Parenting in an Apocalypse

This is a vital part of the revolution.

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The last 4 weeks have been disastrous for my nervous system. If you are living with a beating heart, I know it has been for yours as well.

It’s true that everything we have come to “depend on” feels like it’s crumbling. It has been for a while, but this latest upheaval is next level. It’s like you can’t tune out the noise.

Today, I want to talk about the kids.

While we are all doom scrolling, what’s happening to them? While we are trying to figure out if we’ll be able to afford groceries when these ridiculous tariffs start, what are our kids overhearing?

I can’t speak for you, but I know what’s happening with my kids and with the many kids that I’m around. They too are coping.

My kids want to watch more shows. They want to watch with me when they hear me watching a video. They want to look back on old photos when they see me looking at things on my phone. They’re picking on their siblings more often. Their sleep is disrupted (particularly, my 3yo was waking up 2-3 times a night for the last 3 weeks).

I think it’s easy to forget the impact our systems have on kids because they can’t articulate what they’re experiencing in the same terms as us grown ups can. However, the level of stress we are all experiencing is absolutely having an impact. Now is the time to make changes so you can navigate these next four years and beyond in a way that makes them (and you) more resilient.

My husband Ryan reading to our kids at bedtime.

The Parents are Not OK

Straight up - the devaluing of care is straight out of the Supremacy Delusion handbook, and it pre-dates the United States by a country mile. While I could trace it’s lineage straight back through the last 10,000 years, what I want to use this time to help you understand is that it’s not new and it’s not creative.

Here’s what is new and creative:
- Honoring the caregiving that you give and receive in your life.
- Advocating for caregivers (including yourself!)
- Making a point to notice the care that goes into things that you usually don’t notice
- Creating more space in your life for actual care, for yourself, your family, and your community

Dear friends, I wish the message weren’t dire, but it is. It has been for years, as those of you that have been here for a while can attest to. The ability for us to withstand the current pressure is directly related to our ability to heal our relationship with care.

The Terror is Intentional

More and more, politicians and organizers are coming out and stating the obvious - the feelings we are feeling are intentional. I just had a flashback to an email I wrote back in 2016 with the same message. We were right to feel like the 2024 election had everything at stake, and now we are having to live through this nightmare.

What I want you to realize is that Care is an antidote to Supremacy Delusion. It’s so easy to overlook for that reason, but you have so much more power in your hands and I want you to use it to resist letting the violence into your heart.

Here’s what we know:
- SD thrives in survival mode. Care abates survival mode.
- Care strengthens your internal sense of self (i.e. sovereignty), a human experience SD is vehemently against because it makes you more resilient to manipulation
- SD decimates communities with making us fear each other and act in extreme self interest. Care shares resources and strengthens communities by reminding us of our shared humanity.

For these reasons and more, care is intentionally devalued and undercut in our culture.
- Those with the means outsource care immediately and completely extricate themselves from providing care personally.
- Care is seen as weakness. As softness. It is then stigmatized and stereotyped to further enforce a means of controlling and reducing it.

So to prioritize care in the midst of an authoritarian coup is nothing short of revolutionary.

Giving Care is not just for Parents

Listen. The parents are not ok. We have never raised humans on an island in the hundreds of millions of years of human existence. This phenomenon of parental isolation has only become a common experience in the last 50 years. (I say “common” because it certainly did exist for many hundreds if not thousands of years, especially in Europe and the Middle East amongst the elite. However, it was not a common experience because only the wealthiest of wealthy could afford it.)

Whether you have young kids or not, whether you have experience with children or not, whether you are in an industry of care or not - you are still a part of the revolution of care.

Show Up for Our Kids

Together, we are going to navigate this, and we will be stronger as a result. Our kids are the ones who will carry on this legacy, so how we show up for them in this moment has a direct impact on what’s possible for our society moving forward.

Here are some ways we can show up for the kids right now:

1) Don’t pretend that you are ok. The kids know. They can sense what’s happening in an intuitive non-verbal sense, so be honest with them however do communicate in an age appropriate way. When we avoid the topic, Dr Becky teaches us that your kid starts to fear it. “If this is happening and mom/dad/caretaker are avoiding the topic, it must be really bad.” As scary as it feels that you’re going to mess it up, letting them see you in your process gives them a model for how to be in their process.

2) Model Self Care. Taking care of yourself in a culture built on exploitation is hard work. Your kids need to learn how to do this, and you are the best person to teach them. That means you might have to keep learning it yourself, and that’s ok. We all have to start somewhere. By taking care of yourself, you are going to have more capacity to be present and available for your kids. You have to put your oxygen mask on.

3) Normalize the values you want to see grow in our society by implementing them in your home. In our house, we a big believers in restorative justice. One way we work towards that end and abolition is to use restorative practices ourselves - both with our kids and with our loved ones.

4) Practice having boundaries on negative information sources, for your kids and for you. Yes, turn off the news. Yes, delete Instagram from your phone. Yes, delete YouTube from your kids tablet. We have to have really clean energetic boundaries right now. Be intentional about where you get your information from, how often you are going to check, and hold each other accountable. We are navigating this in real time, it’s true. However, the flood of ill intent is also a tool we recognize. If we allow it to keep us tethered to our

*5) PRIORITIZE JOY. This is the most important way you can support your kids AND yourself. Joy is the fuel for the revolution. This is actually a core tenet of what we learn in Human Design, specifically for Generators and Manifesting Generators. However, the rest of the types take in and amplify that sacral energy - so it’s safe to say it’s critical for all of us! Make a joy list. Incorporate 2-3 items from your joy list every day. Trust me, the way life starts to look different for you and your kids will absolutely blow you away!
(*if you do none of the above and still prioritize joy, you will naturally build the capacity to be able to do the other things on this list.)

Over to You

Which of these steps can you take first? What are the obstacles you face in implementing the steps to support yourself or your kids? Let’s be in community and normalize being “in process” together.

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(Please hit the heart button, comment, and share. All of your engagement helps this article reach the people who need to read it.)