Episode 355-What Big Behaviors Are Really Saying And How To Respond with Melissa Schulz

A meltdown in the grocery store. A fight over screens that spirals into yelling. A kid who seems “fine” at school and falls apart at home. When you’re parenting a neurodiverse child, a strong-willed child, or a deeply sensitive child, it can feel like the usual advice was written for a different universe. We wanted something more honest and more useful, so we sat down with Melissa Schulz, a parenting coach and BCBA who brings both professional expertise and real-life parenting experience.

We get into a simple but powerful reframe: behavior is communication. If we only focus on stopping the behavior, we miss the message and often create new problems like shutdown, masking, or bigger explosions later. Melissa breaks down why kids with big feelings often need explicit emotional regulation skills, not just consequences or pep talks. We also talk about the parent side of the equation: if we’re triggered, we can’t access the best tools in the moment. Learning to regulate our own nervous system is not “extra,” it’s the foundation for co-regulation and connection.

We also go practical: how to meet your child inside their interests (yes, Roblox and Minecraft count), how to make “calm down” supports actually work, and why a beautiful calm-down corner can fail without practice during calm moments. You’ll hear language to reinforce unconditional love and worth, plus a root-cause approach that stops you from “weed whacking” the same behaviors over and over.

If you found this helpful, subscribe, share it with a parent who feels stuck, and leave a review so more families can find these tools. What’s the toughest behavior you’re trying to decode right now?

Transcript

Welcome And Meet Melissa

SPEAKER_01 0:00

It's recording. Hey, thanks so much for joining the SJ Child show today. I am really looking forward to this conversation. You know, I like to bring all of the most magical people to the show that I can. And you know, sometimes they find me, I find them, and we get matched up together. And that's the beauty of it. So today I am bringing Melissa Schultz. Uh, she is a parenting coach of BCBA. And what does I'm not what does MS stand for?

SPEAKER_00 0:30

It is the masters of problems.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

So thank you so much for being here. It's lovely to have you. I'm really looking forward to getting to know you more. Give us an introduction and a little bit about yourself, and we'll jump right in. Yeah, thank you so much for having me.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

I'm really excited to be here. Yeah, I am a parenting coach. I have spent the last 20 plus years helping kids with all the behaviors and then supporting their family. So that is my passion and my love. And I'm a mom of three myself, and I have two neurodiverse kiddos of my own. And so I love that I have like so much professional background and then also have so much lived experience. So I really understand, you know, kind of all the perspectives and can offer a lot of hope for where we can still have there's so much joy, even if our kids have more challenging behaviors, maybe than other kids do.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

Yeah, and we have to just really learn how to find those for those who who are having a harder time or who are feeling like, wow, this is a challenge. So we'll hopefully give you some great tips today to try to find some happiness, some success, something that works for you. And I think that just like you said, the I think one of the most important things, this is my personal opinion, not medical advice. I'm just joking, is a parent parenting coach should be a parent. Because I will tell you, in the past, I've had some lovely, lovely coaches that haven't had the experience of actually being with a child overnight. Yeah, right. And those types of things, it's hard to get on board with other types of program systems if you can't even get me through a 24-hour period. For me, I you know, nothing to that, you know, text learning is is beautiful, it's absolutely wonderful for where it belongs. But when it comes to especially parenting, you know, nerd or diverse kiddos, I really love the space from an experienced person with some anecdotal experience themselves.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

So and I also find that sometimes people are just parents. They're like, hey, this works really well with my two, three, four kids. So like everyone should do this. And I'm like, wait, no, that just means that worked for your three or four kids. Every kid is so different. So yeah, I was doing this for over a decade before I became a mom. And so I got a lot of that experience, even though I wasn't a mom yet. And then I was able to really put it together in a much more comprehension, comprehensive way when

Why Parents Need A Village

SPEAKER_00 3:10

I became a mom too, with kids that were struggling with the exact same things I've been helping with professionally. It is, I was great before, but I'm way better now because I do get it. I'm like, yeah, I know. And I think it's also really helpful just to see someone that is having that same struggle and is handling it in a way they like and is still joyful and still really enjoys their kids and like feels confident. Um, sometimes we can just feel so stuck. And then if someone hasn't done it, we're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, but you don't know. And that's kind of where I find I'm like, no, no, no, I do know, I do know, and you can do it too.

