4 Effective Tools For Handling Strong-Willed Children

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Do strong willed children seem to know exactly which buttons to push? Do you feel the heat rising inside when they respond in ways you never would have dared with your own parents?

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Well, you're not alone. We've all been there.

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Anger takes over. Patience runs thin and before you know it, you've lost it. Despite wishing for a better way, Kirk Martin is the founder of Celebrate Calm and the Calm Parenting Podcast.

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Kirk has helped me and thousands of other parents with their strong willed children. He shares transformative insights and practical strategies to help you stay cool, calm and collected even in the most challenging parenting moments. Discover how to turn frustration into empowerment and create the peaceful home environment that you want. Tune in to learn how to connect deeply with your strong willed child and find the calm amidst the chaos. Don't miss this chance to transform your parenting approach and build a stronger bond with your child.

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Welcome to Grandparents Raising Grandchildren Nurturing Through Adversity. In this podcast, we will delve deep into the challenges and triumphs of grandparents raising grandchildren as we navigate the complexities of legal, financial and emotional support. I invite you to join us on a journey of exploring thoughts, feelings and beliefs surrounding this growing segment of our society. Drawing from real stories and expert advice, we will explore the nuances of child rearing for children who have experienced trauma and offer valuable resources to guide you through the intricate journey of kinship care.

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We'll discuss how we can change the course of history by rewriting our grandchildren's future, all within a supportive community that understands the unique joys and struggles. This podcast was made especially for you.

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Welcome to a community where your voice is heard, your explanation, experiences are valued, and your journey is honored.

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Before we dive into this episode with Kirk Martin, I want to share a personal story that probably resonates with many grandparents raising their grandchildren. In my journey, although I was seldom pushed to anger with my own children, parenting my grandchildren has been a whole different story. They came to me with no boundaries, little guidance, and one had been diagnosed with Defiance Disorder. I was stretched to my limits and I love and care for these kids deeply and wanted to avoid losing my temper and saying things I'd regret. I also had a strong desire to break generational patterns of behavior because these kids are, after all, part of my legacy.

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Discovering actionable tips that instantly worked was a game changer for me. It not only helped me manage my anger and feel better about myself, but it also provided healthy examples for my grandkids. I was all in and excited to share this journey with these transformative insights. Join us today as we explore how to find better ways to handle the challenges with strong willed children through practical advice that really works and encouragement from Kirk Martin. Kirk had found himself in a similar situation when he first became a dad. Raised by a military father, he was taught, as I was, that children were to be seen and not heard.

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Questions were followed with yes ma'am and no ma'am.

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Rude or impolite behavior was met with a spanking or worse sometimes. Kirk's parenting skills were transformed by three pivotal questions.

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And now he helps millions of parents stop the yelling, defiance, and power struggles between parents and kids. It's changed my parenting for the better, and I hope it will. Yours too. Good morning, Kirk.

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Hey, Laura. It's awesome to be with you too.

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I'm so excited. You are the founder of Celebrate Calm and you have helped over a million parents stop the yelling, defiance, and power struggles that they have with strong willed children. And that all came from a passion I gather from within you because of being a father yourself to a strong willed child. Yes, I always joke. Our son came out of the womb with boxing gloves on and challenged everything inside of me. Right from the way I was, with the way I was parented. And those strong willed kids and kids with trauma, kids on the spectrum, they know how to push your buttons. They know how to find every weakness that you have. And so we'll get into this. But what I learned is if instead of fighting that and trying to change the child, you really lean into that man, it will change you as a person, even if you don't want to be changed. Because I didn't want to be. So that's kind of how it started to happen. Was our son. It brought up probably a lot of issues from your own childrearing, did it? Not absolutely. My dad was career military. Like in our home, he was known as the Colonel. So for your listeners, many of you were raised in that era, right, of like fear and intimidation, yell and scream, speak when you're spoken to. And so then I become a dad and it's like, well, that's all I knew was to do that. So a lot of this is just breaking those generational patterns. And it's hard, but it's worth the work. And what did that do to you when those issues came up for you and you were parenting your own son? You know, when I look back, I wanted to change our son. And I think what was happening was it was causing all of this inner conflict inside of me.

