When Mother's Day Is Painful

Published May 8, 2019, 7:00 AM
In this week's episode I'm sharing tips to take care of yourself if Mother's Day is painful for you due to a complicated relationship with your mother. I also answered a few listener questions about dealing with a partner who's uncertain about the relationship and managing social anxiety.

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Ya. Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, a weekly conversation about mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves. I'm your host, Dr Joy hard and Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. For more information or to find a therapist in your area, visit our website at Therapy for Black Girls dot com. While I hope you love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is not meant to be a substitute for a relationship with a licensed mental health professional. Hey y'all, thanks so much for joining me for session one oh six of the Therapy for Black Girls podcast. Mother's Day is coming up this weekend, and while many may be celebrating, for some this holiday can be very difficult for a variety of reasons. One that is often too taboo to discuss is when you have chosen to have a very limited or non existent relationship with your mother. So that's what I want to dig into today, but first let's show some love to our sponsors for today's episode. I'm happy to be working with medi Q again this year on another very important health initiative to raise awareness about sexual health and HIV transmission. Medi Q is an accredited medical education company that provides an exceptional educational experience for physicians, nurses, pharmacists, and other health care professionals. You know that here on the podcast, we've had several guests talking about things like sexual confidence, reducing your shame around sex, and how to be more comfortable with having conversations with your partners about getting your knees met well. An important component of all of these things is making sure that we're prioritizing our safety and health. Sadly, the HIV rates for Black women remains six times as high as that of white women and five times higher than that of Hispanic women. I want us to take control of our sexual health by making sure that we're protecting ourselves. One method that has been shown to be incredibly effective in reducing the risk of contracting HIV is through taking prep prep stands for pre exposure, prophylaxis and as a daily medication that, when taking regularly, can reduce the risk of contracting HIV by more than and when taken in combination with using condoms and other prevention methods, can reduce this risk even more. To find out If preface for you are to find a healthcare provider in your area who is familiar with the medication, you can visit PREP locator dot org. Most private and state medicaid plans cover PREP, and you may also be able to receive copay assistance to pay for the medication through the drug manufacturers or patient advocacy foundations. To help us continue to raise awareness and get more information about this important issue, please participate in a short survey med i q is conducting at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash med i q. The survey, which includes more education on this topic, will take less than fifteen minutes to complete. Survey responses are anonymous and will only be shared in aggregate. Your responses to these survey questions will provide us with important information about how women communicate with their physicians about their sexual health. The insights gained from the survey will be used in an educational tool to provide information that may be useful in keeping the lines of communication open with health care teams. Once you've completed the survey, you'll be asked to provide your email dressed if you'd like to be entered into a drawing administered by so Much strategies to win one of eight on visa gift cards. If you choose to enter, your email address will not be sold kept our stored email addresses are used only to randomly draw the winners and notify them of their prize. Again. You can find that survey at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash mad i Q. Support for today's podcast also comes from the Color Noir coloring book app. If you're part of the Thrive Tribe or follow us on our social media channels, there's a good chance you've caught one of our conversations about many sisters enjoying coloring books and coloring apps as a part of their stress management or self care routine. Coloring can be incredibly helpful in managing anxiety, helping you to be more in touch with the present moment, and engaging your sense of playfulness that is often lost when we grow up. So I'm incredibly excited to tell you about Color Noir in O I R, which is the first and only coloring book app celebrating Black women in culture. Color Noir was created by husband and wife team Moyo O Komi and Nakla Matthews Okomi, who's my sister in podcasting. They've combined their talents to create a high quality app experience using coloring to celebrate black girl magic in all of its glory. I've had a chance of download it, and I know several of you have already, and I've seen your beautiful pictures. I know that those of you who haven't downloaded it yet will absolutely love it. It's free to download, and to get it, all you have to do is open your iOS app Store app search for Color Noir in O I R and enjoy. Make sure you can subscribe in the app so you can get all the amazing images, updates and premium content dropping each and every month. Again, it's available in iOS in the app Store, is coming to Android soon, and the name of the app is Color Noir in O I R. Now let's get back to the show. As I mentioned earlier in the episode, many of us have very painful feelings about Mother's Day because of painful relationships with our mothers. I think it's time for us to be really honest about how harmful and damaging some of our mothers have been. Although the image we have of mothers is that they're loving, nurturing, kind and full of praise, The truth is that they can sometimes be judgmental, manipulative, critical, and