Q + A with Jennifer Fink, author of Building Boys

I’ve only had the opportunity to meet Jennifer Fink in person once (at a writers’ conference in New York City, many years ago), but she made a strong enough impression on me that the two of us have stayed in touch ever since. (It’s one of the best things about being a writer: being in community with other writers!) When I heard Jennifer had a brand new parenting book arriving on bookstore shelves, I invited her to do a short Q&A for my blog. What follows are my questions and her answers.

Q. In the introduction of your book, you highlight the challenge that parents face in “[helping] our boys navigate evolving gender norms while we adults are still unpacking the ways in which gender influences our lives?” How has your own thinking about gender norms changed over the years, both as a parent and as a person?

JENNIFER FINK: I didn’t realize that gender norms affected boys and men until after I became a parent of boys.

As a female, I’ve long been aware of the many ways in which gender limit women and girls’ experiences. I didn’t realize that boys (and men) are limited and harmed by gender stereotypes too. Before I had young boys, I never realizing how damaging (and emotionally stunting) “boys don’t cry” or “man up!” can be. Before I had boys in school, I didn’t realize how many teachers and others presume that a boy is “making trouble” when he’s wiggly or physical.

I learned about the “man box” – the set of stereotypical characteristics that describe what a man is “supposed to be.” These are so ingrained in our culture that you know them, even if you’ve never heard the term “man box.” Stoic. Strong. Tough. Not gay. Ready for sex (and good at it!). I don’t want my boys (or any boys) limited by the man box, just as I don’t want my gender to limit my opportunities or unduly influence others’ perception of me.

Personally, I’d like to do away with gender norms. I’d like all humans to be able to live, dress, and act as they please.

Q. What words of encouragement would you offer to parents who are trying to take into account the fact that rigid gender expectations are (as you put it) “giving way to a more tolerant, flexible understanding and expression of gender”? Why is this good news for parents and kids alike (and for all of us, actually)?

JENNIFER FINK: Let people be who they are! I firmly believe that each of us comes into the world with a unique set of gifts and talents, and that each of us is supposed to use our gifts and talents for the good of the world. When we stifle others’ gifts – by telling them they can’t do certain things because those things don’t align with traditional gender norms, for instance – we harm both the individual and the greater society, because we never get to experience the individual’s gifts.

When we let go of preconceived, gender-based notions of what people “should” or shouldn’t do, people can be their authentic selves.

Q. In your book, you talk about the importance of helping boys to untangle the confusing messages they are being given about what it means to be a boy. I’m thinking about the section on male privilege where you encourage parents to have frank conversations about how socially constructed gender roles can limit or advantage a person. What advice would you offer to a parent who is having this kind of conversation with their son for the very first time?

JENNIFER FINK:

#1. Remember that your boy is relatively new to this world. You may be well aware of the centuries (or millennia) of male domination and males’ historical oppression of others, but your son doesn’t know all that yet. Informed tweens and teens may know the history, but like most young people, they’re most concerned with what’s in front of them. And what our boys see in their classrooms and schools looks very different than what we adults see in business and politics. Boys see girls, almost exclusively, in positions of power and leadership. (Girls now dominate boys academically throughout most of the world, and girls also dominate class and club leadership positions.) Your boy’s perspective and experience are likely very different than yours, and you must take that into consideration.

#2: Provide context. Help your son understand history (including recent history!) and how it affected people he knows.

#3: Listen. Don’t lecture. Ask your son about his experience. Ask him about girls’ experiences, about the experiences of trans or non-binary kids he knows. Thank him for sharing his insights and observations with you, even if he doesn’t say all the “right” things. A lot of boys have questions about the idea of “male privilege” and they need space to have those conversations with caring adults. If you shut down the conversation, his questions won’t simply dissipate. He’ll go online and find someone like Andrew Tate, who’s more than happy to profit from boys’ confusion.

How to Feel Less Guilty as a Parent

Over the course of the pandemic, I’ve spoken at dozens of community events and workplace town halls for parents. Time and time again, parents have told me: “It doesn’t matter what, I’m doing. I always feel like I’m letting someone in my life down. Sometimes it’s my kids or other family members. Sometimes it’s my coworkers or my employer. I simply can’t be there for everyone in the way I want to be or that they need me to be. There isn’t enough of me to go around.”

