Helping Parents Handle Feelings in Crisis

This fall, a Hand in Hand parent joined a parent co-op nursery school, where parents have built relationships with each other over several years. At a parent meeting early in the school year, it was announced that one of the fathers in the co-op had cancer and that his condition was grave. Here is this parent’s account of what happened:

I sat back to listen and observe how the news had deeply affected the group. There were tears of compassion and shock. Then almost immediately, tears were wiped away and the group sprang into action. The room was abuzz with questions, suggestions, offers of help, brainstorming all the ways that people could assist–playdates for the boys, dinners, errands, grocery shopping. It was truly amazing. Being brand new to the school I was in awe of the sense of community these families had nurtured, the deep caring, the honed skills of organizing and pooling resources, the generosity of time.

Given that all but one of the parents present were women, I was not surprised by the deeply instilled, unspoken, almost instinctive expectation of ourselves to put aside our own feelings and needs, and FIRST offer help to someone in greater need. Feeling terrified and completely overtaken by an even bigger need to speak out, I raised my hand and suggested we partner up and each take five minutes to talk about and acknowledge how WE were feeling. My suggestion was heard and overruled by further urgent organizing and clarification. I just couldn’t let it rest, so I spoke up once again. I said that we were all personally affected in some way by the news. I said I thought it was important to notice our own feelings so that we could continue to think well about ourselves and this family, and still have some attention to give to our children when the meeting was over.

So we did–with excellent results and lots of gratitude for the suggestion. We emerged feeling relieved, acknowledged, and able to move on to the next topic. Before leaving that day, I talked with the teacher about incorporating a listening exchange at the beginning. of each of our monthly meetings. She gladly agreed and asked if I would facilitate the listening time. I felt very scared and vulnerable for having exposed myself, because I was a newcomer to the group. But it had obviously gone well, and I can do some listening time to take care of those worries.

 

A Big Cry then a “Big Red Truck”

My son was just a little over one year old. He was used to being latched to me, having me always right there next to him. I was lying down with him while he was napping, but got up to do something in the living room.  He woke up without me right there, and he was furious!

I came to him, held him, and listened to his feelings for about 45 minutes, until he felt better. Immediately after that, he said his first sentence!  Until then, he had been putting at most two words together.  He said very clearly, “That’s a big red truck.”  This was directly after crying for 45 minutes.  He cried hard, he came out of it a completely calm child, and then, out came this perfect sentence!  To me, this is proof that crying helped his mind make a big leap in language skill.

 — A mom in San Bruno, California

 

Special Time Teaches Me About My Son

Easter Sunday I had a chance to do Special Time with my 14-year-old. First we went to church, and he did his play in church and I was there. After church, we just did what he wanted. We went out to the marina, and walked the pier. This was what he wanted to do.

I very seldom get a chance to do this kind of thing because my husband is the one who normally does these things with him. So we walked the pier. My son realized that we had fishing poles in the car, and he said he wanted to get his fishing pole. So we had to drive back to town to get some bait. These are things I would normally get frustrated with! I’m the type of person that, if you are going somewhere, you have to have everything you need — I’m not going to take you back and forth! But I didn’t find myself frustrated that day, I was very calm. I was actually enjoying it.

We got back to the pier. I wanted to fish, once I was out there with him. But then came the worm thing! I never handle worms, never put them on the hook. But he was saying, “Now, Mom, you’re going to learn how to put that worm on the hook. You have to do it yourself. That’s the only way you’re going to learn how to do it. I’m not doing it for you!” And I said, “You aren’t?”

So I asked this gentleman, “Could you put this worm on the hook for me?” And my son came up and said, “Sir, I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t do that for my Mom, she needs to learn to do it herself.” Can you imagine! And I found myself looking at this man, thinking, “Come on, I’m the parent, here!” But he told me, “No, I won’t.” I was getting ready to go ask another guy there to help me with the worm, when my son and both of these guys started talking in Spanish. My son speaks fluent Spanish. Now both of the men were saying, “No, Mamacita!” and I felt kind of outnumbered! It was amazing to see how my son took charge.

