Episode 281: 11 Lessons From Lillie As She Turns 11 Years Old

No need to whine, it's whiny palooza. Have some wine and join us on the whiny palooza podcast with Rebecca Greene.

Welcome to the whiny palooza podcast. I'm your host, Rebecca Greene. I'm a wife, mother of 3, and licensed clinical social worker. I also have 3 fur babies at home too. My passion has always been to help children and their families. I always dreamed of being a wife and a mother. Parents are always learning through their struggles, failures, and successes and joys. I am no stranger to this wild ride of parenting, and I know behind every great parent lies a team of supportive friends and family. I want to be part of your support system. I want you to know that you are not alone. We are in this parenting world together. Join me every week for insightful discussions with experts on parenting and marriage, as well as other parents who have found the secret to successes in parenthood. You'll learn tips and tricks to make life with your family better than ever. I hope you will follow along with me while we dive into what it takes to achieve a happy family.

We're live.

Hello everyone, happy Winey Palooza Wednesday.

Merde, it's Winey Palooza Wednesday. Have some wine and join us on Winey Palooza Wednesday with the Greene family.

Um, I don't know if you were outside at all, but did you notice that it's October 4th? Is it October 4th?

Would outside have noticed me?

And it was like 80 degrees today.

Yes, our air conditioning on our second floor stopped working yesterday and it was 80 degrees inside.

Oh, I didn't know that.

I forgot to tell you. We all moved upstairs until the AC people came today to fix it.

Wait a second, back up. Tumped. What, what happened?

Air conditioning stopped working on our second floor.

Okay.

The heat went up to 79 degrees because it was hot out.

Okay.

We moved to the third floor because the third floor AC worked, so we all hid upstairs where it was cold until today when the AC people came and fixed it.

I— you have me all confused with floors. Oh my Lord, what is the first floor to you?

The first floor isn't us, that's the mortgage broker and the accountant.

Oh, you're talking about the building?

Yes.

Oh my God, I thought you were talking about home, and I was like, no, DC works fine. I was like, what on earth is he talking about? You have me all confused. Can you say at work?

I, I didn't know. I apparently— I didn't know I needed to.

Okay, you did not tell me any of that stuff at work. At work.

So that's not what we're here to talk about.

Well, I would like to kiss your ass before we move on to what we need to talk about. All right, because Oh, thank you for everything you did after work. I felt so bad because Seth got home at like 5:45. By the time Seth walked in, I felt like I was back to the little baby era when you came home from work and I was like, gone.

Yes.

And I was like, take over.

Yes.

That's how I felt today. So thank you for stepping in.

You're welcome.

And I appreciate you and I need you and I really needed you today.

So I took Lily to cheer, I assembled a vanity, I brought you— I brought Lily back from cheer, I finished assembling a vanity, and now we're live.

So Lily, for Lily's birthday, she wanted dressers, new dressers, and a vanity. Yes. So the vanity was expensive. So she got a vanity, and maybe for Hanukkah we'll work on the dressers.

I told her to order those with assembly, please.

I don't know how to do that. How do you order dressers that are assembled?

I'll show you. Yes, I want it assembled. That was 3 and a half hours of my life.

I'm sorry. I'm so sorry for all that work you did on the vanity. And as soon as we are done here, I am running upstairs to see what he has been working so hard on.

Days and days.

So our baby turned 11.

Yes, that's what we're here to talk about.

And she—

Jamie says buy from a furniture store. That was going to be one of my suggestions.

I am such an Amazon person. Actually, we bought that from Home Depot, right? That wasn't even from Amazon, right? But, um, maybe we can just—

Ashley Furniture.

I would imagine a furniture store is going to be more money, but we can check.

Might be worth it to save me all those hours.

I am an Amazon obsessed person.

11 Lessons from Lily Turning 11.

Would you like me to get to the topic?

Well, you did say some stuff.

Okay, I did say I needed to like be prompt tonight.

Yes.

