Competent Kids

Why Reassurance Doesn’t Work…and What to Do, Instead

Written by DawnHuebner on June 16th, 2010

“You’ll be fine!” How many times have you said that to your child? One hundred times? One thousand? I promise I’ll be there to get you. You’re not going to throw up. It isn’t going to rain. There won’t be any dogs. Just call me if you need me…

But here’s the thing – no matter how many times you’ve reassured your anxious child, it isn’t enough. She needs to hear you say it one more time. To promise. Pinky swear. And still, it will never be enough.

Anxiety is characterized by the inability to tolerate uncertainty. Those dreaded “what if’s” – What if I don’t feel well? What if you aren’t there? What if I don’t like it…I miss you…I get bitten…we lose power…something goes very, very wrong? You can tell your child that none of those things will happen, and still her anxiety comes back with…what if they do?

There are 3 classic thinking mistakes inherent in anxiety:

1. Overestimating probability (the bad thing that might happen WILL happen)

2. Overestimating magnitude (the bad thing that might happen will be CATASTROPHIC)

3. Underestimating ability to cope (I totally cannot handle the bad thing that is going to happen)

Helping children recognize and correct these thinking mistakes is far more powerful than providing repeated reassurance. I use a method called The 3 Questions. Here’s how it works:

When a child is anxious (fretting, asking for reassurance), help her think through:

1. What is the worry saying? Kids often feel anxious without knowing why. They’ll say they don’t feel well, or that something is ‘boring,’ or they just don’t want to do it. Help your child pin down what the worry is actually about.

2. How likely is that? Help your child estimate probability. You don’t have to get fancy – likely/unlikely is fine.

3a. (if whatever she is worrying about it unlikely) What’s more likely, instead?

3b. (if whatever she is worrying about it likely) What can she do to help herself?

Pose each of these questions, in turn. Or better yet, have your child write them on an index card so she can refer to the questions, herself. This sort of logical, sequential thinking makes it easier for kids to evaluate their worries, recognizing and correcting the classic thinking mistakes. Over time, it gets easier for kids to remember that the things they worry about rarely happen.

Your role is to stop reassuring and, instead, prompt your child to use The 3 Questions. Say, “That sounds like a worry-question; let’s think about those 3 questions.” Encourage your child to answer the questions herself (rather than having you provide the answers) – your aim is to help your child internalize the sequence of questions and, importantly, to learn how to answer them herself. Then, and only then, will she be able to recognize, “That’s the worry talking to me; the worry doesn’t know what it’s talking about; I don’t have to listen.” Won’t that feel good?!

Posted in Managing Strong Feelings, Moving Away From Reassurance |
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One Stone: Extinguishing Negative Behaviors in Kids

Written by DawnHuebner on June 2nd, 2010

Go to the craft store and buy a bag of clear, blue stones. Or go to the beach and find 30 smooth pebbles. Put them in a jar. These stones will be the start of an amazingly effective behavioral system.

Think of a behavior you want to extinguish. Back talk is a biggie. Forget everything you’ve been doing to try to stop it (unless what you’ve been doing has worked, in which case you can stop reading this post and go find something else to do). Here’s the new plan:

At the start of each week, your child gets 30 stones in her jar. Each time she talks back (uses a rude tone, sasses you, argues after you’ve asked her to stop), you are going to calmly say, “That will cost you a stone.” If your child immediately stops the backtalk, nothing else needs to happen. If she continues, walk over to her jar and calmly remove one stone. At the end of the week, she gets a point for each stone OVER 15 that remain in the jar. If she has 18 stones left, she gets 3 points (18 minus 15). If she has 27 stones left, she gets 12 points (27 minus 15). If she has 9 stones left, she gets zero. Using 15 as a base is important; for behavior to change, your child needs to be putting forth effort to hold onto her stones. Fewer than 16 stones shows very little effort, and should not be rewarded.

Decide on a menu of rewards based on points – 15 points might earn a trip to the bookstore; 25 points a visit to the local SPCA to play with cats; 40 points a sleepover with a friend.

Some important factors:

1. Your child should only lose 1 stone at a time. Don’t retaliate by saying, “You just lost another stone” if your child sasses you when you take the first stone. Upping the ante in this way will quickly wipe your child out, rendering the system useless. If you take a stone and your child keeps giving you a hard time, shift to a different system for setting limits. 1-2-3:Magic is particularly effective (First infraction, say “that’s one”; if child continues, say “that’s two”; if keeps going, say “that’s three” and deliver a consequence such as time-out or the brief loss of a privelege).

