I'm traveling overseas for work, so I'm going to have to keep this short (for me, anyway). This week's strategy was mentioned on this blog a few weeks ago, on the post dealing with temper tantrums. (If you're new to the blog: WELCOME! You can find the first and second Parenting Challenge here and here).
I have found this method useful for both my kids since they were about 18 months or so. It can work in loads of different contexts… but, as usual, it won't work for all kids, at all ages. For this strategy in particular, I think it would be really helpful for parents to pipe up with their experiences because I find that temperamental differences and our own emotions play a particular large role in how well this works.
The step-by-step discipline strategy comes from the fabulous book, How to Talk so Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids will Talk. It's meant to convey to your child that you understand his FEELINGS, but do not approve of his BEHAVIOUR. Unfortunately, I left my copy at home so I'm hoping I've got the precise sequence here (feel free to correct me, for those of you well-versed in the method). The idea is that when your child begins to melt down, argue, tantrum or otherwise freak the frack out, try the following steps:
(1) When he’s starting to whine/complain (but is NOT tantruming yet), give him words to express what he feels (e.g., "Jonny, you’re feeling so mad that mama won’t let you watch TV! Mad, Mad, MAD!" or "You're really frustrated that no one will listen to you!")
(2) Scrunch up your face and look mad, so he gets that that’s what he looks like and YOU get that that’s what he’s feeling.
(3) Repeat your rule, accepting his feelings, but not his behaviour ("You can only watch TV after dinner; You can be mad at mommy but you can’t throw things/scream, whatever").
(4) Fantasize with him: "You know, I ALSO wish it was TV-watching time. I LOVE watching TV with you O! I wish mommy didn’t have to work, but I can’t WAIT until after dinner when we can watch together."
The idea of trying to empathize, accept and "join" with our child while she's feeling particularly vulnerable and out of control is a fabulous one, I think. For many children, the core reason why they become so upset sometimes has less to do with the surface features (e.g., I want more candy/tv/to push baby etc) and more to do with the frustration of feeling misunderstood or not heard. So these steps are meant to address that core need and, as a result, can work miracles in diffusing a stressful conflict.
As we discussed at length with the Playful Parenting challenge, I think one of the most challenging things about implementing these steps is REMEMBERING to do so when we are frustrated, angry and/or anxious about our child's behaviour. Also, some children feel overwhelmed when they're faced with their parent mirroring their emotions too intensely, so it can be difficult establishing how much is too much "empathizing."
I've gotta run now. I may be less involved in the discussion early on in the week, given my trip, but I'll be checking in regularly and hope, as usual, that you can join in the challenge if it feels right for you and tell us about how it's going in the comments.
I do find this approach to be pretty helpful. I’ve got a fairly laid-back 28 month old, so he may not be the best test subject, but acknowledging his feelings does tend to diffuse situations and make him more amenable to whatever I need him to do.
This is one of the things discussed in Between Parent and Child too I think.
I find it really useful in dealing with my often very intense 3-year-old boy. There are days with about 4 or 5 opportunties to employ this method and it’s the best way that I’ve found so far to handle a tantrum.
Sometimes it nips them in the bud and sometimes it just makes them shorter than they would otherwise have been.
At any rate, I find that I get a lot less angry and frustrated and guilty because by saying that I feel his pain, I literally do start to empathise so there’s a connection between us. We’re kind of on the same side of the fence in a way.
(Okay, got to get back to building a sofa/sheet/blankey cubby house now.)
Flo
I’ve tried this on and off with my now 33-month-old, starting around when he was 18 months. It never works for us! I don’t know if it’s him or me, but it always leads to escalation with him repeating over and over what he wants. “but I want to watch TV now, but I WANT TV NOW” no matter what I say. Ha. Not all strategies can work with every child, I guess.
Not to throw a monkey in the wrench, but what do you do if your kid doesn’t throw tantrums? My 2.5 yr old internalizes everything and so he doesn’t throw tempter tantrums. He seems to be taking everything in stride until smash! crash! boom! he’s had enough and he’s throwing his potty seat down a flight of stairs (in his defense, it was sliding out from underneath him every time he tried to back up onto it from his step.)
I’ve had better luck with this approach for sad, rather than mad. When Pumpkin is mad, and I try this approach, it just seems to escalate things, like @Christy says. But it worked really well for handling the day care drop off meltdowns we went through recently. (“You’re sad Mommy is going. It is OK to be sad. I’m sad that I can’t stay with you, too…”)
We used this method a lot at one point. This is a good method – if you have the time. It may not stop the tantrum, but it generally makes them smaller for us and the most important thing is that it leaves us without that bruised feeling that sometimes lingers after a tantrum. And the tantrums sometimes does not go into full force so that we can talk and communicate with our son through out the whole time.
I did, around 3 1/2 years, find that this tended to make my son’s breakdowns longer though. Like 45 min to 1 hour longer, because that was how long it took my son to get over the insult/disappointment/mood that triggered him, if the only input from me was empathy. He got stuck and also all the attention (I think) made it more rewarding stay in that place. We needed to acknowledge his feelings fairly briefly and then help and coach him to move on. Usually by distracting him. I should probably try again now a year later to see if his coping skills have developed. Well, I will try, now that we have been challenged…
I was afraid that my not-quite-17-month-old would be too young for this one, but it has remarkably worked three times just in the last 24 hours. We’re hooked! I wouldn’t have thought that a kid this age would really understand what I was saying, but you can’t argue with results.
