Good Inside with Dr. Becky - Let’s Talk Bullying With Dr. Sheryl Ziegler

Episode Date: October 21, 2025

Few things feel more triggering than hearing that your kid is being teased or left out. If your first instinct is to “fix” the situation - text the teacher, call a parent, march up to school - you’re not alone. But as Dr. Becky and Dr. Sheryl Ziegler explain, our own wounds can make us miss what our kids need most. This episode unpacks why bullying feels so personal - and how to reset before you react.Get the Good Inside App by Dr. Becky: https://bit.ly/4fSxbzkYour Good Inside membership might be eligible for HSA/FSA reimbursement! To learn more about how to get your membership reimbursed, check out the link here: https://www.goodinside.com/fsa-hsa-eligibility/Follow Dr. Becky on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drbeckyatgoodinsideSign up for our weekly email, Good Insider: https://www.goodinside.com/newsletterFor a full transcript of the episode, go to goodinside.com/podcast.Thank you to our sponsor Mommy’s Bliss. Find Mommy’s Bliss in-store and online at major retailers. Your future self will thank you.Thank you to our sponsor Skylight. Head to Skylight.com/BECKY for $30 off their 15-inch calendars. This offer expires December 31st of this year.Thank you to our sponsor Hot Wheels. Check out our full series with Hot Wheels at hotwheels.com/challengeaccepted.Thank you to our sponsor Zelle. When it counts, send money with Zelle.At Good Inside, we’re shifting the narrative - away from instinct and toward education - because parenting isn’t something that just comes naturally. And the first step to real, cycle-breaking change? Understanding yourself—and the patterns you fall into.I’ve said it before: every parent has a pattern. But have you ever stopped to ask… what’s yours? Take the free quiz at **goodinside.com/better** to discover your parenting pattern.Good Inside Members! I wanted to let you know that Sheryl will be LIVE in the good inside community on Monday, Nov 3rd. RSVP now to save your spot. Not yet a Good Inside member? Learn more at goodinside.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Bullying. I mean this. Just saying that word makes my whole stomach drop and it also makes me have this entire replay of my childhood in every single situation when I felt left out and just didn't have that connected belonging feeling I was looking for. And at the same time, we know feeling left out is a part of childhood. So what do we do when our kids left out? What do we do when our kid has other kids who are mean to them. And is there a difference between kids that are mean, feeling left out, and bullying? And do we do different things in different scenarios? This is such an important conversation. And I am so excited to have Dr. Cheryl Ziegler back on the podcast to explore all of these issues together. I'm Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside. We'll be back

right after this. So I want to talk about bullying. This is a hot topic. I get asked about it all the time. I know you do too. And there's so many different areas around it I want to explore. But maybe we could just riff a little. When you hear the word bullying, let's go like scenario, scenario.

What kind of situations come to mind that are kind of under that umbrella? What do you hear about? Well, when someone asked me about it, the first. first thing I ask is let's figure out if this is bullying or mean kid behavior. Because that's a big difference. And I think kids overuse the word bullying too. Yes. And to me, the word bullying is so serious that I want to make sure we're on the same page. So what I'm looking for is, is it repetitive? Was it one time somebody was mean to you? Are they doing this often? The big thing is, is that are they doing the mean thing because they want to feel powerful over you? They want to have power over you. They want to

make you feel smaller. They want to be dominant over you. And is it intentional? Do you know for sure that they're doing this on purpose? Or did you not get invited to the sleepover because, you know, you're not that close. And they didn't think of you that way. Or they only had two or three people over. So that's the first place I start is I really want to make sure we know what we're talking about because it's kind of two different paths. Okay. So then maybe we'd do this. We're going to start with a little game. I'm going to name scenarios and you're going to have incomplete information. So I know we both like nuance but let's just play around and give me your instinct like I think this is mean kid behavior or this is bullying yeah let's do it okay um my kid comes home and just said oh

