Session 120: Helping Children Regulate Their Emotions

Published Aug 21, 2019, 7:00 AM

The Therapy for Black Girls Podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a licensed Psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia, about all things mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves.

In today’s episode, we’re talking about how we can work to better regulate our own emotions so that we can help our kids regulate theirs. For this conversation I was joined by Dr. Ann-Louise Lockhart and we discussed what co-regulation is, how it can be useful in strengthening your relationship with your kids, how we can make sure we have enough reserves to manage our own emotions, and the important distinction between discipline and punishment.

 

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Welcome to the Therapy for Black Girls Podcast, a weekly conversation about mental health, personal development, and all the small decisions we can make to become the best possible versions of ourselves. I'm your host, Dr Joy Hard and Bradford, a licensed psychologist in Atlanta, Georgia. For more information or to find a therapist in your area, visit our website at Therapy for Black Girls dot com. While I hope you love listening to and learning from the podcast, it is not meant to be a substitute for relationship with a licensed mental health professional. Hey, y'all, thanks so much for joining me for session one twenty of the the Epy for Black Girls Podcast. I know that for many of you it's back to school time or it soon will be, so I wanted to dig into a topic to hopefully help stave off a few mail downs for both you and your kids. In today's episode, we'll be talking about how we can work to better regulate our own emotions so that we can help our kids regulate theirs. For this conversation, I was joined by Dr and Louise Lockhart. Dr Lockhart is a pediatric psychologist, parent coach, national speaker, author, and business owner of a growing psychology practice in San Antonio, Texas. She was born and raised on the island of St. Croix. Dr Lockhart and I discussed what co regulation is, how it can be useful in strengthening your relationship with your kids, how we can make sure we have enough reserves to manage our own emotions, and the important distinction between discipline and punishment. If you hear something that really us and need to with you while listening, please make sure to share it with us on social media using the hashtag tv G in Session. Here's our conversation. Thank you so much for joining us today, Dr Lockhart, Thank you for having me. I appreciate it. Yeah, so it is back to school time. You know, parents are soon to be back to school for some people. My little ones went back last week, and so you know, we want to like make sure that we're starting the school year off right, thinking about like what kinds of plans we can have in place, what kinds of routines we maybe need to adjust to kind of make sure that we're kind of starting off on the right foot. And I know, in the conversation you and I had before we started recording, you know, we often want to look at like what's going on with our kids as opposed to what may actually be going on with us that is actually impacting our kids. So that's what I want to chat with you about today, about how we as parents can do a better job of kind of taking care of ourselves and regulating ourselves so that we can then share that with our children. Definitely, that's a great idea. We need a lot to help with that, and I think, you know, I think it is something that we do have to be careful about because I think sometimes we get too much into kind of picking up our kids behaviors that we don't recognize that the issue may actually be with us. That's exactly right. And I think that it's a fine line between parents actually targeting what's going on with their kids and then blaming themselves. And I think when people engage a lot of that parent guild and shame and say well, my kid is bad because of me, I was like, Okay, just stop that. It's not about blaming and it's not about pointing the finger, but it's about knowing that we impact our kids behavior, that our mood impacts are our kids moved as well too. So if we're rushed and we're hurry and we're in a skinky old mood. Then our kids are going to pick up on that and they're going to reflect that back, except they don't know how to control their impulses and their behavior, so it's going to come across as more irritating and annoying for us. Right, right, right, Really, I'm really glad you made that distinction, right, But is I think it's important to remember that parenting does not come with a manual, right, Like, so much of this is on the job training and kind of figuring out as you go along, and so I think it can be easy to kind of get into some of those behaviors of blaming yourself and like, oh I could have showed A would have But really it's just an opportunity for you to learn something differently in to try to do a better job. The next thing exactly exactly that. It's that there's lots of different things that we can read and look at Google about parenting, but when it comes down to what we have two parent based on our individual child need, their personality, their temperament, and life circumstance, there's so many different things to keep in mind and to keep other considerations. So I think parents need to be more gentle with themselves and give themselves more of a break when it comes to it, because every time you think you've mastered one stage, they switched it up on you and it's a whole new thing. Right just when you thought you had it under control, here they go with like a new thing. Yeah, they're like, where the heck did this come from? Their human beings and their minds and their brain are growing at a very rapid rate. So yeah, we just have to make sure we respond properly and as effectively as possible, and then that way we can really shape their behaviors for the better rather than just focusing on so much punishment all the time. So I know something after a lockhood that you work with a lot with the parents that you work within your practice is on coregulation. So can you tell us what that is? Yes, definitely. So co regulation