70 - Anneke Elmhirst and Emotional Regulation Tips for Parents and Kids 25/11/24

Anneke (pronounced UH-nuh-kuh) is a coach with a background in both corporate and clinical settings, having worked as a clinical director, supervisor, and behavior analyst. Based in Pittsburgh, PA, she supports clients worldwide through phone and video conferencing. Anneke specializes in coaching professionals with ADHD, autism, and related neurodivergent experiences. She brings personal insight to her practice, as she has been diagnosed with ADHD, depression, anxiety, and PTSD.

Website: www.Anneke-Elmhirst.com

Instagram: www.instagram.com/allforlovecoaching

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Website: www.everybrainisdifferent.com

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TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to the Everybrain is Different podcast. We're here with Anika Elmhurst and she is a relationship coach specializing in neurodivergence. She used to be a behavior analyst, but pivoted when she realized she could make a larger more values aligned impact through her coaching. Welcome to the show.

We're so excited to have you on. It's so good to be here. Thank you for having me. Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit more about how you're involved in the neurodivergent community? Sure. So I personally am neurodivergent. I, as an adult got a diagnosis of ADHD, which looking back on everything throughout my childhood makes so much sense.

Um, I am very active in my, uh, local neurodivergent community. And honestly, I can't think of a single like close friend I have who's not some flavor of neurodivergent themselves. It's, um, Um, it's, it's, it's, it's sort of a lifestyle at this point. It's funny that you mentioned about like all your friends being neurodivergent of some kind.

I feel like we all just kind of like flock together. So you're running packs. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So we like to ask people who come on who are late diagnosed neurodivergent, like what made you seek that diagnosis? What made you realize, Oh, I might be neurodivergent. For a long time, I thought I couldn't possibly have ADHD because my mother has ADHD and we present very differently.

Uh, the, and, and some of that was in relation to each other. When I was younger and lived at home, the faster she went and the more hyped up she got, the slower I got. And I always thought that That meant that I couldn't possibly have this same label that she had. Um, and then I started learning a little bit more about it.

And as I educated myself and as I was working with, um, kids with autism and ADHD, I was seeing myself reflected in them so much that I eventually just sort of went. Maybe having this label could help me. I think self assigned labels can be incredibly powerful and important. Whereas externally applied labels, your mileage may vary.

Yeah, for sure. And I like what you said about being different presenting. Um, I don't know if you felt this way, but if anyone around me is like amped up or escalated, I can maintain. The energy, like equalize the energy or something. So me and my best friend in college would always be like, well, if you're angry, I can't be angry because I need to like equalize the energy.

We both can't be angry. So one of us needs to like, not be like super happy, but like. Look at the brighter side of things. Is that, did you experience that? Yeah, absolutely. I always felt like the situation needed the situation needed balance. I knew that if I amped up, it wouldn't. Help her in any way, and it certainly wouldn't help me.

It would just mean that there were two frantic people running around the house. So instead, I needed to slow down, calm down, and hopefully that would pull her down as an anchor. Didn't necessarily work that way, but I did my best. Yeah, and I think you bring up a good point. That, um, we can do that with people and especially with our kids.

So when we're parenting, if you're escalating with your kid, that's just going to make them escalate more. And so if you can maintain like self regulation and maintain the calm, that you can help bring them back down to where they need to be so that they don't get so escalated that. You know, they have a meltdown or whatever or hurt themselves or whatever is going to happen.

But if you amp up and they're going to amp up and then everyone's just going to keep going up and up and up until bad things happen. Yeah, it was a skill that really came in handy when I started working residentially. Um, kids with severe support needs, but, um, it was, it, it was a hard earned skill to be.

How did you develop that skill? Like, how did you, um, you know, get better at it? Cause it can be really hard. I think, uh, there was, there was a lot of, there was a lot of trial and error involved, honestly. Um, especially, you know, as, as a child, when you're. You're essentially learning by your by your own statistics.

Um, and I'm, I'm fascinated with child language learning and how it's statistically applied, but that's a whole mother. That's a whole separate topic. Um, and so I think that I. Um, I learned very, very early on that by getting escalated, nothing, how I didn't feel better afterwards. I, I didn't get what I wanted out of the situation because normally what I wanted was just for everyone to calm down.

