“I DON'T KNOW WHEN TO PUSH AND WHEN TO BACK OFF”—THOUGHTS MOMS PARENTING TEENS AND ADULT KIDS ARE ASHAMED THEY THINK | EP. 264
Welcome to the Almost Empty Nest Podcast, where we moms of teens and college kids reframe what letting go really means to feel more connected, confident, and at peace. I'm your host, Master Coach Jennifer Collins.
Have you ever had a thought as a mom and then immediately felt terrible for thinking it? Believe me, you're not alone, and you're truly not a bad mom for thinking it. In this series on the thoughts us moms are ashamed we think, I'm exploring these thoughts and where they're coming from. Because when you shift from judgment to understanding, that's when everything changes. Let's dive in.
Hello, my friend.
So my youngest has been home for the past few weeks. He just finished his freshman year at college, and when he got back, he was out all the time. He's a social kid, and he always has been, so that part I expected.
But after a week or two, something changed. He started staying home more. Sleeping in later.
And honestly, seeming not quite like himself. It felt like something was off. I'd try to casually ask him if he was good, and I'd get the standard non-answer.
All good. No information. Just enough words to technically answer the question without actually answering it.
And as the days went on and nothing was changing, I could feel myself getting increasingly worried and increasingly wanting to push for an answer or for a conversation where I could try to get something out of him. I really wanted something that would tell me what was actually going on with him. And then the other day, I came home and I found him in the kitchen talking to my husband.
And I had this immediate thought, well, here it is. Something's wrong, and they're talking about it. So I joined in the conversation, and they were talking about nothing in particular.
I pressed my husband afterwards, convinced that they stopped talking when I walked in. And he assured me that no, they were just talking. Nothing deep.
And that's when I had to be honest with myself, that I'd fallen back into that age-old trap of needing my son to feel better so that I could feel better. But here's the thing. What if there's actually something wrong? I mean, when do I push? And when should I back off? Because what if I back off and there's actually something wrong? Our kid's mental health is a major concern.
We worry about depression when we see our kids sleeping too much or spending too much time in their rooms, seeming to pull back from the things they used to love. We know that sometimes all good isn't all good. And we worry that our kids aren't going to ask us for help or that they're not being honest with us about how they feel.
These fears are real. And so it makes backing off feel really risky. So you find yourself in this place where you're not just worried about your kid.
You're also second-guessing your own worry. You wonder, am I seeing something that I need to be concerned about? Or am I projecting my own anxiety onto a kid who's fine and just needs to decompress? Because those two things, a kid who needs space and a kid who needs an intervention, can look almost identical from the outside. Same closed door.
Same short answers. Same sense that something is just slightly off. And somehow, as their mom, we feel like we should be able to know the difference.
And my friend, this doesn't stop at mental health. These same questions about when to push and when to back off show up in so many situations with our big kids. We worry about the kid who isn't motivated.
Should I push them harder so they don't miss out on opportunities and regret it later? Or should I let them face the natural consequences of not trying their best? If your kid seems lost or alone, do you step in and try to direct them towards something, anything to get them moving in the right direction? Make them feel more connected? Or do you trust that they have to be the ones to figure it out for themselves? The stakes feel different in each of these situations, but the question is essentially the same. Do I push or do I back off? And often, we can find ourselves thinking, I don't trust myself to know what to do here. I want to invite you to consider something.
From the time we became mothers, we found ourselves in constant problem-solving mode. If something's not working, we try something else. Something's wrong, we figure out how to solve it.
The whole journey of motherhood is just one long process of trying to figure it out. We're constantly adjusting and recalibrating, trying to assess if what we're doing is supporting and guiding our kids in the way they need to be supported and guided. And when our kids were little, we generally could find the thing that works, even if it took a bit of time to figure it out.
But then, of course, that thing would only work until the next stage of development, and then we were back in problem-solving mode. So this has actually become a reflex, really a habit. And what's so fascinating is that somewhere along the way, that became how we measure our success as moms.
