Sarah Part 1 of 3: When your Teen is a Great Negotiator

Welcome to Season 3!  We start this season off with a family from Australia.  Sarah is a mom of 2 boys- James is 12, Noah is 15, Sarah and her husband are both ex-military personnel which has a direct impact on their parenting.  In today’s episode we discuss how Sarah’s parenting style matches with James who has been recently diagnosed with ADHD, Autism, and Oppositional Defiance Disorder. Many parents can  probably relate to Sarah who tween is a really good negotiator especially when it comes to getting off video games. We explore the big picture concept of the parent-child fit. I also discuss and teach practical skills including setting the stage, coping ahead, and brainstorming to support Sarah in her parenting. 

Time Stamps

6:18 How a parent feels when a child is defiant:

7:30 When a parent is works on rules and boundaries and command and your child doesn’t work that way

8:55  Children who work well with predictability and structure like knowing what will happen and when it will happen and how it's going to happen.

10:30 Sarah changes her words from “his emotional regulation problems” to emotional regulation that is still developing

11:36 Raising an obedient child is different from raising a responsible child

11:41- 14:40 1When a parent thinks that a child’s behavior is a reflection of them (personalizing their behavior) and which leads to mom-guilt

17:00 When parents get diagnosis for their child and when they fear how their child will respond to a diagnosis

18:32 Describing the concept of a “good fit” between the child and the parent as well as the child and its school environment

20:42 The difference between a validating environment and an invalidating environment

23:49   Turn the volume down on the  “shoulds” and increase the volume up on the learning. What have I learned from this?  - A learning model of raising kids

26:55 When your child is an avid gamer and the challenges associated with it.

28:35 Describing a skill called “Setting the Stage” - prepare your child for what is likely to happen and how they will respond vs how they want to respond

30:50 An example of using the brainstorming skill

34:47 Don’t judge the big emotional reactions, just plan for it

35:50 A description of the Cope Ahead Skill (from Dialectic Behavior Therapy) 

38:10 Practicing skills over and over again is what makes them effective

39:00 Parenting is a long-term investment 

Resources:  

Leslie’s Handout: Understanding the Parent Child Fit

Leslie’s Handout: Misbehavior is a form of communication

Leslie’s Handout: Raising a Responsible Child vs Raising an Obedient Child                     Dialectic Behavior Therapy Cope Ahead Skill Handout

Leslie-ism: Take a look at your parent-child fit,

For a full transcript of this episode and more information about the host visit https://lesliecohenrubury.com/podcasts/ . You can also follow Leslie’s work on Facebook,  Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. 

Credits: Is My Child a Monster? is produ

Transcript

[Music: The Wilds Beyond by L-Ray Music]

0:02  Sarah:  I'm an ex-military. My job was very structured, and rules and boundaries and command. So that was super challenging to try and navigate with a child that didn't work that way.

0:20  Leslie Cohen-Rubury:  A military mom and a defiant kid can be like oil and water, but it doesn't have to be. There are so many strategies to help you parent a child who may be different from yourself. Remember, the goal of parenting is to figure out what works for your family. 

Welcome to Season Three of Is My Child A Monster?, a parenting skills podcast where you get to listen in as real parents and caregivers share their trials and tribulations in coaching sessions recorded live. I'm your host, Leslie Cohen Rubury, a licensed clinical social worker with 39 years of experience helping families. And no, your child is not a monster, just misunderstood. 

We start the season with Sarah, a mom of two boys, 12-year-old James and 15-year-old Noah. She and her husband are both former military and are used to very regimented schedules and adherence to rules. That can be tough when one of your children has ADHD and autism and doesn't like to obey commands. 

But there's hope. Today we talk about practical skills, including setting the stage, coping ahead, and brainstorming to support Sarah in her parenting. So now, as a reminder, all of the names and identifying information have been changed. And though I'm a licensed clinical social worker, this show is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for therapeutic intervention. So let's begin. 

2:01  Leslie: Hello, Sarah. How are you today? 

2:04  Sarah:  Well, thank you, Leslie. 

2:07  Leslie:  So nice to have you here today. And would you share a little information about your children, about your family, and what's happening? 

