Nurturing Bonds: The Life-Changing Blueprint for Family Harmony

Join us for an insightful conversation with marriage and family therapist, Jan, as we explore the vital connection between a happy marriage and a happy family!

Discover Jan's unique concept of wearing different "hats" – the marriage hat, the parenting hat, and others representing various roles we play. Learn how to keep your "marriage hat" closest to your brain and how it connects with the parenting hat to create a harmonious family environment.

In this episode, you'll learn:
• The importance of connection and the hormones that facilitate it.
• How to handle tension and reset emotions in a healthy way, including the power of a cold drink, warm beverage, or crunchy snack.
• Why body language speaks louder than words and how to use it effectively.

A moving story about how Jan's husband prioritized their marriage, inspiring them to make shifts in their life and to continue that journey.

Plus, Jan is offering a free 60-minute phone call to provide support and encouragement!

Here's the link to schedule a call with her: https://calendly.com/usandkids/fun-session

Jan's website: https://www.usandkids.com/

Get ready to transform your relationships with Jan's invaluable insights! This is the first of a series of episodes with Jan. Stay tuned!

Make sure you hit subscribe if you haven’t already. And, if you’d like to check out my other channels...

YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@LupWaiChan
Website: www.lupwaiparentwhisperer.com
Instagram: www.instagram.com/lupwaiparentwhisperer

Transcript

All right, good day to everyone and welcome, welcome to the Learning Curve with Lapwai podcast. And today I'm so happy to have Jane with me.  And you're going to benefit a lot because she's a marriage and family therapist, a wife, mom to four, and grandma to 11.  So she loves kids. and marriages, and she's always there to cheer them on.

Her slogan, happy marriage makes happy family.  And Jen is from Michigan. And the rest of it, information that you want to know more, I'm going to let Jen to introduce herself to you.  Welcome, Jen.  Would you like to introduce yourself?  I am so glad to be here and to be able to get to know you better, but also to be able to encourage all the people out there who are listening and going, wait, I can have a merry marriage and a happy family at the same time. 

And I want to say, you sure can. It takes some work and it takes some intentionality. Instead of just making it happen, we are intentional about what we do, and that helps to really set a path and an attitude that goes, Oh, this isn't so hard after all. In many relationships, usually we start out with a marriage or a good solid partnership, and this is my hot date hat.

This is the hat I wear when I'm going out on a fancy date with my husband, and we are being married.  Okay, and people give me late strange looks because  in the United States, I don't know about where you guys are, but we don't often wear hats,  but when we do people notice  and I think it makes me look a little sassy.

It says I'm in on this marriage.  And so this is my marriage hat. But the trick is, is that I should never take this hat off. At least in my mind, my marriage has to be closest to my brain.  Wow, I didn't know that.  That's interesting. This has to be closest to my brain. I have a mom hat. I have a baseball hat. 

Hey, do you guys have a baseball hat?  Yep, I do.  Hey, now it looks funny, doesn't it? It's sort of like, oh, now that would be a really interesting hat. You think you get looks with just your marriage hat on. Put these two on together.  And you do get looks when you wear your parenting hat that's tightly connected to your marriage hat.

Because now these two talk to each other.  And you're going to get looks because your kids are going to be fun and happy and cooperative.  And you're going to be relaxed. And able to go with the flow and adjust to the mood, or all of a sudden it's raining, or somebody slipped and scraped their knee. And you're not going to fall apart.

Your hats aren't necessarily going to go whoop like this.  They're going to be able to stay on,  and stay with you. So that you can think both, how can I help my  spouse in this messy situation that we're in, while also staying connected to our kiddos.  And we want both of those to happen.  Yeah, I love that visual connection on how that marriage and the parenting hat to be put on.

Yes, we do wear a lot of hats.  We do, yes.  Yeah, and having this visual. Because the top hat is work hat and play hat, right? And then there's a financial guru hat. And then there's the take care of my mother in law hat, right?  Yes. Oh shoot, my kids need this at school and I forgot to do this for the soccer team. 

So the first hat is the marriage hat. First head is the marriage head and followed by the parenting head. So how does this marriage head and the parenting head get connected? So the first marriage head is connected to our brain. Yes, right. And then subsequently is the parenting head. So how will the  marriage head and connect parenting head connect?

Because what I practice in my marriage is exactly what I'm going to practice with my kiddos. 