Not necessarily by having all the answers, but more, can I figure this out? Can I keep trying and adjusting until I find the thing that gets my kid back on track? Because it feels like that's what a good mom does. And just consider, too, that when your kids were little, the feedback loops were faster. In other words, there wasn't a huge amount of time between us trying something and figuring out if it was working.
Your baby cried, you gave them milk, and if that didn't work, you tried changing them, then rocking them, and then you'd finally put them to sleep. Eventually, something worked. Something was wrong, you figured out why, then you fixed it.
But now that our kids are older, it is so much less clear what they actually need. And so you still try to help. We still have that instinct to want to try to fix it.
But now, you might not know for months, or maybe even years, whether or not you did the right thing. And sometimes, we'll be doing what we think is the right thing, and our kids will act like it's the absolute wrong thing. You try your best, and you're left constantly guessing.
Are they really fine? Or are they just shutting me out? Are they just processing what's going on with them? Or are they annoyed at me? It can feel like it's impossible to know for sure. The problems we were working through when our kids were little were also relatively simple. There were only so many variables to change, and we were in control of the majority of them.
But now, we're not in control of almost any of the variables anymore, except, honestly, the amount of financial support and resources we give our kids. Now, we can't just give them a hug and make them feel better. And we can't make them apply themselves more, or push them to get out there.
And yet, we can't not try, right? And here's what's also fascinating. We think we know our kids. We've been the one raising this person for 16, or 18, or 22 years.
We have more data about this person than anyone else on earth. And we have a perception that we know how they handle stress, or what it looks like for them to be off. We feel like we know them.
And yet, that knowledge doesn't always translate into knowing what to do. It's like having the map, and still being lost. The information is there, but we can't seem to make things better the way we wish we could.
And look, all of us moms experience these moments as we raise our kids when we get it wrong. There are those conversations where you push, and it ends up in a blow-up, with your kid getting really angry, or just shutting you out. That time when you kept asking questions until they finally snapped at you.
Then there have been the times when you decided to give them space, and trust the process. And then you found out later that something was actually going on, and you missed it. These moments only reinforce our self-doubt.
We find ourselves hesitating before we knock on the door. You can feel like you're bracing yourself when you need to ask your kid a question. The problem is we learn from our past experiences, and what we learned was, you can get this wrong.
And getting it wrong has a cost. So this thought, I don't trust myself, it actually feels like an accurate description of a legitimately hard phase of parenting. You're trying to navigate a situation and make the right choice in these heated moments with incomplete information, and with a person who's simultaneously growing away from you, and still needing you, but also needing you in ways that keep changing.
The fact that you're uncertain doesn't mean that your instincts have failed you. Honestly, I think it truly means that you're paying close enough attention to know how much is actually at stake here. When I hear moms say that they don't trust themselves, what I've noticed is that what they're grappling with is two fears that seem to be pulling them in opposite directions.
The first fear is, if I push, I'm going to make it worse. Maybe I'll damage the relationship, or they'll shut down completely. Maybe I'll become the problem.
The mom who can't let things go, who makes every small thing into a big thing. The mom who they stop talking to because every conversation turns into an interrogation. And you can probably picture that version of yourself.
I know I can. It's the version of us who hovers and is always anxious, who keeps harping on things and nagging, who feels like they're always checking in or following up. The one that is frankly just annoying.
We fear being too much, caring so hard that you push the person you love away. I think there's something incredibly unsettling about the idea that your love, the thing you feel most fiercely for your child, could actually be what damages the relationship. That the very fact of how much you care could become a burden to your kid.
It almost feels cruel that this could be possible. I love them. And because of that, I'm pushing them away? So we fear if we push, we'll make things worse.
But the other fear is the exact opposite. That if I back off, I'm failing them. That essentially I'm checking out.
That I might watch something go south and do nothing. I'm sitting here giving them space when I'm really just avoiding the hard thing. And not just avoiding the hard conversation, but avoiding the hard consequences.
