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The Fatherhood Challenge Podcast & Radio ProgramTurning the hearts of the fathers to their children. Author: Jonathan Guerrero
The Fatherhood Challenge is a movement dedicated to encouraging fathers to engage with their children and educate society on the positive impact involved fathers have on their communities and society from generation to generation. Language: en-us Genres: Christianity, Kids & Family, Parenting, Religion & Spirituality Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it Trailer: |
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Beyond the Outburst
Friday, 27 March, 2026
If you match your child’s chaos with your own anger, you’ve just turned the heat up on a house that’s already burning. But if you can master the neurobiology of your own calm, you provide the 'External Regulator' your child’s developing brain desperately needs. Emotional Intelligence isn't about 'being soft'; it’s about having the Tactical Restraint to lead your family out of the fire instead of into it. And my guest is going to give us some language and strategy to do just that.Dr. Gloria Vanderhorst. Dr. Vanderhorst is a psychologist and an expert in the science of human connection. She understands the 'Wiring of the Heart' and how a father’s ability to manage his own emotions is the single greatest predictor of his child’s future resilience.To connect with Dr. Vanderhorst, get her free resource or her book visit: https://drvanderhorst.com/To purchase The Body Keeps the Score, visit: https://a.co/d/0aJEazo1To be a guest on The Fatherhood Challenge visit: https://podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/thefatherhoodchallengeCreate your podcast today! #madeonzencastrhttps://zencastr.com/?via=thefatherhoodchallenge00:04.18Jonathan GuerreroEvery father knows the sound of a household losing its grip. It's the door slam, the high-pitched scream of a toddler, or the heavy, suffocating silence of a teenager who's checked out. In those moments, your biology is designed to respond. Your heart rate climbs, your jaw tightens, and your protector instinct flares up.00:22.74Jonathan GuerreroBut here's the hard truth. In a crisis, you aren't just a witness. You are the thermostat.00:28.75Gloria VanderhorstMm-hmm.00:29.11Jonathan GuerreroIf you match the child's chaos with your own anger, you've just turned the heat up in the house that's already burning. But you can master the neurobiology of your own calm, and you can provide the external regulator that your child's developing brain desperately needs. Emotional intelligence isn't about being soft. It's about having a tactical restraint to lead your family out of the fire instead of into it. And my guest is going to give us some language and strategy some strategy to do just that in just a moment. So don't go anywhere.01:01.78Jonathan Guerreroyou.01:34.89Jonathan GuerreroWhat you find in their role? And it's how society will understand how important the mother's arms, the ability and culture of their family is fired.01:44.88Jonathan GuerreroGreetings everyone! Thank you so much for joining me. My co-host Isaac has the day off today. We are joined by Dr. Gloria Vanderhorst. Dr. Vanderhorst is a psychologist and an expert in the science of human connection. She understands the wiring of the heart and how a father's ability to manage his own emotions is the single greatest predictor of his child's future's resilience.02:07.10Jonathan GuerreroDr. Vanderhorst, welcome to the Fatherhood Challenge.02:10.58Gloria VanderhorstThank you very much. I'm excited about being here and having this conversation.02:17.16Jonathan GuerreroDr. Vanderhorse, how in the world did you get interested in the science of human connection and working with boys and helping boys and dads learn emotional language? What's your story?02:28.18Gloria VanderhorstOh, it's a fascinating story. I was a professor. With tenure, I could have stayed at the college level and kind of coasted, but I decided i wanted to do more hands-on work.02:46.87Gloria VanderhorstAnd so I started doing evaluations for another psychologist in private practice. And she went on a sabbatical. I took over her practice completely.02:59.13Gloria Vanderhorstand then decided that I would leave academics and start my own private practice. I had a friend who ran a preschool. And so when I started my private practice, she naturally referred preschool students to me for evaluations as necessary.03:20.63Gloria VanderhorstAnd all of those were boys. Amazing. Boys in preschool stand out to preschool teachers because the preschool teachers are female and they really don't understand what is happening with preschool boys. And so they label their energy as perhaps a sign of attention deficit.03:47.19Gloria VanderhorstAnd so I got to evaluate lots of preschool boys. And then the preschool boys' fathers decided to put themselves on my calendar.04:00.44Gloria VanderhorstAnd I got pickled