How You Can Yell Less and C.A.R.E. More with Claire Cetti

Listen to this episode, "How You Can Yell Less and C.A.R.E. More with Claire Cetti" as "Yell-Less" Parent Coach, Claire Cetti, joins host Dori Durbin. Do you ever struggle with yelling in your parenting? In this episode, Claire Cetti shares her game-changing strategies to reduce yelling and strengthen your bond with your children. Unveil your unique yelling style, tackle common stress triggers, and implement the transformative C.A.R.E.S. approach. If you want actionable tips to manage stress, foster self-compassion, and revolutionize your parenting journey then listen and start your path to a calmer, more connected family life! 

This episode covers:

• Understanding Different Types of Yelling
• Common Triggers for Parental Yelling
• Parenting Under Public Scrutiny: How to Stay Calm 
• The C.A.R.E.S. Approach to Better Parenting
• Managing Parenting Challenges with Teens
• The Importance of Self-Compassion and Repair
• How to Connect with Claire and Access Resources

About Claire:
Claire is a PCI Certified® Parent Coach and Positive Parenting Educator, also known as the Yell-less mom coach. She has been helping moms struggling with frustration, anger, and yelling become calmer and more confident, creating more connected families for almost ten years. She’s also a stepmom/mom of 4 young adult children and lives in Santa Barbara with her husband and fur baby, Bella.

Claire often shares about the day in July 2003 that changed the trajectory of her parenting journey leading her to break generational patterns of anger and emotional immaturity. What took her many years to accomplish, she now shows other moms how they too can yell less, break generational patterns and effectively, calmly and confidently navigate their anger and yelling in a much shorter period of time.

She does this using her C.A.R.E.S. Approach to Parenting and proven Positive Discipline Tools and Techniques. The C.A.R.E.S. Approach is partly her personal process, which incorporates conscious awareness, brain/body understanding, science, mindfulness, and positive parenting tools, all of which she still uses in her journey today.

Find Claire:
https://www.ccparentcoach.com
https://www.instagram.com/clairecettiparentcoach
https://www.facebook.com/ccparentcoach
https://www.claire@ccparentcoach.com

Did you love this episode? Discover more here:
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/thats-good-parenting/id1667186115

More about Dori Durbin:
Dori Durbin is a Christian wife, mom, author, illustrator, and a kids’ book coach who after experiencing a life-changing illness, quickly switched gears to follow her dream. She creates kids’ books to provide a fun and safe passageway for kids and parents to dig deeper and experience empowered lives. Dori also coaches non-fiction authors, professionals, and aspiring authors to “kid-size” their content into informational and engaging kids’ books! Find out more here: https://www.doridurbin.com/

Follow Dori:
https://www.instagram.com/dori_durbin
https://www.facebook.com/dori.durbin.7

Intro for TDP (version 2)

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction
• 5:07 Common Triggers for Parental Yelling
• 8:07 Parenting Under Public Scrutiny: How to Stay Calm
• 14:07 The CARES Approach to Better Parenting
• 16:07 Managing Parenting Challenges with Teens
• 22:07 Importance of Self Compassion and Repair
• 24:07 How to Connect with Claire

Transcript

Claire Cetti:
[00:00:00] if we stay stuck in the guilt of the one mistake we made, we're missing all that we've done well. And they're all there. You have to intentionally find them. But it starts with self compassion. Go, you know what? Not my finest moment. I apologize for it. I'm human. I made a mistake. Moving forward, I will do better.

Dori Durbin:
We all know that being a parent is a huge blessing, but it can also be equally exhausting.

And sometimes when you're on call all the time, your patients can be a little bit short. Most people have family who can step in and give parents a little bit of a break, but that's not always the case. And it might not be enough to actually stop the frustration or the desire to yell. My guest today is a yell less parent coach.

As a mama, parent coach, in fact, whose own physical sense of her isolation from her extended family ultimately caused her to support other moms and families as a parent coach herself. [00:01:00] So welcome to the show, Claire Cetti. 

Claire:
Thank you. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. 

Dori:
We always chat a little bit before we start to record, and I loved what you said. about the different kinds of parent yelling. Could you talk about the different types? 

Claire:
Yes. Okay. So you're talking about when I refer to pressure cooker yellow. Or are you a frequent flyer yeller? So the idea is that we, not everyone yells the same, right? Some people are frequent flyer yellers. Maybe they're yelling all the time.

