Faith teaches that we are made for and formed by relationship. Science powerfully reveals this to be true. And the most foundational of all human relationships is the relationship between parent and child. For parents who feel pulled in a hundred directions, dizzied by the volume of clashing strategies, and jaded by the parenting programs that complicated their own childhoods, The 6 Needs of Every Child is a groundbreaking roadmap integrating the science of connection with practical tools. On this episode of the allmomdoes Podcast, Amy and Jeffrey Olrick join Julie Lyles Carr to help equip us with the 6 needs of every child.
Listen to “allmomdoes Podcast #138: Amy & Jeff Olrick – The 6 Needs of Every Child” on Spreaker.
On This Episode:
Transcription:
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:00:00] I’m Julie Lyles Carr. And this is the allmomdoes podcast where each and every week we bring you special guests and episodes that are here to help equip and encourage you in your faith journey for the kids you’re raising, that romance that you’re nurturing the career that you have, all the things for exactly right where you live.
I have Jeff and Amy Olrick. They have some really great things to talk to us about when it comes to parenting and hey, how about what it takes to move away from the US all the way on the other side of the world, all kinds of things that you’re going to want to know when it comes to working with your kids. Jeff and Amy thanks so much for being on today.
The Olricks: [00:00:46] Oh boy. Thank you so much. Thanks for having us.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:00:48] Absolutely. So give our listeners a little bit of the backstory of what makes up Jeff and Amy Olrick.
The Olricks: [00:00:55] Yeah, I am a clinical psychologist. I work in community mental health with children and adolescents here in New Zealand, which is a real honor for me.
I work in underserved communities and really enjoy that work. I’ve been working with children and families for close to 20 years now. And we’ve been in New Zealand for three, and I am an author and a techie, do a lot of nonprofit work work with some refugee organizations that I care deeply about. And, um, we have three children, three boys, and they are 16, 14, and nine.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:01:32] So you are in the thick of the teen and tween lifestyle.
The Olricks: [00:01:35] Yeah, that’s right.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:01:38] Yeah. Take me back a bit. Given the ages of your boys, you made a decision to leave the continental U S three years ago and moved to New Zealand. What precipitated that decision and how was that for your kids? I moved quite a bit when I was in high school and I got to tell ya. I hated every minute of it. And then I was never going to do it to my kids. And guess what? We made some moves too. So talk me through the opportunity that came up and what you decided to do, and then how you equipped your kids for walking through that decision.
The Olricks: [00:02:10] Well, we had been living in Florida for, um, as the time that we decided to make them open. We’d been there for about three years and we knew that when we had moved to Florida, we knew that it was going to be a decision. Do we stay, or do we make another move? And our oldest son was about a year away from starting high school. So we’d already had in our minds, we weren’t sure we knew he didn’t want to move in once he moved once we were in high school. And, uh, Jeffrey had a colleague he worked with a group of other therapists in Fort Myers, Florida, and one of the people who’d been an owner in the business before him had moved to New Zealand and just been an incredible opportunity. And we’d had this dream in the back of our minds of moving the kids abroad and having them experience.
We really want them to understand, not only just hear us say that the world is beautiful and, um, the world’s people are worth knowing and that we have nothing to fear. And then we have this opportunity to explore that together and to do that as a family. So it was a lot of prayer and a lot of thought, but also so many open doors that almost just seem to be pushing us to go.
So when Josh, our oldest was 13, we did, we made this move to go. And how did we equip them hon? Well, we’re real sensitive to the fact that especially with our oldest, it was going to be a tough time to pull him out. He’s in middle school. And I can remember we pulled him aside, went to Starbucks and said, Hey buddy, where we have this news, we want to share with you.
And he was so nervous. When we shared with them, this idea moon is, you know, and he was relieved. Actually. We’d had an incident earlier in the day with his brother and he thought that we had been taking him to Starbucks to continue the conversation about the incident.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:03:57] So New Zealand was a relief.