Parents have been feeling guilty — really, really guilty — because they have been asked to shoulder an impossible load: to juggle the often competing demands of work, family, and school.

It’s a massive and unsustainable load and parents have been carrying it for a very long time.

So what can you do to sidestep some of those feelings of guilt? Here are a few strategies.

Know that you are not alone. Everyone is scrambling and stumbling and feeling stretched in all directions and worrying about letting their kids and their co-workers down. It’s not just you. It’s pretty much every other parent I know.

Give yourself permission to be a gloriously imperfect parent and your child permission to be a gloriously imperfect kid. You’re going to make mistakes. You’re going to say and do things you regret because everyone’s under a lot of stress. The good news is that you can recognize when this is happening and then pivot to repairing the relationship. Parents don’t have to be perfect and neither do kids. We can learn and grown together.

Practice self-compassion. Tell yourself, “I’m doing the best I can in a really difficult situation.” If you’re finding it hard to do this, think about what you would say to a friend who was struggling with feelings of guilt about their parenting. Odds are you’d offer words of support and encourage to that friend. Shouldn’t you be at least as kind to yourself?

Recognize that you’re not the one who should be feeling guilty: it’s policymakers who should be feeling guilty for letting parents and kids down in so many far-reaching ways. You have been put in an impossible situation — and you haven’t been given the supports needed to manage all these competing demands at the same time. It’s not that you’re doing anything wrong. It’s that the cracks in the system have finally broken wide open, and in a way that has caused disproportionate harm to certain families. And that’s not okay. As we start to think about the kind of world we want for ourselves and our kids moving forward, it’s pretty clear we need to get serious about addressing systemic inequities as opposed to allowing ourselves to be mired in the muck of individual guilt. Systemic problems require systemic solutions. Our families and our kids deserve nothing less.

Ann Douglas is the author of Happy Parents, Happy Kids — a book that offers strategies for feeling less anxious, less guilty, and less overwhelmed as a parent; and getting to a happier, healthier place alongside your kids.

Related resources

How to feel less guilty as a parent (video)

The secret of good parenting: lose the guilt (interview with the CBC Radio show Tapestry)

Can we talk about summer parenting guilt? (blog post)

How to Help Kids Manage Feelings of Disappointment

Spring is usually a season of happy anticipation for kids—a time to celebrate the return of the warmer weather and to start making plans for summer. That’s how things play out in normal times—but it’s already becoming pretty clear that kids are going to be asked to do a lot of things differently this year; and that they might even have to miss out on certain types of spring and summer experiences entirely as we continue to practice physical distancing.

It’s tough enough to deal with these kinds of disappointments when you’re a grownup.

It can be even harder when you’re a kid.

Here are some tips on helping kids cope with feelings of disappointment and even sadness about what simply might not be possible this year.

Acknowledge and accept your child’s feelings

This is hard to do as a parent, because it means accepting that your child is in pain: acknowledging all those painful emotions and giving her permission to talk through her feelings with you. It’s also incredibly important. Your child needs to know that you are strong enough to handle any emotions she might care to share with you, no matter how big or how messy. And if you end up shedding a few tears together—well, that’s okay! Your heart will probably break a little as you listen to your child—but it will be breaking in a good kind of way: the way that leaves you feeling more connected than ever to your child.

What I’m talking about is responding with empathy (attempting to see the situation from your child’s point of view) and then validating your child’s emotions (letting your child know that her feelings make sense).

When you’re able to respond in this way, you encourage your child to sit with these uncomfortable emotions as opposed to trying to run from them or pretend they don’t exist.

That’s so much healthier for your child.

Then, once she’s had a chance to express her feelings of anger, sadness, and disappointment, she will be able to start coming up with creative ways of dealing with the situation—of finding a way to make a bad situation a little less terrible.

Recognize that some kids will have a harder time coping with disappointment than others

Learning how to manage disappointment is a skill—and a skill that doesn’t come naturally or easily to every child. The way we develop a social-emotional skill like this is through practice; and with the support of another person.

The most important thing you can do right now is to be that strong, caring person for your child: to help her to work through these feelings of disappointment and to help her to recognize the importance of turning to other people for support in times of struggle. Because even the most crushing of disappointments becomes a little more bearable if you can ask someone else for help in shouldering that burden.

