Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #117 Dealing With Changing Moods & Temperaments

Transcript

#117 Dealing With Changing Moods & Temperaments · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast, the podcast for the time
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: poor parent who just once answers now, please hurry, Why
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: haven't you give me the answer already? I'm doctor Justin
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Coulson and I'm joined by Luke and Susie, husband and
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: wife radio team. They have three young boys. Today we're
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: answering a listener question about temperamental eight year olds.
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: When we get questions like this, I always think, I
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: wonder if this is something that Justin's faced or if
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: he avoided it, because he's been amazing all along. Because
• 0:31
  Speaker 2: I feel like we're heading towards this. But let me
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: tell you first for Sephena's question. By the way, Hi,
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: oh good.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: It's great to be with you. Yeah, And I'm sure
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: that whatever the question is, I probably dealt with it
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: last night with my own kids.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Oh great, Okay, this is a judgment for his zone.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: We don't know this person who names Sephena. She said,
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: how do your parent an eight year old who used
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: to be loving and caring but now is the opposite.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: So it sounds like there has been this extreme character change.
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: We see it in our children generally going more into teenagers.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: Eight very young to see that change, what are your
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: thoughts justin.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: Every now and again we see this sort of temperament change,
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: this emotional change during mid childhood. It's not altogether unusual,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: and so, I mean, some parents are expecting these middle
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: childhood years to be so calm and comfortable because that's
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: what everybody else says. But it's not the way it
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: is at all. Sometimes it's just such hard work. So
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: there's a couple of things that we probably need to consider.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: The first is is there anything that's changed recently for
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: your child that might have made life feel a bit insecure,
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: a little bit unpredictable, anything that might have riled them
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: up emotionally and sort of stuck in their craw And
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: we obviously don't have Sphina here to talk to her,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: but I can think of a couple of things. There's
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: just been that what do you call it, that's right,
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: COVID nineteen a global pandemic. So there's been school started
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: just starting in stoppages, and there's been interrupted relationships and friendships.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: There's been timetables and schedules that have been turned upside down.
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: There's been all sorts of shifts in what would normally
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: be a fairly stable and predictable childhood experience. On top
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: of that, there may be things that have been happening
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: in the family. Maybe there's been things going on in
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: relation to parenting, in relation to the couple who were,
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: you know, the mum and dad looking after the children.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: There's you know, maybe when new babies come into the home.
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: So all of these kinds of things can cause a
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: sense of interruption and the randomness and the volatility and
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: the unpredictability of these things. While ultimately will be good
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: for children to develop resilience and more, in the moment,
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: they can be quite challenging as our children try to navigate.
• 2:36
  Speaker 3: It's interesting because not at the age of eight, but
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: a little bit older than that, I was a kid
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: who turned angry from a happy, go lucky young guy.
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: And when I looked back at it an adult years
• 2:45
  Speaker 3: and I say I turned angry, I was noted for
• 2:48
  Speaker 3: the anger in my eyes. And it was when I
• 2:50
  Speaker 3: came to faith that people without me saying a single thing,
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: I never told anybody what had happened, and I had
• 2:55
  Speaker 3: a gode encounter and they went, what's happened to lout
• 2:57
  Speaker 3: because the anger had fallen from the eyes. And it
• 3:00
  Speaker 3: was when I looked back, and I went, well, what
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: is that angry? Because I didn't particularly think of myself
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: as angry, But I realized when I backtracked, when I
• 3:06
  Speaker 3: had Mum who was having nervous breakdowns and going into hospital,
• 3:09
  Speaker 3: and Dad who was away on work, and my sister
• 3:11
  Speaker 3: who left, my brother who went to prison, everybody who
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: was meaningful to me was leaving for some reason or another.
