I have a shared love of child behavior and development with Alyssa Blask Campbell, CEO of Seed & Sew and host of the Voices of Your Village Podcast. She has a master’s degree in early childhood education and she joins me today to explore the WHY behind tantrums and find more peace in the process.

 

She joins me to discuss:

• The different sensory systems we have and why knowing your child’s go-to can help BEFORE and DURING a tantrum
• How we can sometimes “over-do it” as a parent in the tantrum
• Why AFTER a tantrum and moments of dysregulation are most important

 

To connect with Alyssa Blask Campbell follow her on Instagram @seed.and.sew, check out all her resources at https://www.seedandsew.org/ and take her free quiz: https://seedquiz.com

 

Our podcasts are also now on YouTube. If you prefer a video podcast with closed captioning, check us out there and subscribe to PedsDocTalk TV.

 

We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on the PedsDocTalk Podcast Sponsorships page of the website.

00;00;00;00 – 00;00;26;13
Alyssa Blask Campbell
So when we’re looking at emotional intelligence and emotional health and well-being, but we’re looking at is the ability to feel and experience all emotions and that doesn’t mean that we only ever have happy, content, calm kids that they’re going to if we’re looking at having an emotionally healthy child, they’re going to experience a range of emotions, just like we will experience a range of emotions.

00;00;26;15 – 00;00;50;03
Dr. Mona
Welcome back everyone to the show. We are fast approaching the holidays, but October is actually a very big month in our lives because some cultural holidays. And then it’s Halloween, my birthday, and work and routine in between. And over the weekend, I had plans to take my son, Ryaan to an event called Gaba. We are currently celebrating now for our three, which stands for nine nights, where we celebrate the feminine energy for a goddess in our religion.

00;00;50;05 – 00;01;12;01
Dr. Mona
And there’s a lot of fun and dancing and light and energy. Well, the morning of the event, Ryan wasn’t feeling very positive and high energy. He woke up and everything that normally didn’t set him off, did. He had huge, huge meltdowns that he didn’t have before, and they kept rolling from one to another. And have you been there before?

00;01;12;01 – 00;01;31;23
Dr. Mona
Like one meltdown would end and then ten minutes later, another one and another one and another one. It felt like we were walking on eggshells. I even at one point turned to my husband and said, if he keeps acting like this, I can’t take him to the event. And it was a later event after his bedtime, and I couldn’t imagine handling meltdowns there.

00;01;32;00 – 00;01;51;02
Dr. Mona
After a day of this, I also noticed that I was extremely dysregulated during these moments, and I had to have my husband manage the meltdowns towards the end because I found myself starting to get really short and irritable. Even if I wasn’t really saying something. And you know, we eventually ate lunch. Ryan took a nap and he woke up a different kid.

00;01;51;04 – 00;02;11;03
Dr. Mona
Sleep time, rest, some co regulation. Who knows? But it ended up being an incredible night. And I advise families all the time on tantrums and meltdowns. But listen, they are hard to get through even if you know how to get through them. Hearing a child cry, trying to regulate, trying to navigate through it, the big feelings, the big energy.

00;02;11;03 – 00;02;32;09
Dr. Mona
It is a lot and I have a lot of resources. But I want you to remember this, that tantrums pass. They are not forever. Number two, check your regulation. If you find yourself getting a rise, hand off the situation to a more regulated caregiver. It matters to bring them back to a regulated state. If you’re alone, which I often am, and find yourself dysregulated, step away.

00;02;32;12 – 00;02;52;06
Dr. Mona
Take a moment and take a time out for yourself. Tell your kid, hey, I need a moment and just step away to regulate. For me, it’s looking away for my kids, telling myself this is a moment and getting back to it, which can sometimes be so hard. Number four tantrums can be complex to manage because they also depend on your child’s temperament.

00;02;52;08 – 00;03;12;06
Dr. Mona
I found that my son really responds to deep pressure when he’s upset, meaning me pressing his arms and legs in a deep hold like a massage. Being a parent is so much about understanding your child’s needs and yours too. Sometimes you may need a moment or they may. Which leads me to today’s guest. Today’s guest is Alyssa Blas Campbell, CEO of Seton.

00;03;12;06 – 00;03;43;05
Dr. Mona
So she has a master’s degree in early childhood education, is a leading expert in emotional development who travels the globe. Speaking on the topic, her podcast, Voices of Your Village, is a gathering place for parents, caregivers, teachers and experts creating a modern parenting village and reaches listeners in more than 100 countries. She co-created the collaborative emotion Processing method with Lawrence O’Donnell, an assistant professor of early education and mindfulness consultant, an approach that changes the way adults experience children’s emotions so we can respond with intention and raise emotionally intelligent humans.

00;03;43;08 – 00;04;12;27
Dr. Mona
The research of the SIP method and experiences as educators and parents was shared in a book called Tiny Humans Big Emotions, published in October of 2023 from Harpercollins. Alyssa is company seed and so serves people around the globe through speaking, consulting, online courses and early childhood professional development programs, sharing tools and expertise to build emotional intelligence. And she joins me to talk about exactly what I just started talking about on this episode, which is decoding tantrums, understanding, navigating, and regulating the emotions underneath.

00;04;13;00 – 00;04;28;12
Dr. Mona
And how important is to understand your child’s temperament, to be able to navigate tantrums. And don’t forget to check out my Real on Instagram for a chance to win a book from Alyssa and resources from myself. Let’s get to this amazing conversation. Thank you and welcome to the show today.

00;04;28;14 – 00;04;31;12
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah thank you. I’m Jaz to get to hang out with you.

