Darcey Fairchild is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker who began her specialization in Perinatal Mental Health after experiencing the distress of postpartum anxiety. Her own healing journey began with yoga and trail running and ultimately led to the practice of mindfulness and a holistic embrace of health.
Darcey Fairchild
In this relisten, I talk to Darcey Fairchild, Licensed Clinical Social Worker and the first Certified Mindful Parenting Teacher!
She takes us through her journey of healing and how this path led her to the Mindful Parenting Teacher Training. She shares how she is using her Mindful Parenting skills to help families change the dynamic in their homes, as well as how it has positively affected her own family.
Relisten: Mindful Parenting Teacher #1! (312)[496]
Read the Transcript 🡮
*This is an auto-generated transcript*
[00:00:00] Hunter: Hey there, it's Hunter, and welcome to Throwback Thursday. Most Thursdays, we are going to re release one of my favorite episodes from the archives. So unless you're a longtime listener of the show, there's a good chance you haven't heard this one yet. And even if you had, chances are that you are going to get something new listening to it this time around.
[00:00:20] Darcey Fairchild: I think I had a lot of shame around the fact that I wasn't able to regulate my own nervous system at the time. And I wasn't practicing what I was preaching, and it was very shocking to me, I think. To become a parent and realize that I wasn't able to be in a calm body for a long time. Coming to transformation coaching and being like, help me.
I can't regulate. I don't even, I didn't even know that's what I needed at the time. Honestly, that's how disconnected I was from my own body.
[00:00:46] Hunter: You're listening to the Mindful Mama podcast, episode number 312. Today we're talking about Becoming a Mindful Parenting Teacher with Darcy Fairchild.
Welcome to the Mindful Parenting Podcast. Here, it's about becoming a less irritable, more joyful parent. At Mindful Parenting, we know that you cannot give what you do not have, and when you have calm and peace within, then you can give it to your children. I'm your host, Hunter Clark Fields. I help smart, thoughtful parents stay calm so they can have strong, connected relationships with their children. I've been practicing mindfulness for over 25 years, I'm the creator of the Mindful Parenting course, and I'm the author of the international bestseller, Raising Good Humans, and now, Raising Good Humans Every Day, 50 Simple Ways to Rest Pause, Stay Present, and Connect with Your Kids.
Hey, welcome back to the Mindful Mama podcast. I'm glad you're here. I'm so glad to connect today. I'm super excited to. I want to introduce you to this person because I have known this person for a long time now, and I think she is really darn cool. So I'm super excited for you to meet her. Darcy is a licensed clinical social worker. She began her specialization in perinatal mental health after experiencing a stroke. The whole distress of postpartum anxiety and, she worked on her own healing through yoga and trail running, which ultimately led to mindfulness and embracing health holistically. And Darcy is going to share her story and she lives in rural Montana with her partner and her small little son. And we're going to talk about how she came towards mindful parenting and raising kids with, a connection to nature and all of these wonderful things.
I'm so excited to talk to her. There's going to be so many great takeaways. I know that you're going to totally relate to her story about you may be in a helping and healing profession and yet still be struggling in your own life. And this is, this happens to a lot of us and a lot of us feel a lot of judgment for ourselves.
for it. And, in our whole individualistic culture, we tend to be not be super ready to give ourselves the help we need. And this is a great story of that and coming out the other side stronger, more resilient, and being able to help more people, which is so cool.
And now, dear listener, on to this episode.
Are you passionate about parenting and maybe want to become a parenting coach? Perhaps you're a teacher, a therapist, doula, or simply a parenting junkie. Then let me tell you about the Mindful Parenting Teacher and Coach Training Program. It's a five month intensive program that can be done from anywhere around the world and gives you everything you need to bring mindful parenting to the people in your life.
Here's what people have said about it.
[00:03:53] Mindful Mama Member: Hunters. The program that really drew me in was that it wasn't just on like how do we practice mindfulness. It incorporated the communication and the problem solving and, went a lot deeper. It was really amazing to be going through this process and have that like weekly support that extended beyond just our teacher training really.
The whole process was really well laid out and organized and having the materials from a teacher perspective was really nice as well.