The Olricks: [00:03:58] He wanted to know about the reptiles. That was his first one. One of my real passions is just being outdoors, exploring the world. Physical world. And I think for them, that was an entree to think about, Oh, what can we discover in Louisiana? It is a beautiful place. And we use that doorway to say, Hey, look, let’s discover this great, beautiful creation.
We’ve done that our whole lives. And this will be a completely new chapter. And that I think we’d done a lot of groundwork. Okay. Over the years, leading up to that point and really taking them seriously taking their thoughts and their concerns and passions, treating them as people. We know we have a role in leadership in their lives, but we’ve worked really hard to treat them seriously.
And I think they have a sense from us that they would consider what that was going to be like for them. And we certainly involved them with them. I think. As time went on, we really rallied around each other because in the end it is a huge thing as you obviously know to uproot yourself. So there’s been some pain in that, but there’s also been some real intimacy as a family, as we’ve been through that together.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:05:13] What do you think the difference is between moving internationally and moving domestically? All of my moves were from one end of the country to the other, to the middle. So it was kind of a, but it all stayed. And those were pretty significant changes. I mean, having grown up primarily outside of LA Angeles and then living in Washington, DC, and then in Utah, I was born in Alabama and Pennsylvania.
You know, I mean, just all these different things. Those seemed like significant changes, but it was all still within the United States. So how does an international move change even that dynamic?
The Olricks: [00:05:47] I do think there is a lot of similarity. You are uprooting. I think even just moving a few towns away, you’re getting to know different places and your kids are getting to meet different friends.
So I don’t think, I don’t want to make it seem as if this international move was so much more difficult because I do think that moves in general can be really difficult for kids, parents too. But I think that getting to know a different culture, even though we, we had decided we didn’t want to move anywhere with the kids, with Josh being the age that he was, that they didn’t speak English, but even if we’re still speaking the same language, there are cultural differences that really take awhile to get used to. And I think in some ways that really made us closer because we couldn’t just fit in. We had to come home and just kind of digest things around the table.
One of the things that we love, one of our favorite expressions here in New Zealand is they add the word as to everything. So cool as. Funny as. Tasty as. Yum, like all these things with as, but we couldn’t quite tell what it, what the word was. And I was like, I don’t think the other moms. I’m not sure what the other moms are saying.
They just keep saying cool as, and so just these, these things that are happening out there and about, and then you bring them home to the kitchen table or to the living room, and you’re just hashing it out together and trying to work it out. And I would say that that was unique from our other moves and really kind of drew us together even just.
To, to laugh at or at our mistakes together. Would you? Yeah, it’s, it’s very leveling, you know, from parent to child moving internationally to a new culture, even when they’re speaking English, you, you really have a sense of like we’re foreigners in a new land, all five of us. And we’re trying to figure out how we fit in here in this new place.
And, you know, in the U S and we’ve moved plenty of times. They’re in our lives as well. There’s sort of a sense, you know, what you’re getting into there may be slight flavor differences, but you don’t have that same sense of being knocked down to the first wrong and starting over. Also, I was thinking about one of the things that we talked a lot with the kids about, we made the choice to come to a different country.
So we have to be open to what is here, right. So going into all of our interactions with, Oh, this might be different, but we are not going to say it’s weird or, or wrong. It’s just different for us. So I think that that really challenged all of us, but in a good way to really open ourselves up to, Oh, our experience in the world, isn’t the only right experience.
And another thing was just the kids. Tend to pick up accents and understandings much easier than I do. I think that both of us. So I think that that has been a fun thing to see in some ways, I think that’s a pretty universal immigrant experience of often in those situations, the kids are leading the way and the kids are explaining to the older parents or a slightly.
