FAITH: So I'm exiting the elevator and I see my two colleagues huddled together whispering and when they notice that I'm there they suddenly go "shh".

MELODY: That's not a good sign.

FAITH: Of course my immediate gut reaction is they've got to be talking about me. I'm trying to keep a lid on my emotions but inside I'm churning and I'm trying to think about all these things, I'm going back in my mind about all the things that I must have done or I could have done that would have led to them trying to talk about me or what are they talking about me.

MELODY: I get I get why you would think that they're talking bad about you because I mean it's kind of like it doesn't feel good right when someone stops the conversation just because they're looking at you and it's like a deer in headlights but you're also spiralling a bit too much aren't you?

FAITH: So you know in psychology there is a phrase that says, “When it's hysterical it's historical”? Here's the context and information. I grew up in a family environment where what we did and what we said was a constant source of concern for my parents. Social interactions were judged by them in a way that what others said or did would then indicate not just deep character flaws in that person but that person was then judging us in a negative way.

MELODY: What do you mean?

FAITH: Let me give an example. Okay let's take a deep dive. So I'm 12 and my parents have let me have a birthday party at home and I've invited all of my friends. At the end of the day everyone's gone home, I've had a really good time and I thought everyone had a really good time and I noticed that my mum is very unhappy because she tells me that as she's serving food one of my friends coughed. I don't remember the cough.

MELODY: It wasn't a *cough*yuck*cough*?

FAITH: You know what. If it was at least that would have been a legitimate reason but I honestly think that the the worst of it is that it was something so like nothing that I didn't even notice it. It was so innocent that I didn't even remember that it happened but to her . . .

MELODY: It was more like *cough*.

FAITH: Dust in the air yeah. Dust in the air whatever right? Maybe something caught in her throat whatever but to my mum she interpreted it as this person was being passive aggressive and giving a passive aggressive cough that judged my mum's cooking, judged the serving, judged the house, judged the party. Now because this person was judging my my judging us harshly the judgement then turned around right on to that person and said this person then must be a um a rude person right. It became uh like a judgement of the person's character right. A character flaw this person must be rude, this person must not have a good upbringing, this person must have parents that you know didn't teach them right and there's a lot of judgement going both ways.

MELODY: That's reading a lot into a . . .

FAITH: Cough.

MELODY: Yes, yes.

FAITH: You can see how when there is a pattern of constant judgement it becomes where I'm nearly 50 years old and there are still times when I walk into a room and I'm afraid. I'm afraid because I don't know if something that I do or don't know or don't do or say or don't say may trigger someone to judge me harshly or think that I am judging them harshly.

MELODY: It's a funny, it's a very funny situation because I'm like, you know you're thinking you're saying that oh you're 50 and so you're thinking about that and yeah what I mean as opposed to how I would react it's very very different because you know I've come to that stage in life where it's mostly meh. I can do whatever like. I'm happy to do whatever and it's like whatever. You wanna judge, however you wanna judge it, I don't really care.

FAITH: You've a blessed blessed life.

MELODY: But the thing is we like to think about it as kind of like a trauma response right, which you know, I'm not saying that it isn't and it's very valid still but yet at the same time, so this is this is my son okay, I'm talking I'm thinking more about my son because in the last little while I've noticed that it's what is happening to him as well because he's starting to ask questions it's like, “Oh, will people think I'm such-and-such?” or “I'm doing this, does it make people think that I'm so-and-so?” which you know coming from his family of origin, me, you think that he wouldn't have it but developmentally he's actually getting to that that stage as well.

FAITH: Right, okay because that's very interesting because you're talking about that there's a developmental aspect to it. Okay I want to dig into this because that's very interesting but we got to do the the admin stuff okay. So I'm Faith.

MELODY: I'm Melody.

FAITH: Okay good and this is Life in the Grey and this is a micropodcast from Mums At The Table where we try to understand what makes us tick how it impacts our lives and relationships and if you want to know more about who we are check out the first episode or the show notes. Okay so back to your son and the developmental aspect of this um this judgement.

MELODY: So yeah there's two folds to it right? So okay there's the developmental thing where basically it's it's linked to this theory of mind concept so basically up to around two years of age children think that the world revolves around them as in there is no extension between who they are and who someone else is. You'd you see it in the way they play hide-and-seek. You know they'll stand in the middle of the room and they'll go hiding and they think because they can't see you you can't see them so it's like they're just just one person right? Then they start growing up and they start realising that there's a world that exists outside of them that they are separate and soon they start to behave differently because they start to notice that people are different and people notice them as well. It's a bit like you know the phrase where it's you go um, “dance like nobody's watching”, “sing like no one is listening”? So kids do that because they really don't think that anyone is watching or they think that no one is listening But then they stop doing that. It's like my son he stopped playing with dolls because he discovered that his friends were laughing at him so they start . . . yes we won't go we won't go into the whole topic of gender bias here because yes I want to go there but what I'm trying to talk about is the fact that so they start they developmentally they start having this theory of mind they know they're separate and so they stop doing what they're doing because they know people are watching, people are listening. So what has happened is normal but how you react to it, I think it's a little bit different. So for me right, I don't I don't want him to grow up under this weight that you know the world is judging him and I don't want him to grow up like you. [LAUGHTER]

FAITH: Great I don't want him to grow up like me either but I okay we'll back we'll go into that but yes continue, yes.

MELODY: And so what I do to him right like I basically want him to be himself right and I want him to not be afraid.

