Mum Guilt - How To Let Go Of It And Stay Confident

What does it really take to stay confident and let go of mum guilt? In this episode, Camilla is joined by Liz Wilcox - email marketing expert, Survivor contestant, and single mum to her daughter Chelsea. Liz shares openly and honestly about her journey through divorce and health issues, and what's kept her showing up as the parent she wants to be.

In this episode:

The powerful mindset shift that stops her in her tracks when she's about to lose it as a parent
Why mum guilt is the real thing exhausting us, and how to let it go
How her own mother's words shaped her extraordinary confidence
The beautiful story of how Chelsea dared her to apply for Survivor and what it taught them both about the power of a child's voice
If you're lying awake wondering if you're enough, this one is for you.When you're ready, here are some ways Camilla can help you further.
Tired of feeling like you go round in circles with your child? Wish they came with a manual?

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Podcast Transcript

INTRO
What does it take to raise a confident loved child when life hasn't exactly gone to plan? I really want you to stay tuned for today's episode, How to Stay Confident and Let Go of Mum Guilt. So my guest is Liz Wilcox. She's an email marketing powerhouse, Survivor contestant, and a single mom to a daughter, who by the way, was the one who dared her to go on Survivor in the first place. Liz has navigated divorce, health issues, and built a hugely successful business from nothing, and somehow manages to show up, well, at least that's how I experience her, every day with this extraordinary energy and belief in herself. So what I really want to dig into today is the mom behind all of that. How does she hold it together? Where does that confidence come from? And what would she say to the mom who's lying awake at night wondering if this is enough? So this one is gonna leave you feeling seriously inspired. But first...
As a parent, you know it's important to have clear boundaries, but you also want to be caring and compassionate, right? Well, I'm Camilla McGill, and as a seasoned parenting coach and mom of four, I'm excited to give you the principles, tools, and inspiration you need to raise amazing kids. Welcome to Raising Kids with Love and Boundaries.

SHOWING UP AS A PARENT WHEN LIFE KNOCKS YOU SIDEWAYS
Liz, I've been in your world quite a number of years, and I just observe this tenacity that you have — the resilience. So you've navigated all these things. I know you came from a difficult background, and you've built this life as a single parent. So I kind of wanna know, when life has knocked you sideways, what's helped you just to keep showing up as the parent that you want to be?
So for me, I never have thought about, and this was intentionally, I've never thought about Chelsea as my kid. You know, not really. Chelsea is an adult that's gonna go into a society one day, and so any time that I'm struggling as a parent, I just think about that. You know, a lot of parents say, "Oh, I picture my little baby." And that helps me. But for me, it helps to do the opposite, to picture her as an adult. And what is she... when she's around the table with her mates, right, maybe she's at university or, you know, she's in her 40s and she's talking to her spouse or her best friend or maybe even somebody she just met, and they start talking about their childhood and their mothers, right? Oh gosh, everyone has a mother story, right? And I've got plenty. What is she going to say? What do I need to do right here, right now, in this moment, to ensure that those memories are good ones or ones that strengthen her, ones that create resilience within her? And that, oh, it gets me every time. It stops me in my tracks of, if I wanna go down a bad track, right, if I wanna lose it or say something maybe I don't mean or that I'm not gonna mean in the morning, that stops me dead in my tracks. That truly, that visualization of her as an adult and the knowing, the actual literal knowledge that sure, this is my kid right now, but this is somebody's partner, maybe somebody's spouse. This is someone's employee or somebody's boss. Ooh, I'm giving myself chills. That's who I'm actually talking to. I'm not talking to my kid. I'm talking to that adult, because those voices stay in your head forever. And the years that I have with Chelsea, those are the ones that are gonna shape the literal rest of her life, and they're gonna shape other people's lives that she's in contact with, too.
Wow. That is just so seriously inspiring, because I just think you're so right. We don't think about this as parents. We think about, "How am I gonna get them to do their homework?" And, "Oh, she's just got stroppy about the fact that she's late for school," and she's been demanding about this. And what you're saying is I'm the voice in her head. I'm the role model. I'm the one who shapes her for the future. I have to be so careful, because what comes out of my mouth right now shapes the 30-year-old navigating a bump in the road in a difficult relationship or a belief in herself when she's hit the wall. And I just think, I just love that. And I do think it's unusual, and I think that my listeners, I hope, and without that adding an extra layer of guilt as a parent if you haven't been speaking like that, I knew this episode was gonna be inspiring, and I think that will be an amazing inspiration.