I can’t speak Spanish, but he can, and he and these guys were having a really good time. I asked him, “What are you saying?” and he said, “Well, you don’t really need to know, Mom.” And I thought, “Well, maybe it’s a male-to-male conversation, and I don’t need to know. Just because I’m the Mom, I don’t need to know everything.”

I finally got the worm on the hook, and we sat there, and we fished, and he caught two fish. He was OK with that. I really enjoyed taking that time with him. We got a chance to talk. He got a chance to tell me how he’s really feeling about me and about him growing up and the role I’m playing in his growing up. He made me see that I am too hard on him. He does need some loosening up from me in order to explore life for himself. He’s going to make some mistakes, and I need to allow him to make those mistakes.

That whole day, his dimple was as deep as it gets, he was smiling so big. He felt free — I could tell by the look on his face, he felt at peace. “I’m doing whatever I want to do, and she’s gonna do whatever I say.” But it wasn’t in a bad way. It was like, “I finally have got her to myself, I finally have her attention!” I could tell it felt really good to him, telling Mom what to do, and telling other people what he thought, also.

I’m the type of person who basically takes over with her kids. Not that I intend to boss them around, but I don’t always treat them like they’re human beings. They need some kind of control over their own lives. I was able to see this after that day.

So I started this week, as opposed to making him stay in the house, letting him ride his bike to the San Leandro Marina with his friends. I was on pins and needles the whole time. We had a plan. I told him, “Son, you can go. But you need to check in. Check in every hour, just say ‘I’m OK.’ Even if I’m not home, I want you to leave a message on the answering machine, to tell me how you are. I check those messages.”

He followed that direction. Every hour, he checked in–he was gone for four hours. “Mom, I’m OK — I’m at Round Table Pizza, and then we’re going to go back over to the Marina.” He let me know where he was every hour on the hour. I appreciated that. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I have been worried, thinking, “This kid is going to get out there and go crazy, like boys do!” But he didn’t.

He even stopped by the 99 Cent Store on the way home, and he knows I love little figurines. He bought me a little figurine, a music box. He was doing his thing, but he was thinking about me, too. It made me feel really good that I could trust him. I know I can trust him now, as opposed to not giving him that chance to see if I can trust him. He knows how to follow directions. That was a relief for me–a big step. We got through it OK.

So we’re going to spend a day a week, just me and him. And we’re going to do whatever he wants to do, within reason. He does need me, and I saw this. He has been on me, hugging me and kissing me and all this week. He was the kid who would say, “No kisses!” but all this week, he’s been hugging and clinging to me, and saying, “Mom, I love you, you know.” It’s not often that he says this, and he’s been smiling so big. We’ve been close, you know, but we’re going to be really close.

— a mother in Oakland, CA

 

Offering Reassurance

When a child bursts into tears or a tantrum, his perspective on the world has momentarily shattered. His mind can no longer take in information—he can’t make sense of anything. Hurt has flashed, big and hot, and his life feels broken. Every cry has its own particular feel, its own unique emotional tenor. We can’t know precisely what our children feel during these emotional moments, but it’s clear that these moments feel dire.

Click here to read more of this article by Patty Wipfler, September 2009 column for “The Connected Parent” at Cleverparents.com

You can access more of Patty’s articles at Clever Parents.

 

Playlistening to Address Sibling Issues

Recently in our family we’ve had a new baby. That’s brought all sorts of adjustments, of course, for my son. There are a few “playlistening” ideas that have been helpful, that others may find useful too:

1) Morning Special Time
There always seems to be so much that HAS to be done in the morning: getting dressed, getting food made, visiting the bathroom, changing diapers, getting ready for the day. Most of those, of course, are my agenda items, not my son’s. What really helps us is to have a short, 5 minute “Morning Special Time” that includes the baby, to start the day. Anything can wait five minutes before I get to it. And spending even that minimal time together enables my son to play on his own afterwards while I get the day going.”

2) Throw the Animals
We have a copious stuffed animal collection. One of the games that my son can identify as being helpful to do when he is mad is to throw the animals down the stairs. I stand at the bottom (I can do this with the baby in my arms) and throw them back up, being bewildered, of course, about how they keep coming back down. He laughs and laughs.”