they said I couldn't play four square with them today mean mean okay um someone was saying I'm a loser on the group chat I'd have to ask some follow-up questions how often right I'd have to know how often. One time? One time. Mean. Okay. Um, they don't want me to play soccer because I'm really not very good at soccer and an intense game of soccer. Mean. Hmm. This one kid tends to pick me out every day at recess and tell me that I have no friends. Probably bullying or borderlining on bullying. And why? Because you said every day and intentionality picks me out. Right. So in the third aspect I would follow up on is like, why do you think you? Why you? Right? And that would be like the third piece that I'd need to know. Interesting. So and I do think I'm hearing what you're saying

and I'll have parents come and say something to me like my kid is being bullied. And the reason I think the label matters is if the label. And I probably say this is true of any label. If a label activates us and makes us as a parent kind of lose touch with a grounded, wise mind, that sturdy leader we all have, it's probably not that useful. Because whether your kid is having mean kid behavior or is being bullied, they probably need something from you. Right? And so I think that's really important, which is, you know, noticing what comes up for you as a parent when your kid tells you I was left out on one end of the spectrum one time or, oh, a kid is targeting me every day at recess on the other end of the spectrum. I actually think that's a really important

starting point. So curious what you see talking to parents. We're going to get to the kid stuff, but what tends to come up for parents when they hear or see evidence of either their kid being left out, their kid having mean kid behavior, or their kid being kind of repeatedly targeted. Old wounds. They more. This is one of those things that it doesn't matter where you grew up, how long ago that was, whatever your experience was. Most of us have stories from our childhood that they stay with us. We never forget.

One time somebody said, you know, you have chicken legs. never forget it 30 years later you don't forget somebody said you know your hair is stupid you don't forget it you don't forget even the mean things right and then we also though have I mean some numbers are like one in three people reporting feeling bullied so that means you have a lot of parents walking around the world probably this was not addressed it could have been physical and verbal and they just kind of had to deal with it. If you watch movies, old movies, the kid being bullied is almost a right of passage in childhood, especially for boys. Although interestingly today, boys and girls are equally bullied. But in the past, we have, right, we have movie after

movie where sort of the school yard, bus stop, boys getting physically beat up. And it's a right of passage. It's kind of like get home, dust it off. Parents weren't very concerned. They said clean up and comes it down for dinner. Yeah. And I think that was reflective of the times. So then therefore, it's reflective of the stories we come into parenting with. And one thing I want to double click on there that's really interesting is I think about parents I've worked with when they come to me around is my kid being bullied, my kids being

really left out and some of the deeper themes we explore. And it really is so often one of the things you're describing where we do end up getting into these kids picked on me on the bus. I wasn't, even though I was in fifth grade and the fifth graders sit in the back of the bus, the fifth graders in the back of the bus always made me sit in the front of the bus and I'd come home and it was always like, who cares, moving on. And one of these things I think that can happen is, at anyone listening right now, if you think back on your childhood and you think about some version of I wasn't allowed to sit in the back of the bus or these kids were mean to me, that pain is so real, right? whether it's mean kid behavior or bullying just for right now, that pain is so real and so intense, especially in a time of your life when peers means so much.

And if you grew up in a family, that kind of pooh-pooted or it's just like this is a rite of passage, I think something important to know is when you hear about your kid struggling with mean kid behavior, you might be triggered to react to your kid and almost kind of solve the problem so rapidly and quickly, maybe even in a more intense way than your kid felt it, in part because to some degree we're saying to our past, like I am also defending the fifth grader who wasn't allowed to sit in

the back of the bus and nobody heard me out and nobody believed me. And I think those old wounds and triggers, where I know for me with my kids, there's been moments of is this about my son? Is this about my daughter? Is this something about what happened to me in fourth grade when my friends weren't nice to me in this situation? And how much of what my kid needs am I able to see versus how much is that colored by something that almost has nothing to do with my kids?

Absolutely. I mean, I sit across from people who will tell the story. And sometimes they do have that insight. And they'll say, I have to tell you, I'm more fired up than ever about this particular story, you know, or this kid that continues to just harass my kid. And they'll get tears in their eyes. And I don't get tears in my eyes that often, but this one gets me too. Because to see the adult, right, the 35-year-old mom, the 40-year-old dad. And I will tell you, dads get to tears just as quickly and see tears in their eyes.