Um, and it didn't feel good to be to be amped up like that I didn't, I didn't feel empowered I felt out of control. Um, and so I, and so I very quickly sort of learned that adaptive skill of if, if I present my point calmly, the other person is much more likely to take it calmly. Sometimes that didn't work.

Sometimes me escalating did actually fix the situation because it took people aback because I was so calm. Usually even keel, they went, Oh my gosh, Annika is yelling. We better sit up and pay attention. Cause she never does that. Um, but that, that was, that was rare. And I found that, um, I found that keeping my, keeping my energy calm was a much calm in, in more regular sense was a much easier way to manage various situations.

Yeah. Yeah. That's awesome. Um, I think also, you know, if you stay calm, like you said, If you didn't stay calm, then you, you didn't get what you wanted anyway. You didn't feel good about how you are acting. And so when you did stay calm, you can still feel successful and still feel like you're doing what you want to do and being the person you want to be.

Um, that's, I don't know. That's what I heard from that. And that's what I usually tell parents who like in the parenting with confidence program, we work on self regulation and I'm like. I always tell a story about when my son had a meltdown because I wasn't doing positive parenting strategies and I felt like a terrible parent because I escalated with him.

But then the day that I didn't escalate with him, um, I, he still cried. He still was mad, you know, but I felt successful as a parent and his meltdown did not last nearly as long as it did when I was escalated. Yeah, absolutely. I, I think that, I think that once you, once you have that, that successful touchstone, you can come back to that in, in, in the future.

When you start to ramp up again, you go, Oh wait, I know that I can remain calm. And I know that remaining calm makes me feel better in the long run. So having that to, to borrow from my behavior analytic past, having that reinforcement come in and create a cycle is really powerful. Yeah, for sure. I love that.

So tell us more about your behavior analytic days and how you got to where you are today. Sure. So I, um, like I mentioned, I actually started in a residential home, uh, for kids with severe support needs. Um, ages 12 to 21, I think, were what we had in the house. And, um, I loved those kids. I loved working with them and the whole, uh, school and residence was set up in a behavior analytic framework.

So I thought, well, I want to work with autistic people. Let me just, let me just jump both feet first into this. And my master's program went great. It was all, you know, let's, these are, these are tools that you can use to foster understanding and communication. That's, that's cool. That's great, right? That's what we want.

Um, unfortunately, after my master's program, I moved to Pennsylvania, and the state of behavior analysis in Pennsylvania is a little, a little rough. Um, and I, I discovered that a lot of the clinicians that I worked with, I eventually became a clinical director at a local behavioral health organization.

They were focusing not on fostering understanding and two way communication. But they were focusing on, well, I have these tools to change behavior. Let me leverage them to force neurotypical looking behavior. And that's not what I, I, I see you shaking your head, Lauren. That's not, that's not what I was about.

That's not. That's not what I wanted to do. And I stayed thinking I can, I can fix the system. I can fix the system. And eventually I went, I am one person. And for every clinician I managed to get through to there's You know, a dozen more up and coming ones who have not done this work to examine their biases and to really put the ethical legwork in.

Um, so as, like, as much as I miss the kids, I really couldn't do it anymore. Um, and while I was, I was still in a behavior analytic role, but I was searching for something else. Um, my mother posited coaching. I went. That I couldn't, I couldn't possibly do that. And then I took my first course and I was absolutely hooked.

It is, um, very much, it very much feels like a calling for me. That's great. So what coaching do you do? Like, how do you do your coaching? Because I know there's very different views when it comes to coaching. Yeah. So I, I always put this massive caveat when I talk about coaching because coaching is very unregulated and anyone can call themselves a coach.

Um, I am currently going through, actually next week I finish up my certification with the Coactive Training Institute. And once I get my certification with them, I'll be able to get my certificate from the International Coaches Federation, which is, as far as there is one, the governing body of coaches.

So, as, as to what coaching is, um, I describe it sort of as the difference between having a contractor come to your house. Which would be a therapist and an interior designer coming in. A contractor you get in when there's a problem. You get them to come in and fix a leak in your plumbing or patch a hole in your roof.

