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Don't Mom Alone Podcast

Parenting a Spicy Child: How to Stay Calm, Set Boundaries, and Keep the Connection :: Mary Van Geffen [Ep 558]

Don't Mom Alone Podcast

Don't Mom Alone Podcast

Education, Leisure, Kids & Family, Parenting

4.9 • 2.3K Ratings

🗓️ 2 February 2026

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Parenting a spicy child can feel overwhelming, isolating, and exhausting, especially when traditional parenting advice just doesn’t work. In this episode, Mary Van Geffen joins us to talk about what it really means to parent a strong-willed, spirited, intense child without losing yourself or crushing their spirit.

So often, as moms, we unknowingly tie our identity and worth to how our children behave. When our kids are calm, compliant, or successful, we feel like we are doing a good job. When they are loud, explosive, or struggling, we internalize it as failure. Parenting a spicy child brings this tension to the surface and forces us to ask deeper questions about where our identity really comes from. This conversation invites moms to loosen their grip on performance-based parenting and remember that our value is not measured by our child’s behavior, but by who we are and whose we are. 

Here is some of what we cover: 

  • How to stay connected to your child so you can guide them long-term
  • A practical calm down recipe for flare-ups and explosive moments
  • How to set boundaries without crushing your child’s spirit
  • Why you are not responsible for your child’s happiness
  • How to support the mild child in a family with a spicy sibling

Connect with Mary Van Geffen: 


Links Mentioned:  

Related Episodes:


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Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Hey y'all, welcome back to the Don't Mom Alone podcast.

0:10.3

I'm your host, Heather McFaddean, and this is the place where I get to walk alongside you

0:14.2

and connect you with people and resources so you know that you don't mom alone.

0:19.0

And in this episode number 558, I'm welcoming back to the show,

0:23.3

Mary Van Geffen. You represent God in a way that you are the image of God, but so is your child.

0:30.9

And I think sometimes we think that there's spiritual battle in our child's heart, but I think it's

0:36.8

just as much in our own that,

0:38.6

like, where do we get our identity from? Is it from being a perfect mom with a well-behaved

0:44.0

kid? Or is it in following what God has for us and has laid out and loving his gifts and

0:50.9

working hard to name the bitterness, the resentment, and replace it with wonder

0:57.3

and delight for this child. Mary is an international parenting coach for moms of spicy ones,

1:04.2

as well as a spicy one herself. She combines her training as a simplicity parenting counselor

1:09.9

and certified professional

1:11.2

co-active coach with hard-earned personal experience.

1:16.2

She's written a new book called Parenting a Spicy One, a Compassionate Guide for Raising a Deep

1:22.2

Feeling and Wonderfully Strong-Willed Kid.

1:25.8

And today she's going to talk to us about a variety of things like

1:29.4

how to stay connected to your child so you can guide them long term, a practical calm down

1:34.6

recipe for flare-ups and explosive moments, how to set boundaries without crushing your child's

1:40.5

spirit, why you're not responsible for your child's happiness, and how to support

1:45.2

the mild child in your family who has a spicy sibling. All that and more in today's episode.

1:52.5

Definitely connect with Mary. In the show notes, there's all the links into her new book.

...

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