Feb 21, 2022
Ep 217 // Becoming a Better Parent by Honoring Our Inner Child with Cynthia Perez
In this episode, I welcome Cynthia Perez, a first generation Chicana therapist based in Los Angeles, CA. Cynthia is a mother of 3, an author, and a clinical supervisor for LCSWs in a clinic setting. In 2021, After realizing she had workplace burnout, Cynthia left healthcare to start her private practice, Rooted in Reflection, LLC. Cynthia created 4 virtual groups in the Covid-19 Pandemic to address the real time need for collective healing. From Storytelling Workshops, Shame Resiliency Trainings, to a 10-hour workshop on Reparenting, Cynthia has been honored to create spaces that she has only dreamed of holding and people showing up every week!
Main Topics Discussed:
* Changing the name of shame
* How tending to the needs of your inner child leads to non-violent parenting
* Developing maturity by honoring your inner teen
* How gender constructs get in the way of your parenting potential
What are you up to nowadays?
Cynthia: I left my full-time healthcare job, which broke such a mold for me. I started my own business, where I work part-time. Now, I can’t stop dreaming. I can’t go back to it anymore. It’s all systems. It’s more of the same. So, I have a happy problem. I want to incorporate CRT into my work now to offer historical information on communities of color but applying it to mental health, so we can see ourselves in the historical context and how that looks now in our generational problems. So, I’m now in that gap.
What do you love about what you do?
Cynthia: If you asked me that last year, I wouldn’t know what to say. I really thought I was going to give up mental health. It sounds so cliché, but I had to reach an epiphany to find what I really love to do. I had to discover my calling and deliver it to the people that want to receive it that are on this journey, too, and do it in a way that honors them. I love that I can now be my authentic self, and I love having honest, meaningful conversations. I get to do that in the spaces that I create.
When I met you, we were both participants of the Latinx Parenting series. At that point, where were you on your journey?
Cynthia: I always caught myself yelling at my kids and was having a tough time overcoming that impulse. I loved being with the community because it was such a beautiful place to bring up my feelings. I was actually triggered when I saw you with my mom, not because I had anything against you, but because I thought I could never bring my own mom to that class. I thought she would make me feel worse if I asked. I grew up in a violent home; so, this was an opportunity to look at my inner child.
What was it like for you to implement that work into your family life?
Cynthia: It’s been really hard. When I was there, it was so powerful and palpable; and now that I’m back home, I have to give myself a grace period because it’s so tempting to go back to the way it was before. I also had to honor my inner teen to teach myself to slow down and scale back those big adult expectations.
As we know, gender is not a binary, and we can embody all of these energies—the masculine and the feminine—as we grow as parents.
Cynthia: Gender constructs has been another big one for me. Gender constructs oppress everybody. We don’t even realize the depths of it. This was a subconscious breakthrough I had to have. I had to stop caring about what people think, focus on my inner child, and embrace that I’m probably gender-fluid. I needed to give myself the freedom to choose.
Learn more about Cynthia:
Follow her on Instagram: _https://www.instagram.com/wellmama_lb/_ --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/danelliaarechiga/support