How to Set Boundaries with Your Family Over Summer Break: Top Tips for Teachers

Summer is here, and while you’re counting down the days until that final bell rings, are you also feeling the weight of a never-ending to-do list? Discover how to reclaim your summer and set boundaries that will leave you feeling refreshed and empowered.

In this episode, I dive into the challenges educators face when summer arrives but free time doesn’t seem so free. If you’re tired of your summer being hijacked by others’ demands, this episode is for you. I share personal stories and practical strategies for setting healthy boundaries with love and grace, so you can truly enjoy your well-deserved break.

Key Points:

• 🎯 Why summer doesn’t always mean “time off” for educators.
• 🚫 The hidden traps of people-pleasing at home and how to avoid them.
• 💬 Effective communication techniques to express your needs and desires.
• 🛑 Identifying and overcoming guilt when saying no.
• 🛠️ Practical strategies for setting boundaries with family and friends.
• 📝 How to use “yes, and…” to maintain harmony while protecting your time.
• 💡 Real-life examples of setting boundaries and handling tricky situations.
• 🌟 Why setting boundaries is a loving act and essential for your well-being.

Tune in and learn:

• How to spot if you’re struggling with boundaries.
• The importance of assuming good intentions and communicating clearly.
• Tips on buying yourself time to respond to requests.
• Strategies for dealing with snarky comments about your profession.

Empowerment Takeaways:

• Boundaries are like lane markers on a highway, not just guardrails—essential for smooth travel and safety.
• You have the right to say no without guilt and to prioritize your needs.
• Setting boundaries enriches relationships by fostering respect and understanding.

And if you TRULY want your experience in education to be better next year (and beyond) I invite you to check out the Elevated Teacher Experience this summer - it is the ONLY program that combines PERSONAL development curriculum with life coaching to help educators elevate every area of their life.

➡️ To get your FREE 🎁 PDF Guide The Professional Teacher's Guide to Saying "No" visit: www.gracestevens.com/sayno

Want to truly thrive in teaching without sacrificing your personal life? Check out the Elevated Teacher Experience here
Check out the best-selling Positive Mindset Habits for Teachers book here
And the #1 new release for educators Beat Teacher Burnout with Better Boundaries book here

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Transcript

  Okay, summer countdown is on. Am I right? I bet you can tell me down to the day, the hour, the how many more periods of school you have until that final bell rings. Yay, you made it.  But, you know what I found? When I was still in the classroom, when summer rolled around and I had this to-do list longer than Santa's naughty list, I was so frustrated that summer came around and I thought I would have all this free time to do whatever I wanted, and it just wasn't true because I was an extreme people pleaser at work.

Turns out I kind of had some of those same habits at home and other people thinking, Oh, well, you have all summer off, suddenly felt very entitled to my time and suddenly their priorities became things that I needed to take care of. So we're going to address that in this episode. What are the problems with that?

And most importantly, because I'm all about the empowerment, what can we do to fix it with love and grace and to have a happier experience for all involved? Hold on to your seats, I will see you on the inside.  Welcome to the Balance Your Teacher Life Podcast,  where we talk all things avoiding educator burnout, setting healthy boundaries and achieving better work life balance. 

If you're passionate about education, but tired of it consuming your whole life, you have found your home in the podcast universe. I'm your host, Grace Stevens, and let's get going with today's show. 

Through the back catalog of my episodes, so many issues on setting boundaries. What is a boundary? What are the misconceptions about setting boundaries? How do we do it in a loving way? I find that boundaries is a big buzzword recently, and people don't really totally understand what that is. So unless you've been listening to all my episodes and you know exactly what it is.

I like to say, if you spot it. You got it. So let me tell you a couple of things and see if any of these resonate with you. These are clues that you do not really feel confident. You may have got into some bad habits of letting Other people's needs, wants and desires supersede your own for any number of reasons.