in understanding what life is like for boys and men in this society. And it was a great lesson.04:12.98Jonathan GuerreroOh, what a powerful story. Well, let's dive right in. When a kid starts screaming or a teenager rolls their eyes, a dad's fight or flight response often kicks in instantly.04:25.05Jonathan GuerreroWhat is actually happening in his brain in those seconds? And how does a dad, how does he retake the command center before he speaks?04:33.35Gloria VanderhorstI think what's really happening is fear because we rob boys and men of access to the full range of feeling states.04:47.29Gloria VanderhorstSo when their middle schooler, goes on a rampage, when their teenager, uh, confronts them and talks back, the immediate reaction is to be shocked and not know what to do.05:07.10Gloria VanderhorstSo when I'm shocked, I'm either going to increase my energy and try to take control, or I'm going to decrease my energy and disappear.05:21.33Gloria VanderhorstSo most dads do number one, they increase their energy and make an effort to take control over the situation. But they're doing that on impulse rather than taking a breath, counting a beat or two and reflecting on. So what's happening with this teenage boy here in front of me, who's just gone ballistic.05:48.82Gloria VanderhorstIf you can give yourself an opportunity to do the analysis first, before you jump into responding, Then you have an opportunity to connect with your teenager.06:02.39Gloria VanderhorstIf you just respond, you will distance that teenager. And that's not healthy for either one of you because the teenager is acting out because he wants connection.06:16.60Gloria VanderhorstHe wants to be able to be understood and to get help from you.06:26.32Jonathan GuerreroSo it sounds like what's really going on is that teenager has a desperate need to empty and they're just looking for somebody, specifically you, I guess they chose you to empty themselves to.06:39.86Jonathan GuerreroAnd that's really what they're wanting. Does that sound correct?06:43.77Gloria VanderhorstOh, that's a great description. All right. That here's your teenage son just filled with something. All right. It could be filled with irritation about something that happened with a peer.06:58.58Gloria VanderhorstIt could be filled with fear about what's going to happen in the next stage of his life, but he is full of something needs to empty it. And you have to be a safe receptacle to receive whatever is happening with that teenager. And too often, fathers respond on impulse to take power over the teenager rather than to invite the teenager to disclose more and make a safe container for that teenager to dump.07:37.69Gloria Vanderhorstwhatever he's wrestling with. And he's certainly wrestling with something.07:43.26Jonathan GuerreroI can relate to this, I think, because in the times when my kids have had to dump, I've always, not always, but a lot of times I've taken it personally, especially if I'm any way related to what they're talking about.07:58.71Jonathan GuerreroIt gets taken personally. And so my response ends up being a defensive response, which is the very thing they're scared of.08:07.74Gloria Vanderhorstokay It makes perfect sense, right? Because typically what your teenager is going to dump is something that you experienced when you were a teenager.08:20.70Gloria VanderhorstYou had the same fear base, right? You had the same reactions as a teenager. And typically, right, as adults, we don't want to go back and visit those times, right?08:35.61Jonathan GuerreroNope.08:36.47Gloria Vanderhorstour Our teen years were naturally right full of angst, ups, downs. It's the time in our lives that we experiment with different parts of our personality.08:50.07Gloria VanderhorstAnd so we don't really like being reminded. or pulled back into that stage of life, but your teenager needs you to connect, to be reminded, to go back to that stage of life and have empathy and curiosity. Often we miss having curiosity with our teenagers, particularly with our teenage boys, because we have this expectation that a boy should be able to solve the problem, move forward and not need assistance of any kind. We do our boys a real disservice.09:37.31Jonathan GuerreroAnd when they need us to go back to, say, our teenage years, are they just wanting us to go back internally ourselves just for the sake of being able to empathize?09:42.34Gloria VanderhorstMm-hmm.09:49.18Jonathan GuerreroOr are they wanting us to share those experiences with them?09:54.08Gloria VanderhorstI think both things are possible, but I would tell you they are not wanting to hear your story before you hear their story.10:04.79Gloria VanderhorstSo empathy trumps sharing. And empathy is sometimes very hard for fathers to generate. If you really look at the development of boys in this culture, we don't offer empathy to our boys as easily as we offer it to our girls.10:29.94Gloria VanderhorstSo frequently they have just been shut