I’ve had the same response as @Christy. Just not working for my child.
Except there have been a handful of times over the last two years when it worked… and @Cloud just nailed it for me! It’s when she is sad but not too upset that it has actually worked!
When she is angry or already starting to get worked up, it just escalates. In fact lately when I try (like yesterday), she screams, “NO!” and “Stop talking to me!” when I try it. I think she prefers to just rage for a while to let all that emotion out. Then either she calms down or gets distracted. But she does NOT want to hear that I understand but am not going to/can’t do anything about it. Ah, my spririted, highly emotional little girl.
Today I said “Hands aren’t for hitting, hands are for hugs and high fives” and my 28 month old looks me in the eye and says “no, hands for hitting” I mean really. I don’t spank him, ever, but he clearly knows what he likes to use his hands for lately. Last night he had a middle of the night tantrum that included purposefully banging his head on the floor while screaming. Honestly, I’m so freaked out by that. There was no talking, no emoting, nothing working until he wore himself out.
I agree with what others have written about the timing of this being critical. With my one ‘persistant’ boy, there’s a spot along the fussy-tantrumming continuum beyond which this just makes things worse. It does work great for avoiding a lot of tantrums, provided I catch the situation early enough.
This doesn’t work for me. I try it a lot, and now get “No sad! No mad!” and her pushing me away. Empathy doesn’t work. Sitting with her and letting the tantrum run its course doesn’t work; things only escalate. Distraction is the ONLY thing that works for us. I sometimes wonder if this is ethical and in her long-term best interest.
@Dr. Confused – How old is your kid? When mine was in the 18 – 24 month range, only distraction worked for her in most cases. Now at almost 3, we are able to also let her just have her tantrum.
I love that I can still use distraction so successfully. He’s so big into not wanting to do or go where ever we need to be going without any real idea of why that it’s just pointless to have a lengthy debate on the merits of my decision. But if I can say – look where is that big fire truck going while I buckle him in his car seat without a fight – I’m going to use that fire truck every time. I have been doing the reflective emotion talk – but he really just gives me funny looks and carries on with his complaint unless I can switch the topic of conversation. I have yet to say “I can see you are mad. I would be mad, too” and have him do anything other than try and hit me or get back to doing what I had stopped him from doing. I don’t think he’s old enough yet. Or I am just a really bad reflective emoter. There is always that possibility.
@Dr. Confused- my experience is a lot like @Caramama’s- in early toddlerhood, only distraction works. At about 2 years old, some other techniques started working sometimes. Now, at almost 3, we’re starting to be able to do some reasoning. Sometimes.
And distraction still works sometimes, and when it works I’m happy to use it, just like @mom2boys! The way I see it, her little brain just isn’t developed enough yet to understand the reasons behind rules, so why expend energy trying to enforce them when there is an easier way?
IMO it really depends on the child. This strategy has always worked for my easy going boy, whereas less with my more intense girl, although now she is 3 plus, we have been having more success with it. I tend to prefer other strategies with her that seem to work faster.
She’s 2yrs 2 months.
It’s just that I read both “Playful Parenting” and “Parent-Effectiveness Training” recently, and both say that distraction is not a good strategy, because it teaches kids that something is wrong with their negative emotions, and that we expect them to move on to positive ones. “Playful Parenting” claims that if you end one tantrum, the child will just find a way to have another one, because they need to get that negative emotion out.
I was very much constrained in my emotional expression as a child, and it has had substantial negative effects on my life.
However, distraction DOES seem to be the one thing that works for us right now, so I’m going to stick with it for a while yet. Maybe the negative effects that the books talk about are what happens when parents persist in using them too long? I don’t know what I’ll do when it stops working. (Current strategy is just keep trying different distractions until the screaming stops).
@Dr. Confused: Great name BTW. Check out tomorrow’s post. Might help.
@Dr. Confused- I think Playful Parenting might be aimed at slightly older kids. But it has been awhile since I read it, so I could be wrong.
My thinking on distraction as a tantrum avoiding technique is this: if I can see the tantrum coming and distract away from it, great. There were no negative emotions at all in that case, so that should be OK, right? Once we’re in the tantrum, I’ll usually try the “Oh. You’re mad! It is OK that you’re mad…” approach, similar to what is outlined in this post. It almost NEVER ends the tantrum, so I don’t spend a lot of time on it, but it makes me feel better to try, because it IS important to me that my daughter learns that all emotions are OK. Then I will try another technique to end the tantrum. I wish I could say I’d found one that works reliably, but I haven’t. Sometimes, the way that we end the tantrum is to distract her. Sometimes, we let the tantrum run its course. Sometimes, there is a “compromise” solution that I can offer, and sometimes she’ll accept it.
I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s post for my ideas, Tracy!
My daughter is 18 months old. I’ve been trying to work this strategy in all week but maybe she’s still a little young. In the meantime, it seems to work as a good distraction technique! For example, sometimes she is strongly opposed to diaper changes so in the midst of her madness, I’ve been trying to tell her calmly that I understand she’d rather play than get a diaper change, but it will only take a minute and then she can play again and in the meantime, would she like to look at the balloon book? She stops crying/whining long enough to listen to me and I think by then she forgets she’s mad. So, hey, it is something!