[00:04:20] Mindful Mama Member: The course is so thorough, like you're given every single bit of material that you could possibly need. This is really a community, reaching far and wide. And I think that this program, because it works on decreasing your inner stress response to taking care of yourself, so then you can give that back to your children and model that behavior for your children as they're growing up into adulthood.
[00:04:43] Mindful Mama Member: Just seeing the positive changes in my own family and knowing that as I continue to spread that into the community, that will be, like, just even more heart reaching.
[00:04:52] Hunter: Enrollment is open now and there are limited spots available. Step into your dream of becoming a Mindful Parenting coach.
Find out more at mindfulparentingcourse.com/teach. That's mindfulparentingcourse.com/teach.
I'm so excited to talk to you because, Darcy, you're number one! Number one! You're the number one, first, certified, mindful parenting teacher. Besides me. So high fives. This is amazing. Yay. I'm so excited. So I wanted to bring you on to talk to you about what brought you into the whole journey and what you're going to do with it.
But I really want to, I'm curious about I'd like to walk it back cause you have a life of service and doing things, right? Like you're a licensed clinical social worker. And I don't know, I guess I let's keep it to parenting first. Can we go back to like you, your own story and like how were you parented? Were you, did you come to the mindful parenting, like reacting against or like trying to live up to?
[00:06:03] Darcey Fairchild: I'm one of five children. I'm number four. And so we. I feel like my mom probably ran the gamut of parenting styles, and by the time she got to me at number four was very loving and tired and exhausted, and also was balancing a very professional career And I think he did a lot of bringing what she could, but sometimes spoons were gone by the end of the day.
And we didn't have, I don't feel like I had a ton of boundaries as a kid. Certainly we had like rules and some structure, but really I don't know if she would agree with this, but I certainly felt at times we were in charge of making our own decisions a lot. We, I grew up in an era of moms joining the workforce for the first time and really probably struggling with the fact that they were torn between parenting and also wanting to have their own careers. And we would stay home alone a lot after school and I had older siblings, so they were caring for us. And a lot of, maybe some free range parenting was going on. Yeah.
[00:07:10] Hunter: Yeah. My parents like to call this benign neglect. It sounds like-
[00:07:14] Darcey Fairchild: yeah, I've heard that term recently and I really relate to it. And I don't attach negative feeling to it, but certainly there was definitely benignness going on.
[00:07:23] Hunter: That sounds a lot like me, actually. I I was really roaming around town a lot. My town was very, had a lot of sidewalks. It was a small town. But I, from a very young age, it was so funny because recently my daughters were like, it's they wanted to get candy or wanted for something. And it's like, why don't you go down to this Convenience store. It's like a mile from our house. Like there are sidewalks, just go there and get some. And they're like, couldn't go to a, into a store by myself. And I'm like, 14 and 11. Like I went into stores by myself when I was. Six and seven. Yeah.
[00:08:00] Darcey Fairchild: I was definitely like walking myself home from school from kindergarten on.
Not just across the street, like probably a mile or two. Yeah, but yeah, and my, I do think my parents separated when I was really little, so I think I was maybe like three. And we lived primarily with my mom and often a stepfather figure and, so I like to look at my mom as a single parent because I don't think that my stepfathers had a lot of influence in our life. But yeah as I got older I remember a lot of like yelling and and I've, I started to notice that in myself pretty early on. So that kind of actually brought me to. Yeah.
[00:08:44] Hunter: The yelling, it's like it was probably, I don't know if you're like me, like for me, when I discovered the yelling in myself, like the temper in myself, it was like, Oh my God, this is what I did not want to bring into my own parenting because I remembered it from being a kid and just being petrified.
I don't know if that, if it was similar for you.
[00:09:06] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, and I don't remember ever having the feeling of fear or it was certainly like in my family we were very much taught to stifle our emotions. I remember a lot of okay, stop crying. And growing up in Montana, there is this overall cultural view of Perspective that is very much pull yourself up by your bootstraps. Like, you don't ask for help. You just. And you also don't talk about what's going on in your family, not even to your family. These are all like pieces and components of my childhood that certainly I recognize now as a parent that I don't want to-
[00:09:42] Hunter: perpetuate. Yeah. Yeah. I'm curious did this sounds like you're, I also wanted to ask you about your upbringing. In some ways it sounds like a little like what my my mom was the youngest of three sisters, but she was like a surprise "oops baby" that her mom had when she was 42. And her oldest sister was like 14 years older than her. So she said, and there's all of a sudden there's a baby in the house, like after all these years, and so she was raised like she, She tells me she's Oh, I just ate dinner by myself in front of the TV all the time. And she has they were just so chilled out by then and just didn't care that much, I think they were just a lot more relaxed. And it's so funny because it always seems like like being a lot more relaxed. It's generally a good thing in some of those ways.
