Episode 36
What If This Is It?
Nobody tells you this part about being a parent.
That every boundary you set comes with a quiet, gnawing guilt.
Needing space. Wanting quiet. Asking not to be touched for five minutes.
And immediately wondering if you’ll regret it forever.
Hi, I'm Lauren Howard. You can call me L2. Like other people do.
And in this episode of Different, Not Broken, I talk about the constant tug-of-war between your needs as a human and your guilt as a parent.
Because even when your kids are healthy, safe, loved, and thriving, it can still feel like you’re failing someone all the time.
Usually yourself. Sometimes them.
Often both.
I get into overstimulation, sensory overload, and why tiny, almost invisible things can feel completely unbearable when your fuse is already short.
And I talk about that thought parents torture themselves with over and over again.
What if this is the last time?
This is a conversation for parents who love their kids deeply and still sometimes need room to breathe.
Useful stuff
Stuff that helps you become awesome even if you’re different: https://stan.store/elletwo
My grown up job: https://lbeehealth.com/
Timestamped summary
00:00 The chaos nobody prepares you for
01:00 When your fuse feels dangerously short
03:03 Overstimulation and sensory overload
06:20 The tiny thing that breaks you
10:45 “What if this is the last time?”
14:50 The moment I knew I’d done something right
27:30 Recording while being a parent
Transcript
They make me feel like my insides are collapsing onto themselves.
Speaker:There's this constant balancing act of
Speaker:your needs as a human and your guilt as a parent.
Speaker:You feel like you're gonna be failing one of them at all times.
Speaker:All right, here we go. I'm gonna pretend I'm pushing record. Cause that feels right.
Speaker:Okay, I'm pressing record. Boop. Hi,
Speaker:everybody. I'm Lauren Howard. Welcome to Different
Speaker:Not Broke is our podcast on exactly that.
Speaker:That there are a lot of people in this world walking around feeling broken. And
Speaker:the reality is you're just different. And that's fine. I'm sure I've
Speaker:said this before a number of times, but the last year has been
Speaker:chaotic and exhausting and
Speaker:a thousand other things that have left me frequently
Speaker:feeling like my fuse is very short.
Speaker:I always try to be really, really
Speaker:aware of what my kids are getting off of me,
Speaker:kind of vibe wise. If you had told me before we had
Speaker:children that Kyle Howard would be the heavy and the
Speaker:disciplinarian and that I would be the
Speaker:laid back, permissive parent, I would have laughed in your face.
Speaker:I would have told you that you were bonkers. And then these
Speaker:kids were born and I became fully useless at discipline.
Speaker:I am absolutely worthless when it comes to enforcing the
Speaker:rules. The only rule that I'm really good at is bedtime. Kyle
Speaker:Howard is terrible at bedtime because he doesn't understand
Speaker:clocks in any way, shape or form. He has never met a
Speaker:clock that he agrees with, whereas I only understand clocks. And
Speaker:I am like a walking one. And so I'm good at bedtime. He's not.
Speaker:But other than that, like, these kids are mouthy and
Speaker:disrespectful. And I'm like, that was great. And he was like, you shouldn't let them
Speaker:talk to you like that. And I'm like, why not? I love it.
Speaker:My youngest cries and is clearly definitely a hundred percent
Speaker:trying to manipulate me. And I am totally on board for it.
Speaker:And the alternative is let her cry. And my
Speaker:response is, come here, baby, I need to hug you and
Speaker:cuddle you. Because even though I know you're being manipulative, I still want to hug
Speaker:you because you're so cute. So anyway, life is funny in that way
Speaker:that there's no planet where my husband was supposed to be
Speaker:the heavy. That is not the way we live our lives. And yet here I
Speaker:am being 97% useless when it comes to
Speaker:discipline because I just want to let them live and do what they want and
Speaker:figure things out. And apparently that's not what you're supposed to do with children. And
Speaker:I think that's ridiculous. There is this very
Speaker:real aspect of parenting that is
Speaker:the constant overstimulation of being a
Speaker:parent. And it does not matter how many
Speaker:children you have, their existences
Speaker:are overstimulating. And if you are a person like me
Speaker:who is prone to overstimulation, it can be really
Speaker:overwhelming at times. And again, for the most part,
Speaker:I try to deal with it. And my kids know. My kids know that if,
Speaker:like, four people are talking at once, you're not getting an answer out of me.
