The Therapy Edit - On the best gift I've given my kids

Episode Date: February 19, 2024

In this short solo episode Anna shares the decision making process and benefits of a massive change she introduced to her life last year.If you want to find a way to be a more patient parent, this episode could be for you. We hope you enjoy the listen, don't forget to rate, review, subscribe and share! Thank you x

Hello and welcome to the Therapy Edit podcast with me, psychotherapist Anna Martha. I'll be bringing you weekly 10 minute episodes to encourage and support your emotional well-being. Hello, welcome to today's solo little 10-minuteer of the Therapy Edit. I actually do not have a script today, not that I have like a word-for-word script every week, but I do tend to write down some bullet points, things to share with you about. Actually, I've just got a topic today. And it is on the biggest gift I have given my children. Now, I know that a lot of people are going to turn off when I share what that is.

And that is okay, because to be honest, a couple of years ago, I probably would have made that decision to you. But I'm just going to be really open and honest with you, part of a part of my journey at the minute and something that I'm really learning about myself and something that I'm trying that is just benefiting me in ways that I could never have expected and my parenting too. And yeah, so I haven't got any notes. I'm just going to share this with you. A couple of years ago, my journey with alcohol, I've shared a little bit about this on it's gram and actually it's because people

DMing me asking me to share more which is why I decided just to throw this podcast episode out there knowing it won't be for everyone but maybe there's something in it for you I very much got into the evening drinking I think through the pandemic I don't really know any of my friends that didn't it was very much

kind of normalized it would be my way to exhale at the end of the day it was very much something that I felt I deserved my massive glass of wine, my huge G&T, maybe, then another one later on. It would be something that I would lean towards throughout the day. It was a thing that I was really looking forward to

and it would be on my mind during bedtime, just get them down, get them down, then I get my time. And my glass of wine, my drink was very much the thing that drew the line between mummy and flopping on the safe of me. And yeah, I think I just became, came more and more challenged on that habit that it really picked up. And what happened? Oh, I was, I gathered with my friends. So we all got a bit excited after all the lockdowns lifted. And we started doing this little kind of games night on my live on a development. We all moved in at

the same time. It was a bit like a kind of grown up version of a university halls when everyone was, you know, all similar age kids. Anyway, we got together and we played a game. I think it was a game or did a jigsaw and a friend of mine was drinking non-acolic gin and I was like that's very strange why is she doing that why would you do that and she said that she was on a health kick and she was only drinking twice a week and I was I was surprised to be honest she was definitely you know a friend that would always be up for having a drink with me and anyone and it just really yeah just set off this kind of what the heck and also not only that but the other kind of thing that really alarmed me was that my immediate thought was I couldn't do that I couldn't

do that and then that I mean I I love a challenge me and I don't like to think that I'm being kind of controlled by a habit so that kind of alarmed me as well I was like I don't like the fact that I just thought I couldn't do that that's making me really want to try doing that so I started I was a couple of years ago now maybe longer actually really started on this journey of just learning more and pulling back on my intake because I started drinking like twice a week only and I'd really look forward to those days and I'd really be so excited to have a spring of my step on a Friday morning because I knew that we were going to crack open a bottle of wine that night and like finally I'd get my reward for being so good in the week and not drinking and I just to kind

of really help me with that because I definitely recognise that I found it hard. I found it hard. It really felt like something I was having to discipline myself about and doing what I do. I love to learn I love a podcast I started listening to podcasts I listened to the whole human manab I never know how to say

his name episode on the effects of alcohol and that just really spoke to me because I thought my gosh I never knew what alcohol was doing to me I never knew I honestly thought

it was my off switch I honestly thought it was helping me relax I did not realise the truth and I kind of felt a bit duped to be honest

but I still I just pledged to drink less. So I think my two days a week turned into one day a week and then I'd be bargaining when which night, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, at the end of the day, I did dry January last year, so we were talking 20, 23, and I just realised my sleep was so much better. My patience with the kids were so much better.