Okay, so then you went into service. I want to since we're on the timeline, is it okay if I, tell me about why you went into social work and what you were, what drew you to that?
[00:12:50] Darcey Fairchild: If I'm really, truly honest, I don't think it was a conscious decision, much of a conscious decision, honestly. There were like a lot of events in my life, I was living in North Carolina for a time being in a military town and working as a assistant preschool teacher and during that time, it was just following 9/11, I was seeing a lot of families being impacted by the separations that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were causing.
And so I started to like kind of tune into the fact that there were going to be some serious implications on families back then I was like in my 20s. I didn't have a family at all, but I think that kind of planted the seed of like service. I always grew up saying I wanted to be a pediatrician. I think I just had this like innate caregiving thing going on from a pretty young age. And So yeah I, it wasn't a linear path at all. I did the teen, the nannying gigs for a while. I did preschool teaching for a while. I was a ski bum for a while. I taught, I was a ski instructor. Yeah, that was a fun time. And I, I also was a wildland firefighter. I actually started out in in forestry school here in Montana at the University of Montana. Wanting to be a silviculturist and work in the woods.
[00:14:04] Hunter: silviculturist, this is great because my daughter has been wondering what the word is for like somebody who like goes and works in the woods.
And I didn't know there was a word, a silva, like silvin, you know, yeah, silviculturist. I'm writing this down for me.
[00:14:20] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah. And I can be offline. We can talk more about what that actually means. But yeah. Yeah, so it was a long winding path. I I actually ended up losing a family member to suicide, a cousin when I was in undergraduate, once I had come back from preschool teaching and I was working as a ski instructor and also going to school. And I think that was like a very big shifting point. I was like, okay, so like I, I thought I wanted to go into education more, but I think maybe there might be some room for me over here maybe in family counseling or therapy. I had no idea, honestly, because as I said, we were raised in a family where we didn't talk about our problems. So that certainly meant nobody was doing therapy. I didn't even really know what it was, quite frankly. And so I started taking more and more classes and in human development and starting to explore psychology and things like that. And I really enjoyed it.
[00:15:09] Hunter: And so did you, can I ask, can I interject here? When I did my first intro to psychology class and I learned about attachment theory. I was like, Oh my did you like self diagnose like everything you had in all of your undergraduate psychology classes?
[00:15:23] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah. I probably did start like being like, oh boy, like things weren't as good as I thought they were. Because I really truly have this perspective and I did really until even a few years ago that like things were fine. Like I had a great childhood. It was pretty happy. Sure, there were some things that weren't great, but overall, like I would have classified it as a very normal Montana family upbringing. And it's when you start to pick things apart, you're like we might've done that differently. So yeah I'm totally going off track here, but that's what we do here. That's good. Yeah, I I definitely, The seeds were planted and I started watering them and and then the death of my cousin certainly sent me on a path.
I applied for my undergraduate degree was in health and human development and I had no idea what I was going to do with that other than maybe no, I really had no idea. And so I applied to graduate school And in a marriage and family therapy program. And I was wait listed and devastated. And I was like, Oh my God, like I can be a ski instructor forever. It's super fun. And I was actually making great money cause I worked at this private ski area, but I was like, the sense of purpose and meaning part was very much missing in my life for many years. And so I, I kept nannying and I worked as a personal assistant for this like super wealthy family.
And at that, like working for them, I was like, Oh my gosh, I cannot do this anymore. There is something bigger that I'm supposed to be doing than serving people with a lot of resources. And, your purpose is calling. Yeah, it really was.
And so I applied to a social work program. I had talked to the faculty of the program where I was waitlisted. They really wanted to know, like, why I wanted to be in the program and, to see if I was a good fit more. And as we talked, they were like, you sound like somebody who might be a good fit for a social work program. And I was like, okay, cool. I don't even know why, but that sounds great. And then as I started to look at programs and to realize Social work was a very great option for someone like me at the time who had no, no real clear direction, but like a definite desire to help because it wasn't gonna just confine me to being a therapist. I, at the time, I did not want to be a therapist.