Speaker:I can't figure out who's saying what and when. And so I'll
Speaker:say, like, stop, guys. One person. Pick one person.
Speaker:They also kind of experience the same kind of sensory overload at times. And so
Speaker:they get it. And I don't expect them to fix things
Speaker:for me, but I do expect that if they need something,
Speaker:that we will kind of work together to figure out how to communicate it in
Speaker:a way that works for both of our brains. And that's a constantly
Speaker:evolving process. But after the year we've had,
Speaker:my proximity to overstimulation is shorter
Speaker:or closer than it's ever been, ever.
Speaker:There are little teeny, tiny things that they do that
Speaker:are completely imperceptible to other people in the world,
Speaker:completely imperceptible to anybody who is not me,
Speaker:that make me feel like I am being
Speaker:crushed inside. They make me feel like my insides are collapsing
Speaker:onto themselves. And I have to remember, and I have
Speaker:remind myself all the time, that just because this
Speaker:feels like absolute chaos to me internally does not mean I have to communicate
Speaker:it to them that way. And I can very politely ask them to
Speaker:stop doing those things, even though inside
Speaker:I feel like I am being absolutely freaking
Speaker:crushed. Absolutely crushed. And it's very,
Speaker:very simple, tiny things that I think probably never would have
Speaker:bothered me before, but I'm just in this phase
Speaker:of my life that we're working through a lot, and
Speaker:there's so much stress and there's so much overwhelm. So I'll
Speaker:give you an example. My kids are always in my office coloring. And that's not
Speaker:a complaint. I love it. I even have a little station set up for them.
Speaker:I like to buy pens, but I am a picky
Speaker:diva when it comes to pens. So if you show me
Speaker:a pack of colorful pens, the reality is I'm probably gonna buy it
Speaker:because I love it and I wanna try them. But I will also try them
Speaker:one time before being like, well, these are Trash and never touch them again.
Speaker:So I put them in a pile. Like there's a little organizer on that side
Speaker:of my desk and my kids can come in and use them whenever they want.
Speaker:And I print out coloring pages for them and they can use them and it's
Speaker:great. And I get to have my colorful sets of pens so they come in
Speaker:and they color next to me like somewhat constantly. And that's fine and I
Speaker:love it. And my 7 year old, I say that
Speaker:her butt has magnets in it because it
Speaker:is immediately drawn to the nearest adult and she
Speaker:has to be right on top of you all the time. Not
Speaker:nearest adult in like strangers. In fact, she's the one who is
Speaker:very stranger averse. Whereas my 9 year old is like,
Speaker:everybody's my friend. And so she will come and she'll start
Speaker:across the room and then slowly creep her way until she is
Speaker:like right on top of me. And she'll do this thing where she is just
Speaker:putting the tiniest amount of pressure on my desk chair
Speaker:so that I can't move it and fidget freely.
Speaker:And it is like being trapped in a vice as far as my
Speaker:brain is concerned. Literally nobody else in the world would
Speaker:notice that this is happening. But I notice.
Speaker:And it makes me feel like I have lost all function in my body
Speaker:and that I can't move freely and I hate it. And so
Speaker:I have to translate that from this is the
Speaker:worst thing that has ever happened to me. Which is not. It's not. But
Speaker:that's what it feels like in that moment to hey, can you not
Speaker:lean on my chair? To which she always says, oh, sorry and
Speaker:bounces away and everything's fine. And then five minutes later she does it again and
Speaker:I have to go, hey, can you not lean on my chair? Hey,
Speaker:remember what I said like 2 minutes ago when I was like, hey, stop leaning
Speaker:on my chair. And every time it's like, oh, sorry. Then she bounces back to
Speaker:where she's supposed to be. It really does feel awful internally,
Speaker:even though it is so small and so simple. It
Speaker:is something that for whatever reason, the
Speaker:fuse that is so short right now is lit by
Speaker:that. It also happens when she, like, my kids do this all the time.