Bottled. So that’s been unique for us, I think.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:08:44] And of course shows an incredible part of the world to go to where, of course, you know, so much of Lord of the Rings was shot in terms of the film and all kinds of things. I mean, just really these iconic, just incredibly gorgeous vistas. You know, I know that for my brothers and I, through the moves that we made, as much as I did not enjoy those moves my brothers and I became a little, a lot closer because they were the place of permanence that moved with me. And I think that it has a lot to do with it. The three of us all live in different locales today, but we’re all still very, very close. It was almost like we learned how to conduct healthy connection.
I did long distance relationships because all of us remained in relationships with friends from the previous places we had lived. But I think as siblings, there was a hugely bonding component of making those moves together, particularly in the timeframes in which we did. Have you noticed that with your boys, do you feel like that this has been something that has been enforcing and connecting for them?
Or can it sometimes be something that maybe siblings don’t enjoy that same kind of response? How, how can moms and dads be really intentional to help nurture sibling relationships in the process of a move?
The Olricks: [00:09:53] Yeah, no, I think in our experience, maybe similar to yours that you really see the three of them kind of rallying as a troop together.
You know, I do think we have tried to provide some leadership in that and to say just that like, Hey, we, you know, at the end of the day, You will always have your brothers and other people will come and go in your lives, you’ll move or other people will move. And you always have each other that obviously a move like this emphasizes the point.
And I think for the most part, our boys have embraced that. Although they’re also going through their developmental, you know, shifts, and that’s always a challenge as they focus in different areas and their relationships as they move to reanalyze essence to adolescents and such. And that can be a struggle for the ones left behind this part. It’s really? Yeah. They view themselves as
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:10:51] Right. Yeah. I think my brother, I would say that’s how my brothers and I experienced it too. Sometimes if we, uh, we thought we were rallying around a common enemy, right. Which might be wherever we knew there, my parents’ decision to move us.
But yeah, I think it was very, you know, longterm benefit. It was really good for the three of us that Jeffery and your clinical work. And as a parent and Amy in your writing, and as a parent, you have begun the process of really identifying what you see as six needs of every child. And that has found its way to being birthed into a book called the Six Needs of Every Child: Empowering parents and kids through the science of connection.
How did you begin seeing these six needs and quantifying them? Because I think sometimes our places as parents, we have a sense of what we think our kids might need, or we have a sense of what we felt like we needed as kids. And maybe we got it or maybe we didn’t, but we would have a challenging time putting voice to that.
Where did you begin to see these six needs bubble up? I’ve been sort of identify themselves in a way that parents can get their hands around it.
The Olricks: [00:11:50] Yeah. So the six needs are really grounded and a research basis that stems from attachment. That was my area of focus and training when I was in graduate school, even starting before that and undergraduate school.
Now, along the way, as I was growing my understanding of how attachment theory, guides, human development, I also had a faith experience alongside of that. And that informed how we think about our humanity. And so in our book, we try and really bring together those. Two perspectives on what it means to be human.
And so we think there are a lot of folks out there who want to understand how we’re made from both perspectives. And we hope that this book gives people some confidence that both those perspectives are in alignment with each other. Jeffrey and I started dating when he was in graduate school and I was an undergrad at the university of Virginia.
So I kind of feel like I’ve been studying along with him for. Over two decades now, right?
The needs are really based, as he said on, on attachment research and attachment science, and that’s just decades and decades of studying human interaction and there’s research that has been replicated across cultures and countries around the world.
And what it shows is that we human beings have to. Instincts two complimentary instincts that sometimes as parents look very confusing, when we see these instincts in our kids, and one is the instinct to go out and explore the world, just to master it, to discover, to see what we can make of it. And that’s when we’re doing well, we want to go out and explore.
And then when things are pretty tough, we have this other instinct and it’s to come back and to seek refuge. In our parent or a caregiver and so needs are born out of this understanding of these two different instincts. We actually turned them into a compass. We found that there are three needs that kids really need.