FAITH: No.

MELODY: So whenever he asks me, "Oh, what are people thinking?" I acknowledge his concerns but what I try to do is I try to remind him that people are often so worried about what other people think about themselves they're not actually spending time judging you.

FAITH: Yes and I have heard that being told to me so many times but here's the thing how do you know that for sure?

MELODY: I don't I don't know that for sure but it's it's what I believe and it's what I want him to believe just just so that he if he if he has that perspective I'm hoping it means he'll grow up more brave and more confident instead of you know cowering under the weight of perceived judgement.

FAITH: And that itself which is what I wanted to say earlier is going to help him not grow up like me because you are giving him a very different upbringing. You are making the effort to equip and skill him with the tools that he needs to self-regulate to to see that the world is out there full of people who not only will not judge him but who also want to get to know and like the authentic him and my parents on the other hand did not really give me that experience. They gave me a very different experience, so that is giving him a very different foundation.

MELODY: I'm curious though, what what is the judgement criteria that your parents have?

FAITH: I don't think it was so much as like the things that they had a criteria on. Like it wasn't like oh they they picked on clothes or they picked on grades, stuff like that. It's just, it was just that um the pattern of it. You know the the consistent constant pattern of just feeling judged and judging others.

MELODY: Which is, it's a pretty harsh standard to live up to isn't it? I mean that doesn't it mean that you you're always thinking that you're like never good enough?

FAITH: Yeah. The belief that gets ingrained is that inevitably people will judge you for not being good enough.

MELODY: You know you asked me earlier where is the proof in the statement that I give my son right that people are more concerned about being judged themselves and yes I do not have solid proof but you don't either! Your parents don't either! They don't have solid proof that people are talking about you, thinking about you judging you negatively. So you don't have proof, I don't have proof, isn't that the grey?

FAITH: Exactly and you have just come to the point in just a few minutes that took me years of therapy to get to. That is the grey and that is one of the tools that I use to help me to cope when the feelings of judgement, of rejection, of being othered surface because those feelings those feelings are from my past right. It's it's it's gonna surface when triggers happen but what I do with them that's my present. That's my healing, that's my wise mind so when these feelings come up, I don't suppress, I don't deny, I don't I don't judge them. I identify them but also I hold space for the fact that there is grey. I don't have proof for one or the other just like you said so if I'm gonna write the story of all of the negative stories then I also have to give equal opportunity to write the other side of the story and then ask myself what's the grey here and can I hold space for the grey and say I'm not gonna run away with either story until more context and information surfaces. Until I know something is a fact, I have to ask myself what am I assuming here and what am I extrapolating and what am I inferring because sometimes the feelings that come up might tell me really a boundary was crossed but sometimes the feelings that come up just come up because the situation looks similar to what happened in the past.

MELODY: It's funny though like you know how we we react differently to grey like you know your parents, I'm a parent and how different the reaction is. So I guess what I'm curious about right is, what are the things that your parents did that you know, perhaps I should avoid so that you know for people who do not want children to grow up like you, like what should we avoid?

FAITH: I wouldn't speak about what people should avoid but I can just share about what happened for me. I cannot emphasise enough about consistent pattern because we're not talking about one isolated incident of like, oh my mum maybe like made a judgement on someone but we're talking about consistent pattern, of an unspoken pressure to always perform, to always look right, look good and even when we messed up, there was a right way to mess up. There was supposed to be a right way to mess up. The way that they interpreted the things that people said or did, there was always this negativity around it.

MELODY: Which is so sad like I mean it's such a, it's such an awful awful way of living and well obviously harmful to children. It reminds me of this thing that I try to tell my kid whenever he has, he does have his you know, glass-half-empty negative moments right and it's like you know, you can choose to be happy. It's not about the feelings, it's not about choosing to feel happy but it's about choosing to have that perspective in which that you can therefore be positive and be happy. Happiness can be a choice.

FAITH: And that is so true because it is a skill that you can develop. I mean look at me. I'm almost 50 and I am developing the skill right to mindfully go through my emotions that way. If really sometimes a boundary was crossed, now I'm mindfully, intentionally going to address it in a healthy way or if a boundary wasn't crossed, I know I can regulate myself and then protect the relationships that I have right and you know treat the relationships I have with the love and the kindness that I want to treat them with. So it is a skill that you can develop and it's never too late it's never, never too late.

MELODY: Okay I'm gonna pull in the big guns now right because we're just talking. We don't really have any psych, we got psychological we got interest in psychology but we don't have the qualifications per se. So I'm gonna pull in the big guns now. I talked to Doctor Katie Kjelsaas. She's a clinical psychologist and she actually did share with me four simple things that parents can do to help children who are suffering under the weight of judgement. So I've converted into an article and it's on the Mums At The Table website which I will share in the show notes. And so there's our stories but there's also the big guns. It's also good right to know that you know what we talk about there's actually research-backed evidence.

FAITH: Okay so I think we can get to the point we've got to wrap up here and so just to just to conclude, we're here to share stories okay, we're not here to give advice and we definitely are not anybody's therapist here but if you enjoyed our chat today, please uh do give us a thumbs up hit the subscribe button and click the bell icon so that you don't miss an episode but if you do just prefer the audio, you can still find us on your favourite podcast app and all you have to do is just search for Life in the Grey, that's Grey with an E and we do love to keep the conversation going, so please leave a comment below or reach out to us on any of our social channels, so thanks for tuning in!