2:14  Sarah:  Okay, so I'm based in Australia. I have recently had a diagnosis for my youngest son, the 12-year-old. And I'm trying to get some help with how I can navigate being a parent to two teenage boys, especially one with some special requirements at the moment, navigating teenagehood. 

2:39  Leslie:  So James is the one who recently got diagnosed?

2:43  Sarah:  That’s correct. So, he's just had a couple of diagnoses recently in the last month.

2:48  Leslie:  Do you want to share those diagnoses?

2:51  Sarah:  Absolutely. So he's being diagnosed with ASD. And he also has ADHD. And he's also got some Oppositional Defiant Disorder.

3:03  Leslie:  Okay, so we might as well go with those letters, too: those are ODD. 

3:08  Sarah:  ODD, yes.

3:09  Leslie:  ODD, as you said, is Oppositional Defiant Disorder. ADHD is Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. And ASD is Autism Spectrum Disorder. Did he get assigned a level?

3:25  Sarah:  We are on level two. 

3:27  Leslie:  Okay, so level two is moderate support of his needs. Three is high needs. One is low needs. So he's right in the middle of moderate needs. What led you to getting some testing done, to getting some more information about your son, James? 

3:45  Sarah:  So, here in Australia, he has just started high school, so that is a big transition from a very structured school environment to an environment that is more self-driven and self-disciplined. And I had noticed some changes in him, probably for a few years, but definitely some behaviors that I thought were hindering him from learning to the best of his ability, and making friendships with his peers and navigating being a young man in the world.

4:22  Leslie:  So it was academic, it was social, and it was his daily living skills—is that correct? 

4:30  Sarah:  Absolutely. 

4:31  Leslie:  Okay. And you said you noticed it a couple of years before this big transition to high school. What can you tell me about his early years? 

4:41  Sarah:  So, his early years were typically normal milestones. He definitely had some, what I now know is, some oppositional defiance behaviors…a toddler. But as a toddler, you seem to think that they're pretty normal, as a three year old that knows best. He was very different to our older son, Noah, but there were different behaviors that he demonstrated. We did have some intervention. We had seen a pediatrician when he was five that didn't seem to think that there was too much to worry about, and so we continued monitoring him as his parents and decided that there were some behaviors that were really holding him back. Okay,

5:27  Leslie:  So, did you feel like you needed support as a parent with those earlier defiant behaviors? 

5:36   Sarah:  Absolutely, one hundred percent.

5:37  Leslie:  You did.

5:38  Sarah:  Absolutely, absolutely. So we definitely looked into talking to a psychologist. We have a very…our support networks, his grandparents. So we use my one set of grandparents to sort of give us a break. Or try and defuse his behavior. But as his parents, that were both shift workers, we had to manage him as best we could. 

6:04  Leslie:  So for parents, the defiance can feel…it can feel like, “Someone's challenging my authority.” It could feel like, “My child is struggling.” What were the thoughts or the thoughts that went through your head about this child?

6:22  Sarah:  So I think the part that I was worried about is that I wanted to set him up to be a functioning adult. That was my goal. Always in my head is: I just want you to be a functioning adult where you can survive in the world. Which is hard when your child is three, because that's not realistic. 

So for us, for James, we had very clear boundaries for him. He had to not toe the line, but there was definitely things that we would have to do. So we would have to eat when meal times were. We would have to go to school or kinder. Those things were like…or shower, these were non-negotiables for him. 

But James is a very good negotiator—he's a very good negotiator. So that is super-challenging for me. That comes from a background where I did have a very structured job. My job was very structured, and it was very…well, it was…I'm an ex-military, so for me, that was super-challenging because it works on rules and boundaries and command. So that was super-challenging for me to try and navigate with a child that didn't work that way. 

7:38  Leslie:  Oh my goodness. Defiance in the military is not okay. So in order for you to do your job—you were in the military—you know how to toe the line, as you said earlier. You know how to follow orders and structure. And I don't know if it's in this…it is an assumption whether or not that kind of structure actually works for you. Would you say that that kind of structure works for you?