00;04;31;14 – 00;04;50;22
Dr. Mona
Yeah. And we are chatting about tantrums. Every parent wants to talk about tantrums and we are talking about tantrums from your perspective, understanding, navigating and regulating the emotions underneath. But before we get into that, tell us more about yourself, the inspiration of your book and also maybe the inspiration behind it.

00;04;50;22 – 00;05;16;23
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so yes, so I have a master’s in early ed, and I am a mom of two now, and I had found when I was teaching in early Ed is a huge focus on social emotional development, which is awesome. Super rad that we’re talking about skills, social emotional learning. And also in my experience of it, there was a huge focus on social development.

00;05;16;26 – 00;05;50;25
Alyssa Blask Campbell
How do you get kids to show up with certain skills socially? How do we get them to be empathetic? How do we get them to collaborate, how do we get them to be kind, etc.? And there wasn’t a lot around how do we help them build tools to notice what’s happening in their body, to know how their unique nervous system works, to know what calms them, to know what disregulated them so that they can show up with intention so that they can access things like self-control and be able to choose their words and speak kindly to somebody or engage in social play.

00;05;50;27 – 00;06;17;12
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so a lot of the expectation was the social component without the like, how do you build the emotional piece that is a predecessor for the social peace? And so Lauren and I were teaching together at a school, it was really resource rich in the Boston area, where every head teacher of the childcare program had a master’s in early ed, and, we were attached to a university and had the opportunity to do research.

00;06;17;14 – 00;06;41;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And we created the collaborative emotion processing method to help guide us through, like, what does it really look like to build, emotional intelligence and spoiler alert, of the five components, four of them are about us as adults, and what we’re bringing to the table and how we are showing up and our own tools for regulation and acknowledging our biases.

00;06;41;11 – 00;06;57;29
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I wrote in the book that sometimes I open my mouth and my mom comes out and like, sometimes that’s great, you know? And like, sometimes I’m like, yeah, I totally want to pass that on. And sometimes I’ve spent a lot of time in therapy trying to not pass that on. And so where do you go from there? What does that look like?

00;06;58;01 – 00;07;22;24
Alyssa Blask Campbell
So diving into like the practicality of this and recognizing that, you know, we don’t have a spare 20 minutes to work through emotions or kids aren’t like, hey, mom, is this a good time for you? And so really building in the like, what does it look like to do this work in real time? Was what led us to the set method and our research.

00;07;22;24 – 00;07;39;23
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And then from there, I started. When our research ended, I started seeing. So to be able to just share about this work in a, in a broader sense and, then eventually we, after gathering all the data and all that, just wrote Tiny Humans.

00;07;39;26 – 00;08;02;14
Dr. Mona
Love it. And congratulations again on the book. And we’re going to be diving into, again, tantrums, which are just obviously a part of, you know, their emotional processing and awareness. And I cannot wait to dive into this, an area that I also love chatting about. I love talking about tantrum de-escalation, but also, like you said, getting into the ability to teach that child how to tap into what they’re feeling.

00;08;02;17 – 00;08;22;13
Dr. Mona
I know I’ve been on your show, as well, talking about really getting into the, the why and the, the feelings for a child. And so I think it’s just so important. And so we’re going to talk about tantrums. I know everyone listening really get the book to and we’re not going to be able to tell you every situation how to manage every emotional situation your child may go through.

00;08;22;19 – 00;08;33;09
Dr. Mona
But I guess I want to start with one of the biggest misconceptions that you feel parents have in regards to tantrums that you would love to debunk or sort of clarify with some nuance today.

00;08;33;11 – 00;09;12;10
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah, the biggest misconception is that you’re failing if they’re happening that like, you know, there’s, that there is a perfect way you could set everything up so that your child doesn’t have a tantrum. And that’s not true and it’s not real. And I think it’s also one of the challenges, like, I’m going to put this in quotes for like parenting experts on social media, is that there can be this perception that if I set everything right, if I did everything right in quotes, then my kid wouldn’t have a hard time, wouldn’t have that tantrum and that they would just be like, hi mom, I’m feeling really frustrated and I want to talk through it

00;09;12;10 – 00;09;25;28
Alyssa Blask Campbell
and can I have a hug? And and that’s not real. And so I think that first and foremost is that, like if your kid is having tantrums, that is a very healthy, normal part of development and you’re not failing for that.

00;09;26;00 – 00;09;40;15
Dr. Mona
I couldn’t agree more. And, you know, I hear a lot about the preparation and what can we do. And not to say that that’s not important, right. Because we can take a child and say, okay, I know that my child is going to have more meltdowns if they’re sleep deprived, if they’re hungry. We know the basics, right?

00;09;40;15 – 00;09;55;27
Dr. Mona
And I, I know your resources and mine is we’ll talk about that. But I love that you’re normalizing that because that also can lead to that unmet expectation. And I see that all the time when parents come in my office, they’re like, well, I was told that if I do this, then this would be how it shows up.

00;09;55;27 – 00;10;18;27
Dr. Mona
And I’m like, well, your children are not robots, so you can try and I don’t think we should not try. But I also agree with you that we have we have to also know what am I going to do now that they have that moment. And the first part of that, like you said, is not have self shame of like, well, I must have not done I as a parent failed them because now they’re melting down in the grocery store or on the plane and I didn’t do everything right.

00;10;18;27 – 00;10;31;11
Dr. Mona
And that is met with guilt. I mean, it’s not a fun place to be. And then you’re more likely not to really manage that tantrum, as you probably would, because you’re you’re approaching it with self shame and, and embarrassment, if you will.