2. Keep your tone neutral.

3. Don’t engage in the specifics of what your child is saying. When he talks back, simply state, “That will be a stone” (eventually shortened to “Stone”) and if he doesn’t quickly stop, take the stone.

4. Explain the system to your child before beginning. Focus on the benefits to your child – less yelling and the opportunity to earn cool stuff.

The beauty of the system is that it helps your child modify a negative behavior with relatively little fuss. Try it on backtalk, swearing, complaining, and negative persistence (whining, begging). Then weigh in. How did it work?

Posted in Extinguishing Negative Behaviors, Managing Relationships |
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All that Glitters: Designing Effective Reward Systems for Kids

Written by DawnHuebner on May 23rd, 2010

Make it clear. Make it appealing. Do it fast. Link it to the behavior you want to reward…

I have broken my own rules (Ugh!) by not quickly posting an insightful entry following the single non-spam comment I have received since starting my blog, a comment asking me to talk about reward systems. I wish I could turn back the clock, follow my own advice to immediately reward the one engaged reader I have. I hope she’s still out there…

Behavior that is rewarded increases – one of the basic tenants of Learning Theory. Really, it’s as simple as that. Identify the behaviors you want to see more of, and reward them. The tricky part, of course, is to (1) identify behaviors in language that is specific and clear, (2) elicit your child’s interest in the system, and (3) work in small enough steps that your child is bound to succeed.

(1) Identify behaviors in clear, specific language. Word goals in the positive (‘keep your hands to yourself’), highlighting what you want your child to do. Target specific behaviors (skills), rather than outcomes. Let’s say you want your child to stop biting her nails. Don’t harp on her to stop biting and don’t promise a manicure once her nails are long (unlikely to work). Instead, find behaviors incompatible with nail biting, behaviors that meet your child’s needs in a healthier way (using a fiddle toy, blocking access to her nails, finding other outlets for stress, etc.), then design a reward system around the use of these skills. A manicure might still be the carrot, but allow your daughter to earn it by using new skills, which may or may not coincide with having longer nails (after all, one nibbling spree can cancel out all her hard work). Teach and reward specific, measurable behaviors.

(2) Elicit your child’s interest. Kids do best with a combination of internal and external rewards. You are managing the external rewards, but can make sure your child recognizes the internal rewards, as well. Point out the various ways life will be better when your child succeeds with the behavior plan (less yelling, more time, etc.). Underline his sense of pride. Be creative with the carrots (external rewards) you are dangling. Activity- and privelege-rewards are appealing to kids: one-on-one time with a parent, family activities, special time with a friend, getting a pass on a hated chore – all make for good rewards. Make the system itself fun. Design a colorful chart, or use a jar, filling it with one marble at a time as your child succeeds with the targeted behavior. Once your child has earned a reward, let him have it as soon as possible. Kids ages 5 and older enjoy the immediate gratification of a check-mark (or marble) followed by a larger (delayed) reward for accumulated checks/marbles.

(3) Keep expectations within your child’s reach. With reasonable effort, your child should be able to earn rewards fairly quickly. Complex behaviors can be broken into parts in a process known as shaping. If, for example, you want your child to get ready for school without theatrics (refusal to get out of bed, angst about what to wear, need for multiple reminders about teeth, glacial-paced breakfast, etc.), you might start by re-vamping the wake-up plan, rewarding your child for setting her alarm and responding to it on her own. Then you might move to getting dressed, perhaps rewarding your child for laying out her clothes the night before and putting them on fuss-free. Identify and reward specific behaviors until they are firmly in place, gradually building on these behaviors with closer approximations to your goal. Older/more motivated kids can handle several new behaviors at once. Younger/less motivated kids do better with one behavior at a time. Both benefit from clarity. Many a reward system has crashed and burned by targeting too many behaviors at once or (even worse) failing to define target behaviors (e.g., ‘being good’ is not a target behavior).

Reward systems need to extend over time. It takes at least 3 weeks for new behaviors to become routine, so plan on following the reward system for a month or more. Tweak it slightly as you go, varying the prize (to keep interest high) and possibly modifying what your child needs to do to earn it (moving, for example, from 5 points to 1o points to 15). If your child is not earning points, or is earning points without changes in behavior, re-examine your system. Are the behaviors you are striving for clear enough? Do you need to break them down into smaller parts? Keep the system simple and clear. You can add new, more sophisticated behaviors as your child masters the initial targets.