I was like sure, I might work at an agency or in policy or something like that.
[00:17:43] Hunter: And so I, for people who don't know, like social, cause I didn't, it took me a long time to figure it out, social workers. Can do therapy and but do all kinds of other things, right? Just maybe you can give us like the 30 second lowdown into what is a social worker.
[00:17:57] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, sure, absolutely. So social workers are unique in that they can work in many different arenas. One of the things that the program I chose had that I loved was a focus on like macro level social justice activism. And so I thought maybe going into policy work might be interesting or, even politics at some point, so you could go into politics, you could work in an Non profit organization. You could run a non profit and it didn't just have to be in like working with children. It could be working with anybody on the spectrum. And I think, that's one thing about social work that was really appealing to me was that it wasn't going to pigeonhole me. And I applied to the Univ in Montana, School of Social Work, and got in and it was a two year program. Like I said, it wasn't a clinical program, a broad program that encompassed a lot of areas, including social justice and activism and and very little focus on the micro parts of social work, which I think are more like individual therapy.
[00:18:57] Hunter: But that's what you do now, right? Yeah, that's what I do now.
You circled back to it.
[00:19:02] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah. And when I graduated, there weren't a lot of opportunities still, and so I found myself working as a family therapist for a non profit in town and that's where my therapist career began, and I enjoyed it. I worked for a grief organization here in town that also partnered with TAPS, which is a national non profit serving military families who've experienced death or loss.
And I got to do some like program management, I got to, I was planning camps and retreats around the country that was really exciting and fun but I was also doing therapy at the same time while I was working on my license and I really liked that and so I, long and winding path, I worked for the VA in their program supporting veterans experiencing homelessness.
And then I worked as an intake coordinator at a emergency room and doing crisis assessments. And all the while, I think my goal was, like, I'm going to move towards individual therapy. And when I got pregnant with my first kiddo, my only kiddo, I I started a private practice and kind of inched my way out of my high paying VA job.
At the time, it felt very high paying. And and I was doing, four days, four 10s at the VA. And on my fifth day, I was seeing clients in private practice and that kind of happened really quickly. And I was able to leave the VA and have my private practice.
[00:20:24] Hunter: And we wind up to present day. So now I'm curious about this, Darcy, because sometimes.
People come to like Mindful Parenting and people are like, they maybe have like a degree in child development or they're a preschool teacher or a therapist and things like that. And what I've discovered is that a lot of people come to the course and they're like, I should be a parent. know all of these things and they're so frustrated that it's so hard to implement that in their own family. And so I'm wondering if that was a similar dynamic for you because I know I've heard that from a number of members before.
[00:21:06] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, it's a great question, and absolutely I think I had a lot of shame around the fact that I wasn't able to regulate my own nervous system at the time because I'm sitting here teaching people to do this, and I I, I wasn't practicing what I was preaching, and and it was very shocking to me, I think, to become a parent and realize that I wasn't able to be in a calm body for a long time.
And yeah, I think that was certainly a part of, coming to transformation coaching and being like, Help me. I I can't regulate. I don't even, I didn't even know that's what I needed at the time, honestly. That's how disconnected I was from my own body. But yeah, it certainly was a part of my process was reconciling the fact that like I'm a human and I get to have experiences just like everybody else. And sometimes those experiences are going to overwhelm the skills and abilities that I thought I had.
[00:22:03] Hunter: Yeah, it's so funny how we all have this We, it's so universal that we all have this individualism complex that we're like, but I'm the one that's special and won't need X, Y, or Z because I can just choose to be how I want to be, right? But we all, and I've gone through that too myself, but it's it's so fascinating that we all have this idea and they're like, oh, what's wrong with me? This special thing that's wrong with me because I'm having trouble regulating my, and I should be the one that should just be able to do the thing that I want to do.
It's amazing that We all feel that way.
[00:22:42] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, it was so humbling to recognize my humanness and to make peace with it. And I think, that's one of the things I loved about working with you is you were very open about, the fact that you had been in this, a similar place of struggle yourself.