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Right. Like, I would have never talked to my dad like that.

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Am I doing something wrong? Why can't he just get with the program? And I found that I began and I loved our son. Right. Like I was a good dad, spent time with him, we played ball together. But invariably, almost every interaction, some of kind of my dad came out. So I'd be critical of him, I'd be short with him. Case, come on, just get my tone. You just get frustrated with these kids. And I think what I resented in our son was he was forcing me to come face to face with my own childhood issues, with the fact that I couldn't even control myself. I needed, in a way, I needed my son to behave so that I could behave. And so at the very beginning, I think I was resentful toward my son. Why can't you just do what I asked you to do? It would be so much easier. And so there's all this wrestling inside. And I think obviously the parents and grandparents listen to this.

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You're going to experience that it's hard, emotional work. I'm a guy, I can work like a regular job. I can work 20 hours a day. It's a nice escape from real life. Like, work is easy for me.

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Human relationships, those are hard.

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Like very hard. Yeah.

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Obviously that made you become more critical of yourself and had to have inspired the work that you're doing now. Oh, absolutely. It's foundational to everything because it was first my transformation as a dad. It was coming to understand these kids, these kids who are different.

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And if we do a large, big bucket, it would be you have your kids who generally are just more compliant and easy to raise.

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And then many of you have, if you're listening to this podcast, you probably have a strong willed child, a child who is like, they just want to do the opposite all the time. They want to touch the hot stove. They want to figure it out for themselves. And so there was a deep level of acceptance of I didn't get the easy kid.

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I wanted the easy kid. And I had to grieve that I didn't get the kid that I wanted. I wanted the kid who we would play catch and he'd say, dad, thanks for playing catch with me. What do you want me to do now, dad? And I didn't get that son. It was putting his shoes on was difficult. Home where everything was kind of different. So understanding that these kids are who they are is foundational to all of this. But I have to believe, and I know that this has been the same for me, that it brought out the best in you.

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What tools did you use to change your approach of parenting.

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Two things, I think. One, your point of I am a different human being today precisely because our son was so challenging. I leaned into it. It changed me. It made me more patient, made me see people in a different way. It honestly, I had to learn how to control my own emotions. Now I'll tell you the two things that I did right away, Laura. That made a big difference because I'm not great at that. Well, just do deep breathing exercises. It didn't work for me. I would hyperventilate. Want to yell more. Right. Or like, it's like we tell our kids, like, punch a pillow. It's like punching a pillow is not satisfying. They need to. It's not what you think of.

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It's not the first thing you think of. No. I want to hit something concrete and hard. But the two things I did right away were I began sitting because I was raised by a dad who kind of just, you know, when I think about my dad, he just was always lurking around the home. It was like he was this presence who was finding us doing things wrong and then yelling at us. And so I began sitting. And sitting changed something because when you sit down, you see situations more clearly. It's really hard to yell when you're sitting. Right. Like you, you think like, you know, you're, you're a New Yorker. You're a New Yorker, right? Like you got the hands flying and you're talking quickly.

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And then that body posture leads you into more standing over a little kid yelling. So I'd sit. And part of the reason, Lauren, people always push back like, oh, that's too simplistic. I'm a caveman. I'm a guy.

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All I know is I can't remember like a 10 step process to calm down, but anywhere I am, anywhere I can sit and it changes the response of the child.

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You can picture this if I'm a guy and I come up to another guy and we're both standing with our hands on our hips, squared off. Well, a fight's about to happen. Yeah. If I sit down, I diffuse that situation. Yeah. So sitting is really important. And then tone of voice, hugely important for our strong will kids.

