Skip to main content

Repair repair repair





Repair Repair Repair 


As parents there are so many things we worry about.  We worry about giving our children enough attention, we worry about giving them too much attention, we worry about their routine being too structured, we worry about their routine not being structured enough.  And most of all we worry about how we respond to our children in those moments when we lose our temper and end up shouting or even yelling at our children. 








Yelling is frightening and confusing for children.  It activates their threat response which means they become overwhelmed with big feelings making it much more likely that they will either start to fight back (reactive mode) or withdraw (shut down mode) altogether.  The situation is also incredibly confusing for children because when children (and adults) feel frightened they are biologically programmed to go to their primary caregiver for comfort, it is extremely unsettling if this is also the person who is activating their threat response in the first place. Our primary job as parents is to keep our children safe and it is our responsibility to ensure that we are the safe space they can come to when they are feeling overwhelmed by their big emotions.







However, we are also human and we all make mistakes and respond in ways that we wish we didn’t.  Have you ever found yourself so exasperated with your children that you find yourself shouting that the summer holidays are cancelled or there will be no more television for a year? I have!  The good news is that as long as this is not happening all the time it’s OK.   When we respond to situations in unhelpful ways that result in a rupture in the relationship with our child the most important thing we can do in that moment is repair.  We can do this by apologising to our child for getting our response wrong and creating space to think together about how to make it right. It might look something like this…

“I am so sorry for the way I handled that.  My voice was too loud and my words were unkind. Please forgive me.  Do you have any ideas about how we could have managed it better?”

This apology, whatever it looks like, is so valuable.  It shows our children that hard things can happen and relationships can be OK.  It also models for them how to apologise and put things right after a messy unhelpful interaction.   

For many parents this can feel extremely daunting and unfamiliar.    And this is understandable, apologising to anyone makes us feel vulnerable and this will always be slightly elevated when it involves people who are important to us.  But what we know is that rupture followed by repair will deepen the connection and trust between you and your child.  Dan Siegel also suggests that this process will allow our children to be more comfortable in future relationships by enhancing their trust and expectation that conflict in a relationship can be followed by calm and connection. 

All of our children are going to experience many ruptures with friends, teachers, colleagues along their way, let’s give them the gift of both recognising that ruptures can be repaired and the tools to be able to do this in their future relationships.  



  

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Parenting: Why normalising can protect our children from future shame

  Much of what we feel comfortable talking about stems from our home environment.   What was allowed and what wasn’t.    Parts of our bodies smell bad sometimes, it is normal and part of being human.   But what if, when we start to talk about the weird smell, we immediately get shut down “no more of that talk please” or “that’s private and not something you share.”   Many of these comments are made from a place of good intention, we want our children to follow the social norms of whatever culture we live in.   But when our children voice valid experiences and these valid experiences are hushed up or ignored this creates feelings of shame and isolation.   If our body smells bad and we can’t talk about it we have no way of knowing that everyone’s body smells bad from time to time.   If on the other hand we take a normalisation approach and say something like “tell me a bit more about it, my body sometimes smells bad too” …. This normalisation m...
Post a Comment
Read more

Parenting: Our teenagers are supposed to have intense emotions

  I was speaking to a friend this week and she was talking about the focus on mental health and wellbeing in her daughter’s new school.   Like most parents she was pleased to see the school shift in this direction but she had also observed a change in her daughter’s choice of words.   Words like worry and sad were being replaced with words like stressed, anxious or depressed.    And while more sophisticated use of language is part of the normal developmental trajectory it got me wondering about how our young people are making sense of their feelings within this new world of embracing mental health.     Mood swings are a defining feature of adolescence.   During this period of development our kids will experience their emotions more intensely than any other time in their lives.   This happens because their brains are under construction – they are getting faster and more specialised, ultimately supporting our kids move into adulthood.   ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Parenting: Moving our children from “BUT” to “AND”

Next week is children’s mental health week and the theme this year is “ Know yourself, grow yourself”.  In our schools our children will be exploring the different parts of themselves – the kind part, the mean part, the lazy part, the super competitive part.  They will be meeting their big feelings and learning that all our emotions have a place and a job and it is important to make room for every single one.  The tide has finally started to change and we are now beginning to support our young people to shift themselves from a “BUT” to an “AND” From “I would like to go to the party BUT I am feeling anxious about going” to  “I would like to go to the party AND I am feeling anxious about going” This may appear to be a benign change but within these small words lies so much agency both for ourselves and for our children.  Within this context imagine your child has been invited to a playdate.  They are super excited and they are super anxious.  Their mind ...
Post a Comment
Read more