And I think that made it feel more accessible to me because I was like, Oh Hunter's like a human too, cool. I tend to, part of me loves to like, have this hero worship thing and think everybody doing these amazing things doesn't have issues and that really helped me recognize we're all in this together and Step off your high horse a little bit, Darcy.
Just cause you're a therapist doesn't mean you're not a human. Yay.
[00:23:23] Hunter: Yay. And it's just it's just like a clear seeing, it's just like acceptance. It's not like it's anything, it's not like we're, Yeah, we're humbling ourselves, but it's it's just oh yeah, like this is honest, truth, clear seeing.
This is how human beings work and I'm a human being too. Cool. So what did you get from Mindful Parenting and the work we did in the coaching and what made you decide to want to do the teaching?
[00:23:51] Darcey Fairchild: Goodness, what didn't I get is a better question. The process has helped our family restore peace on such a huge maybe find peace.
I don't think we even had it. From the time I became a parent, things were very intense. We had, we had ICU involvement. We had a life flight day seven. It was awesome.
[00:24:11] Hunter: Wait, you can't just drop that and then not tell the story, Darcy.
[00:24:15] Darcey Fairchild: So yeah when we had Cooper, I'll try not to get too long winded here, but Essentially, like I had planned, I had hoped for this like natural birth at the birth center, like no medication, the universe at that time was like laughing at me oh, okay, we see what you're doing here.
And they gave me everything that was not that, but so yeah, I labored for 32 hours at the birth center and with my midwife and my doula, and it was, intense and hard and beautiful and messy and all the things. And it ended with me being transferred to the hospital, which I had literal visions of that happening before.
And yep, I, and I was working at the hospital at the time, so I had this experience where I after 32 hours of labor and like having been in the bathtub and it was a hot mess in the middle of my journey, got wheeled through my own emergency department that I worked in. Oh, and I saw all my coworkers and I'm like, hello buddy.
And so yeah, I I ended up having a cesarean which of course was never even close to part of the plan. My mom had five children. I just assumed I would easily birth a child myself. Or, clearly I have some work to do around this. But yeah, I just assumed that it would be an easy process.
And my body would do what it was supposed to do and, lots of reasons it didn't. And I ended up having a cesarean. It was actually, a beautiful process as well. And we then got to go home a few days later, everything seemed normal. And we went to the pediatrician appointment right after discharge from the hospital.
And. They found that Cooper had a heart murmur. And at the time I was doctor's office, he was like, I'm going to see if I can get you in to see the heart specialist. And came back and she's I got you in this afternoon. I was like, wow, that's great customer service. And then like in retrospect, I'm like, Oh, that's because things are really not in a good place.
When you get in to see the heart specialist, the only heart specialist in the community, like the same day, that's actually not a good sign. So we went over the same afternoon and did a bunch of testing and they found out he had some multiple heart, congenital heart defects. And so they sent us home that day and he was like, I want to see you on Friday.
And we came back on a Friday and during that process, he, the doctor, felt very uncomfortable with the way that Cooper's aortic arch was presenting, and he actually decided that we needed to life flight to Seattle that day. I think Cooper must have been like, seven or
[00:26:46] Hunter: eight days old.
So you were getting in a helicopter with your seven day old baby.
[00:26:52] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah. Was your husband able to come? No, he wasn't. He yeah, we actually flew on a they have a jet that fly, a regional jet that flies So yeah, we got in our second ambulance ride of the week since I had already transferred to the hospital and transferred to the airport that afternoon after I had called my dad and was like sobbing if you want to meet your grandson, you better get here.
So like he lives about two hours away from here and got there in just over an hour. Him and my stepmom and my mom was already there because she'd been here for the birth. And so yeah, that was pretty crazy. My, my dad is. Holding my child who's now hooked up to all of these wires and anyway, so no, my husband wasn't able to go with me on that flight.
We got on the flight and I flew to Seattle with Cooper and the medical team. It was incredible. Absolutely incredible. We got off, got in an ambulance and we're rushed to Seattle Children's Hospital and Joe was able to fly out. He had a friend who like worked for the airlines and was able to get him on a flight.
For free. Thank you, Lenny. And he came out that night and got there about 10 o'clock, I think. Yeah, we spent the weekend in the ICU in Seattle and, the long story short is he didn't have to have any interventions. It was all precautionary at the time. He gets ongoing screenings now, so it was a very jarring, dysregulating experience pretty much from, the beginning.
