182. Lent - Asking for Help

Parenting has a way of bringing you to the end of yourself. There are seasons where the noise, the conflict, the exhaustion, and the constant needs of your kids can make you feel like you’re barely keeping your head above water. A lot of parents quietly assume that if things feel this hard, it must mean they’re doing something wrong. But the truth is that family life was never meant to be carried alone.

In this episode of our Lenten Series, we talk about what it looks like to ask for help when parenting becomes overwhelming. Not in theory, but in the real, messy moments that every parent eventually faces. We walk through three places parents can turn for help when things feel difficult. First, we talk about going to your spouse and learning to lean on each other instead of trying to carry everything individually. Marriage is meant to be a partnership, and parenting becomes much heavier when we stop asking our spouse to step in with us.

Second, we talk about seeking help from people who are just a little further ahead of you in family life. Parents whose kids are a few years older, who have already walked through the season you’re in. They don’t need to be perfect parents to offer wisdom. In fact, some of the most helpful guidance comes from people who have made mistakes and learned along the way. And finally, we talk about therapy—both for parents and for children—and why reaching out for professional help can sometimes be one of the most loving and responsible things you can do for your family.

If parenting has felt heavier than you expected lately, this episode is an honest conversation about why asking for help is not weakness. It’s often the very thing that helps a family grow stronger.

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SPEAKER_00 0:00

Boop. Okay. And welcome back to To Become Family. You are walking with us, or we are walking with you during this lunch together. I think in holiness. We are walking together. And last episode we talked about missing the mark. What we do when we miss the mark. Hopefully, we said good stuff because I don't remember. But today we are focused on asking for help. So when things are continually hard, um, we're talking specifically about in the realm of parenting. Uh, what do we do? And we have three things that we think couples should do if they are struggling with kids at home. Parenting is hard, and they just need to ask for help. So these are the three ways that we think people should ask for help.

SPEAKER_01 0:38

I just think that there's a very big um stigma to asking for help. I don't know if that's the right word to use, but like there's a big resistance. So I think that there's like this really big fear of admitting that we need help, asking for help, um, not even necessarily like going to the right place to find help, but like even just that acknowledgement that like I need help, it feels like a huge failure. And it feels like it feels like a human failure and then a spiritual failure to not be able to figure out this parenting thing on your own. And um, and I guess we just really want to dispel that myth, like really, really boldly and clearly, that like you needing help, you asking for help, you searching for help is not a sign of moral failure or human failure, parent failure, vocation failure. But it's actually like a really good thing to have more people who are loving you and loving your kids and guiding, guiding that process and offering support and help. So go do it. So that's the first thing. Yeah, well, so before we say why and where or whatever, like you should do it. Yes, we affirm that.

SPEAKER_00 1:44

We talked about how we need humility, especially during the season, um, and asking of help requires humility and being able to see ourselves honestly and know that this is not something we could do on our own. Um, so for parenting stuff, so this is the kind of ways I broke up the categories. So you tell me if you disagree and then just kind of roll with it. So, number one, if you are feeling absolutely exhausted at home and parenting just seems like it is taking way too much out of you, I think the first way that you should ask for help would be from your spouse.

SPEAKER_01 2:15

Ah, I was thinking the same thing. Oh, look at that.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

She didn't even read the notes that I put together.

SPEAKER_01 2:20

Yes, I totally agree because I think that um uh in different seasons of parenting um or just different seasons of life, like you can get into a um you can get into like a system of just coexisting in the home. Um, and so maybe, maybe you are doing a really good job of prioritizing your marriage, like God, marriage, kids, and like maybe you've got that down, but like it still in the parenting, we're kind of parenting side by side instead of together. Um, or maybe one parent feels overburdened, or one parent feels like I'm doing a really great job, and the other parent feels like I'm failing, right? Like, so you can you can be having these two like parallel paths of parenting, and you're not like parenting together. So I think that's absolutely the first place that you should start is to really communicate about parenting, ask for help in parenting, um, tap out when you need when you're just like overwhelmed, and the other person has like is kind of on the outside of it and like switch spots or like brainstorm together of what's going on and what do we think is the root of this? How can we address it? What's working, what's not working.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Yeah, because I think some of us, one of us feels like it's a failure when they check processes. It's okay.