SPEAKER_01 3:42

Yeah. Isn't that the truth? And I think empowering, especially parents that are, you know, worried or concerned or finding that they're feeling isolated, especially can be so scary for them. And just learning how to have them join support groups, look for help around them. It's so rewarding when you find those communities that you can build.

SPEAKER_00 4:06

100%. We all need a village, and sometimes our village doesn't have kids that are like ours. Sometimes in our village, right, like our family's kids or the neighbor's kids, they're not having the issues that our kids are having. And so we start feeling like we're the only one, or that there's something really wrong with us, or something really wrong with our kid, that this is happening for only us. And that's the lie, it's not only you. And I can tell you, because I get to talk to these wonderful moms, like back to back to back to back to back all day. And they all tell me the exact same things. They're great moms whose kids are just having really big feelings and really big behaviors, and none of the typical parenting things are working, but it's not because they're a bad mom, it's not because there's something really wrong with their kid, they just haven't found the right strategies yet, and that's where I come in.

SPEAKER_01 4:52

Yay, and I'm gonna focus on a word you said because I love it, and we can really go into detail on this typical parenting, right? Just like saying everybody is normal, and I always say normal is only a drier setting. That is it, okay, no more because it's it needs to be it, and just as when you just if you have more than one child, you soon discover parenting is not a like a task-filled checkbox that you can get through the day with these lists of tasks you can do. Uh-huh. A magical list that works for everyone, and you just copy paste it for all the kids. Exactly. It has to be individualized, it has to be you know thoughtful and meaningful to that little child. Um, and that takes intention. Yeah, that's tricky, and that's tricky when we have working parents that are so not that they're not intentional, but I think that sometimes timing and experience and maybe experiences

Ditch One-Size-Fits-All Parenting

SPEAKER_01 6:05

get lost in the same thing in chaos.

SPEAKER_00 6:09

Yeah, I mean, I think anytime if you're just in this like constant, if everything feels like a power struggle, if you're just always walking on eggshells because you don't want to set your kid off, right? You're losing the connection and joy. Like, yes, there's the behavior stuff, which is not fun, but like much more deeply, you're you love that kid so much, but you're not deeply understanding them if you are just like, I don't know why they're doing that. That makes no sense, right? Like, yeah, it's a weird thing, but like that's where I can, like, this is exactly why your kid's doing that, right? It makes perfect sense to them, no matter how irrational it is to our fully formed brains. And let me explain what's happening for your kid and how you can still be present and calm and connected no matter what they're doing. And yeah, I love that you called that out because if you're just listening to this podcast, anytime I say typical or normal, I have to do air quotes because like I don't really know what that is. Like, I hear about these easy, typical kids out there. None of them live in my house. I will tell you that for sure. Um, and yeah, like I have three kids and I parent them all in completely different ways. So it's like, and none of them are the really the ways that I would like to parent, like my default parenting style and how I would like to show up. That does not work for any of my kids. But instead of just continuing to try that and hope that someone grows magically grows into my preferred way of parenting, I adjust what I'm doing and I'm giving each kid exactly what they need. And they're very different people, so it's very different strategies, but it's exactly what they need and it works and it feels really good.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

I think that that's so important. Feeling really good. I remind my and mine are teens, mine are all teens. I don't know if yours are maybe littler, but oh, I remind my teens all the time. It's not about maybe it how do you feel? How is this situation making you feel? That is what you need to just maintain that focus on because if you listen to those body, you know, urges, then you will have such an easier time getting to happiness, right? Following that happiness when you go against those things and those, you know, that's when you find yourself in a not so good situations, and and it's unfortunate. And you know, kids of course, you little trouble, kids struggle with in like lots of different stages and uh things, but okay, a little visit from Jack here, real quick. But oh man, when especially when you have uh let's say, you know, siblings and you have one non-speaking and one more, you know, less high less support needs child, then you really have to have those boundaries set out. And both of well, the one that can understand the most, right, needs to really understand that the parenting or the style or the communication is different, not because of a value or a worth, yes, the accommodation needed.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

Yeah, and so one thing I really like to focus on is something that these the kids that I focus on have in common, strong-willed kids, really sensitive kids, and neurodiverse kids, they tend to just have much bigger feelings and emotions than the typical air quotes kids out there, right? And so often the behaviors are a result of just these really big feelings they have inside that they don't know how to process. And so more typical kids might learn emotional regulation just more naturally by their environment, by for others, by simple little lessons that they do. But these kids need much more specific ways of learning how to do that. Otherwise, they just shove their emotions down completely and they explode all over, or they get, you know, there are a lot of different, different unhealthy ways that we can deal with those big feelings because it can be so uncomfortable. And then it can trigger really big emotions in the parents. And now we all are just in fight or flight and triggering each other, and like, you know, no one is regulated

