The Complex Entanglement of suppressed emotions in boys and men

(upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to the Cardamom Pod, the spice that fuels the four digestions. I am your host, Rebecca Steele, and here I have innovative conversations with inspiring guests. My background as a multidisciplinary therapist is woven into the role of the four digestions, creating a structured playground where curiosity is the main doorway to learn frameworks and practices that help you thrive, be mindful and stay present. My contact details are in the show notes. Now let us welcome my next inspiring guest. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) Hello everyone, and welcome to today's podcast on the Cardamom Pod. I'm Rebecca Steele, the host, and today we have a really special guest. And you know, all my guests are so special, but you're going to enjoy my most recent guest here, Catherine Imayabashi, who is going to talk about a topic that for those of us who have sons as mothers, or as parents, or even those who are childless or choose to have no children addressing the boy in the man. And you know, Catherine has written a book about this, which I'll get her to talk to you about. It is a real passion for her to bring this into the awarenesses around the world. And basically today, what we want to do is put it out there on the table and just have a conversation about this. Thank you, Catherine, for being here with us. So please tell us a little bit. Yeah, you're so welcome. So tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got to this topic of sonhood. Well, I'm a Canadian. I left Canada when I was 30 and started my international career. I came directly to Japan and then have gone to various places after that, and then returned to Japan. And this is currently where I am. And this is where I've started up sonhood. Six years ago now, I retired from education. I had been working in the classroom, in leadership, in a variety of different positions. My focus for most of my career has been specializing in early childhood. So when I did get married, which hadn't been in my cards, I wasn't going to get married. That wasn't the plan. And then when I had a child, which also was not in the plans, which always reminds me of the saying that I just love, that we all make beautiful plans and then God laughs. So I have created a lot of laughter, I guess, because none of the things I planned were the things that obviously is the path I'm supposed to be on. So when our son was about three or four, there was an incident in Japan where he and I had gone fishing. A little place, a little creek, a little bit in the woods, a little bit off the roads. But living in Japan, I had no concerns about our safety. It was a beautiful sunny day. When we were down there fishing, there was a group of boys that came down. And when I noticed them, just in the peripheral vision, I immediately, without thought, had this image of a gang of boys coming down, and I was filled with fear. And I, it was gut wrenching, and I was just so afraid and concerned, like the mama bear thing really is a thing. And it was, how am I gonna protect my little boy and myself? And this was all in a split second, but it was a very intense emotion. The boys came down, they ended up being in that stage of development between elementary and middle school where their bodies have really grown, but they're still just little boys. And they ended up spending several hours with us, and my little guy had a wonderful time, and they were just beautiful, beautiful young boys. And so that could have been it, and then I would not have done what I have done. But that night when I got home, I couldn't let go of trying to figure out, I'm very analytical, and I will, as long as something makes sense to me, I can go in any direction most times, but this didn't make any sense to me. I did not understand why I had that guttural reaction when there was nothing that made sense to me as why that would come up. It wasn't a trigger, I had no experiences, I wasn't fearful of my environment. There was nothing that made any sense. And I just about gave up, which was unusual for me, but I could not pinpoint where the emotion had come from. And then in that second, I had a thought, and it was, okay, my little guy is three, four right now, so in five years, or 10 years, or 20 years, is there gonna be another woman, another mother who's going to be filled with that same fear? Simply because he's a boy, not because of what he's doing, what he is saying, what he's wearing, only because he's a boy. And the thought that another woman, another mom, would be afraid of my boy just broke my heart. And it was like, something is wrong with this picture. I don't know what it is, but I'm gonna find out. And that's how it started. And 30 years later, I have learned everything that I could learn within my own capacity to try to understand the inner emotional world of boys and the world that they are growing up in. One of the first books that I read was by Dr. William Pollock, who does studies and connected with men and gender from out of Harvard. And he wrote a book called "Real Boys," and that became like a Bible for me. And that was, I learned some of the language that is around masculinity and boys. And at the end of his book, he said to the reader, if you have learned something about this, then now it's your responsibility to take this and share it with other people so that more people have more of an awareness and the knowledge of the situation. And I took that seriously, and I started