Raising children isn't easy. When things get challenging it can leave parents feeling like they are failing at the most important job in the world. This podcast aims to help calm the chaos, respond to the rivalry and help the happy, so you can get on with growing your small people and feeling like you're a good parent, making a difference in their lives.
We hear loads about resolutions, goals and outcomes around New Year. We set them for our personal life - like a fitness goal or a for business, - a certain sales turnover for example. It got me wondering if feeling aligned as a family and as a parent, could be helped by having a plan? When you began thinking of life with a family, probably even before babies came along, you may have had a vision, a dream of what family life would look like. Then, when babies come along, li...
5 Sept 2022
Change & Transitions: Back to School and Beyond!
September brings so many changes and transitions for the family to get used to - and not just the little ones! For them, though, it can be quite a big adjustment from the relative freedom of summer to routine in autumn. Perhaps it's Big School for the first time, maybe a change of classroom, teacher or expectations. Perhaps there is a move to a different school and the loss of friendship groups. Even for older children or teens, this can be a challenging adjustment - huge, for th...
8 Aug 2022
Listening - A superpower for Parents!
A very important component of communication, (Secret No. 1 of the Five Secrets to Happy Children), is listening actively. After all, communication is a two-way process and we sometimes focus on getting our message across first and foremost - and forget the other half of the process. Listening actively is SOOOOO important if we are going to have successful communications with our kiddos (and other people in general, to be honest!). In his amazing book, Seven Habits of Highly Effective Parents...
1 Jul 2022
Parents Have Needs Too (Yes You DO!)
Parenting isn't easy at the best of times. There's always something to do! If you have additional responsibilities on your to-do list as well, is it any wonder sometimes things gets missed? Trouble is, what often gets missed is looking after your own needs. They get put aside while you see to the needs of every other person that you care for. And someone always needs something! So what can you do? Because if you continue neglecting your needs, you could find yourself with nothing left ...
18 Apr 2022
Episode 4: Helicopter or Ninja Parenting?
In this episode, Kim plays around with a creative idea, comparing 'Helicopter' parenting with 'Ninja' Parenting. Maybe you've heard the expression 'Helicopter Parenting' which describes hovering around, taking a lot of interest in the children's activities, swooping in to make sure everything is managed and fixing any glitches in plans or processes to ensure that nothing upsets the day. In comparison, Kim & Mairi discuss how 'Ninja Parenting' can take a less attention-...
6 Feb 2022
What Would You Do? - Four little words with heart!
Many times, raising children, you will find yourself faced with things that go wrong! It might be accidents - major or minor, or a fight between siblings, homework that hasn't been done or a sports kit that hasn't been washed ready for lessons. Whatever is happening, often we parents like to spin round fast, put on our superhero cloak and swoosh in, to rescue and fix. Now, sometimes that is definitely the right thing to do, especially if there's injury and danger. But there are occasio...
22 Jan 2022
Helping Children Manage Change
Change is a constant in our lives. Whether it is going from holiday time to school time, from one school to another, moving from house to house between parents, or studying and preparing for exams, there is always some transition from one 'place' to another. For children and young people, this can be a challenge at the best of times, and during the pandemic, there has been an added layer of uncertainty to spice things up! This episode is a conversation between Kim and Mairi, looking a...
7 Dec 2021
Pushing Buttons & Fighting Battles
In this episode, Kim & Mairi talk about how sometimes our 'parent' buttons get pushed and we jump into protective mode, and come out all ready for a fight! Often this button is more related to something that was a sensitive spot for ourselves as children and is not necessarily in our child's best interests. If we look at the bigger picture, we can see that our job as a parent is to prepare children for being grown-up. Therefore, it might serve them better if we allow (...
8 Oct 2021
Episode 8. Encouragement: How to help grow happy children - and grown ups!
This episode was originally recorded during lockdown 3 in February 2021 but didn't get used immediately. The ideas around encouragement are still useful though, as we continue to adjust to post-lockdown life and getting back to doing all the things we have to do in the everyday. Challenging times need lots of encouragement to deal with. But how do we do it? Firstly, understanding what encouragement actually is. Describing the difference between praise and encouragement and why knowing...
21 May 2021
The Five Secrets To Happy Children Masterclass Launch: What is it?
Often when people think about Parent Groups, they feel anxious and worried that they will be labelled as bad parents, who can't look after their children - or that their issues and worries are too trivial to take to a group. in this episode of the Growing Happy Families podcast, I talk with Mairi about how the Five Secrets to Happy Children Taster session coming up on May 25th, are an opportunity to experience what the Masterclass series will be like, and will actually give you some ti...
17 Apr 2021
Helping children to deal with (and talk about) scary stuff.
Because of the COVID-19 Pandemic, there's been a lot of news broadcasting and discussion about the situation. It's everywhere! There is often no let-up in the talk around death, dying and lots of other scary stuff. How do we handle this overwhelming amount of information, for ourselves and especially for our children, and help them to handle the anxiety and fear that this deluge of information can provoke? Notice Behaviours Look for behaviours that are not usual for your child and hel...
11 Apr 2021
Episode 5: Not Broken - Unfinished! Reframing behaviours
Sometimes we parents regard what our kids do as the problem: something broken, that needs fixing. As the poet, Amanda Gorman says, in the beautiful poem "The Hill We Climb" that she performed at President Biden's Inauguration, "we are not broken but unfinished". This is a wonderful reframe for how we can look at the role of a parent, bringing up children. Taking the different view of 'unfinished rather than broken' allows parents to move back from fire-fighting problems and step into ...
10 Apr 2021
Episode 4: Self-Care for busy Parents
How do we bring our children through the intensely stressful times we live in, such as lockdown and the pandemic and manage to keep our health and sanity? The answer is self-care. But how do we find the space when we are already stressed and stretched thin? Finding the smallest actions of self-care - as opposed to a day at the spa - that can keep us moving forward is first off, a mindset shift. So how do we do it? In this episode of the podcast, Kim and Mairi break things down into sm...
10 Apr 2021
Episode 3: How To Keep Your Cool At Special Occasions
Special occasions are just that! - Special! - We want things to go really well for everyone, ourselves included. How do we keep our cool and help the kids to remain calm during exciting times? The answer is planning and factoring in kids' needs, so we can head off misbehaviour and consider ideas for getting others to help with the kids (and you), to help keep things harmonious and make it a good occasion for everyone - including you - so all the hard work and effort result...
10 Apr 2021
Episode 2: Start with Strengths - Not Weakness!
As adults and parents/carers, when things aren't going as happily or as successfully as we want, we may well feel like we are failing at the most important task of our lives - bringing up our young ones. When we think we are failing, we might well focus on the 'bad stuff' - those failings - and start beating ourselves up for being bad parents and that makes for a hard time. In this episode, Kim and Mairi are talking about turning things around and looking for the strengths...
15 Mar 2021
Episode 1: Introducing Growing Happy Families
How did the idea for Growing Happy Families come about? The COVID-19 pandemic has had a massive and fundamental effect on everyone. Having to be confined to home, unable to visit family and friends, or even go to school, because of lockdown has meant the community that we are all used to has changed completely. This podcast grew out of a wish to offer small ideas to help families to survive the strange times and keep finding ways to connect, to find ways of getting along with each othe...
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