Big Feelings Need Real Skills

SPEAKER_00 10:10

and calm. And so I think part of that is like every parent, like, what do you want for your kid when they grow up? Oh, I want them to be happy, right? That's like what the first thing we say, happy, and then maybe successful, but happy. But we never teach them how to feel all the emotions, right? You can't only feel happiness. That's not a thing to be human is to feel all the emotions, including the negative ones. And the better you get about being comfortable with negative emotions, about allowing them to pass through you and pass on instead of shoving it down so you don't have to feel it, the more you're gonna be able to feel the joy and the happiness. And so I think that's like the one thing that's what we say we want for our kids, and that's like back burner, we don't really actually teach it, teach it how to do it.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

And how many of us were really taught ourselves, which then is hard because we had to figure it out on our own. But you know, luckily some of us have had the success in doing so, so we can share with others.

SPEAKER_00 11:04

But a lot of us are like we're trying to, we never learned how to handle our emotions. Like it was, you know, toxic positivity, positive emotions only. If you're feeling something negative, just be happy instead, which is not actually a thing, right? We can't just calm down or just be happy. That's not really how human emotions work. It was well intended, but that's also why my generation is very anxious and depressed a lot, right? Because we were just told like any of those negative emotions is is bad, it's wrong, you shouldn't be feeling like that. And so we didn't learn how to release them in a healthy way. And so a lot of us, like a lot of the parents I support in my own personal journey to this point, has been learning how to do it first for ourselves, so we can then teach it to our kids. But then we give our kids the gift of not having to figure this out for themselves after raising their kids.

SPEAKER_01 11:51

I love that, and that's my biggest goal in my life. Literally, my biggest goal is that exactly what you just said. If I can get these three kids to their future and not have to fix the last whatever years of their mind, oh my heavens, right?

SPEAKER_00 12:10

We've done something right, and like we're still gonna mess them up, but there's no way we should everything. I'm like, I'm gonna do my best and still stay for all their therapy, right? But like the emotional regulation is just such a crucial skill that if we can give them anything, like that's really something that these kids need, and it's like the main thing that most typical parenting strategies are missing.

SPEAKER_01 12:30

Yeah, and it starts with our mindset that the parenting strategies want you to focus on behaviors, changing things that Hilda's doing, but you're not sitting your parent down, being like, okay, it's time for you to get a new look, lady. Remodel that brain.

SPEAKER_00 12:48

That is so amazing that you said that. So I have like a five-step process, it's my guide process that helps address any behavior. And the second step is we need to figure out why this behavior is triggering you as a parent so much and change your perspective, teach you how to process your emotions around it so it no longer triggers you. Because maybe you even know the right thing. Because people always want my step five, which is like, what do I do when they're melting down in the grocery store? What do I do when they're refusing to get off screens? What do I do when fill in the blank? And I'm like, yes, I will teach you that, but you're you're skipping to the end. And even if you have the right response, if you are really emotionally triggered, feeling really angry, you're not gonna remember what I say in the moment. You're not gonna be able to utilize what I'm telling you in the moment, and and it's not gonna work. So sometimes parents are have even tried the right strategies, but they didn't do it from a regulated place. They tried it from a triggered place and it didn't work. So that's one of the main things we do is like, hey, before we even change how we're responding to the behavior, we have to get it. So it's like, you know, they say the kids can always push your buttons and they can, but it's like, what if I just cut that string that's attaching the buttons to my emotions? So you can do whatever you can do it, but I'm still in charge of my reactions and my response, and I can stay calm and curious about what the heck you're doing right now, right? And confident that I know how to respond instead of getting triggered or angry or frustrated or shutting down.

SPEAKER_01 14:11

Yeah, and it's hard. Like, when do you suggest that we as parents or parents that might be listening, no matter what age your child might be, what when do you suggest we start to form this idea to go into parenting different, or how do we even approach it?