And I'm like, I know right now in this moment, you are literally. 10 years old. Yes. You are 10 years old and now you feel bigger, stronger, more confident and you want to come in and defend your kid. We want to protect them from that pain that we felt that was unprocessed. The pain that was unprocessed and maybe was invalidated and ignored, right? And I think one of the things I see all the time is, right, there's a lot between invalidation and minimization on one end of the spectrum and kind of rushing to fix everything on the other end of the spectrum. Of course, there's moments with peer bullying where you've got to call the school. You've got to intervene.

That is definitely needed. But definitely in some of these more nuanced mean kid moments, there might be something more in the moment, more in the middle that your kid needs, that if we're not aware of how that stuff was processed for ourselves, we might not be able to get to that middle ground because, again, we're kind of responding to what we felt we needed, not to the situation our kids describing. Yes. And then throw on top of it that bullying peaks in middle school. So now you've got a 12, 13, 14-year-old that is individuating from you.

Yeah. Right? So first of all, is it safe to tell you this? What are you going to do if I tell you this thing? Second of all, is it okay for you to get involved? Aren't I like a big boy, a big girl now? I'm supposed to do this on my own. Why do I need you?

And do you even know what you're talking about? Right? And so it's actually peaking at a time where the kid is like, wait, I'm actually stepping away from you. You don't even know my friends anymore. Maybe when I was in second grade, when someone was mean to me, you called their mom. Right. We might not even know who their mom is at this point. You don't know who their parent is.

So true. Again, you don't know all their teachers. If they go, they transition to a middle school. You don't know their world, really. Yeah. I had a mom just say to me the other day, I don't even know what the cafeteria looks like in my kid's school because he's a sixth grader. Yeah. She's never been in it.

So these things are happening, peaking actually, during a time where they are separating from you and like you said, caring so much more about what their friends think. And so what do they do? Do they go to you? And then as the parent, how do you manage that? When do you take the break as a parent to say, hold on? Is this about me? What's my unresolved stuff? Yep.

And so I think when parents do take the time, though, to do that, they feel emotions. They haven't felt in so long. They were living in there. They just didn't feel them. Yeah. They bring them to that consciousness. And it can be really emotionally overwhelming. Yeah.

Okay. Okay. So let's look at this whole arc. First of all, there's a situation where your kid comes home and tells you, this is what someone said to me on the bus. No one played with me. This person's repeatedly targeting me. We can go through those. But what I want to start with first is how might you notice some of the stuff is going on in ways that aren't so obvious?

Because not every kid, especially those ages, is so verbally direct. Oh, yeah. I think some things, I mean, it's kind of by age, but I'll try to make it like middle-ish, like tween type of behavior. right because younger kids are more likely to say so-and-so didn't sit with me today so-and-so said I wasn't allowed to playgroundies like the younger kids are more likely and they don't know that they're reporting something they're just telling you but once they start to become a little bit more aware of social dynamics you're going to look for things like the lunch comes back it wasn't even touched like full lunch like buddy what's going on you you didn't even touch your lunch today

right there's a lot of reasons why that happens they are saying they have a stunt stomach ache in the morning. They don't want to go to school. Such a and just a double click on that. What might that be a kid's body's way of saying? Yeah. It's that fight, flight, or freeze. Like I, it's scary there. It feels dangerous to me there. So I want to, I want to flee from that. Yeah. I don't want to go there. And then it manifests in your stomach or your headache. And I know it's so easy to get into a cycle, like, you're fine. Like, oh, come on. You have a stomach ache again and it almost can feel when we're in like the rushing mindset of like I've just got to get my kid out of the house and I've so much to do it can feel like your kid is trying

to trick you or play you and I think this is so important feelings live in our body and there's a lot of adults who when they're really nervous about going to a dentist they don't say it to their partner I'm feeling a little hesitant I really no they end up saying oh I had a lot of traffic I missed it right? They end up acting it out at work, right? Our body can act things out. So noticing your kids kind of relatively chronic stomach aches before school, it's just so powerful for parents to know that could be my kids a way of communicating their feelings. That's not them lying to me. Yes. And I am with you, I think it's so hard for parents that are like, they'll call and they'll be like, this is three mornings in a row now. They were fine the night before.