is a term that I learned about quite recently the past few years as well. Even after doing this for so long, I had learned a lot about regulation and self regulation, but coregulation was kind of a new term for me and for a lot of people. So regulation is when you can basically practice some level of control over your thoughts, your behaviors, your actions. You're regulating. You're saying, Okay, this person just gave me, you know, funny look, and I could custom out or I could walk away. Like regulated behavior means I don't respond to every impulse that I have. Okay. So we learned that what we should be learning this as we grow older, so that by the time we're fully functioning adults, that we should be pretty regulated. But as we know, not every adult is a regulated adult, and not in every situation. For us personally, we can say that we're always regulating ourselves properly. Okay, m hm. So co regulation is something that occurs in a much more basic level that occurs really when we're younger because we need someone else to help us do it. So as children and parents, the way we help co regulation is by basically it occurs in the form of a close relationship with a caregiver and someone who we have a healthy attachment with. So that would include if you have a little baby, for example, and they're fussy and they're crying, coal regulation would involve going in and rubbing their back in the crib for example, not putting them to sleep or picking them up necessarily, but it may just be soothing them because you know all their needs have been met and you're helping them to regulate themselves by giving them some coregulation by rubbing their back. For a toddler, it might mean they're fussy, they're crying, they're upset about somebody hurting their feelings, for example, So a coregulation might be rocking them and speaking to them in a calm voice to help bring down the energy. Maybe modeling breaths, not telling them just breathe and calm down. That's not a co regulation, but it's about maybe just holding them against your chest so they can feel you breathing in and breathing out. So they learned to co regulate through you because you're staying calm. But it also happens in adult relationships. So if you're like super upset about something that happened at work and your spouse or your partner is telling you, oh, man, that sounds like that was really hard. How can I help you with that? They're actually helping you with coregulation because they're forming an emotional fund and connection with you to help you kind of calm yourself down, rather than them telling you it's not a big deal, calm yourself down. So it's all formed on a lot of attachment and connection and relationships. That's what coregulation is all about. So if I'm understanding correctly, it really is about so you're still regulating yourself, but a lot of it comes from kind of being connected to this other person who is in your presence right that they're helping you kind of be there's sensitive enough to your emotional distress or your physical distress, and they're helping you get to the point where then you could start doing it, but don't. You don't always have to become dependent on them to do it. But they're kind of serving as a support, as a crush in a sense to to help you get through and not crushing a bad way, crushing in a very supportive way, so that you're they're helping you kind of get through it in a sense, to get through on the other side. Okay, so of course, you know, I mean you already mentioned that, like to be able to do this, you have to kind of have enough emotional presence to be able to kind of step in and see what needs to happen. But if you don't know, then it makes it difficult for you to and offer that to someone else to correct. And that's why I tell parents so much why being a martyr for your kids is not healthy for you or your children, because if you are running yourself ragged, always on the go, always being a mom or a dad to your child all the time, never taking time for yourself, never going on dates with your spouse, to your partner, I'm never going up with your girls, never just taking a nap. If you are so spent and stressed and kind of stressed out all the time, then you're not going to have any reserves left for your child. You're going to be so worn out that when they need health regulating, you can't offer it to them because you're so tapped out yourself. So I strongly believe in having a balanced life because when and my kids know that. My kids are nine and seven, and they understand that when I'm taking a nap, that's for their own safety. Because if i'm that's time that I don't even take of nap. But I love these naps like that helps me to be a better mom because then I am arrested, I'm taking care of and I will respond to them in a more in a healthier way, so that if they're disregulated, I can help them calm down rather than yelling across the room to calm down or to deal with it, or to stop crying or whatever it is. And I think that's why it's so important for parents to really understand that they have to take care of themselves as well before they take care of their kids. Kind of like when you're on a plane, right, you don't put the oxygen mass on your kid or the dependent person. You put it on yourself first. And that's an analogy I hear often is that you can't pour from an empty cut all these different you know, sayings and inspirational quotes, there's truth to that, is that you can't pour from something that's spent and that's empty. And that's what we do so often when we run ourselves ragget, and then we think we could be an effective parent. No, we can't, because you're not going to be because you don't have your reserves. Your reserves are spent. Got it. Okay, So let's say somebody's listening now and they recognize, like, oh my gosh, this is me. I struggle with this where can they start to maybe make some improvements so that they can do a better job of regulating themselves and then helping their kids to co regulate. That's a great question. So I know, because so many of us are away from our families and their support system. We're in a much more mobile society and we're not raising our kids or growing up in areas where we have a lot of