Episode 47: People Pleasing and Parenting with Andee Martineau, Part 2

Andee Martineau and I continue our conversation this week about people pleasing and parenting. Tolerating failures and disappointments with your children can be challenging but it is possible to deal with. The need to fix, save, and/or rescue can be consuming. As a parent, you have to be true to yourself and respect yourself first while also respecting and loving others. Stopping the patterns and the cycles of people pleasing is possible with awareness.


Find Andee here:
https://connectmethodparenting.com/
https://www.instagram.com/andeemartineau/
https://www.facebook.com/connectmethod

Find Sara here:
https://sarafisk.coach
https://www.instagram.com/sarafiskcoach/
https://www.facebook.com/SaraFiskCoaching/
https://www.youtube.com/@sarafiskcoaching1333
https://www.tiktok.com/@sarafiskcoach
What happens inside the free Stop People Pleasing Facebook Community? Our goal is to provide help and guidance on your journey to eliminate people pleasing and perfectionism from your life. We heal best in a safe community where we can grow and learn together and celebrate and encourage each other. This group is for posting questions about or experiences with material learned in The Ex-Good Girl podcast, Sara Fisk Coaching social media posts or the free webinars and trainings provided by Sara Fisk Coaching. See you inside!

Transcript

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You are listening to the x Good Girl podcast episode forty seven. Right before we started recording, Sarah was talking about how she has some things to add to the list that we started with last time. So I'm so excited to hear your list. And should we start there? Yeah. And I just see what I love about your list is it's like, how do people pleasers get created? Mhmm. And then my list is more like, Once the people pleasing dynamic has already existed and you feel stuck in it, how does it show up? How would you know, right, that you are stuck in people pleasing One of your children. And then we can talk about strategies for getting out because I think you and I both agree that What we like is useful information. Yes. And I wanna make sure that people leave today with some some strategies to to begin to unravel it because I think people pleasing, it is at the heart of our most complex Human needs. Mhmm. Being wanted, belonging, having community, love, friendship, Knowing that we have a place in the world, and so no wonder that it can be tricky to unravel in a way that still feels Like, we get to keep the love that we want intact because so many of us, people please, to be loved. And I think that's really at the heart of what is happening in some of these parent child relationships. Yeah. I would agree. Yeah. I'm excited to hear your list. And I will say even though it might not seem like what we've talked about so far has been helpful, awareness is powerful. Having somebody call out when I heard the word resentful accommodation. All of the sudden, bing bing bing bing bing, I had this awareness of what I was doing, and then I could shift. So even though it might feel like we've talked a lot about the problems or how it manifests in your life, those are really important because without the awareness, you're not gonna start on being able to unravel it. Yeah. Right. And we'll say it again. Like, if you're seeing some of these behaviors with you and your children, Beating yourself up about it is a a normal human reaction, but the least helpful. Actually, the the not helpful Reaction. And so to acknowledge, like, okay. This is happening. What can we do about it? We're gonna get there, so stay with us. So As I was thinking about, you know, the list of the things that I see my clients doing with their children, It's all about not being able to tolerate their children's negative emotions or negative experiences like failure or disappointment. There's probably, you know, a hundred different variations on that same inability to tolerate, but, like, I can't Let my child get a bad grade. So when they call me and tell me that they left their homework, I drop what I'm doing or I rearrange my day so that I can take their assignment to school so that they don't experience any negative consequences. Mhmm. Or My child is used to getting their nails done. And so when they go off to college and they're now working a A job at Baskin Robbins and not making enough money to get their nails done. I feel obligated to send them money because I don't want them to be disappointed. That's so good. Yeah. I think everything's a mirror. So it's like, I don't want them to be disappointed. I don't wanna be disappointed. I don't want them to fail because that means I fail. Like, There's this mirror, I think, happening always. Because if we're comfortable with ourselves being disappointed, then we're gonna be fine if our kids are disappointed. Yeah. There's this need to fix, to jump in, to fix, to save, to rescue, to make sure that negative or unwanted consequences don't happen. And for me personally, I have a really interesting reaction To when my kids have, like, something going wrong, sometimes I get angry. I get angry. Yeah. It's so interesting Because it's like, oh my gosh, you guys. We just got everything worked out. Like, you called