There's only way they get the message across. It's the only way they, their kids will listen. So they just yell daily or frequently. frequently. Those are the frequent flyer yellows. Then there's the pressure cooker yellow, and that was me. I was a pressure cooker yellow. I, walking around everything looked like it was fine, but everything was just like this bubbling underneath agitation, frustration, anger, and toll.[00:02:00] 

Like that mind blown emoji on the phone like just like the pressure cooker and just would yell let it all out. So yeah, the question is, are you a pressure cooker yeller or are you a frequent flyer yeller? I think it maybe are some people a little bit of both sometimes too. Yeah. Yeah.

Dori: 
Yeah. Yeah. I feel like when you say that, when you give them names, as pressure cooker and frequent flyer, it feels more comforting to know that it's not just you. Oh, no. And you must hear that a lot. 

Claire:
Yes. I want to normalize it, not saying Oh, it's okay, yell all you want. That's not what I'm saying, but normalize the frustration, the anger that actually lies underneath the yelling.

And which is why I call myself the yell less mom coach that we talked about earlier, because I really want to acknowledge the unrealistic expectation that we'll never yell again, because underneath the yelling, [00:03:00] there's always something. The anger, the frustration, and that's what we want to pay attention to.

And it's okay to get frustrated and feel angry, right? And oftentimes when we're not acknowledging that, that's where the yelling is actually coming from. So it's not about never yelling again, but it's about learning how to yell less. Because you're really acknowledging all the other stuff that's going on underneath.

And often, most times, when we're focusing on the yell less, moms will often get to the place of, I can't remember the last time I yelled. Because they're learning the skills of dealing with what's causing the yelling in the first place. So are there specific things that, let's say, events, maybe five events or triggers that parents, when they are exposed to these.

Events and triggers. It just causes them to yell their commonalities with that. . Yeah. I love that question. There are so many triggers. The triggers that cause people to yell are [00:04:00] very unique to every person really, because experiences know, growing up all of those things. But common triggers are tri things that lead them down the path of either fear or anxiety of feeling powerless.

I don't know what to do. I'm stuck, right? Worrying about what's gonna happen next. Oh my gosh, if my kid's doing this now, what does that mean about later? I call those mental movies, right? So underlying fear and anxiety of I don't know what to do. So I need to do something. And oftentimes that's that yelling to feel like you've got some sort of control.

It's the feeling out of control, really. That really can trigger yelling. I have an e book. There's three common reasons why moms are yelling. Or, there's been three things, things you can do about that today. But if we're talking about events I would say, daily events are, very common ones are, kid not listening.

Whining. A messy house. These are common triggers that get [00:05:00] moms really, oh my gosh, but, the underlying cause is really for a lot of reasons why moms are yelling. A high expectations that are not reasonable. Again, like getting caught up in power struggles, a feeling of lack of control.

And really another one is just not having the capacity because they're just not taking the time for themselves. But you can learn a lot more about that in the ebook I have, but those are really common, the most common. 

Dori:
I think as parents, you feel a little bit more judged than you ever had before, or people are looking at your kids saying, why are they letting you do that? There's a lot of external pressures on. 

Claire:
So much so and something you said when in the beginning when you said when you shared how I was away from my family, right?

So the lack of support and having to figure things out on your own is really hard because then you have all these expectations. I should be doing that. I should be doing [00:06:00] that. They're doing that. It's this comparison. And we're looking outside the box. What is this? It's like we're like doing things on the outside of ourselves.

Like all the things we should be doing, Which is really can be overwhelming. What am I even doing? I know that's what I was thinking. So what am I even doing? I have no idea. Questioning everything. Every decision I made. Am I messing up my kids? Is this the right thing to do? What would they think?

And when we do that, We just, That's super overwhelming. But what you're talking about too, is this idea of parenting in front of an audience. And that is one of the most pressure filled way to parent. When we're parenting in front of an audience, and that can be family, friends, neighbors, strangers, like in the store.

And we, a kiddo is acting out, or maybe they're not listening to us, or they're, defiant, whatever the case may be. And we go, oh my gosh we have to deal with this, because what would they think? And we're looking outside, but what a kiddo really needs right now is that [00:07:00] to be like attuned to them and what do they need from me right now and being able to put those blinders on.

That's hard to do, but that is also a skill of being able to go, okay, right now, I need to do this. My kiddo is having a temper tantrum. What can I do right now? And so I offer this tip with a client and also in my social media. I'll say, one of the things you can do when you're finding yourself parenting in front of an audience, one, recognize what's happening.

