27. The Biggest Mistakes Parents Make in Meltdowns and the #1 Phrase That Calms Faster

Feeling like your child’s meltdowns and blow-ups are almost impossible to calm?

Do you get super frustrated when your validation and calm words seem to fall on deaf ears?

You’re not alone. In today’s episode of Sustainable Parenting with Flora McCormick, we’re diving into positive parenting strategies that give you clear, effective tools to help your child manage their emotions—even in the most explosive situations.

We’ll talk about why “neck-up parenting” (trying to fix big feelings with logic and reasoning) rarely works, and how shifting toward “naming it to tame it” makes a huge difference.

If you’ve been looking for calm parenting tips and want to practice gentle discipline that actually helps in the heat of the moment, this episode is for you.💚

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Transcript

Flora McCormick: [00:00:00] You're listening to episode 27 of the sustainable parenting podcast with me, Flora McCormick, licensed counselor and parenting coach of 15 years. I'm so happy to be with you today and excited to share with you what to say when your kid is irrationally upset. So let's dive in. Hello and welcome to the Sustainable Parenting Podcast.

Let me tell you, friend, this place is different. We fill that gap between gentle parenting and harsh discipline that's really missing to parent with kindness and firmness at the same time. And give you the exact steps to be able to parent in ways that are more realistic and effective. And for that reason, finally feel sustainable.

Welcome.

First, I want to start [00:01:00] by highlighting our listener of the week. Who is Alex. Alex said Flora's approach is exactly what I was looking for. I wanted to be both firm and kind as a parent and I've learned and applied so much from Flora's sustainable parenting tips and tricks. It has helped tremendously. I feel a connection to my toddler that I was missing out on because I was in constant battles with him.

I'm enjoying being a mom so much more now and I'm forever grateful for Flora's knowledge that she shares with all of us. Thank you so much, Alex. And I'm so glad to connect with you as well. Friend, as you're listening today, if you find value in what you're learning, please do us a huge favor here at Sustainable Parenting.

One, be sure that you subscribe to the podcast so that you don't miss a future episode. Two, be sure to invite a friend and share this episode with someone who you think it would help. And three, leave a review if you haven't done so yet. You can scroll down to the bottom of all of the episodes and be able [00:02:00] to submit a review.

Thanks so much.

So if you've been getting value out of this podcast, I'd like to ask you a huge favor. If you could do me three solids, one is to subscribe. So you don't miss the future episode. Be sure you download episodes as you listen to share the podcast with a friend or family member. And three, if you haven't yet left a review, scroll to the bottom of your.

The episodes and leave us a review. We so appreciate it. Now let's dive into how we can respond when our kids are irrationally upset. One of my favorite examples is I think of amazing mama, Karen, who I worked with and she had a. Six year old who came to her with just tears and sobbing and was saying, I had found this stick and it was [00:03:00] so cool and it looked like a candy cane.

And then my friend thought it was neat. So I gave it to her and then afterwards I thought, Oh, no, I'm never going to find a. Stick like that ever again, sobbing, emotional, so upset. Okay, all of us could probably picture ourselves in that moment just being like, Uh, are you kidding me? Like, does this even matter?

There are children in Africa who don't have food to eat. I mean, I get in this like high horsed in those kind of moments very easily. And she was like, Frustrated in that same way. And she went, Karen went down the road of saying like, Honey, I, I, okay. Like I hear you and we're going to find other sticks.

It's not a big deal. There's so many sticks in the world just resulted in more sobbing, more upset, just arguing back, but I'll never find a stick like that. I mean, I've never seen a stick like that before. So how can you know, I'll find one again. [00:04:00] Uh, okay. So that's not working. So then she tries sort of a little more tough love, like, okay, well, this is a ridiculous thing to be upset about.

You just need to calm down and move on. Sobbing increases more upset. She starts saying the mean things to mom, like you're so mean, you don't even care, which makes mom even more upset. The cycle was not getting anywhere. Sound familiar. If it does. Here's the two main things I want to tell you to not say, and then I'll give you the number one thing to say.