LETTING GO OF MUM GUILT
What if you're feeling like... I know you've had health issues and you run a hugely successful business, but obviously when you run a business like that, there are really difficult challenges to face. How do you flip that switch when you've got this pressure, and she may be misbehaving in a challenging way, as kids do? I know you said she's a pretty good kid, but they all have their moments.
Yeah, for sure. Well, it's something Camilla just said — guilt. Guilt will take up so much of your energy. So you don't need it from me, but if you feel like you do, here's your permission slip. Let go of that, my dear. Even with that picture of Chelsea as an adult in my head, I'm not perfect. I've lost it. I've said really stupid things that the second they came out of my mouth and I saw her reaction, I thought, "Oh, well, I've done it this time." But being able to let go of that guilt allows me to manage my energy so, so much. A lot of my friends, you listening, maybe you've experienced that guilt. But when I really learned to control that guilt, not let the guilt control me and the way that I react, I'm not holding onto that guilt because that eats you up inside. That is what causes you to be exhausted. Not managing your child's emotions — the guilt of how you managed your child's emotions, that's what's really killing us as moms and parents.
True. I mean, can I get an amen? Like that, whenever I let the guilt take over, because I am busy. I run a business. I've currently taken on a large partnership. I went on Survivor and left my sweet little baby angel for five weeks. She didn't even hear my voice. But guilt could eat me alive. It made me so sick for years — like physically ill — to go on that show, and I could let the guilt eat me: oh, now I'm not taking care of my daughter the way I need to. I'm too exhausted to play. I have to work versus being able to do all the fun stuff I wanna do as a mom. I could have let that guilt eat me and I could still be so sick I wouldn't even be able to do this podcast right now. But I had to learn to let that go. The decision is already made. The words came out of my mouth. What am I gonna do now?
And what I've learned, what helps manage guilt is the moment you start to feel it, confess. Confess to yourself, confess to your friend, to your child, "Hey, I don't like the way I handled that." Even when they're little, right? Because they're always, again, that voice in the head, right? We want them to know that it's okay to make mistakes. We want them to know we have big feelings, right? "Hey, I feel really bad about what happened last night, and I feel bad that I didn't tell you last night that I felt bad." And you know, we could go on and on about how we feel bad, but just letting it out with your child just releases that guilt. And kids, they're gonna love you forever, but they're really gonna love you later in life when they say, "Hey, you know what? My mom made a bunch of mistakes, but she always let me in on them. She always let me in on, 'Oh, I didn't like the way I said that. Oh, I could have handled that better.'" Just being a human, that helps release the guilt, and that's how I'm able to manage everything, because I'm managing my emotions, particularly guilt for moms. I'm managing my emotions first, and then I can manage theirs. I can manage my business.
Oh my God. You're just so wise, Liz. No, I mean, seriously, that's just so profound. And it's modeling, isn't it? Because then when she messes up and screams at you 'cause you didn't buy the cereal that she wanted, you've modeled it for her. She can come back the next day and say, "Hey, I'm really sorry, Mommy." That's an absolute perfect modeling for her, and they need that.

