Parents Have Feelings, Too
A Guide to Navigating Your Emotions So You And Your Family Can Thrive
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- $23.99
Publisher Description
This practical guide teaches parents how to understand and process their emotions–and how to teach this valuable, life-changing skill of emotional intelligence to the next generation.
Parents Have Feelings, Too is an emotions playbook for family wellness. With 1 in 5 moms experiencing anxiety or depression, and over 60% of parents struggling with burnout, parents need tools to support their emotional well-being. Parents Have Feelings, Too illuminates the emotional lives of mothers and fathers, providing parents with practical tools and guidance so they can effectively work with their emotions, as well as their children's, with greater calm and confidence.
Parents desperately need real, actionable, long-lasting advice that helps them process their emotions in a healthy and productive way. In Parents Have Feelings, Too, psychotherapists Hilary Jacobs Hendel and Juli Fraga provide the tools parents need to understand and effectively work with their own potent feelings, breaking the chain of intergenerational trauma, and passing along emotional intelligence to their children to create a generation of people with emotional regulation skills.
Parents Have Feelings, Too includes the following:
Practical strategies to help parents process their feelingsStories and examplesTools that build confidence and emotional know-how in their childrenNew approaches that break the intergenerational transfer of trauma so parents can raise emotionally healthier people who can thrive amidst the many challenges of being human in society today Expert insights and insight-building exercises that support parents on their emotional journey
Parents have feelings. And when they can identify what they are, where they are coming from, and how to work with them, parents are empowered to help their children understand and navigate their own emotions.
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In this transformative guide, psychotherapists Hendel (It's Not Always Depression) and Fraga offer tools to help parents work through their emotions and avoid passing intergenerational trauma onto their children. The main tool they recommend is the "Change Triangle," a "map of the mind" designed to help people identify inhibitory emotions, core emotions, and the defenses they use to avoid emotions altogether. When experiencing distress, the authors explain, people often use defensive behaviors, like sarcasm or blaming, or experience inhibitory emotions, like anxiety, guilt, and shame. The goal is to become aware of these patterns and connect with the core emotions one is actually feeling, like anger, sadness, fear, disgust, joy, or excitement. This process can help parents avoid reactive "freak outs" that hurt their kids. The authors illuminate how the "Change Triangle" works by sharing patient stories. In one example, a mother who was raised to believe anger was shameful found herself snapping at her kids in frustrating moments. Acknowledging her core anger allowed her to release it in safe ways (journaling, walking, or venting to a friend), and her family life became more peaceful as a result. Offering practical suggestions and enlightening stories, Hendel and Fraga prove to be compassionate teachers for parents in need of healing. This is a game-changer for parents and their children.
