Five Keys to Resolving Conflict in the Family Unit

[AUDIO LOGO] Welcome, everyone. I'm Dr. John Whyte. I'm the chief medical officer at WebMD. We've all been stressed over the last two years, three years. And one area where we're starting to see a lot of conflict and challenges is in the family unit. So how do we help manage this conflict? How do we improve our parenting skills and make sure that family dynamics works well?

Well, joining me today to help guide us through these challenging times is Dr. Charles Sophy. Dr. Sophy is a psychiatrist with a new book that's come out called Family Values, Reset Trust, Boundaries, and Connection with Your Child. Dr. Sophy, thanks for joining me today.

Thank you for having me.

I want to start off with, I mentioned about the conflict that currently exists. Now, is this something that COVID has caused, or are we just more sensitive to it nowadays that there's always been conflict, and it's not necessarily more, we're just more attuned to it?

Well, I think that's a very good point because family dynamics are family dynamics for a reason. And just because you're related doesn't mean you have to like each other, you have to love each other. And so there's always a dynamic interaction, and it's always been there. I think it's probably amplified now because during COVID, we've had to learn to hang out, deal with, be more present with people maybe we didn't get along that well with.

And we've had to learn to deal with the rub, and probably now we're dealing with the aftermath of that. So it seems like it's new, or it may be amplified, but it's always been there.

And how do if you are experiencing challenges within the family unit? Sometimes people will just ignore it. Or you know what? It'll go away. They're still growing as children, and we'll just wait it out. What do you look for, signs that perhaps there may need to be an intervention, particularly with our children?

Well, I just want to make a point. It doesn't go away. And even if you ignore it, it will rear its ugly head somehow, either through substance abuse, domestic violence, abuse of some sort, or neglect. So please don't ignore it. And also, it isn't hard to deal with. It feels like it may be overwhelming, but it's really not.

And I think the signs that I could tell people-- and I wrote about this in the book-- are very simple things that you can look at to see if there's any red flags that we need to address. And I put it into a simple mnemonic called SWEEP. It's just five simple areas of your life that if you check on on a regular basis, for you as an individual, your family as a whole, you will start to see red flags that if you address them early, do not become massive explosions later on.

The S is for Sleep, looking at the quality and the quantity of sleep for yourself and for your family, how you value sleep, where it's placed in your home. Is that a chaotic time of the day? Et cetera, like that. W is for Work, and it's work as an adult. What are those hours of the day that you're spending? Are they purposeful for you? Are you happy, for the most part? Nobody's happy all the time doing their job, but is it meaningful? And if it's not, do something about that. Get on a path to change that or address it somehow so that you're doing something that you feel meaningful to you, and you are happy, and you don't come home irritated and upset.

And for children, work is the school side of life, academically and socially. And are your children learning the way that they should? Is that the right learning environment? And if not, check it out. And are they getting along and connecting and growing socially, as well?

The E, the first E is about Eating. Are we eating properly? Is the food nourishing? Is it healthy? And are we eating as a family at least once or twice a week, at the very least? And is that time preserved? Is it without technology? Is it a time to connect?

And then the other E is for Emotional expression, learning how to deal with your own emotions and then teaching and role modeling for your children how to deal with theirs, as well as dealing with the emotions in your intimate relationship, your marriage. If it's not right, get it right. If it's not going to work, then deal with that appropriately. But ignoring all of those things are huge red flags that we could do something about today that don't explode tomorrow.

And then P is very important. That's for Play, hobbies, things that we have learned to do for ourselves that are self-soothing and life-saving, and things that we teach our children are hobbies so they have those tools to deal with when they hit a wall in life or they have a crisis. We oftentimes need to soothe ourselves. We teach our children how to soothe in a crib to go to sleep. We need to teach our children how to soothe through crises in life. And the earlier we do that, the better.

So those five key areas need to be in balance, and that's a great checklist to be able to raise red flags and look at things that are in a seedling place that don't end up blowing up later on down the line.

But then where can we learn some of these skills? Everyone is not good at emotional expression. Some people don't know how to balance work and play. So when it comes to actually developing a plan or figuring out how to learn those skills, where do you start first with people?

What I do most often with people is to tell them simply that every emotional and logical expression that they're trying to do should come 50% from their head and 50% from their heart. So they should talk-- they should think and feel about everything, and it should meet and come out their mouth, so 50/50 comes out your mouth.

