Sometimes I just know my son is purposefully trying to push me over the edge. I mean what else could it be. “If he wanted to behave he could, he just doesn’t want to!” “He knows that what he is doing gets me angry.”
I can remember arguing with my son when he was three-years-old. Seriously, I was arguing with a three-year-old. What will it be like when he is a teenager. I know other parents experience this challenge and wonder if things will ever get better.
I am here to offer you hope that it can get better, and instantly! All you need is a mental shift.
“Wait a minute!” I can hear you saying. I am not the one who needs to change the way they are thinking. That minion over there rolling on the floor yelling at me is the one who needs to change. And yes, they know exactly what they are doing!
Won’t Mindset vs. Can’t Mindset
(This is another helpful tool from the Karyn Purvis Child Institute at TCU.)
How we as parents respond to our children’s actions greatly determines how things progress. I am sure most of you reading this already know that. The challenge doesn’t lie with knowing. It is with doing.
How do we respond in a way that avoids a spiral downward into the usual cycle of resistance and conflict, and help the behavior to spiral upward toward reduced fear and anxiety leading to felt-safety and self-regulation?
Depends on What We Believe About Our Child
Your response or reaction will usually depend on some foundational beliefs you have about your child. That is, do you think that your child’s behavior is intentional or unintentional?
It helps if we keep in mind what is going on in their brains. If your child is intentionally misbehaving that means that they are operating from the upstairs or thinking part of their brain. If your child is unintentionally making bad choices, most likely they are stuck in their downstairs or survival part of their brain and in fight, flight, or freeze mode.
Most of the time when a child from a trauma background is misbehaving, they are operating from the downstairs part of their brain which means that they can’t make good choices in that moment even if they want to make a good choice.
This describes a Can’t vs. Won’t mindset.
If our child is stuck in survival mode and behaving accordingly, yet we think they are intentionally trying to get under our skin, well, the interaction will most definitely take a downward spiral.
However, if we can recognize that they are doing the best they can, and that their behavior is driven by their survival part of their brain, that helps us respond accordingly. Once we recognize this we can apply the trauma-informed principles we have learned that helps our child regulate, builds connection and trust, and reduces anxiety and fear.
Here is an infographic that I found that does a good job of describing this interaction:
My experience and belief is that our kids want to make good choices and please their parents or caretakers. They just can’t until they receive help regulating enough to transition from their downstairs brain to their upstairs brain.
Study the infographic and see what you can change or apply to how you respond to your child’s behavior. I would love to hear if you see any changes with your kids. Let me know!
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