Parenting with Self-Trust: Joe & Olga with Nancy Evans

Olga

Welcome to The Caring Instinct podcast. We've got a lovely guest with us today. Nancy Evans is a mother of three sons, a Londoner now living in West Sussex with her husband and children. It was while pregnant with her younger son, who is now eleven, that Nancy decided to change her parenting paradigm. Since then, as a family, they have continued to grow and heal together. Nancy is a relational trauma and addictive behaviours coach, supporting healing and recovery with compassionate inquiry, an approach developed by doctor Gabor Mate. Hi, Nancy. Welcome, welcome.

Nancy

Hello. Hi, both of you. Lovely to see you.

Joe

So, first question, come, tell me, tell us about that shift that Olga talked about in parenting.

Nancy

Yeah. My eldest two sons were five and seven when I became pregnant with my now youngest son. After the first two, I decided that was enough. They were quite close in age, 21 months apart and, you know, I sold all the baby equipment and was really sure, no more children. And then I suppose I was in my late thirties and started thinking, three's. Three is a magic number. Maybe one more, maybe I could squeeze one more in. So we did. And Vince was born a week before my 40th birthday. But whilst I was pregnant with him, I just became really aware of how much I was shouting at my younger two, try and get them out of the door, ready for school. I now know they both have ADHD. They were always very much about entertaining one another. It was just such a struggle and I was quite dysregulated. I could get stressed quite easily and something in me just said, this is not healthy, not for me, not for my baby, not for my small children. And I don't know how I came to it. I think someone must have recommended it, but I read Alfie Kohn's book respectful parenting. Is that what it's called? Parenting without punishment?

Olga

Unconditional parenting?

Joe

Yeah.

Olga

Yes, that's the unconditional parenting.

Nancy

And it just made so much sense. I started having conversations with my husband and he was becoming aware that he was falling into old patterns, parenting in the way his dad did, and he really didn't like that. That's where it all started. By the time Vince was about one, I'd then decided to take my other two out of school to home educate because it wasn't working for them. I didn't know at the time that they had ADHD and the school were really unsupportive. And as soon as I took them out of school, I was really just focusing on our relationship, creating joy, following the joy, you know, the connections between us, connections with all of their interests and just really supporting them to learn things that they were interested in. And that kind of made everything so much easier. And Vince, who's my youngest, we very early on made the decision that we would take the path of least resistance when it came to raising him, you know, in his infancy. So he slept with us. I breastfed him till he was about four. I carried him around everywhere, so he was really easy. And it was just. It was a huge shift compared to where I had been. Although I was an older ish mum, 32 and 35, with my other two children, I was quite immature in that sense. I knew I didn't want to be like my mum, which was quite authoritarian, disapproving. She used the silent treatment, kind of coercive shaming tactics. It was the best she could do, you know, but I knew I didn't want to do that. But I didn't know what else to do. I didn't have any other guidance. I didn't have a village. I didn't yet really have the Internet. We're looking at sort of 18 and 16 years ago. So the first five years of their lives. I know now, in retrospect, I didn't get right, which, yeah, I'm okay with now. When I was realising this, you know, reading all the books and thinking, oh, that sickening feeling of having messed up a bit. Really? Yeah. There was some judgement, self judgement, and it's taken me a few years to get over that, but I feel I have. And at least with one of my older boys, we've had good conversations about it. One of them is still really not ready to have those kind of conversations yet. But in general, we feel like a much healthier family unit.

Joe

What was it like at the time for you, those first five years?

Nancy

The first five years of my younger two, it was, yeah, stressful. My mum wanted to help, but there was this conflict between me needing her help, but also not wanting to listen to her ideas, like leave him in the pram in the garden to cry, he just wants your attention, that kind of advice. Yeah. So there was this really awkward thing of me needing her, wanting her, but also resisting her way of doing things. I was exhausted. My husband was probably a workaholic at the time, so not around much. And I can remember at one point just sitting on the floor, just completely zoned out, like, staring into space. And the two of them were kind of fighting and throwing things around. And I can just remember feeling really. I don't know what the word is, completely ineffective. So I would try and talk to them and ask them not to do certain things. And it was like falling completely on deaf ears. So I would escalate and escalate and escalate until I was doing what my mum used to do and really screaming and yelling. Not good. Not nice memories, actually. It's like, yes, I've done a lot of growing since then.

