Chelsea (00:00):

So much of your needs, you want them to be fulfilled by your partner. In a society where we don’t have a lot of the built-in supports that would be helpful. And so a lot of our logistical interaction is with our partner and a lot of our other needs. We kind of feel like, where else am I going to go? It’s just my partner, and it can become a little dry, little transactional, not quite as sexy and flirty and fun and natural as it was at one point.

Dr. Sarah (00:39):

When we become parents, everything in our lives shifts, our routines, our priorities, and oftentimes our relationship with our partner. Many couples find themselves moving from a secure sense of connection to feeling distant, stuck in autopilot or even resentful. In today’s episode, I’m joined by the founder of Postpartum together Chelsea Skaggs. We talk about why serving the entire family system, not just the child is so essential and how the demands of parenthood keeps shifting as our children grow. Chelsea shares why resentment so often points to an unmet need within us rather than a partner problem. We also talk about how mismatched energy and chronic fight or flight states can undermine our bids for connection and what polyvagal theory can teach us about how to regulate our nervous systems to feel safer and closer together. Plus, you’ll hear practical tools that you can start using right away, like daily or weekly check-ins and conversation prompts to break the cycle of reactivity and bring curiosity and compassion back into your relationship even if only one of you is ready to do the work right now. So if you’ve ever worried that you and your partner are drifting apart or felt the fear of moving from secure to insecure attachment patterns after becoming parents, this conversation will help you feel less alone and offer a roadmap to begin finding your way back to each other.

(02:11):

Hi, I am Dr. Sarah Bren, a clinical psychologist and mom of two. In this podcast, I’ve taken all of my clinical experience, current research on brain science and child psychology and the insights I’ve gained on my own parenting journey and distilled everything down into easy to understand and actionable parenting insights so you can tune out the noise and tune into your own authentic parenting voice with confidence and calm. This is Securely Attached.

(02:41):

Hello, welcome back to the securely attached podcast. We have a repeat guest with us today, Chelsea Skaggs. So good to see you again.

Chelsea (02:52):

I know, and you too, Sarah. I was calculating, I think it’s been three years since we recorded together, so.

Dr. Sarah (02:59):

Oh my gosh, that was a good episode and that was like we were in completely different places in motherhood and life. You were on the road, it was COVID. Oh my God.

Chelsea (03:15):

A whole different world.

Dr. Sarah (03:17):

So one, I’m going to link the episode that we did before in the show notes so people can go back and listen to that, but update us a little bit. Where are you at? Where is your focus on how are you working with families now?

Chelsea (03:33):

Yeah, so I feel like three years brings a lot of personal and professional evolution for all of us. We went from kind of being nomadic during COVID to resettling back near family and being really, really intentional about the community that we’re building here and just realizing there’s so many things you can do in the world, but the quality of having really good people, families that you really enjoy being around in your circle is invaluable. And so that’s been a big focus for us professionally are business has expanded. My husband is joining me for a lot of our coaching sessions and workshops and things like that now. So we are honed in on the relationship aspect and really we’ve been asking ourselves how do we contribute to the world? How do we make the world a better place? Maybe it’s a midlife crisis, maybe it’s the state of the world, but we’re like, what are we doing with our time and how does it matter? And we are just really grounded in the idea of supporting couples so that they can be the rock for their family and they can raise secure, confident, happy kids.

Dr. Sarah (05:01):

I love that. I mean, I think that speaks so much to what I believe so deeply is at the core of all the work that I do, which is, I was thinking about this a lot recently. I was talking about this with my team at our group practice of who do we work for, what do we do and who is our person? And I always was like, when it comes down to it, me, my team, all of us, at the end of the day, I think our core value is to serve the family system as a whole, whether it’s working with a kid or working with a parent or working with a couple. What you’re describing is a healthy family system requires all of the moving parts to have their own health and wellness and support and intentionality. And so yes, everyone who’s tuning into this podcast wants to help their child develop a secure and healthy relationship to their world and themselves, but if we just focus on the kid and we don’t zoom out and look at the whole family system, you could put everything right into supporting that child and still not end up where you’re trying to go. And I feel like that’s so what you get.

