One of the most frustrating things about being a parent is when we KNOW kids know how to do the things we ask them to do -- clean their room, put their dishes away, get dressed, do their homework -- yet they don’t do it. Often we’ve tried multiple strategies to...

Being home all the time means that there is MORE to do in certain areas. Kids need more help and support. There is more cleaning and cooking to be done. It even takes more time and energy to put away groceries! If you’re doing more of the work but don’t have more...

Even before the global pandemic, many children struggled with fears and worries. Unfortunately, many of the strategies we've used to address our kids’ concerns -- logic, reassurance, and sometimes good ol’ frustration (because we’re human, after all!) -- don’t tend to...

Whether we’re aware of them or not, our expectations have a tremendous impact on how we feel. When we expect that we can get 10 things done in a day and we only complete 6 things, we may feel unproductive or ineffective. When we want to spend more time with our kids...

Welcome to the first on-air coaching episode! (There will be many more to come.)  In this episode, I coach mom Audrey, whose daughter, takes her Yuck out on Audrey when she's upset. Together we focus on how Audrey can help her daughter cope differently. We discuss...

You may already know that it’s important for kids to express their feelings.  But what do you do when they express their feelings in a way that seems unhealthy -- if they become aggressive when they don’t get their way, become disrespectful when you set a boundary, or...

Fear and uncertainty... It feels like those feelings are growing every day. And often with those feelings comes negativity. Just like we do with our kids, we also have to understand what’s causing OUR feelings and behavior. When we recognize how our current situation...

Many of us are exhausted and would love to find ways to save time and energy.  Although it doesn’t seem like it would be true, one of the ways we truly can save time and energy is to stop addressing negative behavior and big emotions as they’re happening. Instead,...

Although it is more effective (and less exhausting) to handle kids’ big behaviors and emotions proactively, sometimes we simply have to deal with them in the moment. Unfortunately, our in-the-moment responses often make the situation worse -- especially because both...

For many of us, life as a parent is stressful. But what makes us feel even more overwhelmed is when we want things to go a certain way -- we want our kids to act a certain way, we want our spouses to do something different, we want our plans to work out smoothly --...

Raising a “strong willed” child can be unbelievably draining. Dealing with resistance and big emotions and big reactions can take everything out of us.  But parenting strong-willed children can be much less negative when we stop focusing on changing their behavior and...

We’d all love to make parenting a little easier… and there probably are times when parenting seems less difficult. During those times, our kids aren’t necessarily behaving better; rather, WE’RE IN a better place and their behavior doesn’t affect us as much.  But when...

It’s incredibly frustrating when we ask our kids to do something they don’t want to… or we tell them something they don’t want to hear… and they whine, complain, melt down, or become disrespectful.  Not only is it often exhausting to have to deal with their response,...

We’d all like to be able to make parenting decisions easily… and feel good about the decisions we made. And we’d like to feel confident in our ability to handle the parenting situations we face.  But the truth is that many of us question our parenting decisions and...

You may recognize how important it is to address the cause of behavior if you want your child’s behavior to change.  But you may have a hard time understanding why your child is doing some of the frustrating, illogical things that they’re doing.  It certainly can be...

It’s incredibly frustrating to have to address the same issues over and over with our kids. We don’t want to have to ask them again and again to get their shoes on, or brush their teeth, or put their dishes away. We don’t want to deal with the drama or disrespect...

Watching kids open and play with their gifts can be one of the best memories of the holidays. But seeing our kids receive without gratitude can be frustrating... and worrisome.  And even when we tell our kids how lucky they are, it doesn’t seem to change their...

While it’s nice to spend more time together as a family over the holidays, the amount of energy we have to spend mediating sibling issues can be exhausting.  It seems that the more we try to help our kids work through their issues, the more they whine and complain...

Often over the holidays -- when kids are overexcited and more tired -- we see an increase in negative behavior.  And when we notice that our kids are overstimulated, we tend to ask them to “calm down,” and then we get frustrated when they don’t. Instead, it is...

We know our kids want attention. And we even try to find the time to make this happen, but often it’s hard to stay focused on them when we have so many other things we could be doing.  And then we feel guilty for not giving them that attention.  The good news is that...

When our kids don’t believe in themselves, it’s often our instinct to try to build their confidence by reassuring them or trying to cheer them up.   But those attempts don’t tend to make kids feel better about themselves  -- at least not in the long run.  That’s...

As much as we want our kids to do what we ask, often our requests are met with resistance, disrespect, and/or big emotions.  And even when we try other strategies to get them to listen to us (sometimes even positive ones like rewards or praise!), in the long run, most...

So many of our parenting decisions are made in attempt to motivate our children to make healthy choices. Often we use external motivators — rewards, punishments, nagging, logic — to try to get them to act positively… but those motivators don’t seem to last. The good...

We want our kids to feel good, and we want to have a strong relationship. But often the things we do to help them feel good, and to strengthen our relationship -- giving in to them, doing things for them, taking them places and buying them things -- tend to lead to...