Joe

I mean, what comes up for me is just how common this is for parents, just to be completely alone in their world. There's not much support.

Nancy

Yeah.

Joe

And the support that was there, like with the school, it's not. It wasn't support. They weren't on your side?

Nancy

No. No, they weren't. I was made to feel like that nuisance mum that kept coming in. The first thing I did with my eldest son was write a letter to the school, exempting him from doing homework when he was seven.

Joe

Yeah.

Nancy

Because it was just causing such a struggle, having to force him to sit down and write projects on the victorians. And I could see that handwriting was. It looked physically painful for him to try and write. And I kind of just wonder, I thought, what the hell am I doing? Like, why? Why am I forcing him to do this? He's been at school all day long and that. I think that was the beginning of the end, actually. They didn't appreciate that. I said I would still continue to help him learning spellings and times tables, but long, lengthy projects out of school was not going to happen.

Joe

Yeah. You really trusted yourself back then.

Nancy

Yeah.

Olga

It's so important to realise that you have this power to say, no, my child will not be doing it. What I found remarkable was the fact that when you started this shift, when you stopped shouting at the kids and when things started to improve, was when you actually added a baby into an already overwhelming mix. Yeah.

Nancy

Yeah. Isn't that interesting?

Olga

That is.

Nancy

That was deep wisdom from somewhere. That wasn't my head. And I hadn't. I didn't really know much about the effects of stress, but I just kind of suddenly knew one day when I felt myself get really worked up and just thought, uh uh, this has to stop. And it kind of had a knock on effect as well. Yeah. My husband too.

Olga

So how do you stop being stressed when you feel getting worked up?

Nancy

Well, now, it's taken me years, you know, it's taken me years of practise, but now I meditate every day, 30 minutes in the morning today, a couple more times, just ten minutes at a time, because I've had a bit of a day where I've been up in my head and just really focusing on slowing down my breath and I stopped drinking, which definitely helped. The after effects is when alcohol is leaving your system is like a flood of stress hormones. So that was definitely impacting my parenting. I mean, you know, wasn't drinking loads, but it was like a thing of taking the edge off the day's stress. At the end of the day, it's like a shutdown. And I just think while as a short term tool, it feels like it really works, there are negative repercussions. And I didn't fully realise until I stopped drinking five and a half years ago how much less stressed I am without that up and down.

Olga

It blew my mind when I read that the after effects that you mentioned can last for several days or can show up a good few days after one has had a drink.

Nancy

It really showed with my husband, actually, because when I was drinking, we would drink maybe five nights a week, four on a good week. When I stopped, he stopped drinking midweek and would just drink at the weekend. You know, on a Sunday, it was probably at least a whole bottle of wine. And then by Monday, he was such a different person. His anxiety was through the roof. He was irritable, impatient with the kids, not managing his team very well. He's a project manager, you know, that was sort of Monday, Tuesday, and then just feeling really low and looking forward to being able to drink again at the weekend. I never asked him to stop drinking, but within six months he'd stopped because he just kind of realised, well, actually, what's the point? I'm doing this on my own on a weekend and it's costing me most of the week. It's a tricky one because. Well, because of all the marketing, but also when you're already struggling as a parent, it does feel like it works and it's a bit of a reward in the short term. And no one ever could have told me to stop drinking when I was enjoying it. I would just be like, shut up. What are you talking about?

Olga

And it's such a part of a modern parenting culture. My kids make me drink a and the whole humour around it.

Nancy

Yeah, I find it really uncomfortable these days when I. Because I saw a. I don't know if it was a meme on the Internet or a card. I think it might have been a gift card. It said something like, strong women who raise strong children need strong drinks. And it kind of made my stomach turn. Like, it's so distasteful and sad. Yeah.

Joe

Every one of those strongs is basically, to me, saying, you're not feeling the other side of it. The way to get to strength is to block everything else out and just try and get strength that way.

Nancy

Yeah. Numb and push through.

Joe

Yeah. Which is what we can invite our children to do sometimes. Very often.