8:09  Sarah:  Absolutely. 

8:10  Leslie:  Okay, so now, whether you're in the military or not, now you are running a family. Do you run your family like the military?

8:18  Sarah:  Probably to some extent, yes. We get up and we make our beds so that we win every day. And we do clean up after ourselves, and we are a team. So I guess that we do take…I have taken some parts of the military with me as a parent. Yes, that does work for my children, for both of them, because there's structure to their day, to start the day.

8:45  Leslie:  And did you get defiance, setting up that structure, from James?

8:51  Sarah:  James, he seems to work really well with structure. He is a child that works off knowing what will happen and when it will happen and how it's going to happen.

9:04  Leslie:  Okay, so the predictability—get up, make your bed, come down for breakfast, get dressed—that structure, that routine, that predictability was good for him.

9:15  Sarah:  Correct. And that absolutely serves him still today.

 9:19  Leslie:  And when I said, “Good for him,” I mean it was working. 

9:22  Sarah:  Yes. 

9:23  Leslie:  Okay, tell me about the places where it wasn't working, where this defiance showed up.

9:29  Sarah:  So when it was about things that he would like to do. So, “I don't want to go to bed at a normal bedtime,” or, “I don't want to go to kinder,” or, “I don't want to do schoolwork today,” or, “I don't want to…”  so all the things… or, “I would like to play my gaming all day,” those things was where the the rules were bent, bent a little bit, because he could negotiate.

10:03  Leslie:  Okay, did you bend them because of his power of negotiation, or did you bend it because it seemed to be effective to give a little to get a little?

10:15  Sarah:  So, with him, he has emotional regulation problems. 

10:24  Leslie:  Okay. 

10:25  Sarah:  So, not a problem, sorry. He just…emotional regulation, he is still developing. For him, if he really wants to do something and the answer is no, then we scream and yell till it's a yes. So we had to learn ways around those emotional regulation, where he couldn't regulate well. We would have to find ways to negotiate, to get what needed to be done and to do with a reward at the end, if you were able to do what needs to be done.

10:59  Leslie:  Okay, so you use the reward system. I imagine that was a bit challenging, as you said, the defiance of someone talking back, of negotiating, of being a good negotiator, for any parent. We dream, we start out, before we have children, imagining that our children are going to be these sweet little things that say, “Yes, mommy, Yes, Mommy,” and do what we tell them to do, right? And we love children to be obedient. But raising a responsible child is different than raising an obedient child.

11:37  Sarah:  Absolutely. And I think that his behavior, I used to think, reflected me. So his behavior was a reflection of me being a bad mom or not making sure that he had all the tools in his toolbox. Whereas it's not, I'm not…it's his behavior and his emotions. They're okay. 

12:02  Leslie:  How did you learn that? [Laughter]

12:07  Sarah:  Like I said, several years. [Laughter]

12:09  Leslie:  I bet.

12:10  Sarah:  Absolutely. So…and again, because of that military background, I had to let go of that. His behavior and his screaming and ranting is his way of showing me his displeasure or his annoyance or his frustration. It's not about me as his parent, and when I actually learned to dump that, life got a whole bunch easier for me, because it's not mummy guilt.

12:38  Leslie:  That’s beautiful.

12:39  Sarah:  I've done the best that I can do for him, and I've just got to let him work… And we actually spoke about this in the car yesterday, about that I used to own his behavior. And it's not my behavior.

12:51  Leslie:  Okay, and he will learn to actually be responsible for his own behavior. Because you're not personalizing it, as you said. And you said you did, so I'm thrilled. And it is so not easy. So, wow, give yourself that pat on the back. That's pretty amazing, that you've made that change.

13:16   Sarah:  And I think it took a long time, because we talked about consequences, good and bad for behavior.

13:23  Leslie:  Okay, what do you mean?

13:25  Sarah:  So for example, we scream and yell at someone, then that person is probably not going to come to the party when you ask them for something. You treat that person with kindness, then you ask that person for something, and then probably more than likely, they will come to the party. 