Speaker:And this is really kind of the thing I wanted to address.
Speaker:Do you remember when the Barbie movie came out and Ken said
Speaker:my job is beach? Like I say,
Speaker:my job is chair because as far as my children
Speaker:are concerned, I am a chair. If they see
Speaker:me, they sit on me. And that for the most part, I love It.
Speaker:It's amazing and it's wonderful. But also, there
Speaker:is something very, very
Speaker:stressful about a small human
Speaker:wedging herself onto your lap when she was not invited
Speaker:between your lap and your desk and
Speaker:having to navigate. And I'm like, why is your butt on me?
Speaker:Why is the immediate response that your butt needs to be on me?
Speaker:Because all of a sudden I can't move around, I can't fidget, I can't. And
Speaker:I've got. I can't use my hands, I can't use my computer. There's a butt
Speaker:on me. And a lot of times I will say, hey, can you go stand
Speaker:over there? And of course they'll do it. Sometimes they look at me and say,
Speaker:no, but it's like, very deliberate. It's like very
Speaker:much I know this is bothering you. And also, I'm
Speaker:making the conscious choice that I'm going to bother you. And that's like.
Speaker:I get that. I do understand that, and that's mostly funny.
Speaker:But for the most part, they just get up and move away. But then
Speaker:whether it's because, you know, they're doing something that
Speaker:feels constricting and making me feel like I can't move my body
Speaker:freely, which is really hard for me, or they're sitting on
Speaker:me and I'm not ready for that particular stimuli, right then
Speaker:they will absolutely move away. Correct it. No
Speaker:argument. And the next part of it is that I
Speaker:immediately feel guilty for two reasons. One, I feel guilty
Speaker:that their touch or their closeness could in
Speaker:any way make me feel so negative, which is a function of my
Speaker:brain and not really a function of anything that they're doing. But then
Speaker:there's that part of the parent brain that turns on
Speaker:when you're like, I'm asking her to get off my lap,
Speaker:and someday she's not gonna wanna sit on my lap anymore. And I'm gonna regret
Speaker:this. I'm gonna regret, like, not
Speaker:soaking up every single second of having her on my lap.
Speaker:But also, I can't make decisions about things based
Speaker:on guilt. There are times where I need space and
Speaker:the overstimulation is too much. But that doesn't make the
Speaker:guilt go away. It doesn't make you feel less guilty about
Speaker:making a conscious choice to not spend time being showered with the
Speaker:affection that someday your kids. Not even that they're not going to give you, but,
Speaker:like, there's going to be a day where my kid is not going to walk
Speaker:into my office and immediately climb on my lap because she's too grown up or
Speaker:she thinks she's too cool for it or her friends are around or whatever.
Speaker:And that's going to be devastating in its own way.
Speaker:This is 1000% the way that parents torture
Speaker:ourselves all the time. Like making a
Speaker:decision for yourself, protecting your peace, deciding
Speaker:to set a boundary, even if it's not a critically important
Speaker:boundary, the immediate balance to
Speaker:that is. But what if this is the last time?
Speaker:What if we don't ever get to do this again? Someday
Speaker:they're not going to love this. Nobody told me
Speaker:that someday you're going to pop out a kid
Speaker:and every decision from there forward is going to
Speaker:be about how you're failing them. And there are the
Speaker:times that you fail them less, and there are the times that you
Speaker:fail them more. But there are very rarely times
Speaker:when you're like, I'm getting this right
Speaker:at all. And right now I'm in a phase where
Speaker:my brain, my
Speaker:stress level, the things that we have recovered from, the things that we're still
Speaker:recovering from, require me to have a whole lot
Speaker:of grace for myself and for the people around me. Myself especially.
