Today I was eating in a restaurant and at the table next to me a little boy was crying because he wanted something differant than what was ordered. The parents were doing their best to try to keep him calm. They kept telling him ” It’s ok, you are fine. Turn off your tears.”

The mom smiled apologetically at me and kept telling the boy that his crying was bothering “that lady”. I said ” I am a child therapist I work with this a lot.” The mom said, If you have any ideas on what to do go ahead.”

I looked at the boy and said, “You sound really upset.” Mom said “Yea, and he can make himself throw up”. The boy started making gagging noises. I looked at him and asked “Were you upset about your food? You sound angry and you are pointing at your plate”. Are you maybe disappointed. ” I made a sad face.

The boy nodded. He said “it has matos”. I said, ” Were you surprised that there were tomatoes? You didn’t want tomatoes. I don’t like surprises in my food either.” The mom said “Do you want me to take the tomatoes off”. The boy nodded and said,” Now it is yummy.”

Before I started talking to the family I heard them say what seems natural to do when a child is upset, tell them they are ok or distract them. I could hear the child getting louder and more agitated as they kept asking “Do you want this, do you want that?” What the boy really wanted was for the adults to understand that he was upset. He needed his feelings validated not pushed away with a distraction. When I validated his feelings of anger and disappointment at getting tomatoes on his food his voice and body calmed down. Then he was able to say what he was upset about.

Understandably you cannot stop and have a long discussion every time your child is upset. But, if you are consistently pausing, validating their feelings and asking “what do you need” they will learn valuable communication skills. Allowing them to tell you what is wrong rather than trying to guess and fix the problem teaches the child that their words matter. They are able to communicate with someone who takes the time to listen.

Which sounds better? Acknowledging that your child has feelings and helping him or her work through them or sending the messages that emotions are a problem and they are “fine”?