And all of a sudden they wake up, they've got this stomach ache conveniently five minutes before we're supposed to be heading out of the house. Right. So they're angry. Now they're triggered. They're activated. And like you said, like we as adults wake up with a plan and a routine, right? We do this at 705. We're out the door at 715, whatever.

So I really want to emphasize, though, that when we look at bullying, as is defined by bullying, one of the top two unintended consequences, are poor academic functioning, increased absenteeism. So when I say that, you're going to look for your kids' grades are going down. They don't want to do their homework. They don't care anymore about studying. And they're going to start missing more school. And so if we think about the place of school as being a place that no longer feels safe, you think about it from that perspective.

It makes sense that a kid would want to avoid engaging in that place or being at that place. And I think when you think about it that way, it's less likely to feel like in a front or like a trick. And if you think, okay, well, if there was a place I was supposed to go to every day and I actually didn't feel safe there, I would also come up with a lot of reasons to avoid it because I felt like I was just trying to protect myself. Right. And I think when we see it that way, we soften like, oh, okay. Now I can I turn to a different conversation with my kid. Absolutely. And think about it even to add on to what you said, I don't feel safe there, but the people that are supposed to be in charge of, loving me and keeping me safe. My parents are telling me it's okay. I have to go there. And you have to go. That's right. The other thing I just want to double click on because I was talking about this the other day and I think it resonated when you're saying we have a plan. I got to get out the door.

I call that efficiency mode. Like when I'm an efficiency mode, which by the way, can be rewarded in a lot of places in life. Anything my kid does that's kind of off script, I just see as inefficient, right? And so any of us can miss signals in that mode. When you shift a little to like relationship or connection mode, your kid saying my stomach hurts every morning becomes kind of a way you can peek your curiosity. Like, oh, I wonder what that's trying to tell me. Oh, I wonder what's going on. Can I be curious about that? And then we're probably more likely to hear a longer story. Yeah, you know, as you were saying that, I was, like, getting into my mind around who are the parents that actually do tolerate that pretty well? And you know who it is?

It's the parents who go, I remember going through a stage. I had a stomachache every day. I remember going through a stage where I didn't go to school for, like, a whole week. So important. If you can relate to it as a parent, you see it more easily sometimes or a lot of times in your kids, not all the time. But when it comes to this particular issue, there's something like a bell goes off, maybe not day one, but day three, day four, where you go, oh, or if you talk to your parents, if they're still alive and you still have a relationship and you say, oh, my gosh, you know,

Ava, she's had a headache or a stomachache every morning. And sometimes it's a grandparent who says, oh, honey, you went through that too. Do you remember those girls, they were being so mean to you at the bus stop and eventually we figured out. And then the bell goes off and then sometimes parents feel guilty. And we don't need to feel guilty. It's data. It's information. Yes. And it helps us to drop in. So if you, if you have that experience, you're probably likely to resonate. If you don't have that experience, you're right. In efficiency mode, how do we tolerate when your kid's like, I can't do it? And they might just flop on the ground. Yeah. Like they're not going. Yes. And I want to actually give anyone listening a

moment to just pause. Like really thinking back decades ago to days that you didn't want to go to school to a lunchroom you didn't want to go to because maybe you didn't have a place to sit or the group you had to walk by tend to kind of make some snarky comment. It's so easy, I think, as we get older, to think like that wasn't that big of a deal. When you're in that moment, it is the biggest deal. And I actually think our own memories convince us of that. And so just allowing yourself to time travel and remember the stomach aches you had before school or the lunchroom you avoided or the recess where your heart was racing and you were kind of counting down the minutes the bus stop and the bus ride bus stop and the bus ride yeah um

you know our kids world might be much more digitized than ours was but the feelings are kind of remarkably consistent right and like what we We just said like those places are still places today. And there's also online. Yes. Right. There's just more of them. There's more of them.