SPEAKER_01 3:38

You can do that. You can do that with me.

SPEAKER_00 3:42

It's not that's not the direction it goes. Like, so like just even even if you're not exhausted, just checking with like, hey, this is how I do things, this is my vision for what I'm doing, this is why I do it the way I do. I like the idea, like poke holes in that, like tell me what's wrong. But right, but like I think even just starting there of like being willing to be like, this is like you know, breakfast time is awful, this is what I do. What could I possibly be doing differently? Um and I think if you are not comfortable enough with your spouse to be vulnerable like that, I think that's something that you must work on within your marriage that you are comfortable enough. Because I think there's a lot of wisdom that comes from just an outside perspective, unless like they're involved in it too, then it's then it's not as helpful. And we'll ask that, we'll talk about that a little bit later. But I think being willing to be like, this is the process, this is why I do it the way I do it, is there something I could be doing differently? Now, if your spouse that you're bringing this up to is completely aloof and doesn't care and it's just like, oh, that seems fine to me, that that's not helpful. Um, but if it hopefully you have a spouse who's like willing to engage and willing to like just give their perspective on things, and hopefully that'll help you um see, because maybe it in my experience, usually the spouse that is that um feels overwhelmed sometimes are taking more on more than they need to be. Um, such as being able to like, hey, yeah, you don't, you know, it doesn't matter if they get all these things at this one meal, something like that. Um, sounds very silly. Um, but then on top of that, if you feel like you can't open up with your spouse and you have you're ha you you you are speaking past each other for certain things like that, um, I do think this is where you can consider uh counseling for your marriage in order to help you in your parenting.

SPEAKER_01 5:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

What do you think of that?

SPEAKER_01 5:20

Yeah, I think there's two things I want to pick up on that. Um, the one is if one spouse is kind of aloof or kind of hands-off, kind of like, this seems like it's fine, or well, isn't chaos just part of parenting? And like, yes, but like it shouldn't feel this hard. You should still feel, you should still experience joy in your parenting, even in the difficult parts. And if you're not feeling joy, if you're feeling completely drained, if you're feeling like a failure, that is not how parenting is supposed to be. That's not the experience that you should have in parenting. And so if one spouse is kind of like brushing that off, like that's not a big deal, then um, I really think that there's a deeper rooted place of like passivity that's not that's happening um in your marriage and in your home and your family life in their parenting, that like they're not engaging enough to understand like that that parenting doesn't happen by accident. And so I think that um if that's the case, to really go back to we talked about having a shared vision and to to bring that idea of shared vision of your marriage and your family life specifically into your parenthood and be like, these are the goals that we have for our kids. We agree on this, but they are not being achieved because of how we are parenting. And so we need to pivot, we need to reorganize, we need to restrategize how we are parenting so that though that shared vision can be accomplished. Um, and so that I think is really, really important. If you feel like one of the parents is disengaged from parenting, then like kind of we we've said it before, like if if your marriage is suffering, like other stuff has to stop and you need to refocus on that. Like other stuff has to stop and you need to refocus on being a joint uh partnership in parenting, even though the tasks will be delegated differently and the engagement will look different, but like both have to care the same amount. And it could be one is caring too much. That is sure, that is surely the thing that some people can overweigh every single behavior and action. That could be true too. But I think disengagement is is really I think usually that comes from compensating for disengagement. Um, and then the other thing that you kind of mentioned that I thought of was um we are personally we're raising four boys, and two of them in particular are getting older now. Like they're on the cusp of puberty and they're they're they're really like exerting their boyhood. Where it's like when when they're kids, yeah, boys and girls are different, but like there's a lot that is really the same. And now are they are distinguishing themselves as like young men. So um I really have to like turn to you for a lot of things in that realm of like like the check-ins and like how am I handling parenting future young men so that they that their masculinity can be affirmed, that their masculinity can be um Yes. Good point.