SPEAKER_00 14:30

Yeah, you know, I I would say it's like never too late. It's like I think it's a Chinese proverb, right? Like the best day to plant a tree is like, you know, 20 years ago or whatever, 10 years ago, but the second best day is like right now. And so often parents will start to see it's like almost a disconnect. So maybe even around two or three, the age of two or three is kind of when it starts, where your kids just having these big meltdowns. You don't know why, you're feeling really overwhelmed. And if that's you, like that, like that's your sign, like listening to this. This is your sign that let's get you more support right now. Because they're not, we like tell ourselves we're gonna grow out of it, right? Oh, it's because they're two, oh, it's because they're three, oh, it's because they're four, oh, it's you know, when they start school, when they get into upper elementary, when they we like have a long list of all the things that we're waiting for to change their behavior, but we're not changing how we

Regulate Yourself Before You Respond

SPEAKER_00 15:20

respond. We're not changing, we're just like hoping that they'll grow out of it and like they won't. It's usually it's due to missing skills, it's not just a phase, and they're not gonna learn those skills if you don't teach them. And so if you have a little one and you're noticing, yeah, I am so overwhelmed by their behaviors, I don't know why they're doing it. It's so frustrating. Like, that's okay. You're a great mom, great dad, but this is your sign that we need to get you some support right now because that divide is just gonna keep widening. And then when you do hit the, you know, middle school, teenage years, that divide is gonna be much more hard to fix. It's really hard to get that connection back. You're gonna see all these behaviors amplified, but also it's not too late. I work with lots of parents of teens. Like you can always make you can, it's never too late. But when we have the little ones, like you're hearing it, just start now. It's so much easier, so much faster to solve this when they're little.

SPEAKER_01 16:13

Yeah. Plus, when you really show them when they're little that, you know, what they're saying is important to you, what their their behaviors are, that you're curious about it. They want to build that connection with you. They they trust that you're like really into them, you know?

SPEAKER_00 16:33

Yeah, yeah. My oldest right now is 12. So we're just very much between middle school years personally as a mom. And you know, this is a time where often he's a boy, right? So where kids kind of do start pulling away, and I'm expecting that fully in this next stage, but also it's not happening right now. And and it's often because I listen to him talk about Roblox games incessantly, right? Like, that is not my interest, but I want to be interested in what he's interested in, right? So, like wherever he's at, it's my job to meet him there because I love him and care about him as a person versus like talk about something I care about. Like, no, I'm gonna care about what you care about, even if it's Roblox. Okay, fine.

SPEAKER_01 17:13

Yeah, and you know, I love that you said that because when when my kiddos were going through their you know, never-ending Minecraft days, it was the same thing, and it was like, How do we how do we connect with our kids? They just want to be on video games, they just want guess what? Get in there, let them show you something. Teach you what they can do, and then they're like, What you did that? Then they're they're I'm impressing them. What it's very exciting for them. I used to have my kiddo who has dyslexia practice writing signs or practice doing multiplication tables on the little signs and doing different kind of doing math or adding the blocks. I mean, there's just so many games that you integrate with learning with their interests. That's the point. That's the point. Their interests, when you enter into their world of interests, you can get so much done.

SPEAKER_00 18:14

So much, and then yeah, you're like you save so much time because you're not doing this whole battle over trying to teach them what you want them to learn. Instead, you're entering their world and teaching them the way they actually learn, so they learn it much more quickly, and now they're looking to you as someone who's on their team, on their side, versus someone like who is just giving them boring stuff to do that they don't care about.

SPEAKER_01 18:34

Yeah, definitely. And you can make everything exciting. Yeah, everything can be fun.

Start Early And Close The Divide

SPEAKER_01 18:41

And you know, I I don't know why I thought of this, but this last, you know, my son is is 16, but he is non-speaking and well, he's semi-verbal. And for he loves number blocks, loves, loves the number blocks. And so for his 16th birthday, I printed, I had Chat GPT print out 16 different messages uh from the number from each number block and gave those to him. And just those types of things. What a special, like he still has them like um next to his bed, and the kid doesn't, you know, throws away everything but has a tiny stack of papers that mean the world to him. Wow, it's just the the stuff you can that we you know kind of would take for granted, maybe, or something so meaningful to people you show that you really care for them on a deep, compassionate level.