Next time, a twist on rewards: using a jar system to extinguish unwanted behavior.

Posted in Increasing Positive Behaviors, Managing Relationships |
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Picturing Success: See It, Do It

Written by DawnHuebner on March 31st, 2010

‘What if’ is the rallying cry of anxious children everywhere. What if you aren’t there after school? What if that noise was a bad guy? What if I miss you? What if I strike out? Feel scared? Get sick? Terrible outcomes cascade through the minds of anxious children, some so awful, so utterly catastrophic that the mere suggestion of going to school, going upstairs, going to a friend’s house causes panic.

Parents spend a great deal of time reassuing their anxious children (which, as you’ve probably noticed, doesn’t help – more on that another time), while anxious children spend a great deal of time avoiding whatever has the slightest chance of causing harm. It’s a viscious cycle. One that will not end on its own. If you child isn’t reassured the first or second time you tell him that going near the blanket his sister threw up on last week (which of course you’ve thoroughly sanitized) isn’t going to make him sick, he isn’t going to be reassured the 20th time you tell him, either. And if your child is afraid of bees, continuing to avoid them isn’t going to make it any easier to go outside.

There are lots of things kids (and parents) can do to break free from anxiety. Previous and future posts cover an array of strategies. Here’s another: picturing success.

Picturing success is a visualization technique combining exposure (known to reduce anxiety) and relaxation (ditto). Your child will need some help with it, especially at the start. Let’s say your child is going to the orthodontist, where a mold of her mouth will be made. She has sensitive gag reflex and is terrified of the procedure, sure that she will gag and throw up ~ her worst nightmare. Every time you mention the appointment, your child tears up. So you stop mentioning it, hoping for the best while bracing yourself for the major scene you know will unfold at the doctor’s office (assuming you are able to manhandle her into the car to get there). Your child is only too happy to wipe the appointment out of her mind, too – except it keeps popping back up, reducing her to tears.

Rather than trying to avoid thinking about the appointment, help your child imagine it in as much detail as possible. That’s right: picture it. Imagine the beginning, the middle, the end. In detail. Even the scary parts. AND the parts that show your child coping. Create a story to review with your child every day (children ages 6 and over can participate in creating and telling the story). Your story might sound something like this:

“It’s the day of your appointment and you wake up feeling a little sick but then you remember you are getting your braces off, and that part’s really great. You have some breakfast, only a little, but it’s raisin toast with cream cheese and it tastes good going down. I tell you it’s time to go and you really don’t want to because you keep thinking about that mold and it seems so scary. But then you remember what the orthodontist said, that it only takes a few seconds to get the mold in place, and you know you can put up with a few seconds, even if you do gag. You remember that you’ve gagged lots of times and it was unpleasant but it ended pretty quickly and you were okay. So we get in the car and crank up the music, singing along to keep ourselves busy. We pull up at the office and they call you in right away and your stomach starts to feel sick but you tell yourself, I can do this, and you follow the nurse in…(more details)…and then it’s time to open your mouth, and even though you feel scared, you do it. And you remind yourself to keep breathing, nice and slow, just in and out through your nose, and you take yourself on a mental vacation to Grammy’s cottage. You are sitting in the orthodontist’s chair, tilted back, and your mouth is wide open and you are breathing, breathing, and you are picturing yourself at Grammy’s the way it looks first thing in the morning when you and Grammy go out looking for blueberries. And you feel like you might gag but you relax your throat and you’re okay. You just need to breathe and think about Grammy’s house and then, all of a sudden, the mold is in place and you’re doing it! You’re mouth is open and that mold is back there and it feels weird but you are okay. And you breathe and see Grammy’s house and you can smell the lake, that earthy, watery smell, a little like fish only better. You’re still in the chair and the nurse tells you to open just a little wider and you don’t see how you can, but you do, and she takes out the mold and you’re done. You did it!”

Clearly, your child’s story will reflect her own experience. Make it detailed enough for her to picture. Include the hard parts, and the parts that show how she copes. Underline that coping, again and again. Tell the story (some version of it) every day in the days leading up to The Event. Coach your child to imagine the scene in her mind, breathing slowly and deeply while she listens to (or tells) the story. Repeating this exercise over and over provides a model for coping while easing your child’s anticipatory anxiety. When it comes time for the actual experience, she’s practiced it (in her mind) and desensitized herself to the scarier parts. Picturing success enables success.