mean. Simply because someone is related to us by blood and may have even been the one to birth us or raise us does not give them a pass to be cruel and harmful to us. In our culture, we're taught to celebrate and revere our mothers. But what happens if the relationship with your mother is much more complicated, or if you don't have a relationship with your mother at all. Mother's Day can bring up lots of feelings for people who have complicated or non existent relationships with their mothers. So I wanted to chat some today about how to take care of yourself if that's the case. So Number one, I want you to be really gentle with yourself and allow yourself to experience whatever feelings you may be feeling as a result of this holiday. You're sure to be bombarded with lots of messages about what this day should look like, and you may have feelings of sadness, disappointment, anger, and a host of other things. It's okay for you to feel all of that. Number two, don't allow yourself to be guilted into feeling or doing something in particular with relation to your mother simply because other people think that you should. If you've decided to have limited or no contact with your mother, it's likely been for good reason, and you're entitled to setting that boundary, and it's okay for you to honor that. Number three, allow yourself to grieve the laws of what you hope this relationship should or might have been. Be sure to show yourself some extra love right now. A part of you may be feeling really good about choosing yourself, but another part of you may be feeling really sad about not having the connection you wish you could have had with your mother. And number four, affirm for yourself that choosing to have a limited or non existent relationship with your mother is not your fault. Whatever your mother did to hurt you had nothing to do with anything you did. You were not a bad child, You are not undeserving of love. You are still worthy, And even though it's disappointing that these things weren't freely offered by your mother, you can still have these things and you still deserve them. I also want to take this time to issue a challenge to everyone listening to be really sensitive when you hear other sisters talking about painful relationships with their mothers, Hearing things like you only have one mother are not really helpful and they minimize the very real pain and trauma many have experienced at the hands of their mothers, So please be mindful of this when you run into this situation. If Mother's Day is difficult for you because of a complicated relationship with your mother and you want to share, please share with us on social media how you have or plan on taking care of yourself this weekend and what kinds of things have been helpful to you in managing your feelings about your mother. Be sure to use the hashtag TBG in session so that we can keep up with the conversation. Now, let's dive into some on the porch questions. Question number one is from Gladys. This is a name I've given her. I'm in a four year relationship and we are currently not in a happy place. My boyfriend told me he is not happy with us and feels less connected to me. He is not sure how he feels about me and our future, and that makes me really sad. It's been about three weeks since he told me, and we're trying to work it out by talking and seeing what we can do, but he seems to have no ideas on how we can work on it. I just feel confused and shocked, and also have no idea. We've been living together for three years, and since the past week it has been hard and painful being with him knowing he is unsure. At the same time, I don't want to go too far because I fear he might not even fight, But I feel sad and don't know what to do. Do you have any tips you can give me our steps I can take to work on our relationship, and how do I know he is willing to put in the work. Thanks so much for your question, Gladys. I'm really glad you wrote in, and I'm really sorry here that you and your partner are struggling right now. I'm sure that it must feel incredibly painful to be continuing to share space with someone who's unsure about you. If you can, I would really strongly enourage you and your partner to do some couples counseling if you can. It may help you to have an objective party walk both of you through what's been happening, and to have a space where you and your partner can hopefully share your concerns, where you can maybe even develop a plan for how you can move forward with the relationship, if that's what y'all choose. It's not uncommon for one of both people in a relationship to realize that they don't know what's happening in the relationship or that they've lost their way and you're unsure of how to get back on track. It sounds like that's the confusion you are both experiencing right now, which is why a therapist may be really helpful to help you guys backtrack to figure out what happened and if and how you might be able to move forward. I do, though, want to call special attention to one part of your letter where you said I don't want to go too far because I fear he might not fight, And I would encourage you to really sit with that for a minute, because if you're fearful that you can't even take some space to regroup after he said that he's unsure about the state of the relationship and that he might either end it or gradually just fade out, Because now you need time to figure out what's happening now that your world has been turned upside down. I would really pay attention to that. It's very difficult to make decisions that come from a healthy place when you're afraid that anything you say or do might run someone off. The truth is that if he's not committed to working things out in the relationship, nothing you do will convince him to be committed. So don't let your feelings and desires get drowned out in this situation. If you need time to figure out how you need to move forward, then it's okay to give yourself that time. You're entitled to that. Good luck. Question number two. Question number two comes from Rachel, and she says, I'm twenty years old and I am a student in college. While I haven't been officially