Okay, this is hard. This is oh my God, the eyes are on me. This is really, I feel pressure. That's okay. Acknowledge it. That's real. The next thing is what you can do is get away from the audience if you can. So basically what that can look like is you know what, can you guys excuse us for a moment?

I need to help my kid. And hopefully people will leave the room or they'll sit, right? But if they see you in a store, you can't do that or something, you can say, [00:08:00] excuse me right now, I'm going to move my kids where I can help them out. And you remove yourself from the audience. So those are two actionable things that you can do to help empower yourself and get some power back.

That's that powerlessness, right? Yeah. The camera's on you now oh my gosh, everyone is awful. But those are two things you can do to get some control back for yourself and stay regulated enough to move forward in a more effective way when you're caught in those situations. 

You're bringing back memories of being in stores and having the kids melt down.

Dori:
That's awesome. And, you have all the, you're in an aisle, you're trying to get out, you've got the, a cart full of groceries. And I know like my reaction was always, okay I'm just going to stay as calm as I can, or look as calm as I can. You're just boiling underneath and you're pushing through trying to get through to the next thing and it seems like you set yourself up because it's one more thing and you're going to go [00:09:00] off, whereas what you're saying is you can just totally step aside from that and focus on the kids and take care of the situation instead of trying to ignore it for Yeah.

Claire:
Yeah, I remember the first time I was pregnant with my third one my second one, my, my oldest, my stepdaughter, but and so my stepdaughter that I have my two and a half year old and I was pregnant with my other one we were in a post office. I had to mail something that were time sensitive that day.

I had to be hand posted. Damned, right? And so my two and a half year old, there's a whole long line waiting for the windows at the post office. It's just like an echo chamber. It's like really loud in this post office. And he decides that this is a good time to have a temper tantrum. And screaming, like echoing, and I'm pregnant, and I'm looking at him, and it took Everything in me to keep it together.

Like I was not gonna leave because, and come back. So it's just okay. I remember saying to myself, I'm sorry people , [00:10:00] we just gonna have to deal. And I did everything I could reign him in and help keep him, corralled. And he eventually settled down and we moved right along, like it passed.

It didn't define the rest of my life. It didn't like, it's just, but it can feel so much Oh my gosh, this is like emergency. This has to end now. But I just remember very clearly speaking to myself. I'm like, okay, I'm sorry, everybody. And I'm just going to have to deal with him right now.

And this is what I got to do. And yeah. It's really good. It's good that you had that clarity. And that's something that I love that you're able to teach other people. Because like I said, if you don't have that vision of the ability to do that, it's not going to come right to you. Or it, I have no idea where that came from to be honest with you.

It was not like, oh, this is what I need to do when this happens. It just, it was so overwhelming and I think what happened was I knew I couldn't leave and come [00:11:00] back. So I was forced to deal and what was I gonna do, scream in front of all like that. I wasn't gonna do that. So that was more of a self preservation than anything else.

But I do know that just knowing that this is going to pass, and I, it was just that self talk, and that's one of the things that we need to do for ourselves when we're caught in a situation that's really hard. It's really that mantra, talking to ourselves okay, I can do this is not fun.

Dori:
So is that what helps people to maybe choose not to yell? Let's say they really don't want to yell, but they keep going back to yelling. Is it talking to yourself, catching yourself? That makes the difference or what? What can they do to stop that automatic response for themselves? 

Claire:
Yeah, no, I appreciate that.
No, I'm gonna say no. Yelling laugh is more of a than it is about will. Oh, I'm just going to say these mantras. Mantras are awesome. Don't get me wrong. Affirmation and all that self talk is very important, but there's a lot of [00:12:00] skill that we need to learn before we're doing that part, right?

And so oftentimes the skills are things we were not modeled or taught. So it really isn't your fault. So to speak, you have a stress response. Your brain is automatically going there, right? But we have to learn. You had a great question here. What are the steps? Are the indication that you're getting there?

And that is the awareness and being understanding of what are those sensations for you so that you can choose to stop. And then once you choose to stop, that's been the mantra that really helpful to help you stay regulated and thinking. 

Dori:
Okay, so the steps that you help people with, do you help them to figure some of these things out?

Claire:
Yes. Yep. So the program I have, my one on one coaching, I use what I call the CARES approach to parenting. It's C A R E S. And it's literally what I did in my own journey. Because I did, you asked me if I had a, Any bad parenting moments and I really bad or [00:13:00] learning parenting moments, right? We're always learning and if we make a mistake, these are cool.