SPEAKER_00 8:09

Good point.

SPEAKER_01 8:09

And so I think that that's another reason why both spouses, both parents are super important, especially if you're raising the opposite gender from you to like you you don't know all of it because you haven't experienced life as not a girl or not a boy. And so um, I think that that has been hugely critical for us that um that there has even been a transition of like you're gonna handle some more of like the discipline or some more of the stuff because it's important for the dad to be to be really obvious in this area of their life. Um, and so to real to like acknowledge that that like I am not everything for my kids. Yeah. And then for me, I'm I'm noticing right now, currently, that that is especially highlighted in boyhood.

SPEAKER_00 8:57

Yeah, that's uh I think we talked about this, I think it was earlier this week or last week, where we were like we had sat down to start, like the boys asked to play a video game with me. Um so we sat down to play a video game, and then you had come in and been and like, you guys made such a big mess. Um so I like I told you later, like um, like that's fine if you want to make sure that we clean the mess before we play, but like come in before we do that because I don't want them to feel like every time we try to have fun, mommy's coming in to ruin the fun.

SPEAKER_01 9:26

That's the hammer, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:27

Yes, and like it's so it's and it's it wasn't that what you and as it was funny, like this is the way we talked about it, like it wasn't that what you were asking for is wrong. I I agree that like if they made a mess in a different room or something, like they need to go clean that before they go play, whatever they do. Um, but then if you're they're already starting to play, like I don't want them to ever see you as the antithesis of them being fun because like the and this is what ends up happening with boys, and like you see that with older men, like they end up like the whole thing of like the woman being the ball and chain, like it comes from like little instances like that where it seems like well, we can't be men around women because they're gonna try to like restrain us and not let us do our things like you we just don't want to create that uh association. Well, like that, and so I was we were I mean that's one of those things where I was like, I remember making that association as a kid. I think most boys remember that, and like we don't necessarily have to fall into that.

SPEAKER_01 10:15

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So a lot of times too, like having that that sounding board, that second parent is like, you're not wrong that this is important, but right now it's it it doesn't have to be right now, or like you know what? Actually, no, all things have to stop. That is that has to take precedence, you know, right? And you're kind of like, oh, I was gonna wait. And so having that second person involved in the brainstorming, involved in the strategizing, involved in the parenting, um, it can give the two perspectives. And together with that shared vision, you can you can figure out like when to address it, how to address it. Okay, we're addressing it this way, and it's still not achieving what we're hoping. Let's let's try something else. And so I think it's really important to like be um a united front in that. And so communicating is really important.

SPEAKER_00 11:02

So another way to ask for help, um, you can get a different perspective from your spouse. Um, I think another way of asking for help is also finding an older couple or older person who is who has already gone through your stage of life. And I think workshopping, workshopping sounds funny, but like, because I don't want to just go and and at least I don't think it's helpful to just talk to people and commiserate. Maybe that's what helps some people of like I just need an older person who knows who can tell me everything's gonna be okay. I would like an older person who can like tell me like this is what to expect, this is how I handled it. Um, or that can look at like this is I can tell them like this is how I'm handling things. What do you think? Will this work? Will this not work? What are my blind spots? Um, because we as people, no matter how many kids we have, how many kids we've uh raised, like we don't know what we don't know. Um so being able to work off of other people's experiences is really something that uh is very beneficial and we shouldn't just poo-poo that because it's hard to ask for help.

