The Therapy Edit - One Thing with Clover Stroud on loving your children deeply and making sure they know it

Episode Date: June 21, 2024

In this guest episode of The Therapy Edit, Anna welcomes back the ever popular guest that is Clover Stroud who shares her One Thing; nothing else matters in parenting other than loving your children deeply and making sure you communicate that love well.Clover Stroud is a writer and journalist, writing regularly for The Sunday Times, The Guardian andThe Saturday and Sunday Telegraph, among others. She also hosts a popular podcast called Tiny Acts of Bravery.Her first book, The Wild Other, was shortlisted for the Wainwright Prize. Her critically acclaimed second book, My Wild and Sleepless Nights: A Mother's Story, and third book, The Red of My Blood: A Death and Life Story, were instant Sunday Times bestsellers and rated 'best books of the year'.Her fourth book Giant on the Skyline is now flying off the shelves having been released on the 9th May to rave reviews.She is currently living in Washington DC with her husband and the youngest three of her five children.Follow Clover on Instagram where she shares the true messiness of love and life. 

Hello and welcome to The Therapy Edit with me, psychotherapist, mum of three and author Anna Martha. Every Friday, I invite one guest to tell me the one thing they would most like to share with mums everywhere. So join with me as we hear this dose of wisdom. I hope you enjoy it. Hi, everyone. Welcome to today's guest episode of The Therapy Edit. I am so excited to have with me at Clover Stroud's Day. and Lord is going to be so excited to listen to this one. She is, she is a particularly

massive fan of yours. Clover is a writer and a journalist. She writes regularly for the Sunday Times, The Guardian, the Saturday and Sunday Telegraphed, amongst others. And she has a popular podcast called Tiny Acts of Bravery. Clover is an author. Lily Dunn said of her writing, I think this is so true, having got some of her books on my bookshelf here. Her writing is intimate, warm, honest and generous. And she really does. I would also call it just kind of just honest and gritty. She has his most incredible gift of getting under the skin of emotions and speaking about kind of life and the mess of it all in the most beautiful way that kind of calls out those more kind of deeper experiences of our own to reflect on as she does with her. So if you

haven't read any of her books they are beautiful poetic powerful and just acutely kind of honest and real and yeah amazing so her first book the wild other was actually shortlisted for the wayne right prize and her critically acclaimed second book is called my wild and sleepless nights a mother's story and that's my favorite i've read so far her third book the red of my blood is a death and life story all about, yeah, just the realities of grief after losing her sister. And then she has another book coming out on the 9th of May, and that is called Giant on the Skyline, on home belonging and learning to let go. How incredible that encouragement to let go. So that's often where the living is to be done as we relinquish control. So she's currently living in Washington,

D.C. with her husband and the youngest three of her five children. So, Clover, you're speaking to us. It's kind of 10 past 6 a.m. And it's your son's 10th birthday. And he's going to have to patiently wait for the present opening. But thank you for joining us. It's a real joy. Thank you very, very much, Anna.

And it's lovely hearing your reaction to my writing, actually, because I really do try and, in my writing, and I'm embarking on my fifth memoir at the moment, I really do try and communicate the reality of the way life feels, the way we feel. And knowing that the words connect. And I know that they do because I get, you know, amazing responses from people at events or on Instagram. And knowing that my experiences and the kind of pain of my experiences, what I've been through connects directly with other people, has connected with you.

It's just such a, and has kind of helped you to feel your own emotions and see your own emotions and process your own emotions. It's just such a wonderful feeling. It's worth all the hours and hours and hours of toil that goes into writing. It's hard. It's hard work. It's kind of like you literally climb inside your own emotion,

like really allow yourself to experience. It must be really cosy at times, I wonder, especially with your book on, you know, The Red of My Blood talking about, talking so deeply about grief. But like, what does it feel? like how do you kind of you just have such a powerful way of articulating things um do you have to really encourage yourself just to kind of climb to that emotion to be able to explore it in such a

visceral way yeah i know that i do feel emotion i mean like many of us i feel emotions really really deeply and i've got more skilled i hope at communicating what the color of them and visually they look like and and and what yeah what they really feel like somebody described reading my books as a whole body experience, which I really, really loved because it's that feeling of like, yeah, and it's what you're saying as well, that you really, I really inhabit it and I climb inside it. Yes, it does, you know, there are many different sort of techniques I use as a way of, because obviously I'll be getting the kids to school and then right, it's time to start working. You know, you have to go, and that might be writing a scene like my latest book is about home and