Chelsea (06:18):

Yeah, yeah. I just can’t get over the importance of the energy in the home and the way each person is able to show up and how much that starts with these connections, the communication and the relationship of the individuals who are parents and how you do that with yourself and your own personal evolution and have a safe place to be a person who’s evolving and changing through parenthood and beyond.

Dr. Sarah (06:52):

Which is like that’s a huge thing, right? Because one of the things we really wanted to talk about today was how after having kids, so in our last episode we talked about how do you have sex after kids? Now we’re like, okay, we’re just getting to how do we have a human to human relationship? Years after you’ve been in it, you’ve been in your cocoon, you’ve been in the weeds, and as your kids get older, hopefully the physical demands, the emotional demands, the cognitive demands of parenting, they don’t go away. They just change, but there’s a little more space to breathe as your kids get older. The last time you and I spoke, I think our kids were three and four and now they’re six and eight and seven kids are the same age, and I feel different. Even just my head just feels like, oh, I’m coming up for air.

(07:55):

I am reconnecting with my relation to myself. I’m finding hobbies that I never had time to even consider when I was in it, and so did my husband. He emerged out of the midst and in a lot of ways we kind of emerged parallel to one another and I think a lot of families, I think that’s pretty typical, but I think the trap we can get stuck in is after we both emerge, it’s kind of easy to maybe keep going down that separate parallel path because easy and it’s kind of been well worn at that point, but now that we have more bandwidth, how do we tune back into this person that’s been living in your house with you for your partner, that stranger that you used to know so well.

Chelsea (08:44):

And I think in those days of survival mode, the autopilot is what you do because you don’t have the energy or the capacity or the brain space to be as intentional maybe as you want to be, especially in a relationship that you’re like, we’re functioning, we’re okay, we’re getting by. It’s easy and it’s natural. I think. I don’t ever want people to feel shame about being in a season that’s on autopilot, but I think we get to this point where we emerge and we’re coming up for air and we’re like, okay, now we dreamt of having a family. What did we dream that would look like and how do we be intentional about moving towards that? Or this is the kind of love I experienced I thought that I would experience and maybe we’re not exactly there. How do we get back to that place of connection and spark and enjoying one another again?

(09:42):

And so it goes, I think in two directions. Either you decide to stay on autopilot and then these are the people that potentially get to the place and they’re empty nesters and they’re like, wait, who am I? Because now it’s just me and you. Or you have the choice to intentionally build together and say, okay, now who are we both, I want to get curious about how you’ve changed and who you are, and I want to get to know you again and I want to express myself again. And I think it gets to be a really exciting opportunity if we position it in that empowering way.

Dr. Sarah (10:21):

Yeah, I really like that. As you’re talking to, I’m like, you’re pointing out, okay, we’ve both evolved, which I think is something that we maybe don’t always expect to be at the reality. I think intellectually we know, okay, we’re going to go through a lot of evolution as we enter into parenthood. We’ve talked on this podcast a little bit before about the idea of mince and petre essence, which is the developmental stage of becoming a parent. It’s kind of like adolescence, but it’s when you become a parent and it’s actually a true developmental stage, there’s actual, just like adolescence, there’s massive neurological changes and growth and pruning and all this stuff. It’s like you really do change and dads go through it, non birthing people go through it. When you become a parent, you go through this developmental shift. And so when you do come up for air at the end of this cocoon stage, nesting stage, and for some people that’s like a couple months, some people it’s a year. Some people it’s like four years. Some people it’s like 10 years.

(11:30):

And to your point, it could be 18 years and your kids go to college and you’re like, oh crap, I forgot to attend to this other person in my life. But hopefully people are listening before that happens, and if you are in that place, don’t worry. I’m sure Chelsea has some strategies for reconnecting even if it’s been a really long time. But I think, sorry, I’m going off on a tangent, but to come back to that thought of, sometimes it’s surprising when you do really tune into your partner that you’re like, oh, I know I’m different because I’ve been with myself this whole evolution, but you are different, and that can be, what do you find people struggle with that can that be hard?

