Why You Should Never Tell Your Child ‘You’re OK’
You give your child the red cup. They want the blue cup. They start crying and shouting. You feel that familiar panic: Oh, no—not again. When your child is having a large emotional outburst you feel helpless. You want them to feel safe, secure, and loved. When you see them distraught you want to fix it. And, yeah, you also want them to stop freaking out.
One of the most frequent challenges I’ve guided parents through is dealing with big reactions and large emotional expressions. OK, let’s be real: tantrums. The challenge is how to connect and say the right thing while your child is screaming at you for something that seems so small.
Why Is It Hard for You When Your Child Gets Upset?
The most common reason parents are stuck is because they themselves have a hard time coping with emotions.
It makes sense why we as parents struggle: The focus on developing emotional intelligence didn’t really start until the 1990s. And even during the ’90s parents weren’t familiar with how to build with their child what we call emotional intelligence—the ability to identify emotions, feel those emotions, and recover from that experience.
Stop Telling Your Child ‘You’re OK’
We who are now parents did not have an emotional guide because our parents didn’t have an emotional guide. You may have grown up in a home where you were told “you’re OK,” or “I don’t like to see you sad”. You may have just perceived your parents’ nonverbal discomfort when you felt big emotions. If you were upset they distracted you to be happy by acting silly.
When a caregiver tells a child “You’re OK” when they feel sad, the child comes to understand that their caregiver can’t handle them being sad. The child learns it is not safe to feel sad in front of this person. They see that they must suppress these negative feelings and maintain a happy demeanor when the caregiver is around. Which in the early years of life is all the time.
Emotional suppression has many damaging effects on the body. Emotions are how our bodies communicate needs with us and when we push the emotions away we’re not honoring those needs.
You Must Support Your Child’s Intuition
Over time, not honoring a child’s needs by validating their emotions teaches the child to turn off their intuition—the sense of what is safe and how to respond based on the situation at hand.
Intuition is very strong in a child’s younger years and when nurtured, it can be their guiding light as they gain independence in their teen years and adulthood. We must not impede this natural development; we must instead support its growth.
Children who have lost connection to this intuition make decisions based on the response of the people around them. They will focus on how others view their actions or will follow others in an effort to please them. In situations of peer pressure these children without a trust in their intuition often make choices that don’t reflect their needs and can be in danger.
When intuition develops naturally through emotional support, a person is capable of navigating dangerous situations with confidence. When intuition is trusted this gut feeling can keep them safe. In addition, person with a strong intuition makes choices in career and relationships that are based on what they need rather than what others need or desire.
What You Should Say Instead of ‘You’re OK’
You may be saying “You’re OK” because you want your child to know he is safe and you will take care of him. That is what you say. “You are safe.”
You validate their experience because even if it seems small to you, it is big for them. You give them the space to work through their emotion, even if your adult brain knows they just didn’t get enough sleep and can’t cope as easily. Hold them. Love them. Don’t tell them they’re OK; show them they’re OK.
The way we can give them a safe place to feel is to:
Allow space for their feelings.
Validate and name their emotion.
Allow them to do what they need to be regulated.
Recap what they experienced.
I have created a subscriber exclusive FREEBIE about how to respond when your child is upset. Sign up now for your FREE printable, which outlines each step to help your child cope during a meltdown. It includes language to use to make it easier in the moment.
Emotional Development Must Be Supported Before A Child Can Learn
I taught in Montessori classrooms for almost 10 years. In every classroom I taught in, at least a quarter of the students needed my help with emotional regulation. Some children would get angry very easily and turn to hitting or biting others. Some would strive to be perfect and melt down when something didn’t go right. Some couldn’t cope being away from parents and needed an hour or more to recover from the separation.
Some of these children were never able to learn large academic lessons and concepts in that year even though they were older. Because before a child can work on larger academic concepts he must first learn to emotionally regulate.
I believe this to be the most important skill a child must learn. And the best way they can learn is by watching others do it, so give your child the opportunity to grow and learn by building these skills with them at home.
You don’t need to teach your child to read or do addition. That’s what school is for. Your job is to teach them how to cope with their emotions and to feel safe while learning these skills.
To Help Your Child’s Emotional Development, You May Need to Work on Yours
As a parent you must find ways to cope with emotions yourself. Feel your feelings in front of your child and show them how you cope and recover. If you are struggling, reach out to a therapist who can guide you through this and help you with the roadblocks you face.
If you are looking for guidance and tools on how to implement these skills with your child I can help. I have been working with families for years to find the language and techniques to assist children develop positive coping skills. Please schedule a complimentary consult call with me so we can talk about what your roadblocks are and how I can help.