When they’re going out to explore the world, they need our delight and they need our support and they need our boundaries. And then when things are hard for them and they need to recover, they need to regroup after something that’s been painful or hurtful, they need our protection and they need our comfort and they need our equipping.
So we, again, we put them in a compass just to kind of give if people had tools to think about it’s helped our family so much to think about. Where could we be in this moment that we’re dealing with within our family right now? How can we help our child with what he’s experiencing and how can we help ourselves?
You know, we often get stuck.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:14:22] Right? I love that distinction of really seeing these sort of two basic ways that we all need to experience the world like a baby learning to crawl and roll over. That’s a form of exploration all the way to needing to be snuggled. And that continues obviously, as we continue to mature and grow.
Talk to me about a phenomenon that we’re seeing that’s pretty interesting when we look at these two instincts of the desire to explore and the desire to come back and seek refuge. When we have this generation that sociologists and psychologists are identifying as saying, boy, we’ve got people who are waiting later and later and later in their lives to truly fully explore in that way that leads to independence and leads to what we typically consider adulthood.
We have people into their mid twenties all the way into their early thirties who seem to only be staying in the seek refuge. So what are we needing to do as moms and dads to make sure yes, in a world that feels uncertain, in a world that there seem to be no guarantees, but to make sure that we’re communicating well, that exploring is also a great part of growing up and, and to not put boundaries and hindrances, even as much as we want to keep our kids safe and protect them.
The Olricks: [00:15:37] Yeah, that’s a great observation. I think there are a couple of things going on there. One is on that, that side of, yeah. Yeah. I sometimes refer to it as this dance, this move out into the world and back toward us. But on that, that move outward. I think there are a lot of the pressures on parents to see that their kids are achieving whatever is one’s value and achievement.
That could be grades, that could be a accomplishment, that could be one’s morals, but you see parents, I think a lot more than a lot of previous generations, having their hands in that work that is really their children’s work, you know, standing over them, making sure have you done this? Do you got this?
How’s this going? And we can put a lot of pressure on our kids making sure that they’re on the right track. And then alongside of that, you see a lot more involvement in parents and stepping into protect them. The kids from experiences, the world can seem scary or threatening. We see it on the news, the scariest stories.
So, so we have this sense. Uh, the world is dangerous and I’ve got to protect my kid from these dangerous at all times. So you see overprotection and you see over support those, those two needs in particular where parents feel pressures, they’ve got to step in, but at a cost lost is our kids don’t know how to stand on their own two feet and figure things out on their own and discover that they are brave and strong and they can assess danger themselves and get themselves out of trouble, become aware of when you’re doing too much of meeting a need and the cost of that.
One of the stories that we tell in the protection chapter as we’re talking, because it’s so much of these needs is about balance. It’s not about perfection at all. It’s really just about some of the needs. Do we tend to overvalue in some we don’t even know about or undervalue and the story that we tell for protection, probably our oldest was.
- And our youngest was, I don’t know, eight or nine. And, uh, Jeffrey just started to notice that they didn’t roam. They just weren’t going out and roaming the way that we were used to when we were kids, we just, when we were children, we just knew our neighbors and we understood our neighborhoods. And I knew like which neighbor would yell at me if I got too close to his flowers.
But that just wasn’t the culture of the Florida community that we were in. They were in all the time. And then because of all the news reports and scary things that we know happened that didn’t bother me too much. I didn’t actually mind that they weren’t going, but because of Jeffery’s research, he just really realized like, no, they need to be able to go out and explore the world now.
So he actually pulled up Google maps and he looked up his old neighborhood and figured out the distance that he had roamed in miles when he was their age. And then he juxtaposed that map. Or that distance on a map of our area. So like, what is reasonable for a child that age to roam and then made scavenger hunts and just started to send them out, send them out.