Speaker:I'm horrible at giving myself grace and
Speaker:balancing it with this constant
Speaker:feeling. Like, the areas where I
Speaker:have to assert that there is something that I need are
Speaker:going to be places that I might regret someday
Speaker:because of this constant parental guilt that
Speaker:is crushing all the time. Even when you're doing things amazingly right
Speaker:again, like, it never feels like you're crushing it. It always feels like you are
Speaker:doing things the least bad. Like, I joke a lot about things that
Speaker:my kids do that are as good as a DNA test, where I feel like,
Speaker:oh, I've nailed this. Either I've nailed this, or like, oh, I'm sorry I made
Speaker:you that way. But usually they're funny. But there was one
Speaker:situation, the one time in the
Speaker:almost 10 years that I've been a parent that I was certain I
Speaker:had done something right. Absolutely certain I had done something right. We
Speaker:were at a relative's house, and my
Speaker:kids mouth off to me all the time, and it doesn't bother me. They talk
Speaker:back to me constantly. We joke like that all the time. They're funny as
Speaker:hell. They're sarcastic as hell. My oldest has a
Speaker:pun game that rivals the best, most advanced
Speaker:linguists in the world. Her pun game is better.
Speaker:And so I love it when they banter with me. I love it when they
Speaker:argue with me. I love it when they say silly stuff. And they also, like,
Speaker:I can also turn it off when I need to and be like, hey, not
Speaker:the time. And they'll usually back off, but for the most part, like there's nothing
Speaker:off limits. They can say whatever they want. And so we were at a
Speaker:holiday meal or something and my kid said something
Speaker:sassy to me and I like raised one eyebrow and laughed because I thought
Speaker:it was funny. And the family member who was sitting at the table
Speaker:looked at her and said, you better watch it or she's going to
Speaker:give you a fat lip. And I was so
Speaker:shocked. And my kid looks at them and says,
Speaker:what's a fat lip? And they say it means
Speaker:she's going to hit you in the mouth for being disrespectful. And without
Speaker:missing a beat, my oldest, very
Speaker:genuinely and without concern, looked at them and said,
Speaker:she's my mom, she would never hit me. And I was
Speaker:ready to jump in. I was ready to say, like, how in a
Speaker:million years could you talk to my kid like that? How could you suggest that
Speaker:to my kid? That is not what we do in our house. And before I
Speaker:even had the chance, my then nine year old said,
Speaker:she's my mom, she would never hit me. And it was like
Speaker:watching something heal. Generations and generations of
Speaker:generational trauma, just like resolve in
Speaker:this little 45 pound body. That was a three minute period
Speaker:in 10 years of parenting, the only time that I
Speaker:ever felt that I actually got it right. And so
Speaker:I keep that moment with me forever. Because if
Speaker:the only thing I ever do right is to give them
Speaker:a space safe enough where they can say anything, do anything,
Speaker:bring anything, and know that there's no violent
Speaker:reprisal on the other side, no terrifying reprisal on the
Speaker:other side, everything else is awash.
Speaker:But even though I've had the kind of tangible proof of that that
Speaker:most people would die for, most parents at least,
Speaker:I still spend so much time balancing
Speaker:my own needs, my own overwhelm, my own overstimulation,
Speaker:which is something I struggle with all the time. And my desire
Speaker:to keep my kids close, and my general
Speaker:concern about the fact that someday they're not going to be my tiny babies
Speaker:anymore, even though they're already not tiny, which is rude, nobody told them they were
Speaker:allowed to do that. There's this constant balancing
Speaker:act of your needs as a human
Speaker:and your guilt as a parent, and you feel
Speaker:like you're going to be failing one of them at all times. I don't have
Speaker:a solution for that, except to acknowledge the fact that it exists,
Speaker:acknowledge the fact that my kids are healthy and well taken care of and
Speaker:have everything they need in this life and most of the things that they want.
