The Meet Hope Podcast
The Meet Hope Podcast
108: Parenting in 2025: Parenting Under Pressure
What are your hopes as a parent in 2025? What are you happy to say good bye to and leave behind in 2024? Hear from Amanda Cavaliere - Preschool Director & Marriage and Family Coordinator as we talk about navigating the unrelenting pressures of being a parent in 2025. You're invited to continue to conversation at Parenting 2025 in person on February 8! Sign up at meethope.org/parenting now!
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Welcome to the Meet Hope podcast, where we have conversations about faith and hope. Hope is one church made of people living out their faith through two expressions in person and online. We believe a hybrid faith experience can lead to a growing influence in our community and our world for the sake of others. Welcome to Hope.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone, welcome to the Meet Hope podcast. My name is Ashley Black and I'm excited to be here with you today. Today, joining me is Amanda Cavalieri. Hey, amanda, how are you doing? Hi, ashley, I'm great. How is your new year going? It's going fast. Yeah, I mean, when this comes out, we'll be. I feel like we're well into the new year going. It's going fast.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, when this comes out, we'll be we'll be I feel like we'll we're well into the new year, yeah, yeah, we're going to have a conversation about parenting and families and all that kind of stuff in the new year today, yes. So, but before we do that, I thought we could kind of do some reflecting. So, because you and I have talked about parenting and families and all of that a couple of times over the past year and sometimes we've shared our own anecdotes and whatnot. So if you think about 2024 as a parent, what comes to mind, like what was a highlight for you? What are you happy to say goodbye to and hope to not have in 2025?
Speaker 3:It's probably. The answer is probably the same to both questions yeah, so my kids, I'm living you're living in the toddler era and I'm living in the teen era.
Speaker 2:That's why I wanted us both to answer this question.
Speaker 3:There's lots of similarities between teens and toddlers. Um, because I work with toddlers during the morning and then I go home to teens later in the day. Um, so really my brain functions more in school year.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 3:But last school year my son moved into high school, my daughter moved into middle school. And so it was a big fall for both kids at once. It was this huge transition, big change, lots of back school anxieties and, just you know, navigating all new waters for both of them, and probably the highlight was both adjusted and tried new things that were completely unexpected.
Speaker 3:And that was exciting. So my daughter is athletic and play sports, but never played field hockey, and she went out for the team and made it. So my daughter is athletic and play sports, but never played field hockey and she went out for the team and made it. So that was, that was awesome. And then my son joined robotics and it was trying a whole new realm there. So seeing them, um, adjust well and reach out and try new things, take some risks, that was probably my parenting Hi. The thing I'm happy to say goodbye to is starting new schools with both kids at once. No thanks.
Speaker 2:I don't care to do that again. I remember you talking about that because I think I'm right that you and Beth did a podcast and because hers one was going to college, suzanne.
Speaker 1:Suzanne. Yes, thank you, suzanne.
Speaker 2:And you guys talked about all those transitions back in that episode.
Speaker 3:So I don't ever want to do that. Two kids in two new schools again.
Speaker 2:Well, I'll be coming to you in, like, whatever years, that will be our life. We figured that out, that that'll be their school life, and so how?
Speaker 2:about you and your, yeah, so I as a reminder for everyone, I have a four-year-old and a one-year-old and I think, yeah, it's actually probably like you said, it falls into the same category of what was hard. What I'm happy to say goodbye to is the shift of going from one to two kids was hard. My second kid was born in the end of 2023, but really felt like the first half of 2024 was that adjustment of there being two of them. It's a big change.
Speaker 2:It's really big and we knew it was going to be as best we could know. We talked about it a lot and we just were like we're going to just be flexible for whatever this looks like. But it was. Yeah, the winter and the spring were just a hard adjustment, just like for our, for our four-year-old. Just figuring that out, that dynamic out, and just you know it was a big, it was a big shift. So I'm happy to say goodbye to that.
Speaker 2:Our family is is, you know, shifted more now and and that. But that also became the highlight because my one year old started walking right around Thanksgiving of 2024. And something switched in my kids where, when the second went vertical, suddenly the oldest was 20 times more interested in him, was so excited to play with him New playmate, yeah, and like and so all of a sudden it was like oh you're, you can play with me because you can walk around now. And this like shift happened more. Now they have so much fun playing together because the youngest loves to follow the oldest around and the oldest loves that the younger one wants to follow him around and so they just like.
Speaker 2:they'll just like run back and forth around my house house through the hallway, and they're laughing the whole time because the one is like come on, Otto, let's go.