That moment where I actually have to hold the line and mean it. Because this is what's best for my kid. Because backing off isn't just about whether or not to bring something up.
It's also about whether to let things slide. Whether to look the other way and not enforce the consequence when your kid has crossed the line. Or is struggling in a way that really requires boundaries to get them back on track.
This, my friend, is the fear of not doing enough. We think, my kid needs someone to push them. To hold them accountable.
And there's something wrong with me if I'm not being that person. It's when we interpret love as responsibility. And not doing something as a form of neglect.
Really irresponsibility. This is the fear that saying, I don't want to push, is just another way of saying, I don't want to deal with it. And if I was really paying attention, really committed to this, I'd find a way to do the hard thing.
Backing off feels like giving up. My friend, notice this. Neither of these fears are irrational.
In fact, they're both rooted in real things that really happen. Kids do shut down when parents push too hard. And kids do fall through the cracks when parents stop showing up.
Both risks are real. But just notice, when you hold both of these fears at the same time, you end up with two competing versions of what it means to get this wrong. Push too hard and you're the problem.
Back off too much and you're failing your kid. There's no neutral ground. Every decision you make is wrong in one direction or the other.
Which means you're not actually choosing between a good option and a bad one. In your mind, you're choosing which risk you're more willing to live with. So let's talk about what we're actually hoping for when we say we want to trust ourselves.
What does that even look like? I think most of us, if we're being honest, want a kind of certainty that frankly isn't available. We want to know without a doubt which move is right. We want to walk up to that closed bedroom door and just know, should I walk in and push for the conversation? Or should I walk by? Give it time.
Should I hold the boundary or decide to pick my battles? Should I make them do the thing or accept that I can't make them do anything and figure out what that means? We just want the answer to be clear. We just want to know what to do. But I want to offer that this kind of certainty is an impossible standard.
Even for those moms who look more confident somehow or more successful because of what you perceive her life or her kids or life. She too is facing uncertainty. There is no perfect formula for this.
I wish there were. But there is no version of setting the right boundary or paying close enough attention or even knowing your kid well enough that makes the right next step obvious every time. I have clients with strong and beautiful relationships with their kids.
Kids who actually talk to them and come to them when things are hard. And they are regularly working through challenges that have no clear answers. The mom whose daughter tells her everything still doesn't always know whether to push her daughter to get help or allow her to figure it out on her own.
Then there's the mom with a great relationship with her son who sees him sitting on the couch all summer and genuinely doesn't know if saying something would motivate him or just damage the one thing that is working between them. Then the mom whose kid is struggling comes to her and she still doesn't know whether to problem solve or just listen. A close relationship might give you more access but it doesn't give you all the answers.
I don't know when to push and when to back off. It feels like a strategy problem. Like if you just had better information or a little more certainty about the situation you'd be able to make the right call.
So this is where we spend our mental energy. We research solutions and try to figure out what's really going on. We analyze our kids' behavior and their reactions.
We consult our partners or our friends, sometimes the internet at 11 o'clock at night. Now ChatGPT has become another partner in helping us find the right answer. We're constantly trying to problem solve our way to finding it.
But here's what I've come to believe both from my own experience and from working with so many moms in my coaching programs. The push or back off question is not primarily a strategy problem. It's actually a mindset problem.
And here's what I mean by that. Most of the moms I work with already have a pretty good idea of what they want to do. Or at least they have some sense of their options.
They're not stuck because they haven't thought about it and don't have any answers. They're stuck because they've thought about it from both sides and both sides feel risky. Again, push too hard and you damage the relationship.
Back off too much and you're failing them. And when you genuinely believe both of these things, you can't win. Every option has a cost.
So you either freeze or you do something reactive just to get out of the discomfort. And then you spend the next three days beating yourself up or wondering if you handled it right. That's not a strategy problem.
The problem is what's happening inside of you while you're trying to decide and follow through. And my friend, what's happening in those moments is anxiety. It's the fear of getting it wrong.
