THIS POST IS CONTINUED FROM LAST WEEK’S BLOG AND PODCAST

2. DISMISSING FEELINGS 

• Along the same lines as “ignore the junk“, this is one I catch myself doing and definitely one I was raised with… when our kids are hurt or sad over something minuscule we often… Encouraging child to not cry/be tough

• What are ways we can handle this instead of telling a child not to feel a certain way?

  
  VALIDATE instead of DISMISS feelings

When your child is upset—especially when their emotions seem a bit on the dramatic side—it can be tempting to minimize how they're feeling. But dismissive comments will teach your child that the way they're feeling is wrong.

Just yesterday, my two kids were fighting. The two-year-old hit the four-year-old, then the four-year-old hit back. Dad intervened and both kids ended up in their room crying. Neither of the hits actually physically hurt, but their emotions were heightened over the original conflict.

Instead of saying something like, "that didn't hurt, she's two" I said, “are you feeling upset because sis hit you? Yeah, that doesn't feel very good.” He started to calm down and just snuggled up to me as we rested. When he realized that his feelings were VALID and I wasn't dismissing them, he was able to communicate his hurt without wailing on and on. Some kids will need to wail on and on, but that validation will continue to help them feel SAFE in their emotions.

3. EXPECTING HEALTHY COPING STRATEGIES FROM KIDS

• When we ourselves sometimes aren't practicing these

• If we expect our kids to be able to handle their big feelings, we have to show them how we handle ours. That's going to look different from parent to parent.

• Wendy shared: I love teaching. I love teaching about emotions, but after creating this course I realized I was teaching about the emotions I was most comfortable with. I was avoiding the ones I wasn’t comfortable with.

4. LET BEHAVIORS SLIDE BECAUSE THEY ARE COMMUNICATING AN EMOTION

• How can we parent in a way that teaches that all FEELINGS are ok, but not all behaviors?

• Listen to the podcast to hear the discussion here. It goes back to making a safe place to FEEL all the feelings, without letting our kids act however they want because they feel a certain way.