Speaker 3:And he's pretending they're pirates or pretending they're superheroes and he gets to be the leader and he's the leader.
Speaker 2:Sure, he loves that and Otto is just like ha ha ha ha, just toddling after him. But it's really sweet and Otto is comfortable with Kale kind of rolling around with him a little bit and, you know, in a safe way. But like, yeah, there's been this shift in them that it's been really nice to see. So I would say that that's cool, that would be mine, so that I'm sure that everybody has their own thoughts about parenting.
Speaker 1:And I would encourage you to think about your.
Speaker 2:You know it's funny for both of us how the thing that was hard was also the thing that was joy, and so to think about that. But as we head into 2025, what are you thinking about? What are you hoping for as a parent? But also, you are a marriage and parenting coordinator. You are a preschool director. You know you keep an ear to the ground for all of us as parents. What are you hoping for? What are you thinking about?
Speaker 3:I constantly think of the scripture from Psalm 127 that says children are a gift of the Lord. They are his reward and I love that Our kids are our gifts, that our kids are our rewards. But in conversations that I have with either preschool parents, parents in small groups that I run or just my friends who are parents, parents are stressed, Parents are overwhelmed, Parents are constantly questioning decisions they're making, overthinking things, overwhelmed. I don't feel like many parents live in that space that their children are rewards. It sometimes feels more like children are a burden and parenting is hard.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is really hard and it can sometimes feel really lonely, even though you're doing it right next to somebody and it's so busy that it can be easy to get caught up in, like all the stuff you feel like you have to do. Yes, and am I doing it right?
Speaker 3:Yeah, am I doing it right? And there is constant pressure from so many places. So there's pressures from just society, culture, um others in just a far away removed sense of like oh, everybody looks like they've got it together. Or this is what the perfect mom looks like, or this is what the perfect dad does, and so this pressure to at least try and live up to that, or put the perception out that you can. And you know, if we read the Bible, there's not one perfect parent.
Speaker 2:That's really very true, entire Bible. It's so true and I say this all the time with parenting, but also just with the whole Bible. We put the I don't we just we make this false presumption that everybody in there is perfect. And if you just read like three pages, you'll find out that none of them are.
Speaker 3:I open every parenting small group like this yeah, there's not a single one in that whole bible and yet we come along and think we can be that perfect parent, right, the only perfect parent is god, right? So if, if we want some example to follow, it's really not anybody in scripture.
Speaker 2:As far as parenting goes, I I love that, though.
Speaker 3:So there's this pressure from society, right. Then there's this pressure from, maybe, extended family who means so well love us so well, but I can't tell you how many times, especially when my kids are little. But even now I get the. We didn't do that when you were a kid and you turned out just fine, yeah.
Speaker 2:And you're like, yes, I know, but I were a kid and you turned out just fine. Yeah, and you're. And you're like, yes, I know, but I'm the kid and I know what I internalized, or what I longed for, and I'm trying to change change for different reasons and my kid's going to have their own stuff from me, and it's just an ongoing cycle and the world keeps changing.
Speaker 3:Yes, the world keeps changing, that's so true. So, there's these pressures from well-meaning loved ones. Right, are you going to do this? You should do it this way, you should do it that way, this is the better way, and so we internalize that. And then there's the pressure we just put on ourselves. Yeah, right, it's really true Of what we maybe expected parenting to be like.
Speaker 2:And wow, this is looking a whole lot different. Or yeah, I think it's so easy to go into parenting, like with your, like we're gonna do these things and have these values, and and I think the thing that like no, you're not coached on or like encouraged in is that, like we know, our children are their own individual human beings. But until you experience the actual lack of control you have over them, like like not that we don't have control over our kids, like we like guide them and teach them in a specific way, but sometimes they're just going to be who they are and you have to bounce with it.
Speaker 1:You know what I?
Speaker 2:mean Like I think there was a sense, like if I do it, if I do things this way, my kids will turn out this way and that's the right way. And it's so much pressure.
Speaker 3:And it's so much pressure. Well, we think of that as an algebraic equation.
Speaker 1:A plus B equals C. Yeah, but not always no.