SPEAKER_00 19:32

Yes, yeah, and that's what it's about. It's about loving them for where they are and then guiding them to who we know they can be, to like meeting their full potential, whatever that is. Like that's why before we started recording, we're talking about the wildflower uh poster behind that I did not paint. I bought on Amazon. But I love it because I think sometimes we like, you know, you plant a seed and you're like, okay, I'm gonna have a kid and they're gonna be a rose, right? I don't actually know anything about planting or flowers or art, but like stick with me. We're like, okay, it's gonna be a rose. So I'm gonna follow all the rose, you know, instruct gardening instructions, and like, and and then I'm gonna like try to like make it grow in a certain way so it becomes a rose. And like, that's not how plants or kids work. I don't really know how plants work, I do know how kids work. You don't know what seed you got, right? It's just gonna grow. You have to just figure out the best way to nurture it and grow it into who whatever it was meant to be, whatever is in time out, you know. So I'm like so the nature versus nurture debate, right? Like, how much is nature? How much is nurture? I'm like, oh my gosh, after having kids, I like believe so much more of it is nature. I'm like, you just came out like this. Like, this is not anything you learned here, right? But like, okay, like who are you? And how can I just help you guide you into that best version of yourself and love you exactly for who you are right now?

SPEAKER_01 20:45

Yes, exactly. And you know, I tell my teens, and I've said this in a few podcast listeners. I'm sorry that you're I'm repeating myself, but I think you should repeat it to your kids. Your your worth and your value does not come from your grades, from how good of a singing voice you have, from how good you play checkers or that that rooms you whatever. You are already valuable, you are already worthy. And the more you reach right, you remind your kids and your teens that, and they start to like like, whoa, that's and I guess I have the experience of of having a bonus kit in my life lately that didn't have those experiences, and now I'm sharing what can be. And my heavens, I'll tell you what, the wildflowers are in triple double, like remote over here, growing so much.

SPEAKER_00 21:36

So okay, I'm gonna give you another take on that because I do something very similar. I love that. So this is yeah, everyone take take whichever one you want, because they're both they're all beautiful. But is there's nothing you can do that will make me love you more or less than I love you right now. Like you can't, nothing you can do can make you don't have to earn more love. You don't have to perform to earn, I won't love you more if you perform. I won't, my love won't go away when you mess up. I just couldn't possibly love you more than I already do, right in this moment. And I tell my kids, I started telling that when they were very little, and I try to tell them that every day at bedtime. And oh my gosh, the eye rolls, right? Even when they were little, they're like, Mom, we know. Right, right, especially with your teenagers. The eye rolls means you're doing it. But I and and anytime we are like maybe repairing after they have made a mistake because they make a lot, like, I'm like, hey, does mom, you know, how much does mom love you? And they're like, Yeah, mom still loves me the same. I'm like, Yeah, like we that thing that you did, that was the mistake. We all make mistakes. We're we're not doing that anymore. But that does not change how much I love you. Mom still loves you when you scream at me or you know, whatever's happening. That does not change my love for you. Yeah, and that's like the solid foundation that these kids need because that their worth is not based on their behavior, they don't have to perform to earn their parents' love.

SPEAKER_01 22:52

Yeah. And it's so so hard when you have, you know, other adults that place those expectations over your kids or over other kids, and you see them and you just say, Oh, I wish, I wish I could just hold that little kid. Yeah, I just want to scoop them up. Yeah. So do me a favor, listeners, make sure that you are gonna just check in with your own mind today, check in with your perception. How are you how are you viewing your own behaviors around people, around with when you're with yourself? Are how much integrity do you have, right? Are you doing what's right even though no one's looking?

Connect Through Games And Interests

SPEAKER_01 23:32

That's a tricky one. But teaching our kids to be able to do that can empower them more than than anything. And I think that you know, behavior in general is is so uh concerning to so many people who don't see that it is the communication that's not being processed by this child, and that's what they need is that focus on how do we get this communication across.

SPEAKER_00 24:03

Exactly. Yeah, what is the behavior trying to tell you versus how do I just make this behavior stop? Yeah. Because you probably you can make a behavior stop by yelling and like doing a lot of punishment on it, but then you're not you're not understanding what they were trying to communicate, and they're just gonna find other ways that might be even less desirable to communicate that need, or they're just gonna stop communicating their needs altogether, which is even worse. No good. And so behavior is just an outward period. I think of it as like behavior being the weeds, right? I just did so much weeding in my backyard over the weekend, it was a disaster, it was very satisfying, it's looking pretty. But like when you're weeding, like you can just weed whack, right? I could have just cut all the weeds off, right? I would have been exhausted, and then they would have grown right back, and it would have just been this endless cycle of spending all my energy whacking at these weeds. But instead, that's not how we weed, right? We pull it out from the root. We're like, what's going on underneath? I need to pull out the roots so it doesn't just keep growing back. And we live in a culture of weed whacking so that kids perform the right way instead of dropping down into why are they having that outward behavior? And how do we teach them a better way to communicate that need so they no longer need to engage in that behavior? They don't want to be doing it either. They don't want to be out of control and getting in trouble, and they want to have their needs met in a really appropriate way so that you're proud of them.