down or given directions on how to manage their feeling states, but no one has really been curious and interested in sitting down and hearing more of what's happening with their feelings because culturally we train our boys really not to have feelings.10:59.45Gloria VanderhorstThey're allowed to be angry, irritated, anything that falls into that bucket, but they're not allowed the full range of emotions. They can't be sad. They can't be tender.11:14.01Gloria VanderhorstThey can't be needy. They should be brave. They should be strong so they can be angry or frustrated, but not other emotions.11:24.80Jonathan GuerreroOh, wow, you hitting on some truth because that plays itself out well into adulthood. And it's probably why so many men are messed up.11:39.38Gloria VanderhorstIt's right on target. Our jails are full of men. And not women. Why do you suppose that is?11:48.37Jonathan GuerreroUnresolved issues from the history that nobody wants to go back and visit.11:53.05Gloria VanderhorstYes, that's absolutely right. We do not give men the opportunity to process their emotional experiences when they have them.12:05.02Gloria Vanderhorstor when they reflect on them, we are not interested in helping our boys and men process feeling states.12:16.02Gloria VanderhorstSo they swallow them, they hold them in their bodies. They also die younger because of that. They develop lots of physical problems because of that. We train our boys very early on to deny their feelings.12:34.71Jonathan GuerreroInteresting you said that some of that is stored in the body.12:39.05Gloria VanderhorstMm-hmm. Mm-hmm.12:39.35Jonathan GuerreroFor example, i in my own experience, like I remember as a kid, part of my discipline or whatever, if I got out of line or got rambunctious or anything, is i would they would grab me were around the back of my neck, around the shoulders really hard and squeeze.12:57.02Gloria Vanderhorstokay12:57.30Jonathan GuerreroAnd so to this day, I have a lot of tension that will flare up in that exact spot. Is that what we're talking about?13:05.82Gloria VanderhorstThat's exactly what we're talking about. That makes perfect sense, right? Your body holds so much information about the interactions that we've had with everyone. And when we train our boys not to cry, right, they still are human beings. So they have experience of sadness. But if those tears cannot come out my eyes and run down my cheeks, they have to go someplace.13:38.14Gloria VanderhorstI have a great story to tell you. One kindergarten age boy that I worked with was in a situation where his parents were divorced. He moved back and forth between these two houses and he was constantly acting out in each house. He just had no comfort in either place.14:00.57Gloria VanderhorstSo working with him through several sessions, we came to the point that he started to talk about this anger that he had. And I asked him, you know, you're, why don't you ever cry about all of this?14:19.32Gloria VanderhorstAnd he gave me the most elaborate description. He said, i have tears. But my tears go down my throat into my tummy.14:31.03Gloria VanderhorstThey turn into rocks and then they come back out and they come into my hands and I just throw them around the room. Well, that was a perfect description of what happens when you suppress an emotion.14:48.89Gloria VanderhorstIt's going to go somewhere, right? It's either going to come out as rocks you throw around the room, anger at everyone else, or it's going to affect your body. So a tummy full of rocks is not comfortable at all.15:09.27Gloria VanderhorstSo you end up with bodily symptoms as a male because you hold on. to these feelings states rather than sharing them.15:21.43Jonathan GuerreroThank you for sharing that story. I think that child is really emotionally bright.15:26.90Gloria VanderhorstTruly.15:28.81Jonathan Guerreroyou know how hard it would be for most people to describe that in language?15:32.89Gloria Vanderhorsti know it was fascinating. I was thrilled to get his description.15:39.54Jonathan GuerreroYou mentioned that a child's brain isn't fully wired to calm itself down yet. How does a dad's calm presence literally act as an external hard drive for this child for his child's developing nervous system?15:52.11Gloria VanderhorstThat's a great question. And it's so hard for a father to be that external calming influence.16:03.09Gloria VanderhorstThey've been trained. the same way that their little boy or teenager has been trained to suppress emotion. And when you pack something in tight and push it down and push it down and push it down, it's gonna have a natural resistance to that.16:25.11Gloria VanderhorstSo it's not surprising that boys and men end up with explosives acting out forms. of anger. They have not been allowed to develop any other process for managing their feeling states.16:44.44Gloria VanderhorstSo when your son dysregulated and you meet that with dysregulation, there's going to be a huge