Aaron’s dropped this off at a friend to go buy a piece of pizza together. And it is interesting how just these things that we used to do more natural, I think, um, now I do think that the fear and there are other. There’s a cultural constraint that keep us from just encouraging our kids to go out. But if they don’t learn that they can get through a little bit of trouble, they can get their bikes and get a flat tire and they can figure that out and they can walk home and it’s not a big deal.
Then when it’s time for them to get their license or time for them to go to college everythng becomes more scary because we’re putting it off longer and longer.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:19:17] Right. Right. And you know, you’re so right. I mean, I remember as a kid and I don’t think they were wildly different times in terms of crime cycles and things like that.
And my parents were very responsible parents, but we certainly would, you know, we had certain ways that we were allowed to take our bikes and go and, and do the things. And, and we did. And you’re right. That was such a confidence builder to navigate some of the challenges that would occasionally arise from that situation.
And to learn that I had resources and skills and the ability to troubleshoot and in that desire to protect, I love that you add to that place of saying, okay, they need our protection, they need our comfort, but they also need to be equipped. That that is a part of seeking refuge is also being told how to troubleshoot, how to think through. I love that balance along with the balance that you include in the Explorer need of kids, the delight and support, but also the boundaries that need to come with that, that there are, you know, there were places we were not allowed to ride our bikes. There were places that we were not supposed to go and it wasn’t my parents trying to stifle us.
It was simply that they were giving us appropriate boundaries in terms of what was wise. So how do you think a parent’s personality? Plays into meeting these six needs for kids. For example, if I’m someone who’s much more extroverted and I have a high premium on exploring, I may be someone who struggles a little bit with trying to be that place of refuge for a kid to come back.
Or if I’m someone who is just naturally more introverted and really loves home and hearth a whole lot more and enjoys having my kids there with me, it may be a little bit tougher for me to say, okay, time for you to make a run to the store, to pick up milk for me on your own. So, so how do we balance our own personalities and the needs those personalities have with the legitimate needs of our kids?
The Olricks: [00:21:09] So one perspective you take on that is temperament, which, you know, the introvert extrovert is a good example of just natural temperament. And certainly we experienced that with our children where I have a different temperament. So part of it, I think when we’re talking about just temperament is recognizing being at peace with the fact that we can’t be everything for our children and we can’t be exactly who they need and every circumstance and that’s okay.
We can find ways to connect without having to always. Feel connected. Always feel like I get you exactly. But there, I think probably the biggest area that is worth exploring for people and, uh, and we help folks do the through the book is to say some of the things that are hard for us or hard or. Not natural because those things weren’t attended to in our own connections early on with our mothers or father, they had a hard time spending time in that space.
Let’s say delight. They were somebody maybe who was really focused on getting things done and doing things a certain way or doing things right. And missed those opportunities to just. Step back and take a breath and say, I just, I love being with you just as you are. And what happens when we have the important people in our lives, focus on service.
One of those needs that becomes familiar ground for us. And we take that into our parenting as adults. It’s like an underused muscle. We’re just not comfortable with going to that other need. Because we didn’t exercise it. We didn’t experience the exercise of that name growing up. So once you become aware of how we all carry these needs within us, but may not attend to them ones as much as others, we can recognize, Oh, that’s actually a muscle I can exercise.
I can practice the light. I can press into that, even though it’s unfamiliar. And my kid can respond to it and it can become a gift to me and to my child because, Oh, I wasn’t used to spending time with that need. Cause it just wasn’t attended to growing up. So it’s an area of growth. It becomes an area of growth for us.
Right. Understanding what the needs are and why they matter. I think that’s why the research part, and then also the uncovering, what scripture has to say about each as really helped me too. But so for instance, comfort is just not a need that comes naturally to me to meet. And one of my. Children needs a lot of comfort.
So to learn about how much our children grow in strength by being comforted, when they’re young, it’s understandable to think, Oh, if I over comfort this little person and they’re going to grow up needing a lot of comfort, right? So there’s that whole buck up camper kind of philosophy. Right. But actually the opposite is true that the more that we can enter into their pain and just give them space to feel what they’re feeling and do that, do that well, they end up actually growing stronger through that.
