CLEVELAND – For moms and dads to be the best version of themselves, the structures that support good parenting need to be in place.
“These are kids who go to school, these are kids who have a daycare to go to, these are kids who can have dates with their friends,” said Dr. Lisa Damour.
With the pandemic disrupting this so much, for two years now, Damour has mobilized to fill the void.
“All the uncertainty and all the unpredictability really made parents forget,” Damour said.
From her home in Shaker Heights, the clinical psychologist launched the podcast “Ask Lisa: The Psychology of Parenting”.
“Co-host Reena Ninan and I started this podcast because we knew parents needed help, we knew they needed it right away and they needed it on a weekly and agile basis,” Damour said.
Among the podcast’s goals: to help parents and children get through the stress and anxiety of the pandemic.
“We just had our millionth download. In fact, we are now well past that,” Damour said.
This huge audience was built entirely by word of mouth.
“This number tells me that we somehow fit into a space that needed to be filled,” Damour said.
It’s a space where mentally exhausted moms and dads can find the coping mechanisms to help keep their families on track.
“This is the first podcast I’ve ever listened to, I’m a total newbie,” Courtney Visioni said.
Visioni, a Pepper Pike mother of two, said she finds the support much needed the pandemic has broken.
“It was really that kind of community development experience,” Visioni said.
In addition to tools to help her navigate parenting in a pandemic world, Visioni has found ways to empower her children for a time they can’t control.
“The kids painted kindness stones to put in a little basket in our neighborhood and they did a book drive for the Cleveland Children’s Book Bank,” Visioni said.
Courtney visioni
Parents like Visioni are also encouraged to prioritize their own well-being while providing warmth and structure.
“Kids can handle a tremendous amount if they know what’s coming even though it’s a fairly short horizon that we are preparing them for,” Damour said.
Ultimately, Damour says parents need to keep perspective.
“The presence of the negative does not mean the absence of the positive,” she said.
Although this is a crisis of historic proportions, she suggested that parents focus on the fun times that can easily be overshadowed.
“The longer it lasts, the more exhausted we are, the more important it becomes that we find ways to fill ourselves and we look at those and take advantage of them. They can live side by side with this very difficult time,” Damour said.
You can listen to “Ask Lisa: The Psychology of Parenting” on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Lisa Damour
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