As parents, we often feel the need to be perfect, to hold it together, and to stay ‘strong’ for our kids. Parents, like any other human beings have bad days too.  We feel anger, sadness, anxiety, frustration and so much more.

What if I tell you that it’s ok to have “negative” feelings, that these feelings can be opportunities to help your child develop healthy ways to manage their emotions?  Negative feelings are not the big bad wolf here. It's what you do with it that matters.

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Name your feelings OUT LOUD and deliberately SHOW your child how you self-regulate.

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Whether you are aware of it or not, we show our children how to express and manage emotions all the time.  Our emotional state is not only conveyed through words, but through our facial expressions, body language, tone of voice and behaviours.   From blatantly slamming doors to furrowing our brows, children can sense the emotional atmosphere, even when it’s not openly discussed.  

Some parents worry that by expressing their own negative feelings, it may create unnecessary worries for their children.  It is important to note that children should not be bogged down by adult issues and unnecessary details about their life dramas.  However, simple and age-appropriate descriptions that authentically disclose a parent’s internal experience, can actually decrease a child’s anxiety, rather than increase it.    

Why?  Our brains are made to scan for any ‘incongruence in the environment’  for survival.   You know that gut feeling that 'something is off' but you can't quite put a finger on it?  When that happens, our brain is actually sending us warning signals to alert and prepare us for potential danger.  

Similarly, when a child senses emotional incongruence in their caregivers, which is when their belief or actions does not match their emotional state, the brain registers it as a ‘threat’.  An example would be a father who’s angry but has a smile on his face, or when a mother claims that everything is fine but sees her crying all the time.  

By authentically naming your emotions out loud, it can send a message to the child that there’s no real ’threat’ here and that it is ok to have those feelings because I have it too!  In addition, labeling your own feelings can provide your children the emotional vocabulary to describe similar internal experiences in the future.  When healthy self-regulation skills (i.e. deep breathing) is also role modeled, your child will create a mental model of what to do when feelings such as frustration, anxiety, sadness and anger arise.

Here’s an example of this strategy:

A child is having a meltdown.  Mother tries and fails to calm her child down.  She is loosing patience.  She feels her heart pounding faster, muscles tensing and the blood rushing to her face (coincidentally, what the child is probably experiencing as well).  Instead of yelling and resorting to a strategy that she may later regret, she names her feeling out loud: “I feel myself getting very angry.  My heart is pounding fast and my muscles are tense!  I need to take a break and cool down.”  Mother proceeds to sit down at the other end of the room and begins breathing deeply.  Child watches her intently.  

What Mother did well:

1. Noticed her body sensations and registered it as anger;
2. Described her body sensations and named her feeling OUT LOUD; and
3. Showed her child how to regulate those feelings in a healthy way–in this case, by removing herself and breathing deeply.

The mother took responsibility for her own anger and dealt with it in a way that did not bring guilt and shame to the child.  The child also learned a new mental model of what anger looks and feels like in the body, how to describe it, and what to do about it when it arises.

Now, imagine if the mother started yelling and spanking the child.  This experience will activate the fear center of the child’s brain, which moves him further away from self-regulation.  The child internalizes the blame and gains a mental template that associates aggression and hurting of others with anger.  

In times of stress, when parents can PAUSE, look within themselves and authentically acknowledge their own internal struggles, our children will learn to be compassionate with their own internal experiences and eventually develop self-regulation skills.  Even when parents mess up (which we all do), it is never too late to show them healthier alternatives to managing emotions. Parents need practice too!