And sometimes the online part is the part that you're like, I can't escape it. But mom, you don't understand. They're saying these terrible things in this group chat about me. They passed around this picture on Snapchat of me or they put together, you know, some AI, deep fake of me. And it's going around and I can't escape it at school. and I can't escape it at home. You know, it makes me think that experiences of bullying or mean kid behavior, either way,

none of it is new in 2025, but the way it has a megaphone now is completely new. That's what it is. It's like your worst, most embarrassing, ashamed, alone moment that did happen when you, quote, weren't allowed to sit in the back of the bus, now is passed around online

for a million people, even out. outside of your school to see, I mean, the megaphone impact of that, it would be like somebody getting on a speaker when you were left out and telling the whole world that this was happening to on the bus. I mean, it's, it really is so visceral when you think about it that way. It really is. And it's, it's the fastest growing place where this kind of bullying and, you know, intimidation is kind of happening. And what happens is these kids used to be able to come home And like, again, for some reason, I picture, yeah, like, I picture this old movie, right, where the kids running away from the bullies. And then he gets in the house and he slams the door.

And it's like, and maybe mom or dad, who were in the living room or kitchen, not knowing was even somewhat of a relief. Like, oh, hi, honey, how was your day? Oh, it was good. And they just, and they could turn it off or press pause for like 12 hours. And now they absolutely can't. So interesting. where even if you had a parent who knew about it and invalidated it,

it wasn't happening live at the same time digitally. It was kind of over. The invalidation definitely didn't feel good. But it wasn't happening in parallel with the activation of your body in real time. It's like this forever bullying, being left out script that's happening now. That's right.

And I want to like, I want to bring this back, let's let's yeah we'll take it to the mean kid part okay okay so now you've got some mean kid stuff and online and this is what I want parents to understand I remember it was a couple years ago I did this I did a segment called like group chats are the new like mean kids circles to hang out in so I want them to understand that let's say there's a night and nobody's saying anything mean to you or you or nothing's happening on a group chat what that actually means is you've probably being kicked out and so I want parents to understand that being in there is so repetitively demoralizing you know it's just it's an awful feeling but being kicked out is almost as bad or worse

because now I don't even know what is being said and what's being planned and now I'm out yeah like and I don't know who my friends are I don't know who to trust is it like not no longer having a seat at the table at the lunch table right just like you someone takes their butt and slides you right off that little bench that you used to sit on, and it's like, there's no room for you. Yeah. And you have to be way across the room, and you don't know what we're talking about. And we're laughing and we're whispering. We're doing all sorts of things.

And I think that's right, where if you think about it as a lunch table, you might not even love being at the table. You might not find the conversation terribly enticing, but I think we all know what happens when you're in a corner looking at the lunch table you were previously invited to sit at and watching them all talk to each other. And just again, how painful and real that is. But now it's digital and you're just completely alone in the dark. Completely.

With what it feels like no one in your corner. Right. And to your point, the seat at the table, right? The seat at the metaphorical or literal table, it's like for a kid who's like, let's say in sixth grade, they're 12 years old, well, at least I got a seat. And to the outside world, like I've got 10 kids I'm sitting with. and I'm eating, even if I don't say one word, but I'm monitoring what they're talking about.

I know that they're being mean or they're not being mean or they're talking about what they did over the weekend. And so you're at least one toe in, which for lots of kids feel so much better than you're out. You're out. So a couple things this makes me think about. practically. I think it's so easy to hear this. And we all think as parents, like, how do I protect my kids from these situations? Right. And there's definitely things we can do over time that just help our kids build confidence, which in some ways is the most important thing to withstand tricky peer moments. But I think one of the things also that's realistic, I'm curious if you

agree, is we can't fully protect our kids from experience. Like, they're going to happen. It's like turbulence on a plane. Like, you're never going to have a turbulence free kind of flight. Right. Right. And I think some, I think this is where I see a lot of deviation in how parents view it. Some are like, hey, you know, this is part of growing up. I went through it. They're going to go through it. And so there's that. And then there's some who are like, no, I need to protect my kid. They're sensitive or they can't handle this the way maybe other kids can. And like you said, then there's gray in the middle. So we also are parenting a generation of kids pretty differently around this issue. And I think that is problematic because everything from the definition to when to get school involved, when not to, when to be involved, it really varies so much. And I guess my perspective on that is very similar to other extremes I see. I personally don't find either extreme helpful. Look, my kid's going to go through this. I went through this. I'm fine. I don't think that's helpful because the truth is we probably needed something different than what we received in those moments. and again, because these moments have a megaphone now and the way they didn't, our kids have more needs. But the other end of the spectrum also doesn't feel that helpful.

