Angry Moms Unite! How to Stop Yelling at Your Family: Behind the Scenes Peek into Successful Mama Meetups #207
Did you spew angry volcano-vomit on your family today? Or yesterday? Or right before this, which is why you’re listening to this episode right now? IYKYK.
Today I’m taking you behind the scenes of one of our July meetups in Successful Mama Meetups. The theme for the month was "Angry Moms Unite," focusing on how to stop yelling at your family and regulate your emotions, so you can show up as the mom you want to be more often.
We’re not looking for perfection, but progress. Empowerment. Giving you the confidence that you can change the things you want to change cuz you’re not doomed to be a hot mess.
In this portion of our July meetup, I’m talking about why we get so upset and what we can do about it. How do we manage our emotions throughout the day to be able to have something left in the tank for after school and homework, or the witching hour and bedtime, without losing your ish and shutting everyone out?
Each week we start the meeting with 30 minutes of getting stuff done, then social time for the second half.
Every week is different because ADHD needs a lot of variety! However there are some repeating themes, like once a month I do free live coaching and every month I share exclusive lessons and discussions within the Successful Mama Community only.
Other weeks, we hang out in small groups and chat, because there is so much power in showing up, getting things done, and finding support in a community of moms who understand the struggles of parenting with ADHD.
This is a two-part episode, so you’ll hear the exclusive group discussion this week and next week you get a peek into the free monthly coaching available to Meetup members. Jess shares her struggle with emotional outbursts, which I think we can all relate to!
This monthly theme aims to help us understand ourselves better, find strategies to take care of ourselves, and connect with the mothers we truly want to be.
Ready to join us? Head to patriciasung.com/meetup and sign up for Successful Mama Meetups before our next meetup!
We have 2 bonuses inside of Successful Mama Meetups this month:
Want to set up your day in a way that feels exciting instead of exhausting? Join the ADHD Energy Recharge Workshop on September 21st at noon eastern (yes, there’s a replay.)
No matter if you’re an early bird or a night owl, I’m sharing how I work with my daily energy cycles with a splash of cycle syncing, to cater to my fluctuating energy levels and lessen the effects of PMDD.
And when you opt to join the Meetups with an annual membership, I’m giving you my original course for free: Daily Planning: How to Use a Planner for ADHD Moms, which is normally $267.
It’s all inside of Successful Mama Meetups this month. See you there!
Patricia Sung 00:02
Are you overwhelmed by motherhood and barely keeping your head above water? Are you confused and frustrated by how all the other moms make it look so easy. You can figure out how to manage the chaos in your mind, your home, or your family. I get your mama, parenting with ADHD is hard. Here is your permission slip to let go of the Pinterest worthy visions of organization and structure fit for everyone else. Let's do life like our brains do life creatively, lovingly, and with all our might. When we embrace who we are and how our brains work, we can figure out how to live our lives successfully, and in turn, lead our families well, at the end of the day, we just want to be good moms. but spoiler alert, you are already a great mom. ADHD does not mean you're doomed to be a hot mess mama, you can rewrite your story from shame spiral success story. And I'll be right here beside you to cheer you on. Hey there successful mama. Welcome to motherhood in ADHD.