So as Lily turned 11, I started to think about all the stuff that she has taught me. I would say, and Seth, you can disagree with me, I would say Lily is my greatest teacher. I begged for Lily. I asked Seth many, many times for a third child, and I feel like I was supposed to have her for so many reasons, one of which, man, does she make me grow. She doesn't give me a choice.

Excellent way to look at it.

No, she does not give me a choice. It's like, Mom, you're gonna grow, and I'm gonna make you grow, or this is gonna be really hard. Yes, do you agree? I have not been doing— I wrote this blog in such a good state. Yes, I think since I wrote this blog, I have not been in the best state. I think I have been shorter with her. I think I have been rushing her. I think I have had less patience for her.

You would think that writing this would make you even—

I was in a really good state when I was writing this, so I'm going to talk about it and it's going to put me back into a good state.

Awesome.

So hopefully I will get a good night's sleep and be a happy mother tomorrow. Awesome. Yeah, so what did I learn from Lily? So Seth, yes, how does fire and fire go together?

Makes more fire, makes it hotter, makes it explode.

So he says to me one day, honey, you're coming at her with fire and she's already fire, and you got to be water.

Gotta put her out.

You got to be the water, he tells me. Yes. So I had to learn to deal with Lily's storm, and what I was doing was I was making the storm worse. You're asking, and what I want to do is I want to be a source of my children's comfort and assistance and help. I don't want to be a source of their pain. I don't want to make it worse. I want to step in and I want to help her calm her storm.

Yes.

So I have to walk in with a good attitude of thinking to myself, this child is having a hard time. She doesn't know how to handle her feelings. She's overwhelmed. She's frustrated. She's angry. She's upset. She doesn't need you to have all those emotions too. So you're, you're 47 years old, get a hold of your emotions, get a hold of yourself, be a big girl, be the mother, and come in and help her. Right?

That's awesome.

I would say how many times out of out of 10 do I succeed? Maybe 6.

Hey, that's better than when it was 2 or 3.

It was zero. I'm trying to be nice. It was a big fat zero. And when our dynamics are not good, we have to observe and fix the dynamics.

Yes.

So I continue to work on this. Like I said, she's my greatest teacher.

Yes.

Okay, so one of the things that I have noticed, one of the themes I have noticed is that Lily's the youngest of 3 and our older 2 children are so smart and so capable. But guess what? So is Lily. And what I find is because she's the baby, because her older siblings are so capable, I tend to underestimate her. I tend to try to protect her more. I worry more. I don't need to do that. She's very smart. She's very capable and she's very strong. Do you see that I do that?

Yes.

And do you think that I have noticed and changed at all with that?

Yeah. You've gotten a lot better at all of these.

I think I was very much more protective than I am.

Yes. You are letting her stand on her own two feet, do things more all by myself.

All by myself. She's been telling us all by myself since she was 1 years old, and she wanted to put on her shoes. She didn't want me to do it, and she said all by myself. And that's where it all began, which brings me to number 3 of Lily likes to be in charge. So guess where she gets that from?

I have no idea.

You're so full of crap. You can be honest. You can— as I'm talking, you can throw me under the bus.

I'm doing a great job getting under the bus all by myself.

I am under the bus so many times a day. And I want to tell everyone that just because I might have insight into something, just because I might maybe know what the therapist would say, doesn't mean that I'm doing all of that. I'm—

I'm— nobody's perfect.

I'm learning. So Lily wants to be in charge. And I want to be in charge. So what I am realizing is let Lily be in charge when she can and when I can allow it. Give her choices, let her make decisions. Don't fight Lily for control all the time.

Doesn't work very well.

I don't need to be in control. It's, it's less work for me if I'm not in control. When other people want to be in control I— this is huge, a huge difference, okay? And I would say over the last few years I realized this. When other people want to take charge, I'm like, here you go, this is for you, have fun. Including Lily, okay? Lily needs one-on-one time. I think we all need one-on-one time. I think Lily really needs one-on-one time. What do you think about that?

For sure.