learning and sharing and doing workshops and anything I could do. So when I retired, there was not really much thought about kicking back and drinking margaritas. It was kind of, okay, now I've had it as a side focus because my work for 40 years has been connected with parents and children, so that part was the same. But now I could totally focus on support and service, not as part of, as my job, but as part of my passion. And so I started up Sunhood Coaching. And my son, actually, was my biggest supporter, helped me with all the tech stuff, tried to help me understand about social media, all the things that I knew nothing about. And one of the, so he helped me and we created a website. I created numerous online courses, created a community, and then I wrote a book, my first book. And that book, which I have, is this one. And it's called Raising Boys Who Become Remarkable Men, Intentionally Parenting Your Son From Birth. to eight. So that really looked at the first two parts of childhood and the beginning of being a boy because those foundations are critical into how he's going to interpret what it means to be growing up through society. And also the lens that I have as an educator, the section that's about the early school years I think sheds a pretty good light to parents on what to be aware of and how they can support their boys the best. So that was the first one and when that was finished I did the things you're supposed to do for marketing and that all new stuff for me. But one of the things my son said was you know you should try to get on podcasts to talk about your book. And so I started that and then I got hooked. It was I loved talking to people and and talking to them about something that I was so passionate about. So a little bit later I wasn't sure what do I do next? Like I've I've made all the preparations what's next and my son recommended I start my own podcast. So I was like okay another learning curve but I can do it. So I started two years ago I guess. What I called first season was really trying to understand about the process, about interviewing, about the conversations. And it was a general group mostly parents some experts and then the second season was devoted to parents of boys and specifically just that some experts connected with boys but it was mostly that. And then a year ago I knew what I wanted or the conversations that excited me the most were the ones that I was having with young men. And I thought okay season three that's my focus. I'm pivoting that's my focus. So I started interviewing young men and fathers mostly. And every time it just astounded me the depth and the quality of the conversations and the things I was learning from it. So once again it was like okay there has to be a way to share these experiences and the wisdom that comes from them in a wider wider range. And so the birth of my second book which just came out this month that was the seed for that. So this is the new book and Will My Son Become a Good Man? Ten Men Share What Helped, What Hurt, and What Boys Need Today. And in the 30 some years that I have been trying to learn everything I could from from reading from listening from podcasts from documentaries anything that I could do to continue to learn. I'd learned a lot but it was talking to these men it was like this is why this is what needs this is what will make the difference because because of what the men shared and how they shared it and mostly all they needed was a safe space to share and the right questions that they were more than willing to to answer. So in a nutshell that's how I got to where I am today. Oh yeah thank you for sharing that that that journey and it shows the depth of passion in the journey. I came across what you shared when when you did a um I think a reel an Instagram or Facebook reel on those interviews and oh my goodness I was I was like wow yeah you know we've heard about the man cave you know and we've heard about where how young men would go into these join these uh man caves and you just um you know and in there is all that's another topic of its own you know is there a writer passage in the man cave just like it might be for coming into what it what it takes to be a good person a good man or a you know um someone who feels worthy in themselves and um it was really interesting how you had so many different from different backgrounds and environments didn't you? Can you talk a little bit about that? Yeah it was really really interesting um I pulled out from from the men that I had interviewed I pulled out um 10 men who were all from different backgrounds different life experiences different cultural experiences they didn't know each other uh it was it was very interesting I started off with interviewing my own son and that was that kind of is what got me going because you know because this has been my world um he's grown up with these conversations like we often talk about you know society's rules around gender and and the challenges of school and and some gender biases that he's going to like we've had all the conversations I thought he and I had kind of talked out everything I wasn't sure how the interview would go and it was it reinforced um it reinforced the power of questions because there were a few questions that I asked as an interviewer that I probably not probably I didn't ask as a mom and his answer uh surprised me because like what he had said in in his interview that was uh eye-opener for me was when I asked about you know what he felt was one of the biggest challenges for for men today young