They're the same skills. We just do them differently because we are at different developmental stages.  One of the most important things that we do in a relationship is we have to be connected.  Connection takes hormones  and it takes influence and attachment. Those things. Or what we need. So hormones are things like norepinephrine and oxytocin and serotonin and dopamine. 

Okay. And those are all hormones in our head that get turned on. And work together to create a sense of, I trust you,  I'm willing to follow you.  Your words will influence me positively. So when you play, say, Hey, will you, when you're walking by, will you grab the coffee?  You gladly say, of course I will,  because you're connected. 

If you're not connected, you might do it out of your own pride, but you also just might not have even heard them.  Yeah. Because you're not connected.  So when your kiddo says, Mom, can you read another book?  Your connection says, I'd like to find a way to do that.  Because their influence to you is positive, and you know that sitting by your kid, having that sense of touch, them being able to hear your voice and feel your skin, is going to help their brain become. 

It's the same thing as when I'm walking by my husband and I grab his hand.  And we're like, we got to figure this out. Are we a little lost? Okay, we're walking in the woods and we're exploring this way and we should find our path back to the real path? But calm down, hold somebody's hand.  And all of a sudden, some of those hormones go in our brain, they chase out the cortisol  and the adrenaline, and they open up the dopamine so that we can calm down and we can think. 

Oh, true. That's true. Do you have more examples like how to handle that, or how to handle the marriage, how to connect in the marriage that will influence how we parent? 

How do we,  I'm going to stick with the connection thing  for a minute. Okay. If we are connected kindly to our spouse, then even under tension, we have figured out how to hold our emotions in place.  And I would just say, I'm really wound up about this. Give me a minute to take a breath.  Okay. So we want to know how to say that to our spouse so that we don't say words and actions that we regret. 

Just give me a minute to reset.  Okay. If you want to know how to reset a cold drink of water, holding a cup of something warm, I'm not talking alcohol here. Don't go that direction, but just a cup of hot water will work.  Okay. Standing by a warm fire.  Okay. Taking a minute to eat something crunchy. 

So a few crackers or a few carrots. Why? Because crunchy changes the chemistry in our brain.  And so that's why when we're nervous, we want to just sit and eat a bag of chips. It's the crunch. Yep.  Okay. That's true. That's true.  So we want you to pay attention to where am I nervous and then how to calm myself down.

If I can do that in my marriage and demonstrated it within my marriage, my kiddos will see that and will know that it's okay for them to say, wait a minute.  I can't think about that right now, Mom. Give me a minute.  And because we practice giving our spouse a minute, we know it'll be okay to give our kiddo a minute. 

Oh. Does that make sense to you? Yes, it does. Like what you just mentioned earlier on before we recording,  there's like 20 percent with words  that will be passed over, but 80 percent of them will be copied by the children. Yes, so let's dive into that just a tad bit more because,  excuse me, in our  speaking,  so I'm speaking to you, you're going to, for every 10 words that I say, you're going to remember three of them. 

Yeah. Third. Yes. Third. And I don't get to pick which third.  You pick which third.  So if we give our spouse 300 words and they don't have a chance to interject, your spouse is going to remember only 100 of them  and he might just remember how many times you said you  because you were mad and so you said you did this and you did this and you did this and you did this and you did this and they only remember you and they don't remember the details. 

Did you get your point across?  That's true.  Yeah. Okay. So the same is true with kiddos. guys. And when we break that down and we say 10 or 15 words at a time,  you see, now I just paused 10 or 15 words at a time. Now you just picked your third. So you picked five.  Okay, now I can move on to my next 15.  Yes. And you can pick your other five.

Now we're going to have far more cohesion.  in that conversation. 

That's true.  Because the, so that's, that's your 20 percent of, of the word part.  If you want people to remember your words more,  it's in your body language.  So it's how your eyes look. It's what your tone sounds like.  It's whether or not your eyes are darting here and there. You know, I can't wiggle my eyebrows, but some people can wiggle their eyebrows.

Or you know, they have this look like, I don't think so, or their shoulders raise up or they can see them all of a sudden somebody's fidgeting with their fingers, okay, or they're tapping their toes.  Okay, play, they're starting to reach for their phone. All of those things  talk louder. They're 80 percent of what we hear. 