diagnosed, I believe I may suffer from social anxiety. I've been trying to deny it, but the truth is I have been dealing with this since elementary school. I never had an issue making friends, but it is such a chore hanging out with them, and it is even more of a chore just talking to people in general. It's getting to the point where I just want to be alone all the time. I can't calm my thoughts down in my head about what someone will think about me, or whether or not I'll say something stupid, which is what happens nine times out of ten. And recently I have just decided to start kind of silencing myself amongst strangers, family, and friends alike. It has made me such an awkward person, and I'm pretty sure people think something is really wrong with me. I have always felt incredibly small because I feel different from everyone else. I don't have access to good therapy right now because I'm a broke college student, but I just wanted to know it if you had any other tips for me to begin to overcome this. It's kind of starting to consume my life, and at twenty years old, I struggle just making small talk when I should be more than capable of talking to others without feeling nervous, babbling at my heart rate increasing so much to where I can feel it in my whole body. Thank you so much for writing in Rachel. I'm sure that lots of people can relate to you with the feeling of constantly overthinking what you're going to say in conversations and how you're being perceived. I heard you say that you are broke college students, so money for therapy isn't there. I do just want to make sure that you checked out whether there is any free therapy that exists on your campus, as many campuses do have college counseling centers that at least have some type of services, even if it is limited, So make sure that you check that out if you haven't already. But if there are no services, I'd encourage you to take some time checking out YouTube for some relaxation videos that you can begin to practice that might help you to better manage your anxiety. So the key to things like relaxation and stuff like that is that you have to practice it as much as possible when you're not anxious, so that when you are anxious it's easier to access the things that you've practiced. So find some videos that you like and try practicing with them every night before bed to get used to what it feels like for your body to relax. And also encourage you to make yourself a list of what kinds of social situations make you anxious in order of least anxious to most anxious, and then start working on the things that make you least anxious over and over again. So let's say making eye contact with strangers is the lowest thing on your list. For a week, I want you to practice making eye contact with as many strangers as possible, and then keeping a journal about how you're feeling each day about the eye contact. Is it getting easier every day? What kinds of thoughts are coming up for you? Did the thing that you were so afraid happening if you made eye contact happened? If so, how did you handle it. Once you're feeling more comfortable with the eye contact, then I want you to move on to the next thing on the list and keep practicing with those things until your anxiety feels more manageable. And if you haven't already, I'd also encourage you to check out session thirty eight of the podcast with Dr Leicia Hodge because she shared tons and tons of great tips and resources all about slaying your anxiety. So if you haven't checked that one out, listen to that one as well. Good luck. If you have any questions for me or would like my feedback about something, please send it over to me at podcast at Therapy for Black Girls dot com and it just might be answered on the show. Don't forget to show some love to our sponsors this week. Color Noir in o I R is the first and only coloring book app celebrating black women and culture. It's free to download and to get it, all you have to do is open up your Io s app Store app, search for color Noir in oh i R and enjoy. And do make sure you hit the subscribe button in the app so that you can get all the amazing images, updates and premium content dropping each in every week. And please help us to continue to raise awareness about sexual health and HIV transmission by participating in a short survey at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash med i q. It takes less than fifteen minutes. Y'all. No personal information will be stored or shared from the survey. The purpose of the survey is to help us get a better understanding about how women communicate with their physicians about their sexual health and to provide you with some more information on prep and HIV prevention. The insights gained from the survey will be used in an educational tool to provide information that may be useful in keeping the lines of communication open with health care teams. After completing this survey, you can enter your name in a raffle to win one of eight one d dollar visa gift cards. Again, you can find the survey at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash med i q. Remember that if you're searching for a therapist in your area, check out the directory at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash directory. If you want to continue this conversation with other sisters who listen to the podcast, come on over and join us in the Thrive Tribe, which is the Facebook group for our podcast. You can request to join at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash Tribe and be sure to answer the three questions that are asked to gain jury. Don't forget to visit our online store at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash shop, where you can find our guided affirmation, break up journal and your Therapy for Black Girls t shirts and mugs. Thank y'all so much for joining me again this week. I look forward to continue in this conversation with you all real soon. Take get care, the best, best will best, the best wo

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The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a license 
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