00;10;31;16 – 00;11;02;24
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah. Well, and I think it’s also it’s not a part of emotional intelligence. So when we’re looking at emotional intelligence and emotional health and well-being, but we’re looking at is the ability to feel and experience all emotions. And that doesn’t mean that we only ever have happy, content, calm kids that they’re going to if we’re looking at having an emotionally healthy child, they’re going to experience a range of emotions, just like we will experience a range of emotions.

00;11;02;26 – 00;11;19;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And I had a parent who reached out a little while ago and they’re like, oh, we’ve been they’ve been trying this, this other program. They’re like, and it’s just not working. And I was like, well, let me know what you mean by not working. Like, what’s your goal? And they were like, well, we’re still like every time I set a boundary, there’s pushback.

00;11;19;09 – 00;11;37;01
Alyssa Blask Campbell
There’s enough. And I was like, what’s your goal there? And she was like, it would be so nice if I could say, hey, we’re going to do this. And they would just collaborate. This is like totally, it would be so intense. And it’s their job to push back and they’re not going to be like, you know what, mom?

00;11;37;01 – 00;11;54;18
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I can see that you have my best interests at heart when you set that boundary. Thanks for keeping me safe and healthy. And and now I’m ready to listen. And it’s that the expectation there has to shift. And and for me, it’s also that, like, I want to let kids know that you do get to feel all these feelings.

00;11;54;25 – 00;11;58;05
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And they only learn that by practicing feeling them.

00;11;58;08 – 00;12;21;02
Dr. Mona
Now let’s take a break to hear from our sponsors. Yeah, and they only learn these things by being in those moments, right. Like I think a lot of their a lot of what I’ve seen in the community, especially on social media, is a fear of going into situations. Now, I understand there is maybe some nuance in kids like, you know, a certain a child may have some sensory issues with an environment, but barring any sort of that, right.

00;12;21;02 – 00;12;38;09
Dr. Mona
Like I’m using example of flying with a child. I dreaded flying with the child because I didn’t want to do it. It was not something that was enjoyable for me. And yes, you don’t have to love flying, but the more I did it exposure therapy, the more I realized that it’s going to be okay and that people will have comments.

00;12;38;09 – 00;13;04;06
Dr. Mona
If your child is is not behaving quote unquote correctly on that flight. And that’s no reflection of you and that’s just more of a reflection of them. And now I enjoy flying with my four year old. I mean, it’s one of the most enjoyable experiences. I want to take him everywhere and the only way that Ryan, my son, could have really learned about what we do on flights and what we, you know, how we’re going to be in these situations is by exposure.

00;13;04;06 – 00;13;23;23
Dr. Mona
And so taking your child to the store, letting them have that feeling of a meltdown if they don’t get a cookie, navigating those feelings, navigating the moments in public is really useful information for everyone. So child can just again learn and I, I love that. I love that we can teach our child so much about the range of emotions.

00;13;23;23 – 00;13;36;29
Dr. Mona
And I love your resources for a reason, because you really do understand that that range, but also the nuance and sort of yeah, it’s a mixture of preparation, but it’s also a mixture of, well, what are we going to do now that it’s happening? So I love that. Yeah.

00;13;36;29 – 00;13;58;11
Alyssa Blask Campbell
The proactive versus reactive. We go into that a lot in the book. So much of my work is about the nervous system. Right. So we dive into the eight sensory systems a lot. Recognizing that every single one of us processes sensory stimuli differently. And so what is going to be dysregulated for some folks might be regulating for other folks, etc..

00;13;58;13 – 00;14;29;15
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so much of our work on the both proactive and reactive side requires us to understand the nervous system a bit, and we’ll look at things like, for instance, my three year old is sensory sensitive. He is incredible at noticing details. He can tell you if there’s a lawnmower three houses down, he knows exactly how close feel on his body, if they’re too tight, if they’re too itchy, he is really aware of something visually changes.

00;14;29;15 – 00;14;49;27
Alyssa Blask Campbell
If something isn’t in the same place that it was before. He’s really good at noticing details. He has a heightened system that can pick up on these details that my sensory systems often miss. Yeah, like my visual system. I’m like the annoying partner who walks by the pile of laundry over and over, and I just don’t see it.

00;14;49;27 – 00;15;10;24
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I’m not, like, purposefully not taking it upstairs. I just genuinely don’t see it. And my husband, who’s like, my son is like, how do you not see it? Because that’s how they’re nervous systems work. Yeah. And so when we’re diving into this work and we’re looking at how do I support them proactively, how do we consider setting them up for success?

00;15;10;24 – 00;15;31;14
Alyssa Blask Campbell
How do I set them up for success? What it’s going to depend on who your child is and how they process the world. For my little guy, he does really well with pre teaching. So knowing what to expect, he does not like to be surprised I think. Yeah, he even likes at home if like we keep our door our front door locked so that somebody has to knock.

00;15;31;14 – 00;16;03;25
Alyssa Blask Campbell
If they show up. Like if somebody just walks in the house, even if it’s Nana who he loves and sees all the time, he wants to know before they come in. And so letting him know, like, what to expect from something, but also providing sometimes accommodations like you can bring your headphones to this, or if that snowsuit feels too tight, you could take the sweatshirt off and try and giving him other sensory options to help ease the sensory experience of it.

00;16;03;28 – 00;16;29;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And then what we’ve learned about him is, we have. So we often hear of our five senses sight, sound, taste, touch and smell. And then we dive into in the book, the other three senses intercepted, which is what your nervous system is feeling inside. So if you say like I have butterflies in my stomach, you know that feeling of like nervous or excited or those internal cues for having to go to the bathroom or being hungry or tired?