Olga

Society and culture, that is what we are modelling. Not so much drinking, even though that as well, if this is what we do, but numbing, which is very natural behaviour that children engage in as well. An upset child that just wants the telly on or a video game, they know that that will help them in the short term to not feel those difficult feelings.

Nancy

And it works, but it, you know, has negative consequences. It's so, so hard because there are so many pressures. You know, I wasn't working when my kids were young. I was fortunate enough to be able to be a stay at home mom and I was still stressed. Like, I can't imagine where I would have been had I been trying to fit in work and nursery drop offs.

Joe

One thing that comes up for me is you said about the drinking, you said no one could have told me to stop. There was something inside you which had the answer, which you had to find. It was inside you, though. Can you tell us a bit more about that?

Nancy

I think I had. I'd become so identified with drinking, it felt like it was part of my personality and it's not, you know, it really isn't. You believe, falsely believe that if you take that away, you're cutting part of yourself off. Yeah. I used to tell myself all these stories that people that didn't drink were boring and, oh, I don't trust people that don't drink and, you know, nonsense, really. It's like this. Yeah. Mechanisms for that part of my brain that wanted to keep having the alcohol, just really locking it in. It was a slow drip effect. There are a couple of things I noticed in myself and that was very much watching how much I was going to get of the share of the bottle of wine if I was sharing with my husband, and feeling this sort of slight greed around it. I went out dancing. I used to do Lindy hop and go back to London once in a while and I met up with some friends and one of them bought me a drink. It was really kind of him and it was a single gin and tonic. And I'd got so used to drinking home measures, I was quite disappointed. There was a bit of a sinking feeling inside me. Quietly, I asked the barman to put a. Another shot of gin in my glass and the next day I was just like, oh, that's not nice. And like, I'd kept trying to stop, I'd kept trying to cut back. I'd been trying to moderate since I first had my eldest son. What that meant was I was constantly thinking about it, when am I going to drink? How much am I going to be able to drink? What can I get away with this event? Is there alcohol going to be there? Who's going to be driving? It was starting to take up so much space in my head. And one day I was talking to another mum, a home educating mum, and she told me that she didn't drink anymore. She never had really drunk that much. A couple of beers most evenings, but she just stopped and hadn't had a drink for two years. And I was like, what? That's actually a thing? Is that allowed to. I guess it's so ingrained in our culture and probably in my family and in my marriage as well, that's my husband and I met working behind a bar together. But something in me was like, I want to try that. I want to know what it feels like to be an adult that doesn't drink. And I just came home, told my husband after my birthday, I'm going to stop drinking for good. It kind of came out without really thinking it through. You don't have to stop. I just want you to support me. I'd like you not to say, oh, go on, have another drink, try not to encourage me. And he was like, yeah, yeah, that's fine, but don't, you know, I'm not going to stop. Don't think you're going to kind of drag me into it. I was like, no, I really knew that it had to just be my decision and I had to do it for me. And I knew it was a risk. It felt like a risk to our relationship because we were kind of partners in crime, in a way, when it came to egging each other on and making excuses, you know, we did a dry January and we had this ridiculous get out clause that if we went out to eat and had a drink during January, it didn't count. And as long as only he and I knew then, you know, no one else would have to know and we were still doing dry January. It was ridiculous, really. In retrospect, that was a worry, but I knew that was what was holding me back from doing something that was going to be good and healthy for me. And luckily he's supportive and just quietly went along with it until he realised it was a good choice.

Joe

Is that the same part of you that sent that letter off to school saying, we're not going to do homework, or that went towards home schooling, I think so.

Nancy

I think there's, like a little rebellious streak in there somewhere that just suddenly says, nope. Yeah, something came up in. I had a therapy session recently and it was just a memory that at 23, I left a four year relationship with a real textbook narcissist who kind of had taken over my life. Like, he chose and bought my clothes for me, I worked for him, his friends became my friends. And just one day I woke up and thought, I'm not doing this anymore. I just kind of went into my wardrobe to get dressed and started pulling the clothes out, like, I'm not going to wear that, I'm not going to wear that, I don't want to wear that. And suddenly it was like a light bulb. I don't know. Yeah, I guess that's what myself. I guess we all have it, don't we? Like an instinct for survival.