So it was like consequences for all our all our behaviors, and knowing that, yes, frustration…and also allowing him to be frustrated. So, “I can see you're frustrated, so I'm not going to talk to you right now. I get that. So how about we put in place that we put where it's you get frustrated, you can go to your room and we will leave you alone till you calm down. Then when you're ready to talk—because obviously things will not come out that are nice—when you're ready, then we're happy to have a conversation.” So that took…and it’s just not perfect. We're not perfect every time, because we're frustrated, or there's a time we need to be somewhere. But we try really hard to not escalate it further by coming back with the same behavior. We try and model. Try and model. 

14:34  Leslie:  Okay, so I want to repeat that, that you're trying to model, that you don't want to take on your child's behavior, and you're giving them space. You're giving him space, James space, to have his emotion, not personalizing it, not saying, “If he's frustrated, I must be doing something wrong. I must be a bad parent.” And instead, “He's having some feelings.”

14:59  Sarah:  Totally, and feelings are normal. 

15:03  Leslie:  So, that sounds fantastic. It sounds like you're not personalizing anymore. You're giving him space to have his feelings, which is great. What's the problem?

15:14  Sarah:  So, the problem is, now we have a couple of diagnoses for him that have been recent diagnoses, which has now started to make me hunt for more information, because I think I can, we can do better. We can do better because the way he functions is not like we function, which is okay. That is okay, but we've got to find the sweet spot for him to be able to interact with us in a way that is appropriate for both parties. Because his emotions do take over at times. So I feel like, now, with those diagnoses and further education, we can get better again.

16:01  Leslie:  Okay, great. So with your diagnoses, did they make a whole bunch of recommendations?

16:09  Sarah:  Yes. So one of those was that we made, as his parents, we decided to move schools. So he has just moved schools after spending one year at his high school. Because it wasn't a very great start for him. And we needed to short circuit and find him a fresh start for him, to start afresh with all his diagnoses, because here in Australia, our school year starts in January. So he's rolling into a new school year next year.

16:45  Leslie:  And I want to step back a moment before we actually talk about any accommodations or what things can help him. How did it feel to get those diagnoses? What did it feel like for you and for him? 

17:00  Sarah:  As his mum, I have worked in an education setting. I worked in an education setting for 10 years, and I had a pretty good idea. I pushed for the assessments to be done because I had a pretty good idea that probably the diagnoses that we got were probably what was going to come back. Even though I knew that, Leslie, it still broke my heart a little bit for him, because I don't want life to be hard. But then I see that my son has taken it like a boss. He has not missed a beat. He is like, okay, “Mom, that's okay. That's all right. I'll take the medicine. We'll try all the medicine. We'll do all the things. It's all good.” So I think when I look at him; and now, it probably helps him make sense of his big emotions, his trouble making friendships, his not being able to be attentive in classes that he doesn't particularly have much interest in—it probably helps him understand where he fits, and how life is, why that is. 

So I think that now I'm over that, you know, I-don't-want-it-to-be-hard. I look at him and I think he's got it right. He's got it right. He's just taking the world on, making a fresh start and doing amazing. And he's been at his new school for two weeks and absolutely loving it. So, tick for mom and dad, changing schools. 

18:32  Leslie:  Wow. That speaks to the setting that our children are in. They're going to one way or the other, let us know if it's a good fit. Actually, let me take a moment to talk about a fit between a parent and a child as well as a fit between a child and a school. The fit is extremely important, and you said that structure really works for you. If you had a child—and we haven't gotten to your other child, which we can get to another time or maybe later—when we're looking at our relationship with our children, we do want to say: Are we similar? Are we different? And if we're similar, that might cause some friction, believe it or not, because a little bit of what you said: we don't want to see our children go through the same pain that maybe we went through. 

So that can be true in the similarities. I don't know if you're like either one of your children, but that can be challenging, and so the fit in that regard, when we're similar to our child, can be challenging that way, sometimes. Other times, it can be very helpful, because you understand where that child's coming from. And then the environment that they're in, their school environment, and how they fit is either a validating or invalidating environment. So if you were a parent—-like you, say your structure—and he had difficulty with transitions, which is typical of ADHD: Is he a little slower with transitions?