last week, and we Fixed all those things, and now you're calling again. And if my kids are listening, right, this is not about you at all. And, of course, I want you to call me and tell me. But it is I think for some of us, we cover up our fear with anger or our fear makes us Angry. Right? There's this relationship that I haven't quite totally unraveled, but I think anger or irritation or annoyance that something is going wrong again. Like, gosh. Why can't you just keep it together? Why can't you just and it's not at all about The workings of their human experience because that's what being human is. Things fall apart then come back together and fall apart then come back together. But I think what it is for me is my I just want it to be fine for them. I just want smooth sailing. And when it's not, My fear is hard for me to feel, and so I get angry instead. Anger for me just feels more productive, but at the heart of it is taught Still, this need to fix so that if they're fine, then I can be fine. If it's smooth sailing for them, Then it's smooth sailing for me. And so their disruption becomes my disruption. And that's the codependent piece of people pleasing where I'm not fine unless they're fine. I'm not able to experience smooth sailing unless they're experiencing smooth sailing. And so if that is Something that, you know, tugs at you. If you're listening, that is totally it's how we are taught to be in relationship, especially as parents. Right. We're taught that our children are a reflection of us, that if we love them, we will do certain things for them, but it just leads to all kinds of fixing and rescuing and taking responsibility for their lives, and it shows up in things like Continuing to pay for things for them when they are out of the house, and I don't think there's a certain magical age at which they should be paying for certain things or not. But I do know that if you, as the listener, stop and think about, you know, if you have adult children, Maybe you are paying for some things that you wish you weren't, but you don't want to tell your child that because you think that it will Create some dynamic for them that you will not like, or you are tolerating behaviors in when they come back to your home. I see this a lot with parents and adult children that they don't feel like they can set boundaries around behavior, around time, around different activities that like, one of, you know, my clients had a son who really enjoyed smoking pot. And she didn't have a lot of to say over that in his adult life, but he would do it in her home. And she didn't feel like she could say to him, like, hey. I don't want that in my home Because it would somehow threaten the relationship, and he wouldn't wanna come home anymore. And so putting up with behaviors or things that You don't want to be a part of your life becomes really hard when it's connected to will they still love me? Will they still want to come home? That is so good because we think when you said that oh, this is so good. We we think that this is gonna threaten the relationship if I tell my son, hey. You can't smoke pot at home. But if you're back to one of my favorite work terms, if you're resentfully accommodating the behavior, The relationship is being threatened. Like, every time you're resentfully accommodating, he feels your resentment. He feels your anger, annoyance, however it comes out for you. Yeah. That is damaging your relationship. Worse Yeah. Than if you would have the ability to handle the discomfort because it's gonna be very uncomfortable and the fear to have the conversation, but it's it's uncomfortable either way. We think it's gonna be better for the relationship. Fine. I'll just let him smoke pot, but we're not okay with it or whatever the behavior is that we're not okay with. Yeah. It's worse. And I wanna bring that up just because it's a thought error that is going to help the relationship. It's not true. It's not accurate. And maybe if you can start to find how it's actually damaging the thing you're trying to protect, It'll give you the confidence or courage to have the conversation, which probably will create a better relationship. It might be Rocky for a bit. He might have his feelings hurt or might be angry or whatever. But at least you can respect the person you're being, and he can respect that you are being honest. They know that the ability a human has to map another human is insane. We don't fully probably even understand how it works, but we know when someone's not happy with us. So unless you either your two choices are have the conversation honestly or stop caring. Like, don't make it something that you want. Like Yeah. I'm just gonna be okay with the pot. Can you get there? Okay. Great. Fabulous. You can't get there? Well, then be honest about it. I don't know if you have any thoughts about it. But Well, you know, this really Gets for me, ties back to the way we, as humans who are socialized as females in a patriarchal world, are taught to be the ones to adjust. We are taught to be the ones who compromise. We are taught to be the ones who pretend that everything is fine. And so, Of course, this is a hard thing. Right? We have decades and decades of programming about we should be the ones to be kind, to be nice, to accommodate, and that's