We're not going to go into therapy here as to why you do it. We're going to go into how we're going to stop it. So here are some, just a few, off the top of my head, a few kind of hints that this might be something you struggle with in your personal life. Do you effectively communicate your preferences and desires?

All the time,  or do you feel yourself frustrated? Do you assume that a person should just know how you're feeling? No, I said, I really didn't want anything or anybody to make a fuss over my birthday, but then you're all resentful because nobody did. And then you're like, well, they should have known that isn't what I meant.

Right? We expect people in our lives to be mind readers. They should know that I didn't want an appliance, that I wanted a spa day or something else. Did you ever express that need, want, or desire? Right? Do you find yourself saying, I don't mind, To suggestions when you really do mind.  That's a big one for some.

What about a reluctantly agreeing to do things your family wants to do?  Even though you don't want to do one just because you don't want to appear high maintenance or inflexible, you know, or ungrateful. If it, if you know, if it involves your parents, you do not want to seem ungrateful. Let's do what they want to do every single time.

Right. Do you find yourself agreeing to things to maintain harmony and avoid drama? Like you've kind of taken on this self appointed role of peacekeeper in the family, right? So if any of that is resonating with you, you may be,  really, you could benefit from learning how to set healthier boundaries. Bound, lack of boundaries is really the breeding ground of resentment and learning to set them is a skill.

Okay, we have had many episodes on Boundaries 101, so if you need to go back and listen to those, but let's get into the nitty gritty, I'm going to just give you kind of a reminder. Now one reminder is that, um, don't assume, you know, bad intentions from other parts. These are just habits that a lot of people and families have just fallen into, right?

You've fallen into specific roles, um, delegation of responsibilities.  And then, you know, if you sit down with a tally sheet,  you're like, huh, wait a minute, I'm doing more of this than that. Or in my particular case, let me give you an example. Um, I was married to a man who was a wonderful man, um, who worked out the home.

And had the ability during the school year to be very helpful. He would do one of the, he could do the drop offs in the morning while I left early for work. And once the kids got a little older, um, you know, he really contributed equally around the house. Until that last day. Bell rang and school was out.

And then I'm telling you for that whole 10 weeks of summer, that man didn't pick up one dish and put it in the dishwasher. He, stop. He just did literally nothing to help around the house because I had all summer off.  It was just, it really was a breeding ground of resentment. I was annoyed at him. He seemed low key annoyed that the kids and I were home.

One, you know, it was stressful. He worked at the house, you know, this is, we're talking two decades before work from home was a thing, right? So people, you know, weren't patient of hearing children in the background or whatever. I spent a whole, you know, all summer saying, shh, daddy's on the phone. I mean, literally that was my summer.

And so I had to take on this role of like, daddy's Stinking cruise director, like from first thing in the morning to last thing at night, I had to get those kids out the house, involved in an activity, running to the park to, um, to, um, the library, running to the gym, play by the pool, like all the things.

Like I was exhausted. I was exhausted and it would have been better for everybody if I just sat down and kind of had the conversation. OK, so there's an example. So let me remind you of just a few of the boundary basics. First off,  assume the best intentions. Again, you know, maybe he was unaware of it. You know, me just assuming, oh, he should know better is not a healthy relationship.

Strategy. Okay. Maybe it's manifesting for you in different ways. Maybe because summer's off, your parents suddenly think it's your, you're going over to clean out their garage. Well, guess what? Cleaning your garage has probably been on your summer to do list for, you know, five summers in a row. Okay. If yours was anything like mine.

So here's kind of your boundary rights, right? You have a right to say no without guilt, right? You have a right to be treated respectfully. You have a right to put your needs above someone else's. Right? You have a right to make mistakes if you apologize for them. You have a right to reject other people's unreasonable expectations and requests.

You have a right to change your mind. Just because you've gotten into a pattern of war, you always do that. Well, it doesn't mean that you always have to do that, right? That's no different than you always plan graduation at school. Maybe you don't want to plan graduation at school this year. Okay, we've had plenty of episodes on that.