SOMETIMES KIDS JUST NEED TO FEEL THEIR FEELINGS
Yes. So something — I have a degree in early elementary education, maybe I learned it there — but it was like, what are you showing them, right? You have to be a model. And even a couple days ago, my daughter, she was so upset. I think she was disappointed. We couldn't have a campfire 'cause I forgot to buy the campfire wood, you know, because I'm living a billion lives, right? And it's 80 degrees outside. I'm not thinking about having a fire. And she was just so mad. She's 11. She's starting to, you know, her hormones are starting to change. She just, she was so ticked. And I said, "Well, let's go for a walk. Let's move this energy." And I was hoping on the walk I could make a couple jokes. I'm kind of a corny mom. You know, by the time we hit a block, she'd be fine. Well, she wasn't fine. And that made me dig my heels in. I tried even harder to let her in. I tried touch. I tried stopping for heart-to-heart hugs. All the strategies, you know? If I've seen it on Pinterest or heard about it in a book, I tried it. And finally, she just kept digging into me, and the more upset she got, the more happy I got. And by the end of our walk, I realized, "Ugh, whatever. I don't want to be around you either. You know, you just made me miserable for 30 minutes, and I'm trying over here." And I said, "You know what, Chelsea? Whatever. Just go inside. I'm done for the day. Lest you think I'm perfect."
And I had to sit with it for a minute. I realized, you know, maybe if I would've just let her calm down. Maybe if I wouldn't have tried to talk her out of being ticked off. Do you guys know Trolls? Poppy is the princess. She is so aggressively optimistic. That is me. I am Poppy. I literally am looking at two Poppys in my office because I have to remind myself to calm down sometimes. Not everybody wants to ride on a rainbow every day.
So I gave us both, like, a half an hour to calm down, and I came in, and speaking to what Camilla was saying about modeling, she immediately said, "Mom, I'm really sorry. You were trying really hard, and I just did not even want to hear you." And she explained, "This is why I was upset. I was disappointed. I feel like you're so busy right now that my priorities are not in your brain." And I was like, "Yep, you know what? You're absolutely right. I did forget. I was thinking about work. I was thinking about dinner." I said, "But I want to apologize too. Sometimes I just, I love you so much it hurts me to see you angry." And I said just what I said, "I was trying everything in the book to get you to be not unhappy. But then I forgot that sometimes you just have to feel the feeling and just be left alone." And she was like, "I think that would be best." And I said, "Maybe next time I'll just let you go for a walk by yourself." She's 11. She can go around the block. We live in a really safe neighborhood. And we shook on it. We were like, "Okay, deal. Let's remember this, both of us, for next time."
That's so wise too. I think it's that instinct, isn't it? As a mother, we wanna make everything better. And the guilt had popped up — oh, I've been so busy I forgot the firewood. And then there's the, okay, well my job is just to make her feel better. But just so often, and I've had exactly this with my own kids, is that they just need to be heard. They just need us to say, "Ah, this was really important to you. You really wanted that fire, and you're just desperately annoyed and disappointed that it hasn't happened." That's it. No buts, no let's go for a walk, but we'll do it tomorrow, but actually it's too hot anyway. Just let it be. And it's really hard.
I just love the fact that you identify that you're this Poppy. She's always getting herself into trouble because she thinks she can solve everyone's problems. She's very optimistic, and aggressively so. And there's a scene where she's singing a song about that — "I'll get up again. No matter what happens, I'm gonna get up again." But the visuals within that movie are she's basically getting eaten by a spider as she's singing this song, and she keeps trying to get out of it. And she ends up all wrapped up in this web, and someone has to come save her. And so that's definitely me. I think I can do everything for everybody, with a smile on my face, and I'm happy to do it. But I have to realize, you know, maybe sometimes my daughter, she is that prickly spider, and I should just leave her alone and let her rest a little bit, and let her feel the feeling.