Olga

We can be more or less in touch with it, but we do have it.

Nancy

Yeah. Yeah. I'm very grateful to it, whatever it is.

Joe

And I think society really helped. We disconnect from that side of us a lot easier. Somehow you found the connection back to it. I'm just curious about that kind of journey and how you think maybe we can give families, parents support for young children out, like in those maybe kind of the first five years of their life.

Olga

That's how I think about it, too. If parents give to the child, to that little baby, this sense of you are significant, that when this baby is born, they're welcome and they're loved imperfectly. We only love how we can. But when this basic significance is conveyed, this sets up the person for life in terms of this self preservation instinct. We still get into trouble, we still get into abusive relationships, addictions. But there is something inside us that is able to just pull back, that there is still this belief that we are important enough to be saved.

Nancy

Yeah, I would agree. And something just came to my mind then that it's actually, it was gut. It was gut instinct. That's where it was coming from, those decisions, because they kind of come and you're like, whoa, where did that come from? It's like, really from deep within. And what you just said, Olga, makes sense to me because I've got, like, a insecure attachment history with my mum. Sometimes she was really loving and we had some really special moments, but lots of times she was overwhelmed, unable to see me, you know, self soothing, self medicating, stressed, shouty, anxious, you know, not like I was when my kids were younger. One of my core beliefs that has come up in me is, like, not important, don't matter. Sort of wounding that childhood wounding. But clearly there is a part of me that does believe that I'm important and I do matter.

Joe

Yeah. And even before you maybe found out about that, maybe that part was still alive in you.

Nancy

Yeah. Buried until it really needed to kind of surface and have a word in my ear.

Joe

That's why I think, especially when sending that letter to school about the homework, there was really that kind of mother bear gut, like, I know what's right. This is not the time to do homework. You don't know what's happening. I know.

Nancy

Yeah. And I wish, yeah. Teachers and medical professionals did trust that more in parents and mothers. I've heard other people's stories about this kind of knowing that they have perhaps that their kid is not right or they're ill, or there's something and they get brushed off and told they're being hysterical or, you know, over the.

Joe

How do you think we can do a better job of facilitating that as a society or a family?

Olga

It's hard to advocate for yourself. And every now and then you might be lucky to find someone, a friend who will support you. But most of the time, most people just revert to the system. The system is right. We didn't invent the system. No one knows who even invented the system. But it must be right.

Nancy

People that are more interested in making money than making happy humans, I think, what could we do? For me, it comes back to, like, early years, you know, parents having more time with their kids, getting that support to not be so stressed and struggling, and both parents having to work the minute, you know, the kid is months old, little ones having to go into daycare. And I get it. It's the cost of living and everything is really tough. But I think if money was invested into families and parents having the choice or having shared paternity maternity leave, I think it would save an awful lot of struggles and other difficulties, mental health issues later on.

Joe

I agree, because it's like you had all the answers, but we just kind of get disconnected from them as well and then maybe find them a bit later.

Nancy

There was a lack of self trust as well. And this is why, you know, one of the reasons I was really drawn to what you're doing, the caring instinct, because I so needed it. When I was a young mum, I naturally carried my first son, carried him everywhere, let him sleep on my lap. So natural attachment parenting. And then one day my mum came around and she was like, well, no wonder he's not eating his breakfast if you're breastfeeding him all night long, you know, he needs to be in his own bed, in his own room. And I went through that, like, an awful period of two weeks of trying to have him in the bed with me, but not feed him in the night, and then have him in his own room, in his cot and doing that controlled crying, which makes me shudder now, just thinking about it, you know, going in every minute, laying down and going out the room and closing the door. And I'd stopped trusting my instincts and I'd gone back to a source of support. You know, my mum's knowledge came from where? Doctor Spock in the 1950s. I don't know. She thought she was doing the right thing and the loving, kind thing for me as her child, but it really didn't do me and my child any favours, I don't think so. Better advice like health visitors and midwifery and just that very early support, I think.