Chelsea (12:15):

I think it’s alarming, and I think it is still maybe a little taboo or just not something that you expect necessarily, and especially in a season, hopefully this will all come full circle here, but in a season where you become so much of your needs, I think get fulfilled or you want them to be fulfilled by your partner. In a society where we don’t have a lot of the built-in supports, that would be a lot more helpful. We don’t have the village per se in the ways that would be helpful. And so a lot of our logistical interaction is with our partner and a lot of our other needs, we kind of feel like, where else am I going to go? It’s just my partner and it can become a little dry transactional, not quite as sexy and flirty and fun and natural as it was at one point. And then on top of that, if you’ve had this experience where you feel a little awkward in yourself, a little kind of adolescent or teenagey in yourself, you feel a little awkward. I think some people are afraid of the vulnerability that it takes to introduce yourself differently and accept and get curious about how your partner has changed.

Dr. Sarah (13:46):

That makes a lot of sense. I actually think that adolescent parallel makes a lot of, it really tracks. It is a form of an adult adolescent. It just comes with a lot more responsibility and higher stakes.

Chelsea (14:01):

And probably more masking skills.

Dr. Sarah (14:03):

Yes, totally, right? On both sides. Which speaks to that vulnerability piece because if we are leaning into our capacity to mask how hard this time has been for us and even maybe hide it from ourselves then to come together in that vulnerable way of like, oh, hey, I feel a little funny asking for attention from you right now or for you to soften towards me right now or to talk about my ambivalence or resentments with you about certain pieces of our romantic relationship. It just feels like, Ooh, how do we go into that space again when maybe we were more comfortable in that space at one point in our earlier relationship.

Chelsea (14:49):

Yeah. I like to tell this story of how, I remember one night when our son finally slept and my husband and I sat on the couch and we were like, what do we talk about? I don’t even know how to start the conversation. And that has happened. That happened in early postpartum, but that’s also happened progressively through the years. And we recognize that and we stop and we’re like, okay, sometimes we need a little help. Sometimes we like to pull out our conversation deck and we’re like, let’s just get warmed up. Let’s just get in the action of having this conversation again. Sometimes we pull a card that we made that are just easy ways to connect and have that ability to take the brain work out of it. But you kind of have to open up yourself in a new way where you’re exploring maybe something worked really well for your relationship before and now you don’t love it as much. Maybe the way you receive love or your love language has shifted and you have one, have the ability to tune in with yourself and know that and then have the tools and skills to communicate that to your partner after so much change. And again, I just tying that to how awkward it is to be a teenager showing off new parts of yourself and you’re playing with them, you’re experimenting with how it’s going to land. And I think again, that’s just why that vulnerability and that safety piece in the relationship is so important.

Dr. Sarah (16:27):

So if people are like, okay, I recognize that’s atrophied a bit, I want to start working on that with my partner. Do you find that there’s sometimes discrepancies in when one partner’s ready to go there and another one hasn’t gotten to that place yet? What happens then? How do you invite someone to start to come to where you are if you’ve gotten there first?

Chelsea (16:53):

Yeah, I love that you used the word invite because we say that too. We’re not telling your partner they need to get in here and do this work at the same time as you. We’re constantly inviting people to get to know us and we’re inviting them to show us who they are, and that is a kind clear way to address your partner. I like having people practice saying some of the awkward things out loud, even saying, babe, it feels really silly for me to be nervous about saying this because we’ve had so many talks. We’ve been through so many things together, but I haven’t done this in a long time and this feels a little silly and let that be okay. I also think especially for the person who maybe has a more resistant partner or maybe your partner’s not there yet, the way that we present our curiosity is important.

(17:52):

And what I mean by that is if I went to my partner and was just like, babe, what’s on your heart today? He is going to be clam up and I don’t know, I haven’t had time to think through that. That might feel like pressure. And then I’ll be like, oh, fine. Well, I guess you don’t want to talk to me. I guess we’re not, and then we’re both our feelings are hurt and that’s not great. So thinking about how you present that curiosity, maybe you’re okay just sharing for a little bit and saying, I don’t expect anything from you, but I want to start sharing these things more. Or maybe you come with a really specific example, babe, I saw you and the kids and this happened. How did that feel for you? Or what was going on in your body as you did that? So having different angles, and if one doesn’t work, that’s okay. That doesn’t mean you’re doomed and disconnected. It just means you’re going to try it from a different way.