So the two main things that are so tempting to fall into that are not going to make it better is one, to try to reason and talk them out of it. Or two to then just try to minimize and say, it's not a big deal easier way that I think about this is kind of fix or rescue. If we're trying to rescue by explaining how it'll feel better in the [00:05:00] future.

We often just get kicked back. And if we try to fix it by just saying, you need to stop that feeling and just get over that feeling. It often doesn't work. So here's what we do instead. That old way is kind of neck up parenting, focusing on rationalizing. And let's face it in this moment, the kid is not in a rational brain state.

We know from the amazing route work of Bruce Perry, that we can kind of think about the brain state in three main categories, regulate, relate, Or reason, so if we were to picture a triangle that regulate would be that small area at the tip of the triangle. That is like, when it's most explosive, usually our kids are there the least amount of time, but it's a big, big feeling.

They are hitting harming screaming, melting down. So irrationally inconsolable. Then we know they're in a state where they need help to [00:06:00] regulate. Regulate that dysregulated nervous system that's hijacked by their emotions and the part of their brain. That's like the brain stem, the lizard brain. It's sometimes called the animal part.

That's fight, flight or freeze. They also might be in a middle brain state. That's the regulate section. Like they're having a feeling and that too is like the midbrain. It is taking over from the part of the brain that would otherwise be rational. So the third state is the rational part of the brain that yes, can take in information, solve problems, be future focused, more logical.

So I want you to think in that moment when your kid's being irrational, are they in the state of reasoning or are they middle state of needing you to relate to their feelings or are they in that third state of needing you to help them regulate their nervous system that's so [00:07:00] hijacked, likely it's somewhere in that middle or third stage the regulate or reason.

And so that's why I want you to let go of neck up parenting of trying to fix or rescue and instead lean into the essentially effective tool of name it to tame it. Now, this is super simple and yet super hard to do and super effective, super hard to do because it's not where our gut wants to go. I'm going to tell you, you're going to try to go opposite of your gut in this moment to lean into, name it, to tame it.

What does that look like? Going back to the stick example, when I worked with Karen, we walked through how that could have gone differently and played out differently. So in a moment like that, it would look like you saying, boy, wow, you are so bummed [00:08:00] that you don't have that stick anymore. Yes, mommy. I don't understand.

Why did I give it to her? So like, I'm just so sad and mad. Oh, you're just so sad and mad. That you had found this super special stick and you wished you hadn't given it to her. You're now feeling some regret. You're naming what your child is experiencing and withholding all of the lecture and advice that you want to give.

Like it's not that big of a deal. We'll probably find another stick. No, no, no, no, no. We are completely letting go of what I call the power struggle rope and just holding their side of the rope with them. So we name it to tame it. Hear what they're saying and either put it into a word like, boy, you sound and use a feeling word frustrated, mad, disappointed.[00:09:00] 

Or name exactly what they're saying to you. I just wish I hadn't given to her cause it was so special. Oh man. You just wish you hadn't given it to her. Cause it's so special. And then pause. Friend, this might seem super simplistic, but I have had parent after parent come back to me and say, I could not believe how well that worked here.

I was trying to say all the right things and do all the right things. Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. And then all I said was you sound. And inserted a feeling word, or set her exact words back to her. And she completely dissolved in that frustration and pretty quickly got to be more calm. And then we were able to solve the problem.

So try it out friend this week when you see that irrational child coming at you, try out this tool of name it to tame it. And I want to [00:10:00] hear from you. If you haven't yet joined my community, I have a Facebook group called sustainable parenting. That's a free place to connect more directly with me, or feel free to message me in Facebook In email at Flora at Sustainable Parenting, because I'd love, love, love to hear from you.

Friend, I hope this is another week where you get to use kindness and firmness at the same time so that parenting finally feels sustainable.