Have you tried this with your child? How did it work?

Posted in Managing Strong Feelings, Picturing Success, Relaxation |
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Don’t Take the Bait: Teaching Children to Deflect and Defuse Teasing

Written by DawnHuebner on March 24th, 2010

Most of us tell our children to ignore their siblings when something annoying is going on. How often do children actually follow this sage advice? Not so much, right?

Why is that? Teasing provokes strong feelings, which can be hard to keep in check. And face it, it’s hard to ignore all those pesky, annoying, rude things brothers and sisters do. But ignoring is important AND it works, as long as your kids do it right. You can teach them how.

First, explain to your children that when their siblings are bossy or mean or rude, they are looking for a reaction. When you (the target child) respond in a bothered way, you are rewarding them by giving them exactly what they want, increasing the chances that they’ll do it again (and again, and again).

So while it might be tempting to yell at your siblings when they are bothering you, it’s actually a major mistake. It’s like you’re a fish and they’re throwing you a big juicy worm. Don’t bite! Swim away, instead.

At which point any self-respecting child will say, “What the heck does that mean?”

It means ignore them. Either physically or mentally. Keep your mouth shut (you don’t want a mouthful of worm), and turn away. Not with theatrics (that would be rewarding), but calmly.

Walk away, literally. And if you can’t, find someplace to go in your mind. Replay your last soccer game. Tune in your brain to an episode of your favorite TV show. Count backwards from 50. There are plenty of things to do.

That’s the basic version of ignoring.

More sophisticated kids (ages 7 and up) can also be taught to ignore with a twist. With regular ignoring, you completely tune out your brother or sister. Or walk away from them. When you ignore with a twist, you continue to interact, pretending that whatever your brother or sister is doing isn’t bothering you.

What would this look like? Well, it might take the form of distraction.

Example:

Child 1: Saying sibling’s name over and over again, trying to get their goat.

Child 2: Hey, let’s see if Mom will let us build a fort in the living room.

Or agreement.

Example:

Child 1: You stink at baseball.

Child 2: I know! It’s really embarrassing.

Or deflection by way of a joke.

Child 1: Hey, chipmunk cheeks!

Child 2: [puffs out cheeks in an exaggerated way, googly-eyes, smile]

Kids who ignore with a twist quickly discover that distracting brothers and sisters, agreeing with them, or laughing off what they have said, works well. Especially if they use a regular voice, or act wacky when they make the joke.

Ignoring with a twist takes brothers and sisters by surprise. It’s a way of shrugging off the annoying parts of teasing, rather than shining a spotlight on them.

Do you have a child skilled at deflecting the jabs and barbs of siblings? If not, practice these skills, which are effective not only with siblings, but also classmates, neighbors, and friends.

Posted in Dealing with Teasing, Managing Relationships |
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Stop it, Stupid! A Bird’s Eye View of Sibling Squabbles

Written by DawnHuebner on March 17th, 2010

“Stop it!” “You’re an idiot!” “Get away from me!” “That’s mine!” Ah, the chorus of children’s voices…

There are few things more stressful to parents, few things more insidious, more undermining to children’s self-esteem than the jabs and barbs of siblings.

Why can’t they just get along? It’s a good question. One you’ve probably asked a thousand times – perhaps in a voice several decibels louder than you’d care to admit.

There are actually two good reasons for all this fighting: 1) many children lack the skills necessary for handling sibling squabbles and 2) they are trying to win your favor. “What? Win my favor!?” I can hear you now, “I’d give anything for 10 minutes of peace. How could this fighting possibly be for my benefit??” Believe it or not, it is.

Children are biologically programmed to want and need their parents’ love and attention, leading to a complex, often greedy-seeming desire to remain front and center in the eyes of the people who are literally keeping them alive (that would be you). And even after they no longer need your constant attention, they continue to crave it.

Siblings, of course, are big time competitors. They also want and need you for themselves. So kids continually vie for the biggest prize – you. Your time. Your attention. Your favor. Your love.

Now as you well know, you can give your time, attention, favor, and love to all your children; you don’t have to choose just one. But that’s not how they see it, especially if you have been stepping into their battles – mediating, laying blame, telling one or the other what to do. Parents do this all the time.

“She’s younger than you.” “Leave him alone.” “Just let her use it.”