[00:28:20] Hunter: Yeah. Yeah. That's like about as dysregulating as you can get for anything. It just having a baby, even if it's great, it's like incredibly dysregulating. But for that kind of experience, you must have, there must have been after effects for you when Cooper was just like in that first year, I imagine.
Yeah.
[00:28:40] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, I think it was a, it was an important experience that we had because I think, It gave me the opportunity to understand trauma on a whole new level, frankly. So yeah that was the, I recognized pretty early on that I was going to need to do some work. And I started I started with the physical first, actually, and started jogging as soon as I could.
He was born in March and I think my first run was on Mother's Day. I don't, it was on Mother's Day. And I ran/walked.
[00:29:09] Hunter: It probably felt so good just to release. I'm a runner myself, like that whole, like. Getting your ya's out is so important. That physical release it's amazing. Yeah. Wow. So you guys had an incredible challenging start and you had got these, I guess now you can see oh, there are these lessons and there are these challenges that were, in some way, have been really helpful for your purpose, right? That you were meant in some ways, who knows, but to have those so that you could have incredible empathy and understanding for other people's traumas,
[00:31:24] Darcey Fairchild: yeah, absolutely. And I think, if you look at the progression of my career, that is certainly when I started like focusing on perinatal mental health. It was because of my experience. And, I think that's common. We all get into work because of something. And certainly I had bound, if you look at my resume, it's like all over the place, like trying to find my area. And I think, this experience that I had certainly landed. my purpose and meaning for now. Yeah.
[00:31:55] Hunter: Yay. Oh, wow. That's an incredible story. And that's gotta have been incredibly hard. And so I got to meet you when you, when Cooper was. Three and a half, four, I think, right?
Like right around that time. That's like the intense time. The three and a half is like the, that's the time when everyone's Oh my God, I need help. Like it truly is. It's-
[00:32:18] Darcey Fairchild: incredibly hard. Yeah, he was. And I think at the time I was really struggling with a work life balance and understanding like how the heck I was supposed to get work done and also like care for him on the days that he didn't have.
care outside of the home. And you really helped me work through some of those issues and through the transformation coaching process, which was really.
[00:32:42] Hunter: Yay. Yay. And now you're the first certified mindful parenting teacher, Missoula, Montana people. You've got an amazing in person teacher of mindful parenting. You can get a group together and have Darcy. teach you a class, but tell me about why you wanted to do the teacher training
[00:33:03] Darcey Fairchild: Because I think it's so cool that you did it. I really wanted to do the teacher training because my learning style is such that I have to definitely go all in. I usually learn the best by teaching or doing something.
And after the transformation coaching process, so many things had already improved within our family. And I was just noticing like more peace within myself. I was, I, so from a personal perspective. Selfish perspective from a micro perspective, it was a little bit of a selfish journey to become a teacher, but then as I sat with it more, I recognized though Missoula is a pretty progressive city and we have a lot of amazing resources one thing that A lot of the mindful parenting programs that I was seeing was lacking was the part about effective communication and problem solving and, not just, it wasn't just like parents being mindful, it was like all of these other things and I thought that would be a huge addition to to our community and and also I just I had to put myself out of my own comfort zone, quite frankly, because again I felt that if I did that, I would I would probably be a better human.
[00:34:17] Hunter: I'm raising good humans, even when they're adults. So exciting. You really are.
[00:34:24] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah.
[00:34:26] Hunter: Yeah I agree. Like I've seen there's a lot of like mindfulness for parents. They call it may, maybe people call it mindful parenting, but it's like mindfulness for parents, which is great.
That's wonderful, but it's not those communication aspects are huge, because we can calm down and then we can say something really unskillful and still struggle enormously. For you, what were the communication pieces? Because you did, you we talked about like reflective listening and iMessages and how to solve problems.
And I remember for you, it's like surprising that some of those communication pieces were challenging because you were in that therapist position, right?
[00:35:03] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah. So again, it was initially I felt shame. I felt oh my goodness, like I should be doing better in the world if this is what I'm teaching other people to do.
That's shifted enormously throughout this process. But for me I noticed like my default was using like threats and yelling anytime I was dysregulated, boy, you were going to hear threats come from my mouth and that was cringeworthy for me. I absolutely like. Did not want to destroy the relationship I have with my child.
