Reframing Me - Self-Development & Parenting Teens for Midlife Moms
Your kids are growing up - but so are you. Reframing Me is the podcast for moms of teens ready to reframe family, identity, and self-development in midlife.
Parenting teens is hard -and parenting while rediscovering yourself in midlife can feel even harder. Reframing Me is the parenting podcast for moms raising teenagers who are also navigating the transition out of hands-on motherhood, identity shifts, and the search for balance, fulfillment, and self-development.
Hosted by Dr. Jennifer Brubaker, a Communication Studies professor, mom of three teens, and intrapersonal communication expert, each episode blends family communication strategies, honest conversations about parenting teens, and self-reflection tools to help moms strengthen family relationships while rediscovering who they are as women.
Together we’ll talk about the issues moms face but don’t always say out loud: changing family dynamics, feeling invisible, letting go of control, and creating new purpose. Through research, theory, and compassionate conversation, you’ll find support, strategies, and a sense of community in this season of parenting and personal growth.
Join the Reframing Me community to connect with other midlife moms, share your stories, and reframe how you see yourself, your family, and your future.
Send emails to jen@reframing-me.com; or on socials: Reframing Me on FacebookAND join the Facebook group Reframing Me: The Podcast Community; @reframingme on Instagram; Reframing Me on YouTube @reframingme on TikTok
Reframing Me - Self-Development & Parenting Teens for Midlife Moms
Jen is Zen - Episode 200!! Je suis le ciel (I am the sky)
Thank you so much for being here! It's our 200th episode!! And today, for the first time, "Reframing Me" is ranking in France, so I am dusting off my high school French (well... that may be a BIT of a stretch...).
“You are the sky. Everything else—it’s just the weather.”
Or, maybe more simply: You are not your feelings. You are the one who feels them. Emotional complexity is the ability to separate yourself from your feelings. This is what it means to communicate without making everything personal.
But it's not how we, as midlife - GenX or older Millennial women, were taught. So now, here we are: Hormonal messes. Parenting teens who are hormonal messes.
Trying to model emotional intelligence we were never taught.
Trying to teach our kids to express what they feel.
Trying to name our own feelings accurately.
Trying to decode what’s happening in our homes while living in bodies that feel foreign.
Trying to understand our spouses - who were trained in the grand tradition of: anger, or nothing.
And while we're doing all that... we’re also often supporting aging parents who have never processed an emotion out loud in their lives.
So yeah. It’s a lot. Somedays, it feels like we are the emotional managers of our households.
- What emotions have you been carrying that aren’t yours?
- What emotion have you been flattening into something easier to name—when really, it’s more layered than that?
- Where have you been managing emotions for people who haven’t learned to name their own?
- What would change if you trusted yourself to feel it all—but not become it?
This is not about becoming emotionless. - It’s about becoming emotionally fluent.. Because you are the sky, and even on the stormiest days—you are still steady and still you;
Thank you for listening and being part of this community! Let's get social. Follow me on Facebook, on Twitter @reframing_me, on Instagram @reframingme and on TikTok @reframingme
I hope you enjoyed the episode! Please leave a review, catch up on any missed episodes, and be sure to follow the show, so you don't miss new content!