And if the problem is chronic, they can help you develop strategies for ongoing, ongoing management, such as meds, for example. Um, and then an interior designer comes in when your house. Functions just fine, but it's not the way that you want it. There's something missing. You're stuck in some way. There's, there's some level of discontent with your life.

Disconnect with your values, perhaps. And the coach comes in and really grills you in a way on what do you want? What, what are your goals? What are your aspirations? All things being equal, put all the practical thoughts aside. What is your dream environment? And they essentially support you in building that.

Um, and the difference, the difference, there's a difference also between a coach and, um, a consultant. A consultant is a specialist in a particular field, and you ask them to fix a problem for you, and they come back with, Here's a list of all the things you need to do to fix the problem. Um, A coach just asks you questions.

A good coach probably is almost never going to tell you what to do. Even when they give you homework, they're going to say, are you willing to do this? Or is there something that you think would suit your goals and your outlook currently better? That's a very long winded response. No, I love that response because there's so many people I was like.

Are you a consultant? Are you a coach? Are like, I know what a therapist is obviously, but like, what's the difference between the three? And there's so many people that say, you know, like, um, do coaching over therapy, even though you had like this crazy traumatic thing happened that you probably need, like, A little more behind it.

That's what I like to say. Um, so yeah, so I like how you said that coaches are for when everything's relatively okay. You just need some guidance, I guess, like in an area that you really want to focus on. Is that what? Yeah, I have, I have clients come to me, um, sometimes because they've had bad experiences with therapists.

On to a therapist and the therapist has said, well, you don't have PTSD, you, you're, you're just because autistic people can't have PTSD. And I just sit, I just sit here going, okay, so part of our plan for you is to find you an actual decent therapist who's not going to say something like that to you because that's just wrong.

Yeah, for sure. Um, yeah, I love all that. Thank you for giving that, as you said, long with an explanation. I think it was perfect. So don't worry about that. Um, let's talk. We're going to shift a little bit. And I know you talked about your parenting role, like not necessarily your parenting role, but parents in that role.

Um, What like strategies can you give parents to really keep their identity and not having their identity subsumed into parenting because that is so easy to do and I think it takes a toll on your mental health when you do that. It absolutely does. I mean, not just not just in the here and now, but in the long term once.

For example, the kids leave the nest. I've seen parents completely dissolve because they don't have that structure anymore. They don't have that person who's. On the daily dependent on them. So I think being really mindful about who you want to be and how you want to show up for your child as well as in the rest of your life.

So understanding that parent is a role that you've taken on. It's not the completeness of your identity. Um. And there's, there's multiple, there's multiple strategies to balance that. Um, if you are co parenting with someone, then having, um, having offset schedules where maybe one of you handles the morning routine, one of you handles the evening routine so that someone gets to sleep in or someone gets to go to bed early.

Um, having an off shift where for most of the time you are working together, but there are times when it is one or the other, just so that's, so that people need, people need breaks. I mean, being, uh, especially being a stay at home parent, if your kids aren't in school yet, that's a, a full time job and a half.

And so your partner, I think. What, especially if you're co parenting and co nesting living in the same household needs to understand that. Even if they're working a nine to five you're working more than that. It's not, um, an equitable distribution isn't just about how much money is brought into the household, unfortunately, and a lot of people, I think, struggle to understand that or to rationalize it to themselves.

Um, I know a lot of, a lot of people who think, well, I'm the, I'm the partner who's not working or not working as much, or doesn't have quite as high paying of a job, I need to compensate in all of these ways. And maybe there's some balancing that can be done, but overall. You need to make sure that, that you have a break because otherwise you're going to burn out and that's going to have a negative effect on you and on your kid.

Um, but I think one of the best things that parents can do is model. appropriate emotional regulation and problem solving skills. So we can't just say to our kids, these are the things that you should do, and then not actually demo any of them in real life. If you are getting upset, it is so okay to tell your kid, I am upset.

I am going to put myself in a timeout. I will come back in three minutes and we will keep talking about this. And you can do that as many times as you need to, to avoid yelling at your child. We almost, we almost have a sense of like, using these active tools is a sign of immaturity. I think it's the opposite.