Dr. Sarah (18:47):

Yeah, also I like that a lot. That idea of it makes me think of, I mean obviously the parallels between partners and parent child is hard to not point out. How many times have you picked your kid up from school or camp and you’re like, tell me everything about your day. And they’re like, get away for it. We want our intention in that moment is to connect, and their intention in that moment is to chill out because they just got home. And I feel like that attunement, that ability to read your partner’s energy or your child’s energy or help them be better at reading your energy if they’re coming in hot and you’re like, whoa, whoa, too much. I was focusing on something and you just barreled in at me with 10 things to say, and now you’re telling me that I’m ignoring you, but don’t walk in the room, tune into me, notice what is my attention on, and then how do I enter into that space with you and then invite a conversation the same way the other way around. If you are, how do you connect in a way that’s tuned into the other person’s without interrupting them basically?

Chelsea (20:15):

Yeah. I don’t know if I have the exact how to in that, but it made me think about almost like the consent of energy exchange. Not to sound too out there, but you sometimes it’s just respectful to get consent of the kind of energy you’re putting on your partner and you’re expecting them to bring, and this was something I learned through a friendship first where she would send a voice memo and be like, Hey, do you have the capacity for me to emotionally unload something right now? And that was one of the most respectful exchanges I’ve ever had. And then since replicated and now using the relationship, because I had to realize there are times when I just want to get it all out there and I want to connect with my partner. I want them to hear and feel and experience what I’m feeling, but it’s not a consensual exchange because my partner hasn’t been in a place to accept that. And so I think too, that’s just normalizing and naming where you are in that self-awareness piece.

Dr. Sarah (21:28):

Yeah. Yeah. I get what you’re saying. The energetic exchange can be heard as woo, but I think we’re really literally talking about reading the room. We are two human beings who are focusing on our own intention in the moment. If my intention is connection and your intention is finishing this article that you’re reading, those are two very different energy levels and energy orientations, and if we try to merge them and barrel them into one another, that’s not going to go so well. But if I come in, I still want to connect. That’s my energetic intention.

(22:05):

And I notice that you’re reading an article and I sit down next to you and as you are coming to the conclusion and starting to notice me sitting next to you and I say, what’s your reading? Tell me something interesting about it. How do you invite connection? This is super basic realigning into one another’s sort of vibes, but I feel like I could see, and I’m curious when you’re working with couples, there’s this basic, how do we live together in a way that we aren’t attuned, respectful of each other’s needs, curious about each other’s needs, and are building our communication skills, but then let’s level that up to get, so now we’ve gotten to that point, and then I feel like then we need to layer in more vulnerability and more intimacy. And intimacy can be physical, romantic, sexual intimacy, but can also be just emotional intimacy. Where do you find families, couples hit barriers when they’re trying to go there?

Chelsea (23:10):

Yeah, we teach something very basic, and we are not the only people who teach this, but just the practice of a routine daily check-in. When I’m working with couples, we teach a daily check-in and we teach a weekly check-in. So you are putting aside a certain amount of time, 10 minutes a day, and then maybe 30 minutes to an hour once a week for a check-in. And this is that proactive practice because a lot of couples I see get caught in these cycles of reactivity. So they are just constantly throwing the hot potato at their partner, reacting and reacting. And so we get these bids for connection where somebody’s trying to get that connection for their partner, they’re asking them a question or they’re rubbing their back, and when it’s not received well or reciprocated, then we get defensiveness and then we just get into that reactivity pattern.

(24:20):

And so not to say that’s never going to happen, but I see so much success with people just getting into the practice of conversation of those daily and weekly. And usually the weekly is where a little more vulnerability can come up. It makes a little bit more space for that. And it might be something like, Hey, a way that I really felt seen by you this week was blank or a time I felt misunderstood was blank. Because then you get to have those conversations, but they’re not in the heat of the moment where it’s emotionally charged and you’re going to have reactivity. It’s like, let’s make this standard practice that we’re going to have this check-in and we’re going to talk about those hard things when we are both able to come to the table knowing that that is going to be part of the conversation.