To parents it seems like logic. To kids it is anything but that. It’s a contest pure and simple, and you are the grand prize. To motivate your kids to actually work things out for themselves, you need to remove yourself from the equation. This is probably the single most important thing parents can do to reduce sibling rivalry. It leads to a seismic shift, away from you (the parent), and back onto whatever the argument was about to begin with. With parental favor no longer a factor, the steam goes out of many sibling squabbles.

Of course, not all children have the skills they need to negotiate disagreements – skills like talking and listening, compromising and making contracts, managing feelings and letting things go. You can start teaching these skills immediately, and watch for them to be addressed in future posts.

Keep in mind that it is common for children to express strong, negative feelings about their siblings. While this might be shocking (and painful) to you, it’s important to accept a full range of feelings. Understand their fury, or sadness, or jealousy while helping your children translate these feelings into acceptable language. Don’t be too quick to silence your children’s feelings or offer advice. Instead, provide support for managing strong feelings. When calm, your children will be better able to find their own solutions.

While there should always be a place for talking in your family, tattling is a different story. Telling on siblings for the express purpose of getting them in trouble should not be allowed. Empathize with your children, without getting involved in or trying to solve their problems. Your goal is not to end any particular struggle, but to support your children in using coping and conflict-resolution skills.

Have you landed on a solution for helping your children get along? Please share it. And check back next week for “Don’t Take the Bait: Teaching Children to Deflect and Defuse Teasing.”

Posted in Managing Relationships, Understanding Sibling Rivalry |
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Keeping Socks On…And Other Sensory Challenges

Written by DawnHuebner on March 10th, 2010

Do you have one of those kids who rip off their socks, turn them inside out, and rip them off again? Who react to any hint of a label, and cannot wear jeans? Some kids have sensory sensitivities. Things in the environment bother these kids. A lot.

There are a number of excellent books explaining sensory challenges and pointing parents toward solutions (for example The Out of Sync Child and Sensational Kids). If you have a sensory-sensitive child, you might want to pick one of them up. In the meantime, here are two strategies to make clothing battles a thing of the past – one is for you and one is to teach to your child:

(For you) Get rid of the blue jeans. As much as you might love the way he looks in blue jeans, button-down shirts, corduroys, clothing with fancy stitching – some makes/fabrics/styles are simply more difficult for kids with sensory sensitivities to wear. Go through your child’s drawers and clear out the items you know are really tough. The clothes made of stiff fabric, with lumpy seams or tight necklines. Think soft, non-constricting, tag-less (what a great invention, those stamped-on clothing labels!). If your child likes a certain style of sweatpants, get 3 or 4 pairs. Ditto for socks, shirts, underwear. Put all the clothing your child is never going to wear (the worst offenders, the things you can sort-of understand him reacting to) into a bag and bring it to Goodwill. Or give it to the neighbor who just had a baby. Get this clothing out of your house – its continued presence is only going to frustrate you (and your child).

Once you’ve pared down to (or stocked up on) the things that should work for your child, teach him to habituate. Here’s how:

(Many thanks to Tamar Chansky, PhD, in whose wonderful book, Freeing Your Child From Anxiety, I first discovered this metaphor)

Talk to your child about jumping into a swimming pool. Have him imagine what the water feels like – Brrrrrrr! It’s cold. Ask your child what he would do next. Most kids say something along the lines of “start moving around.” Yes, you start swimming or playing, diving deep beneath the surface or paddling from one end of the pool to the other and after a while, what do you notice? Most kids can tell you, “It warms up.” Ahhh. But is it the pool that’s warmed up? Has the water temperature actually changed? “No,” any self-respecting 6-year can tell you, “You get used to it!” Exactly.

Our bodies are designed to get used to things, even uncomfortable things – like cold water. We just need to hang in there, and pretty soon, we don’t notice the cold any more. It happens even faster if we’re doing something fun, liking racing to the end of the pool or diving for treasure. But you have to stay in the pool.

It’s like that with socks (or underwear, or shirts, or pants), too. We can put them on (that’s like jumping into the pool) and keep them on (that’s like staying in, even though - ICK – they don’t feel right) and go get busy with something else (playing with the dog or eating breakfast or watching TV) and pretty soon…you’ve gotten used to it and your body doesn’t notice the seam/cuff/fabric any more.