Yeah,  I agree with that. And I do notice that with my kids as well and in others, in my students as well. Yeah.  Yeah. And so, especially within that marriage,  if you want to be heard accurately, you have to have the connection that we just talked about, right? Those, okay, that positive attachment piece. And then we have to say, if we're not, if somebody is speaking and we're not following because their body is distracting,  then gently, because we want to stay connected, we're going to say, hold on a minute. 

Okay,  here's what I hear you saying, but here's what I see you doing.  So you say, I'm okay with that, but you've just looked over my shoulder like you want to leave three times. So I don't know if you're okay with staying because you keep looking out the door.  Maybe the answer is because the dog wants to come in,  right?

I'm looking over the shoulder because the dog's over there banging on the door and I'm not hearing it, I'm talking. Okay, but he's seeing the door or he's seeing something else. I don't know, maybe there's a snake out the door. Well, that would make me run, but  okay.  We want to know what's that body language about. 

Yeah, that's true. And  when we are talking and we are not showing the same action, it kind of confuse the children. Oh, absolutely. Yes.  Yeah. You see, we practice this and we want our kids to see us practice it with our spouse.  This is part of your merry marriage. It keeps our arguments and our miscommunication down. 

Couples don't really like it when I say it. I'm not sure Singapore parents and around the world parents are any different than U. S. parents. They are busy  and they are just working the schedule like this. And it makes them often miscue.  Yeah.  Okay. And then you can feel the sort of tension just sort of rise.

Somebody puts the glass down a little bit harder. Somebody says, no, it's fine.  And the tone is, it's not fine. The words are, it's fine,  but the tone is not fine. And  if our kids can see us, just come back and touch each other and say, Hold on just a minute. Okay? Let's just be sure we're on the same page.

I'm going to take this kiddo to soccer and you're going to finish making supper. But you've been home all day. Do you want to trade?  Do you need to get out of the house? Just slow it down a minute. It really takes 30 seconds.  And if you don't slow it down and take 30 seconds, you're going to have a 30 minute conversation later on down the road.

Talk about time efficiency.  Right. That's true. 30 minutes, folks. And that's what happens is they don't take the 30 minutes to clean it up. And then all of a sudden, it's a three hour conversation argument thing because we didn't clean it up in 30 seconds.  That's true. But provided that.  They are aware.

I mean, the parents are aware and they are conscious about that as well. Yes. Yeah. So for, for many parts, many people not my really artsy people who are more left brain, but my really my right brain folks. Would like this sentence and that is to think about the end in the beginning.  What do you want this conversation to end up being?

Think about that in the beginning.  Do I want to argue about this and fight about this?  Is it really important that I take the kid to soccer?  Is that the end that I want? Is I want to take the kid to soccer?  Or is it important? And maybe that is important.  Okay, but then you need just need to say that, or is it important that you say and have compassion towards your spouse because you've both been feeling a little lonely for each other. 

And so you say, it doesn't matter to me who takes the kiddo  and if it's better for you and better for us,  then hop in the car and give yourself 20 minutes of quiet after you drop them off.  Cause you'll be out there with the soccer, then you get 20 minutes by yourself in the garage. Haha. Right? Yeah. The car ride is always the best time to stay alone. 

Yes. Well,  I'm old enough to remember the days when there were, when I never took a phone in the car. There weren't phones for cars. So I really was alone. Yeah. Nobody could call me. Nobody could text me. Nobody could bother me.  And there was some real beauty in that. Yes. That's true. I agree with that. Yeah.

But that is, can I think about the end in the beginning? Do I want to build compassion with my spouse, or is there something I'm trying to talk to my kiddo about? This is the only time I'm going to get alone with him,  or her, and so I need the 20 minutes. But then, if I want to stay connected to my spouse, if that's part of my, what do I want in the end, is still connection with my spouse, then I'm going to say, because I want to talk to my, to our kiddo about this,  and I can't find a different 20 minutes of being just alone and undistracted,  because it keeps us on the same page. 

Yeah.  And it's so important here. Like what you mentioned is how to voice out and say how, what you feel, how you feel so that the other party is aware rather than  having it kept in your mind or in your heart.  Yes. Yes. And there, there's a there's a saying that throws me around the psychological world.

My emotions are my responsibility.  Yeah.  And so we can tell how we're feeling  and our spouses can come alongside of us and have compassion and empathy,  but our emotions are still ours.  And there's still our responsibility to use them and to choose them well,  to use them.  Does that make sense to you? Yes.