00;16;29;12 – 00;16;55;25
Alyssa Blask Campbell
That’s the intercept of system. And then we have our vestibular system. This is our movement sense, and it helps us balance and move through the world. And it is we can recharge it with things like swinging or going upside down or spinning around. So the third thing is proprioceptive. And so our proprioceptive sense is located in our muscles, in our joints.

00;16;56;02 – 00;17;15;00
Alyssa Blask Campbell
You might see this with like big body play, kids who are jumping off of things or that they love heavy work. I think like CrossFit for kids with varying things. Right? Or we might see siblings where like one sibling loves to like push another sibling around in a laundry basket or something like that to get that heavy work in.

00;17;15;02 – 00;17;40;23
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so when we are looking at these sensory systems, there are some of them that we’re going to be sensitive to and some that we are going to be seeking that are regulating for us. I am more sound sensitive. So if I’m feeling dysregulated, if I’m hungry, if I’m tired, if I’m overwhelmed, then you add on sound to it like that for me, like tapping or clicking sounds just so many kid toys.

00;17;40;23 – 00;18;01;08
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I feel like me. Like, yeah, I’m like, oh my gosh. And you can crawl in and then I want to explode. And then I’m not the parent. I want to be. And what’s regulating for me is often like proprioceptive input or touch. So I could have a massage for like four straight days and still be like, oh, I want more.

00;18;01;11 – 00;18;12;23
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And I it’s hard for me to get touched out. In fact, one of the things that’s really calming for me, if things feel really busy, is to slow down and just have Mila, my baby, just nap on me in a carrier.

00;18;12;24 – 00;18;13;17
Dr. Mona
Yeah.

00;18;13;19 – 00;18;38;14
Alyssa Blask Campbell
That is comforting for me. And calming, and for my three year old, he is sensitive to most of the first five. He also has a sensitive intercept system. He’s really aware of how things feel. He can go 0 to 1000 when he is hungry or tired. He feels things really deeply and in a big way.

00;18;38;16 – 00;19;06;14
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And he is vestibular seeking. I’m vestibular sensitive. So if I spin or I like on a swing for for long at all, I get nauseous. It’s uncomfortable for me. He could live on a swing. He it’s so regulating for him. And so when we’re looking at this in order to know like how do we proactively support them and then support them in the moment, it’s key to understand who are they and how does our nervous system work.

00;19;06;14 – 00;19;28;27
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so one of the things that we did at seed, we worked with an OT and occupational therapist to create a quiz to help you understand your kid’s nervous system a little bit. It’s free. You go to Seed quiz.com, and it’s a series of questions that will then help you understand your kid’s sensory profile and give you some ideas of activities or ways you might see things show up, if people are interested in that.

00;19;28;27 – 00;19;46;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
But so for sage, for instance, my three year old, if we’re going to go to, say, a restaurant where there’s going to be a lot of stimuli, it’s going to be, wow, there’s going to be a lot going on around him. Eating is a sensory experience in and of itself. Like all that jazz is going to happen.

00;19;46;09 – 00;20;15;07
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I know I’ve got to proactively support him. Sometimes I’ll bring headphones, I bring some accommodations, but sometimes we’re also going to spin around. I’m going to play a game with him between the car and the door of the restaurant, where I can either dip him upside down or get some spins in, kind of like twirls. We’re going to recharge his battery a little bit with vestibular input before we then go into a space where his battery is going to be great.

00;20;15;10 – 00;20;39;23
Dr. Mona
I love this intercept of vestibular and proprioceptive because again, going back into the science and the differences of temperament and who a child is, and that can also be a form of preparation. Like we talked about. But and also I’m, I’m assuming those three things can also help in the middle of a tantrum as well. You knowing the identity or who your child is, what do you think is a mistake parents make in the middle of the tantrum?

00;20;39;23 – 00;20;45;07
Dr. Mona
And also, how could we use the three things that you mentioned, in the middle of a tantrum with an example?

00;20;45;09 – 00;21;09;26
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah. So one mistake is I think the most common was just trying to make it go away. Right? Yeah. Which makes sense because big emotions are inconvenient and they’re uncomfortable and it’s hard to be around them. And yeah, it’s really hard to hold space for them. They’re not usually at convenient times. And so but it’s like quicksand where the more we try to make it go away, the more we kind of sink down into it.

00;21;09;28 – 00;21;31;11
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so when we can allow it, when we can hold space for it and move through it, which we walk you all through in tiny physical motions, then we, we’ll have it. It’ll actually dissipate, usually sooner. But when we’re looking at what do we do in the moment to help them regulate? Because for us, there’s a difference between sensory regulation and emotion processing.

00;21;31;14 – 00;21;52;05
Alyssa Blask Campbell
You can get back into a calmer body and still feel mad or sad or yeah, straight it. You can get out of a space where your body’s in fight flight, freeze von mode, where you’re maybe flailing and screaming and still be within emotion and then go through emotion processing. And that’s what we’re looking to do. So I don’t want to rush the feeling away.

00;21;52;05 – 00;22;11;03
Alyssa Blask Campbell
We’re not going to like, good a fire and like, you’re okay, this is fine. Like, no, it’s not fine. I understand that you’re frustrated. Like all that can be true. And we can help them get into a body that feels more in control for them. And when we’re looking at this, knowing your kid sensory profile is huge. Because I love touch.

00;22;11;03 – 00;22;33;18
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Right? And so when I’m having a hard time, if somebody offers me a hug or touches my body, it’s calming for me. Sage is touch sensitive, and so if I give him what I need in the moment, it’s just regulating for him. Yeah, when he’s having a hard time, if I put my hand on his body to offer a hug, grieving like a gentle like, hey buddy, I’m here, he will flail and it’s worse.

