Parental Development

It seems to be harder and harder for parents to manage their emotions, and this episode talks through why that is and what we can actually do to try to develop skills to manage ourselves when we're triggered and dysregulated.

Most of the time when we lose control and feel dysregulated, it's happening outside of our awareness. So the first step to be able to effectively manage our emotions is to have awareness about what's happening.  Our brains go through the same thing as our kids when we get triggered, and understanding this can allow us more grace to continue to learn how to make changes. Steps to start this process:
1. Notice times you're being triggered - do a debrief
2. Investigate what you're telling yourself about the situation, your child, or yourself
3. Rethink what you actually believe and want to tell yourself 

The actual emotional regulation part requires you to
1. Practice management in relatively peaceful times
2. Tell everyone what you're doing and ask for help
3. Increase interoception - how do you know you're starting to get triggered and how do you know you're starting to calm

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In case you mistakenly thought we've got it all together, this episode will say you straight! We talk through lots of situations that hopefully build a sense of community and an understanding that we're all in this together!

This podcast episode talks through in more detail the concept of guilt and how we can tell if what we're experiencing is actual guilt or something else.

If you want more insight into how to talk to kids about hard things, check out this post on instagram too.

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This episode includes Leah's top 10 tips or suggestions for first time parents, or even second or third time parents.

1. Trust your gut
2. Set boundaries if you need to
3. Each awful stage is just that, a stage 
4. Find support
5. Find time for yourself
6. Let your parenting style evolve 
7. When in doubt, connect 
8. You only have to be good 30% of the time
9. Prepare to do your own work
10. Enjoy it

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Today's a replay because, life. This is one of our most downloaded episodes all about every parent's favorite topic: tantrums

Tantrums can be one of the most challenging things to manage as a parent. They seem to come out of nowhere and can feel almost impossible to stop. This episode talks through some of the science behind tantrums and what parents can do to try to manage them a little better!

It's important to remember that tantrums are a healthy, normal part of a child's development. They allow young children to express their feelings and learn new ways to manage them, even when the behavior that comes with the tantrum is frustrating and overwhelming for us as parents.

To help navigate tantrums a little more effectively:
1. Manage yourself first
2. Don't try to stop it
3. Validate emotions
4. Stay present
5. Hold the boundary

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This episode is part 2 of our discussions about the Shiny Happy People documentary, and goes over the flip side of authority which is blind obedience. 

The idea of obedience pervades our society and is usually the barometer people use to demonstrate the 'goodness' of kids. Kids aren't 'good' just because they do what other people say.

When we tell kids how good or bad they are, we often teach them that if they're bad they lose relationships, they aren't wanted as much, they lose friends, they can't do certain things, or worse. It doesn't give kids room to get better, particularly those who aren't always capable of being 'good' for different reasons, such as ADHD, autism, neurodivergence, stress, hunger, etc.

Kids will believe you if you keep telling them they're 'bad' and adopt that identity. This can impact self-esteem, social skills, and behavior.

How do we define good people, even as adults? We would all have different answers and that's the goal of parenting for us. What makes kids good is only if you obey, which is not how we define it in adulthood. 

Character qualities only develop through work, failure, and experiences. When we only want to make kids obey, we take those opportunities away from them, so they can't develop the character muscles that are so important as they age.

Relying on blind obedience grows kids who always need someone to tell them what to do. This doesn't actually develop them as people, it only teaches them to obey authority and shut down their own thoughts and feelings. 

Obedience is not a character trait! It's behavior.

Misbehavior is actually kids learning how to develop the skills we want them to have. They have to work them out in ways that are hard and disrespectful and challenging. 

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If you've watched the new documentary, Shiny Happy People, then this episode is for you! We talk through the idea of authority and how dangerous it is to teach kids to follow and obey all authority, no matter what.

The idea of authority will always increase the risk of abuse. When we think about how we want our kids to react if they're being abused, including kicking, yelling, biting, sayng no, then we have to help them learn how to react similar ways when they're not being abused.

I will always back my kids up if they feel like they need to challenge someone in authority over them.

Almost all abuse of children is perpetrated by people in authority over them and people they know well. This means kids have to know how to challenge people in authority over them and tell us when something doesn't feel right, no matter who the person is.

When our kids aren't allowed to have an opinion or reaction to a directive being given, they will not be able to learn how to discern what is good or appropriate. This skill has to be taught, and that has to start with challenging our authority and directives as parents.

Parents are squandering the best tool we have to keep kids safe for the sake of obedience. 
Kids have the same ability to feel unsafe around certain people.  Their feelings or uncertainty can come out in lots of different ways - anger, frustration, withdrawal, not wanting to go somewhere, etc. Our job as parents is to listen to them and help them learn to listen to their system and give them control over themselves in those situations.

