Psychiatrist Moms' Open Dialogue: How to escape perfectionism and embrace being a "good enough mom"

In this episode, Dr. Inna Conboy and I have an open dialogue about 

• the impossible standards of perfectionism in parenting
• how social media expediated parenting burden
• how to embrace the concept of "Good enough mom"
• the benefits of not being perfect
• how to find your "style" in parenting
• what to do when you mess up in your family

This episode is a perfect example of the vulnerable human connection... which is what we all need and want! I hope you find some encouragement today that you are not alone!

Inna Conboy, M.D. (she/her/hers) is a Board Certified Psychiatrist who specializes
in psychoanalytic psychotherapy and medication management. Dr. Conboy’s
treatment philosophy centers around an empathic view of the person as a whole and
explores the patient’s past and present to understand his/her/their current
thoughts and feelings. As a person attains a deeper understanding of self, this
awareness may help with his/her/their life struggles.
Dr. Conboy graduated from New Jersey Medical School, NJ, and completed
psychiatry residency at Temple University, PA. In addition, she was trained in
psychodynamic psychotherapy at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia. Dr.
Conboy was a recipient of various teaching awards and certificates and has been
teaching psychiatry to La Salle University and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic
Medicine medical, nurse practitioner, and physician assistant students. She has given
lectures to psychiatry and psychology professionals in various topics, including
psychotherapy, psychopharmacology, emotional intelligence, and the use of
mindfulness meditation in psychiatry. Dr. Conboy’s greatest love is her family. She resides in Pennsylvania with her husband, two young daughters, two dogs, and a cat.

https://www.conboypsychiatryllc.com/

#parenting #perfectionism #authentic #humanconnection #mentalhealth #freedom

**Disclaimer: This site's content is not intended to diagnose or treat any disorders but rather for informational, educational, and empowerment purposes. Please consult with your physician or mental health provider for specific medical and mental health needs. Our connection via social media platforms does not constitute a patient-physician relationship.**

Sign up for Dr. Uejin Kim's Newsletter: https://uejin-kim.mykajabi.com/signup

www.uejinkim.com
www.restorepsych.com

Transcript

Hey everybody, welcome back to it's like this podcast. This is your host, Dr. Eugene Kim. And today for this discussion, I have my friend and colleague Dr. Ina Conboy and Dr. Nina combo. And I met honestly on a Facebook

support group for private practice owners and psychiatrists and a mom. And she and I connected through a few meetings and few conversations. And what really drew me to Dr. Cohn boy was, I don't know, I don't know if I ever told you since doctor called me. But

the spirit of wonder and curiosity, and also humility really drew me, you know, to you. And I was like, Oh, I think this is somebody that I want to be friends with. We just wanted to kind of talk about the struggles of modern parenthood, you know, and what is expected of us and what is not expected of us? How do we find ourselves in the middle of this craziness, you so much for joining me here. It's an honor to be here. I really appreciate you having me on this podcast. Thank you. So tell me Doctor combo? How many kids do you have?

I have two children ages, soon to be six, and soon to be four. And I am a private practice psychiatrist. And what I really loved about meeting you

is that you. So I think you're the person who kind of started this whole sight of like, Hey, we're here as moms and we're here as psychiatrists, and we're here as business owners, and it is so difficult to do all of it all at once. And there's just so much humility, and effort

and love that go into all of it. And it's very real. And so that's what I really, really loved about meeting you is that you are trying to create a community of genuine honest people who are struggling just as much as anybody else were, on a surface that may seem kind of perfect, but in the in reality, we're just trying to survive. Absolutely. And, and I hope that the listeners kind of find comfort as Dr. conduent, and I share our struggles in our journey of finding ourselves, you know, and, and our, our kids are pretty similar age, and we're not like the moms and like their kids are out and having grandkids and stuff. We're definitely in the intermediate, skilled moms.

