Written by Ally Berttucci

An Introduction to Upstream & Restful Parenting

I’m Ally, a licensed counselor by training, and one half of the Upstream duo. I have two little boys (2.5 and 1yr) and live in the Chicago suburbs, and am currently desperate for spring to arrive!!! I repeat, two little boys in freezing Chicago, spring cannot come soon enough!

Seven years ago, my colleague, Kelley, and I dreamed of creating a pathway to support mothers in the journey of motherhood. As counselors, we spent countless hours with families, and as we sat with mothers, we heard – time and again– themes of depletion, exhaustion, loneliness, guilt and shame. Quickly, we realized that in order for kids to flourish– in order for families to flourish– moms needed safe spaces to process the heavy load of mothering. The sleep deprivation, the round-the-clock needs, the worry about their child, the guilt they felt over their last yelling episode, the feelings of “not enough,” the wounds from their own childhoods, and so much more. They needed someone to say, “this is the hardest thing you could ever do, and also the most holy, significant and beautiful.” They needed someone to show radical empathy, to extend care and nurture. They needed soothing and they needed rest. This may seem rather obvious, but we realized that there was a major “gap” in the system. There were lots of programs to support kids, but what about avenues for mothers to receive care, nurture and support?

So we began to reimagine the ways that we could care for mothers and Upstream was born!! Upstream guides mothers into restful parenting, an approach to parenting that recognizes that families grow and flourish when mothers (and fathers) can engage from a place of rest and regulation rather than perfectionism, guilt, anxiety, shame or control. So much of the information and advice that parents consume today drives feelings of “having to get it right” and there is very little space for parents to rest from anxiety and worry as they grow into the parents they desire to be. Our hope at Upstream is to guide women into a gentler perspective of themselves, parenting, and family life and also grow benevolent circles of women caring for one another.

As we thought about how to support moms, we thought, wouldn’t it be AMAZING if we could whisk mothers away and nurture them for a weekend?! We loved the idea of mothers having space to step away from the day-to-day demands of mothering, to rest, to receive care, to connect with other mothers and to explore topics like restful parenting, regulation, stress, attachment and care within families. 

We just returned home from our third retreat and one of our favorite things is creating a space and rhythm in which mothers can have room to meet their needs for rest, movement, connection, play and growth. The goal is that women would have a deep experience of regulation and connection during the weekend. If the language of regulation is new to you, regulation is the degree to which we feel calm, safe and social. This is the space in which our most thoughtful, wise, kind and connected behaviors and intentions emerge. To be regulated is to feel as though we have had our needs met in a good-enough manner, that we have the physical and emotional energy to tolerate and deal with the stresses and demands that come our way. Often this can feel so challenging in family life, in the midst of all of the demands and stressors, and so Upstream enters in to help mothers process how they can live more deeply from a place of regulation, so that they can give that regulation to their kids. 

Restful Parenting Embraces Good Enough & Repair

We can’t talk about restful parenting without getting into the Good Enough Mother (GEM). The GEM is at the center of Upstream. She is our mascot and we have sooo much love for her! So what is the GEM? A developmental researcher, Donald Winnicot, developed the term to describe how infants need a parent who is –on the one hand, sensitive and warm a lot of the time–but who also messes up a good bit, actually! The GEM acknowledges that perfect parenting is a myth and that even if it were possible, it would not prepare children to flourish in a world full of challenges, disappointments and brokenness.  Actually, some degree of misattuned parenting helps children gradually tolerate this frustration and disappointment. 

We hope that this could feel so deeply consoling to the mothers in the trenches. Mothers running on barely a few hours of sleep, mothers feeding babies around the clock, mothers in the throes of potty training or teenage heart-break. For the mothers who are working long hours outside of the home and the mothers picking up yet another crushed goldfish from the floor, while a child is having an all out meltdown at the kitchen table.

What matters most in the day-to-day grind of parenting is that we commit to repairing when we have made a mistake, and helping our child return to connection with us. Researchers call this the rupture and repair cycle and it is one of the most important elements in building secure relationships. As believers, we understand God as the one who repairs with us when we have breaks in our relationship with Him. He ultimately moves toward us and re-establishes relationship in our deepest moments of brokenness, distress and dysregulation. We see this mirrored in the science of attachment and regulation, and believe this is a primary source of flourishing for all humans. So GEMs can rest in the gift of repair and find deep solace in the Biblical narrative of a God who lovingly and sacrificially committed to repair with his people, so that they might experience deep and abiding joy in Him.

Some support for the parent who is struggling or didn’t have an Upstream upbringing

You may be reading this thinking, “I want this, but didn’t grow up this way and feel overwhelmed trying to parent this way.” Well, one of the most hopeful parts of this work is knowing that research actually indicates that it is not what has happened to you that defines your capacity to heal and grow in regulation, it is how you “make sense” of your experiences and integrate them into a compassionate story. In other words, our children inherit our own healing. To heal from stress and trauma, we need to sit with others and honestly acknowledge the painful experiences, while receiving empathy, care and compassion. This may come in the form of safe and connected friendships, your spouse or a therapist. Or maybe a future Upstream Retreat 🙂 Through this process you can come to understand how your needs were (or were not met) in childhood, what it’s like to ask for your needs to be met now, what it’s like to respond to your children’s needs and how you process emotions. It will help you unpack things like your triggers in parenting, your unmet needs and your pathway to healing. 

How to Grow into Restful Parenting

We wanted to include a few ways to start moving toward restful parenting:

• Access Upstream’s free content on Instagram @upstreamparenting! If you are curious about restful parenting and regulation, this would be a great start. We know that deep change must happen in the context of relationships, but we also believe that the content we offer through social media can serve as an invitation into the “Upstream mindset shift”—to help you begin to see yourself and your family through a new lens. 

• Additionally, we would encourage you to see if you could schedule a break for yourself (maybe 1-2 hours at a coffee shop) to begin to explore what needs you may have in this season (for movement, rest, reading, connection with friends, time with your spouse, creative expression, etc). And try some creative brainstorming to see if there are some ways to gradually incorporate these ideas and increase regulation in your life as a mother. Some seasons feel REALLY full and so these may be small steps, but they are still important! Mothers sit upstream of their children, and so the care that is poured into mothers, travels downstream to benefit their children!

• We currently have an online version of our retreat that will be available for 3 more months! You could work through this in a solo capacity or with a small group of friends. It includes a workbook for reflection and conversation. You can find out more on our website.

• We also have a few book recommendations that may help you along this journey:
  • Try Softer by Aundi Kolber
  • Anatomy of the Soul by Curt Thompson
  • The Yes Brain by Daniel Siegel & Tina Payne Bryson

• Stay tuned, over the course of the next year, Upstream will be rolling out more ways to connect with this content and other moms!

We want to close with a word of encouragement. Motherhood is so expansive and wide, and hard and challenging, and full and non-stop, and beautiful and good. We see you in your desire to show up for your family and the incredible work of service, sacrifice and care that you have given yourself to. So wherever you are, we hope you could take a moment and honor your motherhood journey and your family’s story, and invite a moment of pause and rest and peace in the hands of a God who sees you and holds you in His inexhaustible grace.