And I think that being the youngest maybe emphasizes that a little more. And one of her famous lines is, "Me too." Yeah, she says, "Me too," all the time. And I always say to her, "Honey, I'm not gonna forget you." Like, she'll be like, "Me too, me too." And I'm like, "I'm not gonna forget you, honey. You're very special." I give her attention. She wants to tell me long stories. She wants me to sit on her bed and talk to her. I will give her attention. She wants quality time and she wants one-on-one time. She does not want her siblings to go away to college, but she does want some spotlight.

Yes.

Right.

That's a whole nother topic.

Lily is a social butterfly. And what I mean by that is there are lots of days that I let her go from morning until late night socializing and doing things and going from one thing to the other.

Never enough.

And never enough is something that we will say to ourselves or to her. Like, it never feels like it's enough. She'll go on a play— she'll play, hang out with one of her friends, and then she'll be like, can we go to ice cream? Can we have a sleepover? Can we? Can we? Can we?

There's always another thing. There's never, I did the thing and I'm done. It's what's next? What's next? What's next?

But as I see things in her I see myself a lot. So it's like teaching me what is she unable to do for herself and what am I unable to do for myself. So I see the pattern of she doesn't know how to pace herself and guess what, I don't know how to pace myself. She gets it from me. I don't know how to say no to a lot of social engagements that maybe go on until forever.

And I think you've gotten better at that.

I think I have. I think I have much less of a need for it than I used to. I like home time. I tell Seth all the time that my favorite thing is takeout and a movie on a Saturday night. Like, that's my hot date. So what I am finding for Lily, which I see myself a lot in her, is that she does not know how to pace herself, right? And I have to help her pace herself and I have to help her get the rest because she might not do it for herself.

Right, she will go until she falls over.

So she makes me think about balance and pacing myself because I think that I reflect in her and see in her so much of me. Yeah, you agree with that?

I do. Um, she is your mini me.

Are you ready for this? I'm ready. I need to let Lily try new things. And I resist. I resist. And I think part of why I resist is our schedule. So if I can all relate, if I let her, she will make me even crazier and even busier.

What do you mean? I can only take 5 dance classes. So 7.

So she begged me for lacrosse this summer. And I ignored her several times thinking, cross? Really? And she was like, no, really, I really want to do lacrosse with my friends. I'm gonna like it, and please let me. And did you sign me up? And did you sign me up? And did you sign me up? And I finally signed her up, and I was like, just let her try it. If she hates it, then you wasted X number of dollars, right? So I signed her up, and guess what?

What?

She loved it.

She did.

And it just kind of reinforced for me that she's adventurous and she's fun and she likes to try new things. And she also reminds me to try new things. Yes, because we can get stuck in a rut. Yes. And I like her suggestions of doing new things. So I need to not hold her back and I need to let her be the fun, adventurous, spunky, silly girl that she is.

She is on the— driving the fun bus like you.

Okay, just go with it. Let's, let's laugh about this. We don't want to resist Lily. So let's talk about the car rides, Seth. So the car rides lately have been, and this morning, uh, on the way to school, have been Lily and her friends doing TikToks that are on the verge of being obnoxious. And don't even Dart, please.

I'm like, we got to 9 on the car ride to cheer.

Oh my God, I can't even. So do you see that he's just going with it? Thank God you drove her. I don't want to do it.

You don't want to do marshmallow?

No. So Lily and her friend are doing this thing over and over and over, and they're laughing and they're giggly and they're loud and they're clapping. And, and I have 2 choices. I have lots more than 2, but here are 2 choices. Yes, I can be annoyed or I can go with it and I can be entertained and laugh and even join in.

Yes.

And Seth had the same experience.

She did not warn me that this was going to happen. I was suddenly surprised by why are these girls doing this thing and laughing hysterically every 2 seconds. Not if you're driving. And I had to figure it out and go, oh, they stack on top of each other, and go, oh, I can say the things too and help you.

Well, just in general, when she's being silly and loud and laughing and getting mad at her and trying to stifle her doesn't work.

Doesn't work with you either. You go, don't stifle my feelings.

