As a mom we have a choice in how we deal with every situation and how we teach our children to handle emotions and behaviors! There is a fine line between validating our children’s feelings and teaching them to get stuck in the mire of negative emotions. We need to be careful that the “mother bear” in us is not taking over the sensible reality of life. We can’t protect our children from everything and they need to learn to stand on their own two feet in such a way that leads to an emotionally healthy adult. Sound like a tall order? Believe it or not it really isn’t. I take the approach that life is as simple as you make it! I
If we validate our child’s feelings while also showing them how to let it go and move on we create a situation where our child can still feel good about themsleves and feel confident that they know how to handle themselves should the same situation arise again in the future.
Then there is the situation that I call “over-validation”. In this case we take our child’s feelings and focus on the feeling itself instead of why they are having that feeling and how to handle it. Children pick up on their parents’ emotions and attitude and they feel the tension when mom takes on the child’s emotions personally – thus teaching the child to hold on to the emotion. You have just made the situation very complicated when it could have been a valuable teaching tool for healthy emotional balance.
No one likes being around an adult that they have to “walk on eggshells” with! Confrontation should not be a common occurrence in life! It should be used for extreme circumstances only. Do you like every little fault or presumed meaning to be thrown in your face every time you are around someone? No one does – people will begin to avoid you and your children if you become that difficult to be with and if they feel that they are always apologizing for normal everyday human-ness!!!!
Simplify the situation – remain logical. If you remain neutral remembering for yourself how easy it is even as an adult to misunderstand a person’s meaning in any situation it will help you to convey this to your child. Most people (adults and children) do not intend to offend or hurt your child.
What to do if your child is offended or gets in an argument while playing with another child:
- Neutrally observe the situation, keeping in mind that usually both children are involved, but also remember that emotions can escalate fast with children and turn to a word war or physical fight.
- How observant is the other parent? If they don’t even know what is going on, or are choosing not to step in, you should probably remove your child altogether. But give the other parent the benefit of the doubt that they will do something and refrain as much as possible from saying anything to the other child. Your child is your responsibility, not theirs.
- It is ok for your child to stick up for themselves if they are being bullied or yelled out. Your child should simply tell the other child that they are not being nice or that they don’t like the way they are being spoken to and unless they play nice your child will leave. If the other child continues to be mean, have your child play elsewhere. You may say – that isn’t fair to my child, why shouldn’t they get to play where they want because of another child’s ill-behavior? Honest question, but unfortunately the answer is – that is life, teach your child to be flexible and to learn to make lemons out of lemonade! It is the other child’s loss and make sure your child understands this and then – MOVE ON!
- Don’t drag it out or dwell on the situation! Deal with anything that needs to be dealt with at that moment then let it go! If your child’s feelings were hurt, let them express that, but then show them how they are the bigger person and can move on without getting emotionally caught up in the situation. Keep in mind that the more you dwell on the situation the less likely your child is to move beyond it. They over think it and tend to begin to get an overall “victim” mentality.
Are we raising sensitive kids that have been coddled and learned to think that it is everyone else’s fault and that any supposed offense is reason to confront? Or are we going to raise kids who learn that everyone communicates differently and we need to learn to let things go and move on? The choice is yours!