Speaker 1: 0:10

hi guys, welcome back to the preview lines podcast. This is sarah and I've got whitney with us and we are so glad to be with you. We're in 2025 we made it france, we, it and Whitney. This is a really good time to talk about control.

Speaker 2: 0:26

Okay, Well, I say all the moms, but I feel like everybody, not just moms, really resonate with control, a lack of control, all the things, and not to be overly political, but inauguration is around the corner and we don't have a ton of control as far as those results. All we can do is vote, and so a lot of people feel like you know, the world is out of control and it's out of our control. You know like it gets so heavy, so quick when we think about it.

Speaker 1: 0:58

You know, my own therapist told me. She said, Sarah, control is an illusion. I would agree and I thought you know, but it makes me feel better and it does make us feel better it makes us feel better and you know she's also been teaching me the more we try to control things, you know, ultimately, the less control we really have.

Speaker 2: 1:22

I agree with that, I do, and that's super hard.

Speaker 1: 1:25

But I think we're talking about moms and we think we talk about motherhood. If it goes back to even trying to get pregnant, you can do everything in your best effort to get pregnant right or to not get pregnant, and sometimes it does not happen the way we want or it does, or vice versa. But then you ultimately I mean you do the best you can but you cannot control the outcomes of that pregnancy sometimes. So I think in general I know I personally struggle with this and I've heard a lot of moms, these type A personalities, the Whitney's and Sarah's of the world, the Enneagram ones that we have a false sense of control of in our lives we have done X usually equals Y and Z outcomes Right. That pregnancy can really, in motherhood, pull out kind of the ugliness that sometimes presents in us when we do not have control of a situation.

Speaker 3: 2:25

Right.

Speaker 1: 2:26

So why and what do we do about it, Whitney?

Speaker 2: 2:29

So one thing I think it's important to acknowledge is that anxiety tends to get worse if we feel like we have a lack of control or a loss of control. And when we look at any type of trauma in our lives, whether it be childhood abuse that we went through, whether it's that we moved around quite a bit during childhood, whether we're in a car accident, even if it is a minor one, whether we didn't get the job that we thought we fought so hard for, we didn't get into school the way that we thought we would, whatever that trauma is, it impacts us. That trauma is it impacts us and because of that impact, we think well, if I just try harder to get my hands on this, then I'll feel better. So it's our way of trying to band-aid it.

Speaker 2: 3:15

almost you know and I had this conversation with a client not that long ago that it is really challenging to be okay with vulnerability long ago.

Speaker 1: 3:24

that it is really challenging to be okay with vulnerability and what I mean. What is the response from the client when you were explaining to them about, you know, the band-aiding? Because nobody, they're like, okay, cool, whitney, I get that, but I'm still going to do that.

Speaker 2: 3:39

Well, and it's interesting because this client is a therapist themselves. So there is some insight. There's some introspection there, and so we've discussed many times that their defense mechanism more often than not is avoidance, and so yeah which I mean we all do it, we all avoid, we all do yeah, we all avoid things that are uncomfortable or we just don't like.

Speaker 2: 4:03

If you have to address somebody about something that upsets you, do you put that conversation off, probably because it's avoidance. You know what I'm saying. We all use avoidance in different ways. It's a very typical and albeit normal, defense mechanism. It's to the extent that we kind of fall back on it that can be detrimental to us. And so, in the midst of talking about their vulnerability, I said well, it seems like any time there's a big transition in your life, then that vulnerability gets exposed and you avoid and you band-aid it with increasing your workload or doing more things, and this is not a negative thing. But they do more things with their church, they get more involved, they get busy, and don't hear me saying being involved in your church is a bad thing, it's not a bad thing. But this client will almost subconsciously add on to their plate to avoid that vulnerability, because vulnerability means they've lost control. Ooh, yeah, I relate.

Speaker 3: 5:05

Played to avoid that vulnerability because vulnerability means they've lost control.

Speaker 1: 5:07

Ooh, yeah, I relate with that and that was their response and they were like I don't like you're right, but I don't like what you're saying, I don't like what you're doing right here, and I think too and I've been working through control issues right, because control and codependency can go hand in hand.

Speaker 2: 5:24

It can.

Speaker 1: 5:24

Absolutely, and if I can control an outcome, then I can control how someone's going to respond or how someone's going to feel. Or I don't want my children to feel failure. I don't want something to happen that maybe represents I'm failing as a mom. I don't want that shame and embarrassment, right failing as a mom.

Speaker 1: 5:44

I don't want that shame and embarrassment. I want to protect this person from you know again, this outcome. So it is. It's interwrapped of control is not just because I think people and I originally thought this I was like no control is like in an abusive relationship, right when it's like Whitney, this is what you're going to wear, this is what you're going to eat. I'm only going to be nice to you when you do X. I had that mindset of control when I'm like no, you can control things in your life for the greater outcome you want the good.