support. So this could be a strouble when you don't have that. So I think that one is if you are near supportive, healthy family members, to utilize those family members. I think so often so many of us, especially as black women, we think we got to do it all ourselves and that we don't need nobody and we don't need no help. And I think that there is we can't follow that total independent way of operating because that's not going to help us with the regulation. So it's about really using the people in our lives who are healthy, who can help us detach so that we can reconnect. So whether it's taking care of the kids, whether it's going over to the house and hanging out, whatever it is, but using those supports that build edge that can help you kind of balance life out. If you don't have the family. I think that's where it's important to form a good social support network because there's lots to be said where there's healing, where there's connection. So if you can have that connection with other friends, whether it's in your church, whether it's with work, whether it's just people in your neighborhood, but other support systems that can really help you that there's there's lots of research at points to enjoyable activities, social activities and physical activities, and the enjoyable social and physical are what helped keep us safe, rounded, and it's kind of staves off anything like anxiety, depression, isolation, all of those things. And it's the same thing that goes for parenting. And so that's a good way to regulate as well too, is that you use your family you don't have that, make sure you ever get social support network to help you through a lot of those times that are going on. So I think that is the most important thing. And I know for me that's what helps me the most is to be able to detach from the kids so that I can reconnect with the kids and using people in my life that I can also be helpful. So I think those are really really, really important. So creating some space for you to kind of even just step away, like you said, and to you know, make sure that you are um involving yourself and enjoying yourself in other parts of your life besides your role as a parent, exactly exactly, so you have that social support, but you also do the fun things like don't feel guilty if you've mane important to get at your hair done or your nails done, or to just hang out by yourself like those. We need time away from our kids. We can't be a parent Tony Fourse something that's not realistic, and we're not going to do a very good job regulating ourselves or helping to co regulate our kids if we're so exhausted. So I think that that's one piece of it, right, like the you know, being able to kind of create some space for yourself. But I think another part of this, and what I'm hearing from you, is that it is also really important that we learn how to or that we know how to regulate our own emotions. And so if that is not something that we have been taught, then what kinds of things can we maybe do as adults to even do a better job of regulating our own emotions. Yeah, that's great, great, great, great question. So I think a lot of it goes back to that whole. The foundation of the social, enjoyable, and physical is that we do those things as well too, So we do things that are engaging, that we do things that are physical. So so whether that's yoga, exercised, joining a gym, going for a walk, doing stretches at home, but really uh, involving ourselves with taking care of our body, because when our body is stressed, we are going to be stressed and vice versa. Our minds and our body are very much connected. So if we don't take care of our mind and how we think about things and we're overstressed, we're gonna'll be more likely to get sick, to have a lot of physical symptoms like stomach aches, back aches, headaches, all of those kinds of things. And so I think that's a really really important part of it is is the exercise. But another part of it too is being able to practice mindfulness. So that's really be present and whatever you're doing, and mindfulness is not some big task. It's about being fully present with whatever you're doing. So if you're at work, being present at work rather than worrying about all the other things in the world when you're with your kids, being present with your kids. And a lot of parents have a hard time with that. They say they're playing with them, but they're not really playing with them. So it's about, really, rather than feeling guilty about not spending time with your kids and it doesn't help to be a ton of time, is that when you're with them, you're fully present with them, engaging and activity they enjoy. And that's a great way to take care of yourself too, so that when you're with them, you know that you know what, even though I just spent fickting this with my kids before they went to bed, I was fully present with them. So I think a lot of that is important to be Mindfulness is making sure that you do a lot of exercising something physical to engage with yourself, but also practicing a lot of the mindfulness. So whatever you're doing, rather than guilt tripping yourself when you're doing it, is that you're fully present. And I would imagine d call it that. This definitely becomes difficult for any parents who may be struggling with like a mental illness, so something like depression or anxiety or bipolar disorder where regulation of emotions is already kind of inherent. Um, then they would have more difficulty in doing this, and then therefore I have more difficulty in doing this with their kids. Right, definitely if it's harder, because if you are a parent that is dealing with or suffering with depression, then you don't want to spend time with anybody, and many times they want to isolate or it takes. One big thing about depression is that it drains the life out of you, so you don't even feel like you have energy to spend time with your kids or really with yourself. So I think that it's a big challenge, but again it always goes back to that you you're facing the very thing that you avoid or that you have a hard time doing, and that's what starts to build a connection, because with depression on what people often want to do is isolate themselves