Patricia Sung 01:12
Today, I'm giving you a little sneak peek behind the curtains where you are getting a piece of what we did in successful in my meetups in July. So in July, our theme was angry moms unite. How do we stop yelling at everybody? In successful meetups, we have different theme days. So we show up for the first 30 minutes and we get stuff done. You can get your planning done for the week. Or if you're just not in a planning mood that day. What else can you get done? Can you make that phone call to the dentist? Can you pay that bill? What can you get done? When you show up and you have the accountability to be there and make things happen? You showed up because the second half of the meeting is just as powerful. It's in a time where you know you're not alone. You're not the only person struggling with these things. This is a time where we would do a different thing every meeting because we have he wanted to keep things interesting. So some weeks we meet in small groups, and we get to know each other. And sometimes we talk about you know, just random things like what's your favorite reality show going on? Or like Oh, my goodness, the state of the world. And sometimes I answer questions about the courses, then there's some days where we talk about the theme. And we're talking about what we're struggling with, for example, in this snippet from July about, you know, our emotional regulation and feeling angry and yelling, like, I want you to know that you're not the only one that you're not the only one struggling with this and that there are other moms out here who are dealing with this too, because they want you to know that you're not broken and you're not weird or unusual. Like there are literally millions of us out here who are struggling with these things. And it's not only you. So sometimes we meet in small groups and talk about like what's working for us what's not working for us crowdsource information, one week, a month, we do group coaching. So I one person volunteers and I coach them through something to do with their ADHD and being a mom and in the struggle that is our lives. And other weeks, we do a group discussion about like, whatever our topic is for the month, and dive into like, Hey, why does this happen to us? And what can we do about it? And for these two episodes, this one and the next one? Or if you're listening to the second one, this one or the one before it is that I want to share with you first the group discussion on? Like, why is it that we get so upset? And what can we do about it and thinking about how do we solidify this idea into our minds that we understand why we're struggling, why we're upset? And what are the things that we can do about it? Then in part two, I'm gonna go through a group coaching with Jess, who is dealing with this as she calls emotional vomiting, where, you know, it's just too much and then she explodes at everybody. It's like, okay, what's the visualization that we want? Like, what's the thing that's going to help our brains go, Hey, I really want to connect to my family right now not explode into angry Medusa mom, or the volcano or the vomit of emotion, like, how do I find that place in me that I know wants to connect in with my family and build that connection, not tear it apart? So two parts for these two episodes. One, what's going on? Why is it happening? And two, what can we do about it? How can we take care of ourselves, and help ourselves connect into who we really want to be? So welcome to this little sneak behind what happens in successful mama meetups for a couple of our meetings. And if this is something that you're like, Man, I want more of this. This is what I need in my life. Like please come check it out. Feel free, like ask as many questions as you want. I want this to be the place where you feel welcome and you can be yourself and work on yourself and feel like you are leaning into who you really are and connecting with what you need so that you can be the person that you want to be and like unlearn all this crap we've carried along with us our whole lives and Find the person inside who's always been there and like allow you to connect back into who you are, and hear that voice inside of you. So, join me in six of my meetups, I'd love to have you there. If you want to join us, it's https://www.patriciasung.com/meetup.
Patricia Sung 05:16
And welcome to successful mama meetups. So when we're talking about being an angry mom, or like yelling at people, or like just put it earlier in the chat of like, your emotions just kind of vomit all over everyone. One of the things I've been doing like in really diving into this between all my research and therapy, and all this is trying to understand like, why is it that we do this, and I keep coming back to our general state. It's not just in that moment, like when we say like, Oh, my goodness, I just went from like zero to 100. And I don't understand why because everything was fine before that. And then I totally lost it over this silly little thing. Usually, that little like silly little thing is just the straw that broke the camel's back. We were struggling far before that. And we didn't know. And I saw something the other day on social media somewhere, it was Brene Brown doing an interview, I want to say it was with Tim Ferriss, and I can't remember if I shut this up before I start talking. But you know, Brene is doing an interview. And she's talking about how you know, when you're in a relationship, a lot of times we think things should be 5050. And she's like, a lot of times, it's not 5050. It's like, if you get home from work, and you had a really rough day, maybe you only have 20, and you need your partner to take up 80 Or you know, somebody's sick, so they only have 30 to give that day and the other person is picking up 70. And she was talking about how like, there's some days where you say like, I only have 20 today. And then your partner says why only got 10? And you're like, Okay, well between this, we got 30 and we don't have 100. So what are we going to do, and this concept of like giving our energy level or like our capacity, a number reminded me of this phrase where we say like I went from zero to 100 and fell apart and was like, wait a second to thinking about in my head. And I started thinking about like, when we have ADHD, we don't know our number. A lot of the times like we don't know, if we're at 10, or 50, or 70. If we haven't, like stop to think about it for sure. Like if you were just be like how you feeling right now, you'd be like, I'm fine. And you keep on tracking, you don't actually think about like, like, how actually am i right now. And when you stop to think like ooh, like, Where would I put my number. The analogy that I really liked, because it felt more tangible is if we think about like your phone battery, when you plug it in, and it's totally charged at 100%. And then throughout the day, your phone slowly goes down, and you're at like 50% and halfway through, or you're at 30%. But when you think about how your phone functions, your phone pretty much functions the exact same way, whether you just plugged it in, or it's at like 25%, your phone doesn't change, like it's not going to not do stuff because it's at 40%, it still functions the way that it would at 100%. So that whole time that it's losing battery power throughout the day, your phone is not reacting in a different way.
