Don’t Stuff Your Emotions!
12:23 Share

Well, today we want to encourage single moms to know that your feelings matter to God and you're not alone. I'm John Fuller, along with our Vice President of Parenting, Dr. Danny Huerta. And Danny, you've encouraged a number of single moms in your counseling practice. What do you think some of the common feelings they experience are, the most common ones? Yeah, I mean, the most obvious one would be exhaustion. Okay.

That's the most common one among single moms. And loneliness is another one. Stress, just in general, financial strain. It can be emotional stress that they're carrying around.

Yeah.

They feel bad, and so sometimes there's an overcompensating. There you go. At some show, we may talk about that. But they also feel judged many times. I hear that from single parents. There's an assumption being made as to what their role was in the place they find themselves in. But just keep in mind, many times, single moms are trying to juggle so many things at the same time and feel almost a loss of identity sometimes.

beyond just trying to provide and survive. And they have a hard time finding moments to take care of themselves internally, their walk with their Heavenly Father. There's some that have found that margin and you can see a sense of gratitude, a sense of resilience when they're able to find that.

So if you're a friend of a single mom and you can help them find some of that margin to have some time of self-care, man, it makes a huge difference in the mindset and the feelings, that momentum inside of a single mom. I appreciate that. Great perspective. And let's pivot now to a conversation that Jim Daly had with Pam Farrell and Peggy Sue Wells yesterday.

They were on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, and Peggy Sue last time shared her story about what happened and what she experienced, those emotions she experienced when her husband left her. Let me go to both of you. What are the dangers of stuffing emotions when you're going through this kind of hardship, like a divorce or a separation? I mean, it's easy to do. Let's not talk about it in front of the kids. And of course, the kids, as a kid in that situation, Pam, I'll ask you first.

You know something's not right as that child. I mean, it happened to me when I was five, and I could tell something wasn't right, and all of a sudden, Dad wasn't around much or at all. But you didn't feel like you could say, where's Dad? Because there was something wrong about talking about him. Does that make sense?

It does. I think that harder part for my mom and I, because I was older, I became like a confidant to my mom. But she was wise enough to realize, oh, my goodness, Pam shouldn't have to be my counselor. I need to get a good counselor. I need to go talk to my pastor. I need to find a Christian counselor. So that was one of her first best decisions that she made is she surrounded herself with

support system, other single parents that had moved forward in life. And so she made a lot of decisions very quickly, moving us out. She moved us out of California back home to where her parents lived. Oh, so you had support. Yes, right down the street from wonderful grandparents. That's good.

And we went there a lot because they were stable and encouraging. And grandpa was like a male role model for my brother, especially. Yeah.

And so there were some good decisions that she made quickly. And sometimes that's really tough to do because you're selling the house, you're like splitting finances, there's lawyers. It's a lot. And so we always encourage single moms, like don't go through it alone. When Bill and I were pastoring, we had a two-step process. And so a woman would come in for counseling or the couple may have been counseling with Bill and then the guy opts out.

We get the single mom in a room with her best friends from the church that are healthy and her family maybe from the area. And we say, okay, we need a crisis plan, six to eight weeks, and then we'll work on the long-term plan to move you and the kids forward. Wow. Peggy Sue, from a mom's perspective, that stuffing of the emotions, I mean, some of that, what Pam is describing is wisdom.

So it's not like completely healthy to just unload.

And it's like you said, it's not ideal. The situation is not ideal, but it is our real. So we have to deal with our real. And one of the things that was really important was to be able to still have those feelings because I went through a place of this just hurts too much. I'm just going to shut it all down. But they're like grapes. You know, our emotions are like grapes. So if I shut that down, then I don't have the love and the joy and the happiness that goes with it. So you have to be bold and courageous and brave enough to feel all the feelings because that's what makes us human.

And so we made some rules in our home because everybody was at a different stage at a different time. So somebody would be fine. Somebody else would be just terrible. Somebody else would be angry. Somebody else would think everything was good. And somebody else would be like, worst day ever. So we kind of had to put some ground rules which said, you can feel what you feel and we want you to feel it. However, you cannot take it out on someone else. And you also cannot demand that that person change how they feel.

So feel your feelings, but it cannot come out on others. And we will honor you. This is where you are right now, and that's where you are right now. And it's going to shift. I would think that really helped the kids regulate their emotions. I mean, in a healthy way, not to stuff them down, but...

to release them appropriately. Because we need to be able to feel them in order to be whole and healthy and then to be whole and healthy for our relationships that we will be involved in and that we're involved with now. Yeah, that's really good.