It's a grown up thing. We teach our children how to do this. Their brain and their bodies are not ready to fully own those emotions themselves. They won't get that, especially at 3, 4, 5. They might get it at 13 They still have a pretty broken brain at that age, so  we will talk about it and teach it. But our most important piece here is to be able to model it. 

I am feeling really lonely from dad right now.  and so I just snapped at him. I'm sorry about that.  Oh, okay.  Yeah. The kiddo is just nagging, you know, mom, mom, mom, mom, mom  about everything and nothing is okay with them.  Yeah. It would be appropriate for me  to just stop for a minute. Get eye level with my kiddo and with a gentle stance internally for myself.

And say, slow down a minute. What do you really want? Because usually our kids, frankly, usually our spouses too, want belonging.  They want to know that we're important to them.  And when they feel like all the other things in the world are far more important than them,  our spouse or our kiddos, they start to act up and they get anxious inside. 

Okay. I, you know, I don't belong. I don't. What am I doing here? I'm not important to anybody. Would anybody miss me?  And those aren't exact sentences usually,  but they're exact emotions  that start to sort of perk underneath.  Agree. And that's why tantrums are so common when  attention is not given.  Yes, exactly.

Yes. And why tantrums calm down when we simply sit down  and just say, it's okay, we're here. And all, they will suddenly calm down because really it's about I want to connect. Children throw tantrums, but so do parents, so do marriages.  Yeah.  They look different. Agreed. I hope so, kind of. I'm hoping they aren't throwing things, but and punching things.

But, so adults throw tantrums by giving people the silent treatment.  Yes, that's true. That's the common, yeah, common solution,  solution, not solution, common solution among the couples usually just to avoid anything else.  Yeah. But that just keeps breaking the connection.  And then the courage to go back and to touch and to smile and to give a nice compliment to even say please and thank you just takes way more courage to do that because the connection is so free. 

Yeah. If we can keep that connection strong,  then the rest of it's much easier to do.  That's so true. Yeah. Isn't  it? That having that tenderness. And even when we're under tension,  being able to say you're number one to me.  So I'll tell you a little story. So I've been married, I think this may will be 46 years, meaning I've known my husband 49  years.

It's a long time, but don't tell anybody that because,  you know, yeah we have made a very good relationship.  Early on when we got married, we moved from Michigan to California and he started law school, I finished undergrad and somebody said to us in law school when we were looking on the bulletin board, because there wasn't internet, about where to live.

So we're looking on the bulletin board, people are posting. Yeah, where there are different places to live. And somebody walks by and says, are you newlyweds and new here? And we're grinning and yeah, we are. We are. All right. So  excited.  I'm nervous. So I don't have a clue. And he walked by and said, you won't be when you're done. 

As in, you won't be married. 

Wow. We see this as a little act of God because we dug our heels in and said, heck yes, we will be married.  And so that, that's one. Now, fast forward about a year and a half, we have had our first child and we're law school. Here is a three year run.  And we're still in law school, and we're struggling with finances are this big, right?

I've just finished school, and I can work some, but we aren't by any grandparents, we're by ourselves. So we have to work on child care on our own, and balancing that with costs, with just a myriad of things.  And Chip sat down one night, so I was working a 3 to 11 shift, and I would come home, I was working with juvenile delinquents.

And I would come home and my hair smelled of smoke because at that point kids were allowed smoke breaks. The 13th. Oh, wow. But they get a smoke break. And so they sit by me and they chat while they have a smoke break. I don't smoke except for their smoke, but  I would come home, I didn't realize how bad I smelled.

I figured it out later. Like all of a sudden I smelled my hair and went, oh,  man, anyways. And he said, I have something to tell you and I'm  at 1130 at night, what do you have to tell me?  Because I'm nervous, right? Yes. I'm and he said, if  our marriage is too stressed and I need to become a goat farmer, I will. 

Wow. Farmer.  He raised goats. He knew a little bit about goats. He raised goats as a kid.  But what he was saying is, I will give up my dream to keep this marriage. Yeah.  Wow.  Okay, do you see what that did to our connection?  Because I would, no way are we losing this marriage and no way are you losing your dream. 

Yeah. 

How do you feel when she said that?  I was just, like, stunned. I was so busy  with trying to hold the house together and and hold a job and learn how to be a mom and just do all of that on my own. I wasn't paying much attention to the marriage.  And Chip read that as, I don't care.  I know. And it wasn't that I didn't care.