But I think when the society kind of places us, you know, where psychiatry so we feel like and we do have this trained knowledge of these theories, but it is really hard to even apply those theories to ourselves, and

and the theory that I'm talking about is a good enough mom and is coined by the term by Dr. Donald Winnicott. And, and I think it's very relevant today. As as Ina and I talked on the Texas like social media, all the Karen's Karen moms out there, you know, saying oh, you can't feed your baby dad, or you need to do this program for your baby. You know, they're just a lot of

judgments and perfectionistic expectations of parents. So, you know, Dr. Conway, what do you see in your life or in your friends or in your patients lives? First of all, please feel free to call me Ina. Yeah, but let's go back to our first thing.

I actually have to admit that I think I was one of the Karen's, before I had kids, this idea of what a good mom is, and what a good dad and how I'm going to be. And then I became a parent myself. And

all of that went out the window. Yeah. And I think what I really had to develop for myself is a lot of empathy. Or I am and what my needs are, and how I want to be with my kids and

kind of really take a good look at my own family structure where I came from being my own therapy, even to kind of help understand

where I'm at now as a mom, and

I mean, societal expectations are unreal. They're just like, I think that the whole speech in the Barbie movie if you've seen it is just sums it all up where it's like you're expected to be all of these things, and it's impossible.

And what do you do about it? And the reality is, I think you just have to really dig into so much empathy like for myself, I'm where I'm at now and also for my kids and where they're at now.

And even for my

husband? Let's do Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know, you mentioned something that's interesting, because you said that you are wants to Karen on the other side of parenthood, and I think I can definitely agree that when I was going through my child psychiatry training, you know, you see all these, quote unquote, problematic kids, but then you also see quote, unquote, problematic parents, right? And then you're just like, well, they're just copying you. And it was easy to say, and there's grain of truth in that, of course, you know, and that applies to ourselves, too. But it was really easy for me, as you know, somebody who didn't have kids to say, well, it makes logical sense, you know, like, analytically, it makes sense. But on the other side of parenting, I think empathy, and just me struggling through just staying sane, you know, and staying composed. And sometimes I lose my composure. Many, many times.

The struggle is real, you know? And, yeah, so I definitely had to repent and apologize to all my patients that I

judged, you know, before, too soon prematurely. But you also mentioned something that was very interesting, because you mentioned how you were raised, and your family structure affecting, and we can dig a little bit into that categorically, because where is this perfectionistic expectations from our parents or family culture, from society, from random person in the playground? Like? Where is this coming from? Like, it's a very philosophical question, but why do we? Why do we hold that to each other in ourselves? Yeah, that is a really deep question. I think it definitely is very individual. But I think that's the beauty of having a family on one hand, you know, as kids, we're trying to individuate ourselves and find our own path. And and ultimately, we try to find our way back into our heritage and where we come from, and how we fit into this lineage of, of people that came before us. And I think that's, I think that's just part of, I guess, our human nature of who we are, and our attachment. And so, I, I don't know, I think that I definitely struggled a lot between how I see myself as an individual and how I see myself as part of a greater whole of my family and society.

I mean, do you think that you have struggled like that at all? For yourself? Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, one of the things that I kind of find is, I judge when I'm insecure.

You know, I judge when I don't quite know, where I fit in. And I feel like when I'm insecure, I gravitate to few informations, or few concepts, you know, or sets of beliefs. And I tend to judge people, based on that lens that I see. But I think, just like being a parent opened my eyes and a whole new world of failures and successes, you know, then I think my scope expands. And I feel like, in that process of experiencing different aspects of life and through struggling through it,