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Kids who have been through trauma. And I'll do this really quickly.

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So the old school approach, you're not going to talk to me like that. You sit down right now. Well, that produces that kind of gets that fight or flight reaction going from the child. And the strong will child hears two things. One is, oh, if you want to go fight or flight, oh, I'm all in ratchet it up. And that is also stimulating their brain. And they're finding it is brain intensity. And so it triggers them that way. And what they know is when my son heard me start to get visibly or he saw me getting visibly irritated and he can hear my tone getting like this, what he knew is if I just push your buttons a little bit right now, dad, you're going to lose it.

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And see, once I lose control of my own self and my voice, the child's in complete control. So I know the grandparents listening are will recoil at this. Like I have is our modern parents have gone all the way to the other extreme. And now they talk to their children in a question mark and they ask them things. You're like, that doesn't work either because that creates a lot of instability in the child. And you're almost asking the child's permission. What we teach and what we try to model is even matter of fact tone. This kind of business like tone says, I'm not moved by anything. Your behavior does not change my behavior. You can be in that mood. Not going to change my mood. I'm in complete control of myself. It is a very grounding tool. And the strong will kids respond to this because you're almost talking to them like you talk to another adult instead of trying to do this, will you please behave? Doesn't work. You know what? You better get your butt in the car right now. Doesn't work. But when I talk like this, well, now I'm talking kind of like I respect them, but I'm also the authority figure who is in control of myself. And I found if you try those two things, you'll start to see a lot of success with these kids right away.

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One of the things that attracted me to speaking with you was I could really relate to the three transformative questions that you bring up. One, what if your child was created like this on purpose? Two, what if by trying to change your son, you're frustrating my purposes for him or her? Three, what if instead of trying to change your child, you're the one who needs to change? All of those issues came up for me, and I'm curious how those came up for you.

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I think, Laura, it was the process of I was spending so much emotional mental energy just trying to fix our son, like just change the kid. So I would go on these long walks and I would. And I would however you want to say, but I would talk to God and I would just like, you know, I don't even know I wasn't really talking to God. I was telling God that he needed to change our son, right? Like, what are you doing?

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Like, do you not know what you're doing? So, you know, you talk and you're searching, right? And you could put it in terms of like, you know, usually it's moms and grandmas, like searching on the web, you know, till 2 in the morning, right? Like, what? I need some resources. Like, I need some help here. But when I did start to listen a little bit more and I did start to hear those questions of like, well, what if he is made like this, this way on purpose?

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What am I missing here? Because I'm just trying to make this kid be a mini me for my own comfort. Casey, our son made me really uncomfortable. There's a lot of wrestling inside. And I started to think, okay, so what is the purpose for that? What if that strong willed nature of his is there for a reason? He's made like that.

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And I can tell you in retrospect now, our son is 31.

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All of those traits that irritated me most when he was a kid are the very traits I respect and like the most now. And he works with me in the business, but he has another job.

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He kicks butt in his other job precisely because he's so strong willed. Don't you think that's every parent's desire? I mean, as a grandparent, my greatest desire is to transform the generational disorders of the past in my family and be able to give this gift of clarity to my grandchildren and the wisdom, you know, of 67 years for me of experience and so that they can live a happier, healthier life, but not feel. I mean, I had to uncover years of thinking or dysfunctional thinking because of all this crap that was passed down to me in my family. And not that I have a wonderful mother.

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I had a very wonderful father. We had. My parents were divorced, but I mean, there was all kinds of stuff that we pass on. And I don't want to do that with my grandchildren. That's. I mean, I think that's the greatest gift, right? And I think one of the more. Important than anything I can think of. I think it's more important than anything they learn in school, right? Anything. All those things of like tie your shoes, all the daily things, make your bed, it doesn't matter.

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It's more important than material things to leave for them.

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Oh, absolutely. Well, because you're leaving them as a new person, a changed person, a confident kid.