Speaker:And that you don't stop being a parent when things are hard,
Speaker:but you do sometimes become a parent who struggles with specific things
Speaker:when things are hard. And that's not a reflection on you as a
Speaker:parent, but it is something that you have to
Speaker:pay attention to and be mindful of. One, because you
Speaker:don't want that thing to become your kid's responsibility, but two, because
Speaker:you deserve grace in that situation. And
Speaker:sometimes that means that little
Speaker:imperceptible things that don't mean anything to anyone else are
Speaker:really gonna bother you. And one,
Speaker:you have to find a way to cope with it. But two,
Speaker:deciding that protecting your peace in
Speaker:those situations and giving yourself some sense of calm and
Speaker:resolve in something that makes you feel
Speaker:chaotic even though it's so tiny, and that you're
Speaker:not damaging your relationship with your kids by doing it.
Speaker:And now we'll go to Allison, who has this week's
Speaker:small talk. I don't know if this is even a question or just me admitting
Speaker:something out loud for the first time. I'm good at my job,
Speaker:like, objectively good, but I still feel like I'm one mistake away
Speaker:from being found out. Is there a point where imposter syndrome
Speaker:actually shuts up, or do you just learn to live with the
Speaker:noise? That's a really good question. And I say this as
Speaker:somebody who knows your imposter syndrome is full of shit and should
Speaker:go get bent. And the part of your brain that
Speaker:tells you that you can't do those things is either
Speaker:parroting something that it's never actually been told or
Speaker:repeating things that have been told to it by people who
Speaker:are not good sources of information anyway. I think you will go through
Speaker:phases in your life where you're more secure in where you are, and
Speaker:whether that completely manifests as imposter syndrome going
Speaker:away or whether it's more likely that it's this
Speaker:naggy voice at the back of your head that you have learned to work through
Speaker:and ignore. I can't exactly promise the realities of that, but
Speaker:it's one of those things, right? In my experience, I'm sure there are people
Speaker:who have kicked their imposter syndrome. And I really, really encourage
Speaker:everyone who is struggling with imposter syndrome to look at
Speaker:their nearest mediocre white male and see if he's
Speaker:struggling with imposter syndrome, because I guarantee you, he's
Speaker:not. The career trajectory of the mediocre white
Speaker:male does not have the same trappings of
Speaker:imposter syndrome than it does for basically everybody else. And
Speaker:so we say this a lot, but, you know, approach everything as
Speaker:if you were a mediocre white male. Because he is not concerned about being
Speaker:ill prepared for something he's not. He has been taught
Speaker:always that every role was made for him and that
Speaker:everybody's lucky to have him in every space that he's in. And he just doesn't
Speaker:worry about it. I'm not talking about anybody specific, to be clear. I'm talking about
Speaker:this kind of mythical figure. Not mythical. He really exists in a lot
Speaker:of different forms, but they get to
Speaker:benefit from the
Speaker:unfettered joy of failing up. You know, these are the people who
Speaker:do a really bad job at something. And the solution
Speaker:from corporate is to promote them
Speaker:instead of fire them. Well, we need to get him out of that role,
Speaker:so we're gonna promote him instead of actually dealing with
Speaker:the corporate internal issues. So that's not who you need to aspire to
Speaker:because you're already better than that. That kind of
Speaker:inexplicable self perception is what we need
Speaker:to aspire to, even though in your case it's explicable because you
Speaker:really are that magical and wonderful. That
Speaker:said, I will guess there are people in this
Speaker:world who have improved from imposter syndrome
Speaker:or not had it plague them ever again when they
Speaker:have some sort of light bulb. But I think in general, being
Speaker:a person who is self aware and
Speaker:not overly impressed with yourself means that there are
Speaker:times where you feel like a toddler in a room of postdocs.
Speaker:And that is just the reality of
Speaker:being a person who may be super
Speaker:confident in your skills in some places, but not in everything.
