In this episode, I talk about what I typically see missing from the equation when you just can’t stop fighting with your kids. We have to get in the habit of having conversations ahead of time or at least at a non-relevant moment.
Topics Covered:
- The messy moments
- Q.T.I.P. – Quit taking it personally
- Productive Conversations
- After School Restraint Collapse
- Hurt people hurt people
- Timing is key when effectively teaching kids all the “things”
- The 3 Ps – have a plan, establish protocol and be on the same page
- How to establish consequences ahead of time
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About Randi Rubenstein
Randi Rubenstein helps parents with a strong-willed kiddo become a happier family and enjoy the simple things again like bike rides and beach vacays.
She’s the founder of Mastermind Parenting, host of the Mastermind Parenting podcast, and author of The Parent Gap. Randi works with parents across the U.S.
At Mastermind Parenting, we believe every human deserves to have a family that gets along.
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Transcription
0 (0s):
You’re listening to the Mastermind Parenting Podcast with Randi Rubenstein episode 65.
1 (6s):
Hi, my name’s Randi Rubenstein and welcome to the Mastermind Parenting Podcast where we believe when your thoughts grow the Conversations in your home flood.
0 (22s):
Okay, guys, today I have an episode about creating a peaceful family. Really? It’s like, do you feel like your household is a war zone? I know I talk about this a lot. It’s when you have one of these strong-willed kids and you haven’t quite figured out the recipe yet, or retrain your brain with the Mastermind Parenting tools enough for it to come naturally. And you’re saying, okay, I’ve read the books or listen to the podcast. I have tried this, or I have tried that something is not working. Some things not working. I’m still not cracking the code. I’m here to tell you In this episode, what are the missing ingredient probably is?
0 (1m 6s):
So this is it. You know how, when your kids, like, I just had a situation last night, your kid, whatever it takes their mood from the day out on you. In my example, it was my almost 18 year old junior and high school daughter. Maybe in your case, it’s your five-year-old or a six-year-old or a three-year old. And they’re experiencing what’s called afterschool Restraint Collapse, which is they hold it together all day and then you pick them up. And then it’s just whining and meltdowns and, and lots of different behaviors.
0 (1m 46s):
And with the teenager, it’s a bad mood. It’s a snapping out of a brother it’s snapping at me. It’s blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And so often what happens is in those moments, we make their behavior mean something about us, right? Hurt this is what I like to tell. Tell people hurt people, hurt people. So the way your kids are behaving when you received them back from school, and there are always already in a bad mood, they’re already showing these behaviors that are, we’ll just call them less than awesome or enjoyable to be around.
0 (2m 30s):
And we make it mean something about us. And then what happens when we make it mean something about us when we’re, that’s called like a lack of mind mastery, because it never is about us. They’re just using us for their punching bag in that moment, because that’s how they feel on the inside of their body. And they don’t have a better coping skill in that moment because being a human is messy business, and none of us are perfect. And sometimes we have shitty days and we take it out on the people we love. So we typically do in those moments when there’s, there’s one of these, you know, uncomfortable situations or just a less than awesome moment we go in and we start correcting them.
0 (3m 14s):
We start telling them the things that they need to do, or the things that they should stop saying, or that they like. We started going into correcting during that moment. And our timing is wrong. We’re never going to teach them the things that we want to teach them to improve future behavior. We’re not going to skill build in those moments. So the missing ingredient is actually having these conversations that will improve their skills and will help them to have a better future behavior and invite more cooperation and have all the long-term benefits that we want to having that conversation at the right time.
0 (4m 4s):
And you really, you know, it’s not during the heat of the moment, you have to master your mind and take a breath and walk away. Like my husband would say to me, when one of our kids is like acting the way, like a human, like a messy human, having a messy moment, as we all do. And my husband pointed it out to me, I dunno, maybe a few months ago. And he was like, I love it when you’re talking to one of the kids and you just barrel through and you like, whatever they say, it doesn’t affect you. Like you don’t change your demeanor. You just continue on with whatever it is that you needed to say or do.
0 (4m 48s):
And then you excuse yourself from the situation. But you, you act like you don’t even acknowledge or notice that they’re being reactive towards you. You just are on your agenda and you don’t let whatever they say or do effect whatever it is, whatever it is that you’re trying to accomplish. And so I was, you know, and what that really is is that the pillar of Q tipping, Quit taking it personally. So they’ve had a day and I know they’re now having a messy moment and it has nothing to do with me there just using me as their punching bag in that moment, they are in a crappy mood. It happens. Right. So I come in and I need to tell them like, dinner’s ready, or so, or I need you to do X, Y, and Z, or I’m following up with, did you send that thing in for your summer internship?