20:06  Sarah:  He doesn't like change. But I don't like change. 

20:11  Leslie:  Okay, but let's say you did you, you know, you didn't get that. And you're like, “Okay, we're just going to the car, we're just going to the store.” But for him, it's turning off his computer, whatever, getting out of the house, leaving the comfort of the warmth, and going back outside, whatever it is. That fit. And if you're saying, “What's wrong, what's going on? Come on. Let's go. We're all outside. We're all in the car already.” That can feel invalidating if we don't understand how the child is functioning. 

So the fact that you have these diagnoses, the fact that you've now said, “It helped me understand some of the behaviors that he was having,” such as the emotional dysregulation or whatever, that's great, because we want to create a validating environment for our children. More than anything, that is one of the most important factors when raising children: creating that validating environment, because we can unintentionally create an invalidating environment. Do you know what I mean by that? 

21:16  Sarah:  One hundred percent. And I think that that's where we were trying with, you know, when he was small and saying, “These are the rules, and this is how it's got to be,” is that he didn't thrive in that environment. He wasn't thriving.

21:29  Leslie:  So, you talk about, he's a negotiator. He was advocating for himself before he even knew what the word meant, right? 

21:37  Sarah:  He was, yes. 

21:38  Leslie:  He was saying, “This doesn't work for me.” I heard you say early on that he didn't want to go to kinder, he had difficulties in school. Did he have difficulties with some teachers that didn't quite get him?

21:50  Sarah:  It's interesting. I look back now and I think now what I know…and that's the part, as his mom, I feel sad, is: I should have, I should have… I feel like I should have done something differently earlier. But I definitely know that now, looking back, his kinder teacher was like, “He's not ready for school.” And we're like, “What are you talking about? This kid is ready to go. He's bored. He needs to. He's ready to step up.” But I think because of his oppositional behaviors, because things were not interesting, teachers did find him too hard. And the ones that were open to him and worked with him, he thrived with. He thrived.

And I think that's probably now…that's why making the change of schools, and I think, like you say, is that environment so that he can go and be him and thrive and have support systems in place. That is why my husband and I have been so rigid with, “We have to make a change for our child.”

22:56  Leslie:  That's so exciting. And you obviously learn as you go. 

23:02  Sarah:  Sure have. 

23:04  Leslie:  And you mentioned mom guilt before. I'm going to bring it up again, because you did “should” yourself a minute ago. You said, “I should have known.” I don't know how you “should” have known. And I wonder if you're a little hard on yourself, trying to be the very, very, very best mom possible. Are you a little hard on yourself? 

23:24  Sarah:  I think we all strive to be the best moms. And I think that's the part is…I feel like we are his advocates, and I think that we have advocated for him. We definitely have. But, yeah, I just want to be the better version of his mom. I want to be the best version of his mom, so that he can thrive. Beautiful.

23:47  Leslie:  Beautiful.  Well, I might suggest you turn the volume down a little bit on the “shoulds” and go ahead and turn the volume up on the learning. What have I learned from this? And if that's the language that they hear you saying, “We really learned that you have strong opinions about what's interesting, what's not interesting. You're going to know what you want to get in life. That's a great quality. And right now, when you have a teacher that may not understand that part of you, you two may not get along so easily.” It's just giving him that information. Giving yourself that awareness that you're learning as you go is great modeling for your children. 

I'm still doing it. My 37-year-old son is still giving me information—all three of my children are giving me information—that says, “Oh, I might have missed that.” And so I give myself a lot of compassion and forgiveness that, yes, I was doing my best, and I still—no ifs, ands, or buts, missed a few things. Probably more than a few things. I missed things. I'm not going to I'm not going to quantitate them. I missed a few things. And it's okay, even at this point, to acknowledge it, to learn from it, to share that experience. 

I heard you say, yesterday you and your son were talking in the car. Isn't it incredible when you get to share those moments together, those moments of connection? You were talking about his testing. I bet that was quite a strong bond of connection. Did it feel like that?