Patricia Sung 08:00
And I think a lot of us with ADHD are in that same boat of like, I still function basically the same. Most of the day, even though I'm getting down to this like low battery mode, like on my phone, it's like at like 20% it turns the screen turns black. And it's like the little battery turns red at the top. And it's like you need a blog on your phone. And yes, it gives me that low battery warning. But a lot of us don't have an internal low battery warning. Or if we do it's like our alarms, like the little low battery thing comes up and we're like yep, okay, and we just swipe and move along with the message and we dismiss it. We don't do anything about the fact that it said low battery. We're like, Yeah, I'll pull that phone in later. Even when my phone gets down to like 10%, I get a warning that says like, do you want to turn on low battery mode or power saving mode or something like that? And most of the time, I'm like, No, I don't want to do that. Because it like makes the screen all black and white. And you know, some of the things don't function. And a lot of times again, I'll just click Ok, or dismiss. And when I even though I got the message like, Hey, you're running out of battery at 20%, you're wanting out of battery at 10%. I'm still like, Cool. I'll fix that later. And I don't actually do anything. Problem. And when we don't have that forward thinking thought of like, what does that mean for me? Like, do I need to do something different? Do I need to be in power save mode? Or are we just like cool, keep on trucking. And again, our phone functions functioning functions to even with 1% It's still doing its job. And then it's not till it hit zero and it totally dies that all sudden, like ah no, my blood said when we have
Patricia Sung 09:34
ADHD and we let our battery die all the way down to zero. And that's when we explode at our family or that's when we shut down like whatever our method of like, this is too much. That's the moment where like, Oh man, I shouldn't have yelled at everybody. And then we start beating ourselves up for like all the things that we did that we shouldn't have done. So part of the struggle with ADHD is one understanding that Even though we function just fine from 100%, all the way down till 20, or even 10%, that doesn't mean that we still have a full battery, we still don't have full capacity or capability to do things, even though we can continue to function in that method. And can we start to learn about like, how do I know what my number is? How do I know what capacity I have right now? Is there a way for me to start to tell if I am at 50% battery, or I'm at 30% battery, or I'm at 10% battery, they need to do something about that is starting to listen to ourselves. And I'm like, I so wanted to go down this rabbit hole today. But I'm gonna stick on the anger thing of my whole soapbox about how a lot of people who have been socialized as women, we have learned to ignore all of those cues that something is going wrong, and that we are starting to lose battery power and that we need to pause and do something different in that moment to take care of ourselves. Because we just keep on trucking. It's okay, I'm going to keep on going. Just ignore the fact that my health is falling apart. Ignore the fact that like, My heart is racing and my chest feels tight. And I'm not breathing like evenly. I'm like all these like signals that happen in our bodies we've learned to ignore, because we've been told that our perception is off most of our lives, but without getting down that rabbit hole today. So check the website out there. And I'll have to circle back to that one later. Have you been feeling rundown, like you've lost your motivation to get stuff done, and it's just too hard because you're too tired. Or like, Oh, you got so much stuff done, but it wasn't what you were supposed to be doing. Enter the ADHD energy recharge workshop, we are going to sync together your natural rhythms to get the best productivity and the best rest live this month, I am hosting a quick mom friendly workshop. So you can harness your natural rhythms both during the day and during your cycle to feel energized, productive and social when you feel like you've got that big energy and to rest when you just can't be around people anymore. This is an action based workshop. So I'm sharing how I incorporate my daily rhythms to fit with a combination of cycle syncing to combat PMDD symptoms and literally lean into that unpredictable energy that feels like it just comes with ADHD. Because I want you to be able to enjoy your life to when you're feeling fun and sociable and give yourself space for rest. And curling up on the couch with a blanket on those days that are just too much.