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: And so I took a philosophy, if I get rough
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: and push everybody away, no one has a chance to
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: hurt me anymore.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Right, And sometimes it could be a protective mechanism. The
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: other thing that it could be is it could just
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: be a child growing up and starting to have opinions,
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: starting to want to push back. Sometimes kids really do
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: want to watch this TV show. It has become their
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: favorite show, and we keep on interrupting them. Right then,
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: they've got preferences, there are things that matter to them,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: and sometimes we get in the way. So there's one
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: other thing that's probably worth mentioning, and that is that
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: when our children are being challenging, the quality of our
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: interactions with them usually deteriorates. That samdoitizing with what Luke's saying,
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: because as the quality of our relationship deteriorates, the quality
• 3:59
  Speaker 1: of our interaction drops off. They don't think less of
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: us because we're getting them in trouble all the time.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: They don't think less of us because we've called them
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: a name, or because we're criticizing them. They don't think
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: less of us at all. What they do as we
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: criticize them and tell them that they're not living up
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: to our expectations, and as we tell them all of
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: the things that they should be doing and why haven't
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: they done them? Is they think less of themselves. When
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: you think less of yourself, then you actually start to
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: behave in ways that are perhaps less pro social, You
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: start to behave in ways that are perhaps a little
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: bit more aggressive. And so I would say to this mum,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: who obviously cares deeply for her little girl, what can
• 4:39
  Speaker 1: you do to be softer, to be more compassionate, to
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: explore her world and see things from her perspective a
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: little more that might help her to open up, feel safe,
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: and actually lead to some improvements in her behavior.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: Can I ask you, then, for some tips for her
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: on Some conversations start as how do you start this
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: conversation with someone who's eight years old.
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, let me share a vulnerable moment, something that
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: I don't like to share. But you know, I've never
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: made a claim to be a perfect parent, and one
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: of the reasons that I got into this gig was
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: because I struggle as a parent from time to time,
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: and not too long ago, one of my children was
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: beyond obnoxious. We'd had day after day after day. In fact,
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: I counted a couple of days prior to an incident
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: that we had that I'm about to share. I counted
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: a request to her to do something very simple that
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: was well within the realms of reasonable requests at a
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: time that was reasonable to request it. I think I
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: asked her to do something seventeen times before I raised
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: my voice. I do you know what I mean? I
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: just k yeah. And about two days later, I found
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: myself in exactly the same situation, And after the sixth request,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: I raised my voice again and I said to her,
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: this is really frustrating that after what just happened a
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: couple of days ago where I got really cranky at you,
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: I'm now finding myself in the same situation where I
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: want to be unkind. And she looked at me and shouted, see,
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: this is what really bothers me about you, Dad, and
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: started to tell me why I was wrong for asking
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: her to do something six times that was perfectly reasonable,
• 6:09
  Speaker 1: At which point I was not doctor Justin Colson at
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: his best, and I really I let her have it.
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: I told her all of the things that she was
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: doing that were driving me up the wall. Let me
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: suggest something based on my experience with this daughter this
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: particular day. At no point during or after that conversation
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: did she look at me and say, well, Dad, now
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: that you've explained to me all of the ways that
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: I'm failing, I'm much more motivated to be a better human.
• 6:35
  Speaker 1: At no point did she say, well, I'm really inspired
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: and motivated now, Dad, thanks for the pep talk and
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: the reminder that I need to do better. What I
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: did was I punched great, big holes in my relationship
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: with her. I want to be clear, in the relationship,
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: not her. I was not physical with her at all.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: But I really ruptured this relationship. I undermined trust and
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: ultimately she spent the next half an hour screaming the
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: house down from her bedroom as she, you know, whined
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: about how unfair the world was and it also caused
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: a little bit of friction between my wife and myself
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: because Kylie knows that that's not how we talk to children,
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: and she's heard me lecture people for a decade about
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: how that's not how we talked to children. I blew it,
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: absolutely blew it. Fortunately, children are forgiving, and as a
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: dad who wants to be forgiven, I'm not too prideful
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: to go and ask for forgiveness. And we made things right.
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: But if I was this parent and I was not
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: doing what I did that day, what I would be
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: more likely to do is not in the moment, but
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: at a different time, have a conversation that went like this.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: I've noticed that every time I ask you to do
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: something lately, it's been met with resistance and eye rolls
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: and foot stomping. It seems like I'm bothering you a
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: lot lately, and I seem to be a really big
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: challenge for you. Can you help me to understand what's
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: going on? So I would spend time exploring the world
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: through their eyes. Does this mean that what I'm going
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: to let her just tell me how it's got to
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: be in the house from now on, Because at the
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: age of eight, this child now knows no, And it
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: doesn't mean that at all. It just means that I'm
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: going to explore what's going on. It might be that
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: I'm interrupting in the middle of snack time or in
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: the middle of a favorite TV show or right when
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: X yo z is really important, or it might actually
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: be my tone. Perhaps there's something entitled and expectant in
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: my tone that is just a little bit unfair to
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: a child who wants to have a sense of choice.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: But once I've explored, then I can simply step into
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: that nice, gentle explanation where I say, well, I understand
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: where you're coming from, but I know and you know
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: that there are still things that need to be done,
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: and it's appropriate that you're a contributor in our home.