the breeding ground for this resentful accommodation that turns out to be just, like you said, damaging the relationship anyway. We think that if I allow, then they'll love me. They'll wanna come home. They'll wanna spend time with me, but I think you hit it on the head when you said that the way as humans that we map one another. It's just we're never gonna get away with it long term. Yeah. Yeah. I hear so many parents say, no. I was so calm on the outside. You don't understand. I didn't raise my voice. And I'm thinking, well, that is a good stop. That's a totally good stop from yelling. However, if inside you were raging, they knew that. Yeah. You know? That's why this still was a mismatch because they'll they'll not be sure. Like, why weren't the kids responding differently? Well, because they see through it. They map it. Yeah. And I don't know what you think about this term, but I like the term enlightened selfishness. Oh, define it. Yeah. Let me hear it. Well, it's like self firstness. Like, I have to be true to myself. It's not something we've been taught. Selfishness is always are typically you know, there's a negative connotation to it. But if we spin it and it's self firstness. Like, I need to make sure I'm honoring and respecting myself. I wanna get clean on that. Right? I need to have clarity to what's important to me. I need to discover what my values are. I need to speak my truth and passionately live this life while also respecting and loving others. Like, that's the ingredients to create, to show up effectively with our kids so we don't keep passing down this pattern, this way of being of a people pleasing and to teach them, like, it's okay to speak up for yourself if you're not okay with something. And you might discover you're actually okay with it. It was something completely else, you know, different, or you might hold on to that. It doesn't matter, but to explore why you're bothered and get clean on it. So enlightened selfishness is what I call it. Like, just it's okay. I think the difference is a lot of times when we think of putting ourselves first, it feels selfish. It feels negative. And what I'm saying is can you do it from a place of service to yourself and everyone in your life? That it actually that's gonna uplevel every relationship, up level your ability to love, impact your kids, impact people around you that you wanna impact. So I don't know what you think about that, but That's what came to mind when you were talking about it. I love it especially because we are taught, again, good girl programming that my needs come second. My wants Come second. My desires come second. The way I wanna use my time comes second to way the way other people want me to use my time. Mhmm. And That self I wrote down self firstness. I like that. Yeah. But from an enlightened place Yeah. But this is in service, not for vengeance or frustration. Yeah. Since we're talking about it in a parenting context today, interestingly, my guess is that you'd agree. When a parent is caught in people pleasing behavior with their child, and they're they have no boundaries. They're adjusting and compromising and pretending. They're putting up with all kinds of things that they really don't want to. And I asked them, would you want your child to behave this way in their relationships? They always say no. Like, no. I would want my child to speak up. I would want my child to know how to set and keep boundaries. I would want my child to know who they are and what they want and to honor that. And it's just such a funny thing because where will they Where will they learn that from, or where will they see that reflected if not from you? Yeah. And just to take one step further. And if you're doing that, you're teaching them to become the version that you don't want because you don't want them to you know? But you're modeling. You're saying, hey. Look at me. This is what we should be, like, with other people. Put them first. Don't speak loudly about what's not. Or accommodate everybody, but feel so resentful inside that you really hate the fact that you're serving. And now you've just lost all the magic of of serving and helping other people because, yeah, it's clouded. You named the heart of it, which is, You know, how we transition now to talking about, like, the strategies because you said it's uncomfortable either way. Yes. Don't you think? I oh, for sure. I like to fool myself. No. I Back in the day, I would fool myself. I'd be like, it's fine, but it's so terrible. It is so terrible. So let's go back to using, you know, this example of my client whose son was smoking pot in her home. It is uncomfortable to smell pot in your home. It's uncomfortable to you know, the physical aspects of it, and then the resentment that you're feeling are talk Uncomfortable. It is also uncomfortable to say to your son, hey. This is not something that I want to have happen in my home, And I don't want you to do it anymore and to receive participate in whatever his reaction is. And I think that's what stops us Is the unknown discomfort of setting and holding a boundary, of having a hard conversation, of honoring what we want? Talk yeah. Well, we're more of a familiar with one type of discomfort. So even though it's still completely useless, We will sit there and have