It was that I, it was like I had a hundred dollars and I was spending 95 on it and just trying to stay alive  and five of it on marriage.  And he just said if we are overtaxing ourselves and you only have 5 left for the marriage,  then we're going to stop this nonsense.  Wow. We made some shifts  that gave me more room to have energy for marriage. 

Okay. I think there are lots of people who stay in a marriage, but they don't have a marriage.  Yeah.  And I think it's becoming very common nowadays, especially. Yes. Okay. But we have to say those tender things to each other and mean it.  Yeah. My first business is my connection with you. 

Okay. At the end of the day, I don't care if we're rich or we're poor. We can't hit, we can't. I think that how do I want to say that? We can't assume riches.  And that's what they say, catastrophes happen all the time. You just watch the fires in California right now,  following those Californias burning up from wildfires.

Yeah. The rich and the poor are losing their houses like this.  Yes. There's no stop. Yes. And those riches are gone.  Correct.  Okay. They still have a house payment. Doesn't matter if it's burned to the ground.  Okay. Yeah you're back to the basic Do I have you and do you have me?  Yeah.  It's how connected you are and to continue that journey.

Yes, it is. And to do it with that compassion that says, I want to hear you well, and I want to be heard. I want to honor you and respect you.  I want to help you  and I want you to help me  agree things together.  Yeah. And it's like what they say. They take two hands to clap. It's not just one. Yes. Good words.

Yes.  Wow.  Thank you for sharing that story. Yeah. And so that's really where I want to encourage couples at any age and stage. I want to make your family happy. Take care of your marriage.  Yeah. And as the kids see that your energy is going into deeply loving and accepting someone, they will trust your love and acceptance towards them. 

Okay. It translates. Yes. Agree.  And it's so clear now with all the visual that you just shown  and all of the stories that you have shared.  It's so much clearer that it is so important  to maintain both.  Thank you. The first one, the marriage, and the second one is the kids. Yes, it's got to do this, right?  Yes.

It's got to do this, and then it does this. It's not this. This  doesn't work.  Agree.  You've got to flip it around.  Wow. Thank you for that, Jen. It's really insightful and it's really helpful for all the audience here who is listening to us, and also to understand better why we should do that, how 20 percent of the words are spinning.

remembered  or get in her brain, but 80 percent is from the action that we do.  They have to go together.  Wow. And I would like to inform  all the audience here that if you really have further question on marriages and parenting, of course you can come to Jen as well. So Jen, you have a  freebie for the audience here.

I do. I like to talk to couples and people individually. I like to give encouragement and  I like to offer to anyone who wants this, a 60 minute phone call to talk about what's going on with you and to just from my very outside point of view, give you some support and some encouragement.  This isn't a sales call.

I do offer long term coaching. I offer programs and videos, but this call is a call to just support you and cheer you on. If you want to talk about product, we'll talk about products and other means of support that are longer lasting. But this one would be just to pick you up a little bit and give  you a little boost.

Wow. Jen. There, I think you will have the link for that. There'll be a Calendly link. Yes. To look at my calendar. I'm an Eastern Standard Time in Michigan. In your Singapore space, you're getting ready for bed and I'm just getting ready for my day.  That's true. Yeah. I'll be sharing the link on the show notes and whoever would like to have more tips and more support from Jen do book her time from the link in the show notes and not.

And I have to say that from this conversation, I not only the audience here and even for myself, I learn a lot and a lot of things that we do not realize it because we're so busy doing  a lot of things every day that we forget. all the basic stuff that we are supposed to do chore  and to take care of.

Yeah. Wow. And I hope all the audience are able to take back, to  get all the nuggets that Jen has shared and most importantly, wearing the book. We have. We wear a lot of hats and we have to take care of how to build a connection between the hats so that you maintain that and it won't be blown off from your head.

Exactly. Good point. Yes. And if it does go, get it, put it back on.  That's true. Yeah.  Just get it back on.  All right. Thank you, Jen, for being here. I'm so honored to have you here to share with all the audience here. Yes, it has been a true joy talking with you and getting to know you, and I'm excited to be able to share this with the audience and I hope it's really encouraging to them as well.

So thank you very much.  Yes. Thank you, Jen. And thank you everyone for listening and stay tuned for the next episode with Jen as well. She's going to share more if you want more information.  All right. Have a good day and or have you have a good evening wherever you are. See you.