Finding You: with Dr. Brad Reedy

What do you do when your child is struggling with mental health issues or addiction? In this talk, Dr. Brad Reedy explains why the work begins with the parent, not the child. Our own ego, our guilt, and our shame distort the lens we look through to understand the child, and punishment has its limits. The heroic parent is the one willing to look in the mirror and ask: how am I part of this dynamic?

Drawing on his book The Journey of the Heroic Parent and on Daniel Siegel and Mary Hartzell's Parenting from the Inside Out, Brad talks about owning your feelings. If your child is using drugs, of course you are scared. If your child steals from you, of course you are angry. But those emotions are yours. Take them to a mentor, a therapist, or a support group and work them through there, so that when you come home you can be the steady, loving presence your child needs.
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Should I fight for this marriage, or is it time to leave? In this talk, Dr. Brad Reedy takes up the question of discernment: how to know whether to divorce or to stay. He explains why divorce always needs to be an option. If leaving is off the table, then staying is not really a choice, and the intimacy a marriage needs cannot grow.

Drawing on his work with couples and his own story, including the therapist who told him divorce would not be "better," only "different," Brad explains why the answer does not come from weighing pros and cons. Our relationships expose our unhealed parts: the fear of abandonment, the empty cup we try to fill, the need to be seen and validated. When we do our own work and find psychological integrity, the decision to stay or go comes out of that work.
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What does it actually mean to “hold space” for someone? In this talk, Dr. Brad Reedy explores containing: taking in another person with compassion, patience, curiosity, and non-judgment, especially when they’re hurting, dysregulated, or not making sense. Containing isn’t listening to someone being reasonable. It’s staying present with their pain, their defenses, their anger, and their irrational thinking, and letting them see the world the way they see it. We correct very little. And in that quiet, subtle way, a person is changed simply by having been understood. In this episode: Why a child’s sense of self is shaped not by what parents say, but by what they feel Why skills alone fall short, and why containing is built on our own inner work Listening by Capacity: a scale from “I can’t hear it right now” to accountability The barriers to containing: depletion, unhealed trauma, our own needs, self-righteousness, and the narcissistic wound Practical skills: staying silent, offering your body, holding discomfort, noticing your impulses, and getting really good at failing Why doing your own work is one of the most loving things you can do for the people closest to you. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr. Brad Reedy explores artificial intelligence, self-help, and the difference between having information and doing our healing work. He explains that our relationship with AI is only as good as our mental health: we can use it to ask better questions and consider new perspectives, or to reinforce what we already believe. Drawing on his own experience and his work with clients, Brad discusses the limits of AI, why doing the "right" thing is not the same as healing, and why relationship remains at the heart of lasting change. The question isn't simply whether to use AI, but how we use it and what we expect it to do for us. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Dr. Reedy, interviews Finding You's coach and facilitator Beth Hillman. Beth shares her story of parenting a child struggling with substance used disorder. She talks about her approach and working with parents, emphasizing the need for self compassion and forgiveness for anyone working to support a struggling child. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.