I start to be less insecure and more accepting, you know, of like, parents. So now, like, when I see parents struggling, I'm like, Yeah, dude. Like, like, I know, I know, it takes like, 110% of your effort to like, not spank your child in public, you know? So, I have so much acceptance and grace when, when I'm not insecure, you know, and judgy about it. You know what I mean? It's, it's interesting, because as you're talking about thinking about how, when I was younger, I definitely identified more with kids. Because I was a kid, I was somebody's child. And now I'm in the position where I feel I'm in between me between my, my mom, as a child, or my dad, my mom and dad, as a child, but I'm also now a parent to a child. And as their kids are getting older, I can't help but compare what they're going through at their age with what I went through at their Oh, yeah. So then thinking about how my mom and my dad raised me and the judgments I had of them as a child be like, Well, this was well done. Well, like I you know, I'll do it so much by then. And that was an adult and thinking like, Oh, my goodness, like I have so much empathy for them. They were had so much on their plate, and if I was in their shoes as a pair and going through everything that they were going through, I don't know if I would have handled that as well. And maybe I would have done the same thing. And so like, I feel so stuck between I'm conscious

gently, like, wanting to empathize with my children knowing that they don't have any other experience, except that that what they have now, and also empathizing with my parents, having that knowledge now as a child, but also now having the knowledge as a parent. And I think that's kind of what's helping me to be more kind, because there's just so many perspectives I'm now seeing that I haven't seen before, and which I'm very fortunate to be able to do. And so I think, yes, like, I think it does take sometimes a lot of effort, like you said, to like, not spank your child in public or even in private, like, just not spanker like, sometimes they're just like, so much rage can come over and

yeah, it's a lot to deal with. And yeah, to like, hold space for all of it all at once is sometimes definitely overwhelming. So let's, let's talk about what, good enough mamas because rage and anxiety and worry and guilt.

Those are all parts of human nature that gets accentuated, you know, when you have a little one. But I think one way that the Karen's or the social media, perfectionist, whatever they respond is, no, no, no, no, no, you have to keep it all in, you know, you have to keep it all in and like you said, you have to create that space for everybody, you cannot mess up on that, you know, you have to be 110% emotionally available for your kid or, or your husband marriage career, or you have to be able to balance it all. If not,

you're a big failure and everybody's gonna die, you know, like that. That catastrophizing fear, you know of that aspect, but the concept of good enough mom is actually you failing at certain areas, and not being good enough, allows your kids maybe your husband to experience, you know, some things that they can kind of figure it out on their own, you know, so in that sense, we don't have to coddle we don't have to be everybody for everyone. But we can kind of say, Hey, I can't do this right now, like I cannot, so that we don't become a pressure cooker. We're filling, you know, within our max limits and kind of letting other people or kids kind of take, take ownership of their own journey, you know, so that's the theory. How do you think kind of that applies in real life? Oh, in so many ways. I mean, I'm thinking of an example of my so my oldest daughter

is a perfectionist. And she's a perfectionist to a point of when she draws something that she doesn't like, she gets upset, she throws a tantrum, and she doesn't know how to undo it yet. And I think this is part of her nature. Like there's a little bit of OCD in her. And it runs in our family in some ways, like we have that streak that personality. And I must admit that I have some of it too. Like, I know, there are times where I'm just like, you need to do certain things this way. And you need to clean up you need to do it. Now you need like, there's just like, I am an organizer. And I have to often catch myself because her perfectionism to a point of like, we're so exaggerated of like being so upset when she doesn't draw something. It's I must admit, sometimes it's annoying. It's very, like, it's just like, Come on girl, like, this is not a big deal. Like Like, it's so much bigger than this, like, no, no biggie. And then I have to step back and be like, Oh, wait, I think I'm modeling a lot of it myself.

saying like, Hey, you got to do it. No, this is not the way you do it.

And so I I catch myself and I'm thinking by, I probably actually need to be modeling a bit more of, like, I just messed up, and how do I manage this mess up? And I help her get through these mess ups that she makes as well. And so I've kind of been trying to be a bit more authentic of like, well, yes, I made a mistake. And she's, by the way is very good at pointing out when I make mistakes.