men today he said he believed for that it's this expectation that men should remain kind of emotionally flat not too loud not too happy not too sad not too emotional and and I haven't stopped thinking about it so that's almost a year and it's still you know often in the the back of my thoughts but the what was outstanding for me was I didn't know that and if I hadn't known that maybe I would have done some intentional parenting uh to help I don't know uh guide him through that or give him the space to to explore that you know with me I felt I could have done something had I had that knowledge and so that's kind of how it was okay all these men these 10 men there is there are things in their stories they are all different stories but there are things that when you read them you you think well if I had known that if that was part of my son's life how could I have taken that wisdom that this man today is sharing with me and how can I make that work in my world with my son so that he doesn't come out with the same scars or the same pain that these you know these other men are talking about so it's very it's the most moving thing that I have done like I'm very proud of my first book I think it's a great parenting book but this second book feels different because there are 10 other people in the book with me you know um as a mother of two boys and a daughter I can resonate with that because as a mother you always feel like you are on the pulse of what might be happening for them and there is this kind of thread that says when there's when they're quite little like three four you know they're watching and observing you as a mother and their father they're observing and they're observing their environment and they are if not anything else but quietly being conditioned. However, they don't have the bandwidth of expression and even if you were to ask them, you know, what does this feel like for you? They don't have that bandwidth to say, I feel like this. And often I've heard it said, oh, it's much easier to talk to a teenager or a young person than a little child because they have yet to develop that bandwidth of an adult's curiosity into their receipt of their environments. And I feel that we as women and mothers, we have a nurturing and a component about us not to say that fathers don't have it, they do also, but it's interesting what your son pointed out, the flatness of the emotion. And there are, there is this term of this feeling of equanimity or using discernment. So you sit back and you keep observing, you don't give away anything, right? So your expression, your face might be devoid of expression, right? So you don't know what the other person's thinking. So there's two things in what you're saying. The first one is that that's absolutely right about young children not having the capacity to share verbally with us what's going on. But I think that's one of the things as parents or caregivers or educators, that's our job when they're really young, which is why I think people who do work with the youngest children have to be special because you have to be very inquisitive, you have to be very observant, you have to be really curious to really try to understand what it is they're trying to communicate. And often it's not verbal. So a little boy who is having a temper tantrum, if you really are curious and you are inquisitive and you can ask some different kinds of questions, then you might come to understand that it's not anger that he is showing in that emotion, that behavior, that there is emotion, a deeper emotion underneath that behavior. And when you can understand that, he doesn't need to have the verbal capacity. He knows that he is expressing something, he has to get rid of that emotion. He doesn't know where it's coming from. So I'll give you an example, not so long ago example, it was that kind of a situation, a little boy who was four years old. And after asking numerous questions over a little bit of time, what surfaced was that his grandfather had just gone into the hospital. But because that wasn't part of the normal conversation and the parents didn't think to share that at school because it was like, it was not, it was preventatory kind of, but he was grandfather was out of the picture. And so this little boy didn't know how to say how upset he was, how afraid he was because his grandfather was taken away in the ambulance. And so he is showing it by having a full-fledged tantrum about something that doesn't seem to be worthy of that quality of a tantrum. But you would miss that completely if you're just responding to the behavior. So yes, most young children don't have the capacity to articulate what's going on, but we can figure it out if we just get a little more curious and a little more observant and a little more compassionate. That's so deep in the sense that, you know, what it takes to be a parent and a mother or a father to have that, you know, without thinking, let me just protect my child, my boy from noticing the things that might hurt him. You know, I don't want them to have that emotion of like in what you just shared of the boy's grandfather going to a hospital. He wouldn't understand that. And we want to protect him from that emotion. And it's so interesting in that actually, are we as a parent also protecting ourselves from the emotion of possible loss and what might go wrong? So we protect our younger ones, you know, our little ones from that feeling. But it's almost like let's protect ourselves. And as we protect ourselves, we're also protecting our children. But children, I