We can't fully protect our kids from these things. The best thing I think we can do is something in the middle, which is how can I establish myself as a parent who's going to know about these things, who can be supportive to my kid, who can really be a coach and a teammate to help my kid through these situations? And so I guess one of my questions to you is, are there things we do proactively? as a parent. Forget just in the moment of mean kid behavior or bullying that help us establish ourselves as the kind of parent our kid would come to in these situations. I do. I think, I think one of the things that a parent can do proactively is to think to yourself, take 10 minutes out of your day. What was middle school like for me? Who were my friends? Who was nice to me? Who was mean to me? Who was a special person in my life, how did I deal with things? Because, and I want you to, and I'm

specifically saying think of middle school, because some of these things we're talking about are starting in third grade. So no matter how old your kid is, I still want you, because probably I know when I think back to third grade, I can think of times, I'm sure my feelings were hurt, but the big stuff wasn't happening then. So I think, think back to that moment. And I've done this myself, which has been a really interesting process. And what was I going through? What was I thinking and feeling? What were my insecurities? All those things. And then approach your kid, right, in a way that just says, you know, I'm just, I'm here for you. There's some things that haven't changed probably since, you know, I was kind of your age. And yes, I know we say, oh,

kids don't want to hear that. But they actually do. Yeah. They want to know that we can relate. They do. And it just, it's making me think that saying to your kids for salt, the starter sentence, I have to tell you about something I was randomly thinking about. I want to tell you something that just came up in my mind, just qualified. It's so random. So your kid knows. I'm just pontificating. I want to tell you something I was randomly thinking about. There were so many times when I was probably right about in your age that I felt so left out. Like, and those moments were so painful and so. hard and just putting out there, if any thing like that has ever happened to you or does, you could totally talk to me about it. And just, I want to hear your response, but the first thing I want to say to qualify is if I say something like that to my own kid, I just want everyone to know, my kid will never say back to me in the moment. I really needed to hear that. Thank you for laying the foundation for open communication. No, my kid will roll their eyes and be like, you're so weird and like can you just get me pretzels this conversation is over cringe okay but we take

our kids reaction so literally i'm never put off by eye rolling i don't know if i've said this to you but i think eye rolling is a kid's version of compromise that rolling their eyes is a way of saying i actually think what you're saying is important but on my own person i'm not going to fully take it in i have to roll my eyes to kind of push it out and when you turn it turn around i'm gonna take it in but i'm not going to let you know. So every time I get an eye roll, it's funny. Patrick, how do you put up with that? I'm like, no, that is like a huge win in my book. I agree with you. An eye roll is like a concession. 100% of compromise. All right. So I'll hear what you have to say. I'm not going to tell you that it's anything meaningful to me. Right. But it is. But do you think that would be helpful just

put out there every once in a while? Totally. When you said that it reminds me of like there's a term that we learn when we're learning how to counsel people, right? Therapeutic gossip. Remember that? So it's like, that's how I think of it. I think of like myself. I can picture myself in the kitchen and I just say things out loud. Therapeutic gossip means you're like talking out loud. Like, oh my gosh, I remember or this memory just popped up for me. So good.

Pick it up if you want. Totally. Leave it if you want. And the chances are our kids going to pick it up. Okay. A couple other questions because, look, mean kid behavior, bullying. Let's just go over kind of each situation. I want to get some feedback from you.

So my kid comes home and they, say nobody played with me at recess and I tried to play with these kids at soccer but they said this is a serious soccer game you're not good what do you feel like a kid needs from a parent in that moment i mean right then they're just dropping into empathy validation like oh buddy i'm so sorry that happened that must be really really hard sitting there at recess they're not letting you play sorry that happened and then pause i want to i want to emphasize that because it's similar to something I would say like there's a less is more and I think as a parent we think it's not enough do I have to do I have okay I'm asking you do I have to call the school what do you