25:34  Sarah:  It does. And I think that, because we're so, like, I know that when he was waiting on the assessment results, we held off telling him. And he asked us flat out, and we're like, “Well, actually, can we talk about it and we'll let you know?” And he's like, So have I got ADHD?” and we're like, “Well, yeah.” And he's like, “Okay, all right. Next!” 

So I think that for him, I think that he teaches us a lot as his parents too, that it's not that big a deal. And as I've said all along to him, assessments are just there because they give us tools and ideas and education about how we can make life work a little bit more…a little easier, make it a little easier for you to learn in the way that you learn or the way that you operate in the world. It helps you take some tools in your toolbox to help you go forward. And I think that is where we are directing his diagnoses.

26:34  Leslie:  Okay, so included in the recommendations that they had, would you like any help with any strategies for emotional regulation, for that the time when you two are negotiating? I'm just curious if you would like some strategies in those areas.

26:52  Sarah:  Would love some, Leslie, especially around gaming. James is a very avid gamer. That is his downtime. And he socializes that way too, which can be super challenging when you're locked and loaded into a game and mum has an hour limit on it, but the game's still going. So that's where we're really struggling at the moment with him, is that it is his downtime. And where we actually worked our way through that. We're okay with that. But that's where that emotional regulation will start to fly in, because we're taking away something that he really loves, when he's not ready.

27:37  Leslie:  Are you taking it away as a punishment, or just when the hour is up?

27:42  Sarah:  When the hour is up. 

27:44  Leslie:  Okay. So, there's something that, whether I have a child like that, where you can predict pretty well that he's going to have an emotional reaction…high reactivity, in that regard, when you say the hour’s up. Or just someone who, if you tell them, he wants to do something. And you tell him, “No, we can't do that,” he might have another big reaction. In both situations, where you can expect a big reaction, I am going to do a few things. There's a skill in DBT—Dialectic Behavior Therapy—we call cope ahead. So I want to teach you that, but I also want to mention something that I've made up, called, setting the stage. 

So, setting the stage—and you might already do this, because it seems like you know an awful lot, but let's see what happens. Setting the stage is: I'm going to cue him that when an hour is up…like most of the time, parents say, “I'll give you a 10-minute warning, I'll give you a five minute warning,” and they do that. That is not as helpful in my mind, as, “When the hour is up and I ask you to turn off your game, there's a very, very good chance it's going to be really upsetting to you.” I get his buy in. Because, “What if it comes when I'm in the middle of a game with someone, what if it comes when I'm not done yet?” And I would say, yes, that's what I want to talk about before you sit down to play your game. Okay, what are you going to do if the hour is up and you are not ready? That's going to be upsetting to you. What do you think is going to happen?” “Well, I'll scream.” How do you think he'd answer that?

29:37  Sarah:  “I would scream and yell. I would get very angry at you, mom, and I wouldn't get off.”

29:42  Leslie:  I agree—that's what's going to happen. All right, so that's what we want to prepare for. “So is it okay with you that you scream at me, yell you don't want to get off and you end up crying or going to your room? Does that work for you? Does it get you what you want?” What would he say? 

30:06  Sarah:  His answer would be, “No, because I'll get punished and the game will get taken off me. 

30:10  Leslie:  So it doesn't work for you to scream and yell and because—you keep nodding your head because he's saying yes, yes, Mom, that's right—I would say, “James, is there a way that we can think about now, before you get started, how you might want to handle that moment when those big feelings come erupting? They're going to come. I know they're going to come. You know they're going to come. What do you want to do when those big feelings come?”

30:43  Sarah:  So I would say that, he'd say, “I just have an extra half an hour to finish my game, Mom.”

30:47  Leslie:  “Beautiful brainstorming. I love it. I love that you're thinking you could do that. Well, since you're brainstorming, let's come up with seven—I don't know seven or ten—seven different things you can do when that hour's up and those big feelings come up. Let's see, I'll help you. But can you name any more? You could ask me for another half hour…”

31:08  Sarah:  That'll be the first one. The second one would be, “How about I just use my next hour that you're going to give me anyways, later in the day to tack on?” That'll be another one. 

31:17  Leslie:  Great. “You want to add an extra hour. You want to borrow your hour from later. You want to borrow it on credit. I get it.” 