I think it's a sign of maturity to be able to notice yourself and say, I need to take, you know, 10 seconds of deep breathing. And show your child that it is okay to do that in the middle of a conversation. Yes. Yes. I say that all the time. Like, I read this research thing that said that kids who are neurodivergent, they have high emotional empathy, but low cognitive empathy.

And so they don't understand the emotion, they feel the emotion, but they don't understand what they're feeling. And they don't understand what to do with it. So like you were saying about modeling, if we model how we're feeling and we give a name to what we're looking like and what we're feeling, Then our kids can learn, Oh yeah, that's what mad looks like.

That's what frustrated looks like. And this is what they're doing because they're frustrated. So it's good for us because we take the time out that we need, and then it's good for our kids because they're learning what those emotions mean. And what to do when you feel a certain emotion. And it's really difficult for a lot of parents who may have been brought up in households where it wasn't safe to show their emotions or their coping mechanisms.

So for a lot of parents, my advice is go to therapy yourself. And, and work on undoing that, that, that knot that that's holding you back from being able to truly emote and express and feel it. Because if you're trying to model someone who's, who's calm and composed at all times, your kids are going to either.

Find a way to break you because they always do or they will think well Something must be wrong with me because I I can't be like that Men, I was told my whole life not by my parents, but other people that I was too much I was too dramatic. I was too emotional. I was too whatever I was to everything And so I learned just to like stuff my emotions down deep And that, that is not healthy.

So, and then it would just like, I would explode in crying over the smallest thing. Like I remember one year I was at a family Christmas party and I was getting the lasagna out of the oven and I had to cut it up and somebody was like, are you sure you don't want to make up smaller? I don't know if we have enough for everyone.

And I put the knife or whatever I was using on the table and I just stopped. And they're like, what is wrong with you? What did I do? And my cousin, like it was my cousin that came over, you know, and was like, are you sure you don't want to make a smaller just in case, you know, so we don't, so we make sure we have enough.

And he was like, he went over to my mom. He's like, I don't know exactly what happened, but Sam is crying and I think I made her cry and I don't know what to do now. And it was not about the lasagna. It was that I had been keeping in all my emotions. Cause I didn't want to appear too much. And so that was like, just the final thing that pushed me over the edge.

It's never about the lasagna. It's never about the lasagna, but yeah, I just still, I wonder if my cousin remembers that. He was like traumatized. I was just like, yeah. I have so many stories like that. I have one, my mom and I still look at each other and go, it's not about the dress. Oh, yeah. About the dress.

That's our version. Nice. Yeah. Yeah. So, if you don't want your child to like freak out over small things, let them express their emotions over, over small things. And you can show your kid you're expressing your emotion over small things so you don't let it just erupt when they pile on too much. Yeah. I just.

I just think that's so important. Yeah, and tell your kids, like, I'm frustrated right now. Like, it's okay to tell your kids that you're frustrated with them. It's okay to be like, I'm frustrated with you. Like, what you're doing is frustrating me, so I'm going to go do this, and then we're going to talk about it, or then we're going to, like, address it, or whatever, you know?

It's so interesting because a lot of us, I, uh, okay, I can't speak for everyone. I'm going to speak for me right now. I equated for so long any expression of anger or frustration with the harm that it might That it caused. So I equated just saying I'm angry with screaming at someone. And so it took me a long time to come to terms with anger as an emotion.

Because I thought, oh, well every time someone's angry at me, they scream at me. I don't ever want to do that to someone else, therefore I'll just hold off on feeling anger. And, uh, spoiler alert, doesn't work. Yeah, for sure. I've never worked like that. Yeah. I was working with a kid, we were working on emotions, and I asked her how she felt.

I said, you look sad, are you sad? And she said, I can't feel sad, I have to be happy. And I'm like, um, no, you can feel sad, like it's okay, you can feel sad, you can feel angry, you can feel all the emotions, it's what you do when you feel that emotion that's important. And she's only three years old. So it's, you know, like I can't go too in depth, but she just said that.

And I was like, okay, now we need to work on the, all emotions are okay to fail. You know, all emotions have a place. They have a reason they have a time when you feel them. It's what you do when you feel that emotion that is important. You know? So if you're angry, you're not going to go yell and and like break things, but you can feel angry and that's okay.