You just like, why did you do this? You just like put this out there and she almost sounds exactly like me when she says that. Yeah. And so she's my mirror in some ways. And so I think I am practically working on just being my authentic self and being okay with making mistakes. And in doing so it think it will rub off on her and then sometimes I hear her talking to her younger sister when she does something. Then she says something like, Oh no, that's okay. No worries, like we can clean this up. We can do this, like, it's not a big deal. You just like made a mess in the floor. So I think those little aspects are still important because

if we present certain perfection

facade to the world, then we inadvertently make a statement

that you're there's no room for mistakes, there's no room for error. And that's just not how life is. Yeah. And then we don't help our kids to learn how to manage them. Because they will come up one way or another whether we want to or not like, nothing is perfect, they will happen. And so I think the key in some ways, one of the keys, I think there are many keys here, but one of the keys is to learn to accept the imperfection within ourselves first and foremost, and be able to model it. Yeah, it is a process of acceptance, that being a good enough mom is okay. And I think that's very hard to accept. To because it's hard to give grace to yourself is hard to say. It's okay, you know, to yourself, because I think we think we love our kids and so much are at stake, that we don't want to mess up, but to

say to ourselves, Hey, it's okay. Like, I'm not the best mom, you know, and that is okay. And what is the best mom anyways? You know? Absolutely. But I think even the whole like phrase, like good enough, mom sounds not very great. Like, yeah, have a B rating on your mom, you know, like,

yeah, I want an A, I want an A plus like, Yeah, really? Well. Yeah, I think it's like, in some ways, accepting that we are just not. I mean, good enough, is, it sounds in some ways defeated. And but it's not, it's not defeated. But it is, in a way accepting that,

and unlearning that we need to like, do our best all the time and thrive and constantly be like on top like, I mean, there's just so much that goes into our education, like, it's just kind of difficult to get to do like the idea of like, being a good enough mom is actually really good.

Hi, if you enjoy this content, please subscribe and write a review. This increases our visibility and platforms like podcast platforms, or YouTube, and it will help us out a lot. And also, if you enjoy this episode, think of one person that you can share this episode with who could benefit from what we're talking about today. Okay, let's go back to the episode.

Because there's so many ways to because being a perfect mom stole the joy of parenthood.

And being a perfect mom feels like, we're not good. Unless we had to prove like, we get a report card and our kids go to XYZ college or they're like thriving in D one sports or something like

being this perfect. And having it's like a moving target. Because what is perfect anyways, like if you're perfect in feeding your kid organic food, and you're like, that's where all your budget goes, right? Then you can pay for the extracurricular, like, what is perfect, and everybody's been stretched so thin. And so this even facade of perfect parenting not only steals the joy, but then it's like, well, not only do I have to aim for perfection, but now I have to prove that I was perfect. And there's, it's just like a rat race of craziness.

And that good enough mom is almost I hope that it becomes like a movement where Who are you proving yourself to, you know, like, and why are you proving yourself and bring back the fun and joy of not meeting these standards, but just kind of owning your own journey and owning your own style. And

eventually, the kids are going to learn that they don't have to live somebody else's expectations. Absolutely. And I think that in doing all of that it actually brings in,

in some ways, an imperfectly perfect life, which is exactly kind of what we're in, in trying not to be perfect. Were actually really truly going to enjoy life so much more. Yeah, it's almost kind of like the opposite. Like we think that if we're perfect that things will be great, but it's actually the opposite. Yeah. And when when I was kind of thinking about my moments of practicing good enough mom is a whenever I'm making a big childcare decisions or something like that is I'm not trying to be selfish and like what makes me happy, but what makes me able to be more present and attentive and sensitive. What do I need to be able to do that with the times that I have with my kids? Do you know what I mean?

So like one big decision was we decided to put the older one and after school care, I had this fear

You're a perfectionist like, no, I need every single hour a minute with my older kid or he will feel, you know, neglected. So I had to pick him up as soon as school's over. But that was giving me a lot of stress to rush to school and all that stuff, you know, with my husband's job. So then I just realized the only thing that was holding me back from after school was my fear of not being perfect. And I was like, let me just try to just give myself a little bit of wiggle room, you know, like, I still pick him up relatively early. But it just gave me the buffer to not feel so stressed so that when I'm picking him up, I'm actually saying, hey, like, how was school versus like, let's go. Let's go pick on your brother.

So it just gave me a lot of freedom to think of it like that.

Yeah.