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And one of the advantages as each. Child, yes, we have so many unhappy people in the world if you can. Get to those basics. And one of the advantages, I think, Laura, of grandparents, I know it's hard, is you do have that life wisdom, right? And you do have that settled nature. Like, I'm 58 now. I'm so much more settled. I've enjoyed my 50s. I feel like I finally grew up in my 50s, and I'm kind of looking forward to 60s because I'm like, okay, I probably won't get freaked out about stuff as much in my 60s as I did in my 50s, my 30s. I was basically a kid myself trying to raise. You know, we had Casey when I was 27, Casey's 31. I'm like, I can't imagine you with a kid now. And you were 4 when I was your age. Like, we didn't know what we were doing. But to if you can embrace this, even at this stage of life, I know it has to be hard to say we had these plans of what we were going to do in our 60s and 70s and our 50s. But now it's like, okay, so I can take on this challenge and I can take these kids and I can help create for them like a legacy generations going forward. Like, I know our son. His relationship with his wife is so much better than ours ever was. He's so much more. They talk, they handle conflict. Like, in our generation, we didn't understand all of this. It was like, you're just, we were too young when we got married. We didn't know what we were doing.

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And so you're being able to make the generation that comes after you. And for some of you listening, you're skipping a generation, right? And you're going to the grandkids and what a gift you are giving to them of your life wisdom. And then them watching you change right in front of them. And you're older like me, and you struggle with technology and your kids are going to be teaching you some things, but you have an opportunity to be so grounding for them, right? Because one of the things, Laura, that I do with, you know, with parents of their kids, strong will kids, is find an older couple down the street who can mentor your child. Mentors are important, I believe. Absolutely. And I always mention, like, find an older couple. Why? Because we have wisdom. We know what it was like before. Screenshot. The young parents now, they don't know what life was like before there was an iPhone, right? But you and I can remember the corded, gross yellow lime green phone attached to the wall. Remember how Cool. It was when you had the 36 foot one.

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Yes. I remember my parents saying, we don't need to spend the money on that. We can stand next to the kitchen wall. Right. That was a luxury when cable TV. Came out and there was a cord that ran along the living room floor and you had to click a dial. So there's this institutional knowledge that we have and wisdom that the other generations don't have.

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Like, even in my talks with my son, we'll talk about what it was like back then. And I think our son will actually use some of the good parts of that old school discipline. Yeah, right. Of not being moved. Okay, so my child is unhappy. Well, my day's not going to be ruined. Like, I remember. You remember this.

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You grew up in New York. I think I grew up in Baltimore. We just went outside and we were gone literally all day long. Didn't see our parents, didn't talk to them. We came home when the street lights came on. My mom, I never remember her saying, well, honey, did you have a good time today?

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She didn't ask. And it wasn't that she didn't care. I think she knew. Look, if you had that much freedom to be gone all day and you didn't have a good time, that's on you. Right? And she wasn't like all tied up in like, well, my happiness is dependent on your happiness and I need.

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And when we were bored, our parents didn't jump through hoops and buy us stuff. They were like, okay, you're bored, you'll figure it out. And we figured it out. So to the grandparents out there, you can bring some of those great elements of that old school parenting to bear that are very grounding for kids, but then learn some of the new things, like our kids with anxiety. That wasn't like a big deal back when we were kids that we knew about, partly because nobody knew about these things. But you have a lot of advantages here. So I don't think you have to redo your entire parenting paradigm. You can bring to bear your wisdom and set up your grandkids and kids to have amazing lives. So what do you think are some of the core beliefs that we need to take a look at as grandparents that are raising grandchildren in these challenging situations. I think there is, as you know better than I do, would be that grief.