Understand what allows children to be resilient

Most of us do manage to recover from even the most crushing of disappointments. (Scientists have discovered that most of us have a baseline level of happiness that we return to relatively quickly after experiencing something really great or truly terrible—and, yes, it works both ways.) But in terms of what allows children to be resilient, it’s all about relationships. Children learn how to be resilient as a result of being in a caring relationship with a resilient adult. And if that resilient adult feels supported by the broader community—well, that’s where the resiliency magic really kicks in!

It can be helpful to give kids a peek behind the curtain: to share some of the strategies you are using to manage your own feelings of disappointment and to find ways to bounce back from those disappointments. In addition to modelling your own resilience and coping skills in real time, it can also be useful to share stories about times you yourself were faced with a particularly crushing disappointment, back when you were a kid. The fact that you’re still standing here today will be living proof that it’s possible to weather these kinds of disappointments, no matter how terrible they feel at the time.

Kids need to know that they can learn to manage their feelings of disappointment—and that the process does get easier over time and with practice. And when you witness their resilience, be sure to shine a spotlight on it. Encourage them to notice and celebrate their growing ability to cope with life’s curveballs. Because that’s definitely worth celebrating.

Ann Douglas is the weekend parenting columnist for CBC Radio and the author of numerous books about parenting.

Ann Douglas is the weekend parenting columnist for CBC Radio and the author of numerous books about parenting, including, most recently, Happy Parents, Happy Kids and Parenting Through the Storm. In recent weeks, she has been hosting a series of online events on parenting in the midst of a pandemic. She has also launched two new video series: A Postcard from Ann Douglas and We Got This! Parent Support During COVID-19 with child psychiatrist Dr. Jean Clinton.

How to Avoid Shaming Kids About Their Weight

Weight can be a tricky issue for parents. It can feel like you’re trying to make your way through a gigantic minefield: a minefield laden with confusing cultural messages about bodies, weight, and food. Here are a few tips on navigating that minefield based on my own experiences both as a parent and as a kid.

Daria Volkova/Unsplash

Recognize that cultural messages make this tough.

Western culture gives us so many conflicting messages about food. We’re offered an endless buffet of seemingly irresistible snack foods and treats (foods that have been carefully engineered to achieve peak deliciousness, no less); and yet, at the same time, we’re given a lot of highly moralistic messages about the importance of exercising self-control when we’re faced with these foods. It’s all about resisting temptation so that you can achieve a (quote-unquote) “acceptable” body shape and size (or so we’re told).

Now add to this the unique challenges that are baked into the experience of being a parent (the fact that you’re responsible for the health and wellbeing of another human being; the fact that kids are constantly changing and growing; and the fact that every parent on the planet is the product of his or her own imperfect childhoods), and you can see that this is definitely not an easy task.

A lot of us grew up hearing messages about weight and food that weren’t particularly helpful or healthy—messages that were laced with shame and judgment. Is it any wonder then that so many of us are trying to handle things differently (and hopefully a little better) with our kids? We want our kids to grow up being healthy and strong and feeling good about their bodies. And some of us (myself included) know from first-hand experience how difficult it is to be “the fat kid.” Fat stigma is real, even in 2020. We want to spare our kids that painful experience, if possible.

Be mindful of the messages you’re sending your child about weight.

Ask yourself what broader cultural messages about food and weight your child sees you amplifying or rejecting. How do you react to a social media story about a celebrity’s weight loss or weight gain? Do you laugh at a fat joke in a movie you’re watching with your kids?  What kind of things do they hear you say when you talk about your own body or your own relationship with food?

This is something I was speaking with Michelle Allison about recently. She’s a Toronto dietician who helps people figure out what it means to eat normally—in a healthy, non-obsessive way. She told me that parents have an important role to play in modelling these kinds of behaviours for their kids: “Parents really need to sort out, as much as they can, their own relationship with food so that they’re able to model for their kids eating in a way that is normal and healthy—and includes permission, but that also includes structure.” Where kids, like adults, tend to run into trouble and when they can actually end up developing an unhealthy relationship with food is when they get a lot of all-or-nothing messages around food: you’re either depriving yourself of food or you’re rewarding yourself with food; this food is good or bad. The goal is to find some sensible middle ground—a place where kids can grow up feeling good (not guilty) about food and where they can learn to trust their bodies to tell them what they actually want and need.

Find out if there’s actually cause for concern.