So, another thing to remember is,  don't start with your biggest issue, right?  Don't tackle head on your biggest source of frustration in this area.  Get your little boundary kind of training wheels on, right? Try with some. Less stressful situations  and, you know, the frameworks that have presented for setting a boundary usually revolve around saying no, right?

I give coaching on use I statements, you know, don't have an apology. Use a student focused reason that's at school, at home. Use a you focused reason. It's okay for you to have a reason that this is better for you. 

But in this particular instance, when working with family members, friends outside of the school environment,  especially, especially if you have decades old patterns of you just always being the one who organizes the family reunion, you are always the one who takes mom and dad to their doctor's appointments over summer.

You are always the one who does these things. Right? It can be very jarring for everybody, for you suddenly to say no. So this is an instance where I would coach people not to say no, but to consider yes and. We call that yes with limitations. My yes and strategy. Let me give you some examples.  Let's say, as I mentioned before, Mom and Dad I want you to help them clear out their garage, do a dump run, all the things.

Likely, obviously you're younger than your parents. Hopefully you're healthier.  Maybe you're the one with the truck, who knows? There's going to be a whole reason for that, but this is a very common scenario that suddenly your parents or your siblings. or even a cousin. Somebody wants you to. Oh, you have summer off?

Come help me with X, help me move, help me redecorate, help me clean out the garage when really you have all those same items on your to do list. Right now, just because you have a pattern of having done that in the far past and probably having been darn resentful about it, now is the time to set yes and.

So yes, with limits, we're going to say, you know what, I Just given the limit. Say, Hey, yeah, I can help you with that. I can dedicate one afternoon helping you do that. Would Tuesday or Thursday be better?  You see that you're saying yes, but you're putting a limit on it. You're only going to help them for one afternoon and you're giving them  two choices or maybe three choices, whatever, but times that are convenient for you.

Okay, and that's you know, it's uh, it's a selling strategy. It's kind of like the, the guy did clothes there. Is Tuesday or Thursday better for you? You're busy telling them don't ask me to do it on the weekend and don't ask me to come four days in a row, okay? Hey, I'd love to help you with that. You know what?

Given my schedule and other things I've going on, I can give you an entire afternoon, right? What works better for you Tuesday or Thursday afternoon? See, that's not so hard. Go write it down, practice it a few times. Okay. Now, the first strategy that I always teach people with setting boundaries is buy yourself some time, right?

You get flustered when somebody asks you. You know, to your face and you don't know how to say no and you don't have time to, you know, get your thoughts together or whatever. So just remember that. Buy yourself some time. If somebody asks you face to face, just say, you know what? I gotta, let me check my other commitments.

Let me check my schedule. I promise I'll get back to you soon. Okay. Now, it's easier if somebody makes a request in writing, they send you a text or an email. But if they do ask you face to face, remember, buy yourself some time. You're not committing to anything, um, on the fly. Okay. Okay.  That's when we, we just, you know, there's that moment of awkwardness, right?

Like, Oh, you don't want to say no to somebody's face. And like it for in the sake of like, you know,  20 seconds of awkwardness, you're going to commit yourself to something that you're going to be mad about for, you know, a month. So just buy yourself some time. Hey, Hey, you know what? That sounds great. Let me check into my schedule.

Let me look and make sure, um, what my other commitments are and get back to you. Okay. So that's number one, buy yourself some time, but here's another scenario. Now for this one, we're going to assume that the request was made in writing. Okay. So we're going to follow my other strategies that I usually teach, which is, Hey, thanks for thinking of me, right?

So that's one. Number two is you do not need to apologize. Okay, do not, even the word unfortunately is an apology. Unfortunately, just, you don't need to apologize, just state the facts, right? You know, as it turns out, those are my magic words, right? As it turns out, I have lots of things coming up. I promised myself this year I would not be over committed, okay?