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Right. Allowing yourself that grief of, we had dreams of the golden years, we raised our kids well. And now I have my own child who has struggled with addiction or past or all those things. So you have to Allow yourself to grieve that, you know, allow yourself, you know, at times, I know this may not sound right, but you know, allow, at times, do allow yourself to have a pity party once in a while, right? To say, like, this isn't right, like this isn't how it should be. I think that's very healthy. Now, I don't want to live in that every single day.

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But it's also, I don't want you to expect yourselves to be superhuman. Like we, back in the day, we did these camps where we had kids come in our home, but I was like 35. I'm not having 10 kids in my home unless they're my grandkids. And even then I'm not going to have them all at once. That would be overwhelming. So I think being honest with yourself and saying, no, I can't do the same things I did when I was a young parent, saying no to certain things. But I think overall mindset would be okay. And this is what I've learned as I've gotten older, Laura, These are the cards I've been given. Stop spending all that time on, well, if. Then don't go into the guilt. Well, maybe if I would have raised my child differently, this wouldn't be happening to me. And throw yourself into the mission of, okay, here's reality. I now have a 4 year old and a 10 year old, or I have two teenagers that I didn't expect to be raising.

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Now I kind of step out of myself and say, this is my legacy now. My legacy is these kids that I now have. What does their future look like? What do their marriages and their families look like? And now I have an opportunity. And look, I know some of this, I don't want to be insensitive to it, right, Laura, of being like, oh, I'm just going to take on this mission. This is hard. But I watched my own grandparents kind of just slowly die sitting in a mobile home in Florida, watching soap operas every day. And then they kind of just wasted away because you worked all your, you know, you worked. My grandpa worked in a factory. And then it was quitting time in retirement and there was no mission there. Now, fortunately, like with you, it was like, okay, now we're going to travel. But now that's shifted a lot. But if you can take on this as a mission to say, here is my second half of life mission, I'm going to lean into this and I'm going to break generational patterns.

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And these grandkids, I'm going to be given they're going to look back at me as all of the grandkids in our larger family look at my mom, because my mom is a hero to them. My mom, their grandma, is kind of the guiding force of our entire family. She's since passed, but she was an awesome human being who worked through her Ms. And everything else. And when she died and when she was in the process of dying, I remember talking to her and saying, mom, you're free to go now. Because she was a fighter. And she was like, I don't want to leave my boys and my grandkids. But her body was just falling apart. And I said, mom, look at what you accomplished. You raised four boys by yourself who had a dad who was a monster, and we all turned out well. And your grandkids adore you. You have left your mark for generations. And she has like my niece. Cause now we're starting to have the nieces. The kids are having grandkids. And who do they all talk about?

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It's all about my mom. My son, when he's older, is probably not gonna talk about me. Like, dad, you were so great. He's going to talk about. I don't know about that, Kirk. He will. I was just trying. He will a little bit. But the guiding force in our family is the grandma. And so if you can embrace that, you can have a generational impact for hundreds of years even by doing this. So I have a lot of respect for you and for all of the people listening to this to say hard work. I love those points. I think those are great ones to remember. And let's briefly go into.

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Because I know a lot of grandparents have strong willed children.

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I struggle with the anger that comes up. I struggle with raising my voice. Give us some actionable tools. Just let's go over some of the key points and then maybe we'll have another conversation about this. Okay? I think good, Laura, I think first controlling yourself, right? And learning how sitting down, I would practice that even matter of fact tone all the time. I'll give you. If you don't mind, I'll do this quick. Five points for like really emotional kids.

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So number one, the first thing, when you have a child who's really emotional and getting upset, the first thing is not to try to control them and get them to calm down.