and become very a sedentary. They don't want to engage in other activities. They're kind of staying at home, they're not being physical, they're not really engaging at anything that's that's going to be physically engaging with anybody. Else, and those are the very things that you should do. So it's about pushing yourself and doing the things that you know are going to be enjoyable and maybe take very minimal effort at first, and then working your way up. So if all you can handle is ten minutes of walking, then just do ten minutes of walking. If all you can do is spending a few minutes with your kids five seven minutes doing a card game, then just do that. Kind of meeting yourself where you're at, not beating yourself up, but always goes back to that, because we do a lot of beating ourselves up and then just remaining present while you're doing it. And so I think it's just about making those little small steps so that you can get into that eventual big goal. So, what are some difficulties we might see dr lockhard If we are not doing such a great job at either regulating ourselves or cool regulating with our children, how might we see this show up? You mean, like kind of the behaviors that we might seeing ourselves and all the kids. Okay, so kids pick up a lot on their parents emotions, like we talked about in the beginning, and so if we are very stressed and we are feeling overwhelmed. We might see things like irritability so we kind of fly up on the handle, maybe excessive yelling. We might see ourselves is feeling easily frustrated, even over small things that maybe didn't bother us before. We probably are sleep will definitely be impacted, where we have a hard time falling asleep or staying asleep. And then even after we think we've gotten a full night's rest, you might see a lot of very extreme fatigue and low energy throughout the day, where you just when even have energy to get going. A lot of times you'll see how it impacts your other relationships, so you'll feel like you don't want to connect with people, or where you do, it's very tense and not very productive interactions because you feel like you're on edge all the time. And then you can see very extreme things like seeing lots of cases with people when they just not taking care themselves, are not very regulated, they're overly stressed. They may have things like breakouts in their skin. They're here might start stop growing, they might get sick more often. They're more vulnerable to allergies and coals and viral infections. Those kinds of things because your body is literally wearing down, so you can see a lot of that stuff. I know from personal experience when I was in a work situation where there's a lot of work toxicity. There's a lot of actually workplace believe where I was a target, a lot of discrimination going on, and I was trying to deal with it but not really and I started getting nosebleeds and never had a nosebleed in my life, so again, really bad headaches, and I would literally be playing with my son and my nose just start bleading and um. For what I saw with my kids in those situations, and what parents would see if they're not well regulated, is you'll see more tantrum behaviors because they're trying to figure out what's going on with their parents and they're not quite sure how to deal with it. You might see more refusal, so they'll just flat out refuse to do things that you've asked them to do because of the way that it's coming across to them. That their sleep may also be affected as well as they're eating and their appetite. But mostly what you see in kids a lot is a lot of those external behaviors that we don't like those tantrums, the defiance, the refusal to do things, a lot of those disobedience, all of those negative quote misbehaviors that we see. You'll see them acting it out because they're trying to reflect back what they're seeing their parents. Mm hmm, okay, yeah, And I know that that's a big one, right, Like when either a toddler, a middle school or a teenager, like when those tantrums present, I think that that is a very difficult situation to manage. And I think so I would love to hear any like tips or strategies you have for this, because I think it is really hard to catch yourself in the moment when your child gets so activated that you then have to do a really good job of kind of bringing yourself back down so that you don't measge their energy, right, because of course that does makes it worse, right when you kind of know where they are. So what kind of is if their strategies do you have for somebody to try to do a better job maybe of kind of catching themselves before they match the tantrum energy. That's a great question. I think one of the biggest things and the hardest things for us to do as parents, including myself, is when your child is activated in some way, we have to quickly figure out. We kind of have to see things from their perspective and and see what seeing it from their point of view so quickly looking at a lot of the research talks about serving as a detective in a sense, being able to mind read. As my colleague doctor Lana had talked about in her post recently, is what in the world could be driving this behavior? Why is this child responding in this way? Are they hungry? Are they tired? Do they need attention? That's usually the biggest reasons why I kid might be acting something hungry, tired, or needing attention. So we want to quickly kind of assess that because we pretty much know our kids for the most part, we know why they're acting the way they do. Are they angry, they're blood sugar low? Are they tired and not getting enough sleep? Or do they just need my time? And then we want to then make sure we don't take the behavior personally. So often we see our kids acting up and we instantly judge ourselves. I hear this so much when I do parent coaching with parents. If they instantly think oh, if my teenager is mouthing off, if my toddler is having a tantrum, I must be a bad mom. I'm like, okay, wait, how did you jump to that conclusion. Well, if I was a good mom, they wouldn't behaving this way. Okay, okay, No, that's not true. All right. Kids have free will, they have their own personalities, they have their own hang ups, but so do