Well, Danny, we at the top of the show explored a little bit of some of the emotional contours and we heard more from Peggy Sue and from Pam. We can't stuff our emotions. They come out. They either leak out or erupt out. How do we avoid getting stuck in a negative cycle? And just that's where we live. I can't seem to find any victories. I guess it's just this way. Yeah, and great insights from Peggy Sue and Pam. Just appreciate what they've

provided for single moms. And it's so easy to get stuck emotionally in these thoughts that probably feel justified. That, man, it wasn't supposed to be this way. I can't believe this is where I'm at. And the negative thoughts kind of feed on each other. Something that I thought about or learned early in my years studying psychology was

this concept by Dr. Daniel Amen. And he talked about the ants going up in your head. And these are automatic negative thoughts. And what I pictured was ants actually going up there and finding food, finding that negative thought, and then inviting all the friends to have a feast of just negative thoughts. That's a really powerful word picture. Yes. And so you want to have some ant killers that are there in your brain. And the first one is gratitude.

Gratitude is a reverser of those ants that come in. And that's just saying, what is it that I have instead of what is it that I don't have?

What do I get to do now as a single mom or dad? What is it that I can do in response to what do I have to steward? What do I still have? And what impact do I have there? What friends do I have? And so you see out of a mindset of abundance rather than a mindset of not having a certain amount of whatever it is. And it helps you move beyond yourself and begin to pour into other people.

And what I've noticed is single moms that decide to serve others, to care about other people, begin to pull themselves out of their own chaos, their own difficulty, and actually begin to feel some freedom from their own chaos by pouring into others. And I have seen that

moms that have a regular routine, maybe it's exercise, maybe it's reading God's word in the morning and praying, but finding that routine, begin to find a footing that helps them reverse that mindset and helps them deal with all the physiological reality that it makes sense to feel anxious. It makes sense to feel sad. It makes sense to feel stressed.

But what am I going to do about this instead of getting stuck in it? And those are the things you can begin to control. And that is your rhythm. And find that rhythm as a mom. It's going to make a huge difference. And then make sure you look at what friends you've got around you. Be open. Be honest. Be vulnerable with people that are trusted, that you are able to trust in your life. Those are life-giving people. Don't miss out on that potential to be encouraged around.

each day that you are trying to juggle everything. Yeah, yeah. As you're saying that, Danny, I'm thinking of the scriptural passage in which four friends take their mutual friend who is a paralytic, and they said, we're going to have faith on your behalf that Jesus can heal you. They couldn't get in the house, but they said, we're going to lower you through the roof. And I

I mean, he was absolutely unable to do anything. And the faith of these friends was such that they lifted the roof tiles off and they dropped him down, lowered him down, and he was healed. And Jesus commended them for being hope and faith on his behalf.

And so maybe you can do that as a listener. Maybe you can do that for a single mom. You can have hope for her. You can have encouragement for her. You can provide the ant killer for those negative thoughts. If you don't have somebody in your sphere, if this is you, you're struggling with these thoughts.

negative emotions, one of the best things that we can offer is a free phone consultation with a trusted Christian counselor. We have a tremendous team of caring Christian counselors here at the ministry. You can call our 800 number to schedule a free consultation. It's about 20, 25 minutes long. They'll listen to you. They'll pray with you. They'll offer resources and direction. It's a great starting point if you're feeling struck.

So our number is 800, the letter A and the word family. And John, what's interesting with that in speaking with a counselor, what you're doing is going deeper beyond just the emotion. Emotions are signals. And if it's negative, something else is going on a little deeper. Yeah.

Find that person to go a little deep into the soul, into what is really happening behind the emotions. Shed light on this and find some help. And Danny, you used to be one of those Christian counselors that responded. And we're not connecting you with Danny today, but we want to help you find somebody very much like Danny with heart and biblical wisdom. So again, our number is 800, the letter A in the word family, and it's a free phone consultation.

And if you're in a good spot and you can make a monthly pledge or one-time gift of any amount to support the work of Focus on the Family as we encourage families and as we step in and help families.

and individuals at points of need, make a donation today, either a one-time gift or a monthly pledge if you can. Those really help us out. And we'll send the book by Peggy Sue Wells and Pam Farrell called The 10 Best Decisions a Single Mom Can Make. It's really encouraging, a very practical resource, and you can check the show notes for more.

Next time, we're going to hear from Jody Berndt about conflict with your teenager. And for now, on behalf of Dr. Danny Huerta and the entire team, I'm John Fuller, and thanks for listening to the Focus on the Family Parenting Podcast.

How do you and your spouse connect spiritually? Would you like to be closer? Focus on the Family invites you to listen to the Loving Well podcast. Season 8 just released, and your hosts, Dr. Greg and Erin Smalley, share insights and humor from their own marriage of over 30 years. And they'll offer you practical ideas to strengthen your marriage by focusing on God.

Listen, follow, and grow together with the Loving Well podcast. You'll find it at FocusOnTheFamily.com slash Loving Well.