Dr. Sarah (25:10):

Yeah. Oh, I see so much utility there because in the daily check-ins, you can kind of unload some of just the tasks of life with each other because like you were saying before, one of the reasons why we get to this place is in part because the load of parenthood and the load of just life, because we’re so nuclear family now, we don’t have this village to distribute the weight of all of this labor. It’s all on this dyad. And so these two people have to hold everything. And so we end up triaging constantly because we can’t hold it all. And so what falls away is the pleasantry is the curious conversation, like the nothingness conversations. We have too many things must get accomplished, but if you have these daily check-ins, you can kind of get a lot of that logistical transactional stuff off your load. And then when you’re having the weekly check-ins, I feel like then there’s actually space to really go deeper because you don’t have to be like, did you get the groceries and did you forget that this needs to get fixed and oh, the kids need this to be picked up before this date. It’s almost like because you create a small space all the time for the little stuff, you actually have space for the bigger stuff in these larger, deeper weekly.

Chelsea (26:35):

Yeah, and I would say that 98% of couples I talk to can find 10 minutes in their day. I’m not minimizing. We are busy and that things are loaded, but most couples are able to find that 10 minutes to check in, and it’s not to add something to the plate, it’s to make the plate that they’re both carrying lighter because there’s less making stories in your head and trying to figure this out and keeping this tab open so you don’t forget it lightens the plate, and that can be in just a few minutes a day.

Dr. Sarah (27:10):

That makes so much sense to me. And so I’m thinking too, okay, so we just reviewing, we’re working on basic communication skills and attunement skills, reading your partner’s vibes and giving them some space and tuning into them, syncing up. And then from there, we’re working on creating actual intentional space so we can do some of the life stuff without using that, having take up all of our time. And then we have time. That’s because we have this really dedicated time daily and weekly. There actually ends up being room to deepen, room to be more vulnerable, room to go to a more just a realer place with each other. What’s the next level? Where do couples, once they’ve gotten that, how do they move to strengthen their trust and their connection and their intimacy and their relationship?

Chelsea (28:05):

Yeah. Well, I like how you went through that evolution and it made me think about just the safety. We want to be able to exhale and let the tension out of our shoulders and our face and our body that we’re carrying all the time. And so this communication, obviously the goal is communication and alignment and teamwork, but a lot of that too is wrapped up in just being able to relax your nervous system. And I think a lot of people miss the deeper connection because the nervous system is always on alert and where we want to go that deeper is the calm, it is the connection. It is I’m open, I’m not reactive, I’m curious, I feel connected to you. I’m letting down the walls. That’s where we want people to get, which you and I were talking earlier about how I think it’s just important to normalize that that can take a lot of time. It can take a lot of time to get to the place where that is more frequent than the alternative. I just posted something this weekend that got a lot of stories and feedback from moms, and all I said was, now that my kids are six and eight, I’m at the point where my body is relaxed more than it’s tense. I’d say at least 51% of the time my body’s relaxed and 49% it’s tense. And that used to be very, very much more flipped. And so the opportunities to connect are more and more as motherhood has changed, and I’ve gotten to know who I am in that and my values and my skin and my experience. So some of that just comes with time, I would say. And some of that comes with the practice of knowing. I think if you want to be more connected with your partner, one thing you can do with or without them knowing is figure out how to calm your nervous system, how to get into a safe connected space so that there are more opportunities for connection to happen. You probably know a lot more about that than I do though.

Dr. Sarah (30:29):

Well, I was just curious when you’re talking about that, it makes me think of how, are you familiar with polyvagal theory?

Chelsea (30:36):

Yes, yes.

Dr. Sarah (30:37):

So yeah, do you want to talk a little bit about what ventral vagal is and that safety connection space of the nervous system?

Chelsea (30:47):

That’s so funny. I have that chart pulled up because I was like, this is something that has been on my mind. And so in the polyvagal theory, you have the ventral vagal, which is what I’m talking about, where we want to get where there are opportunities for connection because there are feelings of harmony with others. You feel safe in your body, you have joy, you have peace, you’re open and curious. What I really like about this chart that I’m looking at is it references how old these systems are. And I don’t know full accuracy of that, but saying that that is the most evolved version for humans. The inside circle or the second circle, the sympathetic is that fight, flight or freeze, you’re responding to danger. There’s something up. You are protecting yourself, you are protecting something. So there’s some kind of wall that’s in it doesn’t mean you can’t connect, but there is something there and you’re feeling that fight, flight or freeze. And then that oldest system being the dorsal vagal, which is the shutdown, disassociation, conservable energy, fully survival mode. And I think that is just a fascinating way to think about parenthood in general or just a massive life transformation. But then where we want to get so that our brains and our bodies are able to have the kind of deeper connections we’re seeking.