SPEAKER_01 11:58

Yeah. I think one thing that's really critical for this, I totally agree with you, first of all, to have um have people that have experience a little bit ahead of you to um trust and rely on. But I think it's really important when choosing that to be um like somewhat objective and somewhat judgmental of the fruit of their efforts. Um, and one trap that we had fallen into is that like, okay, I don't maybe I don't see a family that has done this perfectly with all of their kids and they're all great all the time in every area. And so that's like the ideal parenthood. I think that you can also have different couples, different parents who have excelled in certain areas of parenthood, and you're like, okay, they've handled sports and family life balance really well. I'm gonna, I'm gonna workshop with them on that topic. They've handled um, like their kids are still really faithful. So I'm gonna go to them for this. Um, you know, like they, they, these parents have really securely attached kids. Like they seem to have a really good, trustworthy relationship. They're their kids don't treat them like friends, but they don't like hate them because they're parents. And so, you know, maybe I'll go to them for discipline. Like you can have different examples and models for different areas, and you can respect and honor their wisdom in that area. Um, because I know for a while we just were like, who's done this well, like the whole thing well? And then we focus on the other thing.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

And also like has kids in the same stage, like same uh like same order of kids, dynamic everything, yeah, same skin color.

SPEAKER_01 13:34

No, no, no. Right. But that's even that's so true though, of like, do you know what it's like to have a mixed culture marriage, you know, or family? Like that that that does have an influence. And so I think for you to try to find the family that you're like, I want to, I wanna copy what they look like, um, is a dangerous trap. So um, but I will say, like, we have one couple we've we've interviewed the mom like several years ago. We can definitely post that in the show notes because she's amazing. But um, our oldest two have the same godparents, and they're exactly that for us. They've raised their kids, they are now uh young adults, but they've raised four kids who are who are faithful and just solid humans. They certainly struggle with different things and we love them so much for it and because of it and through it. Um, but they've given us a lot of um, a lot of, they've shared a lot of wisdom, a lot of practical stuff, and then also some of that solidarity of like, yeah, some of the days just feel like just feel like that. And you're not, it's sometimes kind of reassuring of like you're not doing it wrong because your day looks like that. And so there's a there's a yeah, a mixture of like solidarity. I wouldn't say we've ever commiserated. I don't know if it was ever like this, like, oh yeah, it's brutal. And so like, yep. And like that that attitude just like helped me of like next moment, tomorrow, next year, like it'll, it'll the good will outweigh the bad.

unknown 14:52

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 14:53

And the last way I think that people can ask for help is probably the hardest way. I know we mentioned a little bit a little bit in the first one, but um when do your kids need to go to therapy themselves? Because there are like there's a level of like parenting where you have to like that it's on you and like you have to fix your processes, you have to do things better. Um, but there are also kids that God has gifted us that that may struggle themselves, and there is no like that you just do not have the tools for the tools to provide them with the things they need on your own. Um, and we've learned that, and it's been such a grace and a gift to be able to to accept that reality and then really allow God to work through the other means that He's provided us. Um, and so yeah, so I think uh being willing to consider that your kids might need more help outside of just you is very important when considering should you be asking for help.

SPEAKER_01 15:43

Yeah, I will say um, because I don't want to not be authentic in this, like there was a level, like there's a process of kind of like grief that went into that decision because there's a humility to like I am not everything for my kid. And like to the extent of like even godparents or friends, you know, parents of friends or teachers are not, they're not enough. And like this is this is still like still needs more. And there's just a um, there's definitely a moment of like dang it, you know. And so like I don't want to uh I don't want to dismiss that or diminish that, that like, oh, this was like such an easy decision for us. Like that was it was hard and it was like it gave me a bellyache, right? Like it was it was hard to like admit that, but um, but it was one of the best things that we've done. And I do I want to add to that, like like counselors for your kids, um, what a gift. But then also to not be afraid that like maybe it is you that needs the help, and maybe you need a counselor to help you in like a certain area of your parenthood, or maybe there's a certain area of your own human formation, your own psychological experience, your own emotions that is um preventing you from being the full parent that you want to be. So counseling for yourself is a is a positive for your parenting too. So maybe it's like asking for help for your kid, but maybe it's asking for help for you so that you can show up as the best parent that you can you can. Um, I think that that's another really important thing.