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Because that's what we all do. And you grew up in New York, so you know this, Laura, of like, oh, yeah. If I were to tell you, like, you need to calm down right now. Calm down, Laura, you'd be like, oh, yeah, you can go yourself. Right? Nobody likes to be told to calm down. So the reason kids get upset and we get upset as adults is because we have a perceived or real loss of control. I mean, one of the things you're going to struggle with as a grandparent is you had dreams and visions of how life was going to be like. And then overnight you are responsible for raising these grandchildren. Well, that's a huge change. And so the first thing I do with an upset child is I try to give them something they're actually in control of. So instead of, hey, you need to calm down, it is, oh, you know what, I could really use your help. And then I try to come up with some jobs to do things that they feel in control of. Giving an example, working with his family and one of the kids, he likes to fish. So when he gets upset, his dad will say, oh, I just remembered on Saturday we're going fishing. Could you go to the garage and organize the fishing lures? See, the process of organizing those fishing lures, it's completely within my control. One of the best tools, number two. And I'll tie this all together. So give them something they're in control of. Number two, we've done this. Control yourself in that moment. Try not to react, try not to yell.

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Sometimes I sit, you know what? Sometimes. But even matter of fact, tone. Third thing, motion changes emotion. When kids get upset, one of the most calming tools is to give them a mission or a job to do. Not a chore like go make your bed, but a mission of some kind using movement. Because these kids are very strong willed. They're physical. And just saying, oh, go sit in time out, honey. Yeah, that's not happening. And you can't talk kids into being calm. A lot of words makes them more upset.

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So let me give you a couple of them. Hey, I can tell you're frustrated right now. Listen, I'm going to go grab football. If you want to come outside and play catch. Oh, I help you with whatever you're struggling with. If they're little kids and they love to build with Legos. Oh, I can tell you frustrated. Listen, I really want, I'd love to help you build that spaceship you wanted to build because there's something. Doing something tactile with their hands is calming. You know, a cool one. Laura, sitting and coloring. We did this as kids. So look, you're a grandparent and if you don't have as much energy and you can't go out and like run around with these kids much, I'LL give you two.

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One is coloring. You literally just sit at the kitchen table and start coloring. It's impossible to yell while you're coloring, right? You'll feel stupid while you're doing it. And what you're doing is you're drawing the child to you. And so another one would be have some pre planned missions, so to speak, that kids can do when they get upset. A lot of the kids we work with are very physical. And so even saying, let's say you're a grandma and you're like, oh, you know what? Your grandpa, you know what?

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He couldn't get all those bags of mulch moved. Do you think you're strong enough to move those bags of mulch for your grandpa? Well, little kids love proving that they're strong. And so now they're outside dragging and I would just, honestly, I just order like five bags of mulch or topsoil to keep in your backyard and have them move it back and forth, have them dig a hole in your backyard, I don't care. But having something physical to do helps you work off that frustration and anger. The fourth thing is intensity. Give kids positive intensity. See, when our son was little and he did things wrong, I gave him negative intensity. You know what? You need to stop that right now, young man. And what their brains. And this is really important for your kids who have been through trauma is the brain associates intensity with connection. Because think about this, and you guys all will know this, the worst thing in your marriage is not you two fighting. It's apathy. It's when I don't even care enough about you to argue with you anymore. Laura, I'm done.

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But at least if I argue with you a little bit, that shows I care. So for these kids who have been through trauma, what they learn is if I push people's buttons, they yell at me. Well, at least you care enough about me to yell at me.

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So intensity, positive intensity. Sounds like this. You've got a kid who comes home from school, makes a paper airplane and throws it. It doesn't fly the right way. Now look, when you and I were kids, we'd pick that airplane up and we'd redo it. No big deal. The kids today are going to crumple up the airplane. Stupid airplane. This is dumb. I'm stupid. And as a grandparent, you're like, where's this coming from? This is a stupid airplane. No big deal. But I don't want to walk in the room and say, oh, honey, that was a really good airplane because your Child's going to be like, duh, grandma, grandpa. If it were a good airplane, it would have flown, right? So instead, and I know this is different with this generation, I come and say, you know what? If I were you, I'd be frustrated, too. You put a lot of time into making that airplane. It didn't fly right. That's disappointing. I'd be frustrated, too. There is something very grounding and settling about another person saying, yeah, I'd be upset at that too. And I don't give eye contact. So in that situation, you know what?