The pool analogy makes keeping the item of clothing on (to habituate to it) more palatable to kids. Most have had the experience of getting used to cold water. They know the basics – you have to stay in; you have to start moving around, turn your attention to something else. Talk to your child about this, then sweeten the pot by offering a reward: each day your child puts on his [whatever item of clothing causes trouble] and keeps it on, puts it on and immediately leaves the room to get busy with something else for at least 20 minutes (ample time for most kids to acclimate), he earns a point. Once he has 10 points, he can trade them in for a trip to the bookstore, one-on-one time with Dad, a family-wide Monopoly night, something meaningful/rewarding to your child.

The idea is to take into account the reality of your child’s sensitivity AND to teach him a useable skill. Has anyone tried this with their sensory-challenged kids? How did it work?

Posted in Keeping Socks On, Managing Sensory Challenges, Managing Strong Feelings |
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Why Breathing Doesn’t Work…and How to Tweak It So It Does

Written by DawnHuebner on March 2nd, 2010

We all do it. When faced with a panicky child, our most common piece of advice is, “Take a breath.” And then one of two things happen:

Compliant child: Opens mouth to sob in more air, only to find her chest is too constricted so not much goes in, which is so scary, escalating the panic as she wails – I CAN’T BREATHE!

Less compliant child: THAT DOESN’T HELP (and she’s right)

It doesn’t help to simply tell our kids to take a breath. When they are already hyperventilating (or close to it), they can’t breathe effectively, which only serves to escalate their fear. And when it’s the first thing we say, it feels (to a frantic 5-year old, 7-year old, 9-year old) hopelessly inadequate.

Think about the last time you were really worked up. How would you have responded if someone met your sobbing (ranting, panicking, clenching) by telling you to breathe? “I am breathing, damn it!” It doesn’t really help.

And yet, it does. Not telling someone to breathe, but the act of breathing. When we are worked up (frightened, angry, tense) our breathing changes. It becomes more shallow, less restorative. We begin to starve ourselves of air, throwing off the balance of oxygen and CO₂, making it harder to remain calm, to think, to figure out how to help ourselves. We need to breathe to restore our inner stasis, and kids do, too. Here’s how to help them do it:

Start with an out-breath. When chest muscles are tight (which happens as our feelings escalate), it is hard to breathe in. Not being able to breathe in is scary, triggering a danger alarm deep within the brain, adding to that sense of panic already spiraling out of control. Coach your child to breathe out, first. Purse your lips a little and do it with her, blowing the air out like you would blow to extinguish a candle.
Do it with your child. Even before you start speaking, blow out some air. That’s a cue for your child, a nonverbal reminder to exhale. Keep your breathing nice and slow. Focus initially on the out-breaths, making them long, with shorter intakes through your nose in between. Gradually lengthen your own in-breaths, so you are breathing in deeply (through your nose) and breathing out long and steady (through your mouth). People have a natural inclination to match the pace and emotional pitch of their companions. You are consciously bringing yours down, to help your child begin to de-escalate, too.
After your first out-breath, say something empathic. Reflect what you are seeing, or put your child’s feelings into words in a calm, steady voice. Something like, “Wow, that seemed scary” or “You are really mad right now.” Keep all judgment out of your tone. You are letting your child know that you get it. You see what your child is feeling and whatever it is, it’s okay.
After that first, supportive comment, say something along the lines of “blow it out” or “let’s work on making your body feel okay so we can figure out what to do.” Breathe as directed above, setting the pace, modeling for your child, letting your calm presence soothe her.
Resist the temptation to jump in with lots of words. Questions, admonishments, threats – all of these are disorganizing to kids when they are already in a heightened state. Practice what Dr. Teresa Bolick has described as “Low and Slow” (from Aspergers Disorder and Young Children), bringing the pace, tone, volume, and complexity of your speech down a few notches.
All of this will work substantially better if you practice breathing with your child ahead of time. Start with a simple explanation: You know, when we get worked up it’s hard to think clearly. We need to calm down before we can figure out what to do. Making sure we’re breathing nice and slow can help us calm down. Let’s practice so the next time we’re super-mad or really scared (or whatever feeling your child tends to have trouble with), we know just what to do. Then aim for two or three brief practice sessions a day (we’re talking minutes here – in the car, before bed, etc.). Simply prompt with, “Let’s do a few of those breaths.” And you do it, too.
Some kids respond better when there is a visual component. Have them imagine a smell to breathe in – brownies, sun tan lotion, horses. They can picture the object and sniff in the scent, pulling it into their nostrils.

Have you found a way to coach your child to breathe? A visualization or relaxation exercise that works? Feel free to share it here.

Posted in Breathing, Managing Sensory Challenges, Managing Strong Feelings, Relaxation |
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