that discomfort. But I think once you realize, oh, it is uncomfortable either way, and the result is never gonna change if I stay and, you know, if I don't say anything, and I'm just gonna sit over here and stew and judge and it's gonna but if I take the risk of saying something and being honest. At least there's the possibility of deeper connection. Yeah. You have to risk the relationship. And Chip. Yeah. I really do. What just popped into my mind was a time when I was having a difficult conversation with one of my adult children when I said to them. Like, I am a person too. And it felt like the first time that I was putting my needs and wants on the same level as theirs. Because, Obviously, it's very normal for a child to grow up dependent on parents and seeing them as the person who solves my problems, the person who helps me, the person I go to. And I always wanna be that for them, and I want them to know I'm a person too. Things hurt my feelings. I have, you know, desires the way I wanna spend my time and use my resources too. And and so it's Navigating and learning to befriend the discomfort of, I think, a couple things, like, more than one thing can be true at once. Taught. I am your mom, and I want to help you. And I will do anything I can to help you, and I am a person too with my own limitations and wants and needs. And, also, sometimes, setting a limit or a boundary or expressing a preference or changing course is gonna involve feeling uncomfortable emotions that I'm just not used to. A hundred percent. We can be compassionate and firm, which I think is what happens when you heal the people pleasing or you're onto yourself is I can be compassionate towards myself, towards my child, towards the situation, but I also can be firm in a boundary I need to set for myself or for my child or what matters to me. Yeah. Telling the truth To your children, I think is one really fantastic strategy for changing things. Even if you just say, hey. This is really hard, And I I don't know exactly what to do here, but I wanna work out a new way of doing this together. So strategy number one, just tell the truth. And sometimes I mean, the truth whether or not we wanna admit it all the time is as parents, we don't know what we are doing all the time. Sometimes I think we have a pretty good sense, But there's always that just seems to be how this human life goes. There's always surprises. I'm surprised, and I can't be the only person like this. It's like, woah. I didn't I think we would be dealing with this, and I don't know. This is hard for me. This isn't something I've done before. I wanna get it right. I wanna have a loving relationship with you. I don't like pot smell in my house. I don't like paying for your rent or It's hurting my personal finances to pay for your rent or whatever, you know, fill in the blank of of the behavior that you'd like to renegotiate. Honesty about it Mhmm. I agree. I think is a great first step. Without honesty, what do you have? But having the awareness to just be honest and then Yeah. Not make it personal. No judgment around it. Sometimes we tend to do that where, you know, you've done this to me. You've made my life hard by smoking pot. That's not helpful. Just be honest with what's real for you. You know? It's hard for me to have you smoke pot out front. I don't like that. That's not what I wanna create, but don't make it about him. Just be honest about what you want. So honest, simple, concise. Leave it leave it at that and see what happens. I think that's really powerful. Yeah. And I like what you said, you know, as watching your judgment of it, Even admitting I have some judgment about people who smoke pot sometimes, and I don't want people to judge you. Sometimes I worry they're judging me. We can be so honest. And and, again, I'm this probably applies more to, you know, teenagers and and adult children. I don't know. Do you think it applies To younger children I'm just I'm just trying to think back to you know, all my kids are, like, fourteen and older now. Actually, no. Think it works all along. Because I think if we're if we're able to get to the place, whether we're being more passive or more authoritative, and we can see our patterns. We can understand it and just be honest with our kids about it, even if I have no control over Yeah. I mean, like, I know I'm overreacting right now. I'm still really fired up about it or I'm still whatever. You know? That's the truth, but it's about me. I'm gonna own it. Yeah. I need a break. So I think honesty doesn't ever go out of style. It's never too late. It's never too late, and it's never too early. You know? So yeah. I like that. Yeah. It's never too late. It's never too early. And then we have to figure out how to feel our uncomfortable feelings. Yeah. I was gonna say that emotional intelligence or getting out of people pleasing requires fully feeling. And I think if we wanna just bring honesty back into it, being honest about the taught that it is uncomfortable either way. Mhmm. Because this whole song, it that the it's fine. It's fine. It's fine. No. I'm fine. I'm fine. No. I'm not mad. It's okay. No. It's oh, no. Totally. No. That whole song and dance that we do, it's not fine. Right. And so being honest about the fact that it actually I guess, since we're just going with this pot example, it's not fine for me to have the pot smell in my house. And what I wanna do, I want to figure out how to feel the discomfort of having this Difficult conversation, this sticky conversation in a way that honors me and honors you and sets a boundary Because I don't like it. Yeah. Well and if you're gonna use an example of a younger child who hopefully isn't smoking pot Yeah. Ten or five. Yeah. But just to be clear, I mean, it's same thing with a, like, a messy house. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Like, I can really have a desire. I mean, I know this is one of my desires. I don't love having a messy house, but it's a personal decision I've made. Right? And I get to hold on to that. But, also, if my kids are not on board, not making them wrong, not guilt tripping them, but also holding that boundary and being on like, this is a really important thing to me that we learn how to pick our house up, that we learn how to pick up after ourselves. And feeling my emotions of disappointment or frustration or anger or whatever it is as they maybe always aren't on the same page as me is a big deal because I could go passive. Just it doesn't matter. It's totally fine. We'll just have them like, it's I'll preserve the relationships, which if I'm resentful the whole time, the house is messy. It's not really doing anybody any good. Or I can go authoritative. If you guys don't clean up the house, you know, you're gonna and I start putting all of these arbitrary boundaries from a place of frustration. And I'm not saying there shouldn't be boundaries or you you can't have rules like that. But, usually, when we go to people I would say people pleasing, we're we're not coming from a clean place. I'm not coming. I'm like, this is a problem, and you guys are the problem. So, yeah, learning how to hold that and coming with compassion yet firmness, which I say is the middle way is the key. So and sometimes I think those little things too that maybe aren't morally in our mind, at least, maybe not a moral problem. You know? It's not it's not like, oh, this is right and this is wrong. It's just a preference to give ourselves permission to be okay with the preference. Like, you want a a clean house? That's beautiful. Just don't be angry about it and try to fuel it with anger because as a big mess. So Yeah. Holding on to the discomfort and then staying I always say calm, confident, and connected Yeah. As you're asking. That's, I think the what do you call it? The the anti people pleasing combo. Like, if I can be calm, confident, and connected Yeah. Then I'm clean, and I can speak my truth, and I can say it without any residual negativity. So works every step of the way. Yeah. So I just want to offer one tool that I use to help myself get to that calm, connected, confident place. And it's So simple, really powerful. And if you're listening and wanna try this, you can. If you want to imagine, like, some kind of sticky child, you know, scenario and whatever emotion kinda comes into your body, I just like to take my hands, put them somewhere on my body. I always just kinda default talk to my chest, and the pressure of my hands on my chest kinda draws my awareness there. And then I just name As much as I can about it, like, this I hate this. I don't like this. It's anger. I'm feeling so angry. And I just start to take some deep breaths, Make my exhale a little bit longer, and I start to say things like, this makes sense. Yeah. I'm angry. This is anger. I'm here. I'm listening. I'm paying attention. Makes sense that I'm angry. And as I breathe, it passes, it lessons, and then that calm, confident connected place is a lot more accessible. I love that. What are your thoughts about that? Oh, I have a similar practice. Sometimes I'll talk to myself like, oh, darling. It's okay. This makes total sense, you know, almost this higher version of myself, grandmother figure coming in and reassuring me that there's nothing wrong with me. It's really just a safety thing. I just don't feel safe right now, and my body's reacting this way, so I love that. If I have one recommendation for anybody listening is, yeah, just get more comfortable with those emotions in our body. They're not a problem. And English is kind of an immature language, the way we say I I am frustrated. I am angry. We claim it so boldly, and words matter. They really do matter. So now I am this emotion instead of, you know, Spanish. I actually don't speak Spanish fluently at all, but they, you know, they say more correct me if I'm wrong, but something's more to the effect of I have this emotion. It was a much better Yeah. Accurate way to convey what's happening, and it's an important distinction. Okay. This is hilarious. I I do speak Spanish, and I never noticed. It's the difference of the verb of there's a permanent way to say, Like, I am Sarah. Like, I am Sarah. I will always be Sarah. But It's a different verb that means a temporary condition of just being like, uh, avergonzada. I'm I'm embarrassed. Right? But it's like, that's not who I am. It's That's not who I am. It's not who I it will be forever. So that's thank you for teaching me something you must know about Sarah. A non Spanish speaker in parking knowledge about Spanish. I mean, it it's the same in French