Hello~ The "No Anxiety Calling" column is here~ Past students will share their self-growth stories here. We will meet with you regularly every week. The content of this call was compiled from the Anxiety-Free Parents Club roundtable Q&A. Case 1: How to guide young children to exp

Hello~The "Anxiety-Free Calling" column is here~ Former students will share their self-growth stories here. We will meet with you regularly every week. The content of this call was compiled from the Anxiety-Free Parents Club roundtable Q&A.

Case 1:

How to guide young children to express their emotions correctly?

The child is over 3 years old. Whenever there is a conflict or he does not handle things well, he is very anxious. He will stamp his feet and cry in anxiety. Usually grandma will take the initiative to come to the rescue. Then the child will not appreciate it at all and will hurt grandma with bad words or blame the problem on him. Grandma (Grandma was not even present).

When there is a conflict, the mother will just pick her up and stroke her back without saying anything, and the baby will say: I am hungry and sleepy. Not really.

Case 2:

An 8-year-old girl in the second grade of primary school has a bad temper and speaks very irritably. The more her parents say something, the more they get angry. If she says something wrong, she will speak loudly and she is emotional. The parents don’t know what to do. Sometimes the child will explode. Even if he communicates very carefully, he still does this. May I ask the child what is the reason for this? How can it be guided?

Rain Forest Forest:

First of all, let’s popularize brain science : The order of brain development is from back to front, from bottom to top. The amygdala (responsible for emotions) of children and adolescents is relatively active, but the prefrontal lobe, which is responsible for controlling impulses, is They are the last to grow up, so children are generally very emotional and get angry at the smallest things. This is related to brain development.

Why should everyone first understand emotions? In fact, the main reason is to prevent ourselves from being replaced by children. When children lose their temper, adults are the stable back. But if adults are also brought in, both parties will fall into an emotional brain state.

So when you see a naughty child losing his temper, first recite three times silently: The brain has not grown up yet, the brain has not grown up yet, the brain has not grown up yet.

The second function of understanding emotions is to feed back what you understand to your children.

Everyone has learned a lot of parenting knowledge. Experts will tell us that the first step in dealing with emotions is empathy , but the prerequisite for empathy is that you really understand the child, otherwise it is false empathy.

So empathy actually has three steps: Understand the cause of the child's emotion - see the emotion and the reason - feed back what you see to the child . The first two are based on keeping our sanity online and observing our children, and the third requires a stable attitude.

Parent:

has a question: If the source of the child's emotions is the mother herself, for example, if she sees her scrawled handwriting and points it out to her, she will not be happy to lose her temper. How should we understand and empathize with this?

Rain Forest Forest:

Empathy ≠ Identity. For example, if a child gets angry because his mother criticizes him, what you empathize with is this objective fact. Just point it out and say, "Because your mother pointed out your mistake, you felt criticized, so you got mad." But it does not mean that you agree with his logic. .

When we see our children doing this, we are actually very irritated. At that moment, our inner thoughts are, "What's the matter? You're being too pretentious! You have a glass heart!", and then we are very unwilling to empathize with our children.

We will put all the responsibilities on the child, hoping that he can handle his emotions maturely. At that moment, we actually need some space to deal with our own emotions first. So I also want to give everyone some relief: We don’t need to be as perfect as a textbook every time. We are also human beings, and it doesn’t matter even if we lose our temper with our children.

Parent:

agreed that she felt bad after being criticized and felt uncomfortable having to rewrite, but she still had to rewrite.

Yulinlin:

is like this. Without the previous understanding, it is difficult for children to rewrite willingly. understanding is a matter of parental affection, and requesting rewriting is the responsibility of parents.

Naming emotions is indeed a good way, but when children are at their emotional peak, it is not necessary to use words. Non-verbal behaviors such as a hug, a pat, and a gentle gaze are also good ways to empathize.

would like to answer the question of Tomato Mom : When a child says he is hungry or sleepy, it may be understood that he needs a hug from his mother. Children of this age cannot express themselves accurately. He won't say "Mom, I'm in a bad mood and I want you to give me a hug." In his little mind, his mother will give him a hug when he's hungry or sleepy.

All our complex and advanced emotions develop from primary emotions where physiological needs are not met.

Parent:

Teacher, I was holding him at that time, but he still said: Mom, I am hungry. Do I need a specific response to his statement? I usually say: Mom knows, so what do you want to eat? Is this the right response?

Rain Forest Forest:

Yes.

If empathy and mistakes are made, the attitude will still be perceived by the child, and the child will automatically correct the error. A common scenario in is: "You are so sad because of XXX." "No, I am because of XXX." You often need to guess a few times. If you really can't guess, you can also say: "Mom doesn't know what you are thinking at the moment. , but mom is very willing to listen to your ideas.”