Patricia Sung 12:28
Say goodbye to feeling guilty over canceling plans last minute because you just don't have any energy left in the tank or yelling at everybody in your family because you overextended yourself this week or this month. And let's learn how to work with your ADHD. This workshop is taking place on Thursday, September 21, noon Eastern and yes, there is a replay available if you can't be there live. And how do you sign up for the ADHD energy recharge workshop. It is available as a bonus inside successful online meetups this month. Success model meetups is my virtual meetup where you hang out with other ADHD moms just like you to rant, chat, hang out, get stuff done and build your support network. So head over to patriciasung.com/meetup and join successful mama meetups before September 20. And I'll send you all the details to join the workshop on September 21. at no extra charge is included in your meetups for this month. And so for 33 bucks, you get a whole month of accountability and community along with ADHD energy recharge workshop. Now there is a secondary bonus going on for the month of September when you join successful meetups. And that is when you join for the annual plan. You also are gifted my daily planning course which is how to use a planner for ADHD moms. This course is normally $267. And I am giving it to you for FREE when you sign up for the year. I wholeheartedly believe that this is like the fastest way to get you up and running and planning your day. And I want you to have this available to you right away to dive in, figure out how to get the basics of your day in order so that you can show up in the morning, know where you need to be what needs to get done. And you can then choose any kind of planner you wanted to keep track of your day, because you're choosing the tool to match what you need and your methods of what you know makes sense for you. Instead of hoping that this planner is going to solve all your problems for you. I have never given away this course before. So this is the time jump in join us in successful mama meetups and get both of these amazing bonuses for the month of September. There's no hidden like catches or anything like that. And you can cancel anytime. It really is that good of a deal because I want you to have the support in your hands and have it now. So go join successful mama meetups at Patriciasung.com/meetup. And I will see you at the next accountability meeting where we're gonna get some stuff done and hang out and then again at the ADHD energy recharge on September 21. See you then successful Mama is when we know what our number is we can Then do something about it. So when we think about our phone, we have three options when we're running low on power, we can either plug the phone in, so recharge it. So what are the things that you can do to recharge your battery? What are the things that are going to help you add in an extra 10 or 20%, before bedtime, so that you can get all the way through bedtime? With enough battery power? What are the things that you need that will recharge you, and it can be little simple things, it can be walking outside for three minutes, it can be closing the bathroom door and hiding for three minutes, two minutes, like what are these little ways that you can put a little boost of power on your battery that you can like stick your phone in the charger and let it boost? Even if it gets you that extra 5%? Is that the 5% that you need to be able to get through bedtime without yelling at everybody in the vicinity? So that's number one is these little ways that you can recharge throughout the day so that you have enough power battery power to get through? Number two, is power save mode, like when you get to a low battery? And your phone says do you want to enter power save mode? Is that something that you can do? Is there something that you can do to use up less power, which is essentially like what are the things that you're going to turn off or cut off your plate or eliminate so that you don't have to use that battery power in the time between now and when you're going to be able to recharge like for example that might be like I really don't have much recharge time between now and me going to sleep do I need to cut some things off my plate that like those things aren't draining energy to make it through the rest of the day. And then your third option is to change your usage. So the way that you are using your phone is using it more battery, like if the screen is on.