we. So why in the world would we say this child is acting this way because we're a bad parent. Because on a side note, I have worked with parents who are legit not doing a good job, kids who are coming from a piece of homes, parents who are doing very horrible things to their kids, and those were some of the best kids I ever met. So I'm just like, Wow, they had a legit bad parent, bad parenting situation going on, and these kids were still thriving. So there's not a one to one relationship between good or bad parenting. However, we want to label it and how our child acts. So we have to stop ourselves from like over personalizing our kids behaviors and thinking they're acting this way because it is about us. And then the other part of it, too, is then looking at making sure we reflect how we're feeling and why we're being triggered by this behavior. I had a post about this on Instagram and it got a lot of responses and questions. A lot of parents were like, wow, I didn't really think about it this way. Is that when my child is acting this way? What instant thing am I telling myself? What am I? Why am I being triggered by this behavior? And you know what story am I telling myself behind this behavior? Okay, they're acting this way? And I had a parent tell me one time, oh, my three year old was having a tantrum and treating his little sister Bamian, and I was like, oh my gosh, what if he grows up to be up with I'm like what, what? How did you? How did you jump to that conclusion? But all of a sudden, he's a wife theater because he treated his child, his sister at three. So I think that we want to make sure we're not telling ourselves some story based on our fear, because if we start parenting out of fear, that's going to be a bad formula. I'm really glad you brought that up, doctor Loca, because I think you know, especially just again, as we kind of read more on social media, I think as parents, you're already kind of prone to just wanting to kind of have the best outcome for your child, right like you want to try to do a good job, you know. I mean, I think that that is typically the goal for parents. But I do think, like you said, that we can't kind of go so far, and that then we are parenting from a place maybe of anxiety and fear as opposed to like actually paying attention to the child that is unfolding in front of our eyes exactly exactly, and we can't pair it out of fear, and we can't also aren't imaginary kids, meaning don't parent a child you don't have. Many times parents are parenting a child that they wish they had, or a child that they were or a child they're afraid of having, and it's like you're forgetting the kid that's actually in front of you. So if you're always kind of parenting with this kind of story in your head, you're gonna kind of get out of the whole mindful parenting state and consciously parenting your kid, and then you go into a whole different realm. So then when you're disciplining them or punishing in most of the case cases is that you're punishing them based on this fear of who they might be or how they turned out to be, or who you were. So I've spoken to parents of teenagers who they were terrible, They've made terrible decisions as a teenager, and they have this great kid in front of them who's really conscientious and respectful and obeys all the rules, but yet they don't give them that freedom because well, I know when I was a teenager that I did is I'm like, yeah, but your kids not doing that, So why are you parenting them based the person you were? And so we have to really be aware that that's why all of this parenting stuff, even though there's a whole bunch of techniques you can read about, learn and do, it has to start with the mindset change. Because if your parenting mindset is based on one out of fear, anxiety, worry, and parenting these imaginary kids, you're going to do parenting very ineffectively, and you're going to not enjoy it. You've got to actually hate it because you have all of these things whirling swirling around in your head that are not even really true, because you have this story, you created, this dramatic, epic story about your kid that they're not even really doing because your mind is not in the right place. So how do you suggest we kind of get out of the doctor lock car? Because, like we've already talked about, you know, parenting doesn't come with a manual, and so I think for a lot of us, we are parenting how we were parented, right, because that's the only real formula or model that you maybe have. So how do you kind of suggest people get out of kind of parenting the child they wish they had, the child they were and actually get connected to the child that they actually have. That's a great question. That's a hard thing to do. So I think a big part of it is once you ask yourself strategic questions, like we just talked about, you just you really say, Okay, what is going on with this child? What is the need? What is the underlying need that needs to be met? What are they communicating through their behavior? Rather than saying this is a bad kid, No, they're making these choices because of a need, an unmet need. So let's look at that first. So once we can identify that, then we can say Okay, how am I being triggered by this behavior? What story am I telling myself based on this behavior? And then you say, okay, take a breath, respond to him, and meet the need in the moment. So, if your kid is having a tantrum because you're starving something nasty that they don't like. They think it's nasty, it's dinner time and you're like, I've been looking all day. You know, I can't believe I'm putting up with this. You never do this, and you start yelling and complain about your kid when I was a kid, mo mom and there, but we go, you start doing all this stuff. You gotta stop and say, Okay, my child tends to be a picky eater. I know this. This is not new information. So instead I say, okay, what is the underlying need? My kid is tired, they're hungry, and they're upset because they're not getting what they want. So one of the best ways to do this, for example, and the feeding issue, is give them the food that I have prepared, but also give them a preferred food. Doesn't mean you make a whole different meal