SPEAKER_01 25:22

What do you think about my brain just like showed me? I love this. My brain just showed me maybe like words on a poster that are like, you know, in emotions and how do you express them and things like that. What kind of like environmental visuals should we provide our house and our kids so that they can work on understanding those types of emotions?

SPEAKER_00 25:46

Yes. Okay, this might be kind of a controversial opinion. So I'm gonna start with if you love the visuals you have in your house right now, then if it's working for you, great. I never want to take away anything that's working. But I have just talked to so many parents who bought the most beautiful calm down post, calm down corner poster, you know, somewhere, and they set up a beautiful calm down corner and they're like, My kid's not, it's not working, my kid's not using it. And so I am just not a Pinterest mom. I I like to make things quick and easy, and I I'm not good at Canva and all that kind of stuff. Oh, so I yeah, so like if you if that's you, then do it. If it brings you joy, do it. But what is even more valuable is just having a conversation with your kid when they're calm and teachable and saying, hey, I've noticed that you're, you know, this is making you really upset, or sometimes you just feel really mad or really sad, right? Why do you think we can, you know, it's okay to feel like that. We all feel like that. Yeah, everyone feels mad sometimes. And I even I see why that situation made you mad. But doing X, Y, and Z is not the best way to get the mad out of your body, right? What are good ways? Maybe what are ways that you want to get the mad out of your body? Here's some ideas, right? We can, depending on your kid's age, you know, we can stomp our feet, we can scream into a pillow, we can rip stuff, we can throw bean bags into the laundry basket, you know, a long list, kind of, and every kid is so different, and it's gonna change as they get older. But I just I give them a list and I have them pick three things. And then if they can write or draw, I have them write down the three things that they want to try in those moments. And then I will maybe make copies or whatever, put it up everywhere to help them remember. But just putting it up on a wall, like it pretty much becomes wallpaper to all of us, like after a week. And so it only works if you're like constantly talking about it. And then also you're gonna, but then what's gonna happen, just like when you spend a lot of money on the fancy, you know, posters and everything, in the moment when they are really emotional and really angry, they are not going to want to use that list or look at your poster because

Unconditional Love As The Foundation

SPEAKER_00 27:40

they're not in that part of their brain. So you can offer it and remind them, but also know that like it's gonna take a lot of repetition for that to start to for them to start using it, and that's okay. It's the repetition, and then it's the talking about it and practicing it in moments of calm when they're actually teachable that will help that get to the part of their brain that they can actually access that when they are upset.

SPEAKER_01 28:00

And isn't that the tricky part for parents? They want to get on that lecture train as soon as that kid has done something wrong. Let's start the let's interrupt, let's, you know, we're we got our picket line, we're going with all the parents. Yeah, it's not the right time. If you guys, you know, my husband always says five, five, five, five, five, five, five, five, five. And he's talking about five minutes, five hours, five weeks, five, whatever's uh gonna matter in five minutes, five, you know, is it what impact are you gonna have in the next five minutes, five weeks? What is this problem gonna have on your life in five years? Are you gonna be thinking about this? Do you really need this rubber ducky? Is it you know more of a five-minute problem? But yeah, it's uh it can always uh help you as a parent to kind of step back and say, Okay, I gotta gather my thoughts, you know, and how and really regain your own composure. So I think in modeling is so important, and I've only learned from experience in both ways.