I mean, I have so many examples like that.

Kind of giving certain things up in my mind of what I need to do in order to create a better atmosphere. I mean, one of the things that comes to my mind is, when my kids were babies at first I and I don't necessarily want to start this whole like argument for listeners or anyone else about like co sleeping with kids, or anything, there's like different philosophies there. But when I went into the whole thing, I was like, never co sleeping,

I want my space, and then had kids. And honestly, co sleeping really helped me stay sane. And we did it in the safest way possible as far as we can goes. And the only way I could get sleep because I was nursing is if the child was with me, and I did with actually even more like better for me, like it wasn't my theory wasn't like, this is the way it is. And I'm doing this because it fits the narrative of my life, and who I am and helped me maximize my potential as a mother basically, more nurturing, I was able to get sleep I was able to function on for me, personally, I didn't really see another way that I could do it in a way that would be helpful, right for anybody involved. And so I do think that ultimately, as parents, like, we have to look at our personalities and who we are, get, I mean, definitely go to therapy if we need to process certain things, but also be kind to ourselves in a way that will then help us be kind to our children. Yeah, because if you're, if someone's forcing me away to be as a parent that totally contradicts who I am, or just doesn't fit, like my lifestyle, I don't know, be a really good parent, honestly. Absolutely. Yeah. So I mean, we my husband, and I kind of joke like, you know, like people ask, like, what is your parenting style? Like, is it attachment is something else I'm like, honestly, our style is, whatever the F works. Like, that's our style. It's a convoy style.

For style. Yeah. Because it's just like, we pick up a little bit of this or pick up a little bit of fat. And like, you also have to tailor it to the kid too. Because yeah, so different personalities, what what works for one kid will not work for the other kid. Yeah, there's just constant, like adjustments. And but I think it's not just the kids, we have to really, truly take ourselves into consideration of what works for us, like as a mom as a parent of any kind. Yeah. And I love that because, you know, kind of going back to the good enough mom being sensitive, responsive and adaptive. Not only for your kids needs, but your needs. Because let's be honest, I mean, you and I opened like private practice, what only few years ago right? And yep, that required a lot of stages of adapting to our needs, because the business needs changed. And absolutely. And you know, I will say that there's a part of me that actually has a lot of empathy also for the Karen's, because it's just like, how difficult is it to be them in some ways, like, how much pressure did they put on themselves? And then, like you said, in the beginning of the of when we started talking, like,

when you usually are more judgmental of others when you kind of like, um, she's insecure. Yeah. And secure, secure, like, how insecure are these? Karen's? I mean, I don't know, it just, it just really, it. I have a lot of empathy for them. And also for just like, any father is, by the way, where's the good enough? Father, there should be a theory about that. We're talking about mothers. Yes, yes. Fathers too. Yeah. And I say Karen's, as I've like, not to categorize them, but especially for them because I think we all have potential

potential to be parents and we all have passed, being a parent, you know, and

it's just to give us hope that you don't have to meet any kind of standards. You don't have to meet any kind of theories and I don't know I think social media

Sometimes worked against it's because

what I hear is like, when people are like, oh, did you learn about the attachment theory? Or like, did you do Intagram tests for your kids, you know, like, because of the information or like, in our face, you know, then we're like, we're not doing, you know, we're, we're missing out on something, you know, like, you know, fear of missing out on some kind of other information or other sets of beliefs or institutionalized, you know, test and methods and

but like, just to say that people did fine, relatively fine, by what's more important is to be authentic, adaptive, and sensitive to you and your family's needs. Absolutely. Flexibility. I guess it's like the it goes back to being as flexible as possible, which is personally incredibly difficult for me to do. I mean, like, I, I think I'm learning and I'm getting better as I get older, but

it's kind of riding the waves as opposed to like fighting them and drowning in them as you're trying to swim across.

It's, it's really, really hard. So

I mean, we're talking about this, and it's easier said than done. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And we're, we're definitely in the thick of it with everybody who's listening.