Olga

And this idea of hard work being the utmost virtue is just so hardwired at the moment. In the UK, we get wonderful support and advice in the very first, admittedly the very first days of the baby's life. But I remember when my second was born. So only two years ago, a lovely breastfeeding consultant nurse comes in, in the hospital and the baby's already at my breast and very happily sucking away. And she said, so how long has he been there? And I said, well, I don't know, maybe half an hour. He sort of drifts into sleep and then wakes up again and, you know, it's a newborn. And she said, well, do you know that after ten minutes, he's only nursing for comfort? Like, comfort is such a ridiculous idea to give to a newborn. You know, don't let them have comfort. Why would you try to comfort a baby? Everything should have a purpose and everything should be hard work.

Nancy

Yeah, just food. Yeah, it's got to be food and then cut it off.

Joe

It's like when we're older as well. Someone said they're just doing it for your attention, but then attention is the thing.

Olga

What is that you want?

Joe

Why wouldn't we want to take attention.

Olga

Of our loved ones?

Joe

That's what it's all about.

Olga

This is, again, Gaba mates, the myth of normal. The fact that it's normal doesn't mean that it's healthy. And it takes an enormous amount of courage to go against that mainstream and to find your own.

Nancy

Yeah. I had some fortunate along the way. There was, I was going to a home birth group because I had my second. Two children were home births when I moved to Horsham and my eldest son was struggling at school and one of the other women there was a tutor. So I said, okay, we'll give that a try. And in one of our phone calls she said to me, you know, have you ever considered home educating? And I said, no, I haven't. She said, well, you know, I know I'm a teacher and I'm a tutor, but I'm not sending my daughter to school. I was like, oh, okay, that sounds interesting. And then she lent me lots of books. So I sort of gradually found and connected with people that had a similar ideas. But in the early years, in the sort of early two thousands, it was painful. I struggle with groups, you know, I have a bit of social anxiety. I don't like. Mother and baby groups are like a little bit of a hell for me. It comes back to the isolation, you know, the feeling like you're on your own with it.

Olga

How has home education worked out for your family?

Nancy

My reason for choosing it was that I just one day decided their mental health and self esteem has to be the priority. And I could see that in the school system. Both having ADHD, one definitely very dyslexic, one slightly that I could see their self esteem was really plummeting. So in that sense it's wonderful. It's been amazing for them. They have a great relationship. They're the two eldest, they're best friends, we all are really close, they're happy, but, you know, getting GCSE's has not been a priority for them, but also because I haven't pushed it. They are like my husband and I, we learn differently. We learn from doing and seeing and jumping in. So at the moment they both, they both work. My husband has his own business, they're both working with him and I think one of them will go on to making money somehow. He's quite ultra entrepreneurial. My eldest is still pursuing a career with the marines. He's had some hitches there, but he's appealed that decision and he's just really focusing on his fitness. So I'd say overall it's worked out really well that it's not an easy choice. You know, I know lots of home educating families that have to make real sacrifices because, you know, you don't get any financial support and it means one penniless parent can't work and I'm starting to move into a new career, and I'm really enjoying it. Yeah. I'm like, wow, that's like 17 years of my life where I've been committed. I've been at home with my children. And I said once to somebody, you know, I'm just a mom. There was some shame that came with that. Like, saying, I've been at home with my children for 17 years. Felt not good enough because society just doesn't think it's a very important role, and it's still a little bit uncomfortable actually saying that. I noticed just saying it then I could feel something in my voice. But actually, it's something that I should.

Olga

Be really proud of because I resonate with that so much. Nancy.

Nancy

Yeah. It hasn't been easy, and it has been a sacrifice, but it's been worth it.

Olga

I always say we need to take the jests out.

Nancy

Yeah.

Olga

I am a mom, but most days, I can take my own advice.

Nancy

Yeah, it's. Yeah, it's not easy. Those conversations. What do you do? And yet, for many years, my only ambition was to raise a functional, happy family. And here we are. Like, I'm still married to my husband for 23 years, and we're still happy, and our children are happy and safe and thriving. So something I'm proud of. Really hard saying that it came out.

Olga

Thank you so much, Nancy, for your honesty and your courage.

Joe

Yeah. Thank you.

Olga

You're welcome.