It’s easy to lose sight of the fact that kids are simply going to be bigger than others. That’s simply a particular child’s body type. Looking at your child’s overall growth pattern or trajectory over a prolonged period of time often helps to make this broader pattern clear. A big baby becomes a big toddler becomes a big child. A doctor or a dietitian can help you to gain this bigger picture perspective.

And what if your child is a bit bigger than other kids? The goal isn’t to move your child from the 90th percentile to the 50th percentile on the growth chart. The goal is to allow your child’s body to become what it is meant to be and to avoid reacting in a way that might cause your child to develop an unhealthy relationship with food. Bodies come in all shapes and sizes—and kids go through periods when they naturally become a little bit chubbier or a bit thinner. It’s important to recognize and accept those key biological facts.

This kind of ebb and flow is normal, explains Michelle Allison. “We all recognize growth spurts when it comes to height or…shoe size. But it’s also important [for] parents to understand that there are periods of what is called adiposity rebound that occur as well. And these are periods when kids will gather more fat and they’ll grow more fat tissue on their body and then usually a growth spurt in height comes after that. This is a normal and important part of development. The body knows what it’s doing and as long as parents provide the supportive structure of regular meals and enough permission (exposing children to a variety of different foods, but letting them pick and choose from what’s available), parents can [relax], trust that process, and not try to take it over.”

Maybe you’re trying to fix a problem that isn’t actually a problem at all.

Maybe there isn’t actually anything for you to fix.

Offer support in a way that doesn’t involve body shaming.

Keep the focus on having a happy, healthy relationship with your body: eating well, being active, and celebrating all the things your body can do: how strong and capable it is. Resist the temptation to try to control your child’s weight or food intake in a way that feels punitive or like deprivation. And insist that other relatives do the same. (It’s not okay for a grandparent to tell a chubby kid that he doesn’t “need” this piece of cake, but that his skinnier brother can have two pieces!)

Modify the family environment in a way that supports the child and that is healthy for all family members. Make high-quality nutrition and regular physical activity the norm for your family. And model those behaviours yourself. (Parents are incredibly powerful role models, particularly when it comes to physical activity. More active parents end up raising more active kids.)

Recognize your own internalized biases and stigma regarding weight. Don’t let them spill over into your relationship with your child. And refuse to allow other family members (grandparents, siblings, anyone) to engage in weight-related shaming or bullying. Help them to understand that teasing a child about their weight as a means of “motivating" them to lose weight is a strategy that can backfire big time. Children who are subjected to weight-based teasing actually tend to gain more weight than other kids. Likewise, putting a child on a diet is also hugely ineffective and it may even cause psychological harm, increasing the risk of both weight gain and disordered eating. One study found that women who remembered their parents commenting on their weight when they were growing up were likely to express dissatisfaction with their bodies well into adulthood regardless of their actual weight in adulthood.

Take action to combat fat stigma.

Acknowledge that fat stigma is real. Our kids pick up on all those “fat is bad” messages—and overweight kids pay the price on the playground and in gym class.

If your child is on the receiving end of this kind of bullying, help your child figure out how to respond—what they might want to say and who they might want to turn to for help and support in dealing with these episodes of bullying.

And if your child is the one doing the bullying, help your child to understand why it’s not okay. Bodies come in all shapes and sizes. No one should be made to feel less acceptable or worthy because they’re living their life in a bigger body—or any body, for that matter. Body shaming is also an issue for kids who are deemed “too skinny” and for boys who are deemed “not manly enough,” too.

Recognize how important it is to get this right.

Childhood experiences about weight can have a far-reaching impact well into adulthood, both in terms of how we feel about our bodies and what kind of relationship we have with food. How do I know this? Because I was a fat kid—or at least I grew up thinking I was a fat kid. Looking back, I was a little chubby; and I definitely packed on a few extra pounds as I headed into puberty. But that’s how puberty is supposed to work. (Girls shift from gaining roughly 2 kg per year before puberty to gaining roughly 5 to 10 kg right around the time of puberty. They tend to fill out before they grow up.) But here’s the thing: I didn’t understand that at the time. All I knew was that the scale was moving upwards at a rapid rate and everyone around me seemed to be talking about my weight. It would take decades of my life for me to shed the shame and to develop a healthy and joyful relationship with food.