And thus, it didn't continue. I did go back to drinking, come fair. But again, with more insight and knowledge. And yeah, just kind of lessening the drinking, just become really a warm. just really educated myself. And then I went for a walk at the end of October. And I just had this real sense as I was walking around the fruit farms near my house

that I, just this challenge came upon me. And it was like, you need to stop drinking for six months. And I was like, okay, I'm not one to ignore these strong senses. And I didn't want to ask my husband to join me because I thought, well, that's a big thing to ask him to do. So I'm not going to ask him. But if he wants to, then great. And I went home and I said, I'm going to stop drinking for six months.

It's, you know, bearing in mind that Christmas is coming, could I not just wait until dry jam and go out it with everyone else? No, I just had this sense and I had to honour it. And he immediately said he'd do it with me. Anyway, so thus sparked off this six-month thing and I really do get a sense. It'll very much carry on. However, I think what I've realized is so much, so much, I am learning to ride more waves of emotions. I'm learning that I can feel overwhelmed. We've been through a real time

over the last year of just loss and trauma and, you know, dealing with all the subsequent feelings. I'm realizing that I can feel it because our culture will say, do this, do that, scroll, get you something to a scroll hole, numb, have a glass of wine. You don't have to feel this. You don't have to feel it if you don't want to. Why should you feel hard things if you don't? if you don't want to. And I think what it does when you, I realize how much alcohol was that, you know, that way of just numbing and pausing those feelings. And actually what we do when we do that is they don't go anywhere.

They don't dissipate. They don't dissolve. They just, we repress them and they become more urgent anyway. Having removed that from my life, I'm learning to ride the waves of feeling. But more so, I have noticed I'm not as impatient a person. I always will joke, I'm naturally not a patient person. I'm learning that actually without alcohol, my nervous system is so much calmer. I'm not rushing through bedtime.

I am more present. I'm less irritable. And it's not, I'm talking about more of the time, not all of the times I always do. Trust me, currently hormonal and viral and just, uh, low on resources. So having a hard time, but having a hard time kind of navigating some of the emotions that arise in me. However, I'm doing it so much better. And I just think it is such a gift.

to my children. They do not even know. And I never realized what. Everything I was doing in my life grounding exercise, breathing exercises, bits of yoga, bits of journaling. All of these things were all in pursuit of widening that gap between the stressor. Often my kids meltdowns, all of these things and how I reacted. I just wanted to be able to take a breath. I didn't want that reaction just to lurch out of me. So I was doing all of these things in my motherhood to desperately try. and respond in a way more often that I wanted with my kids and I did not realize and I think this journey has really helped me realize that it's such a gift to my children because all of these things that I was doing in pursuit of having more, not having more to give, having more

of an opportunity to take a breath before I responded. I was directly opposing them by drinking because it felt like an off switch when actually I've got a flipping garment watch and I love it, but it shows me that when I was drinking alcohol, it was a stressor on my body. My heart rate was increasing. My nervous system was in that stress state. And I thought, the thing that I thought was helping me relax was actually adding to my stress. So I was getting to the evening thinking this is it. I'm flopping on the sofa. And actually, the reality of it was, I was depleting myself further and trashing my sleep. So, yeah, I mean, this is, honestly, I don't think my kids will ever know how much of a gift this is and I only wish that I could have given it to myself and then

further and then earlier on and yeah I'm really really noticing the benefits on my parenting and how much of a gift this is not just I mean there are so many other things I could talk about with regards to this the gift it is to myself my mental health my work my my relationship but for my children and I'm loving it and I thought I might share that in case you're somewhere along that journey and this is just what you needed here

sending you love. Bye. Thank you so much for listening to today's episode of The Therapy Edit. If you have enjoyed it, don't forget to subscribe and review for me. Also, if you need any resources at all, I have lots of videos and courses on everything from health anxiety

to driving anxiety and people pleasing nail all on my website anamatha.com and also don't forget my brand new book raising a happier mother is out now for you to enjoy and benefit from it's all about how to find balance feel good and see your children flourish as a result speak to you soon