Why do we want to tell her not to laugh? Why do we want to tell her not to clap? Why do we want to tell her not to sing or dance? Like, just go with it and have fun and let her be herself. Yes, it goes a lot smoother when we do that. Uh, Which leads to—

Melissa says, this is when my mom would ask me how many times did we do the Macarena, and then I try harder to go with it. That's a good point. Yes.

Oh my gosh. Or—

and the funny part is, we were in high school when that came out, and we learned it and did it a million times, and now somehow it's back in style and our kids are doing it all over again. I'm like, didn't I do this 20, 30-plus years ago?

Yes, yes you did. Yes, you did. Okay, I have written adjust expectations accordingly. And what do I mean by that? Things change minute to minute with Lily. One minute she's telling me about her full day and she's going, I'm gonna do this and then I'm gonna do this and then you can you take me here Then can you take me here? Oh, and I forgot to do this. And my head is spinning and I'm overwhelmed. And I'm thinking to myself, kid, you can't take up my whole day. I have my own stuff to do.

You do.

And then the next minute she says, oh, never mind. I think I'm going to rest and do my homework. And I'm like, what? Like things just change like that. Have you noticed that?

I have.

Or she goes to school and she's like, I think I might fail my math test. Test. And I'm like, just do your best. What am I supposed to say at this point? She's got a math test. I was like, if you can study in homeroom, study in homeroom. And then she comes home and she's like, I think I did my math test. And I'm like, she went from I'm gonna fail to I think I did well. I just have to—

it's a roller coaster. You can't let her drive it.

It's a roller coaster. So, so don't let her drive the roller coaster of Lily.

Don't let her drive the emotional roller coaster. Don't ride it with her. You taught me that in regards to work and clients.

Okay, so what are you doing instead?

I'm driving a roller coaster.

Okay, so how are you driving the roller coaster?

Um, being more— being in charge, having more emotion. Whoever has the more certain— more certainty wins. So being certain and communicating that generally gets people to follow along.

Isn't that interesting? That is number 11. Oh, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm gonna go back to number 9 because I want to go to number 11 because you're talking about it. And what I wrote is that I have to hold steady for Lily. And what I mean by that is that if I say no and she hears the consistency and the firmness and she knows that it's non-negotiable then things go well. If I'm consistent and firm, things go well. She likes consistency, just like you like consistency. Yes, she totally gets that from you. I do not have that need.

That is one thing on that list she gets from me.

She gets— is that the only thing? I might have to go over this again. I don't know. I don't know. I might disagree with that, but we'll get back to that.

Yeah.

Okay, so If I waver, things go south and we start fighting.

Because she smells the weakness, senses the weakness and will push.

That was so good. That was so good. Okay, so going back to number 9, don't rush. Avoid rushing at all costs. It's like the epitome of how to fight and lose control with Lily. Right? Yes. So let's go back to the 1-year-old who wanted to do her shoes herself. And what if I needed to be somewhere? I was like, I was like, how long are you gonna do your shoes? So I have to give us plenty of time to be somewhere, which I'm not always successful at. I have to be like, we're gonna leave at such and such a time, and I have to give her warnings. And she reminds me, because when I'm rushing, I'm frazzled. I have to ask you about that. How have I gotten with rushing? Do you remember the craziness?

I remember the crazy rushing lady.

Okay, so how is the crazy rushing lady doing now?

You are much less crazy.

I was really crazy.

You were.

I would like lose my shit because we were going to be late. And now I'm like, what's more important, my mental sanity?

Yes.

Or being late?

Yes.

And I've also noticed that when I think I'm gonna be late I'm— I don't tend to be late.

It works out.

So I need to not rush her. I need to not rush me. I— we need to try to give ourselves enough time. Can't always succeed at that. We were— we were going to be late for her cheer showcase. And do you remember what I said to her? You thought it was hysterical.

You did. You said, I don't have time for your feelings.

I don't know that that's my proudest mom moment.

That was a good line. We don't have time for your feelings right now.

I was like, save them for later. I was like, we needed to leave like yesterday. So can we not have feelings right now?

And they did start the cheer showcase late. Well, so I got all the way home, got all the way back, and still had 10 minutes when I got there.