SPEAKER_00 29:06

I think a lot of people hear like the five, five, I love that. Yeah, any of those things, right? And then they tell it to their kids in the moment their kids are upset, right? They want their kids to stop being upset, so they try to logic them out of it. Yeah. When our kids are upset in general, we talk way too much. But a lot of it is because we are uncomfortable with our child's behavior, and we want this uh discomfort, the un the you know, whatever it is, the discomfort in our body to stop. So we have to stop our kids' behavior right now so that we feel comfortable again. And when you think about it like that, that's putting so much pressure on your kid whose brain is not even developed. Yeah, totally. And so I yeah, I love that you're saying the five, five, five, five, five, right? It's that's for us. And I care that you it took you 10 minutes to put your socks on, or I had to ask you five times in five years, right? And and I'm gonna let my kid have all their feelings and I'm gonna be quiet and yeah, make my kids' tampes might last five minutes to two hours. And the but the more I just try to end it because I'm uncomfortable, that's going to escalate them more. I have to just like, yeah, I'm I'm here, I'm gonna love you. I'm going to control my own nervous system. So maybe you can co-regulate with me a little bit, right? I'm gonna do my best to stay very regulated, genuinely calm. Not that like I'm calm, I'm not yelling, but I'm actually calm, I'm okay. And they can take as long as they need, as long as everyone's safe, right? To get this out. And I'm just gonna be here.

SPEAKER_02 30:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:32

And that is deeply uncomfortable for a lot of us because that's not how we were raised. We weren't allowed to cry, we weren't allowed to get our feelings out. We had to stop them because our parents were uncomfortable with them. And our parents were doing their best, but they didn't know better.

SPEAKER_02 30:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:45

And so when you're listening to this, now you do know better. And this is your sign that you can give that gift to your kids.

SPEAKER_01 30:52

Yeah, definitely. Oh, I love that. Where are you at online? Are you doing online or in person?

Calm-Down Tools That Actually Work

SPEAKER_01 31:00

And where are you at in the world? We didn't even talk about that.

SPEAKER_00 31:03

No, but I am in Northern California, kind of near Sacramento, but all my work is online. So I am on your computer, on your phone. I work with my clients one-on-one or in groups, but it's all on Zoom, which I love. So I have clients across the country, I have some international clients. It's really fun. I'm just like any parents that are really ready to learn a unique custom way to respond to their child's behavior and connect with them. Like I can be in, yeah, I can help you. I'm here. And then I'm also on social media Facebook, Instagram at ConfidentlyMoman. And my website is www.melissa schultz, s-c-h-u-l-z dot com. I have a freebie on there that I'd love to offer your listeners, how to get your kids to listen. You can go to my website and download that right now. Thank you so much for adding on. Yeah, that was those are my three favorite tips that worked for all kids about how to just more cooperation and compliance and connection with your kids.

SPEAKER_01 31:59

Oh, and that is so so important too. And I love that. I knew that this was just gonna be such a great conversation when I was reading your bio and everything. So I'm so excited that we got to do this today. Any kind of like programs or events that you have coming up?

SPEAKER_00 32:18

Yeah, I do different events pretty much every month. So the best way to know is to get on my email list. Great. Uh, I post them on social as well. So I think uh the I don't know when this is going to be published, but the first week of May. Okay, do we have anything next week? Next Tuesday, this will come out. Okay, so two days go to my website and you can join. But it's going to be how to help kids with big feelings tools for calming yourself and calming your child. So I'll be doing that. That's a I do that, uh, I do a lot of public speaking uh locally and nationally, and that's one of my most popular topics. So I had that one coming next week, but I have a lot of stuff coming because summer is coming. So so many moms and dads I'm talking to are like, what am I gonna do over the summer? Right, like less structure, more chaos, more behavior. So I have lots of stuff coming. And you want to be on my email list to get to hear to be to get first dibs on all the things I have coming up.

SPEAKER_01 33:12

I love that. Thank you so much for sharing that. That's wonderful. And and listeners, please go to malicious schultz.com and all the links will be in the description show notes and everything, so you can know where to find us and go follow her on social medias. Tell me the social media again. I I was I was typing both things at once.

SPEAKER_00 33:34

Yeah, on social media it's at confidently and then it's momin, m-o-m-m-in-

Where To Find Melissa

SPEAKER_00 33:41

I love that.

SPEAKER_01 33:44

Okay, can you spell today? We shall see confidently momin. How did we do perfect? Ah, yay! Good go to confidently momin. That's such a cute name. I'm so excited to go and follow you and share resources. I love to share, so please make sure that you're, you know, sending me all the stuff to share with my communities because I'm I'm so happy to do so. It was so fun getting to know you today and chatting. And I I've we've already followed each other on social media, so I can't wait to stay in touch and just have some more conversations. And if you do have other things that you, you know, want us to promote, please come back on and share some more tips and and we'd love to have you back on in the future.

SPEAKER_00 34:33

Oh, wonderful. Thank you so much. This was so much fun. I really appreciate you having me on. Yes, I had a great time.

SPEAKER_01 34:39

We'll talk to you soon.