00;22;33;21 – 00;22;56;11
Alyssa Blask Campbell
It’s more just regulating for him. What’s helpful for him is for me to get as quiet as possible for my body language, to get as quiet as possible. This looks like dropping down to the ground if I can. Not towering over him. Being mindful of my tone. Where if I’m like, all right, but I get it.

00;22;56;11 – 00;23;18;27
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yep. Come on. Like that’s different. Yeah. I’m like, yeah, but I get it. We got to keep moving. But I get it. Like if I am mindful of my tone, his nervous system responds to that really well. And then if when he is ready for touch or if he’s open to it, some vestibular input like, oh, wow, if I can validate for him, like me, and you really wanted to get that at the store.

00;23;18;27 – 00;23;38;15
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And I said no. So disappointing, I get that. But when you’re ready, would you like to hear a story about a time where I wanted to get something at the store? And Grammy said, now he’s very into hearing right now. The times where I have experience. Yeah, right. Lets him know he’s not alone. He’s not the only one who’s ever felt this.

00;23;38;15 – 00;23;57;27
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I have felt this. I have survived the disappointment, too. I know what it feels like, right? It helps him feel seen and connected. And in that meantime, I will let him know I’m going to be here with you. And when you’re ready, if you want to, we can do some big jumps or some spins, and he’ll usually be like, no, in the moment, right?

00;23;57;27 – 00;24;18;28
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Like yelling no until he is ready to accept that. Now, sometimes I have time to let him flail or have a hard time, and sometimes it’s going to be further just regulating for him. But sometimes I’m going to pick him up off the grocery aisle for and carry him out to the car and know that we’re going to process this in the car or at home.

00;24;19;00 – 00;24;23;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And that it’s okay if you don’t go through all the steps in that moment.

00;24;23;12 – 00;24;45;12
Dr. Mona
Now let’s take a break to hear from our sponsors. I love your resource and I can’t wait to read the book more, because you also brought up the fact that you are recognizing that you carry either similar or different styles in your children, right? You brought that up beautifully because I think we often forget that that mismatch sometimes, or even the similarity can be difficult.

00;24;45;14 – 00;25;05;06
Dr. Mona
And I also use an example because my husband is not one to want that physical touch. But yet me and my son, when we’re dysregulated, need the hug, need the you know what we do people can’t see. It is when my son is dysregulated. It really helps him is when I squeeze his arms really tightly to give him that input.

00;25;05;06 – 00;25;26;05
Dr. Mona
Right. That sort of I got you. It’s not even a hug. It’s me sneezing down his arm and regulating him with that, that strong touch, and all of a sudden he just melts into like regulated mode. And my husband, that does not work for him. And so I love that you’re providing that nuance and all of the science in your in your book and your resources.

00;25;26;12 – 00;25;48;05
Dr. Mona
Because I do feel oftentimes that we hear these blanket statements of, oh yeah, get down to their level, verbalize, offer the hug. But also we got to really flip it to the narrative of, are we looking at what that child may also need? Because we also know, and I know you know this to be true over verbalizing for a child who does not like that is going to be more triggering.

00;25;48;05 – 00;26;09;09
Dr. Mona
And sometimes we to share that narrative about, verbalize and empathize. Of course, you can verbalize and what you just said perfectly with a tone correction, but sometimes it’s about quiet and really loving it. Yeah, yeah, say less because I’ve been there. You know, the, the when you just keep talking, they’re like, just stop. And I’ve been there as an adult too.

00;26;09;16 – 00;26;28;09
Dr. Mona
When my, my husband was coming to me like Moana I see it, I get it, I hear you. It’s so frustrating. I’ll be like, yo, can you just stop talking and just sit with me? And like you said, yeah, just sit and just be. And I think sometimes parents are uncomfortable with silence and uncomfortable not being a fixer.

00;26;28;09 – 00;26;39;21
Dr. Mona
And you go back to that with tantrums, right? They want it to end or they want to be the fixer that, oh, I can help you get through it. But many times it’s just not doing too much. And I love I love the way you talk about that.

00;26;39;23 – 00;27;00;21
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah. Thanks. I, I think that we absolutely can overdo it. I think it makes sense to me. A lot of us grew up in households where no one talked to us about our feelings in our life. Well, I will be down to like, we will be talking about feelings and we will talk, talk, talk about them. And yeah, there’s a middle ground.

00;27;00;21 – 00;27;21;11
Alyssa Blask Campbell
There’s a balance here of like, yeah, we can talk about them for sure and we can make sure they’re welcomed and mentioned and that we’re there for them. And when we’re adding also one of the things that I see a lot and it’s this fine balance where like people love, when we put out scripts, when we say, here are things you could say.

00;27;21;13 – 00;27;41;25
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And I really try to balance this with like, but also find your authentic voice. Yeah. Because if you go up, for example, I was crying, I was having a hard day and I was crying in the living room, folding laundry. And Zach walks in my husband, he was like, oh, hey, you seem sad. And I was like, no shit.

00;27;42;01 – 00;28;02;26
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Is it the tears coming down my face? Right? Like, oh yeah, way to go, bud. Good detective work. Yeah, it but it felt like he was trying to say the right words. Yeah, right. Rather than just showing up as his authentic self and being like, hey, whoa, what’s going on? Which is feels more connecting to me than trying to say the right words.

00;28;03;02 – 00;28;26;21
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so if you’re working from a script and you’re inside narrative is this is really inconvenient and annoying, and I actually don’t have empathy for it. But you’re outside. Words are hi, bud. Wow, you look really frustrated. Like, but those things aren’t matching. Then they’re going to feel it from mirror neurons. Way more than what the words coming out of your mouth are.