leaving home. And when my husband said, we should move to America for his work, I found that sort of the idea of the loss of stability of our house and of the community where we lived really, really traumatic and I really questioned it. And I use different ways of kind of creatively going into that space. I sometimes use writing, you know, other people's writing as a trigger, use photographs, use poetry. But I definitely trigger myself. I'm actually interested by trigger warnings because personally for me as an artist and I do I am an artist I know I communicate that a trigger really matters like confronting the pain and going into the pain is really important and I'm concerned by the way we sort of like there is an impulse to trigger warn on stuff don't

look at the stuff that scares you actually I think look at the stuff that scares you go there with it because you might find that in really confronting it really staring into it there is there is less fear. Well, there is fear. You'll feel it and then you'll pass through it. And I think that there's massive value in that. Oh, I mean, that's a one thing in itself. And that, yeah, that is so true. And I must say, like, following you on social media over the years, there was still some posts in the way that you worded things that just kind of slotted inside of me like a jigsaw piece and gave me this fresh understanding clarity, the way that you talk about the passing of time and kind of memories and love. And I would encourage everyone to go.

and follow you, because the way that you talk about life is just, I remember seeing there's so much chaos in your house, like with your five kids and like you had a chicken in it. I'm sure you had like a chicken in your kitchen at one point, just like walking around and stuff everywhere. And as someone who is this kind of, you know, a type perfectionist personality, I just found that so challenging in the most amazing ways. And following you has really kind of drip fed my the challenge of my ability to just embrace more chaos in my life and everyone around me has benefited from that. So yeah, our homes look very different in mine everywhere. Everything has a place and it goes back into it. But I just, yeah, following you has just really encouraged me

in a really uncomfortable but just amazingly healthy way just to embrace the chaos being more in my life. I love that. I'm really grateful. I'm really grateful. So you've given us a golden gem already about having the courage and the bravery, which is what your podcast is about, you know, having that. It's about bravery to actually turn towards some of those things that feel like the messiest and darkest, most painful parts of ourselves so that we can feel less fear. So there's a bonus one thing from you. But what is that, what's the other one thing that you would love to share with people today? Yeah. So along with the chaos and there is a lot of chaos in my life and mess. And I think that, you know, knowing that the messiness,

seeing the messiness of my life, which I very much do present, has helped you. It also really, really, it's good that mess in such a big, you know, a literal way, the actual literal cluster can help. But so alongside the mess, I think, is the importance. And I've thought, you know, I've got five children. My youngest is seven. My eldest is 23. And I have a 23-year-old 20-year-old and then a 7-10 today and 11-year-old. So I've been through one whole cycle of parenting, as it were, my eldest son is about to graduate from university this year. And it's taught me so much about love and what actually matters in parenting.

And I, like all of us, angst all the time about other kids doing enough homework, doing enough activities? Are they eating the right food? Are they seeing their friends enough? Are they at the right schools? Are they kind of doing all the sort of practical? Am I doing all the practical things? Am I spending enough time with them? Am I doing craft with them? Am I knitting with them? Most of those things I'm getting wrong. I'm definitely not doing any craft or knitting. I can tell you that. What I do do is I really, really, really love those children and I've really always communicated to them, my belief in them. And that was particularly important when my son, was going through adolescence.

And adolescence with a boy, in my experience, is very, very stressful and very hard. And it was something I wrote about in my motherhood book, My Wild and Sleepless Nights. He got into a lot of trouble as a teenager, normal teenage trouble. But, you know, he got into trouble, and it was hairy at times. And I know that he knows that throughout that, and he's held this, and I've held it as well, I believed in him, and I loved him, and I walked beside him. And even when he was being a bit of a nightmare to him, because I was probably being a nightmare to him because I was his mom and he was a teenage boy, we loved each other. And we continued somehow to communicate, even if that communication was shouting at each other because you do end up shouting at your teenage son, definitely, and they shout at you. And I think that holding on to that thread of love and with the love, love, love is an active word. You know, it's not just writing something saying, I love you, is actually manifesting that love and showing that love. And showing that love, and showing that love, that I believed in him, even when he probably felt that the world was against him certainly

