Raising a human being will bring up all of your unresolved stuff around your own parents…

So will being in a relationship where you feel unclear or want to take things to the next level…
So will dating, and trying to figure out who’s really right for you…
So will being married, and all the ways your partner shows up with you…

We all have stuff that is unresolved with our parents.

You just have to be willing to reflect and look at what’s underneath your emotional triggers.

Here’s what I mean.

The other day I thought I had the answer to Sohum waking up a lot at night. And with kids, there are so many variables that truthfully you don’t really know, but you make a lot of intuitive guesses.

I felt we were feeding Sohum too much for dinner, so he was having belly aches at night that were waking him up.

I expressed this to our nanny and her immediate response was, “I don’t think it’s that. I think it’s probably something with his teething.”

I love my nanny; she’s amazing.

She takes exquisite care of Sohum, and we often strategize about ways to support him.

But when she said that she didn’t think it was the food, I got triggered. I felt like she was resisting and pushing back on what I was saying.

I had thoughts like, “I’m the mom, the one that knows him more than anyone else. I don’t think I’m wrong.”

I also thought, “She could at least acknowledge that it could be a possibility!”

I was upset with her for the entire day and I kept it to myself.

It totally threw me off.

We are both very aware that we don’t want awkward energy between us because that can affect the baby. But that day, the energy was off.

At night I reflected. I asked myself, why did I feel so upset by her just stating her opinion?

What came up for me, because I’ve been asking myself questions like this for years, was as a child when I would express my feelings of sadness, upset, or irritation, I would get a reaction that tried to shut those feelings down.

My parents didn’t know they were doing this but they did.

My Mom would try to say something like, “Oh you’re just tired or maybe you’re hungry,” drawing attention to something else other than how I felt.

My Dad would say, “You have so much, why are you feeling this way?” basically wanting me to be happy all the time.

These responses then had me get louder and argue back just so I would be heard.

So, interestingly enough with my nanny, I kept saying in a very stern way, “No I think it’s the food” and then internally blaming her for not getting what I was saying.

As I uncovered this awareness, something released for me. I was like OHHH this has nothing to do with my nanny, this is all about how I didn’t feel heard when I really felt or believed something.

Now my parents didn’t always do this, but I could feel how annoyed and hurt I was as a little girl when it would happen. They didn’t know this is how I had translated it, they were just trying to make me feel better.

After realizing this connection I knew I had to express this to my nanny. I explained how she probably felt my weird energy, and what I made her comment mean. How it was connected to my childhood, and that sometimes I need a little more support with what I initially think.

She totally got it.

She said she was just trying to balance out my thoughts, which I totally understood too. That’s one of the reasons I love her.

You might be asking did I really need to talk with my nanny? Couldn’t I have just moved on without having to address it? Maybe.

Trust me it wasn’t the easiest conversation to have so I must have said, “I don’t really need to talk to her” to myself a dozen times. But, I knew I needed to clear out the yucky feelings I had towards her for an entire day, so I was no longer weird.

It’s so important to be aware of our emotional state.

This is what I teach in my courses and when you work with me one on one — how to become aware of your emotional state and to vulnerably open up and have profound conversations within relationships, so that you can keep giving and receiving love.

If you would like to work with me one on one and start the year off breaking through in your love life, fill out this quick form and my team will get back to you.

Your turn.

Have you gotten triggered in a relationship lately? If so, take a moment to reflect. Can you identify where that actually came from? It’s usually not the person that triggered you, it’s usually something with your parents or those that raised you.

Let me know in the comments below.

In Love,