me. So that's how I would handle that situation.
[00:49:53] And with the kids that I work with, it's very hard for parents to feel close and connected because there's so much acting out behavior that what that does is it drives parents apart from their kids and it puts both of them in a state of mutual resentment, right? And that's a feedback loop. So the kid misbehaves, the parent gets angry and resentful, kid notices the anger, anger and resentment, they act out more and so on and so on and so on, which is why behaviors get bigger over time.
[00:50:19] So we get in there and we disrupt that. So by teaching parents how to be matter of fact, and calm, but firm. They're no longer feeding into that loop. And when the kid isn't misbehaving, which really for most kids is the vast majority of the time, we ask parents to turn it on the praise, the love, affection, the spending time.
[00:50:37] We're going to do something together this weekend. You look for opportunities to reconnect and get them in another feedback loop, which is the more warmth and affection. The less the negative behavior, the less negative behavior, the more than affection. So once you can start that loop going and it becomes self sustaining, then everything starts to improve.
[00:50:54] So it does. You do have to start with yourself. You don't have to model this for your kids. I tell parents, pretend like you're an actor on stage, like whatever you're feeling on the inside. I don't want you to show it on the outside because if you do, it's going to get yourself into trouble. And the better you get at these interventions, the less you'll need to show anything on the outside because you will feel calm and relaxed as a matter of fact, because you'll know exactly what to do.
[00:51:14] Casey O'Roarty: Yeah. Yeah. Uh, I cannot believe how quickly time just went by. There's so many, I mean, I've a whole bunch of questions that I didn't even get to ask you. Thank you so much. So. Your book is out and available for people. Um, is there anything else that you want to make sure that you say before we wrap today?
[00:51:35] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Yeah, I'll say this. If you are a parent of one of these kids, you don't have to live like this. This is not your lot in life. It doesn't have to go on like this, that there are ways of vastly improving your situation. You're going to need though. To find the right resources, find people who know how to help you with this.
[00:51:55] And it's not going to be your average therapist on the street corner. They just, they're not trained in it, but if you look hard enough, eventually you can find somebody who has this skillset. If you're in California, I would love to help you. And even if your kid doesn't present as severely as most of the kids that I work with, you're more than welcome to contact me and I'd be happy to make suggestions or run ideas past you.
[00:52:15] Casey O'Roarty: On that note, do you have anything, because I, parents are asking me all the time, do you have someone, do you know of any therapists, and you know, when I go on Psychology Today, anybody who's a therapist can say, oh, I work with teens.
[00:52:29] Dr. Paul Sunseri: You bet.
[00:52:30] Casey O'Roarty: Right. How are, is there anything in particular that parents could look for inside of those little bios and just the little amount that they're being shown to help them have more confidence in who they're choosing?
[00:52:44] Sure. For their kids?
[00:52:45] Dr. Paul Sunseri: So a first clue that I would want to look for is how long have they been practicing and people have different opinions about this, but if it were me, I'd find somebody who's been working as a therapist for at least 10 years because they're seasoned, they're knowledgeable, they've got all that kind of stuff.
[00:52:58] Yeah. The second thing I would look for is how much do they talk about kids and teenagers? in their profile, right? If it's just to mention, I work with adults, couples, children and teens, that's probably not their area of expertise, right? They hardly ever see kids. But if the profile is mostly about kids, mostly about parenting, that's their orientation.
[00:53:16] That's likely a therapist who knows what they're doing. And you can tell they love kids or they wouldn't pick that population. So you can read between the lines. If you know of anybody who stumbled upon a good therapist, you know, word of mouth is always a helpful thing to,
[00:53:29] I
[00:53:29] Dr. Paul Sunseri: think psychology today is a great place to start.
[00:53:31] And you really can learn a lot about somebody. And if you can't get out of their Bible, just write them or call them and ask them some questions. What would you do in my situation? How could you help us?
[00:53:39] Casey O'Roarty: Great advice. Great advice. Thank you. And my final question that I ask all of my guests Because the name of my podcast is Joyful Courage.
[00:53:47] So I'm curious, Paul, what does Joyful Courage mean to you?
[00:53:53] Dr. Paul Sunseri: Well, in the context of raising children, I know you didn't ask a question specific about kids, but that's how I see it. Kids are a joy. They're just, they're amazing and they're wonderful. And there's so much fun. Some of the most enjoyable kids I've ever met are the really hard ones.
[00:54:06] I think they're just awesome in their own way. They're very strong willed. And that quality can take them very far in life if they apply it in the right ways. And to be a parent of one of those kids takes courage. You got to get up every morning and you got to do the hard thing. And some days you're not going to feel like it, but they want you to show up.
[00:54:21] They need you to show up. So you're going to have to put your game face on and it will get easier with the right kind of help.
[00:54:27] Casey O'Roarty: Yes. Thank you. Where can people find you and follow your work?
[00:54:31] Dr. Paul Sunseri: I'm on Instagram. I'm on Facebook. I'm on LinkedIn. The best starting place would be at the website for intensive family focused therapy.
[00:54:38] It's just my, M Y I F F T dot org. And you can access all kinds of information about me and my work, IFFT, and that's how you can contact me too.
[00:54:49] Casey O'Roarty: Great. Well, we'll make sure all of those links are in the show notes. Thank you again for spending time with me today.
[00:54:55] Dr. Paul Sunseri: You're very welcome, Casey. And thank you for the opportunity.
[00:54:57] It's been really fun.
[00:55:05] Casey O'Roarty: Thank you so much for listening in today. Thank you so much to my Sproutable partners, Julietta and Alana, as well as Danielle and Chris Mann and the team at Podshaper for all the support with getting this show out there. And helping it to sound so good. Check out our offers for parents with kids of all ages and sign up for our newsletter to stay better connected at besproutable.com. Tune back in on Monday for a brand new interview, and I will be back solo with you next Thursday. Have a great day.
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