Speaker 1: 6:18

But it is. It's also being very uncomfortable sometimes with the unknowns.

Speaker 2: 6:24

Oh yeah, and that's where us type A's really struggle.

Speaker 3: 6:28

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 6:29

Us type A's really struggle with the unknown because there's that lack of predictability or stability and again those unknowns naturally spike our anxiety Again, normal, typical, expected reaction. But when we start to those type A's we struggle with the unknown. We think, well, if I can control the outcome, then my anxiety is better and I am better, and then my kids are going to be better and it's all good. And so it taps into that fear of failure too. That if. I can control this outcome. I can't fail.

Speaker 1: 7:04

And that, I think, is a bigger conversation of why failure is looked at, which I struggle with this right, I don't want to fail. That's not a natural response to say failure is great. But I've also learned. It's like a toddler. They fall down. What do we say? We say come on, keep going. We don't look at that one fall down when they're learning to walk or run as that it's all over. They're never going to walk or run. This is it. But failure is a stepping stone, right, and if you have never failed, you've never ultimately tried Right, correct. But why do we see that so harshly, especially in motherhood, whitney? Because it's like I'm not a good mom.

Speaker 2: 7:46

Right. So there's a lot of factors, and so I'm going to open up on my own personal story, because I think that's the best place. I know to draw from. So I was never great academically. I was never a strong student. My sister, on the other hand, literally could fall asleep in a math class and she made straight A's. It came very natural to her. It did not to me, and now I'm okay with it. But in middle school, high school, college, it was a struggle. I made a D in accounting twice in college.

Speaker 2: 8:16

Ok, so I just want people to know, like I don't have it all together and I have never had it all together. But basically I was told well, you're not trying enough, you're not working hard enough, you need to buckle down. You know, nose to the grindstone. You've got to work harder. And I was working hard on it. I truly was, but my brain just really struggled with certain subjects. So guess what? There was this negative connotation over you're failing a class. You made an f on a test, or you made an f on a quiz or a paper or whatever it might have been. So I have a lot of harsh criticism coming in. A try harder. And my prefrontal cortex being fully developed, brain perceive that, as you're not enough, you're not doing enough, you need more. Now. Is that what my parents wanted me to think? No, no. And also let's just keep in mind this was also like late 90s, early 2000s. Evaluating for learning disabilities was really not a thing, unless you were like a troublemaker in the classroom.

Speaker 3: 9:24

I wasn't.

Speaker 2: 9:25

I didn't throw a desk across the room. But did I understand algebra? Absolutely not. I have yet to find X. And here I am at 38. Like it's not gonna happen for me, okay, yeah. So now I have hindsight in.

Speaker 2: 9:37

Oh, I probably had a learning disability in math and it just flew under the radar. You know, I scraped by with barely making a C at times in math. But I received that harsh criticism of you've got to try harder, you don't want to fail. Failing is bad, failing is wrong. So we have that morality component too. So when we're given those messages of you need to do more, more, more, we inherently think I'm not enough, which, with moms, I think that just comes, you know, in so many capacities. So whether you have a hospital birth, a home birth, whether you have a C-section, whether you have a vaginal, whether you're medicated, you're not medicated. Whether your formula feeds, you breastfeed, like there are so many things to make us feel not enough as a mom. Right from the get go, from the beginning of motherhood, there are certain things that make us feel like we are just not enough.

Speaker 1: 10:32

I think that's so true.

Speaker 2: 10:33

And that translates into a fear of failure. Well, if I'm not enough, I'm setting my kid up for failure, and I don't want them to experience what I've experienced.

Speaker 1: 10:43

I mean, it can be even something simple as say like you know, the control could show up. I see myself sometimes I'm going to be ultra prepared, right, so that we could be way more obsessively prepared than I ever should need to be, but, like I feel like, okay, we're going to set ourselves up for success, then that means I'm a good mom, that means my kids are going to have this good experience, right, like, and it's it's like so. What happens, though? That there's a one thing that you know, okay, so you forget this, right, like so, like I forgot my three-year-old's letters just send in, you know, recently, and I was just like you know, and actually the preschool teacher kind of sent back. This message was like friends were sad that they didn't have this, and I'm like, okay, but that does not mean I'm a bad mom or I failed. I was like, okay, we're going to put that one off to the backside here.

Speaker 2: 11:30

But life happens, people Life happens.

Speaker 1: 11:33

But old Sarah who was struggling really with figuring out what your self-worth was, what control issues were, value failure, all that, that would have really crushed me.

Speaker 2: 11:45

Right. I mean you hit the nail on the head there, because I can remember when my oldest daughter I took her in, I think, for her very first pediatrician appointment. So you know I'm not even a full week postpartum at this point. So you got all the hormones, you've got all the recovery going on, you've got all the sleep deprivation and I tell you I packed that diaper bag with the formula, the ready feed formula. You know where you just shake it and you know the nipple or a bottle to put it into. And I just remember digging through the diaper bag and my mom was there because I wasn't allowed to drive yet, and I just sat and I burst into tears. And she's like Whitney, it is okay, I will run across the street to the pharmacy, I will grab a bottle and it will be okay.