Dr. Sarah (32:25):

And just to translate that, because I think it can be confusing all these names, but this polyvagal theory is a very well established and well-researched theory put forth by Dr. Porges. And if you send me the visual, I’ll add it to our show notes because I think it is helpful to see it. But this idea, like you were saying, our brains and nervous system has evolved as a species over many, many, many, many, many, many, I don’t know, hundreds of millions of years. I don’t. Maybe not as many as that. That’s the numbers part, I don’t know. But our most primitive parts of our brain region, that’s where that dorsal vagal part of that nervous system is connected to. And so that’s older. It’s a much more primitive defensive system. And so just basically it’s on off. If we are in dorsal shutdown, we’re just kind of off. And then another evolution of our brains and nervous system moved into our ability to have a sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system. And so our sympathetic nervous system is like you were saying, that’s our fight or flight, our hyper arousal, it gets us out of danger more quickly, which is evolutionarily advantageous.

(33:45):

And then as human beings, we evolved even more to have this social connection nervous system basically is the ventral vagal nervous system. And that’s we as humans and some primates are the only ones who really have the system because we are able to rest in calm ourselves in this safety and connection. And so when we are truly, it’s just like a way of orienting ourselves to the concept of nervous system regulation. When you are in the most regulated state in the most calm, safe state, you are also able to access a very organic and evolutionarily based sense of connection with the people around you. So that is when you’re talking about wanting to connect with your partner and needing both of you actually needing to be able to be in that ventral vagal activation, safety, and connection, you both have to kind of be in that regulated state to want to and to enjoy being connected. And that in and of itself is going to deepen intimacy. So I’m so glad that you brought that up. I do think it’s like, I dunno, I like to nerd out on the neuroscience of it all.

Chelsea (35:15):

Yes, it’s fascinating and I think some people need that perspective. I was thinking about the science there and how it applies to touch out even. And so thinking about that for some of my clients who are a little earlier in their postpartum journey of just like some backing here too about being touched out and not having the capacity to receive that physical intimacy, which I think we can parallel that too with the emotional.

Dr. Sarah (35:48):

Yeah. Hey, just jumping in here for a quick moment to chat with you a bit more about polyvagal theory, something you just heard me and Chelsea discussing. If you’re curious about what this really means and more importantly how to use it in everyday life, I’ve created something just for you. It’s called Be the Calm in Your Child’s Storm, a 90 minute workshop where I break down the basics of polyvagal theory in a super approachable way and teach you practical strategies to help you calm your own nervous system in the heat of the moment. And while the workshop is framed around parenting, what you learn applies far beyond just moments with your kids because when you can recognize what’s happening in your nervous system and learn to regulate, you can respond rather than react, whether it’s to your child’s meltdown, a tense conversation with your partner, or even just the everyday stress that pops up inside your own mind. These are the same evidence-based tools I use with my patients to help them move from feeling stuck in fight or flight to feeling grounded and more in control. To get instant access to this workshop, you can click the link in the episode description wherever you’re streaming this podcast, or just go to dr sarah bren.com and click the workshops tab. Now, back to my conversation with Chelsea.

Chelsea (37:17):

It makes me think of the very common phrase, and I don’t know your opinion of the phrase, but you can’t pour from an empty cup, which I feel like if something gets too trendy, I’m over it. And so that phrase I’m always like, but when I applied it in this way to you can’t connect out of the dorsal vagal state, or you can’t have authentic openness just from the sympathetic stage. And so that’s my new framework of you got to get ventral vagal if you want to have the kind of deep connection you’re really looking for.

