11/11/2021
Tantrums have long been spoken about, the ‘terrible twos’ or ‘teenage angst’ are often used to describe these emotional overloads.
Tantrums are generalised a lot, but whatever the cause of the tantrum if they have ‘gone’ then how we deal with the tantrum should be the same.
If we try and stop the tantrum, punish the child for having a tantrum we are teaching them that emotions should be hidden - that you can’t handle their emotion either. An emotional overload is frightening for a child, like a huge ‘flip your lid’ moment that they haven’t the skills (or in younger children, development) to come back from.
The more comfortable we can become in these moments the more we can teach them that emotions aren’t scary, that they pass and you wil co-regulate them through it.
The reasoning part of the brain switches off during a tantrum so it is really about us facilitating a safe space for them to ride it out; if we jump on the ride with them it becomes one heck of a rollercoaster 🎢
💚 Soothing statements:
“I’m here”
“I won’t let you hurt yourself”
“You are safe”
💚 Afterwards, reassuring or discussing in an age appropriate way.
“They were some big feelings. You wanted _____ and you couldn’t have it, that was really disappointing for you.”
“Let’s do something to help us feel calm after all that emotion energy in your body”
💚 Have an activity for the recovery stage. If you’re out and about this might look like a popper toy, a shaking jar, sticker book or mini rain maker. At home it could be colouring, Lego, sorting buttons or shells, mosaic sticker pictures.
💚 Introduce Emotional Literacy stories & activities into the home and model how you recognise and manage big emotions, help to normalise them to make them less frightening. There is a FREE booklet on our website full of ideas…
https://bit.ly/3BVQh3K
💚 Try and know your child’s triggers and introduce soothing and grounding strategies proactively for them.
💚 Maintain your boundaries but acknowledge and validate the emotions that show up as a result of them.
There is so much to cover when talking about tantrums but remember that they are releasing that energy, their emotion is being shown to you. The alternative to that is them keeping it hidden, quietly imploding.
Emotional development takes time, the frontal lobe responsible for managing emotions doesn’t mature until our 20’s so our interactions and responses help to wire this.
Supporting child mental health proactively shows up in lots of ways during childhood, tantrums is one of them. We have lots of parent empowerment workshops and online courses to help you help them…send a message or give us a call to chat more about them 🌈💚