Speaker 3:No, and child number two, this is my life right now, child number two is not at all going to follow the same equation that child number one did, and so on, because each child is their own unique person. Yes, they're all that reward and that gift from God, but they are all their own people too. So, just when we feel like we figured it out, they change.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm thinking about two things. One I'm thinking about how you're talking about being this being perfect thing, and how God doesn't invite us towards perfection. God doesn't invite us towards perfection. God invites us towards love and grace and understanding and hospitality and all those things. Yeah, I was just thinking about that. So I was thinking about, when you were saying about the A plus B does not equal C that I recently saw a woman who I follow on social media but her children are all much older, they're all either in college or out of college or they're like seniors in high school, and she had something that made me really laugh a lot was she said I don't understand how they all came out of me so differently, because she showed she shared her children's clothing piles, basically, and the one her son, it was like his drawer, she like carried down and it was like neatly folded and they were all lined up in color order.
Speaker 2:And then she brought the other one and they're all just like stuffed in like different places and she's like they were trained how to put their clothes away the same way.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I thought it was a good example of that yeah so you know, if we want to have this viewpoint, like god does that children? Are a gift that, that they are his reward. It starts with our own viewpoint of our kids right and seeing them as a gift, seeing them as reward, and we have to be able to relieve some of that pressure that we are living under, whether it be from society, whether it be from ourselves, whether it be from ourselves whether it be from our parents or kids spouses, whatever wherever that pressure is, we need to be able to relieve it so that we can love our kids the way that God designed for us to.
Speaker 3:So I'm excited for an opportunity coming up in February where we started last year running a parenting workshop Just simple parenting in 2025. But the theme, the overall theme, is just helping parents navigate the pressures of parenting in 2025 and trying to a say Hey're not alone, right, because so often, so important, that's how we feel.
Speaker 2:yeah, there's so many moments I've been aware of recently where I'm like standing in a circle with other parents and we're all kind of doing this dance of like. We kind of want to talk about what's hard, what's going on, but then we also like, don't want to, because what if I'm the only one? And then like, and it's, it's, and then every time somebody does share everybody else goes.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, me too, me too, but like we, but I'm just so aware of how like we put this pressure on ourselves to even be perfect around other parents.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and well, I think, we. We think that every choice and word and way that our child has acted or reacted is a direct reflection of us Right, and that's just not true we cannot carry all of their actions and reactions.
Speaker 2:Yeah, Right, yeah, that's what I mean when I said like when you, when you take in the knowledge that they are their own human being and you don't have control over every piece of it. That it also isn't, it isn't up to you to Right.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah, yeah, have control over every piece of it. That it also isn't. It isn't up to you to right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And the older our kids get, the less control we have. Yeah, right, and the less we talk about it too with other parents. Yeah, that's. I hear that a lot yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:So creating a space where parents can be together, where they can learn from one another, where where they can be encouraged, where I have benefited so much from being around parents whose kids are a little bit older than mine who can say I went through that too, I survived, you're going to survive. And then the benefit of being with parents whose kids are the same age to say yeah, us too, us too, right yeah. So some of the things we're going to be talking about are more global and some are more specific right.
Speaker 3:So financial pressures? Oh my gosh, it's so expensive to raise children right now.
Speaker 2:I know you feel that. Yeah, we feel it all the time and it just feels like you feel like you figure it out, and then there's something else.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's just, you know, everything seems the everything seems more expensive and you want, we want our kids to do things, be part of things, and things and how do we?
Speaker 2:and there's so much pressure and they come home because so-and-so did this and so-and-so did this and it's yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so how financial pressure um can impact our. If you are married, right, how just bringing in two parenting styles? Yes, huh, what that does to Can you speak to this? Feels like you can relate to this? I can. What conflict can arise from parenting within your marriage? You? Know, and those pressures, or if you are parenting solo, those single parents. They are heroes.
Speaker 2:Oh, my God, yes.
Speaker 3:Absolutely. The pressure that they carry, and carry alone sometimes, is intense, right? Um, new babies, right? I mean we, we think what parenting is going to be like and then we have a baby and it it's.
Speaker 2:It's not at all and it kind of throws you because I always I kind of giggle now because I've had babies where, whenever our friends, who Chris and I, I often talk about, chris and I were the first of a lot of our friends to have kids.
Speaker 2:And so we feel like we kind of went first and now we love getting to support others and whenever they, whenever someone has a baby, the first like couple of months they're like this is not as bad as we thought it's, so I'm like it's because the baby's sleeping all the time Right. And then it's so I'm like it's because the baby's sleeping all the time right. And then, like six months hit and the baby's busy and we're like we're here for you, what can we?
Speaker 1:do you know? And?