SPEAKER_00 17:17

If you are constantly how do I make this sound not awful? But if you're the reason, not you're the reason, if you make your kid worse, like they have their own thing and then they are worse though because you are doing things or like you're triggering them, or if your kid's triggering you to the point that you can't let it go after that, like you should look at yourself first because um if you aren't stable and secure and a place of safety for them, uh, that just isn't gonna make them better ever. Because uh that's something like you should never need your kid to act a certain way for you to feel calm and collected and under control and at peace. Like your child should have the freedom to lose control in your presence and be okay. Whereas, like, that's not you're not given the same. This is again, I hope you can tell, like I'm speaking from like experience. Like you're not supposed to be able to lose your stuff and your kid just deal with it. Like that's not how the relationship works. Like you are the parent and you're supposed to be in control. So if you're not and you feel like you're constantly losing it and it's making everything worse for your child who's already struggling, I think that's when you can take another humility pill and just accept that, like, yeah, maybe I need to work on me first. Um, and that may mean going through the other things we said, right? Like fix fixing your processes, asking your spouse for help, um, trying to get input for others. But if you're still doing those things and you're still struggling in your humility, you should be able to consider, like, maybe I need to talk about my stuff and figure out a processes in a way with someone that can clinically dissect the nonsense that I'm trying to serve so they can tell me, like, hey, you need to actually do this, this, and this. Um, because therapy is more than just like, it's funny, our when we talk to our kids about therapy, um, they think of Spider-Man No Way Home, not No Way Home, no, Spider-Man across the Spider-Verse. And they have that, there's one scene where Spider-Man is sitting on the couch in a very stereotypical way, like talking about Uncle Ben dying to the other Spider-Man. And they're like, and then they know one of them goes to therapy, they're like, that's not what therapy is like. And I was like, I know. And most of us might think that like therapy is just sitting on a couch and sharing all of our biggest, darkest secrets. Um, and that's just not what it is. It's it's for good therapists, it could just be going through the process of like what is happening in the moment, what happened before, what happened after, so that you can understand yourself a little bit better. Um, and then you can love those that you want to love a little bit better.

SPEAKER_01 19:27

Yeah. And I think, um, I think that, like you said, it's a humility pill, it's hard to swallow, but it you are a contributing factor to your kids. The goal of parenthood is not behavior modification, it's not to like manipulate our kids. We talked about this at the very beginning. It's not to engineer our kids, but to shepherd our kids to becoming like the fullest version of themselves, the way that God created them to be. And we are contributing to that. Like our genes contribute to that, our our nature and our nurture contribute to that, and the way that we parent contributes to that. And so it's important to acknowledge that and it's important to like ask for help. There are people out there. Um, I did kind of want to add maybe to counseling of just like other people that can help your kids that you can ask for help um is like teachers or tutors in your co-op or your schools, like they do this. Yeah. They do what they do because they love what they do. And they might not be perfect at it, but they are somebody else that's like on your kids' team that wants to support them be great. So um, like asking them for help, getting feedback from them, learning from them, how does my kid act in this environment? What are things that are working for you that like I'm struggling with at home or what have you, or bringing to them like some things that we're working on at home? Can you also like support me in that? Um, coaches, music teachers, theater instructors, like things like that. Like if you find a place where your kid loves, excels, feels comfortable, comes alive, like just enjoys, then those are more people that are there for your kids that can help you in your parenting. Um, because again, maybe they have a strategy, maybe they have a phrase, maybe they have just a way of loving and supporting your kids that you can you can mirror, emulate at home as well. So that all of this is like all of this goes towards that shared vision of what you hope for for your kids. Um so that's all aligned and they can feel secure and that there's like some level of consistency in the areas of their life.

SPEAKER_00 21:34

I support it. So for this Lent, as we are moving through, uh, don't be afraid to swallow the humility pill and ask for help when you need it. Um, if you like this episode, like, comment, subscribe, leave us some reviews on Apple and Spotify. Um, and thank you for joining us and walking with us as we walk with you during Lent. And please know we're praying for you, and we will see you at the next episode.