We've chosen to only have one child and I was like I should probably not be a terrible parent.
[00:35:42] Hunter: I could, I totally understand you. Like the threats are like the default. That's like the native language. I think of it now as this is like the native language from not only my own family, but just culturally, that's just what we do culturally.
And and yeah, now sometimes I'm like, I really want to threaten right now. That's I say something like that. So funny. But yeah, because that native language comes out, right? Like it's we learn a new language, but the native language is always pretty, pretty strong. Yeah, that's why it takes.
I
[00:36:20] Darcey Fairchild: love how you frame that as the native language and then, thinking about as part of the Mindful Parenting curriculum, like you bring in the brain science about why we don't have access to our prefrontal cortex when we experiencing a stress response. And then it makes sense.
And this is the part that helped me personally unwind from the shame, right? And to notice this isn't I'm not a broken human being or a bad person, like I'm having a stress response. And again, I knew all about the gross. science behind stress responses, but I hadn't applied it to my own life.
And that part, it was super helpful. And it's one of my favorite parts to teach in, when I'm teaching the Mindful Parenting curriculum, but also, I teach it in my practice. I'm sure my clients get very sick of hearing about it because we're always coming back to the brain science.
Yeah, And so that, like when you were talking about that initially when I was going through the program I knew that this was a good program and a good fit for me personally because it just was based in science.
[00:37:25] Hunter: Yeah. You've got to address that. Otherwise, it's ends up being like just respond this way.
And then you're like, but I can't, because I'm all, reactive and we have to deal with our humanity, it's like, there's ways to work with this. Yeah and it's so essential. I'm so excited. So Darcy you've taught your first class and I know it. It went well, but can you tell the listener how it went well?
[00:37:53] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, the first class was a really great experience though. I certainly I experienced what I'm sure a lot of folks experience, which is, nervousness and, a little fear that the technology wasn't going to work and all of these things. But I had such a gracious group of folks participating.
And it was all moms and on the first go around. I am excited to do an in person class. I think that will be a totally new and different experience. But I certainly think there is, there are folks wanting more in my community. So that's exciting.
[00:38:28] Hunter: Yay, yay. It's so nice to like, I feel like whenever I share it, I feel like I'm just like sharing these, like these tools that have just, like these are tools that work here take this beautiful thing that, these lovely tools that help me so enormously and may they help you too.
Like I just, it's, it feels really good to, to share them all the time. For me anyway.
[00:38:54] Darcey Fairchild: Yeah, it does for me as well. And I think. It's been cool because a lot of the folks that took the class, I continue to have communication with, and they'll tell me like, Oh my gosh, that thing that we talked about in Mindful Parenting they dubbed it the Mindful Mama class I did not dub it.
That's what they did. And I was like, you're gonna have to talk to Hunter about that. But yeah, so they'll be like, yeah, in Mindful Mamas we talked about this and I can't believe it like keeps coming up and I'm so glad I have this tool with me now. And I'm like, oh, I'm so glad you have it too. So it is nice to to do the class because you get to have ongoing connection with this community.
It just it builds community and that's another, important piece of Mindful My life is always being in community, you
[00:39:37] Hunter: know. And now, and Cooper's five now. You're past three and a half, the three and a half crazy. And how's it going? How's it going at home then?
[00:39:48] Darcey Fairchild: It's going well.
We've regularly use win problem solving in our house. I've mentioned that in the past. And so Saturday morning we'll roll around and Cooper will say, I'll say, what does everybody want to do today? And Cooper's let's do win problem solving. Like it's part of our family language and culture now, which is really exciting and fun.
And certainly all things I, mindfulness practice. It's not a hundred percent. It's not perfect. But my room set up and I I feel like I bring mindfulness more to my life in a holistic way now, like at the beginning it was like, Oh, I have to go like beyond the mat and I have to practice.
And I do that still, but I also like bringing it to all these other areas of my world. So it has really become natural almost. And I think, sometimes you. The point where you're thinking, Oh gosh, I'm not even like doing my mindfulness practice anymore. And it's Oh, actually I think it's become such an innate part of who I am now that that I'm always practicing. So that's cool. An important shift.