Unfortunately, along the way, I ended up giving my own kids some rather mixed-up messages about food and body image. Like my parents, I did the best I could with the knowledge I had at the time—and, like my parents, I fell short on this front. Despite my best efforts not to burden my daughter with any of my own weight-related baggage, she ended up developing an eating disorder during her teen years, perhaps in response to my weight (I was quite obese at that time) and perhaps because of my obvious efforts to lose that weight (diet culture can be both toxic and contagious).

The good news is that I ultimately managed to find my way to a healthy place: both in terms of my physical health (I am no longer morbidly obese) but even more importantly in terms of how comfortable I am in my own skin. And so did my daughter.

And that’s what I want for any kid who might be worried about their weight: that same hard-earned feeling of self-compassion and self-acceptance; the lightness and grace that allows you to move in the world without obsessing 24/7 about the shape or size of your body; the freedom to accept and enjoy your body without even a hint of body shame. The freedom to be yourself, in other words….

Note: This blog post is based on my most recent parenting column for CBC Radio.

Ann Douglas is the author of numerous books about parenting including, most recently, Happy Parents, Happy Kids and Parenting Through the Storm. She is also the weekend parenting columnist for CBC Radio. Ann frequently speaks at health and parenting conferences across the country on issues related to parenting and mental health.

When Your Child Does Something that Embarrasses You (or You Do Something That Embarrasses Your Child)

Some advice on getting through some of the more cringeworthy moments as a parent.

Being a parent can be downright embarrassing at times.

• Your toddler has a meltdown in the middle of the grocery store.

• You get called to the principal’s office because of something your child said or did at school.

• Your teenager says something obnoxious or edgy at a family reunion.

You get the picture….

The question, of course, is how to respond to these all-too-common scenarios.

How can you manage your own feelings of embarrassment so that you are able to respond in a way that is helpful (as opposed to harmful) to your child?

Start out by acknowledging that this is hard — because it is.

There’s no doubt about it: it can be challenging to handle the more cringeworthy-moments of parenting: those moments when your child says or does something that is downright embarrassing to you. Say, the classic candy aisle meltdown…. Basically, you’re being called upon to be “your best parenting self” at the very moment when you feel least equipped to do so: when your brain is being flooded with emotion and you feel like every single person in the grocery store is judging you and waiting to see what you will do next. You can almost imagine your fellow shoppers reaching for the popcorn and placing bets with one another about how well (or how terribly) you are going to handle this:

“I bet he’s going to give in to the candy request!”

“I bet she’s going to start yelling at the kid!”

Trust me, it doesn’t feel great!

Parenting is challenging at the best of times — and knowing that you’re parenting in public only serves to make it 100 times harder! And these days, it can feel like you’re just one smartphone click away from becoming the Internet’s next bad parenting meme. So, there’s that, too….

Recognize how much power you have in this moment.

Sure, you might feel completely powerless — like your shrieking toddler is the one who holds all the cards — but actually the opposite is true. You have a huge amount of power in this moment. You have the power to choose how to respond — a decision that will play a major role in determining what will happen next. Will your actions help to calm your child or will they escalate the conflict, pulling you and your child into a messy and very public tug-of-war, a situation where you’re likely to say or do something you might regret?

You’ve reached a turning point, in other words. And it all starts with you gaining control of your own thoughts and feelings so that you can make a conscious decision about how to respond to your child.

Hit the pause button on your own emotions.

A critical first step is in managing your emotions is actually allowing yourself to acknowledge whatever it is you’re feeling — and odds are you’re feeling a lot of different things all at once. In addition to feeling embarrassed (“Everyone is staring at me and thinking I’m the world’s worst parent!”), you might also be feeling angry at or frustrated with your child (“Why can’t you just behave? Why does everything have to be a battle with you?”) Add to that a layer of guilt (“Good parents don’t ever feel angry with their kids! Why am I such a terrible parent?”) and you can see that you’ve got a cocktail of emotions swimming around in your brain.

Parenting is ultimately about empathy: recognizing that it’s hard to be the parent and it’s hard to be the kid.

Hitting the pause button on all those emotions gives you the opportunity to figure out how you want to respond to your child. You want to be able to do your best thinking—something that’s impossible while your mind is being flooded with emotion and all kinds of just plain unhelpful thoughts. And, according to Leena Augimeri (Director - Scientific and Program Development with the Child Development Institute in Toronto and co-founder of the Stop Now and Plan (or SNAP) program) hitting the pause button on your own emotions begins with answering yourself this all-important question: “What is the first thing that you need to do to gain better self-control?”