It is a learning opportunity. I don't think it's bad parenting. It's just you had a hard time and what do I need to do now to help make that better, right? So don't keep repeating that pattern. And so it was in July, 2003 that I got that I had a moment of rage. That changed the trajectory of my parenting because after I, I literally threw a phone across the room.

It was just like, and I looked down and my kiddo was looking up at me. And the look on their face was one of two things and I I was not a mama who cares at that moment I was a mama who scares like the scare, like fear. And two, it was me looking at my mother. At that same age, and I was, it just, boom I just knew oh my gosh I have to do something about this relationship with rage, if I really want to [00:14:00] have a relationship with my kids, and, because I didn't want to have, it is, so this generational cycle, that's a cycle, and so I was just repeating.

What I saw in that moment. I knew it. You clicked. I did not know how. So fast forward to my kids are all now older, but fast forward, that's what I would call the care as opposed to parenting. It's what I did to change that cycle to being able to stay calmer and connect with my kids during those.

Parenting is hard, but it doesn't have to be miserable. And I call it becoming a mama who cares. So that's another little slogan I have with that too. 

Dori:
I love the acronym. I love the fact that you're willing to share that with people and show that you went from one moment where it really impacted you and made such a difference in how you perceived your child's experience .

Okay so let me ask you this when we were talking about the teen and between years, does the yelling stop? Does it shift? Does anything [00:15:00] change? 

Claire:
Okay, that's a great question. Here's the thing. When you can start learning this care, the cares approach anytime and reason why I call it an approach, because it is not a checklist.

And then we're there. I really, there's no such thing. Do these five things, you're good to go, your parenting's going to be great. It's what I call an approach. So within care, you'll always know where you are. Right smack dab in the middle of it is remember the relationship. And the relationship is the glue that holds you and your kiddos together.

We're meant to be connected. We're meant to be in a relationship, right? And so one of the questions you have here is, I can't find it right now, but it's just the parenting power that you have is the relationship you have with your kids. That's your parenting power right there and the cares shows you how to have that relationship with them, even when things are hard, even when you're not agreeing with them, or you're not liking what you're [00:16:00] seeing or hearing that sort of thing.

So fast forward to teens, they're growing into their own independent selves, they're exploring ideas and thoughts and. Maybe everything inside of you, all the firearms are going off Oh my God, what's actually even happening? I've got to stop this now. But that is what I call it you might be in a letter E of engaging with the kids, having conversations, and they say something, and you're like, find yourself up in the sea And trigger it, and oh my gosh, right?

And so we have a choice there to either engage in that power struggle go back at them, or go, okay, I'm going to be here and be in relationship with them and hear what they have to say, because when we see our kiddos perspective, even if we don't agree, if they think we have seen their perspective truly, They are much more receptive to what we might have to say, teach, guide, that sort of thing.

Does it mean that they're going to do everything we want 100 percent of the time? [00:17:00] No, but you're more likely to have an influence, your parenting power influence. because of the relationship. So to answer your question, when we have that skill, we are much less likely to yell. 

Dori:
Actually, I think about the development of our kids.

I think the more they understood what was going on, like you said, the more that we could have those conversations, the more the doors open. And the yelling definitely did get loud. So you've got more control of what you were saying because you knew that they were hearing you. 

Claire:
Yeah. Yeah. And I think too, we actually learn a lot when we take the time to engage and listen.

Oh, I never even thought of that, right? We just immediately assume we know what's best, and we just miss the opportunity to learn more information, and trust that maybe they do know what's best in this situation for themselves, right? But we could jump in and salute, solve something, and we might be [00:18:00] missing a crucial part of the information, and it's not.

Right at all, right? So it really is a learning of being able to actively listen and tolerate the uncomfortable feelings we might be feeling while we're listening. Hoo! That's not easy to do, but when we learn how to do this, our kiddos are learning right alongside us, and it's a whole lot nicer to be connected and engaged.

That's really powerful. And there were, we spent more time there. So I'll give you another quick story with my youngest woman. She was 16. We were having a very hard conversation. It was a topic that my, my alarms were going off all over the place. And I'm like, Oh my gosh. And so at one point I remember saying to him, I forgot, hold on, I'm getting, I'm really, I'm getting triggered.

I'm really, I really want to be able to have this conversation. So I just need a minute. She's okay. So she gets up and she walks out and she goes to her room and I'm just like, okay, what's going on? I'm [00:19:00] not actively doing cares. I'm caught myself. No, I'm assessing what is actually happening here.