When it comes to things kids can't communicate clearly, we need to trust their systems and believe they know what is best for them in those moments.

I regularly think about not disrespecting my kids, just like I don't want them to disrespect me. 

Parents would die to keep kids safe; but would you let them tell you 'no'?

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This episode keeps it simple, talking about curfews and how to establish and maintain them for kids as they get older.

How do we establish curfews? Do we set them arbitrarily? What would happen if we just let kids decide when to come home on their own?

What's the purpose of a curfew? To make sure kids get enough sleep? To keep kids safe? To teach them how to make good choices?

Does a curfew really keep kids safe or teach them how to make good decisions? They can get in just as much trouble at 8pm as they can at 1am.

We want to teach kids to make healthy decisions, do the right thing, stand up for what's right, etc. starting when they're young, not only between the ages of 16 and 18 when they need a curfew.

I want my kids to make mistakes while they have the safety net of living at home. 
When our kids turn 18, we automatically control nothing.  If they don't have any freedom for years leading up to that, there's no way they'll know how to navigate the change.

Consider this if you're going to impose a curfew: Try to make it flexible and allow collaboration whenever possible.  Develop the curfew together, based on what everyone thinks is appropriate. Try to say yes as much as possible, instead of looking for ways to say no.

A strict curfew almost always pushes kids to be sneaky, which is where the risk often comes in. Instead focus on ways to help them learn important skills - time management, fighting peer pressure, meeting responibilities, etc.

Kids have curfews for 2 years of their life and will never again. So what's the point? :)

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This episode talks about fear-based parenting and the specific neurobiology of fear. 

Some parents talk about how their kids have "healthy fear" of them, which makes them behave themselves. But really, the only healthy fear is the fear that helps keep us alive.

Brain science teaches us what happens in our brains when we're faced with threat - Can I outrun this? Can I beat this? Then you would fight or flight. If you can't do either of those things to stay alive, then you have to come up with a different plan, which often means simple compliance.

When our brain is triggered by fear, our thinking brain goes offline and regualtion can only happen when it comes back online and can help manage our emotions and behaviors.  

You cannot create fear in a child without initiating their stress response. 

In the beginning of fear-based parenting, your child may try fight or flight first, as their body's stress response has prompted them to try to stay safe through fighting or running away. This often leads parents to dig in and increase fear, punishment, shame, etc. to teach their system that they cannot win the fight or run away. This causes them to shift into a different stress response, which then starts to look like compliance. Parents often think this means the technique is "working," but it's actually a different stress response that they have learned is the best way for them to keep themselves safe.

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How do you talk to you kids about death and dying? What do you do about funerals? How do you help them cope? This episode answers all these questions and more, trying to help us support our kids during really challenging times.

Kids cannot fully understand death and its finality until they are 8 or 9 years old. This makes it difficult for them to process death and react in ways that feel appropriate to us as adults.

To help kids with death:

1. Be completely honest 
2. Don't try to control their response
3. Be prepared for it to take a long time
4. Let them create a memory or memorial
5. Give them choice, whenever possible

You need to be willing to answer all the questions your kids have about death or the person who died. You also need to respect their communication that they cannot tolerate additional information, and understand information may need to be shared in small doses.

Our kids will not have the same reaction to losing a loved one as we do as adults. This is largely based on their level of relationship, how often they see them, how old they are, etc. 

Around here, we would never force a child to attend a funeral if they didn't want to go.
If they are going to go, prep them for what they're going to see - open casket, family, etc. You can come up with a plan for them to leave if they get overwhelmed. 

It's ok to share out emotions with our kids. They can see us crying or upset, and trying to convince them that's not true can be really confusing and make it hard for them to learn to express their own emotions.  Death and Loss cannot be made better. They're hard. Instead of trying to make it go away, we instead can teach them to get through it and find their own way of grieving.

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This episode talks about consequences, which usually means punishment and often doesn't address the actual problem or behavior. People use these words interchangeably, but they actually are very different.

Many people only know two ways to change or manage behavior: rewards or punishment.

We believe that misbehavior is a sign of a need or a missing skill or a desire for connection, which means imposed consequences are not effective in actually fixing any of those problems.

Attempting to impose consequences can very often create a power struggle, because we can only "force" our kids to follow through by using fear, threats, or manipulation. It's important to avoid putting yourself in a position where you can't guarantee cooperation or follow through.

If your goal for imposing consequences is truly to TEACH your kids how to do better, think about how you would teach them to read. If you wouldn't do it to teach them academically, then it probably isn't actually going to teach them how to have better behavior.

There seems to be a group of parents who either think kids always know how to do the right thing, so the consequence has to hurt, which doesn't truly take child development into account. Demanding our kids behave in ways they're not developmentally able to and then punishing them for falling short leads to shame, low self-esteem, guilt, and increased bad behavior.

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