Augimeri recommends taking a deep breath or counting to ten or doing whatever else you can do in that moment to calm yourself. Then, at that point, you can start challenging the unhelpful thoughts that only serve to make parenting harder — thoughts like, “He’s doing this on purpose to make me really angry!” or “He’s doing this to embarrass me!” — thoughts that may not even be the least bit true at all. Odds are, your child isn’t doing this to make your life harder: he’s actually just really frustrated himself. Recognizing that simple yet all-important fact allows you to pivot from embarrassment to empathy.

Switch into detective mode.

Sometimes we parents are required to play detective. We have to decode the messages that our kids are sending us. Then, once we’ve managed to figure out what it is that a particular child is trying to tell us in a particular moment, we’re in a much stronger position to be able to try to meet the underlying need. Maybe a child who just had a very public meltdown needs you to help solve a problem. Maybe she would benefit from some hands-on help. Or maybe she just needs to have you recognize and validate what she’s feeling: a simple acknowledgement that “This is really hard.” As psychologists like to remind us, “Behaviour is communication.” Sometimes the messages that that our kids communicate to us through their actions and their emotions are far more powerful than what they’re actually able to put into words.

Keep your expectations of your child age-appropriate and realistic.

According to a 2016 study conducted by ZERO TO THREE (a major US child development research organization), there’s a significant gap between what parents think kids are capable of at a given age and what those kids are actually capable of at that age. The researchers discovered, for example, that nearly half of parents of two-year-olds expect their toddlers to be able to refrain from having a temper tantrum when they’re frustrated when, in fact, that kind of self-control only starts to develop when children reach the age of three-and-a-half or four. In other words, it’s normal for toddlers to have difficulty managing their emotions, and failing to understand that simple-yet-all-important fact makes parenting so much harder.

Having a basic understanding of child development makes it easier for you to parent in a way that you can feel good about and that brings out the best (as opposed to the worst) in your child. Understanding child development also makes it easier for you to tune out the voices of other people. Instead of worrying about what other people are thinking as they observe your child’s meltdown in the candy aisle (“What a bad parent!” “What a bad kid!”), you can focus instead on meeting your child’s needs in this moment and learning from this experience (“Note to self: Let’s skip the candy aisle next time!”). And, most important of all, you can choose to parent in a way that will build upon the all-important bond between you and your child.

Be self-aware enough to recognize when you’re the one causing the embarrassment.

The embarrassment thing works both ways, after all. Sometimes we parents are the ones who are embarrassing our kids!

It’s important to be self-aware enough to allow yourself to recognize when this is happening. Maybe you shared something cute or funny that our child said or did and your child is embarrassed that you passed that information along (“Hey, that was a secret. I didn’t want you to tell Grandma or to post it on your Facebook page!”)

If you’ve goofed, be willing to acknowledge that you’ve made a mistake. We parents are human. We’re going to make mistakes. We’re going to say or do things that our kids aren’t thrilled about. And when this happens (not if this happens – when this happens), we have an opportunity to apologize and make amends.

Key to making an effective apology is acknowledging the impact of your actions and promising to do better next time: “You’re right. I shouldn’t have shared that on my Facebook page without checking with you first. I can see now how that would have embarrassed you. I’m sorry. I’ll take the post down and I’ll make a point of checking with you before I post anything similar from now on.”

Finally, take solace in the fact that you’re in good company when it comes to accidentally embarrassing your kids, but, at the same time, don’t allow that to become an excuse for behaving badly. Sure, parental oversharing (or “sharenting”) seems to be happening more and more these days, but that doesn’t have to mean that we should make embarrassing our kids the new normal. We can make a conscious decision to do things differently: to do our best to defy all those stereotypes about that totally embarrassing mom or dad; and to try to embarrass our kids a little less. I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a worthy parenting resolution to carry with us into a brand new year.

This blog post is based upon my most recent parenting column for CBC Radio.

Ann Douglas is the author of numerous books about pregnancy and parenting including, most recently, Happy Parents, Happy Kids and Parenting Through the Storm. She is also the weekend parenting columnist for CBC Radio.