for them, no, but you know that if this is going to be a battle because it's a new situation for them, a new food item. You basically give them something that's preferred, But it goes back to meeting the need something that's preferred and something that's non preferred. To be able to expose yourself to new situations, whether it's food or activities or anything else, you have to slowly get a kid to engage in that. Some kids are more rigid and less flexible, so we have to kind of meet them where they're at and slowly get them there. So we have to kind of go to saying okay, let me not get into this stuff. Mindset about how my mom or my dad, parents and me and I have to see my child through a different lens. So once we can do that, then we can kind of step back from the situation and say, Okay, I know I'm taking this behavior way too personally. I'm over personalizing it and I'm reacting to it. Rather we step back and say, okay, let me respond differently. So I said, okay, sweetheart, you know it seems like you're really upset today. What's going on? Or if your child is having a tantrum, you go over to them, help them co regulate, say come on, come on with mama, Sit in my lap, tell me what's going on. If they're way to speak, If not, you help them just calm down. And so you're basically always looking at ways rather than looking at punishing and sending the kid away and yelling at them, but you look at what is the need that needs to be met and how can I help them meet that need? And it goes right full circle back to coregulation. They have an unmet need. Kids misbehave in our mind because there's an unmet need. It always goes back to that. Every time, whether they're kicking their sibling, they hit you, they run out of the house, they sneak out of the house, they whatever it is, there's an unmet need that we need to address, and we have to sometimes be very kind of huge detectives in the process. We always have to go back and say, what is that on the need and how can I help them? At me by collaboratively kind of being collaborative, asking them, you know, it seems like you're having a really hard time. How can I help you with this situation. It seems like you had a really rough day at school. How can I help you with this? And being able to collaborate on that rather than saying, well, what you need to do is because that's not collaborative, that's one sided, and they're going to reject it. M m okay. So if we go back to your food example, right, like I think a normal reaction might be to like, well, what you need to do is what I have prepared, right, And you're actually suggesting that you can offer that, but also maybe offer something that they enjoy as well. It's exactly introducing them through the new exactly. Because really, when it comes down to it, if you're gonna get real technical with feeding and eating, there are like twenty I think it's twenty six steps to eating, which means that it's not just about showing the food in your mouth and eating there. It's about being able to smell the food, cooking about it being prepared, seeing it being prepared, having it on the table, having it next to your plate, having in your plate, having a touch of food, having it in your mouth, chewing it, swallowing it. Like, there's so many steps to the eating. So when there's something new being introduced to a kid, there's some foods they're gonna like automatically, and there's others that they need to be slowly introduced to. And so we have to then say, it looks like you're having a really rough time with this food. Huh, what would help you in terms of being able to eat this food tonight? What would you prefer to be with along with that food that you can try? I know you don't like potatoes, but you sure like some French fries. What about if we do a baked potato and French fries. And because it takes ten to fifteen introductions, for example, for food before a child can literally say they like a food or not. So you can give them a food to three or four times and they's still look like it, but it takes about ten to fifteen times for your your palette, your tongue to actually start to accept for food and like it. So see, I think that go ahead, go ahead. Um. I was just thinking, you know, this kind of goes back to your conversation earlier about kind of making sure that you have done your work in terms of kind of taking care of yourself there so that you have the bandwidth to be able to address something like this, Because I'm just imagining like this kind of conversation at like six o'clock after you have been working all day, you pick them up, you've been in traffic, you know, you just want to Then you gotta do best and homework and you know, so I'm thinking, like what kind of time is this conversation taking, right, But again, you have to have done your self care so that you have the bandwidth to be able to support them in eating this broccotly exactly, or at least being introduced to it right. And you know, sometimes we don't have the time. I mean you literally, if you're a single parent or you're working parents outside the home, I mean you sometimes don't have the time because you're leaving work, picking up the kids, ticking a home, you have to make dinner. I mean you literally don't have the time. But that's where those reserves are important, so that maybe you're not finding the time in the middle of the day for at the end of the day. But you did it on the weekend. You did it earlier in the day. You took a lunch break away from your desk, you called up a friend, You called a friend on the way home, like you find other ways. Maybe you don't go home straight. You go to our restaurant let a restaurant deal with your kids, you know, you know, maybe it's going to a park, changing up the routine on the way to home so that you can find time to just decompress while your kids play. Maybe they're doing their homework at the library before you get home. Like finding ways, little little small ways to basically find ways to kind of rejuvenate and like you said, increase kind of the bandwidth and your ability to be able to handle that so that way, by the time you're getting to the point of feeding them, you can handle it because you've had that break you had that you had that time