00:36:24.965 --> 00:36:46.514
I'd be frustrated too. Then I usually say, you know what? I need to go to the bathroom. I need to go get a glass of water. When I get back, let's problem solve. So I don't stand over the child when they're upset, because nobody likes to be watched when they're processing their emotions.

00:36:47.014 --> 00:37:04.875
So giving them a mission to do, controlling yourself, using that intensity can be extremely helpful with these kids. And it's just learning some new tools. And Laura, once you start doing it, you're like, oh, there's a little process to this.

00:37:05.175 --> 00:37:18.454
I can do that. And you'll watch their reactions change. So I just encourage you try some of those things, Grandma and grandpa, moms and dads, and just watch how the child responds to it.

00:37:19.954 --> 00:37:42.074
I really think those are great tips that I've never thought of before. And I know that I'm going to be reporting back to my husband after our interview. He's very interested as well in learning some tips on how to work with our kids. Both of them are strong willed, both of them are different, obviously have different issues.

00:37:42.155 --> 00:39:12.621
But any good advice is helpful because we do want to work with breaking negative cycles if we can get to that point of understanding that. I know that it's been a beautiful transition for my husband and I, recognizing that we're doing the right thing. And as we've embraced this mission, it's changed, changed us in some amazing ways and made us better people and will continue to. I'm so excited to start using the actionable tools. I think they make so much sense. Well, Kirk, why don't you tell our listeners where they can find out more information about your programs. And let's invite maybe others to share their stories and experiences maybe for our next conversation. Yeah, that would be awesome. Well, if you're interested, our website is celebrate calm.com and then our podcast is the Calm Parenting Podcast. And if you just Google or search that, you'll find us. And the one thing I'd like to say Laura is if you are a grandparent on our website you will find our email address. Just email us, we'll help and say hey, we're grandparents raising our kids and we will move you to first of the line and tell us you found us through Lara and we'll help you with stuff because I know this is really really hard work. So just email us.

00:39:12.652 --> 00:39:19.949
We're friendly good people and you'll either hear back from me or our strong willed son and he'll actually be really nice to you.

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Even if he wasn't nice to us. He was very nice to me. I'm going to look forward to sharing with you the results that I get from some of the tools that you've given us today. Thank you Kirk. Awesome Laura, you're awesome. Thank you for doing this work. My pleasure. Thanks for joining us today for another episode of Grandparents Raising Grandchildren.

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Nurturing Through Adversity. I encourage you to share both your challenges and your successes with us.

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Your story is undoubtedly one someone else needs to hear. Submit your stories to the links provided in the podcast information. Your contributions will enrich upcoming conversations, creating a more supportive community in which we can learn and grow together. Get ready to embark on a journey into the future of social work with our next episode where we explore a revolutionary new technology designed to prioritize stress management and provide unparalleled community support. Just a click away. Imagine a world where a holistic approach to well being is not just a concept, but a reality. Join us as we sit down with John Gesumaria, a licensed social worker whose personal journey through learning disabilities, mental health challenges and significant losses led him to become a passionate advocate for mental health.

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John founded Differently, a groundbreaking online social support system that is transforming how social workers and communities approach well being.

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Discover how this innovative platform is creating a brighter future for social workers and the communities they serve. Together, let's reimagine a future where mental health is a fundamental aspect of overall societal health and social workers are recognized as essential pillars of our communities.

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Tune in next week to learn how technology and empathy can work together to create meaningful change for all.

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Thank you for tuning in to grandparents raising grandchildren, Nurturing through adversity. Remember, you are not alone. Together we can find strength and hope in the face of adversity.

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Peace be with you and I pray that you find some time this week to listen to your inner wisdom amongst the noise and the pandemonium of this world.