and that other people didn't believe in him. And that to me is at the heart of parenting, and that to me is at the heart of all that really matters. Because I sort of increasingly think, I'm on a WhatsApp group with some friends from uni and they were worrying about, one of them was worrying about not being able to get some to revise for his GCSEs. And another mum said, or it doesn't really matter you can't really make children work anyway and I thought it was a tremendously good bit of advice actually because I do think a lot of what we achieve in life

is kind of inside us anyway if we're going to be great at music it's probably not because our mum has stood there and forced us to do violin lessons all the way through our childhood it's probably going to be an eightly in there anyway but love sort of enables that stuff to come out and enables the confidence

and enables the kind of realization of the life that the child, their own life that the child needs to find. So for me, that is, you know, that's really, really what matters. And of course you need to like make them eat their vegetables, do a bit of homework and so on. But way more than that, you just need to love them. And that means spending time with them, which obviously is, you know, difficult with being a working, working mums as so many of us are. And also modelling the importance of work is really, really healthy, I think. So trying to drop that guilt around working. But, I think that, you know, that that sense of love and belief and with that that comes

the confidence to the child is, is all that, you know, that's my one thing that matters. That's, yeah, it's amazing. It's such a sobering reminder, isn't it? I think as we get so caught up in all the detail and this fear of making wrong decisions. I was actually just recording a podcast on that. Someone's saying how they're just so fearful of getting it wrong. all the time so you're saying actually is the love it will it will go wrong it will be messy it will be shouty there will be hairy hairy points but you're saying that that that foundation of love knowing that knowing that they're loved is actually the most important thing yeah i think and and and making it really really clear that the child knows that is i think that's i know

through my life, my mum was a fantastic mum, but she didn't, but that was, and that was what she gave me. She didn't do, you know, I grew up in the 70s and 80s, she definitely didn't do helicopter parenting or she never did crafts with us. There was a lot of stuff she didn't do with us. She didn't even go to parents evening, I don't think. It was a different kind of parenting, but she definitely, definitely loved us. And I think that's given me a kind of, you know, a kind of belief in life, I suppose, you know, and a belief in myself and a belief in what I can do. And she taught me that. She definitely taught me that. And I think, yeah, we get so caught up in the idea of getting it wrong. And we probably are getting it wrong because who gets life right?

You know, none of us know how to do anything. It doesn't even look like anyway, and it doesn't sound like it would be that fun if it was just so straight down the line and predictable. Yeah. So it's, you know, that's perpetually what I feel is, is, you know, really, really, really matters as a parent, definitely. Yeah. And I bet you've seen different ways in which your children have kind of lent into, lent into that love. So what would you say to the parent then that is just so caught up in in the fear of getting it wrong? I often say we will mess up our kids. Perfect parenting doesn't prepare kids

are very messy and imperfect world, but how can, if there have been times where you've really needed to kind of like dig a little bit deeper for to be able to let go of the worries and all that the world kind of in culture presses on us of like this

is the most important thing. You should be worried about this. You should be fearful of getting it wrong how you wean your child. Yeah, there's all of that. There's all of that stuff. And I don't know, having done it five times as well, you can't, you know, you talked about the chaos and the mess of my life, which absolutely is there and is there

on my Instagram. You can see it. But when you have five children, unless you're like super efficient, it is messy. You know, it just is messy. It's really, really chaotic. So you naturally, I mean, I felt like I was holding on a bit. And then once I got to my fourth, I was like, I was like. I just, you can't, actually beyond, I think actually beyond, to be honest, beyond what, like, with what, you know, you can't hold on, you can't hold on, you can't control every decision.

And what I said as well about the child being born with the stuff that they have in them, with their character, with their, you know, if they're going to love music, they'll love it. If they're going to love sport, they'll love it. I know that I've tried to encourage some of my children to, like, be really into team sports. that child was never ever ever going to play like football he just wasn't into it and and at the time you think oh he needs to be out there socializing and taking exercise and all these other kids are off with their you know on the pitch on Sunday morning I tried to make it worse just wasn't going to happen and that's fine and I'm much more laissez-faire I think now about my parenting and like if they like something kind of you know go with it and I put a lot of time into like my daughter's really into dancing I drive her around

continually to her dance classes. So it's not as though I'm just saying, oh, just unschool and just let it all go at all. You know, there is also still, of course, like supporting them and helping them do the things they want to do, but don't kind of push the stuff that they don't want to do. You know, let them kind of move towards their strengths, I suppose, and their natural instincts.