0 (5m 39s):
Like, I’m I have, I have an agenda in a way to do list. And so I need to get answers to certain things or follow up on certain things and they act snappy or snippy with me and I’m like, okay, so you haven’t done it yet, or you have done it yet. You know, like whatever they say to me, I’m, T, I’ve got my agenda on my to-do list and I’m not going to react to their, their reactive state. So I’ve had to practice to get that, to have that skill of Quit taking it personally. It takes a lot of my mastery. And in one of the mantras, I say in my head always is, is hurt. People, hurt people. They are always just acting on the outside of what they feel on the inside.
0 (6m 19s):
And there’s more to this story. Like something happened today. There’s something else going on. And if I take their behavior personally, in those moments and then take that opportunity to, to tell them how they will or won’t talk to me and to teach them the lessons and to tell them all of the things like they’ll never learn it. And although you end up doing is just being more annoyed with me and then taking their frustration out on me more, and then it will become a dance and then we’ll have a whole fight. And now I’ve just given them an outlet to fight for a fight with me and two take out all their frustration versus taking it, just, you know, Q tipping and walking away. Well, the truth is though I do.
0 (6m 59s):
I mean, there’s so many times where it’s like what we do want to teach them the things we do want to let them know after a less than awesome moments that we didn’t deserve, that behavior. We do want to talk about when you’re frustrated, like some more effective Productive tools to use when you are frustrated or have a bad day to release that and to feel better. And it doesn’t involve using the people that you love as your punching bag, right? So we want to teach them those things. It doesn’t mean that they are always going to do it, but we do want to teach them to things. So when do we do it?
0 (7m 40s):
So the missing ingredient, it’s really all about having a conversation head of time or at a non relevant time and, and teaching those things at that time, setting the expectations at that time, you know, Creating a plan and coming up and going over the consequences. So let me explain. So maybe, maybe it is after a moment when your older child has spoken to you in a way that was disrespectful and taking out their stuff on you, and you do want to let them know like, like you deserve respect, and you’re not gonna be a doormat at the time to talk about it.
0 (8m 25s):
Isn’t during that moment, during that time. So what happens later will later on, or you would come back and you would have a productive conversation. So a, you would own some of the, if you, if you ended up engaging, you would have to have a Productive conversation, which is basically owning your role. Like you took their behavior, personally, you overreacted. And then it turned into, you made a mountain out of a mole Hill, and then you would actively listen and then you would problem solve together. That’s what would happen if you got sucked into their mood, but let’s just say you handled it well and you didn’t take it personally. And you walked away. How do you go back and then stand up for yourself and let them know, Hey, when you’re frustrated or If, or you’ve had a bad day taking it out on the people that love and support you, it’s not the way to go.
0 (9m 13s):
Let’s talk about better, better ways to process that upset. Let’s talk about better ways for you to let me know. You’ve had a shitty day in the future that doesn’t involve, you know, treating me like dirt, hold on, I’m plugging my computer and that’s it. That’s a losing power. And, and, and you’re saying, you know, I get it. Look, I have bad days. Look, you’re empathizing. I have bad days too. I haven’t been bad moods to we’re all human. We all do this. And let’s talk about like, when you’ve had a bad day, instead of just being mean to me, what can you say? I don’t know. What can you say, mom might need some space.
0 (9m 56s):
Momma had a really crummy day. Mom. I’m feeling like in the worst mood ever right now, because a lot of things happened today that I don’t actually want to talk about right now, but I just need some space. I need some time you can ask for that, ask for what you need, right. So we can give them kind of an emotional vocabulary and let them know you’re entitled to be in a bad mood and let’s, and express it to me, but express it to me by saying I had a bad day, I’m in a bad mood things. Weren’t great. I don’t want to talk about it. Actually. You can say all those things to me. You don’t need to insult me or, or treat me in ways that, you know, I don’t deserve to let me know that your in a bad mood and just say I’m on a bad mood.
0 (10m 41s):
Okay? So we’ve talked about that at a non-relevant time. And now we’re going to establish a mutual expectations, which is the what, so next time, your in a bad mood and you forget, and you just start snipping and snapping and acting that way. To me, what’s our plan. What’s our plan is to come up with a plan and you can talk about it. And what’s the consequence. If you want to tie a consequence to it, what if you refuse to tell me that you’ve had a bad day and take deep breaths and do all of the things that you need to do to kind of take a bath and the things that we all need in terms of self care, after we’ve had a bad day, what if you refuse to do those things and you continue hurling insults at the other family members in this family, and really disregarding our family values.