Dr. Sarah (37:59):

You do, you do, and it’s hard to come by in parenthood because there’s a lot of stress and we can be on low level chronic fight or flight all the time, which I think is your original point, which is, yes, we want to connect with our partner, but before we can do that effectively and successfully, we have to figure out how to have a regulated nervous system. And we do that by getting our basic core needs met by getting some white space. And I think that’s why a lot of people are thinking about this in 3, 4, 5 years out of postpartum because they actually have it. My nervous system is so much more, I have the capacity, I’ll say, to have a more regulated nervous system now than I did when I had babies, and that’s partly just because of the brain changes that happen when you are pregnant and postpartum, your fight or flight system becomes highly, highly activated because you need to keep a small baby alive, so you need to be constantly scanning for danger and really strongly reactive to it. That’s good for our species, but once your kid is going to more or less be able to survive, obviously our kids need us for a very long time.

(39:15):

But the need to be on constant vigilance to keep them from falling off of a high place and impaling themselves on a dangerous thing, whatever we are, we’re not in firefighter mode as parents as much. We’re more in gardener mode. And gardeners I bet have a much calmer nervous system than firefighters.

Chelsea (39:42):

It also makes me want to have a t-shirt that says self-care is a regulated nervous system. I like that. And all the talk out there about self-care, and sometimes I have clients, specifically women who are like, well, I made time for this and I got my nails done and I went to this class, but I’m still feeling frazzled. And it’s like, okay, maybe what we need to do is figure out what really gets you to feel like you inside of your body and release the defenses that you have.

Dr. Sarah (40:15):

And to rest.

Chelsea (40:16):

And to rest.

Dr. Sarah (40:17):

And to actually rest.

Chelsea (40:19):

Yeah.

Dr. Sarah (40:20):

It’s not what, we didn’t call it this, but this is another term for parasympathetic arousal, which is the opposite of fight or flight or ventral vagal is rest, digest. You have to be able to rest in order to get into that regulated state. And I think we live in a world, again, whether it’s from parenthood or just the demands on us being so high, we are doing everything is that we are going, going, going, going, and we aren’t actually orienting to a task, making a plan, doing the task, and then truly finishing the task, taking a beat, integrating, I’m done with that. That was tough or that was lovely, and then orienting to the next task, thinking about what I’m going to do, doing it, and then finishing that task. We don’t do that very often. We’re usually, and I know I am, it’s like, do that, do this, do go, go, go. And I’m not taking the time to rest and integrate in between these tasks. So my nervous system feels like worldly intense. I’m holding onto all this kinetic energy. I never got that exhale. And so I do really think that that can certainly, if both partners are going, going, going, going, going and not resting, you’re really going to have a hard time slowing down and connecting. But even if one of you is working on this, but the other is go, go, go, go, go. It’s still going to be feeling kind of out of sync. So I do think, how do you help couples recognize this and then start to focus on, yes, we want to build the intimacy. That’s the byproduct though.

Chelsea (42:16):

That’s the byproduct.

Dr. Sarah (42:17):

If we get really intense on focusing on, we got to build this intimacy, why are we not having it? I want this thing and I don’t have it, and you’re frustrating me because you’re interrupting my intention of having intimacy. We’re moving away from that rest, that safety and connection. So it’s like we have to reverse engineer it and actually start with the basics. So yeah. How do you help couples recognize that when they’re doing it and then build in that rest and that build up those skills for regulating their nervous systems?

Chelsea (42:48):

Yeah. Okay. I’m going to take you through a little process and hopefully this answers your question, but with couples that we work with who are already parents 100% of the time, we start with resentment. We start with getting it out of your head and onto the table so that it can be worked with. There’s an agreement that this is not accusatory, this is not to complain or slam your partner. It’s to say, true or false, better or worse, this is what I’m holding in my head and in my body. And we have to get that resentment out because I think that is where obviously there are other factors that could be true for some of the defenses and the walls that come up between couples, but starting with resentment is a really good place to break down a lot of those walls and get to something and someone can do this on their own.

(43:45):

You can start to write out or use a voice memo or whatever you want to start seeing, what am I holding onto? What just makes me clinch up and defensive, and how do I start to get it out so I can work with it? I think what that then tells us is what you’re missing, what you resent for your partner probably reflects something about an unmet need that you have or something that you are missing. So guess what? Maybe I don’t get really mad at my husband because every day at noon, we both work from home and he takes a 15 minute nap every day at noon, and I’m like, oh my God, how could you do that? All this stuff is happening. I say, wow, I really would like a midday reset. Can I find a way for me to have that too instead of being resentful or upset with my partner?