too. And I think a lot of the romantic languages, Yeah. They more accurately portray emotion. My hypothesis is it allows them to be to scale that emotional ladder of maturity probably a little faster because they're not from a young age thinking I am permanently frustrated. You know? That's interesting, though. I love that you explained kind of the difference. So I love that because it gives me just yet another level of evidence that emotions are not me. I'm the blue sky. The emotions are the clouds floating through. We would never say the sky or the clouds. The clouds are not permanent. They're moving all the time. Yeah. And that's how I like to think of emotions, but it's taken a lot of time because that's not for sure. You know, decades of thinking and claiming it in the way I speak verbally. So, yeah, people who speak Spanish, you have a heads up. Yeah. Is that right? The no. Uh, yeah. An advantage I don't know what word I'm trying to think of here. An advantage over English only speakers. So, yeah, sit with that discomfort and let the clouds pass. I think being aware is something else we've talked about. Like, that awareness, it's linked right into this. Just being aware of how am I showing up with my kids? What is that creating for me. Am I trying to get validation from them to prove my worthiness? Anytime we're trying to get external validation, It's a good sign that we need to Yeah. Take a break and just come back home, not try to put that pressure on these four kids at that late I mean, thirty is for a male is what I've seen is a developed brain, twenty five for female. Go females. No. Just kidding. But We're advanced in all areas. No. But, I mean, we're putting a lot of pressure on brains that don't have completely developed prefrontal cortexes to manage our emotional state where, theoretically, we should be more developed and capable. So don't put that pressure on them. Be aware if we are. It's okay if we are. Yeah. We've been trained too. But and then I think the last thing I was gonna say too that I think is super helpful is just to identify your values. I think you do that with the women you work with in your group. Right? You talk about what matters. I just think it's really important. Because if I'm vacillating, is it okay that I want the house clean? Is it not okay I want the house clean? I'm not really sure. That's gonna be a lot harder for me to navigate versus, yeah, it is important, and this is why. And, you know, and I can get really clear on that and then move forward in my life with, like, consistency and not second guessing myself. I don't know if you have thoughts about that, but I think that's That's something we don't always do. Yeah. I love that. You have to clearly know what is important to you and why and like your reasons for why that thing matters to you so that it can get the attention from you that it deserves. And, I mean, I think about it. It's just another extension of telling the truth. I want my house clean for these reasons. I've examined them, and I like those reasons. And so What can we work out together, right, that honors me and honors you around this desire that I have? Right. I I think it also will help you not put the the blame or the responsibility of accomplishing or or staying true to that value on anybody. Like, if you can just keep owning that, don't put it on them. Like, that's what I want. My child doesn't value a clean house. That's okay. I probably didn't his age either. So he's not trying to make my life hard. You just were Mhmm. Like, so we're clean. Like, we just need to be really clean about it. It'll help. Yeah. Well, I didn't know I was gonna get a Spanish lesson in addition to to all of the other amazing things that I mean, I'm I'm thinking about it now. That's that's really, really fantastic. I have appreciated this Conversation with you so so much. It's just you're one of my favorite people to Thank you. Talk to and all of our, you know, bouncing ideas off each other's over the years, I think, has just created a lot of safety for me in our friendship, and I'm so appreciative of that. And if people are interested in finding out about you and working with you. Where can they do that? Yeah. So my website's connect method parenting dot com. It's based in developmental psychology. Lots of emotional stuff in there too, emotional intelligence neuroscience, so you can go check it out there. On Instagram, it's just Mandy Martineau. So you can find me there over on Facebook at Connect Method parenting, and I'd love to, yeah, share this with you. It's my passion. How about you, Sarah? Tell everybody, since we're co collaborating this, we're putting on both of our podcast, the same episodes. Yeah. Tell them about where they can find more for you. Sarah fisk dot coach is my website. Yes. Dot coach is a website URL these days. And Instagram, it's sarahphys coach, and I would love to help you unwind any people pleasing or perfectionism or codependency that you see popping up. Got a number of ways to do that. Awesome. Thanks so much. Again, I enjoyed this so much. Just could just say ditto to everything you said. So grateful for our friendship and the conversations we're able to have and the journey we've both been on together. So thank you, Sarah. This has been so fun. Love you. Me too.