00;28;26;23 – 00;28;53;13
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so just being mindful of that, that like if you’re not ready to talk yet, don’t like you are in a place where you actually can’t empathize and connect right now, give yourself a beat and you can even self-talk this off like, oh wow, I’m feeling really overwhelmed right now. We’re in the grocery store and your body’s on the ground and screaming and our carts full of groceries, and I need to calm myself down to figure out what to do next.

00;28;53;13 – 00;29;13;12
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah, just give yourself and say it out loud. Like, let the kid here. Yep, she’s overwhelmed and she’s going to take stock of her own stuff. She’s going to be accountable for her own regulation and she’s going to figure out what to do next. I don’t have to stop what I’m doing. I don’t have to police my emotions.

00;29;13;14 – 00;29;32;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I get to still be a kid and have my experience and recognize that she has her own experience and is accountable for her own regulation. That that I think can bias time and also help us regulate ourselves while showing them that they don’t have to get calm for us.

00;29;32;11 – 00;29;51;14
Dr. Mona
Yeah. Oh, I love I love this, so great. And, you know, we’ve gone through that sort of prep that you talked about and I’m going to touch the seed quiz scone because I do feel great. Be so useful for everyone. That’ll be in the show notes. And then we talked about in The Tantrum. Now what would be your biggest tip for after a tantrum, which I also feel is so important to.

00;29;51;14 – 00;29;57;15
Dr. Mona
So how would you approach or tell parents to kind of remember when they are going after a tantrum?

00;29;57;18 – 00;30;22;06
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I think after’s the most important of the. Yes, actually I agree, that like because you there’s going to be so many times where, yeah, you don’t prep and things happen. They are going to be times where maybe you do all the prep and still hard emotions happen, and they’re going to be times where in the moment you can respond with intention and times where you don’t respond with as much intention, like all those are going to happen where you do have the most control over.

00;30;22;06 – 00;30;46;24
Alyssa Blask Campbell
It’s actually after, you know, after regardless of how things went down, being able to revisit now the biggest mistake is revisiting too soon. It takes about 20 minutes for a nervous system to really calm. Once we start that process. And so if you know this starts to calm down in five minutes later, we tap back in and we’re like, hey bud, I’m so sorry for you.

00;30;46;27 – 00;31;08;27
Alyssa Blask Campbell
They probably aren’t ready to receive it yet. And so giving it enough time without waiting, you know, days where you can pop back over and be like, you know what? Earlier this morning when we were trying to get out the door, I was rushing and I was feeling overwhelmed and I’m sorry that I yelled, I’m going to work on next time getting my stuff ready ahead of time.

00;31;09;01 – 00;31;25;01
Alyssa Blask Campbell
So I’m not feeling as rushed. Yeah, that wasn’t a kind way for me to speak to you, right? To be able to come back to that we own our stuff, or even revisiting and saying, well, you know, I’ve been noticing that when we are getting ready for school and trying to get out the door, that it’s been a really hard time for you.

00;31;25;02 – 00;31;44;28
Alyssa Blask Campbell
You’ve had a lot of feelings. It sounds like it doesn’t feel good for you. I want to help figure out what’s going on and see what else we could do. When you go to put your socks on, if they do feel too tight, instead of screaming and throwing them across the room, I want to help you so that you can say, mom, these socks feel too tight.

00;31;44;28 – 00;32;00;16
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Can we find a different pair and letting them know in the comments like, here’s what we can do and here’s what we can work on. And it doesn’t mean the next time this is going to happen, but it shows them, hey, it starts to bring some awareness, this situation and shows them I’m on the same team with you.

00;32;00;19 – 00;32;21;24
Alyssa Blask Campbell
We’re on the same team here and I want to help you and I’m not mad at you about it. We get to revisit and talk about them in the calm moments where our brains are actually able to receive this information, because when we’re in a dysregulated state, when you’re in the moment that prefrontal cortex shuts down, our rational thinking brain shuts down and we’re in, it’s great.

00;32;21;24 – 00;32;43;28
Alyssa Blask Campbell
We should be in a reactive state. We want to be able to react when we need to. And and recognizing that. That’s why it’s not the time to have these big convos about what to do differently. It’s why in the moment when a kid hit somebody saying hitting hurts, we’re not allowed to hit in our house. We X, Y, and Z isn’t actually helpful because they’re not choosing hitting.

00;32;44;02 – 00;33;03;05
Alyssa Blask Campbell
They know hitting hurts. They don’t want to do this in the moment. They’re body’s out of control. Having those conversations outside the moment is really helpful. Hey, but I know that, you know, hitting hurts and I know that you’re so kind. And I believe that you don’t want to hurt your sister. I want to help you figure this out so you can make a different choice next time.

00;33;03;07 – 00;33;22;21
Alyssa Blask Campbell
We can come back to this, afterwards. And sometimes some sensory input here can be helpful, too, especially in navigating these conversations. Because it’s uncomfortable to have hard conversations, you might notice some discomfort arise. Kids being like, I don’t want to talk about it and letting them know, like, yeah, that makes sense to uncomfortable to talk about hard things.

00;33;22;21 – 00;33;43;05
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I’m wondering if you’re feeling embarrassed about what happened or feeling guilty. That makes sense. And it’s okay to feel those things. And you’re like, with the deep squeezes of the arm. Like, this might be a time where maybe I’d have this conversation with Ryan when he’s sitting in my lap. And even before I start having the conversation, I’m going to give him just some gentle squeezes.