Kind of let's talk about those moments when we do mess up, you know, or when we find flaws. How can we give ourselves grace in those moments? Um, well, how can we give grace?

Well, I cry.

I cry, sometimes just, I'd meditate. So I don't know how everyone handles their own stressors. But for me, personally, mindfulness meditation has been really huge in taking a step back, and being able to ground myself into

to kind of see things as they are, I think it's important to take a moment in so many situations and kind of like, check yourself. So for me, it's my meditation. And honestly, also, it's my husband, too. Sometimes he's like, he, like comes over to me, and he like, whispers to me, like you're being too harsh on the kids. And that in itself is actually really good for me. Because yeah, I don't take it as criticism. I do the same thing to him too. Like, I'm like, when the kids are not listening. Like they, you're, you're kind of going overboard right now. And he listens to, and I think sometimes it's helpful to have another perspective of like, yourself, of what, what's happening.

And, yeah, it's. So for me personally, it's the taking the step back, looking at things and being able to evaluate the situation, in the more kind of clear mind taking a timeout. Yeah. And I like that you and your spouse have a grace filled, and accountability of sort, where you're not accusing each other of like, you did this and that's where the kids are mad, or you did this and, you know, there's no accusatory, but it's, is a gentle check of, hey, like, let's ground ourselves, let's kind of come back to the present, let's kind of figure this out, you know, like that timeout for each other.

That aspect of teamwork has been so monumental in our home to where, let's be honest, sometimes our past childhood trauma or, you know, past, you know, cognitive distortions, or our messed up thinking, kind of plays out in how we parent and my husband had to comment kind of call me out, like, whoa, like, why did you ever say that to him? You know, like, or I'm like, why are you walking out on our kids when they're crying, you know, so we kind of, in a way, bring the insight to our own unmet needs, you know, as children's with that was really wonderful. To have. I think, for me,

some of the thoughts that really helped me is number one, I told myself, that I'm supposed to mess up. And in the world of you should not mess up. I, there's a thought through my meditation and like, reading the Bible is like, I'm supposed to mess up. And somehow that gave me like, a really comforting, something to fall back on, you know, like, Oh, I'm supposed to mess up and this is supposed to happen. And it just really gave me the freedom to like, not prove myself, you know, like, if anything, I'm in the journey of proving that I'm messed up, you know, so that gave me a lot of freedom. And the second thought was always comparing me not to other moms, but me to the older versions.

A mom, where my anger was so much more explosive, like, let's say, six months ago, but now I can kind of ground myself enough to like, give me timeout. And I did yell, but it was not as big chaotic experience six months ago. So always kind of tracking my progress to being more authentic and being more sensitive, you know, to everybody's needs, versus like, older version of me, I really love the first part that you said that kind of you talk to yourself about how you're supposed to mess up, and you kind of remind yourself that I love it so much. Because as I'm getting older, I'm kind of starting to realize that none of us are going to escape the condition of humanity of where life is really, really hard, and that we're gonna have struggles, and that, in some ways, we're actually doing ourselves and our children a disservice if we're trying to limit too much suffering from them. Because it's going to happen. I mean, it suffering is just part of this life. And yeah, the only thing we can do is not necessarily take the suffering away is to help them learn how to gracefully go through the suffering. And so when you said that, you know, this is I'm supposed to be this way, like, I'm supposed to struggle, I'm supposed to like, like, this is just this part of the journey. And so, absolutely, and, you know, in the world that we live in fear of failure, so crippling, because because of the fear of failure, we don't try, you know, and we don't get up again, you know, and so I'll just say that I was not always preaching this message to myself or to others. But, you know, like you said, like, throughout life, where 30 something, you know, we're relatively young, but not too young. And the message that I love is, is that there's no such thing as failure. And what I tell people is, is just better mistakes. And you will always make better mistakes. There's no such thing as the end, as long as there's breath in your lungs, you can try again. And, and what I tell people is, is you have nothing to lose, I think, here's the thing, with the perfectionist perspective, you have everything to lose, if you're not point 00000 1%, you know, perfection. But when you just take that out, you know, take that ceiling off. When you're just going through your journey, you have nothing to lose.