It's simple things that I've put into this book so that even if you're thinking about what you're going to have for lunch, what do you think about lunch, and what do you feel about lunch? Those things are-- it's a muscle that if you practice it and you strengthen it, you will start to think and feel through your life, which is what the biggest problem is. We're not thinking and feeling through life. We're either emotionally feeling through life and making decisions, or we're just thinking, and we're not having any emotional component to it. It needs to be a 50/50 component to be able to have a great response with a great outcome.

Now, much of this is going to involve change. And you mentioned the word "overwhelming" earlier, but it doesn't have to be overwhelming. But why do parents, particularly, find it overwhelming to bring about some change that's needed in the family or to function better for their children, to thrive? What's going on there?

I think the biggest issue in the fear about the change for a parent is the fact that they've ignored for years the changes that need to have happened from their own childhood that they'd like to have seen implemented through their parenting and their parenting process. And so the other thing I talk about in the book is simple ways to take a look at yourself, where you came from, do a self-inventory so that you're parenting from a place that you want to parent from.

That you're not shooting from the hip saying, ah, I'm just going to do exactly what my parents did. I'm going to do the opposite, and then I'm not going to be like them. Because that's what people think, that the bottom line is you're going to run right into being them because you've ignored it. So I think the fear of the change that they've put off continues to be the fear that they think is going to be overwhelming.

When we talk about families, we have to acknowledge the role of divorce. And what's your recommendations, what's your advice to help children who are in situations where their parents are divorced? How do they deal with this conflict that's going on right now? How do they deal with the mental health pandemic that is all around us?

I think the most important thing for parents that are in a divorce process, or thinking about it, or at the end of one and it's not going well-- and that's what I've seen most often, is that it hasn't gone well-- is because it is a lot of unresolved conflict between the parents, and then it gets played out through their children, as we know. And I think the best advice I would give any parent as they divorce is to please make every decision in the best interest of your children, not in the best interest of either getting more money from your spouse or getting back at your spouse for cheating on you or hurting you or not giving you money or whatever.

Those are things that are going to damage your children forever. And if those are the core places you're making decisions about your divorce or decisions about your children, your children will suffer forever, and you will continue to show your children that divorce is the only answer because they will learn to divorce as they go on.

You talk a lot about parenting in your book, and your career has focused much on parenting. What are the two or three things that you'd say parents need to be effective?

Number one, please, just listen to your children. It's the hardest thing to do, for me as a parent, for anybody. It's hard to not want to interrupt your child. It's hard to not be triggered by your child. But if you listen to your child, you're showing them that you respect them, that what they have to say is important. And you're making it an emotionally safe environment for them to come to you and tell you anything.

And then the second thing I would say is to be able to allow them latitude. So when you're listening to them, you're respecting them. And then you have to work with them. And depending on the age of the child, you meet them somewhere. The older the child or the older or longer you've waited to implement something like rules of technology or substance abuse expectations around your house, your child isn't just going to cave in and say, oh, OK. They're going to push back, and you want them to because that's a strength. But you've got to [INAUDIBLE] them somewhere. So listening and respecting your child are-- they're the two biggest things I think parents need to do.

Is there still stigma around parents seeking help with mental health professionals for their children? Or has that really gone away by now?

Well, I think where I live in Los Angeles, bigger cities, the stigma has disappeared, for the most part. But I think in smaller areas, it still exists because I think parents are afraid they're going to be blamed, that they've done something wrong, that they didn't do it right, or they've really messed their kid up, and their kid's never going to forgive them, and they feel the guilt.

Please, don't be paralyzed by that. None of that has to do with anything. We are who we are. You didn't do anything to your child on purpose, and it is never, ever too late to be a better parent.

What's the main message you want readers to take away from your book?

That it's honestly never too late to be a better parent, and it's always an easy process. Even though it feels overwhelming to make a shift, it's not. Simply looking at SWEEP and doing one of the five will shift your whole family. Getting everybody to sleep with quality and quantity of sleep will shift so many things in your life and in your family's life and increase the value of your family and reconnections that it's priceless.

Dr. Sophy, thank you so much for taking time today.

Thank you.

If you have questions about managing conflict in your family, feel free to drop us a line. You can email me at [email protected]. Thanks for watching. [AUDIO LOGO]