(44:38):

And if not, then we have something else to work out. But if so, sometimes the solution is as easy as I’m going to take up the same amount of space, or I’m going to care for myself, and when I start to care for myself and tune in and listen to myself, I stop resenting my partner so much if they’re able to do what I can’t. So that then gives us something in our control, something that we can do, something that we can say, this is the need. Now. How do we be taking action towards meeting that?

Dr. Sarah (45:11):

That makes so much sense. I really like that because I do think even gave me some things to think about myself, like, oh, right. I think sometimes we forget or we misattribute resentment as because the object of our resentment is usually somebody else, but really the driver of that resentment is actually something that is not happening or happening undesirable so inside of us. And so it actually helps you orient to the true source of that resentment is actually coming from something inside of you. And it doesn’t mean you alone can or should be responsible for always fixing that, but it helps you to not create a bad object in your partner.

Chelsea (46:00):

And one that you have no control over changing, so you’re just going to stay mad and defensive about it.

Dr. Sarah (46:06):

And also, it’s like if your partner’s taking a nap in the middle of the day and you’re mad at them because you truly aren’t getting an opportunity to have your own break, yes, that one means we need to figure out a way for you to get a break. But two, it means maybe your partner is not, maybe they’re modeling something of value, which is they’re tuning into their need to rest in that moment. And how can I give myself permission to do the same versus if I can’t have it, they shouldn’t have it either.

Chelsea (46:40):

Yes, yes. I had a couple recently that I was working with, and that is what came from the husband. He’s like, I don’t want to feel bad taking care of, I don’t want to neglect myself because she’s neglecting herself and he was trying to create these pockets and opportunities for her to care for herself, but she was struggling with her worthiness of having those spaces and stepping away from the child. And so then we knew, okay, that’s actually where we need to focus. And this is a whole other episode in conversation, but I think one of just the key is figuring out what is the root of the issue. Because so many people this are arguing over things that aren’t actual problem. They are just four layers up, and it’s something they keep going back and forth with. So that’s why I lean so heavy into curiosity and making room for you and your partner to both grow and change and to ask questions and to be a little awkward about it, because otherwise you stay stuck in the problem. That’s not really the problem. That’s never going to actually change things.

Dr. Sarah (47:54):

Yeah, because it’s not about the naps, it’s about…

Chelsea (47:58):

The worthiness and the audacity to take up space.

Dr. Sarah (48:03):

Yes. Oh, I love that. I feel like there’s a lot of really, really valuable things to think about from this conversation is there’s one place you’d encourage someone to start or to consider if they want to, whether it’s taking up more space for themselves or asking for something they need from their partner. What would be an entry point?

Chelsea (48:30):

Okay. Become your own detective. And what I mean by that is before you want to go overhaul things and make some big change, look at your daily patterns and take the extra 10 seconds after an interaction to be, oh, that made me really tense. What about that made me really tense? Or when he said that I felt defensive, well, why did that bother me? Or when I thought about going to take that hot shower, I talked myself out of it because of blank. Just study yourself first. Instead of deciding, I’m going into this massive overhaul, I’m going to make these changes today. Get curious about what are your habits, how are you responding to things? And I think that’s really fun to take pauses every now and then to not try to change ourselves, but just to try to, if I were a detective, would I understand my patterns? Would I know what sets me off? Would I know what went on right before I clinched up all my muscles?

Dr. Sarah (49:42):

Yeah. Oh, I like that so much. I think that’s so helpful. If people want to connect with you or learn more about your work, where should we send them?

Chelsea (49:52):

Yeah, well you can find all of that at postpartumtogether.com. That is where you can find access to the blog, to the podcast, to our coaching services, to the wait list for the workbook that we’re launching in August or September, hoping to get it out there before back to school season. But for couples who really want to master this skill of being a team together so that they can get to the next level of deeper intimacy that they want.

Dr. Sarah (50:26):

I love. Well, thank you for coming back on the show. It was so good talking with you.

Chelsea (50:30):

Thank you for having me. You’re so fun to talk to.

Dr. Sarah (50:35):

So are you.

(50:35):

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