noticed from my own children that the sensitivity to the intangible is massive. You know, infants. There's studies done that infants show different bodily sensations or heartbeat or reactions to hearing raised voices of their parents in the other room. So that's an infant. That's not even a child. But parents would think they're out of the room. They're having some kind of disagreement. It's not going to affect a little baby. But because of the world we are in right now, they can test. They can actually find that there are physical sensations that show they are being negatively impacted by this negative emotion that's close by. Right. And then this goes back to what I've learned myself about the embryo in vitro. It's like in the uterus, it's already experiencing the emotions via the mother and whatever is going on in her outside world. So can we talk about how your husband, as your son's father, you know, came into the equation when it came to, you know, the flat emotion that your son expressed? Well, I don't know that my husband and I have had a conversation about that interview, to be honest. My husband is very generous in. Rebecca, can I stop for one minute? Sure. I can hear that my cat is not going to let up until I let him out. One second, please. Yeah, no worries. So to my audience here, whilst Catherine is attending to what she has to her cat there and letting her cat out, she's back. We're grand sitting. This is my son's cat and they're in France. So otherwise I would not have any interruptions like this. So I apologize. And no need. So please carry on. We were talking about your husband. My husband, he has always supported my passion around education. And so it's not that he has left it up to me, but he has given me the freedom to explore that and to raise our son in that way. Like a hundred percent. In a very. Like we're looking at two different cultures as well. So it was a very interesting experience, raising a child in that way. But when actually it was when I started a school here in Japan, a preschool in English, and I convinced him to leave his job and come and work with me for six years before we left Japan. And it was during that time that he really understood like deeply my philosophy around children. And he could see the positive impact when the focus was on supporting their emotional world far above anything academic. And so he has been an excellent role model as far as what it means to be just a good human being. I don't think, especially once we left Japan, we switched traditional roles. Before that we were both working. When we left Japan, I took on the provider role as far as finances went, 'cause we went international and my native language allows me to do that where his doesn't. So I think our son had very valuable role modeling as far as flexibility in what it means to be a good father, a present father and a very open-minded human. I don't know if that answered your question. - You know, I think it does in the way that you shared that he came and worked with you and he saw what was happening in the preschool. And that is in a way, is that how when you look back on it, how any man or any boy or any young man would come into a situation and seek to understand that environment? - You know, I think I've actually given this quite a lot of thought because I don't think we can really understand what the other person is going through until we step into their shoes. So I had never been in a position where I needed to be the sole financial provider. I never understood, for a family, I never understood the kind of pressure and internal stress that that caused. And I certainly didn't feel that way when we were both, you know, contributing to the finances. So the same way as it is for the man, for the man to be the caretaker of the home is not solely, it's not something a lot of men have experience with. So I've also been looking into a lot about fatherhood and paternity leave and that first period of time. And what I see as being the most valuable part of leave is if there are periods of time within, say, the first three years that, and especially if both parents are career parents, that if for one period of time, you know, say the first six months or the year, depending on whatever, that the main caregiver of that baby is the mother with full support of the father, but she's 100% the main. And then, for example, the next year, the woman has more emphasis on what she was doing career-wise. The husband is out of his career world, more or less, and he is the main caregiver for that child. When you have experiences like that, then you understand the other person. And without that, you really can't. My husband could not understand about me and young children until we were sitting in it every single day. So I think that is for a lot of things when you're two people living together, raising a family. I think we don't understand truly what the other person is going through until we've had some kind of a similar experience. - Well, thank you for sharing that. That is actually, it's what we're hearing about today to build that kind of compassion, if you like, is to step into the other's shoes to see from their perspective. And you mentioned something about being, the person who brings the finances into the home, if it's the father or if it's the mother, how does financial financials in any given state feed into how the young men and who you interviewed, how did that come up for them? What came up for them? - The roles of the, sorry, you faded out there for a second. The roles of the