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: And then I empower, what do you think we can
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: do together as a team to make this better? Because
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: it feels horrible, doesn't it. It feels horrible? Yeah, And
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: I know that whenever we talk about it, we always
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: bring up the three e's. But that's ultimately where we're
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: going to try to go with this kind of conversation.
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: With what we've explored so far, we've seen that maybe
• 8:55
  Speaker 3: and this is a generic response because we don't know
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: the specific child, but maybe it's anything from a bit
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: of stress through to some sort of significant fear response
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: to trauma and anything. There's a whole lot of things
• 9:08
  Speaker 3: in between that we want to explore to try and
• 9:10
  Speaker 3: discover that more. But how do we actually try and
• 9:14
  Speaker 3: just determine where it is on that scale? Because I
• 9:16
  Speaker 3: hear this and I think, what if I get it wrong?
• 9:18
  Speaker 3: What if I think it's just a bit of stress
• 9:20
  Speaker 3: over COVID and it's actually something deeper, Or what if
• 9:22
  Speaker 3: I overplay it and it's actually something simple, And I
• 9:25
  Speaker 3: feel like maybe I'm not equipped to fully understand why
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: such a transformation is. What would be your encouragement to me?
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: Just really important question? And this is what I would say.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: Context is everything. We don't have much context based on
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: the request that's come through to spark this conversation. So
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: what I would say is, generally speaking, I go in
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: and label the emotions that I'm seeing. I see every
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: time I talk to you. You seem to be really upset,
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: you seem to be really challenged, you seem to be
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: having a really hard time. Can you tell me more
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: about that? Why is that so upsetting? But there are
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: sometimes going to be clues in the context. So perhaps
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: there's sibling conflict and you might say, you're really struggling
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: with your brother lately, aren't you. I mean, it's just
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: been for the last couple of weeks. It seems like
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: as soon as you start breathing in the same room
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: as each other, there's going to be a fight. What's
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: going on? Why are you too at each other so much?
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Help me to understand. Or you might know that there's
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: been some medical issues, or perhaps there's been some tension
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: in the home because parents are in the middle of
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: a separation, or you know that your child is really
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: missing the life that they had pre COVID. So you
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: can tap into all of these things in your initial
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: here's what I'm seeing, and what will normally happen is
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: that your child will say yeah, and they'll take that
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: and run with it, although say, no, that's not it,
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: I'm not this. It's because of blah blah blah, and
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: they'll open up when we go in with a gentle
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: I'm assuming it's this. Can you point me in the
• 10:38
  Speaker 1: right direction? Am I on the ball or am I missing?
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: They'll let us know quick smarter where we should be.
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot of power in that humble space
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: of not presuming you know everything isn't there.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: And parents know everything. I mean when you watch parents
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: in their in directions with their kids are like, I
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: saw what happened? You started? Who cares? Who started? It?
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: Just you seem to be a really challenged right now?
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: What can I do to help is a much better
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: way to go.
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, beautiful, I love your advice. Thank you so much
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: for answering Sophina's question. We appreciate it. Dr Justin Culson
• 11:04
  Speaker 2: from Happy Families dot Com DoD are.
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: You if you've enjoyed the podcast or you found it helpful,
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: please do something for me. Could you go to Apple
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: Podcasts and leave a rating or a review. It's the
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: reviews that help people to find the podcast and have
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: happier families. You could do what hashtag Queen me hashtag
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: did called it the four H Club. That's what she's
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: part of. Love the four hs. This was when we
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: were talking about our children needing to be heard and
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: have humor in their lives and help others and all
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: that kind of thing. Said. My kids and I had
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: a really tough year last year, and we were looking
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: forward to moving on this year, but now we feel
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: so stuck. I'm going to use the h to get
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: us laughing every day. Thanks for the reminder, well, thank
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: you for the review, the five star review. Once again,
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: this is how people find the podcast by you jumping
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: onto Apple Podcasts and leaving those ratings and reviews. So
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: please do that. And if you'd like more info on
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: how I can help you, visit happy families dot com
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: dot you or visit my Facebook page doctor Justin Colson's
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: Happy Families, and make sure you click on the link
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: to the Happy Families membership where you can find out
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: how to essentially have a parenting expert in your pocket.