So my heart yeah, and I told her mom and her mom was like I don't know where she got that from because we say all emotions are okay You know like I think it's just this thing like you were saying that you know if she just learned somewhere from someone the Feeling angry and feeling sad is bad and you have to be happy and I don't know where Yeah, so anyway, but kids pick up on things like, on small things that we don't even think about that they pick up on those and then they internalize them to the point that that might happen where we don't even know why, you know, but it's just something to think about, I guess.

Yeah, I think, I think it's important also that That we accept to a level that that's going to happen, no matter what we do or say, like the way that we use language is so vast and complex. And I think that as, as, as parents, you can't beat yourself up. If your kid does come up with something and say like, Oh, but you said this this one time.

Um, because it might, it might not even be something that you explicitly said to them. It might, it might be something that they. That they had the, like you said, like you said earlier that they had the emotional intelligence to gather, but not the cognitive intelligence to understand the why. So they said, Oh, you know, I guess my parent gets upset when I do this, even though the parents upsetness had nothing to do with that, with them doing that.

It's just, it's so complicated being a little kid, and it's so complicated being a parent and we need to have so much grace for both of us. Grace. Yes. Have grace for yourself as a parent. Have grace with your kids. Like no, I said this this morning to one of my, um, coaching clients for parenting. You know, I was like, no one's a perfect parent.

It's fine. You're going to make mistakes. Give yourself grace. Keep your kid grace. It's all going to be okay. Yeah. So I really liked that you brought that up. Give yourself grace. Give your kids grace. You don't know what your kids internalizing or what they're picking up or what they're remembering. I remember something that my grandpa said when I was 12 years old.

It was just a passing comment for him and I internalized that comment and I had taken it with me through my life and he probably doesn't even remember saying it, you know? So, um, but yes, but thank you for everything you said. What resources do you have for parents, whether it's things that you made or other resources that you recommend?

Um, I offer a half hour, uh, free confidential coaching session, um, just to see, you know, have a discussion about what your goals are, et cetera. Um, see if coaching might be a good fit. Um. I have a list. Is it live on my website yet? I have a list of resources. Um, it's either going to go live on my website tonight or tomorrow.

I genuinely don't remember. Yeah. But it is a list of, uh, resources on neurodivergence. Nice. So go to your website. And where can people find you online to find that information? Sure. Um, my website is just my name with a hyphen in the middle. So A N N E K E hyphen E L M H I R S T dot com. Nice. Awesome. Well, thank you so much.

Our last question is, what do you do for fun? Okay. I have ADHD. I'm going to try to make this as short as possible. Um, I do embroidery. Nice. Oh, I almost lost my hook there. I do crochet. Um, I build miniatures. I don't have any of those in the room at the moment. I also knit. I have cats. And I love to watch musicals while I do all of the above.

That is fantastic. I love it. I love it, love it, love it. I crochet in like spurts. And then I'll be like, okay, I'm done for now. And then like a year later I'll be like, I'm gonna crochet. I love your embroidery was beautiful, by the way. That was awesome. Thank you. I it's a, it's a work in progress. I'm actually currently trying to cover an entire jacket in lifelike embroidery.

So I've got like a fox and some sunflowers and a bee on this, uh, what's it called? Lapel and all that. That's fantastic. Well, thank you for coming on this show. We really appreciate your time and all the wisdom you gave out today. Thank you so much for having me. It's been delightful.

Well, Lauren, what did you learn? What did you think? Um, I think she's great. Uh, I love a lot of, I just loved all of her words, like flavor of neurodivergent. Like I'm pretty sure I've heard that, but just coming from her, like it. I love that everyone's just a different flavor. Yeah. Um, uh, I really appreciated her really kind of explaining like the differentiating between like coaching and therapy and a consultant and stuff like that because I feel like those terms sometimes I'll just get.

All put in the same bucket, and I'm just going to put my little thing. I feel like the coaching, the way she explained it puts the accountability on the person needing the coaching to get this. stuff that they want accomplished in their life. Like it, cause she's like, I just ask the questions, like lead them to where they got to go.