fathers of these young men? - Yes, so the roles, excuse me, not only the roles of the fathers of the young men, the young men themselves who were the breadwinners, so to speak, in their families and felt the, I want to use another word other than pressure to say, I've got to do this and to do this, my emotion stays flat. I don't, however, underneath the emotions are going because they come back home, let's say, and find that the things have gone awry at the home while he or she, whoever's a caregiver has been working hard, maybe not their favorite job, right? - Yeah. - There were a lot of discussions for the fathers that I had interviewed around being the provider, around mental health. One of the men who's in the book, where he is right now in his life is his identity. If you ask, who are you? His first word is I'm a father. And before that, like he had a lot of things going on in his life, but he was in the military for, from when he was 17 and he was in the military for 15 years. During that time, he got married, had a few children, but he didn't have strong, role models when he was growing up as far as being emotionally expressive. So especially when he left, when he left the military, he also lost his identity and he had already started having difficulties with alcohol and abuse and promiscuity while he was still in the military. And when he left, he kind of broke. And one of the things was connected with identity. He didn't know who he was. And he went through various, very, very, very challenging time periods. He lost motivation to keep going twice. And now he is at a point where, like he was able to get help. He was able, he has a extremely supportive partner who stood by him completely the whole time. He ended up going into one of the 12-step programs that someone in there had been. pivotal in mentorship. And he was able to sort through all the stuff connected with identity connected with being a man. So you know, what does it mean to be a man? Did you have to push down all your feelings? Did you have to, you know, have this stoic bravado on the outside when you're crumbling inside? And today, today, actually, he helps other men going through similar, you know, kinds of challenges trying to find themselves again. But he said what you know, one of the things that he said that stood out for me, he said, because he wrote a book. And he said, My daughter remembers me as a drunk dad. And I will always regret that she had to go through that. But he said he was so proud that she could see now, the man that he had become. And and that he has taken what he has learned and suffered through, and is giving back to other people as well. And he says, the most important thing in his world is being a dad. So his story is just an amazing. It's an amazing story. But it's that part of being a man where you're supposed to have figured out you're supposed to just keep going and and and so then the crutches that you use to try to keep your head above water with the pressure of being a man, but not being your authentic self. It takes its toll. Gosh. Thank you for sharing that. It's, I've heard so much about the 12 step process. And it makes me wonder, you know, whether that's not just a process for, you know, those who've, you know, who've been so drawn to alcohol, or it's, it's, it's a very in depth process. But what it builds is community and connectedness. Yeah, community, I think, is probably one of the biggest things. And, and that was throughout these interviews, too. All of the men had some kind of a story. But they also had, they had some way of being with community. So like, one of the men, just, again, a story that started incredibly, he was born in Guatemala. He was in an orphanage for six months, the first six months, it was so crowded in the orphanages at that time, that there were three babies to one crib. He happened to get adopted and during the process from an American family, and during the process of the paperwork being done, but before they came to pick him up, he was dropped on his head, and had some very serious injuries. There was a lot of things going on there. But and the orphanage actually called the parents said they didn't quite know how it happened. But this has happened. And basically, they kind of said, Do you want another kid? And they said no, they were in love with with this little boy that they had decided on. And so this man, Jeremy, he had such a rough start. But he had two parents that did an amazing job of raising him and him being able to keep his identity and also the strong, the strong component of knowing that even from the very, very beginning, his parents loved him unconditionally didn't matter what had happened. They loved him unconditionally. And the thing that Jeremy talked about a lot was he from a young age, I don't know, middle school, high school, I don't remember that part. But he really, really got into rugby, of all things. And that has been his grounding for decades now, a few decades, probably. And so when he goes to a new city, he joins the rugby team and automatically he has community. And that he has said that that was a an extremely important part of his world. A lot of the other men, there was always something where they had some kind of a community, whether it was like the 12 step program, or it was a church group, or it was a men's group, there was something that they weren't isolated, they, they had support from other men. Hmm, that is that is so good to hear that, in this in the conversation that we're having, we we, you know, it is a complex entanglement