Patricia Sung 16:41
Like I don't know if you've ever done those like time lapse videos on your phone where like a you know, you record for like five minutes and then like speeds it up and switches it down into like speed mode for like only like a 22nd clip. And whenever I do one of those the video keeps going, but it turns the screen off because it saves the power. So like are there ways that you can change your usage so that you are using less power? How can you change the way you're going about your day. So that is not taking up as much of what you are doing. One of the ways that I change the way that I am doing things is when I feel myself starting to get frustrated is finding my imagery for what it looks like for me to be connected to my family. So instead of me just blazing through like a bull in a china shop, trying to get things done connecting back to myself to okay, how do I want to show up here? How do I want to be the connected person that I want to be with my family. So what I want to do is kind of walk through that for the last like 10 minutes that were together is allowing you to think about what's the mental imagery, because a lot of us with ADHD tend to be very either visual learners or very like analogy metaphor kind of people like we like a very tangible example of how something is like, we're going to walk through an actual, like tangible example of how we're going to connect in to that place. But like before I do that I just want to give a little like, disclaimer is that when you are in this place of you only have 5% battery, or you're at power off, like there's nothing left, that is your body telling you like we're at capacity, and we have nothing left. And so I want to offer like that level of like grace and forgiveness that your body is doing its job for you and protecting you. And it's not that you're a horrible person who can't hold it together. And you're not a horrible person that talks and says mean things to everybody. I wanted to like give you permission to like, take that ownership of that and like put it to the side, that's not something that you have to carry around and be like, Wow, I'm
Patricia Sung 18:39
the worst person ever, because I yelled at my kid about not using the purple cup and just can't use the blue cup. Like when you hit that level of overwhelm, that is your body in fight or flight or possibly even farther into your stress response. And it's telling you like you are done, we are we are at capacity, we cannot do any more. And so when we hit that fight or flight space, for some people, it looks like flight, I'm just gonna avoid all my problems. I'm going to scroll on my phone, I'm gonna go hide in my room. And like some of that is useful, you may need a break. That may be why your body is telling you to flight get out here. Sometimes though, we're like, I don't want to be the person that scrolls on my phone instead of talking to my family. So in that case, it's like, okay, how do we do something different? So we don't get to that point, because we're not we can't do anything with the fact that we're at that point, because that's your body taking care of you. So what do we have to do to not get there? How do we change what we're doing throughout the day, the battery doesn't hit zero. Because when you hit that place of fight or flight, and in this case, the fight is now I'm mad and I'm ready to punch everyone in the face and tell everybody what I think of them that fight. It's like that's your body's stress response saying we are stressed we need to fight right now because something is wrong. And you've got fists up and you're ready to argue with every eight year old or 17 year old that comes in your path. So knowing that like this is your body's job. It's doing its thing.
Patricia Sung 19:57
Okay. What do we need to do before we get there. So that's where we get into our three options of either we got to plug in and recharge, we have to hit power save mode and cut things off, or we change our usage. So that's what we're going to do right now. So as you are listening, whether you are here, now you're listening to replay, listen to this on the podcast. Obviously, if you're driving, don't close your eyes. But if you are simply safe, if you want to close your eyes, and you think about this, you can, if not, you can just kind of stare off into the distance and like, not focus on anything, just like you're you're still looking ahead, but you're not like analyzing things just kind of let things fall out of focus. And think for a moment, we're gonna look at how do we want to feel when we connect in with our family, because we know exactly what how we feel when we're frustrated, or when we're yelling, or when we're wherever. And our brain is really good at that. But we want to do is tell our brain cool, we know you're good at that. This is actually what I want to do. This is the the new path that I want to create the new neural pathways that I want to build is that I want to feel this connection with, like, if you want to picture like whatever child is on your nerves when you're yelling, what do you want to feel like in that moment? How does how does that feel like connection. And just if you if you're still up for volunteering, I will talk it through with you if you want to just sit quietly and think about it. I'll just do the questions. I'll leave it up to you. Now it's good, I can talk it through. Okay, so if that's on my mind, we're going to pause there and circle back for part two next week, where we're going to dive into like, what how do we actually do this? And we're gonna do a live coaching example to show you how do you create this part three, where you are figuring out like, how do you change the usage of your battery? How can you modify the way that you are functioning now to use a different type of energy or different amount of energy to do that same thing? So I'll talk to you soon. Successful mama back next week for part two. For more resources, classes and community head over to my website motherhoodinadhd.com.