Hi coaches. I’ve been watching the parenting coaching calls recently & finding them very interesting & useful. In my own parenting, I struggle with this: Whenever my 13 year old son has a difficulty & struggles, my own mood is affected very directly.

Here’s an example. Recently he had one day where he came home from school and (without us knowing why) was very upset & cried a lot. Usually he talks to us but didn’t about this. He refused to go to school the next day which very reluctantly we accepted (again, very unlike son).

After the winter holiday which just ended, he came back home from school yesterday, a bit sullen, and as we were hanging out in the evening he asked me ‘what would you say mum if I said I want to be home schooled’? I immediately answered ‘I would say no’ which I then regretted doing as he shut down and didn’t open up further. I think I answered like that because of my immediate feelings of dread / panic when I heard him bring this up. My main worry with him is that he’s quite shy & hasn’t branched out with friendships properly in his high school, the pandemic having played a role for sure.  Here are my models about this today. I want to keep working on my intentional model for a few days as I don’t have a convincing thought to build on.

Unintentional model
C – Son told me yesterday ‘what would you say if I wanted to be home schooled’. He didn’t say more.
T – (all these thoughts lead to similar feelings) Son may withdraw, Son is maybe being bullied, Son may be really unwell and we don’t know it
F – panicky, very worried, dread – stomach tightens, throat tightens
A – ask him many questions, talk to husband in a worried / whispery way about this, argue with husband about this, ruminate, catastrophize,
don’t sleep, then may become exhausted during work day & evening with son too, more likely to buffer / not attend to other things, calendar becomes confused – I don’t attend to it
R – I limit my ability to support & contain son

Intentional model
C – Son told me yesterday ‘what would you say if I wanted to be home schooled’. He didn’t say more.
T -?
F – ?
A – connect to school & find out more, support son in thinking through friendship issues when he’s ready, thinking through options, work on unconditional love, tell myself my son is great – which he is!, tell myself that kids go through difficult times & that’s normal, tell myself that my own feelings / thoughts are not identical and shouldn’t be with my son’s: he has his own ups & downs as do I, don’t immediately tell him what to do – ask, open up, be there to listen when he’s ready, tell myself teenagers open up on their own terms, not immediately, I have to wait, I continue taking care of myself, I collaborate with husband on this
R – I support son in whatever he goes through, good or bad and also support myself