You're just grow better mistakes. Yep, I really liked you know, you me sharing, just thinking out loud on these concepts, because we hear that, and then we're like, Well, how do I apply to my messed up life? You know, or how do I apply to, you know, when my kids are crying? And I'm like, screaming at them? Like, how do I apply to that? You know?

So,

I, I don't have a very good answer. Because, like you said, I'm continuously learning. And so yeah, you know, there are days when I'm like, Oh, I handled that really well. And then there are days I'm like, wow, that was that way. I was well, at all. Yeah. So I'm not even sure if I'm a good person to tell other people how to handle this. Yeah, I think I can say is just continually, like striving to do better like to like, okay, maybe next time, I will not

just get so irritable when my kid is crying for the fifth time because they can put their sock on.

And also just apologize. Like I, I come from a family where apologies were non existent, like it was not something that was done. And when I got married to my husband, Patrick was like, you know, you never apologize. And I was like, I got very defensive over that. And, of course, over the years, I kind of really learned to say, like, I'm sorry, like, I, I am in a vulnerable place. And I am admitting to that, and I made a mistake. And I do that with my kids. Yeah.

And I have to say, sometimes it's really hard to do, because there's a part of me and the way that I was raised, like you always present a certain like, authoritative aspect, or even sometimes authoritarian. I don't like Aryan park, but but but it does come through. And so I constantly have to be like, Oh, okay, reflect on myself. I just did this. And I'm going to try to work on it next time. And it takes it takes time, like so I don't really have a very good like way of saying like, well, if you do this, you're going to turn out like just great and every time it's going to be greater and you're going to continue growing. Growth is never linear. And so I take steps back and then I take some steps forward.

So

that's an I'm hoping that again, I'm modeling to my kids that I'm a human being, I'm flawed, I'm not perfect, I am going to make mistakes of how I react. And then

and then I'm going to try to patch up our relationship, because our relationship and my love for you what, what matters the most. And I want you to always know that I love you very much. And I will work on it, I will continue working on it. Yeah, I think that I love the theme that just kind of came out from our discussion is that

that, you know, in the concept of good enough, people, you know, is a revolutionary thinking where it's not all or nothing. Well, you know, I enjoyed this conversation. And I feel really encouraged to even think out loud and encourage ourselves, you know, as we encourage the listeners.

So tell me a little bit about your private practice and how we can find you.

Thank you so much, Eugene. I mean, I first of all, just want to say also that this has been a very

pleasurable conversation. I think that, like, it's, we're talking, I'm looking at you because we're doing this resume. And I feel a connection, like there is a connection of like, yes, we have our own families, but then there's also connection of like a human, just kindred spirit of Yeah. And also a psychiatrist. And even though our cultural and familial backgrounds may be different, there's like a human aspect to it. That's so connecting. And I, and I think that that's also kind of what we're talking about, is that,

that recognition of imperfection and in just humanity in each other. Yeah, absolutely. Starting with ourselves, and then we can see it in others. And it's just, it's a, it's a really good feeling.

As for my practice, so I am in private practice in New Jersey and Pennsylvania I have, it's virtual. And if anyone is interested in finding a psychiatrist who also does psychotherapy, I do a lot of psychodynamic psychotherapy, where we explore our inner selves and how we connect to our families and life as a whole. You can find me on my website, Conboy, psychiatry, llc.com convoy, spelled C o n boy, psychiatry, llc.com. And I really liked how you describe that this was like a huge shared human experience. And as almost, it was, like, we were sharing our testimony of like, oh, this is how I'm human. And you're like, This is how I'm human, you know? And we're like, oh, it's like the same thing. You know, and, and it is really spiritual to be in that place. And I loved your vulnerability and willingness to kind of share your struggles, because we need a little bit more of that, you know, and absolutely. Thank you, Eugene. I think it's great that you have this podcast and thank you for having me. And thank you guys for listening and I hope that you got encouraged and I'll see you in the next episode.