But certainly, yeah, holding on to the kind of minutiae, is just impossible. One of my children pretty much only eats white food, and I cannot get a vegetable to pass as well. Not even the cauliflower. I'm trying to think of white vegetables. A swede, that's a bit more yellow. It's just like pasta, you know, plain pasta, no butter, no oil, no cheese, nothing at all.

And obviously it makes me feel a bit worried, but I know that he'll also be all right. You know, I've heard, I know that he'll be right. He's one of the little ones. And, you know, and that feeling that stuff comes in the cycles and it goes, you know, and when you're right in the middle of it, you know, having a toddler and a baby, for example, I look back on having a toddler, a baby and a preschooler and two adolescents. And I just think, oh, my goodness gracious me, I don't know how I got through that. You do.

You do. And just to keep moving forward. And also, because it is a long, you know, people talk about childhood. really rushing past. And it does, in some ways. And it also doesn't in other ways. You know, it is, it, it's a big chunk of your own life as well. So kind of learning not to put, put the microscope over every single one of your decisions. That's going to be, that's going to make it really, really, really hard work, trying to make it as fun as possible and as loving as possible and as relaxed as possible. I think, well, it's the only way that I've been able to do it.

Yeah. Oh, this is so, I just know that this is going to speak to so, to so many people. So I'm really grateful, grateful for your words. And I think this is the importance of hearing kind of people's different experiences, really, because I've learned, I've learned to let go, just as you did. I think after having one, trying to juggle two and get it all right, it was just, I would have, you know, it was impossible. And then by three, actually, I became a more relaxed parent because I'd let go. And it's been more freeing, just stepping away from that kind of, yeah, relentless pursuit of getting things right. And to hear from you as a mum of five, you know, it's kind of hard-worn truth that actually you just can't, just love them well and keep the main things, the main things. And things work themselves out along the way as well. And we parent different children. We're parenting different children. We're a different parent for each child, aren't we? Yeah.

not to take, yeah, not to take outcomes and strengths as a statement of who you are as a person as a parent. So thank you. Thank you for your golden, yeah, your wisdom. So I'd love to finish off with a quick fire question. What is a motherhood high for you, Clover? I think when I'm with all of them, I do love that when I'm with all of them. And I see my, I see the relationship. between the children and I think like for the siblings to have healthy relationships is a real achievement actually for them to enjoy one another's company to be able to support one another empathize with one another and obviously when you've got younger kids you know most younger kids fall out of it they argue and then watching them go through that and and create with my

elder kids you know their sort of adult relationships with one another and and then their relationships with their younger siblings as well, I do love that feeling. It makes me feel like a real deep sense of love for them all and like a deep sense of kind of within the complete chaos and mess and of family life. It makes me, if you feel a sense of harmony, actually, I hadn't thought of that word before, but that question's made me think of that. And it, yeah, it does make me feel like a sense of rightness and joy. Yeah, and that sense of, I've done something right here. Yeah.

Just like affirming. Yeah, just seeing them together and interacting with one another. That's beautiful. So thank you so much, Clover, and I encourage everyone to go and seek out a copy of Giant on the Skyline on Home Belonging and Learning to Let Go, which I know is going to be an absolute poetic wonder of which you will see parts of yourself, yeah, written out on the pages. So thank you for all that you do and bring to us so beautifully. so grateful. Thank you, Anna. It's been really, really lovely talking to you. It's been a

complete joy. I am so excited to announce that my brand new book, The Uncomfortable Truth, Change Your Life by Taming Ten of Your Mind's Greatest Fears, is available for pre-order now and is out on the 8th of August. And in this book, we tackle some of life's big, unavoidable, uncomfortable truths such as some people don't like me. I am going to fail. life isn't fair. Bad things will happen. And in this book, we tackle these big, uncomfortable trees that rob us have so much headspace and energy as we try and control and avoid them. And as we move into a place of radical acceptance of these truths, you will find yourself living more freely and intentionally with more presence and confidence than ever before. So come on this journey with me and

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