Photo by Jill Wellington
On Monday we had a wonderful snowstorm here in Denver. It was cold, and when we woke, it looked just like Christmas. Everything was covered with powder. When my oldest got home from school, both kids were excited to go out and play in the snow. They were getting along well and excited to play together. But, it wasn’t long until Red, the oldest, was out the door, and Blue was in tears. There was a mitten mix-up which isn’t a big deal except that Blue was feeling strongly. When Blue is upset he has an ear-piercing scream, he melts into the floor and becomes a little ball of mush with so many tears they puddle. He won’t respond except to sometimes answer questions by slowly moving his head in one way or another. He is a little blond mop of tears and wails.
In the past, I’ve reacted to situations like this by asking the oldest to change behavior, “can Blue just have the mittens,” or trying to convince the sad little lump to be flexible, “just use these mittens, be flexible!” I might even threaten, “I see you’re sad, but you won’t have time to play outside if you decide to stay here instead of getting your mittens on.” However, none of these statements are helpful. They result in a sad lump becoming more sad, or just remaining.
Today, however, was different. I am going through training to be a parent coach and I just learned more about empathy. I learned that children, particularly children under seven, live in the emotional part of their brain. Not only is it totally normal for Blue to have his reaction, it is expected. And not only are my above comments unhelpful, they are somewhat harmful. When a kiddo, or anyone, is operating with a lot of emotion, they are triggered into the emotional part of the brain and at that time, it is very difficult to access the logical part of the brain until the emotions can calm down. So, a comment like,”be flexible, just go out and have fun!” cannot be absorbed. And because kids are genuine, they pick up on the underlying meaning of, “please don’t bother me with your feelings,” which sets up a negative path for future communications.
But, as I said, today was different. Today, I said, “you look sad,” and I sat. I waited. I gave him time to feel his feelings without interruption. I did have some food cooking on the stove, so I shared with Blue that I was going to give the food a quick stir, but I would be right back, and I was. And when I came back, he, unprompted, looked up and said he was ready to put on his mittens. He sat and looked at me with his small bottom lip protruding. I said, “you still look really sad.” He told me that he had put on the other pair of mittens and zipped them up by himself. I made a guess at the story of what happened. “You put on the mittens and zipped them yourself, and felt very proud. Then, Brother took the mittens and left. You felt hurt to no longer have mittens you could put on yourself.” He nodded his head in confirmation. I repeated the story. We sat digesting what was just said. We sat with the proudness and the sadness and loss over the larger mittens that could be put on without help. Then Blue turned around happily and announced, “I’m ready to go play!” And he did. And he and Red had a lot of fun sledding in the little bit of snow, some of the first snow of the year.
A couple of things happened in this situation for us. First, Blue felt heard which enabled him to feel better faster than in the past. In the past he may have become clingy and stayed inside. It would have been very hard for me to cook dinner, so this was a win for each of us. The other, even bigger thing that happened, is that we formed some new brain connections. The brain is flexible, and we just took the first step in a new normal. Going forward, it will be easier for my brain to respond in this caring way, and Blue will know that I deeply care for his feelings and communications.