There is another point about empathy: don’t expect to get the idea together at the first time. There is no 100% understanding in the world. The most important thing about empathy is not the content, but your true feelings. The attitude of wanting to understand him, care about him, and not blame him.

Next we will discuss the "emotional expression" that troubles everyone. children use unacceptable ways to express emotions. What should we do?

The ideal situation is to try to predict the child's behavior and prevent the child's behavior from getting out of control.

Parent:

Our children rarely lose their temper when they are five years old. Usually, they lose their temper because they are not satisfied with their performance. For example, if the Rubik's Cube is not spelled out or the puzzle is not completed, but they cannot persist in doing it and work hard to complete it, this is the time when they lose their temper. Will lose his temper.

Yulinlin:

Thank you for adding another common situation. This situation is actually to accompany the child to feel the pain of failure, and to express the sadness behind the anger. Anger is actually a secondary emotion, buried inside is loss, powerlessness, and sadness. The principles of

are summarized as follows: stop - empathize - provide other options. After repeated many times to no avail, give the bottom line choice.

First of all, when a child throws something, hits someone, or hurts himself, we must help the child stop these behaviors, because these expressions will actually make the child very scared. He is out of control and needs a more powerful adult to help him press down. Press the pause button, otherwise he will have to deal with the secondary guilt of hurting himself/others.

Empathy has just been talked about a lot. After understanding the emotional reasons behind out-of-control behavior, we need to provide children with other accepted expressions, such as "You can't throw things, you can cry loudly/shout/face this Punch the rag doll..."

The specific method varies from person to person and is also related to the acceptance of the family. In the game room, we usually set up some toys specially used to vent emotions, such as blow-up sticks, inflatable tumblers, Tents (to hide in).

Sometimes it is useless to say it once, and the process has to be repeated several times. The so-called bottom line is to give a final warning, such as "If you choose to continue throwing things, then you have to go to XXX to calm down." Temporary isolation/deprivation may seem like punishment, but it still conveys a message to the child: You can You can choose to control, or you can choose not to control, but you have to bear the consequences of not controlling.

Parents:

For example, before going to bed, a child hears her parents discussing that she should not let her drink too much yogurt. The sugar content of yogurt is too high. Drinking yogurt before going to bed will easily make her excited and prevent her from falling asleep. She has obviously been promised that she can drink yogurt today, but when her parents say this, she still suddenly bursts into tears, gets angry, and even rolls on the floor. Is it because of her sense of loss?

Yulinlin:

This is quite interesting, that is to say, you agree with this behavior, but you use language to express the risks behind the behavior. I think the child is a bit conflicted and at a loss. How to put it, it's a bit like allowing your children to choose a major, but then discussing how bad this major is.

If I were a child, I might be thinking: So what do you want me to do? Do you agree or disagree?

I acted on my behalf and brought a boyfriend home. On the surface, my parents said it was your decision, but they discussed how bad this boy was in front of you. There will be some uncertainty and fear, uncertainty about the risks behind this, and a sense of vulnerability that I am not supported by my parents.

In fact, there is also a sense of guilt transferred to the children: "Hey, this thing is obviously not good, why can't I control myself?"

But internally, it is the parents themselves who feel powerless and guilty because they cannot control themselves. We actually unconsciously transfer some of our unwanted feelings to our children.

That concludes today’s discussion on emotional issues. Thank you all for your enthusiastic participation. Parenting is one problem after another, but it is also one joy after another.

Raising a baby is not easy, I hope we can all become better versions of ourselves. "Anxiety-Free Parents Club" uses scientific analysis and rational judgment to create a better emotional connection between parents and children, and to find a better bridge to each other. Welcome to join us~

What is the "Anxious-Free Parents Club"?

No Anxiety Parents Club is a learning community for parents established by Tongxing Academy. I hope to create a quiet corner in the noisy world. Here there is the psychological content of joint learning, a warm and co-constructive thinking atmosphere, and useful communication on daily parenting. I hope that parents can gain more knowledge about growth and methods of self-analysis, and that children can gain more understanding and support and gain more long-term learning methods.

How to study "Anxiety-Free Parents Club"?

The No Anxiety Parents Club adopts the method of "reading books + studying and discussing together", and conducts joint study around a psychology and education book every two weeks. The course content includes book reading audio, original text selection reading audio, discussion summary audio, understanding problems, applying what you have learned, learning and thinking content identification discussion, and thinking assignments. More important learning comes from discussions and reflections among club teammates. This is a loving and inclusive environment where confusions that usually cannot be resolved can be heard, understood, affirmed and solved.