Emotions and Children: 4 ways to Support an Emotional Child
Having an emotional child can be very mentally and emotionally draining for mums.
Many parents struggle with how to support an emotional child in a positive way.
Emotions are often passed on to others around them, so a small child feeling emotional can often result in a mother feeling emotional and/or frustrated very soon after!
This post will share 4 ways to support an emotional child and how you can bring in strategies to help your child build emotional intelligence and manage their own emotions.
4 Ways to support an emotional child
1: Get empathetic
Having empathy is one of the most effective parenting traits out there. If you are empathetic, you are thinking about what it feels like to be in your child’s shoes-and at least attempting to understand the pressures on your child at any moment.
An empathetic parent also takes into account the developmental age of the child, as it is essential for parents to take this into account when it comes to setting realistic expectations for your child.
Realistic expectations are very important for all ages, and especially so for young children, because they are just learning how to build their skill set, resilience and attitude to learning. Do this right, and you are very likely to build your child’s intelligence and love for learning in all the right ways!
2: Have a Calm space or activities
When your small child is emotional, it is essential that they have some place or associated toy to help them calm down. Often the best toys or props are those with a multisensory aspect, such as a glitter jar, stress balls, kinetic sand or gentle music instruments, etc.
Having one or two activities available, or indeed creating a ‘calm corner’ where a child can choose to play whenever they want to play calmly, is a wonderful space to have when there are small children around.
The reason I like to have a calm corner is because it literally gives the child the lasting opportunity to go and become intentional around managing their emotions.
If a 4 year old feels ‘yucky’ and a bit angry on the inside, they may be able to start to identify that feeling (if you have talked to them on the subject, or been part of a program intended for this purpose), and move themselves to the calmer space intuitively.
When the goal is emotional regulation by the child, this is perfect!
My online coaching program Learning Emotions is all about giving parents the understandings and strategies they need, in order to teach their child about emotions AND parent them with connection and understanding.
3: Listen, don’t talk
Running in and giving your child instructions or admonitions is not the way to support an emotional child.
Creating connection is all about helping others feel that you are listening and valuing them. This means we need to understand what makes another person (in this case, a child) feel valuable-and do that.
Listening, even when we don’t agree (and not jumping in with solving the problem, or giving advice) makes our child feel valued, special and worthwhile, because we are actually taking the time to listen to what they have to say and how they feel.
If no one listens to how you feel as a Mama, do you feel calm?
I understand that sometimes this is the case, and we need to train our children and ourselves to listen carefully to each other. Real listening is a much underrated vehicle to understanding other people-be they our child, our spouse or our friends.
4: Give them a hug
One of the 5 Love Languages, outlined in the book by Campbell, is physical touch.
Some children connect more effectively by using physical touch, and this means they will often respond better when they are emotional in this way, too.
Any child can use a hug when they are emotional-but it’s worth asking, first! Trying not to cross boundaries is always a good idea, especially as a child gets older.
When you want to support an emotional child, you want to give them the option to respond, but the key is to leave the opportunity open for awhile (or a long while).
An angry child is not necessarily likely to run into your arms for a hug immediately (although they could!). But giving them the option of having a hug ‘as soon as you want one’ lets them know that you are emotionally and physically there for them whenever they need your comfort and help.
Supporting an emotional child can be a very challenging experience-but as parents we need to remember that we are the adult here, and the child can be overwhelmed by emotion that they can’t change or manage by themselves.
It is critical that we as parents can hold this knowledge at the forefront of our minds when we are dealing with our small child’s emotions-because if we can’t stay level headed, how on earth will we teach our children to?
