Welcome. This is A Glimpse Inside. I’m Wendy Perrotti and today we are wrapping up our four part series on how to be an amazing parent without losing your identity. My guest today is not only an expert in the field, she is an absolute real role model. Susan Epstein is the parent of two adult children and a serial entrepreneur who knows all too well how critical it is for moms to maintain their own sense of identity. For those of you who have been listening to this series all the way through, you know that early on this is something that I struggled with. It’s a hard thing to do.

Susan is a licensed clinical social worker who spent over 30 years as a family and play therapist before becoming one of the very first parenting coaches online in 2003. Over the years, thousands of moms have been through her signature program, Mom Magic, the five step system for loving, fun, and harmonious homes. She’s the author of Creative Interventions for Challenging Children & Adolescents: 186 Techniques, Activities, Worksheets & Communication Tips to Change Behaviors, really long book title, but an awesome book. Susan was so successful in growing her own business by coaching parents in groups that she decided to start teaching other coaches, therapists, and healers how to do it as well.

When she did, she jumped to a multi six figure business in less than 10 months. She’s a perfected group coaching model and now is known as the queen of groups and masterminds. I absolutely love this woman and I’m so excited to have her here with us today to dig into our topic, which is the secrets and lies of having it all. Susan, I’m so happy you’re here with me.

Thanks for having me, Wendy. I’m excited to be talking with you today.

Yeah. So first question for you. Did you ever struggle with holding onto an identity other than mom?

No.

I had a feeling that that was the answer because everything I know about you is you were this serial entrepreneur, like it was one business after another. Tell us a little bit about that.

Well, I mean, in the beginning, I had a really great role model. My mom was a school nurse, so she had her own career, and from the time I was probably in third grade, she was going to work when we were going to school and we let ourselves in at the end of the day and then she came home like an hour later. So she had her own identity. I think that that was a really big impression on me that I knew that I was going to grow up and go to college and have a career and support myself. So I think that’s why I didn’t ever miss a beat. I mean, I knew that I would figure it out as I went along, whether it was daycare or a babysitter or working from home, which I’ve done all of those things.

So in those early years, I remember some stories you’re telling me about your kids being sort of a part of the work that you did.

Yeah. When I was a psychotherapist, I had a home office and I did my own billing. In those days, you had to print out these HICPA forms and fill them out by hand and then put them in envelopes and send them off to the different insurance agencies. It was a Friday activity, so on Fridays I had my kids on the floor stuffing the envelopes, stamping and addressing for me, and I gave them a little, paid them for it. That was just one of the many things. As they got older, the first couple of books I wrote, my son and my daughter edited, laid them out, did the artwork for the books, helped me actually get them published, transcribed for me later on, my daughter did.

She took my blogs and she acted them out. They were hysterical. They were parenting blogs. She’s wearing aprons and playing all the parts of the mom, the baby, it’s just a riot. You can find those actually on YouTube or Vimeo or something. They’re there if you look at Parenting Powers, my old website. So the kids have been involved even up into this last book that you mentioned earlier on. My son actually did some of the editing for me and he’s totally grown. He just turned 35.