of of situations of dysfunctions. However, to even address any part of it is to, you know, step in to the entanglement in the first place, step in and as a you know, come down, come to the level of wherever that entanglement is leading that parent, that mother or father. And like you just shared with the little boy from Guatemala, it's like, it would be so easy to say, Yes, just give me another one. That one's damaged, you know, because I want a life that doesn't have damage in it. But in these complex entanglements, this, there is, as well, damage is probably a strong word to use a strong word to describe any situation. But there is a sense of that's not quite clean enough. Let me just clean it one more time. You know, have this perfection. Yes. And what was really interesting, and is something that I believed before, but it was kind of amazing to me how many times it came out in these stories. But even for the really, really hard beginnings that some of these boys had, all they needed was one person, just one person was made all the difference. And so it's kind of like maybe you don't have the perfect home situation, you don't have the good role models as parents, you don't have parents who are present, there's all kinds of different scenarios. But every single one, there was somebody that was like their anchor. And all they needed was that one person. And they were able to turn their world around. And I think that's a powerful message, because, you know, and even as a parent, I do think it takes a village. So especially different times, different stages that your your child is going through. They need more than you sometimes. And a minimum of one, and I think the more the better of good, good people in their world. Wow, that is that is a great way to, to kind of summarize our, our discussion here. And I feel like we're only just skimming the surface in this because there is such a depth to it. I wanted to talk about the couples who are choosing not to have children, right, the the, or the ones who can't have children, and are childless. There is the little boy in the man. Have you come across those? Well, I'll talk for my own situation, like one of the side benefits of trying to understand the inner emotional world of little boys, is that it's opened. an awareness to the inner emotional world of men and and how that is impacted by society and how we kind of perpetuate some of some things that maybe we don't really want to. But everything that you learn about what it means to be a man, I'm speaking as a woman, so everything that I learned, I could transfer to my husband, my brother, my male colleagues, my father, and it gave me an understanding and appreciation that I hadn't had before. That has given me an opportunity to develop my communication skills better, because the way I talk to you as another woman is different than the communication, the most effective communication between myself and a male. So regardless, like if you have a child, then I think you have an additional responsibility, a male child, you have an additional responsibility to create the awareness of how he's growing up and how you can impact that. But you know, there are men in our lives, everybody. So the more you understand about the differences and the challenges and the gifts, the better communication is, the better understanding there is, the better everything is. So there's no losing anything from learning more about this topic. Because it reminds me of when we were having our conversation before the podcast, you spoke about when you were leaving Canada, and you were leaving your sister, can we talk about that? Because that was, that was actually an eye opener for you, wasn't it? Well, it was. And I think it's very, it's the same as I mean, I can, I can share that, but it's kind of the same core point as interviewing these men. It's kind of as soon as you create a safe environment, as soon as you give permission for all emotions to be shared, even the vulnerable ones, and as soon as you ask questions that you, you know, you really do want to hear the answer about, then everything changes, and emotions come out, truths come out, but you have to create that environment first. And so I don't think that it's just my husband and how, you know, he was able to share very vulnerable emotions. What surprised me is how quickly he shared when I said, you know, that he should. And I hadn't expected it to be that, you know, kind of black and white, you know, switch on, switch off. And it made me think too, how are men doing it that they're keeping that switch off so much? Wow. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. And I think this is that, that question, how are they doing it? That they're keeping the switch off. What is it in, in them? Because I've noticed it in, you know, like my own boys and my, my, my husband, my, my father, my grandparents, my grandfathers, you know, who didn't communicate at all in the way that, you know, I thought would be, you know, to get to know them. I just think that what, you know, there is a, there is something, they're in this pressure cooker, basically. Yes. And I think it's worse right now than it was even in my generation, but definitely our parents' generation where, so I just, I don't know if I mentioned this when we talked before, but I had just seen a movie, an Australian movie, and it was set in 1959 in Sydney. And of course, it was a nice, easy, you know, story to watch. But what I really got into was watching the role of the father, the mother, and the daughter, like that