Speaker:I can't promise that it will go away entirely. I can promise
Speaker:that you can start retraining your brain in ways that
Speaker:make the bouts of it shorter, that make them less paralyzing,
Speaker:that make you get closer to feeling
Speaker:like you can do it scared. Like if it's
Speaker:fear that's standing in your way, you can do it scared. Because remember,
Speaker:if you're not doing something because you're worried that someone's going to tell you
Speaker:no, you're doing that for them. So you might as
Speaker:well do it and just let them tell you no. There's a good chance
Speaker:they might actually tell you yes. Instead, let them surprise you, even
Speaker:though nobody else is survi is surprised because everybody knew that you would,
Speaker:that you were a shoo in or that you were fully capable, or that it
Speaker:was made for you. So will there be a
Speaker:day that imposter syndrome is not a thing for you anymore?
Speaker:Maybe. Is it more likely that you learn how to
Speaker:train it out of your kind of every day so that it's not bothering you
Speaker:all the time? Probably. And are there
Speaker:still seasons of life where you get a
Speaker:gut punch from something and all of a sudden you're questioning
Speaker:your capabilities and you know what you can do and how it has the
Speaker:potential to interfere with whatever opportunities in front of you?
Speaker:Absolutely. I will say, like
Speaker:February me of this year versus
Speaker:October me of this year were totally different people.
Speaker:One of them, and I won't tell you which one, but one of them
Speaker:was ready to take over the world. And one of them was wondering
Speaker:why anybody even let me own a
Speaker:company. And I say that as the person who tells
Speaker:people multiple times a week that that's just their imposter syndrome
Speaker:talking and they need to tell them to tell imposter syndrome to shove it. Those
Speaker:two things can exist. They can both exist in your body. And you may very
Speaker:well find that as seasons change, so does
Speaker:your confidence level. And that's not only human, but completely expected.
Speaker:And again, the only people who don't have
Speaker:imposter syndrome, the only people who don't have imposter syndrome
Speaker:are the ones who should have imposter syndrome.
Speaker:Everybody else has probably worked their way there. I'm not sure if
Speaker:we've talked about this before, but
Speaker:imposter syndrome is based on a
Speaker:whole lot of arrogance, but not arrogance in the
Speaker:way that you're thinking. Right. So we think
Speaker:that, you know, I must be saying that you're so impressed with yourself.
Speaker:I know you're not. I know that's not what drives imposter syndrome,
Speaker:but it is not possible that every
Speaker:person in your life who has been part
Speaker:of your career up till now has been wrong about
Speaker:you in such a way that you were able to repeatedly
Speaker:fail into where you are. It's not possible.
Speaker:If you got where you are, you got there because you did the work,
Speaker:you put in, the time, you developed the relationships, you did all of
Speaker:those things. It is so self centered to think
Speaker:that the universe likes you so much that
Speaker:it let you fail repeatedly to get where
Speaker:you are. It's not possible. You have not only been
Speaker:surrounded by people who are unsmart and so bad
Speaker:at what they do that they didn't realize that you were also
Speaker:bad at what you do. It's not possible. It's not how it
Speaker:works. You are a
Speaker:magical, wonderful,
Speaker:unicorn person who deserves
Speaker:every ounce of everything that you get and you
Speaker:did not repeatedly fail to get there. That said,
Speaker:I know you don't believe any of it. If you need to hear that
Speaker:again at some time, let me know. I gotcha. Thanks for being here,
Speaker:guys. Have a good day. Love you. Mean it.
Speaker:I just want to point something out before I lose my ever
Speaker:loving shit. Which is close.
Speaker:It is 12:12 Eastern Time
Speaker:on a Tuesday. What do we
Speaker:do every Tuesday? That I have told this man who
Speaker:inhabits my house. That we do every Tuesday.
Speaker:Tell me how a contractor just walked up on my goddamn porch.
Speaker:I'm gonna hurl this man out the window if this person makes noise. And I'm
Speaker:not gonna be nice about it this time. I'm gonna walk out and be like,
Speaker:stop it. It is Tuesday. I'm gonna get
Speaker:a cheap shock machine is what I'm gonna get. I'm gonna attach it to
Speaker:him. How is it every
Speaker:motherfucking Tuesday? Never any other
Speaker:day of the week.