00;33;43;05 – 00;33;50;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I’m going to give some of that input proactively before we even start the conversation, to pour a little bit into his nervous system.

00;33;50;16 – 00;34;18;06
Dr. Mona
Well, I love that you’ve already normalized so many expectations and manage people’s expectations because we’ve already spoken to that at the beginning about going into a tantrum and how some people feel like, we’ll do all this preparation. But you just said beautifully about the the repair and the discussions after giving the 20 minutes, but how the goal isn’t that, okay, next time you’re in this situation, it’s going to go swimmingly, because I think that is a mistake and an unmet expectation of a lot of parents, my husband included.

00;34;18;12 – 00;34;33;07
Dr. Mona
You know, he was like, well, he should know this. We’ve talked about this. I’m like, he’s three and a half, four years old. You know, as they get older, the repetition and as their brain develops, it starts to kick in. But I don’t want you to ever abandon it thinking that’s not working right. I think you probably see that, too.

00;34;33;12 – 00;34;50;09
Dr. Mona
People feel like, well, I talked about it, you know, even an hour at bedtime, and they still do that behavior. So it’s not working. I’m like, you have to trust the consistency. You know, I think a lot of times parents abandon the consistency in a method that is, you know, working like this, thinking that, oh, I didn’t get that quick fix.

00;34;50;13 – 00;34;56;08
Dr. Mona
I didn’t get that kid all of a sudden, oh, yeah, sure, mom, let’s do it. You know.

00;34;56;11 – 00;35;13;17
Alyssa Blask Campbell
It’s not how any of us were, actually. And I think of this kind of like reading to kids. I don’t read to a baby expecting them to read back to me tomorrow. I read to a baby so we can build these foundational skills that they’re going to need to read back to me in 5 or 6 years. Right.

00;35;13;20 – 00;35;35;12
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so if I’ve said, like, well, they’re not reading yet at two and stopped reading to them, I’m abandoning a lot of foundational skills that they’re going to need at five and six. Yeah. When we’re doing this work, we’re building skills they’re going to take with them for life, and they’re going to continue to fine tune these skills at home, these skills.

00;35;35;14 – 00;35;54;17
Alyssa Blask Campbell
But it’s not something you see changing overnight. And no one on the planet has access to all of their skills all the time. That I know for myself. Like, I know how to be kind and respectful and connected in conversation with my husband when I’m in a regulated state.

00;35;54;20 – 00;35;55;07
Dr. Mona
Yeah, if.

00;35;55;07 – 00;36;13;16
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I’ve had a long day and he walks in after work and I have a kid on me crying who needs to nurse, and I have another kid who’s like, I’m hungry. What to eat now? And I’m feeling whelmed. And Zach asks me a question and I turn and I snap and I’m sarcastic and snippy and whatever. It’s not because I’m choosing that right.

00;36;13;18 – 00;36;36;23
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I’m not like, you know what? This is going to be the most productive way to interact with Zach right now. Yeah, no, that’s not the right crew that I don’t have access to all of my skills all the time, because when we’re dysregulated, we don’t have access to everything. Just like when you’re tired, it’s not a great time to do, like, conflict resolution.

00;36;36;26 – 00;36;46;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And so recognizing that that’s true for kids, too, they might have a skill that they can access. Sometimes it doesn’t mean they’ll have access to it all the time.

00;36;46;12 – 00;37;07;29
Dr. Mona
And I oh, gosh, I love talking to you because I just feel like, a lot of times we we hold children to a higher standard than we hold ourselves, like what you just described. Right? You and I both like I’ve had those moments where I snap and like you said, beautifully, it was never intended. I don’t want to be the snippy wife that is overstimulated and snaps when I know that that’s not the way to communicate.

00;37;08;06 – 00;37;30;17
Dr. Mona
And our children are much younger than us. It’s still a developing brain, and yet a fully developed brain that me and you hopefully have still, and a lot of our listeners still, we struggle with that. So how can we expect A34, five, 6789 year old to have all the coping skills and ability to understand that and having more grace for ourselves and them too?

00;37;30;21 – 00;37;48;24
Dr. Mona
And I love that you tie in the neuroscience and obviously the development and normalize that in your resources in your book, because I think this is so key for children, for parents to understand the why, so that they don’t hopefully get us frustrated in these moments, you know, because like you said, it’s a work in progress. And I see it.

00;37;48;24 – 00;38;01;21
Dr. Mona
You see it, it works, I mean, it, it’s a lifelong process, but you will see it pay off in terms of like, wow, my child actually gets it. That’s cool. But yeah, don’t don’t worry if it’s not happening right away.

00;38;01;23 – 00;38;18;22
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah. I mean, I’ve been doing it since sage was born and I’ve been doing it for myself and in my marriage before sage was born. And just recently, at his third birthday party, he came up and said, mom, I’m feeling overwhelmed. I think I need to go and take a break. And I was like, awesome, right in like that.

00;38;18;22 – 00;38;40;26
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Is it working? It’s yeah. My goal isn’t that he never gets overwhelmed. It’s that when he gets overwhelmed, he knows he can ask for a break and what tools help him calm. And that’s three years in the making. Yes. Right. Like and so if you’re starting wherever you are, however old your child is or you are like, now’s a great time to start.

00;38;40;28 – 00;38;59;03
Alyssa Blask Campbell
You know, like it’s never too late and it’s never too early. And know that it takes time to, to hone their skills and to build them and it’s never going to be done with perfection. I’ve never left the day as a parent or a teacher and been like, wow, that was perfect today. Yeah, I navigated everything perfectly. I was always regulated.