conflict.16:56.86Gloria VanderhorstThe task for fathers is to understand how they have been trained and make a significant turnaround.17:09.56Gloria VanderhorstBe able to identify their feelings, put words to them so they can help their sons increase their own emotional vocabulary. And then you can problem solve.17:26.74Gloria VanderhorstIf I can identify what I'm feeling and share it with someone else, there's first immediate relief because I've identified it. If I can label it, I can own it.17:39.96Gloria VanderhorstSo there's immediate relief in identifying it. And then when I share it with someone else, I can problem solve because we're born connected to another human being.17:53.40Gloria VanderhorstWe seek connection all throughout our lives and we are stronger and healthier when we are connected to another human being. So we problem solve in tandem, not in isolation.18:09.55Jonathan GuerreroI think a lot of dads worry that if they validate a child's big emotions that they're actually being soft or they're agreeing with the bad behavior, if that's what the whole discussion is about.18:21.18Jonathan GuerreroBut when you validate that feeling, then what you're really communicating to the child is that, or the teenager, is that they are respected. And then when they feel respected and they're emptied,18:36.28Jonathan Guerreroall of a sudden they become more open to whatever it is that you have to say does that sound correct18:42.59Gloria VanderhorstOh, that's right on target. And the ridiculous piece about this is that we treat boys and girls very differently. Father interacting with daughter gives her much more permission to be emotional and to express a range of emotions.19:03.64Gloria VanderhorstBut father interacting with son will shut him down pretty quickly. either with his own language or with his body posture and facial expression.19:18.58Gloria VanderhorstSo we train boys very early to avoid the full range of emotion. So as an adult male, you're uncomfortable with that full range. You want to shut it down as fast as possible. And that's the absolute opposite of what your teenage son needs.19:41.66Gloria VanderhorstHe needs to be able to explore his feelings. He needs you to be a safe container for that. And not to get agitated or try to shut him down. You want to invite more of his feeling state, not diminish it.20:02.63Jonathan GuerreroI think one of the most effective verbiage or languages that I use or phrasing that I use is, well, no wonder you said or you did that.20:14.65Jonathan GuerreroYou actually make a lot of sense. And then there's this look of shock on their face when I say that.20:21.41Gloria VanderhorstMm-hmm that's fabulous, right? That's a great invitation for safety. You've just made it really safe, right? Even the simple, you know, I can understand why you did that is safety and your child needs safety in order to explore themselves. And you have to be the safe container.20:46.87Jonathan GuerreroSo we all lose it once in a while. When a dad loses his cool and he breaks that connection, what is the neurobiological moral biological importance of the repair or the apology? Does it actually make the bondn the bond stronger?21:01.69Gloria VanderhorstIt does. It's very important that we offer repair. We're in relationship. We thrive in relationship. If we are isolated, we actually get sick.21:17.72Gloria VanderhorstWe actually have difficulty.21:18.86Jonathan GuerreroOkay.21:21.18Gloria VanderhorstAnd if we're completely isolated, it's really difficult for a human being to survive in isolation. So it's very important to validate your son's feelings, to be accessible and set aside the time, right? That message from father is, you know, I'm here as long as you need. All right. So if you want to be silent for a while, that'll be fine for me too.21:51.58Gloria VanderhorstBut we're eventually going to be able to process what you're experiencing.21:59.56Jonathan GuerreroHow do the same emotional intelligence skills, excuse me, how are the same emotional intelligence skills used to de-escalate a crying child to translate? how does that How does that translate into leading a high pressure team or negotiating a business deal?22:18.03Gloria VanderhorstThere's a strong parallel. If you think about it, right? Your toddler is melting down. All right. Do you run from the room?22:29.56Gloria VanderhorstNo. Do you send the toddler from the room? no You stay present. You provide yourself as a sense of safety. Nobody's running away.22:44.57Gloria Vanderhorstright. And nobody's invading you when you're dysregulated, but there's a safe container that is presented because I am present.22:58.78Gloria VanderhorstAnd if you can stay present, I talked with a father just a few days ago about a special needs child who would melt down in the grocery store.23:11.35Gloria VanderhorstAnd of course that's embarrassing, right? But my recommendation was, okay, when your child begins to melt down in the grocery store, all