So let's say the person's saying, hey, could you, Arrange a retirement family party. Could you arrange the family reunion? Yeah, you don't want to take the whole thing on. So this will be another place for yes, and. Okay. So you can, as it turns out, I have a lot of things going on. I'm happy to take on a lesser role such as helping with decorations or checking, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Okay. So. Agree to one part of it, right? And then just say, Hey, you know what? I'm sure it's going to be a great event. Thanks for thinking of me. See you there. You know, whatever.  Don't agree to the whole thing, a lesser role. Okay. And it's okay to say, as it turns out, I just have a ton of things this summer.

I promised myself I do. I seem like I keep my commitments to everybody else except myself. So I'm going to have to say, you know what? I'd love to be involved, but here's the extent to which I can do it. I can. I can organize the invitations, or I can organize the decorations, or I'm happy to pitch in.

Here's another one when people are expecting you to pay for things, right? Let me pitch in for this, or my budget for this is X. Like, be very clear up front. That's not an apology. That's not having to explain yourself. That's just stating a fact. Hey, you know, I'm happy to contribute to the party. My budget is X.

That's it. No apology. Yes. With limitations. Now this one's a bit trickier. This involves you, you know, typically over summer, there will be some kind of event where you all get together, whether it's, you know, family barbecue, 4th of July, Memorial Day, if you're in the United States, a lot of people have family reunions, what do you do?

When your tendency is just to bite your tongue and turn away, but you, you know, there are snarky comments that can come up with, from family members. And I think like you'd feel better about yourself if you did sex. A small boundary. So here's something that I dealt with a lot. So some of you may have, you may know that I had a very successful corporate career before I became a teacher.

Um, a lot of, you know, just all the things that came with that, like the fancy lifestyle and, you know, all the things that on the outside look great to people, the great paycheck, the, you know, the fancy cars, the big house, you know what they didn't see, or maybe they did, uh, just my life falling apart. Like I felt like I didn't participate in it.

Constantly overwhelmed, stressed, just guilt ridden, never gave enough to my kids. I was always working. Then when I was at work, I, you know, I miss my kids. When I was with my kids, I was feeling guilty. How much work wasn't, it was just like, it was terrible. It was awful. Um, so, you know, maybe people didn't see that when we all showed up, you know, and I also put so much pressure on myself to live this life.

Perfect, you know, from the exterior kind of lifestyle, beautiful children, well behaved, well mannered, which they are, they're incredible human beings. But you know, picture perfect, all dressed lovely. And let me tell you, this was years before Instagram. Thank goodness. I can't imagine how extra I would have been if there was the added pressure of looking perfect on social media.

But, um. From, you know, the outside, I'm sure to people, it looked like, you know, I was crushing it in the corporate world. And so there was this kind of innuendo, kind of, a lot of times hints given that somehow being a public school teacher, especially in a Title I school, um, that really didn't have a lot of, uh, well, hardly any, we didn't have anything fancy, but there was one point where to get to the staff bathroom, um, Um, which was a portable in the middle of, um, a field.

You had to walk over a plank of wood.  That was a reality. And I remember my mother in law coming to visit me at the school for something and her saying, wouldn't you rather teach at a real school?  Swear to God, wouldn't you rather have a real job? Like was the corporate life so bad, like this whole kind of feeling from people that somehow I was underachieving by being a public school teacher.

Okay. And also that, you know, Oh, well you have all summer off. I don't know why you're stressed. Like there was just a lot of those comments made. And, um, I would just shrug them off or whatever, cause you know, people,  they don't know what they don't know. Right. But I feel like I would have done better to have just really set some boundaries or set the record straight and just politely.

You know, I could have just politely said, you know what, Hey, you know what, I know you feel like teachers have all summer off. Uh, many of us, myself included, you know, have to take up second jobs over summer  to fund our chosen profession or participate in professional development, or really just kind of recover from the onslaught of what happened during the year.

