Growing Closer to your Child Through Tantrums

A while ago, I shared in my post about expectations, that my ability to understand tantrums has completely shifted the way I respond to my children, especially Jerome, in the midst of tantrums. 

Today I wanted to share a breakthrough I had a little while back.

Rolling Out the Red Carpet

Jerome has certain things that trigger his emotional outbursts. Being around too many people for too long, being away from home too many days in a row, lack of adequate sleep.

Knowing this helps us to be prepared to support him if we find ourselves facing a situation with these triggers present.

This was the case the other day at my parent's house.

He was upstairs playing lego with his cousins, and all was peaceful - until it wasn't. Then, Jerome was downstairs, bawling and upset, and I knew it was time for me to take him aside, let him process his feelings with my support, and get to the bottom of what he was feeling.

As I do when I encounter these situations, especially when we are not at home, I took him to a place where we could be alone, in this case, the bathroom.

Janet Lansbury explains this as rolling out the red carpet for the tantrum.

At first, he was physically upset. Hitting, kicking, lashing out, so I held him on my lap, firmly but gently, saying to him, I will not let you hurt me, or yourself, or wreck the house. I will hold you until you are safe.

When I felt that this part of his anger had passed, I let him sit on the ground. He yelled, he cried, he said unkind things to me.

Mostly I was quiet, saying things like, that sounds like something you might say when you are really mad at me or, I am here for you, you are safe to get all the mad out of your body if I felt he needed me to.

I allowed him to take as long as he needed, and I saw those big emotions gradually leave his body. His reactions became less exaggerated, he started practicing breathing.

Finally, he sat in front of me, and at eye level, I said to him, you were so upset. Do you want to explain to me what happened so that I can help you?

With such deep emotion, he explained to me the disagreement he had been in with his cousin and how he had felt about it.

You guys, I honestly teared up.

I felt so connected to him, I was in a place of such empathy that I could feel this childish squabble from his perspective, and it felt so deep.

This kind of empathy does not come naturally to me. More than a breakthrough with Jerome, this moment was a breakthrough for me.

Being near my children while they tantrumed used to make me feel triggered. I would want to sequester them to their room until it had passed, scold them, make it end at all costs.

But now. . .

I embrace my child's emotions, negative or positive, and feel absolutely no responsibility for them as a parent. The emotions belong to my child and are not mine to control. My purpose is to support, to understand, and to create a safe space for them to feel their feelings.

It is not my job to stop the tantrum, it is not my job to take the emotions personally.

As a result, tantrums have become moments for connection with my children and a deepening of my understanding of them.

Why It Is Safe to Let these Overreactions Happen

I just wanted to share a quote from the Janet Lansbury post I tagged earlier. If you are interested in learning more about respectful parenting, she is a gold mine of advice.

Through these disagreements, they actually release other emotions, other stresses that they have, so it’s always positive. The bigger the overreaction, the more you can be sure they’re getting out of their system, and that’s a plus, because that means, like all of us, when we clear feelings, we feel better. Now we’re at our best again. Now we’re feeling happy, now we’re feeling comfortable, and if we can clear our feelings as a child, not only clear them, but have them be calmly accepted by our parents, that is one of the biggest gifts we can give children, because what we’re saying to them is, all these sides of you are okay with me. I accept all of you. I’m okay with you disagreeing. I’m okay with this side of you that’s not liking things that I do. It’s magic as parents if we can give that message. 

Most of us as children did not get that message, that it was okay to be angry, that it was okay to disagree with our parents and have strong feelings about that. So again, this is gold, this is magic, this is the good stuff. Take advantage of these moments.

This is why I know it is healthy for Jerome to go to a safe place with me and let those emotions out, to just explode as much as he needs.

I have noticed, time and again, that these little disagreements that turn into these huge tantrums are really just my child's vehicle for releasing other emotions, other built up stress and hurt. And always, afterward, I see a huge change, like something has lifted from my child. Like they have just cleared something ugly and are ready to get on with their day again.

So even though it might sound ugly to other people from the outside, even if it might seem like I have no control of my child or the situation, I am completely in charge of myself and am intentionally creating a safe place for my child.

It's countercultural, it's even counterintuitive, but I believe that parenting can be a radical act of social change, and it starts right there, on the bathroom floor.


Read more about respectful parenting and Montessori with this post on a step-by-step solution for dealing with tantrums | not leaving our toddlers hanging with no | positive parenting even with a naturally short temper | and why I don't believe in the terrible twos




Thank you for reading! If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me. I would also love to hear any suggestions for posts you would like me to write about. And if you are interested in following along in our daily adventures, follow us on Instagram where I post daily.

God bless,
Olivia Fischer