00;38;59;05 – 00;39;21;12
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I always spoke exactly the way I want it. No, it’s not the goal. It’s that we can do this more consistently, that we’re not stuck in periods of dysregulation for a long time. And that we can turn more often than not to coping strategies which help regulate the nervous system versus coping mechanisms which numb our nervous system temporarily.

00;39;21;14 – 00;39;23;26
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Those are two of our real big goals here.

00;39;23;29 – 00;39;40;03
Dr. Mona
I love it, and I you know, that story about your son. And when he said that, I, we had that moment, too. And I remember turning to my husband and saying, hey, he he recognized that feeling and he told me that it was too much or for that situation. That was that light bulb moment of, we’re doing it, you know that we’re doing it.

00;39;40;03 – 00;39;58;04
Dr. Mona
It’s happening was when was when Ryan said, yeah, exactly. Same thing. Like I’m feeling frustrated, like use that term because we’ve talked about frustration and he’s like, I need your help. And I’m like, thank you. You recognize you were frustrated and that you couldn’t do it. And rather than saying, I do it, I do it, which is a completely normal developmental thing.

00;39;58;10 – 00;40;01;13
Dr. Mona
You ask me for help, which is what I’ve been trying to put into.

00;40;01;13 – 00;40;02;06
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Your brain.

00;40;02;09 – 00;40;19;15
Dr. Mona
For years. And you did it, and it feels good. And I love what you said, that it’s always possible and I wish more adults would learn that. Right? I mean, I have adults in my life, let’s be honest. But I wish I could say more. I’m feeling a little frustrated right now. I need to take a moment. I’m not naming names, but it exists.

00;40;19;18 – 00;40;34;14
Dr. Mona
And my gosh, like and my and I look at my four year old who has more emotional understanding than some adults I have in my life. And I’m like, we’re doing it. And so it’s never too late. I love that message. What would be another final message for everyone listening today?

00;40;34;15 – 00;40;51;06
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Oh yeah, I it’s so funny because we had a chapter of the book that was taken out because my editor was like, listen, we could keep this in, but you say this every sentence. So I think they get it at each other a million times here. But it’s consistently, you know, you get a message. There’s no perfection. There’s no perfection in this.

00;40;51;13 – 00;41;10;21
Alyssa Blask Campbell
And I think one of the things that we’re seeing over and over is that when parents or teachers or caregivers are navigating rupture, when we respond in a way, or we react in a way that doesn’t feel good inside for us, that then we’re carrying guilt and shame for the rest of the day, or days or weeks or months.

00;41;10;21 – 00;41;33;27
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Yeah. It becomes a part of like, oh, I am a yeller, I am or whatever, mom. And it becomes a part of this identity and narrative we have about ourselves. And a part of emotional intelligence is going to be that rupture and allowing guilt. Guilt, a beautiful emotion that tells us when we are outside of our values and when we can tune in and say like, oh, that didn’t feel good, I’m feeling guilty.

00;41;33;29 – 00;41;52;19
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Great. Then you get to navigate repair. And the key is that when you navigate repair, you’ve done enough. And now when that guilt pops up, you get to be like, yep, thank you for letting me know I was outside of my values. I am going to work on that. Going forward. I’m good here. Yeah. And just that’s it.

00;41;52;19 – 00;41;54;09
Alyssa Blask Campbell
It’s enough to do that.

00;41;54;12 – 00;42;10;14
Dr. Mona
Thank you so much. This was such a pleasure having you on. I love chatting about this. I love learning about your book and obviously the motivation behind your platform and the book as well. Where can people go for more information and learn more about the book? And also just to stay connected with all of your resources.

00;42;10;16 – 00;42;37;24
Alyssa Blask Campbell
You can find me at seed. And so, so seed dot and so as you on Instagram, on Facebook seed and so.org, is like the mothership and we have voices of your village podcast. So we drop an episode every Thursday. You’ve been on the podcast and, it’s just a place for us to hang. I go live every Tuesday on Instagram from 1230 to 1, where I just do live Q&A.

00;42;37;24 – 00;42;48;01
Alyssa Blask Campbell
I just hang out with the community and answer questions. So if you have more questions, you want to dive into things, pop on over to the live and we can hang there. Yeah. Thank you so much.

00;42;48;08 – 00;43;06;07
Dr. Mona
Yeah, I this is an absolute pleasure. I loved connecting with you here on your show. It’s just such a really great thing to, you know, talk about children in a positive way. And, I mean, you literally just spent a whole half hour, whatever we did talking about tantrums in a positive light, which I think is so healthy for parents to hear.

00;43;06;07 – 00;43;10;19
Dr. Mona
So I cannot appreciate you enough. And the work that you do. So thank you for joining me today.

00;43;10;21 – 00;43;11;25
Alyssa Blask Campbell
Thank you mona.

00;43;11;27 – 00;43;31;27
Dr. Mona
I loved chatting with Alyssa because so much of child behavior requires you to understand your child. There’s really no one size fits all approach, which is why parenting guidance can be so hard, or why you may feel you’re not doing it right. Even if you’re listening to one size fits all approach, tantrums can feel overwhelming. But remember, every child is unique and these moments are just part of their growth.

00;43;32;02 – 00;43;53;25
Dr. Mona
And frankly, your growth as a parent and person too. If you love this episode, please comment on our real share this episode on social media and leave a review. This is how the podcast continues to grow, and I’ll catch you all next week, where I chat with Michelle Massi of Anxiety Therapy LA about OCD in kids. Is it normal early childhood behavior in kids or OCD and common misconceptions?

00;43;54;02 – 00;43;58;23
Dr. Mona
Make sure to tune in for this incredible conversation. Have a wonderful week ahead and stay well.