WHERE LIZ'S CONFIDENCE COMES FROM
You come across as a very, very positive person. And I would say you have supreme confidence. I just wonder if that's something that you consciously built, or do you think it's just always been there? Because you came from a very difficult background, am I right?
Yes. So I think it's a little bit of both. My mother, she was not perfect. But she loved me very much. And for whatever reason, especially compared to my siblings, sadly, she thought that I was the one. I was the golden child. I was the one that was gonna make it, and she really put that into my subconscious of Liz can do anything. And that's probably why I think about Chelsea as an adult, right? She would tell me, "You're the smartest person I know. There's nothing you've ever tried that you didn't just get right away." And so she had her moments, but for the most part, that's really how she spoke to me and about me to other people. So I do think I have that privileged sort of subconscious.
But despite that, as a kid, I was actually terribly insecure. I didn't speak until the age of seven. It's called selective mutism, and a lot of it has to do with anxiety. In high school I didn't have many friends. I was just kind of the weirdo. But again, it was something that my mother said when I was about seventh grade. I was homesick, and I was a really sick kid, like super, super sick. And she said, "You know, Liz, the more you try to be like everybody else, the sicker you get." Wow. And my mother was a mom who didn't get past the eighth grade. But every once in a while, we're all moms — sometimes we got those little gems in us, you know? We see more than people think we see. And that just stuck with me somewhere deep down, and once I was ready for it, around late teenage years, early 20s, I thought, "You know what? I remember my mom saying this, and that is so true, so maybe I am just going to be myself."
And then especially when I became a mother and when I became a business owner, I realized, yeah, when I do things my way, people kind of look up and think, "Hey, what's she doing over there?" And when I saw my daughter having confidence, it made me double down on my own confidence. When I saw myself just being whoever I was, I saw that really resonating with others — children and adults — of like, "Oh, well, if she's safe to be herself, maybe I'm safe to be myself too." And that built so much confidence, because it's not even about me. It's like, well, if I'm confident, the people around me that I love and I care about, they're gonna be confident too. And it was just this beautiful cyclical thing of the more confidence I show, the more proof I see in the world that that matters, the more confident I am, et cetera, et cetera.
A virtuous circle. And I mean, that's what I've loved about you since I came into your world. And you've given me such confidence in emails and the approach, and I just suck it all up. It's so interesting to know. And we never know quite what it is that we have said to our children that will have that lasting impact. But your mother's insight — despite the fact she... I mean, intelligence is nothing to do with how many years you went to school. She obviously had an innate intelligence. To say that to you, "The harder you try to be like everyone else, the sicker you get." Wow, what a moment. And it comes back to the thought in our head — how I communicate with my child is so important, not just for now, but for their future self.

THE SURVIVOR DARE — AND THE POWER OF A CHILD'S VOICE
Although you went on Survivor and it was just five weeks away from Chelsea and she couldn't even phone you — she was the one that suggested you apply for it, right?
Yeah, so this is a fun story. Chelsea and I had started watching Survivor together around when she was five years old. And around when she was seven, I remember a commercial came on, Jeff Probst, the host, said, "Do you think you have what it takes? Apply now." And I said, "You know, I think I could win that show. I think I would get on so easy. I could totally play that game." And apparently I'd been saying that every single commercial break for two years, 'cause she was seven now, and she said, "Mom, are you gonna talk about it or are you gonna do it?" And I thought, "Oh, well, speaking of modeling" — I would say that to my students, you know? And they're always listening. She must be hearing me on those Q&As. And I said, "You know what? I'm gonna do it." And she pointed at the TV and she said, "I'll believe it when I see you on that TV."
And I looked at my calendar — I'm a business owner, so I opened up my phone, looked at my calendar, and somebody had canceled my 9:00 AM. And I said, "Oh, I've got a 9:00 AM. I'm gonna apply then, 'cause the hour's already blocked off, Chelsea." And she was like, "Yeah, okay." It was basically like a dare. I felt like she was daring me. And so the next day I applied, and they emailed me back almost immediately. They called me that night. And just went from there.
Chelsea was there every step of the way. I remember her coming home from school literally the next day and I was like, "Hey, I applied to Survivor. They called me." And she was like — she's seven, in her little baby voice — "You're lying." I'm like, "No. I told you. I told you."
And what I love about this story the most, and I think you listening will too, is what a crazy lesson I didn't even know I could teach my child about her voice. Your voice matters so much. If she never would have said that to me, who knows? I might never have actually had the guts to apply, right? I might have said, "Well, next season. Well, my business isn't quite ready. Well, you're getting older, I can't leave you." But now I get recognised in public, and sometimes my daughter's with me. Actually, we went on one of our infamous walks about two weeks ago, and this lady rode by on a bicycle and she actually turned around and she said, "Oh, are you Liz Wilcox?" And my daughter sort of rolled her eyes — she's 11 now, so it's not cool that your mom is cool. And I said, "Oh, yes." And I said, "This is my daughter Chelsea. She's the reason that you know who I am today." And every time somebody recognises me when she's with me, I say that. I want her to know your voice matters so much. You are so capable of making change and doing positive things for other people. What she gave me — I could never give to her, and I'm her own mother and I feel that way. I feel so indebted to her.
So not only was she heard — she'd obviously been listening somehow to your Q&As when you'd been talking about it. And remembered it. Then she suggested it. Then she persisted in it, you know, because we know how important persistence is. Parents, they'll say, "My child will go on and on and on," you know, for the ice cream. And I go, "Yeah, persistent — that's a really great character trait." But she was really persistent with it. And then she was with you step by step, and it was like you heard and you acted on it. So she has now got the experience of, like you say, her voice being heard. And look at the results. Just an amazing thing for her. And for your relationship.