Speaker 2:so we just try to be aware and helpful and not not like be a know-it-all about it but just feel like we'll be over here when the baby starts to become a person you know, yeah, it's a, it's a lot.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you think new baby is going to go one way and they go different every time, like I had you know, yeah, baby toddler, those early years of parenting, they have their own pressures and stresses, yeah, very different from other years. And so wanting to talk about that, um, wanting to talk about raising a neurodivergent, child that's a whole different kind it is yeah, you know these parents who are raising children with special needs, um who are raising children that may always live with them.
Speaker 3:You know, this is very, very different viewpoint that these parents bring in and different pressures that some of us who aren't in that boat can fully understand. Yeah, talking to our about social justice, racial equality, hard topics these are some pressures going on in our society, in our country right now.
Speaker 2:Which are so important because I find they're coming up, they're already having the conversations, a lot of them as they get older and we need to be able to, to know how to join them in those conversations.
Speaker 3:um, yeah, yeah and if parents don't know how, what happens is they just don't yes right, yeah, so that's not good. Yeah, right. So teaching parents how to have these conversations absolutely types of situations. And then there's the pressure of social media and tech on our kids and how do we, as parents, navigate those waters? And that can be, you know, that starts younger and younger, I know so there's a lot and this is just. These are just the things that we're touching on in this workshop.
Speaker 2:There's a whole lot more, of course there is, but these are so relevant and pervasive to what, like I, I also encounter with so many parents is the things that are at the forefront of their minds of yeah, so just creating a space where we can be together, have coffee and refreshments no kids around, you know, because we will provide child care for the little ones and have adult conversations, have some laughs, learn from one another and know that we have other people around us who understand who understand, and also, like I know, you've been talking about the importance of parenting in community, and I think when we do something like this, somewhere like Hope, where there's some of the faith community piece of it, there's an opportunity for us to not only see our kids as gifts and rewards from god, but also for us to start to understand how we are gifts from god too like that like, like, I think being in community helps us maybe love ourselves a little bit more yeah, see ourselves as more beloved by god and then be a little bit more see ourselves as more beloved by God and then be a little bit more gentler on ourselves.
Speaker 2:So then, like you know, we're striving so hard to want our kids to feel that way. But if we, if they don't see us feeling that way, then yeah. I've just been thinking about that while you're talking. That that would be my hope for anybody that comes to is that they would just experience being in a place of love and encouragement Absolutely.
Speaker 3:Yeah, cause, yeah it's sometimes feels really hard to find and you know what our kids are very little, very, very what's the word I want to say? Are seldom going to say thanks, mom, you're just crushing it, so somebody else needs to tell us.
Speaker 2:I know mine when. When he gets something he wants, You're the best mom, right. But if I say no, it's like I'm so mad at you.
Speaker 3:So you're not getting that kind of encouragement from home? No, right yeah exactly. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Well, this is very exciting. So it's on February 8th, the Parenting Workshop.
Speaker 3:It's a Saturday morning. Like I said, we do coffee refreshments and just time together.
Speaker 2:And if somebody wants to sign up for that, how would they do that?
Speaker 3:They would just go to the today page and we're listed under events.
Speaker 2:Register there, register for childcare there, yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Invite a friend. Yeah, all are welcome.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. Yes, yeah, and then I think we'll probably plan to do like we did last year, where we tried to get some of your, your guest speakers, in to do a podcast, or two, yeah, that'd be great so then if you sign up for two seminars and you can't sign up for one, maybe you can still hear more about it from from those people yeah, lots of great information, lots of great people presenting.
Speaker 3:So I'm really excited.
Speaker 2:I'm excited for you and I'm excited to go um, and if parenting is something that means something to you, I would also encourage our listeners to scroll back through our feed and look for kind of early in 2024, we did a bunch of parenting episodes as well, so you can look for those, you can look for new ones. And, yeah, what would you say? Your hope for parents are in 2025, amanda.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think my hope is, what I'm working on is slowing down. I'm working on slowing down me too. Yeah, and just let's take things daily yeah and enjoy what each day brings.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and not live so hurried in our parenting I would really say like that's exactly where I find myself too at the beginning of this year, so I hope that for everybody.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so come slow down and come to Parenting 2025. And yeah, so until next time. This is the Meet Hope Podcast. We're so grateful that you were listening. If this meant something to you and you know somebody else who would enjoy it, please share it with a friend. You can also rate us on iTunes and give us a great rating so more people can find the podcast, and then we will see you next episode.
Speaker 1:Thanks for being a part of the Hope Community as we continue our conversations about faith and hope. If you don't already, please join us for worship on Sundays or on demand. You can learn more at meethopeorg or find us on socials at Meet Hope Church.