Well, and I thought about that when Max asked for his key and I was frantic.

Yes.

And I was like, why are you frantic? Do you think they're going to start on time? So, okay, when I told you about this topic, do you remember what you said to me because it was a really good line.

Which time? No, I don't.

You said some really good lines about Lily and you said you needed to meet her where she is.

Oh yes, yes.

Okay, so do you want to talk about that or do you want me to talk about that?

You're doing— you're on a roll.

So Seth calls it emotional rapport. Yes. Which I love. I love that you use that. And you said she wants to feel understood, she wants to feel heard. And she wants to feel understood. And when Lily feels heard and understood, everything goes better. And guess who's just like that?

Yes. When I am allowed to jump in and notice that she's starting to go sideways and can say, okay, tell me, okay, I hear you. Okay. I would be upset if that happened to me too. Your mother's not really mad at you. Like she's just overwhelmed or whatever. She calms down.

Well, and the other thing in that dynamic that I see happening is that we're good at tagging each other in without words. It's like, you'll just look at me and be like, she needs to— yes, it's time out. You're like, it's my turn, I gotta try. Because as much as we might know how to handle our kids, it doesn't mean we're in a good enough state to give them what they need. Correct.

We have our own feelings that we don't have time for.

Well, I, I have to attempt to take good enough care of myself to be in a good state for my kids. Yes. And my sleep is very different with the high school schedule. I'm not doing so well with it.

No.

And for some reason, 5 o'clock seems to be my new wake-up time. So I'm noticing that my emotional resilience is not what it used to be.

Yes, sleep deprivation will do that to you. Jamie says, it's the same thing when you get down on their level, eye to eye, when they're having a meltdown, they need the attention. I see and hear you type of response. You're absolutely right, Jamie.

Yeah, I think she wants to be heard. She wants to be seen. She wants to know that we understand her feelings. She wants to tell me all about her feelings. I love that she wants to talk to us. I need to cherish this. Yes, I need to hope that when she's 16, she still wants to talk to us.

Okay, you can get all the details about all the feelings when she is 16.

Oh, you think she's not going to want to talk to you too?

Okay, we'll see where we end up. And approval seeking too, says Jamie, for sure.

Yeah, Jamie knows. Jamie knows. Jamie is dealing with her own 4 kids, and, and what Jamie and I have realized is that her 4 kids all need different things, and my 3 kids need all different things.

Yes.

So we have learned to differentiate between who needs what.

Yes.

It doesn't mean we're perfect. It doesn't mean we get it right every time, but we know our kids. We know what we— what they need. And, you know, I think that Lily is her own person. And though— I mean, those are 11 big lessons that we've learned.

Yeah, I think that is one of my favorite blogs of this year that you did.

That makes me so happy when you say that. I wrote this and realized, because it is a blog at winingplaza.com— I forget to say that we're talking about the blog, but, uh, I did write it and I did post it, and I should say Kristen posted it. And what did I want to say about the blog though? When I was writing it, what I realized is that it's not only helped me with Lily, but it's helped me in all my relationships. She's helped me be better with you.

Yeah.

And she's helped me be better in all of my relationships. So definitely my greatest teacher, definitely is supposed to be here, definitely is supposed to be making her mother grow. Okay, you're gonna ask me about the podcast. Who's on the podcast? So Jessica Sonarski is on the podcast and she talks about brain science and you're gonna love her and you're gonna learn from her and she tells us that we want to be the boss of our brain and I love that. I love that she says that. So please listen and please review it and please rate it and please share it with someone that you think would benefit from hearing it.

Amen.

Uh, the Winey Palooza Mom group is having an October challenge, so come and find it on Facebook. And it's a private group, so you need to request, and I can approve you joining it. And you can win prizes, and you can get support. And anything else you want to share?

Thank you for watching Winey Palooza Wednesday with the Greene family.

Thank you everyone. Have a wonderful week.

Thank you for tuning in to the Winey Palooza podcast. If you like what you heard, please be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. While you are there, leave a review. I love to hear your feedback. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time.

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