3) Push Mom
We can’t do this when my son is actively angry, but it is great when I know that he is building up a number of frustrations. I sit on the bed (I can do this one holding the baby, too. The baby thinks it’s very fun), and my son stands at the far end of the room. Then I say, in as snotty and preachy a voice as I can, something like ‘Time to go to bed, Son’ or ‘Be quiet, don’t wake the baby.’ I keep repeating this while my son runs at me, and pushes me backwards onto the bed. Then there’s laughter, and it’s back to the starting gate to do it again–and again and again. Sometimes he feeds me my lines. I ask him what he’s mad at me about today. Often he prefers if I think of what to say on my own–I think it’s affirmation that I know that there are really annoying things that I say or do. Hopefully I never really say some of the lines that we use in this game, but overstating them and hamming them up seems to be part of the fun.”

— A mother in Winnipeg, Canada

* Playlistening is a way of playing with a child so that the adult takes the less powerful role in play. Children release lots of tension in their laughter as they get to be “swifter,” “stronger,” “smarter,” “in-the-know,” and the play helps them feel closer to the adult playing with them, and more excited about being themselves. For more information, please refer to our series of booklets titled Listening to Children.

 

A Grandma Listens

One of our teachers is a grandma. Her daughter’s family is staying with her for a month, with their two young children. Their three-year-old had a huge, screaming tantrum that went on for about 45 minutes last week. Her Daddy was with her, and our teacher as well.

The Daddy was trying to talk his daughter out of the tantrum, but our teacher kept gently reminding him that this was exactly what his little girl needed to do, and that she was smart to work on her feelings so vigorously. Both of them stayed with her, one happy that she was getting good work done, the other not so happy that all this commotion and unreasonableness was taking place.

The little girl finally quieted down and was sitting, thinking. Our teacher gently reminded her of the incident that had set her off, thinking that maybe she had more feelings to eject about it. But the little girl didn’t answer, so our teacher said, “Sweetie, here I am. Can you take a look at me and at your Daddy? We are here with you.” She looked long into her grandma’s eyes, then into her Daddy’s eyes, brightened up, and said, “Hello, everybody!” Then she ran off to play. She slept two hours longer that night than usual, and was a dream to be with the next day.

 

One Dad Supports Another

I have a friend I work with who has a little toddler. He came to me the other day, and he said, “You know, my son is driving me absolutely crazy. He whines and whines and I just go up the wall. Sometimes I have to leave the room, ’cause I don’t want to hurt him and I’m going nuts. I just leave him alone when he does that.”

My friend went on and on for a long time about how his son whined and how hard it was on him. I just listened to him. He was really wound up. I listened a long time. I told him what a good father he is, and that I could see how much he really cares about Ronnie and thinks about him. I told him I really respect him as a father. I do. He’s a great dad.

Then, I said, “You know, what I’ve figured out is that when my son whines, he has something to say to me and he can’t quite say it. He’s either got something that he’s hurt or scared about, or he’s going through a developmental stage, and he can’t quite do what he wants to do yet, and it’s bugging him. I found that if I really listen to him, he’ll find a way to tell me what the trouble is.” That’s all I said.

Today my friend came up to me. He was really happy. He said, “You know, you were right! If you listen, they tell you! My son started whining again a few nights ago, and I went over to him and I said, ‘I’m sorry that I haven’t been listening to you. You’ve been trying to tell me something, and I wasn’t listening very well. But now I can. What is it you want to tell me? What’s making you unhappy?’”

I was thinking to myself, “Now, you don’t talk that way to a little toddler, my friend got it all wrong!” but actually, my friend was right. He said, “After I said this I just kept looking at him and he said, ‘Yeah, Daddy,’ and he gave me a good push on the shoulder. I fell down, and we started wrestling. He laughed and we had a great time, wrestling all over the house for, I don’t know, an hour. Then he started running into the room and throwing up his hands, going ‘Ooooh! Daddy scary!’ and laughing and running away, then he’d find his mom and go ‘Ohhh, Mommy scary!’ and laugh and scream and run away from her. We were all over the place. And you know what? We had been having a lot of trouble potty training him, and after that night, he’s been doing it perfectly! He really was working on something!”

–a dad in Redwood City, CA.