31:23  Sarah:  Correct. [Laughter]

31:24  Leslie:  That's the American way. [Laughter]

31:26  Sarah:  Yeah, correct. Or I would try, like the other one, he would say is, “I would try and get off. If you tell me before the hour’s up, I will try and get off the game before the hour and then I get that extra 10 minutes that I've banked for the hour later on.”

31:41  Leslie:  “Okay, so your third idea is that I'll give you the warning, you'll find a good time to stop, and then you'll get credit the next time. If you get off before the hour, you get credit for those 10 minutes or whatever.” 

31:54  Sarah: Correct.

31:55  Leslie:  Okay, wow. Can I add one or two ideas? 

31:58  Sarah:  Absolutely—please do. 

32:00  Leslie:  Okay, so then I might say, “Well, those are three…” Now, first of all, what people tend to do in the brainstorming is they tend to evaluate. As soon as he says a half hour, say, “No, I'm not doing that.” You evaluate and you give your judgment. “No, that's a bad idea. No, I'm not doing that.” So I just said, “Okay, that's one idea.” That's all I said. I didn't say it was good. I didn't say it was bad. I said, “Great, that's one idea. What's another idea?” And then he came up with his second idea of whatever it was, and his third idea of crediting the you know, getting off early. 

Then I would say, “All right, I'm going to throw a few ideas out. What if, when those big feelings come, I'm there to give you a hug.” And then he's going to probably say, “No, I don't want to hug.” “Okay. Don't evaluate. Let's just brainstorm. That's four. Let's see a fifth idea would be, I'm going to hand you a bubbly drink because it's really hard to drink seltzer water. And you take a big gulp of your seltzer water, and you deal with the bubbly, you know, the bubbly stuff going on. So it distracts you from your big emotions. Instead, you have this big, intense sensation in your mouth. And we do something like that. That's five.” 

Now I also might, there might be, like, a lifesaver that's spicy or hot. What are those called, hot-and-sour? You know, sour candy balls or whatever. I don't know, you could do something like that. “What if, when you get off, we go run around the house. I'll go outside with you, and we'll time it, and we'll see who's faster.” So like a little competition for the sixth idea. 

“Let's stop there. Do any of those ideas work for you? Or out of the six ideas, which one?” And then I'd say, as Mom, “Which one do I think would be a first choice? What do you think would be your first choice? And maybe we'll agree, what's your top two choices?” And what would you say with that?

34:01  Sarah:  I think he would definitely, because he's a negotiator, he would definitely be open to negotiating, working through those steps, which ones suit him, and like you say, one might suit him one day to the next,

34:16  Leslie:  And you will be building this muscle, a flexibility, because if you do this…you don't have to do it every time, I actually wouldn't—that would be too much. But every once in a while, I would do it and have him practice the brainstorming. He'll come up with new ideas. And you say, just like a science experiment, okay, we'll do it. We'll see if it worked or not and then we'll discuss if it works. 

34:43  Sarah:  I love that.

34:44  Leslie:  Great. That's engaging him in the process, that's getting him to be aware that that big reaction is going to come. And I don't judge the big reaction. I just say: Let's plan for it.

34:53  Sarah:  And I think owning that it's going to happen.

 34:57  Leslie:  Right. Let's not make a judgment because that's who he is, right? That's who he is. So we don't want to say, “Those big reactions have to stop.” No. “Those big reactions are going to happen. How do you want to handle it when it does happen?” 

35:12  Sarah:  I love it. 

35:13  Leslie:  It's such a big difference. It's such an important difference. It's so validating to say, “You get to be you. You are who you are. Now, let's give you strategies to make it effective, because having that big reaction—screaming, yelling—-didn't get you what you wanted. You probably feel guilty that you yelled at me. You probably are mad now, angry because you got it taken away even more. And it might have given you a sore throat for yelling and screaming. So it doesn't sound like it works for you.” And that's why we want to say, “Let's come up with some strategies.” 