What's going on with me? What am I worried about? What do I want to come out of this? Like that kind of thing. And just like really be able to get myself regulated again and not where I could think clearly and go back to the conversation. So I remember texting him like, okay, I'm good. Are we good to go?

Can we continue the conversation? She's sure. Came back and we continued the conversation. Was it the one and only conversation? No, it was. several, but this particular one, rather than getting into that conflict and yelling and Oh my gosh, fear, that would have been fear. So I don't want to make this sound like it's really easy, but that is the skill that I teach how you do.

And then when we can do that, they do that with us. It is a much better place to be in solving problems together from there. 

Dori:
Yeah, that could have gone so many different ways and like you said, if it's not right, then over time you were able to work through it.

Claire:
Yeah. I don't want to make it sound like I do this all the [00:20:00] time and I'm this perfect parent. No. Because I have lost my cool, right? I have lost my cool in that moment, but that's where repair comes back, right? That's where repair comes in. You know what? That wasn't my finest moment. I'm really sorry about that.

I got triggered. And I want to do better next time. Can we try again? So you just own the mistakes. It's going to happen. It's okay. You haven't messed everything up.

Dori:
I think my kids could probably tell you there's moments where I did something similar and I actually went back and I apologized. I was like, I'm so sorry.

And just like you were saying, you're owning your mistake, your humanness. And The fact that you've handled it differently. And I think they remember it because we've had conversations where do you remember the time that you but they're not going to do it again. And remember the apology and they remember working through it.

And so hopefully that will become the. The lesson out of all of it and not be yelling at us. 

Claire:
You know what I want to add to that? I love that because they do remember, you do remember, and it [00:21:00] becomes more lighthearted. Like it's a memory. It's a learning. We've learned something, right? And now we go, Oh, remember that?

And we don't want that to happen again. But the last thing I want to say is that when we have our kids come back, Oh, you remember when you threw the phone? Because trust me, they remember. We still talk about it. They're 27 years old now. They will. Five when it happened and I'm like, yeah, it wasn't my finest moment.

Like we can talk about that more in a lighthearted way because we've moved past it, but really give yourself self compassion and grace for the mistake. We don't want to stay stuck in that because then you ruminate and you stay stuck in that because there's so many amazing things you're doing every single day.

And if we stay stuck in the guilt of the one mistake we made, we're missing all that we've done well. And they're all there. You have to intentionally find them. But it starts with self compassion. Go, you know what? Not my finest moment. I apologize for it. I'm human. I made a mistake. Moving forward, I will do better.[00:22:00] 

Really want to offer that self compassion.

Dori:
That's brilliant. It really is so important just being a person and being able to accept where you're at in that moment, too. That's awesome. Tell us a little bit about your programs and where people can find you because I know they're going to have more questions.

Claire:
Oh, my program is I call it the cares approach to parenting. It is a one on one coaching program I have that we do over 10 sessions. So basically we spend about. Three to four months together. Does it take time? Yes, because for real change to happen, it takes time. So we, it's always very close knit, like a very safe container where we just get right in and we explore about what's happening, what do you want to see happening?

And I start teaching you the skills, starting with the letter C of catching yourself. I thought teaching the skills of how to understand what you can do next bias. That thing, how to choose the [00:23:00] relationship over being right, because you might be right, but we don't need to be right now. And then the letter is engaging.

And this is where we start talking about tools and strategies and communication skills. We say things to engage conversation, encourage conversation, and then the letter S is ways to solve problems together. That's CARES. And so that is just a really robust method that I love teaching and it's transformational.

So a parent can reach me in my website www. ccparentcoach. com and I sent you a link to a freebie if they want to start with my ebook. They can start with the three reasons why they might be yelling.

Dori:
Perfect. Perfect. And if they have any questions, can they email you at that website as well? 

Claire:
Of course, yes.
Yeah, you can book a call there, or you can actually, they wanna email me to claire@parentcoach.com. They can also I'm on Instagram a lot, so if they wanna follow me at Claire Chetty parent coach, they can message me [00:24:00] there. So I'm, there's lots of places where you can find me. 

Dori:
Fabulous. Yeah. Thank you for your honesty today.
It would've been easy to say you never yelled. But you admitted to being a real human and real parent. And I appreciate that. And thank you for your time and all your insight as well. 

Claire:
Thank you for having me. I loved it. 

Dori:
Awesome. Thank you.