to disconnect so that you can reconnect again. And maybe you don't introduce a new food at six o'clock at the end of the day. There are things that are more familiar, because why why engage in the fight when you know they can't stand liver and lime of beans that at six o'clock. Maybe that is like a weekend meal that you try to do exactly to expose them to. Right. So again it goes back to like knowing your kid and knowing what kinds of things they're likely to kind of resist you on and working in your schedule so that you make time to be able to handle those things exactly exactly. And you know another really practical too. Learned this with my kids last school year. I'm going to do it again this year is you have them involved in, for example, a menu and meal planning. So at the beginning of the week, on a Sunday, I tell my kids, Okay, we have five days of this school coming up school week, so what do you want to have off for breakfast on Monday on Tuesday? Like they literally look at them, We look at everything, and we find them and we all agree to it. Okay, how about lunch, So this is what the school is serving on these days. You want to order lunch or bring a hot bring a lunch from home. You do that each day. Okay for dinner, what do you want to do? So then we basically are doing it and we create a menu. So it's collaborative. And if there's a day like or last year one day my son was like, oh we have lasagna and today yucky. I was like, dude, you chose it. It's like, oh, yeah, that's right. So then it's it's it's less it's they're collaborative. They are it's predictable. Kids like boundaries, and they like they like some sense of predictability, and so we need to make it where we're not just popping up and say, oh, let's just have something and something random. If you can involve them in their in the meal planning, then when you go grocery shopping, when you're cooking, they know what to expect. Whether they're saying, well, we don't have tonight and then you're just kind of makeing stuff up. So something else. You mentioned Dr Blackheart that I wanted to go back to um An Adam and show. I was gonna say briefly, but it may not be brief. Probably you you seem to make a distinction between discipline and punishment, um and that those are not the same things. So can you talk to us about the difference and why, um, you know why one may be more preferred over the other. Oh yeah, I can be very directive about that. Punishment is about the parents, about your anger, you're being annoyed and making sure the child feels as much discomfort and pain as possible so they don't they don't do it again. Discipline is about shaping the child's behavior so that you're actually teaching them something valuable so that they can generalize it to other errors of their life and eventually not make that safe mistake again. Well, there you go. So it sounds like we should stay away from punishment all together because punishment make us feel good in the moment, but it really is not about shaping the child's behavior, not at all, and it doesn't help because if you tell a kid or you hit your brother, go to your room, that's punishment because well, what did you just teach them? Nothing like? Okay, now they feel bad. Now they carry in their room, and now you feel better because they feel you know, they out by pain or whatever, but they haven't learned anything about them how to treat their brother. Instead, discipline would involve saying, you know what, hitting your brother is not appropriate. That is not how we treat each other in this family. What do we need to do to correct the situation? And they hug them, they apologize whatever it is that you collaboratively look at, and then now they've learned to treat him differently. He doesn't have to go on a time out, he doesn't even have to be separated for the family. The lesson has been learned. That's it. Mm hmm. Okay, So do you think that things like time out are ever appropriate? Oh? Definitely, I think yeah, I definitely. I think that there's some parenting strategies that say absolutely no time out. I don't fully agree with that. I think there can be times when time out could be good, but it doesn't have to be shaped as this huge punishment. Sometimes you do need a time out. I need a time out. And there's times we need to physically isolate or remove yourself from the situation to almed down. That's part of regulation that sometimes a kid is so keyed up that they need time away if you even call it time in, and it doesn't have to be where they're totally isolated from everything, they don't have any toys, note books, on nothing. Sometimes it's about saying, hey, you know what, that was inappropriate, You need to go ahead and spend some time in your room. That way they can kind of take some time to unwind. So if my son is really keyed up, really hyper mouth and off saying things that he shouldn't say, I'll say, you know what, sweetheart, it seems like you need some time to yourself to kind of relax, and then he'll go to his room and he's learned that it's not a punishment, that it's a time to basically decompress. And there's times when I'll go back in his room and he's asleep, okay, so what he needed was rest he was tired, or he'll be drawing, or he'll be reading, and now he's calm, and then I can talk to him, because if I start to then try to punish him in the midst of his behavior, he's not going to hear it and he's not going to learn anything. But then I can say, hey, it sounds like you were kind of amped up. Just now what was going on? He's like, oh, you know, I was just feeling very tired, or I was feeling very over well, or I need a break from my sister. I said, okay, well the next time you need a break, instead of saying something new, then just take some time and go to your room. And so now the message can be heard. That's discipline because now I'm shaping the behavior. So now he's remembering that for the future and he can use that in the future. And it sounds like a key part of this is the conversation, right, like the communication about it, whereas with punishment a lot. It's just like, oh, go to your room kind of thing, and there's never any talking. It's just get out of my face kind of thing, as opposed to like