And learn through us, their nervous systems learn how to calm themselves down. And that was so important for me to learn because then if my child is screaming on the floor about a hurt that I feel like shouldn’t really actually cause that much distress, I have more patience to say, Oh, you know, I’m just going to sit on the floor next to him for a minute.
You know, we don’t have to, this doesn’t have to be a whole day process, but it’s amazing how. Quickly, once you start to understand what the needs are like, Oh, that actually calms them down in a way that me just telling him to get over it and get over, it would escalate a situation.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:24:37] Right. And I think even that embracing of look, there are legitimate needs and we don’t have to talk our kid out of that need.
And that doesn’t mean we let him run rough shot over us either. But, but it’s not about trying to talk them out of that need. Now I’ve got five girls and three boys and I don’t typically. Ascribed to a very strict view of, well, girls need this and boys need that. So I’ll just give you that as the dessert, the claimer up front, because my kids have all been very unique and very different in some of their needs.
But I can see that sometimes culturally, we may tend to feel like we need to. Push boys more toward an explore. And we have more of a sense of maybe having girls be in that place of seek refuge. How do we appropriately address needs in that way without limiting it to potentially how we see things culturally, when it comes to gender with our kids.
The Olricks: [00:25:34] Some pretty good research to say that we do tip the scales for our boys and our girls because of these cultural biases to be protective of girls when they are distressed as an example, and to go to comfort and to push boys to be tough. And that has consequences for us as humans because we’re robbing our kids of being fully human when we tip scales that way. And very often it just happens. We don’t realize it’s happening. We’re not aware of it. Sometimes it can be driven by fear. I know for a lot of men, we see our boys being vulnerable, afraid of them, carrying that vulnerability forward, knowing that teasing, you know, speaking as a boy teasing, I would have gotten for being soft for being vulnerable.
But as Amy was saying, actually giving space for that vulnerability actually makes sense. It’s more resilient and strong. So in some ways we undermine ourselves by giving into that fear saying, you need to be tough right now. Actually, I can equip my sons to be much more resilient where their emotions by saying, yes, you’re human.
You’re hurting right now. Let’s give space for that. Right.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:26:47] I love that idea of leaving that room because it does feel to me and Jeffrey you’re the clinical side. It does, but it does feel to me that sometimes those places where we short circuit emotion or try to talk ourselves out of what the feeling is, just seems to leave a hole whole lot of ground later for something to grow there that we don’t want because it hasn’t been dealt with.
So I love that perspective. Well, Jeffrey and Amy has been so great talking with you, and I’m sure real to know that you’ve got this great book coming out, the six needs of every child, and you also have a website called growing connected.com. I’ll make sure that we get that in the show notes, telling us about growingconnected.com and what parents can find there.
The Olricks: [00:27:28] So in growingconnected.com we are trying to use it as a hub to share resources that are both scientifically balanced and faith focused. So just a place for parents to go to find books that we love information about our own book, writing by different parents who are sharing. So it’s a growing project and we would love for anyone to visit.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:27:47] Excellent. Well, we’ll make sure that we direct people there. Jeffrey and Amy, thank you so much from all the way on the other side of the world. It is a terrible middle of the night time for you, as I talked with you at a very great time for me. So thank you so much for letting me interrupt your sleep cycle and glean from all your wisdom.
I know that our listeners to the podcast are just going to be so blessed by this. Thank you so much.
The Olricks: [00:28:10] Oh, thanks for having us. We love being with you.
Julie Lyles Carr: [00:28:13] Be sure and check out the show notes that our content coordinator, Rebecca puts together each and every week of big shout out to Donna. She is our producer and helps make sure that the audio quality and all the things of the way they need to be so that you can get the episodes.
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