What a Gift! Mountain Strong Families seek to welcome and understand their children’s emotional reactions. PHOTO COURTESY OF ANN SHERMAN[/caption]

“How we tend to our children’s feelings now is how they will do it for themselves later.”

In December, Mountain Strong Families explored how to grant our children the gift of emotional intelligence. Parents attending TEENS, Inc “Raising Whole Human Beings Series” were encouraged to act as emotion coaches for their children. This means taking time to lean into our child’s expressed emotions, help them identify and understand the causes of these emotions, and find healthy ways to manage their uncomfortable feelings.

Families that are raising emotionally intelligent children regularly discuss their child’s inner world more than their external behavior. They not only give attention to recognizing when a child is feeling disappointed, hurt, or anxious, but also help the child recognize when they are feeling calm, proud, or joyful inside. When parents serve as emotion coaches, they are continuously asking themselves “what is my child feeling and needing when they act like that?”

Sometimes this forces us to take on a new mindset about emotions. All emotions serve a valuable purpose. There is no such thing as a bad emotion. Feelings are just sending us a message about whether we should move closer or further away from something. They tell us if something needs to change or be shared. Behind all behavior lie either comfortable or uncomfortable feelings. When our needs are met, we feel good and act generous, curious, open-minded and cooperative. When our needs are not met, we feel uncomfortable and may behave poorly.

Adults can help children understand which unmet needs may be fueling strong emotions by using the acronym H.A.L.T. Consider if the child is H.ungry and in need of sustenance, A.ngry because one of their goals is blocked, L.onely and in need of connection, or T.ired and in need of less stimulation. If under every behavior is an emotion, and under every emotion is a need, when we address the need, the child’s emotion and behavior will also shift.

In order to raise children with emotional intelligence (the ability to recognize and express feelings in appropriate ways and to respond with empathy to the feelings of others), we can first help our children to connect the sensations in their bodies with the emotions they are experiencing. Every emotion creates different physical sensations within us. Our heart rate, breathing rate, temperature, and muscle tension are altered when we feel any emotion. Every once in a while, ask your child to stop and notice what their body is trying to tell them. Paying attention to sensations begins to regulate our nervous system. The sooner we notice what our bodies are telling us, the easier it is to manage any uncomfortable emotions.

Another way to build emotional intelligence is to greatly expand our child’s emotional vocabulary. Use lots of juicy emotion words to describe how you yourself are feeling. Go beyond sharing that you are either just “fine” or “tired”. Does your child know what it means to feel irked, jubilant, discombobulated, or distressed? When children and adults can articulate exactly what they are feeling, that uncomfortable emotion begins to decrease. This is the beauty of the “name it to tame it” strategy for regulating our emotional state.

Since it takes 25 years or more to fully develop the ability to self-regulate, we will want to begin by practicing co-regulation with our children. Just like we model how to do chores – they see us doing it, then we do it together, and then they eventually begin to do it on their own—we need to model “practicing the pause” to calm ourselves. Our children will learn to mirror the strategies we ourselves use to achieve a regulated state. This may mean just sitting near a child and breathing deeply when they are upset. It may mean using gentle, safe touch and a few, reassuring words: “You’re not in trouble. I’m here to help you through this.” Our calm becomes their calm.

Sending a child to time-out for their big emotions and disruptive behavior often fails to teach them the exact skills that they are failing to exhibit. Leaving a child alone with their intense feelings can make them feel abandoned by us at the exact time that they need our guidance. “Time-ins” together imply, “Let’s take a moment to calm ourselves before we revisit what just happened.”

Mountain Strong Families were encouraged to co-create a calming area where family members go to practice healthy regulation strategies when they are upset. Instead of being sent away when children behave poorly, children can learn to embrace and heal their emotions by using healthy calming routines.

Have you practiced different types of regulation strategies with your child, so they know which ones work for them? Our nervous systems begin to regulate with deep, slow breathing or artistically expressing what we are feeling. Journaling, reading, or talking about feelings also brings the upper brain online again. Sensory activities like focusing on a liquid timer, smelling soothing aromas, massaging your hands, water play, or taking a break in nature give your nervous system a chance to heal and recalibrate. The excess energy created by anger or anxiety needs to be moved out of our bodies with some type of exercise. And sometimes the best we can do is just to temporarily distract ourselves by counting or playing a game to give our thinking brain time to catch up with our feelings.

Parents will want to explicitly coach their child how to express themselves effectively after their emotions have regulated. Join MSF on February 1, to learn how to “Teach Empathy and Communication Skills” to your child.

For more info, contact ann@teensinc.org.