The actual skill called cope ahead is, let's say you're putting him to bed one night, or you're in the car, or you're outside shooting hoops or something. Let's say you're just doing something sort of routinely. And you might say, “Can I teach you something that I learned called cope ahead? And the cope ahead skill says you predict when something like that is going to happen.” So you know, same way we talked about it. You say, “What is the reaction going to be?” And then you talk about the skills you want to put in its place. “Do you want to breathe? Do you want to talk to yourself and say, I'm not ready, and I can turn this off.” Like, use some dialectic thinking, “I'm upset, and I can handle this.” Or practice some breathing. 

What does he want to do to see himself handling it really well? Maybe have a piece of paper and say, “Write down I'm really mad. I'm not ready. I'm not ready. I'm not ready.” Get it out, put it on paper. So the cope ahead, there's another step to it, and that's rehearsing it. So, as he's laying in bed, he might see himself. Say, “You know what? See yourself where I come in the room, I tell you it's time to turn it off. You feel yourself getting hot and upset and ready, the urges to yell, and you start to quiet yourself down and say, ‘I can do this. I can do this. I'm upset, and I can handle this.’” 

Maybe teach him some breathing, whether it's starfish breathing, where you go up and down on your fingers, inhale, exhale, as you trace your fingers. Or box breathing. Or you teach him something that when he gets really upset, he's going to try one of these skills because he rehearsed it over and over and over again. 

The big thing is, it takes many years—not many tries, many years—to get good at cope ahead. And as children, I give them plenty of time. I say, “Let's start learning cope ahead. Because if you start practicing now, it's gonna work so well for you as an 18-year-old or 22-year-old, you won't believe it. All you need to do now is try it and do it, and even though it may not feel like it works, practicing, it is going to get it to be effective later.” 

So, I hear a lot of kids say these skills don't work. My daughter said it to me. And what I say over and over again is she called me up from Thailand at 22 years old and said, “Mom, you’ve got to tell these parents and the kids that these skills do work.” Because she heard me. We rehearsed them. I would say them over and over again. And at 22, guess what? They were working.

38:43  Sarah:  Only a few more years.

38:46  Leslie:  Only a few more years. But the important thing is, you said it yourself: You worry about them as adults. All we care about is that these skills are going to be there when they need them as adults, right? 

38:57  Sarah:  Absolutely.

38:58  Leslie:  It's hard now, and what you're doing will have that long term investment. I hope you know that. 

39:06  Sarah:  Thank you.

[Music: Flowerpot by Olexy]

39:14  Leslie Cohen-Rubury:  I just said it in this episode, and I've said it before, parenting is a long term investment. It's a long game, and Sarah is in it to win it. Okay, I can't help myself that’s sort of corny, but it's true that we really need to think of it as a long term project. And I want to thank Sarah for sticking with it, to learning as she goes. You heard a very educated person—she's been in education, and she is very educated—but she's here showing up to get more help, to get greater understanding and to constantly learn from her parenting experience, from raising her children. Because parents are doing the best they can. 

But when they put pressure on themselves to do it all, they can feel like a bad parent. And for a little while there, Sarah shared with us that she interpreted her son's behavior and his emotions as a reflection on her competency and her ability to be a parent. It's so great that she was able to separate her son's behavior and her son's emotions as a reflection on herself, and that's really important. So, thank you, Sarah for showing up and being here today. I love that you're learning as you go, and you're willing to be vulnerable, because you know an awful lot, and you're still trying to be the best parent you can be. 

So this week, take a look at your parent/child fit. And join us on Thursday for a new mini bonus episode that focuses on just the skills to reinforce your learning. This mini episode will focus on what the parent child fit is all about, why it's so important, how flexible thinking is a key element, and how to create a validating environment. And join us next week for my second session with Sarah, where we will focus on how to be a less controlling parent,

And please rate and review on Apple podcasts to help spread the word and get it out there. You can also find a full transcript of this episode, or sign up for my newsletter at ismychildamonster.com. The Is My Child A Monster? team is Alletta Cooper, Camila Salazar, and me.Special thanks to Eric Rubury. Our theme music is by L-Rey Music. 

I'm Leslie Cohen-Rubury. Thanks so much for listening.

Transcribed by Eric Rubury