MOTHERING YOURSELF FIRST
So I have a question. If a mother came to you and she was feeling overwhelmed, like behind, like she was somehow failing her kids, what would you say? What would your advice be?
I would ask her how she's mothering herself. Because at the end of the day, we have to take care of ourselves first. And I know a lot of people say that, and that is way easier said than done, especially at every stage of motherhood, there's always some new set of problems, and it's all-encompassing. But we've got to manage that energy. So asking yourself, okay, well, how can I mother myself so I can mother my children better? If we're going to bed thinking, "Oh, I hated that exchange. I hated that I did this or that." It's like, okay, well, what can I do right now to mother myself? My kids are already in bed. I can't wake them up and have a redo. But what can I do for myself right now so I can wake up tomorrow a different version of myself? Because we're gonna repeat those same things over and over. Guilt does not change the action. Nobody was ever guilted into better behavior. Maybe for a moment, but guilt does not break cycles. Changing the behavior does. So changing the way that you speak to yourself — if I was talking to my kid, I would wanna give them a pep talk right now. Let me give myself the pep talk first. Let me practice on myself so I know what to do with this child.
So that's something that I do with myself. That's something that I suggest when people ask me for advice — how can we mother ourselves before the kids are even in the picture? When they're not around, so that then when they come around, I'm already regulated, I'm feeling really good, I'm able to put my best foot forward.
Yeah, it absolutely correlates with what I teach — it starts with us. If we are stressed and eating poorly and not getting enough sleep — I mean, obviously, if you've got a young baby or kids that wake in the night, that's very difficult. But it's just that, it's the old adage of the oxygen mask, isn't it? But it's more than that. I like the way you put it — how do I mother myself? And everything will stem from that. I think that's a really, really useful piece of advice.

WRAP UP
Oh my goodness. I was excited to have you on, but I had no idea just how enlightening this conversation would be. And just so people know, where do we find you?
Yeah, sure. If you wanna hang out with me, if you have any follow-up questions or stories for me, the best place to find me is Instagram @theLizWilcox. You could DM me over there. And if you are a business owner or you're trying to start a business, I teach email marketing. You can find me at LizWilcox.com. There's a hot pink button that'll get you started.
Brilliant. And I'm in that membership — I've been in it for a good few years, and I love it. Thank you everyone for listening today. Please hit subscribe so make sure that you get alerted to the next episodes. Please tell your friends about Raising Kids with Love and Boundaries. And give me a rate — on Apple and Spotify you can rate the podcast. So Liz, it's been an absolute pleasure. And just thank you so much from me, Camilla McGill at Raising Kids with Love and Boundaries. Thank you.