0 (11m 41s):
’cause, you know, with our family manifesto that is posted in the kitchen. If you don’t have a family manifesto, I teach more about this in my courses, but look up, Creating a family manifesto. You know, the Family manifesto in the kitchen that we all came up to it together. Our family values our we’re a team. We speak kindly to each other and We, there is no violence. We have to know this is a no violence household and no violence own. That means a violent words. That means violent hands, right? Hurting each other in any way, verbally, verbally, or physically. So when you continue to, to break the family rules, by speaking unkindly, by hurling, insults, and names at the other members of this family, what is the consequence?
0 (12m 33s):
What do you think is the consequence should be, y’all come up with a consequence. I encourage you, especially if your kids are older than like seven to ask them, what do you think the consequence should be for a family member that breaks our family code of conduct that goes against our family values. Like this stuff is serious. We take this seriously. What do you think the consequences would be for name, calling him for breaking those family values. This is a serious stuff. This has to be a safe zone for this family. And encourage you to put that question out to your kids before you automatically tell them what it will be, because they always seem to go more severe.
0 (13m 15s):
I don’t know. I should lose my such and such P privileges for two weeks. You were like two weeks. Gosh, do you get it? You do know that we take it seriously. All right. I like hearing that two weeks as a little severe look, being human is a messy business. We all make mistakes. What about two days? You know, then you get to be the hero because they came up with something way more severe. So that’s it. Let’s say I D I did a podcast, a few episodes back where I share to a conversation between me and one of my private moms, my private clients kind of problem solving and workshopping how to handle rough housing with her to kids.
0 (13m 60s):
And, and she told me how she handled the PRODUCTIVE Conversations. She is awesome. And I said, now, I want you to remember that you’ve got to go back and have the conversation. It’s not, it’s a non-relevant time. You got to have the conversation where you really establish the plan to make sure everyone is on the same page. And you’ll all have mutual expectations here. And everybody’s on the same page here. And what’s the consequence. I want you to go over it in this conversation. So the missing ingredient you guys is having this conversation at a non-relevant time, not in the heat of the moment, and really getting clear and clean on this is the plan.
0 (14m 51s):
This is the protocol everyone’s on the same page, triple P plan protocol, page plan, protocol, page. We want to have these conversations so that everyone can be, know what the plan is, is very clearly, you know, what the protocol is very clearly and, you know, and make sure that we’re all on the same page. So what I said to her in that Podcast at the end was like, let them know the consequences. When the boys are rough housing and They, and the safe word hasn’t been respected and listened to, and somebody continues on, or it seems too heated, or it’s gone past the point of play and fun, I will be separating you to, and you will be going to your own spots away from each other to calm down so we can come back together, but that’s going to be the plan, right?
0 (15m 45s):
I’m going to say this word, I’m going to separate you two that’s the plan. Got it. And that’s the protocol. So I’m so, you know, that’s pretty much it. I mean, remember they can’t be hearing the plan and the protocol for the first time during the heat at the moment. Right? So I want y’all to really remember that, that if you don’t know how to handle these conversations, or you’re dreading having these conversations, it’s just because it’s a new skill that you haven’t mastered and you just have to be willing to get in there and have these conversations and use too many words and have your kid’s looking at you like, huh.
0 (16m 34s):
And then you have to say, well, and then you just have to get transparent. Explain to them, look, I want us to be a, a loving family, not a fighting family. I want to change some things up here. And I want us to have a plan so that when we do have those heated moments, when we do have those, those messy moments, we’re, we’re able to get back on the same page pretty quickly. Right? So that’s what I have got for you guys. That’s the missing ingredient. I hope this was helpful. And just remember, you want to have these conversations ahead of time.
0 (17m 15s):
And at non-relevant moments, the time to teach the things is not when everyone is in their emotional brain freaking out. Right. And we’re the, no one is in their thinking brain. During those moments, no, one’s going to learn a new skill. No, one’s going to improve future behavior. You are absolutely. You’re absolutely wasting your breath and your energy. And it’s precious, like no more. Okay. I hope this was helpful. Have a great week, guys. Bye.
2 (17m 51s):
Have
1 (17m 51s):
You read my book, the parent gap. Have you listened to my book? The parent gap? I doubt you’ve listened because my publisher hasn’t released it yet on audible. However, I have the audio version of a parent gap that I would love to send to you. You can download it at Mastermind Parenting dot com forward slash book that’s Mastermind care T dot com forward slash book for your free audio version of the parent gap. Your welcome I.