[00:40:51] Hunter: That's exciting. Darcy, it's been so lovely to talk to you. I've totally enjoyed you being on this journey and watching you do this whole thing and being able, it's been an honor to walk with you through this whole journey.
And I just want to thank you so much for sharing the story of it here. I think it's so cool and. And I, I hope that I hope that, dear listener, you found some pieces in Darcy's story that you can relate with, because I certainly can. I've found pieces that I can relate with enormously for sure. And Darcy, if we people want to find you in Missoula, around Missoula, Montana, where can they find you?
[00:41:32] Darcey Fairchild: Okay back to my comment of me being a bit of a technology averse, I do have a website. It was really hard to remember the name of my website, but it's darceyfairchildlcsw. com, and it's D-A-R-C-E-Y. Fairchild. Yes. C S W dot com.
[00:41:48] Hunter: Actually, on the Mindful Mama mentor site under the Mindful Parenting link, we're going to have a link to our certified teachers and you can find Darcy there.
[00:41:57] Darcey Fairchild: Great. Or you can Google me and you'll find me eventually.
[00:42:01] Hunter: Google her. Google her. There you go. You'll find her and an amazing family therapist and she can teach your Mindful Parenting course. Thank you, Linda. It's been fun. Yay. Thank you so much, Darcy. It has been fun.
I love Darcy. She's such a great soul who is living, walking the talk, man. She's walking the talk. I really love her. So if you are near Missoula, Montana, you should put together your friends and get an in person mindful parenting course with Darcy. She's an amazing teacher and an amazing, peaceful soul.
Thank you. Thank you for listening here all the way to the end, and I really appreciate your time. ears and your connection. I hope this has been helpful. Maybe you could relate to Darcy's story this week and I cannot wait to be back in your inbox next week and I'll be here on Friday doing a Friday podcast again.
So excited about these. Friday I'm going to be talking about how busy parents can make time to meditate so don't miss that short episode. And then I will be back soon. Thank you so much for listening, my friend. Take care. Namaste.
[00:43:25] Mindful Mama Member: I'd say definitely do it. It's really helpful. It will change your relationship with your kids for the better. It will help you communicate better. And just, I'd say communicate better as a person, as a wife, as a spouse. It's been really a positive influence in our lives, so definitely do it. I'd say definitely do it.
It's so worth it. The money really is inconsequential when you get so much benefit from being a better parent to your children and feeling like you're connecting more with them and not feeling like you're yelling all the time or you're like why isn't things working. I would say definitely do it. It's so worth it.
It'll change you. No matter what age someone's child is, it's a great opportunity for personal growth and it's a great investment in someone's life. You can continue in your old habits that aren't working, or you can learn some new tools and gain some perspective to shift everything in your parenting.
[00:44:28] Hunter: Are you frustrated by parenting? Do you listen to the experts and try all the tips and strategies, but you're just not seeing the results that you want? Or are you lost as to where to start? Does it all seem so overwhelming with too much to learn? Are you yearning for community people who get it, who also don't want to threaten and punish to create cooperation?
Hi, I'm Hunter Clark Fields, and if you answered yes to any of these questions, I want you to seriously consider the Mindful Parenting membership. You'll be joining hundreds of members who have discovered the path of mindful parenting and now have confidence and clarity in their parenting. This isn't just another parenting class.
This is an opportunity to really discover your unique, lasting relationship, not only with your children, but with yourself. It will translate into lasting, connected relationships, not only with your children, but your partner too. Let me change your life. Go to Mindful parenting course.com to add your name to the wait list, so you will be the first to be notified when I open the membership for enrollment.
I look forward to seeing you on the inside mindful parenting course.com.
Before we dive into this episode, I have a very special invitation for you. Come with me to a Beachfront Paradise for five days for a powerful personal growth retreat. I'm hosting Bloom in Tulum. where we will start our days with mindfulness and yoga, eat amazing fresh food, dive into transformative personal growth work, dive into the turquoise waters at the beach or the pool, and perhaps even have a glass of wine and a dance party together.
Does this sound good to you? I have a limited number of spots available for this day. All inclusive retreat this October. Learn more and apply now at bloomintulum.com. B-L-O-O-M-I-N-T-U-L-U m.com. Don't wait. Spots are filling up. Bloom in tulum.com.
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