Speaker 3: 12:30

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 12:31

You're not a failure. You forgot one thing, but look at all the other things you remembered.

Speaker 3: 12:37

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 12:37

This is not a failure moment. So she left to go get that the pediatrician comes in. I've obviously been crying and this is my first time meeting the pediatrician and she was like, oh honey, it's fine, she won't remember this, you will.

Speaker 2: 12:52

Yeah, lo and behold, I do remember it, nearly eight years later. I remember that feeling of failure and she was like you're fine. You're fine Because you know what you came prepared. It was on your brain. We're doing the best that we can. Failure is not the ultimate determination of like who you are as a person, your character, your value, None of that. We all have to fail at some point to succeed. Yeah, Because if you would have told middle school, high school me, even college me, prior to changing my major to social work, that I would have gone to grad school and that I would have gotten an additional clinical license to do private practice, I would have been like no.

Speaker 2: 13:45

I would have said, that's not even on my plan. I don't want to do social work. And now look at this. So all of my failures academically led to where I am now.

Speaker 2: 13:56

Same thing in motherhood If we miss the mark on something, we have an opportunity to try again. So, and you know, we talk about emotional regulation all the time, like we feel like we fail if we lose our temper with our kids. That's not enjoyable, I'm not going to deny that. But guess what? It gives us a great opportunity for conflict resolution and we get to teach our kids that, when we might not have been taught that. Because that is a very common theme with my millennial clients that are parents, where we talk about emotional regulation and they feel so bad, so guilty because they yelled at their kids and they don't want to yell at their kids. And I'm thinking and I'll ask them well, did your parents ever reconcile Like, did you ever see them argue and then apologize and come back together? Were you ever apologized to? And I would say probably 85 to 90 percent of the time no, it was not modeled then.

Speaker 1: 14:52

So you also got to think we're kind of the forerunners in this. It's not easy to be forerunners and I think it's all just really good to hear, too, that we are all working through things that's happened in our childhood, what's happened through growing up, it's coming out into motherhood, and control is a big umbrella term for all these other emotions that's associated with that should be if you're, if this is resonating with you and you're going okay, I maybe do try to control this outcome or I like to control this. So these emotions, or I like to control I may be self-sabotage, so I know the outcome is, we got a lot of self-sabotage yourself there, cause it's easier to know the outcome, even if it's a negative outcome, than it is to know an unknown outcome. Absolutely, it's a great way to work through this with a therapist.

Speaker 2: 15:44

Right, you know. It reminds me of that old Southern phrase of better the devil you know than the devil you don't. Not always it's still a devil.

Speaker 1: 15:55

Yeah, yeah. So what is some tangible takeaway things that you can give our listeners if they're like oh, Whitney, you have really rubbed my feathers wrong today because you called me out.

Speaker 2: 16:07

Well, same For starters same, but failure is not the definition of your character, like I need someone to put that on the sticky note and put it on your bathroom mirror. Have it in the notes section on your phone. Have it where you see it, because you need that reminder that a failure does not determine your character or your worth. Everybody fails. We all have an opportunity to do better, and controlling the situation might feel good in the moment, but is it actually good for us in the long run?

Speaker 3: 16:44

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 16:45

And it's one of those. We do have to think that one through a good bit, you know, because sometimes we do have a positive if we do think, ok, well, if I do, if I choose option A over option B, I think that might be the best thing. Like a job change, for example. You know that's very unknown, we can't always control things. So you do have to do that deep look and say, ok, if I did this, what could be the possible benefits or risk? But at the same time it is still a risk and you just have to go with it.

Speaker 3: 17:14

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 17:15

I love it. I think it's deeper. I think this relates to a lot of things in motherhood, and it was a great topic to kind of challenge ourselves, beginning of 2025 to say let's take a deeper look and see what is underneath that. Control need, yes, or lack of control need that could be a whole other episode. But okay, listeners, well, I hope this has ruffled your feathers a little bit, and no, you're not alone. Me and Whitney are working on our own control issues this year and we'll be there for you, so we will be, back next week.

Speaker 1: 17:48

So have a great week.

Speaker 3: 17:52

Maternal mental health is as important as physical health. The Preview alliance podcast was created for and by moms dealing with postpartum depression and all its variables, like anxiety, anger and even apathy. Hosted by ceo founder sarah parkhurst and licensed clinical social worker whitney gay, each episode focus on specific issues relevant to pregnancy and postpartum. Join us and hear how other moms have overcome mental health challenges, as well as access tips and suggestions on dealing with your own challenges as moms. You can also browse our podcast library and listen to previous episodes at any time. Please know you're not alone on this journey. We're here to help.