right, as opposed to go and take a break and then we can come back together and have a conversation about what happened exactly. Yeah, because punishment is very much you're as au as a parent is talking and yelling and screaming and nagging and whining, and you're doing all that stuff and the kid is maybe receiving it, maybe not um but it's not very effective and that stuff sticks with people. I just how to post a story recently that I was talking about on Instagram about how when I work with parents through parent coaching, and these are parents of all ages from the twenties to the fifties, the thing that has stuck with them the most from when they were kids is parents yelling at them too much, like like crying and emotional about it, and really how it impacts their whole life because they felt they were overpunished or nagged that too much or yell that too much. The only thing that really sticks and feeling they haven't learned anything from any of that so we have to be very aware of how we speak to our kids because when we're frustrated, we're gonna say a lot of things that we're gonna wish we did say, and it's that sticks with them more than anything else. Yeah, yeah, yeah, So what are some of your favorite resources as in lack of for people who wants to know more about like cool regulation or you're the things you've shared about discipline. What kinds of things might you suggest for your parents? So I think that it's important to make sure that we're feeding our minds with the right thing. So, like you said, there's a lot of good in social media in terms of resources, but there's also something they're not very encouraging. So we want to make sure that we're following people and pages that can be uplifting for ourselves as an individual as well as for learning parenting techniques. So there's a few and that I think are really great on Instagram. One is working with parents and that's Terry and Menory Gay out of Ohio. She's a great parent coach. Cornerstone Family Services is with Marveie Spence. She is a great resource. She's in Canada. We have Mercedes and video who's Shameproof Parenting, and she's great. I really like a lot of her resources as well too. Those are a lot of the parenting stuff that I really like. Of course my site, I do a lot of stuff at DTR in Louise Lockhart with a lot of parenting encouragement and techniques, but really looking up specific individuals were either child psychologists or parent coaches. I really looking for things that are evidence based and things that are based on things that are helpful to you. Also, American Psychological Association website, uh, they have a resource called Imagination Press, so it's like imagination without the eye, and they have books for parents that are based on research, but our children's books, which I think is so amazing, and they have things on anxiety and kids and depression and bullying and divorce and death and all kinds of really great resources. So if you're looking for a book on a particular topic, you can just go to the A P and website and go Imagination Press and find all kinds of really good resources that way. And then I also have a couple of the books that can be found on my website at a New Day Essay dot com, and I have one on for parents with children who have a d h D and one on eliminating tantrums and so those are all based on kind of my personal experiences with my own kids, because they give me lots of information to help others as well as things I've learned from parents as well as my own training and schooling. So there are some really good resources out there. We just have to make sure we get the right stuff for us. So you've already shared your website, but what are any social media handles that you'd like to share at? Dr dot and Louise Blockhart Um, so that's mine, and then my practice is a you at a New Day psych Um, So those are the two. And is that on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook? Uh? It's on Instagram and Facebook? Actually okay, Instagram and Facebook, Instagram Facebook, so um a New Day Pediatric Psychology as the Facebook. And then on Instagram it's at a New Days like got it? Yeah? All right, And of course all that information would be included in the show notes. So anybody who wants to connect with their website and find all the resources can find it really easily. Yes, Well, thank you so much for sharing your expertise with us today. Black to blackhood. I really appreciate it. Yes, and thank you so much for asking. I really enjoyed talking to you, and I'm hoping this can be helpful to parents because parenting is tough and you're not alone in this journey. There are lots of people and resources that can help you out. Absolutely, thank you. I'm so grateful that Dr Lockhart was able to share her expertise with us today. To get more information about her and her practice, are to check out the resources that she shared. Be sure to visit the show notes at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash Session one twenty, and please make sure to share this episode with the parents in your life so that they can hear all the valuable information she shared as well. If you're searching for a therapist in your area, make sure that you check out our therapist directory at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash directory. And if you want to continue digging into this topic and meet some other sisters in your area, come on over and join us in the Yellow Couch Collective, where we take a deeper dive into the topics from the podcast and just about everything else. You can join us at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash y c C and don't forget to check out our online store, where you can grab a copy of our guided Affirmation track, break Up Journal, or a Therapy for Black Girls T shirt or mug. You can grab your goodies at Therapy for Black Girls dot com slash shop. Thank y'all so much for joining me again this week. I look forward to continuing this conversation with you all real soon. Take it care what

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The Therapy for Black Girls podcast is a weekly conversation with Dr. Joy Harden Bradford, a license 
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