right, set your cart aside, sit down on the floor.23:25.72Gloria VanderhorstGet down to the level of that child. So the same thing is true with your teenager. Be in eye contact with that person.23:40.55Gloria VanderhorstDon't tower over them. Don't send them away. But be present at the same level with them. And then breathe.23:52.89Gloria VanderhorstTake your time. Your physical presence has power. It sends a message of safety. You want to be a safe container for your teenager's distress.24:08.06Gloria VanderhorstAnd you you do that with your body by being present and being at their level. You're not standing over. You're not sending them away. You're physically present creates the safety that they need to start to describe what their experience has been and why they're dysregulated.24:34.19Jonathan GuerreroI think in my experience working in the corporate environment, I don't remember seeing anyone do that.24:41.30Gloria Vanderhorstah Probably not. But it.24:45.46Jonathan GuerreroImagine you what an impact it would do in your environment if you were the first to do that.24:50.01Gloria VanderhorstRight. And it's so powerful, right? When we are on the same level as our child, we have offered connection to them. We've offered safety to them.25:06.04Gloria VanderhorstAnd how many times have you kind of seen in films or in real life, right? The father towering over the child in order to communicate or to deliver discipline rather than being on their level as a means of saying, all right, I'm curious, I'm interested, you're obviously in distress and there's a story here.25:34.20Gloria Vanderhorsti need the whole story. And that may take time. That may take more than one interaction with that child to create safety so that they can tell the full story of what's been happening for them that has them so dysregulated.25:55.23Jonathan GuerreroSo if a dad treats this as an emotional investment and a legacy, and if a father commits to being the emotional anchor today, what does that do for his child's mental health and relationship success 20 years from now?26:03.84Gloria VanderhorstMm-hmm.26:09.89Gloria VanderhorstLong term, it is a healthier child and they are healthier as an adult. They will be able to facilitate similar experiences for their children.26:25.34Gloria VanderhorstAnd it gives men and boys in particular permission to explore the full range of feeling states.26:36.63Gloria VanderhorstYou have said to that child, whatever you're feeling, I'm in attention. I want to know, i want to understand, i want to come alongside of you and walk through this process with you so that I have similar view of what happened for you and I really know what you're feeling.26:53.56Jonathan GuerreroDo27:05.17Jonathan Guerreroyou mind if I go off the rails a little bit on this?27:07.83Gloria VanderhorstSure, go.27:09.40Jonathan GuerreroSo what is the connection between a dad who, let's say, practices these skills early in the child's life? How would that be linked to the child's physiological health? Like, for example, would that have any connection to a reduction in the child's risk of developing high blood pressure or some autoimmune disease?27:33.53Gloria VanderhorstAll right. so you're not off the charts at all. You're right on target. The body keeps the score. Bessel van der Cox famous book describes in great detail how important.27:49.02Gloria VanderhorstIt is to understand the connection between emotion and physiology. If I hold feelings in my body, parts of my body are going to start to break down.28:04.06Gloria VanderhorstAll right. The classic heart attack, right? Because I never disclose any feeling of stomach problems that develop arthritis that develops. There's a great study done by a group of therapists in internal family systems where they took a group of women that had arthritis symptoms.28:32.76Gloria VanderhorstUm, and they put them through a process of therapy where they had the opportunity to disclose and process the stressors in their lives and the arthritis began to heal.28:53.85Gloria VanderhorstSo we know that emotion and body are really interconnected. And if we hold emotion in our bodies, we are going to get sick.29:10.18Gloria VanderhorstIt's just classic. And men hold emotion in their bodies all the time. They die younger than women because they hold emotion in their bodies and it leads to the breakdown of systems internally.29:34.49Jonathan GuerreroSo now you've saved the best for last. Your recent book, Read, Reflect, Respond, The Three R's of Growth and Change, was written specifically to help adults examine their histories and grow into the present.29:46.87Jonathan GuerreroWhy do dads have to know their parts and to get to know every version of themselves through their life's history?29:54.92Gloria VanderhorstIt's powerful to understand the history that you have experienced emotionally because emotions either will get talked about or they will get held in your body and your brain stores every