Lessons on Parenting
Being a foster parent has taught me a tremendous amount about parenting—not just foster children, but my biological children too! When you are a foster parent you have to take a certain number of continuing education classes each year to help you learn how to parent a child that has faced unspeakable trauma. Through these classes, I’ve learned that so many of these lessons and takeaways can be and should be applied to parenting all children.
Most of these lessons I’ve learned come from Karyn Purvis’s model, called Trust Based Relational Intervention (TBRI). Unfortunately, Karyn passed away a few years ago from cancer, but her work of correcting behavior through connection and relationships still carries on. You can check out her book, The Connected Child.
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Parenting Lessons
Everyone goes through trauma. Even if your child grows up in a loving home with an abundance of food available, at some point they will face trauma. Trauma looks different for each child. It could be unspeakable trauma that causes a child to enter foster care. It could be a stressful pregnancy or birth. Trauma could be early hospitalization where they are continuously poked and prodded. Trauma could be a divorce or death of a loved one. It could be being bullied. The point is that every one will face trauma. Therefore, Trust Based Relational Intervention can be used to parent any child, not just a foster child.
Trauma affects the beliefs. Trauma affects the whole child. Trauma affects what a child believes about themselves—if they are constantly getting in trouble then they are going to start to believe that they are a bad kid. They need to understand that their misbehavior doesn’t make them bad—they are still valuable!
Trauma affects the body. This is more about how a child processes the world through their senses. Some kids hate to be hugged or it might take them longer to process what you asked them to do. You have meet them where they are with understanding and compassion, so maybe your child needs a high-five at bed time instead of a hug. Or if it takes your child longer to process a request, then maybe they need a hand on the shoulder to grab their attention as you ask them to put their bookbag away.
Trauma affects the biology. Trauma can affect our children’s children and even their grandchildren. We can project our traumas onto our children and it can keep going for multiple generations. There was a study that said children of Holocaust survivors had experienced small biological changes due to trauma. But, on the flip side, we can reverse those biological changes for many generations in a positive way too just by connecting with our child.
Trauma affects the brain. There was a really good visual that helped me understand how trauma affects the brain. Hold your hand up. Make a fist. Now, pretend your wrist is your brain stem. Your thumb and palm are part of your downstairs brain. The thumb is the your amygdala (the amygdala is 2X larger for those that have experienced trauma). Your fingers are considered your upstairs brain—the cortex. Your brain develops from bottom to top and back to front. The last part of your brain that develops is the prefrontal cortex—it’s in charge of your emotions, seeing something from someone else’s perspective, problem solving, and executive function. The prefrontal cortex doesn’t start to develop until 3 years old and isn’t fully developed until 25 years old for women and 30 years old for men. Now, let’s pretend a child is happily sitting in the grocery cart. They have a happy brain (fist). It’s getting close to lunch time though, but you have a few more items to grab before checking out. Suddenly, they see the shiniest, coolest box of cereal that they must have, but you say no because it has too much sugar. Their amygdala activates. They go in flight, fight, or freeze mode—this very well could look like a tantrum. Raise those fingers up! Their upstairs brain is sounding the alarm and can’t work at all until it has calmed back down. They are not going to be able to rationalize, hear you, or think through solutions until their upstairs brain is back to it’s happy state (fist). So, when your child’s upstairs brain isn’t working you might need to first meet their need—drink of water, hug, a snack, a blanket or lovie—before you can begin to teach to the behavior. In this instance, hunger is what caused your child’s amygdala to activate, so provide him a small, healthy snack to help his brain regulate and then teach him that if he gets hungry he can always ask for a healthy snack, but sugary cereal is only for special treats.
Trauma affects the behavior. Behavior is what we tend to focus on because that’s what we see. I’ve even written blog posts on how to correct behaviors, but I’ve slowly started to learn (with many hiccups along the way) that if I address the whole child, instead of just the behavior, then the behavior will begin to change because I’m helping my child feel heard and connected.
Connect before trying to correct. When our kids misbehave, it’s usually out of a need not being met. I know when I’ve had a long day and I lash out it’s usually because I’m tired, hungry, need a minute to myself, or just want someone to listen to me for 5 minutes. It’s the exact same way with our kids. Their misbehavior is usually the result of an unmet need. Their upstairs brain is in distress because they are tired, hungry, thirsty, need to unwind, overstimulated, want a hug, or just need some one-on-one time with mommy. So, it’s best to understand what that unmet need is, and meet it to help regulate the brain before addressing the misbehavior. Meeting the need doesn’t mean you are ignoring the behavior! You will correct the behavior, but your child won’t hear or comprehend the correction until their brain is regulated first.
Need to be mindful. I have a hard time taking my children’s misbehavior personally—like they are “out to get me.” I know they really aren’t, but in the heat of the moment that’s how it feels. I’ve had to evaluate myself and try to understand what triggers me (what behaviors upset me most, why do they, etc.), which is really hard to do! Now, I’m more cognizant of when I’m started to get triggered so I can calm myself down to help prevent the situation from escalating. We need to be able to regulate ourselves so we can help regulate our children. It doesn’t always work, and then I have to ask for forgiveness and a redo, but I’m trying.
Great proactive strategies to try. As I was going through these classes on TBRI for foster training I was introduced to a few strategies that are so beneficial and an easy way to redirect a child without yelling or nagging. In a very even and calm tone you can say…
“With respect, use your words.” This is for when they are having a tantrum and just screaming and crying.
“Are you asking or telling?” When they tell you they want to do something, but haven’t actually asked to do it.
“Who’s the parent on duty?” This is usually when they try to parent or when they are saying “dad said.”
“Would you like a redo?” When they mess up and have a calm brain you can offer a chance to fix the mess up.
“Are you asking for a compromise?” This is a great strategy for them to provide a solution where you both win. It really helps them start to take responsibility.
You can offer 2 choices. Try to be playful where they feel like they really do have a choice in the matter. For example, when your child is refusing to brush their teeth you can offer that they brush their teeth to their favorite song or cuddle their favorite stuffed animal while Mommy brushes.
Humans are relational. God created a partner for Adam so he wouldn’t be lonely. I believe making sure we connect with our children is so important. I think most of the “misbehaviors” from our children link back to craving attention or connection with us. So, if we are intentional to provide that connection up front then there will probably be less behavior problems to address….unless they are hangry and then it’s a whole other problem. ;) It sounds silly, but I set a “date time” in my calendar for each of my kids where one day a week we set aside 10-20 minutes to do something they enjoy without any distractions—I will help them gather lego pieces while they build, read a book with them, draw together, cook together, play a game of HORSE, tend to the garden, or let them show me their rock collection.
Parenting is challenging because there’s no one way to do it. You have to figure out what works best for you and your family, but I think if you are willing to learn, grow and adapt to what is best for your family then you are doing an excellent job as a parent!
