Disaster Averted!

I am writing to report a small victory from the trenches of family life. I’ll start out by confessing that it hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing in the parenting department. Over-full schedules seem to have blown up in our faces sending shrapnel of hyper-emotionality, short fuses, and exhaustion. My hope is that you have no idea of what I’m talking about, though, if you are a parent, I fear you may.

When things are extra crazy at our house, it is in these moments that I am grateful for tricks of the parenting trade. Those little tried and true strategies that can defuse an escalating situation and spare us all THE DRAMA! Well, this morning, we successfully circumvented a problem and I was reminded of how much I love a particular trick. It involves use of the imagination and I believe I ran across it in a book on emotion coaching by John Gottman. This trick is particularly useful when your child wants something that they cannot have. It’s referred to as giving your kids their wish in imagination and it allows you to align with your child, convey understanding, and ultimately, to stand your ground. When used with humor, it can be extra effective.

This morning, we encountered yet another snag. Early morning fatigue turned the “my jeans are too short” mole hill into a mountain of tears. I’m just as tired as my kids are these days, so my own coping skills are rather depleted. Consider that, much to my own horror, our 2-year-old mimicked us the other day by screaming at his sister, “Stop crying!” I know. Pathetic! Anyways, I found myself encountering yet another challenging situation marked by high emotions, and I remembered the trick. Instead, of my never effective “suck it up” speech, I offered the following: “Wow. I know you would like to have some longer jeans in your drawer. You know what I wish?” (This is the part where I mustered up some animation to my presentation… An early morning miracle and evidence that there is a God!) “ I wish I had a magic wand. And if I did, I would wave it and POOF! You’d have a brand-new pair of jeans sitting in your hands. Super cute, super long, exactly what you want. Then, I’d go ahead and wave the wand again. BAM! Then you would have a beautiful, soft, cuddly, brand-new long-sleeve shirt in your hands, as well. Then, just for flair, I’d clap, just like this, CLAP! CLAP!, and all the tags and stickers would fall off to the floor so that it would be perfectly ready for you to put it on.” Both girls began to laugh and offer their own thoughts and wishes. I looked at my daughter whose face beamed with the look of feeling understood, and I knew that she was ready to move on to problem-solving. I concluded, “But alas, honey. I don’t have a magic wand. What do you think you can wear instead?” Disaster averted!