So I know you may feel that we're spending all summer, you know, sipping mimosas and sunning ourselves. But it's really not. That kind of deal and, you know, or just to say something, you know what? I really feel passionate about education. I believe that a free equitable education is really at the foundation of every  good society.

And I'm proud to be part of that. And  I really wish that you would respect my profession the same that I  respect yours. Okay,  now I know some of you will say it's just easier to, you know, turn your back or scoff at it, whatever, you don't want to cause conflict, nothing about that is inviting conflict, um, because the danger is if you don't, you're just going to harbor resentment and you're going to want to, you know, avoid that person and something I say, you know, Time and time again is a different mindset is reminding  yourself that setting boundaries is really a loving thing to do to enrich your relationships, to have healthy patterns, right?

I often say a boundary is like people think of it, you know, on the freeway, people are thinking that the boundary is that, that guardrail on the freeway. On the side of the road to stop you going off the road. Yes, that is. The guardrail is a boundary. It is something that keeps you safe. But you know what also are boundaries?

They're those little dots in the middle of the road. They're the lines that show where your lane is and somebody else's lane is. When nobody knows where the lanes are on a freeway, There is chaos, okay? Setting up healthy boundaries are just as much those little lanes on the road that say, this is my lane, this is what I like, here's my preferences, here's what I'm willing to tolerate.

They're not just those hard stop guardrails. Okay, so have that mindset that setting boundaries is a loving thing to do. Letting people know where your lanes are. You can't be mad and resentful at them for stepping into your lane if they don't know where your lanes are. You can't be annoyed at people saying, well they should just know I didn't mean that.

Or they should know, you know, Valentine's Day is important to me. Right?  Tell them. Tell them. I was in a new relationship and I had to tell the person, Hey, you know what? I know you were married for a really long time and probably Valentine's day wasn't a thing, but I've been single for awhile. And single being around Valentine's day really stinks.

Okay. And so this is my first Valentine's day in a relationship for a long time. You I'm going to really be feeling so special and so appreciative if you could just make sure a card, something, anything, just to  make me feel special on the day. It could be the smallest gesture. Okay. And I've got to tell you, because it was going to be annoying if he didn't.

And he said, thank you for telling me that because I had no idea. My wife and I didn't celebrate Valentine's Day.  Once in the last 20 years or something. Okay. So I shouldn't just expect somebody to know that like, Oh, you should know. Right. He was widowed. In case you think I was dating somebody who was married, but anyway, off the point.

You see what I'm saying is by letting people know where the, where your lanes are,  if you don't let them know, don't be mad that they cross over them. Right. Did they know? How can you expect people to guess? Right? And so when the person, or the family member, or the drunk uncle makes some silly comment about teaching, then, um, you know, in their mind they might just be having fun.

But if it is upsetting you, and it is making you want to avoid them, then calmly and quietly do tell them, Hey, you know what? It bothers me when you say that.  Right? It bothers me when you say that. Just say that. Okay. And then, you know, if you grew up in the kind of family I grew up in, they'll say, Oh, don't be so sensitive.

Uh, you know, okay. Whatever. You tried, right? You tried. Okay. So that's it. I want summer to be your time. Okay. I know that list is really long and I already know what's on it. It's taking care of doctor's appointments.  It's taking care of dentist appointments. It's taking care of your car. It's every, every maintenance that has been, you know, kind of neglected during the year.

It's going to be your body, your health, your house. There are some room in your house needs to be painted. Your garage needs to be cleared out. There's something, I already know what's on the list. It's longer than any human could possibly do. Make sure that investing in some authentic self care, having some fun, being connected with the world.

You family and friends and passions that fill you up and have nothing to do with teaching. Make sure that they are on your list, okay, because you deserve it. All right, I'm proud of you. I believe in you. You can make it through those last few weeks, days, and months. Hours of school, hopefully creating some magic memories.

And remember till next time, create your own path, bring your own sunshine.