It's needing your kid to be okay so that you can be okay. It's your own history with them and the times you've gotten it wrong before and your own sense of what a good mother is supposed to do. All of these thoughts are driving your feelings and reactions, shaping your decisions, and even your ability to sit in the discomfort of not having all the answers.
This is why spiraling and overthinking doesn't help. Because you can replay the situation a hundred times and still not feel better about it. Because the problem isn't that you haven't thought about it enough, because you know you have.
It's what your mind is constantly working on. The problem is actually that you're thinking about it while you're also scared, while you're second-guessing yourself and trying so hard to make a decision while also needing a particular outcome so badly that you can't see the situation clearly. And until you can separate what's actually true from what you're afraid might be true, what's a real signal from your kid and what's just your worry overtaking you, the decision you make is going to be more about relieving your own discomfort than about what your kid actually needs.
So what are we supposed to do instead? If it's not a better strategy or more information we need, if it's not figuring out the right boundary or the right conversation to have, then what exactly is it? Believe it or not, the power to actually make these choices with confidence is learning to see what's actually happening inside of you in those moments. It's learning to separate what's actually true about your kid and your situation from the story you're telling yourself about it. When your child goes quiet, that's a fact, but the story that something's wrong, that he needs me to step in, or if I don't act now, I'm going to fail him, that is an interpretation.
And it might be right, but it also might be your anxiety talking. And until you can tell the difference, you're not really acting from confidence, you're more likely just acting out of fear. And look, I know that this often doesn't feel like a choice or something that you can easily change, but this is actually a learnable skill.
It's not a personality trait that you either have or you don't. It's truly the practice of learning to notice what you're thinking and understand what it's costing you when you act from fear. And my friend, this changes everything, not just in the big moments or the big decisions, but in those everyday moments, the conversation where you didn't overreact when they finally opened up or shared something hard, or even when they did something wrong.
It's the boundary you actually hold because you're not second-guessing yourself. It's also the ability to let something go and really let it go because you can see clearly that what you're holding onto is simply your own fear. My friend, when you can do this, it's not that you never face these two fears, the fear of being too much or not enough, but you can learn how to face these fears and make clear decisions about how to move forward because you're no longer looking for the right answer.
Instead, you're willing to choose the answer you decide is right. And you're choosing that from a place of clarity and confidence instead of fear and frustration. And then, you have your own back about it.
Learning how to do this is the work we do inside my Mom 2.0 coaching program. It's a 10-week program that you can either do one-on-one or in a group with other moms. And it's built around one core idea that the most powerful thing that you can do as a mom right now is to learn how to take your power back over your own mind and emotions.
It's really to get to a place where your anxiety doesn't get to decide what you say or what you don't say or where your fear of getting it wrong doesn't get to determine how you show up for your kid. In this program, I teach you a tangible step-by-step process to empower you to do this in real life in those difficult situations that really matter. Consider that this question, when do I push and when do I back off? It's truly a sign that you love your kid and you refuse to give up on them.
And as hard as that can feel, notice the power in this, the gift that you are holding for your child, that you will never give up on them. But at the same time, you are parenting a person who is trying to figure out who they are and how they're going to be in the world, in their lives, which means they need you differently than they used to. And this means you have to continue to adjust.
The uncertainty you're facing isn't a sign that something has gone wrong. It's just the truth. Your kid is growing up and you're growing alongside of them, which is uncomfortable and disorienting and often lonely.
But you don't have to be at the mercy of that discomfort. You don't have to white-knuckle your way through this stage of motherhood. There truly is another way, a place where you trust yourself, not because you have all the answers, but because you know how to work through the fear and the doubt and stay true to who you really want to be as a mom, the woman who can be in a hard moment with your kid and feel equipped to handle it, to be able to trust yourself, to keep trying until you figure it out.
You have more power inside you than you think, my friend. Until next time.
If you enjoyed this episode, I'd love for you to check out my next free masterclass. There's a link in the show notes. You have more power than you think, my friend.