experience you have ever had.30:22.62Gloria VanderhorstNow people think, well, that's kind of maybe ridiculous or that's hard to believe, but I know that your brain holds every experience. So there's evidence that we even have memories in utero from the last trimester because your brain is working.30:47.70Gloria Vanderhorstand storing information in the last trimester, but definitely from birth forward, your brain holds on to every experience that you have ever had.31:00.79Gloria VanderhorstAnd if you can tap into that, then you can heal and educate yourself. But the early memories are not stored in terms of language and most journal books have lines for you to write responses to the stimulating questions or essays that are in the book.31:27.51Gloria VanderhorstThis journal book has blank pages. It has a couple of stimulating questions at the top of the blank page, but intentionally the page blank.31:39.16Gloria Vanderhorstso that you can tap into the earliest memories that are stored in your brain by either drawing, scribbling. i mean You can write words, of course. I'm not going restrict you from writing language, but you can tap into early storage, and that's really the beginning stage of the types of reactions that you engage in as an adult.32:13.23Gloria VanderhorstThere's tons of information stored from infancy, toddler, before you start to talk. You've had a history of interactions with other people, and you have learned what the culture expects of you.32:33.18Gloria Vanderhorstand you need to be able to access that information. So this journal book lets you access that early information and heal from the things that you've been told or treated in ways that have restricted you.32:52.63Jonathan GuerreroHow can dads get your free therapy guide, find your resources, or connect with you for help?32:58.39Gloria VanderhorstThey can go to my website. And the website is So it's www.drvanderhorst.com. And the first thing that I would love everyone to do Is to download the feeling sheet. There's a feelings sheet on my website that you can download and print out. It's three or four pages, three or four columns on each page. It has hundreds of feeling words.33:34.52Gloria VanderhorstAnd that lovely thing about our brain. is that our brains can recognize the feeling that we're experiencing in a situation. So if you scan through that list of feelings, the experience that you're having will just leap off the page.33:53.50Gloria VanderhorstBut you could not have generated that feeling word on your own. You need help because we've shut off your access to feelings, but you still have the capability of finding and labeling that feeling. So download the feeling sheet for sure.34:14.65Gloria VanderhorstAnd you can also use the website to book time. And there are tons of resources on my website.34:22.55Jonathan GuerreroAnd just to make things easier, if you go to thefatherhoodchallenge.com, that's thefatherhoodchallenge.com. If you go to this episode and you're looking for the episode called Beyond the Outburst, Beyond the Outburst, go to that episode, look right below the episode description, and I will have the link that Dr. Vanderhorst just mentioned posted right there for your convenience.34:47.00Jonathan GuerreroDr. Vanderhorst, as we close, what is your challenge to dads listening now?34:52.50Gloria VanderhorstMy challenge is to be curious about yourself. Every male out there has been shut off from their feeling states.35:06.81Gloria VanderhorstYou are limited and that limitation can easily be removed. Start with a journal book.35:17.46Gloria VanderhorstEngage yourself in reading, engage yourself in therapy and discover the person that you were designed to be.35:28.71Jonathan GuerreroWe have had an amazing and insightful conversation with Dr. Gloria Vanderhorst, and the lesson is clear. You cannot lead a family. You cannot regulate. Being a durable dad isn't about being a man of stone.35:41.45Jonathan GuerreroIt's about being a man of stability.35:43.54Gloria Vanderhorstbut35:43.45Jonathan GuerreroWhen the world your living room gets loud, Your family needs you to look needs to look at you and see an anchor, not another wave. Your calm is the greatest gift you can give your children because it teaches them that they are safe even when their emotions are big.35:59.80Jonathan GuerreroTonight, when the temperature rises in your home, remember that you are thermostat. Take the tactical pause. lead your heart Lead your own heart first and your family will follow.36:11.61Jonathan GuerreroA huge thank you to Dr. Gloria Vanderhorst for providing the parental prescription that we all need. You can find more of her work and resources at drvanderhorst.com or just go to thefatherhoodchallenge.com and look right below the episode description.36:26.30Jonathan GuerreroUntil next time, stay durable, stay regulated, and remember that your greatest strength is your ability to remain unshakable. We will see you in the next episode.