 

A Teacher Reaches Out

Two weeks ago, I saw a 1st grader crying out on the playground. He was really wailing.  I had seen him many times last year crying and was unable to interact with him, but this time I was in the right place at the right time, so I went up and stood next to him.  I asked what was wrong and he wailed, “I want my mom!”  I said, “I’m here” and put my arm around him and just stood there.  His 3rd grade brother stood a few feet away shifting nervously around as balls and running classmates whizzed past us. 

The little brother continued to cry vigorously, with lots of tears, clearly feeling a lot of grief. I thought about Hand in Hand and the tool of StayListening and just stayed close.  When he  would quiet down a bit, I would say,”You missed your mom this morning?” and that would get him started again.  Since I had about 30 minutes, I wanted to push him towards that grief with my supportive arm around him. 

 That happened a couple of times and as it did, I kept watching the older brother grow more and more uncomfortable.  I knew I couldn’t leave him out dangling alone with his own feelings so I asked him to come closer and when he did, the little brother began to cry even louder and I was able to put my hand on the older brother’s shoulder.  That then sparked the older brother to put his face in his hands and he began to cry.  I just told them both that I was there for them and that it was okay to cry. 

Well, the bell rang and both boys didn’t move a muscle, but just continued crying.  So, realizing they probably needed some connection time, I invited both of them to come to my room at recess and we could hang out a bit.  Boy, kids are resilient, adapatable creatures because in a matter of seconds, they pulled themselves together and were walking, albeit not necessarily with a skip in their step but at least not in a heap, to their classes.

Well, that was 2 weeks ago and almost every day one of those brothers comes to play.  I try to do PlayListening during our Special Time by allowing them to choose what they will play, most often a board game, and then I purposely lose a game or protest vigorously when they are winning.   Mostly the older brother comes.  I think he needs support being the support for his younger brother.  Now, when they see me, the smiles on their faces make having to work and leave my own child behind (maybe I need some listening time on this because the tears just began) worth it.

I will continue to have faith in teachers, whatever system they teach in and do the important work of spreading word of these tools to anyone who listens.    Our children, and those of others, are worth it as well as the joy of really connecting with another human.

- A Teacher in Torrance, California

 

Free Teleseminar: Setting Limits with Laughter

You can set limits with the warmth and the authority children need and still have fun in the process! Join us for this free introduction to Parenting by Connection as we focus on setting limits in playful, clear and supportive ways.

If the timing of this call doesn’t work for you, become a Hand in Hand Member to access archives of all of our monthly Introduction to Parenting by Connection teleseminars.

When: Tuesday, September 22nd at 6:00pm Pacific

Sign up here.

 

Throwing Food

I had a rough day with my daughter. First, she had a tantrum in the store and then at lunch she dumped her food on the restaurant floor. This was very unusual for her and I felt at a loss for what to “do”.  I cleaned up, we left the restaurant and went home.

Once home she continued to throw more food at dinner. I acknowledged that she really wanted to throw food, but told her I wasn’t okay with it. My husband and I tried giving a consequence, but were met with more food throwing and then crying. I could feel the tension growing as she cried.

After dinner, I remembered the Hand in Hand idea of allowing “taboo” things during Special Time. I told my daughter I would allow the food throwing if she wanted to do it for Special Time. Her face lit up and she said yes, she did want to have Special Time and throw food. I told her I needed a few minutes to figure it all out. I took a deep breath and decided I could only handle a couple minutes of food throwing. 

I gave her a choice of 5 foods to “work” with.  She happily picked orange juice and milk. I poured about an ounce of each into two cups. She also picked yogurt, hummus and cereal. I put a tablespoon of each into bowls. I laid it all out on the kitchen floor, got a towel ready for clean up, and set the timer for 2 minutes. 

When I said, “Ready, Set, Go!” She grabbed the cups first and dumped the juice and milk onto the floor. “All right!” I cheered. She decided to eat a little yogurt and then worked on dumping out the hummus and cereal. I cheered for her and when the timer beeped she quickly dumped out the rest of the yogurt and smeared it a little with her finger. 

Allowing this short Special Time helped clear some of my tension regarding throwing food as I could just enjoy my daughter’s delight in the activity. As an added bonus, she has only thrown food once since that time. In that instance I was able to jump in with snuggles and hugs and simply move her plate away.

- a mom in Oregon