was the core people in it. And it was, I had forgotten that, that's all, that's 1959. And it's not that long ago. You know, you're looking 59, so 70, almost seven years ago, which in a big spread of things, that's not that long. And yet the gender roles were very clear and well-defined. I'm not saying they were good. It was before the Women's Live movement. But the father was not very verbal, was not emotional, but he definitely was the authoritarian. And the mom and the daughter kind of skirted around his needs and they, so they were strong, but they were strong underneath. It wasn't something that you, you know, made obvious. You were not the assertive young woman that you see today. But it made me think that man in that story knew what his responsibility was. People treated him a certain way. There were rules to follow. There were rules for the women to follow. Not saying it was good, but that's the way it was. So the Women's Movement comes and changes everything. I grew up during the Women's Live, so I know the benefits that we have reaped and the empowerment that women have been able to step into. And even though there is a lot of space for further growth, that same growth I don't believe happened with males. And so you have a current situation where women are empowered and encouraged and kind of, you know, we boost up our little girls. And the young boys, the men that are coming up, there is no clear line. This is what it means to be a good man. So it doesn't mean anymore that you're the financial provider. It doesn't mean that you have a higher education or social status than your female partner. There's nothing to say. This is your role. And so they're kind of caught between an old version, a new version that's not clear, a place where they don't belong. And that's where you have maybe not such healthy ways of coping with that stress and feeling of just, you know, being lost. I think it's a very difficult time at the moment. And thank you, Catherine, for speaking into that. Because that is what I think once that awareness, once we speak into the awareness, these situations, we bring it to people's awarenesses. And then the question comes, well, what do you do about it? What is there to do about it? And I think the answer from our conversation and discussion so far is begin with the first step, which is be in their shoes, you know, to understand that they are in this, in this no man, you know, to coin a phrase, no man's land, you know, that they're walking in effect blind and, and feeling their way through. And this comes up to, you know, the feeling involves emotions, right, as a feeling. It's also tentative. So part of the problem with that. expectation is a young boy growing up learns from a very very young age what is acceptable behavior and what is not and they learn quite quickly that it is not acceptable to be a crybaby it's not acceptable to be soft and either directly or indirectly that message is given whether it's from society from the parents from the teachers that's the message that these boys little boys are getting so every time they have an experience where they have a true reaction that's not acceptable then in order to stay connected with the people they love the most they put up a mask and what complicates it is that over time that little boy learns to put on one mask on top of another over and over and over so when you get to the point where you could have this communication where you could have those conversations to try to understand what it's like to walk in his shoes sometime for some boys they have put on so many masks that it is very very challenging for them to get into that inner boy in her heart to be able to express that because there's too many masks in between what they're showing the world they are now and where they started right yeah so do you know I feel that that's what that is kind of the current dilemma that we're in and I think it's worth having another discussion about and I'll give you some time to to you know bring some thoughts into that for another episode on this as we've come up to the hour on our discussion and I think you know we've opened up avenues to begin to understand have the compassion have the you know begin our lessons if you like into understanding this so Catherine where can people get in contact with you and you know find out more about the work that you do and the books that are so important as the steps to learning my website is Sun hood coaching calm that's s o n I also am active on sub stack and LinkedIn I do share posts on Instagram and Facebook on Instagram you'll find things within my link tree I have a YouTube channel for the podcast and and for interviews that I do like this I put those on my YouTube as well and there's there's lots of information there for anybody that that wants it but I would say to are very approachable so if someone has a question or just you know wants a little bit of advice support reach out send me an email that's on my website Catherine that is that is superb thank you so much you've brought so much into my day today and you know in in what we've shared and I will contemplate what you've shared for myself and my environment my boys and you know just in who I meet and until we meet again for a further discussion thank you so much for being here and to my audience I'd like to say please do listen again to our discussion and in particular what Catherine has shared from her from her passion from what she has dedicated her life to sharing with the world and making a difference so thank you everyone so