When people say that parenting gets harder as the kids grow up, they are not kidding. I’ve only just come to this enlightenment recently when I realized that my 8-year-old is no longer a baby and now has a whole truckload of emotions that I need to deal with.
You see, handling children is always tough at the onset but chicken-feet on hindsight. When the kids are young, their needs are mainly physical – They get hungry, sleepy or they want to poo. Those are at Level 1 on the scale of parenting, 1 being the easiest and 10 being the hardest. Any one can be trained to handle those needs efficiently. Kids at this age may also have emotional needs but lots of encouragement, coaxing and love can usually do the job.
When a kid grows up, their physical needs become secondary because they now know how to manage them themselves. Emotional needs start to take centre stage because they are more complex and require more time and wisdom on the part of the parents. Their young minds may not be adequate enough to handle them at this point in time, so parents’ intervention is very essential. Or at least, we can help them form healthy self-image of themselves and strengthen their emotional resilience.
I don’t claim to be an expert at this, of course. In fact, I am a rookie, and I learn from trial and error everyday. Hopefully though, by sharing my experiences, some of you might find them useful. Here are my 3 tips to handling kids who are going through an emotional rut:
1. Stay Calm Yourself & Lead The Kid To Share
Kids get emotional for many reasons – They may feel unfairly treated, neglected or unloved. I am guilty for causing some of these distresses in my kids because I was too busy or too caught up with my own agenda. Sometimes I speak too harshly or flippantly, and caused the kids to feel hurt. Hey, I am not a saint, right?
It’s easy to respond emotionally when met with an emotional outburst. At a time like this, it’s important for us to stay calm and refrain from getting too worked up ourselves. Sometimes, the kid is just throwing a tantrum and being downright unreasonable, so it’s easy to get upset at them. I’ve realized that whenever Joey does that, it’s worse when I respond negatively or simply ask her to ‘STOP IT.’ In her little mind, she probably feels that I am a terrible mother who doesn’t bother to understand what she’s thinking about. Instead, I have to speak softly and gently, and ask the golden question, ‘What’s wrong?’ This usually leads to a long verbal diarrhea of why and what caused her to be so upset. See it as a good thing though – When the kids stop telling you what they are thinking about, that’s when the real problem starts. The last thing we want is for our kids to become emotionally-withdrawn - That’s like Level 8 on the parenting scale.
2. Find A Solution Together
Most of the time, emotional meltdowns or outbursts are caused by a problem that the kid is facing. Once the kid has calmed down, sit him/her down and diagnose the problem together. Kids start to panic when they are faced with a seemingly ‘complicated’ problem, and they become fearful, nervous and easily agitated. If we are able to breakdown the issue together with the kid, explain how we can get around it and find a suitable solution to the problem together, the kid will be less anxious. You’ll be surprised how easily solved some problems can be, because in the eyes of a kid, every problem is HUGE! There was one night when Joey broke down and insisted that she didn’t want to go to school the next day. I was very tempted to say that she was throwing a tantrum, but upon probing, we found out that she was actually worried that her Chinese Teacher would scold her the next day because she missed school the previous Friday and had not informed her beforehand. I told her that I would send a text message to her teacher and explained that she had to miss school last minute because of some last minute family matters. Once her teacher replied, “OK, thanks! :)” and I showed her that friendly message, her tantrums immediately stopped and she could go to sleep with an easy heart. Problem solved.
3. Give Lots Of Hugs & Kisses
Physical touch is one of the most effective love languages ever. Kids feel loved when they are constantly showered with hugs and kisses from their parents. Even if we do not know the real reason behind their tantrums and emotional outbursts, lots of affection often turn the situation around. Kids have simple needs – They just need to know that they are loved, and constantly reminded of this fact. I do not deny that some emotional outbursts happen because the kid is attention-seeking, but if the kid feels that he/she needs to behave like that in order to get the attention she craves for, then something is wrong. You can never go wrong with showering your kid generously with love and affection.
As I come to this stage of parenting with my kids, I have to consciously remind myself to slow down in my job and not be too preoccupied with my own affairs every time I am with them. What they really need now is lots of my attention, time and love. I don’t want to miss out on this precious journey as a mom, and hope that I can become a better mom as I go along.