So I love that. Um, I also, uh, when you guys were talking about like kind of trying to like balance other people's emotions, I was just reminiscing when we shared an office and we'd come in and I'd be like, I'm already mad. You can't be I remember you saying that, and I was like, dang it. Emotion. Yeah. Like I already called dibs on hating the world today, so turn it around, Sam.

That's hilarious. Yes. Sorry, I didn't sleep on that. Um, I, we, we talk all the time. Self regulation, self regulation, self regulation, and we added a little bit more today with kids pick up on, on things very easily, whether we realize it or not, like you hear them and you're like, where did they hear that from?

And it was you this one time, like a week ago. Um, and so the thing with like self regulating and keeping yourself calm and all of that, you want to model the behavior that you want from your child or whoever you're interacting with. Yeah, yeah. And so, I think it's I love that we're modeling, like, I'm staying calm, hopefully you'll stay calm, but also, and I really loved you adding on to, it's okay to speak what that emotion is.

So, like, I'm really frustrated right now, so that they also can learn, but put the name to the stuff, um, and so I just, framing it, yes, it's self regulation, but it's also modeling for your child, um, because they are watching, whether you like it or not, they're watching, they're paying attention. Most of the things they learn are from you again, you want to admit it or not as a parent.

Um, and so, uh, I really liked that looking at my notes and they're all over the place.

Um,

I liked, um, what you were saying about the emotional regulation and like modeling and stuff that I read this thing today that it said, we expect kids to regulate their emotions, be, you know, like perfect and regulate their emotions, not having meltdowns, but then adults can't even do that. Yeah. So just remember.

That you can't expect more from like a three year old than you do yourself. And again, and I've said this multiple times, we've said it in multiple episodes, there are kids, not many adults. Yeah. So lower your expectations because they're, they're kids, they're developing, they are learning, they do not have it together and they won't for a very long time.

Clearly because adults are still str struggling. Yeah. Um, and so Grace, we talked about it. Give yourself grace, give your kids grace. Um, I don't, I think we intended to talk a little bit more about it and then, uh, I feel like as you a DH, ADHD do, we got a little sidetracked, um, but with the apparent identity, like you're more than just a parent.

And I think a part of that, a lot of that goes to self care. Um. Like, that's just one role you play, like, that's not your complete identity. You're also a friend. You're also a daughter, a sister, um, and to remember that and to try and do things for those other roles in your life and not let your parenting consume everything else.

Um, because again, like you're going to get burned, you're going to get more burnt out. Um, I think, and I know it can be hard, um, especially if you're a single parent and things like that, but I think it is just important to remember for yourself that you're so much more than that label. Yeah. Um, and then that's in like all, you're more than any label.

Um, so I think just, just remembering that and taking care of yourself. Away from the parenting aspect of your life, so. Yeah, yeah. My husband and I were talking about that last night. And he was like, yeah, um, I said something about making dinner. Not having time to make dinner because we were doing something else.

And he was like, well, yeah, you're not like in a village. Like they used to be where one mom would bake dinner. The other person would take care of the kids. The other person would like do this. The other person would do this. He was like, we're way more. Isolated than we ever have been. And so maybe, you know, you do get together with friends and like make freezer dinners together, or I don't know, whatever you want to do, you know, just to get that like friendship and bonding in addition to getting what you need to do to get it done, but there's different ways to get it done and still feel like a village, even though it is.

So hard. And we're just, we're just way more isolated than we've ever been, but I'm the mentality of just everything should be individualized and figured out for yourself. Pull yourself up by your bootstraps, like, and that's not how it used to be. And again, look at us now, we're isolated, we're struggling, cranky, like, and I, so I think it's important to have those communities for yourself where you can get together, you can share, you can help, um, it's important.

It's important to find your people. Your family, your community, and to utilize that, and it just, it doesn't have to be just you doing everything alone all of the time. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Don't be afraid to ask for help. Because a lot of the time, it does take a bit. Yep. Yeah, especially, you know, especially kiddos, you know, we're in therapy in school, so there's a lot of interaction.

And. It helps if we can all communicate and be on the same page and, and all of that. Yes. Thank you. Boring. Uh, thanks everyone for listening this week. We really appreciate you all, uh, leave us a review rating whenever you feel like doing shares with a friend or yeah. So thank you. We'll see you next week.

Bye.