The Joyful Mom Podcast

Send a message to Megan Find the full show notes here If you like this podcast, and found it helpful, I want to invite you come check out Grieving Moms Haven, my monthly community for Grieving moms, where you can learn positive coping mechanisms, find a safe space with others who understand, and learn life long skills that support you as you learn how to carry this weight of grief in your life. Th...

Send a message to Megan You can find the show notes to this podcast HERE If you like this podcast, and found it helpful, I want to invite you come check out Grieving Moms Haven, my monthly community for Grieving moms, where you can learn positive coping mechanisms, find a safe space with others who understand, and learn life long skills that support you as you learn how to carry this weight of gri...

Send a message to Megan So- here’s to hoping 2022 can be a year of gentleness on your heart, and a time where you can hold compassion, gentleness, and love for yourself as you are walking the hardest journey one can ever be asked to walk. I see you there, doing the best you can, with the horrific pain you are carrying, and it still feels like it’s never enough. It’s a lot, it really is. So please...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers : Using the word AND , helps expand your energy, awareness, and opens up things for your brain to register in a way that’s pretty amazing. We don’t have to live in black and white. Let’s add the AND in there. I’m feeling lighter today, AND I still miss and love my child. I’m feeling lighter today, AND I’m so grateful I have a moment of reprieve. I’m feeling...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: You know that the person is dying, but you do everything to make the situation comfortable. You provide until the end of life. Each one of our stories is so personal to us and so, the grief is so deep. There is no normal for grief, whatever it is for you is okay. In grief, it’s not that you are necessarily ever going to be healed or ever just check the box...

Send a message to Megan Holiday season is a time for happiness and making good memories with your loved ones. How can a grieving mom experience true happiness if she is still having intense pain and longing for her child? In these special holiday episodes,I am going to help you in going through this holiday season. Here are my practical tips for you:   1. Have a plan A, plan, B, and plan C. Becaus...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: Judgment is anytime you think you should be doing better, differently, or than you are.  This quadruples the pain and takes precious energy away from just grieving.  Judgment and shame are huge reasons why grief is so much more difficult.  When you lead with curiosity, you can begin to explore what emotions you are having.  One of the most difficult things...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: When grief first comes into your world, it’s so foreign. The grief wave of emotion almost feels too big to bear. But as time goes on, and this cloud of sadness hovers over your life, and nothing seems to make it go away. As you get comfortable with that cloud of sadness, it becomes your new normal.  But just because you have become comfortable with guilt,...

Send a message to Megan Disclaimer: This episode talks about mental health, addiction, sexual assault and suicide. Episode Pointers: Take care of yourself. Self-care is all you can truly model for your children.  Everything that crumbles or catapults you into guilt and shame comes from a lack of self care and lack of adult relationships. There are 5 things a parent can do when their child has spun...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers:  When grief first comes to you, you might have a few tools in your toolbox. It may be ways you have used to cope in the past or things you’ve used to get through hard seasons in your life before.  But imagine that you get to build a toolbox of skills that you can pick and choose from to help support you on your grief journey.  If you begin practicing skill...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: When Aria died, one of the biggest things I learned was that death can happen at any moment. In one instant, someone you love can be gone. I’ve wanted to learn how to live again, because I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. And I want to live, I want to have a connection with my kids and be present for them.  The only moment we have is right now. ...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers : Anxiety is not a problem. The more you resist anxiety, the more intense it gets. Having anxiety is your brain’s way of protecting you. Thought Induced Anxiety is when your thoughts are like a ‘runaway train’.  You do not need to believe every thought you think. Even if it feels true. Acknowledge the anxiety, fear, and the worries. Then tell your brain tha...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: Enneagram is a lens and the way that we look at the world and it's helping us understand what is going on internally In Enneagram, there are 9 different personalities wherein each type is so complex. This is like a basis of the core motivation or what you subconsciously fear in life. Her book recommendation :  What to Say When You Talk to Your Self  b...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: Imagine that gratitude is like practicing a muscle. It’s like practicing gratitude in your body.   Just because you are grieving doesn't mean you can't practice feeling gratitude.   Grief and gratitude can coexist together and they don't have to cancel each other out.   Remember your thoughts create your feelings,  your feelings create your...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers:    You know what you need inside of you already. Maybe you just haven’t given yourself permission to listen to yourself, or you haven’t even allowed space for that to come to the surface.  When you are suffering, you are not able to take care of your loved ones until you take care of yourself.  If you begin to let go of beliefs that are not serving you any...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: It’s our natural instinct to run from triggers. We often see them as a bad thing.   The thing I believe about triggers, is that it’s your body’s way of letting you know that there’s some healing work that can be done around that. It’s letting you know that there is a layer there that can be worked through.  When you trigger your trauma over and over, it ju...

Send a message to Megan Note : This episode is a Facebook Live Recording on July 20, 2021. Click here to watch the recording:  https://fb.watch/v/3IRqQ5muo/ In today’s episode, Sandra shares her grieving journey when she had lost her only child, Conor.  She was devastated,depressed, and fell into great anxiety. She also had a recurrence of her cancer. It took her 4 years to finally accept that his...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers:   It’s so painful when someone comes and judges the way you are grieving. We all express our grief differently.  You can only control how you walk with your grief. As soon as you give yourself permission to grieve in the way that’s best for you, you no longer need to try to convince others they are doing it wrong. Stop judging yourself, and you will stop j...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers:   When you are resisting an emotion, You might use something to try to distract yourself from feeling the pain inside of you. Every time you use something to try to get out the emotion and not to feel it, is not processing but it is resisting. When you are not processing the emotion it’s almost like you are fighting it. There is a resistance and a struggle...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers :   The benefits of allowing others to help is amazing, because that means you can take a step back and take time for yourself to grieve. Sometimes you have to find the help so that you can make the time to grieve, because your mental and physical health is so important. You don’t need to worry about repaying each person who helped you, but to help others w...

Send a message to Megan Reach out to her through her : Website : www.itbeginswithathought.com Facebook: www.facebook.com/itbeginswithathoughtcoaching Instagram : www.instagram.com/itbeginswithathoughtcoaching Podcast: www.itbeginswithathought.com/podcast Pinterest: www.pinterest.com/itbeginswithathought Her Favorite Book: - More Than A Body by Dr. Lexie Kite and Dr. Lindsay Kite PRomote LAC If you...

Send a message to Megan For this episode, I want to share with you this meditation that I do in my coaching sessions with other grieving moms. It is called ‘Boxing Things Up Meditation’ because we somewhat box our thoughts and then we go to a happy place after that. This is not ignoring or putting them away, but it is to allow yourself to deal with them when you are ready. Today is the 2nd day of...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: Post Traumatic Growth - It is positive change experienced as a result of the struggle with a major life crisis or a traumatic event.  5 General Areas of Post Traumatic Growth: 1. Develop a sense that new opportunities have emerged from the struggle. 2. Change in relationships with others. 3. Change is an increased sense of one’s own strength – “ If I lived...

Send a message to Megan Episode Pointers: Learning to love yourself is not something that happens overnight, but it’s so important. If you want to love others well, you have to learn to love yourself first. When you learn to love yourself, you can take care of yourself. You can give love to others without depleting yourself.  Oftentimes, we don’t have much compassion for anyone else when we are hu...

Send a message to Megan Mehnaz Khan is an Artist and a Color Psychology Specialist.  In today’s episode,she will share how colors affect the way we feel and the way we think. Episode Pointers : Everything in the environment like every single element of a painting, a decor, or texture impacts the subconscious mind. Colors are not only visual stimuli but they can impact you both on a psychological a...