think no no no right do I have to call all the parents nope of the kids nope and I think it's really helpful for people to hear that because we're all kind of just looking to feel like good parents and if we feel like we're not reaching the standard we're all going to do more right but it is kind of. If I went home to my husband and I was like, oh, I had this really bad day and this meeting was bad. And honestly, these other people presented their work and it was really good and mine just wasn't. And if my husband's first reaction was like, well, I'm going to call those people. And I'm like, whoa, like, where are you going? I'm just trying to share my experience with you. And it takes you out of your experience too. Like even the way you were just role playing it, you're down,

like, oh, and then her presentation is better. And the second someone comes in to fix it, now you're going to start defending. Now all of a sudden you're going to start defending. No, no, no, no. I mean, it's not that big of a deal. Exactly. I'm just telling you. Exactly. Right.

So never go there. Even if inside, though, you're like, again, everything lives in our body. So you can feel your heart palpitating. Yes. I feel my heart like breaking sort of. Sometimes my kids tell me things. And it's acting. I act.

Calm, engaged, present. I stop what I'm doing. Right? I'm going to reflect back what they said. I'm going to validate it. And then, like, in the case of like, okay, so. tomorrow's there's going to be recess again. Whether it's right now, right, because I said pause, you have to pause. I always tell parents we overtalk when we're nervous, right? So just pause,

see what they say. And then at some point, whether it's then or two hours or at bedtime, you say, so you have recess again tomorrow, huh? Yeah. I wonder if you've thought about like, what are you going to do? Yeah. Love that. Right? So I'm getting to a plan, but I'm going to ask them, have you thought of a plan? Is there someone else? But I'm not going to come in with 50 questions and I'm not going to come in with my game plan. Yep. I bet you've been thinking about it. Or I wonder if you've been thinking about what you'll do tomorrow.

I love that. And I love just the concrete guidance. Separate those conversations a little bit. Mm-hmm. Right? Like drop down. I always picture my kid when they're telling me something hard. I try to picture them saying to me, I'm just looking for you to understand this.

They never say that to be clear. they just tell me the story. But if you imagine your kid telling you a story and then as soon as they're done saying, I just want you to understand. And then you respond. I know for me it helps me embody the idea of less is more. And then wait. And then maybe at night, hey, I wonder if you thought about it, a little more strategic.

But I know for me as an adult too, someone separating those two things makes me feel so much more secure. Absolutely. And then when we get to be adults and we get to press. practice this a ton. I know for me, sometimes I'll say to either my husband or a friend, I'll say, I'm going to tell you something that happened today. I don't want you to give me advice or don't want you to jump in and start defending me. That's especially for my husband. Right. I just want to tell you this. Yep. And I just want you to sit here with me with it. Yeah. Right. That's pretty advanced, though. Totally. And so I'm even saying that right now just so that

if you're listening and you're a husband, your partner, your spouse, and you're like, oh yeah, that's me. I'm the fixer. Or I'm the mama bear. Yep. Right? There's times where being the mama bear or the fixer is just not welcome. A hundred percent. We're needed. So now quickly, let's just cover the other one fast. My kid comes and says, you know, I've, like this kid's always picking me at recess. You know, it's kind of repeated. It's targeted. What do you feel like a kid needs in that situation, at least as a start? So I think you still start off with that validation and all and, you know, that space and time and empathy for sure. And you say, this is a. safety issue, and I love you enough to be brave to know that we have to do something about it. Yep. And then pause because they're going to say no. Yep.

No, no, no, no. Don't call the schools. You're only going to make it worse. And honestly, a lot of times the way adults handle it can make it worse. So you say, so if you're listening right now and you're like, well, how do I know if it's going to make it worse or not? Even if they're just giving you that look, you can say, I know that you're probably really scared right now.

You're wondering how this is going to affect things at school. what's going to happen to the group. I get it. Let's do this together. I promise I won't make a call or I won't send an email or anything without talking about it with you. We're going to do this together. But this is now a safety issue and it's my job to keep you safe. I love that. And then we could throw a menu of options. Let's start with something. Let's see how that goes. We'll check in. We're on the same team. There's going to be action because it's a safety issue. But that doesn't mean it has to be done totally with my kid on the side. We could include them in it. I think so. I think I always like to say what they know is a lot less scary than what they don't know.

Yes. Oh my God. I just told you that I'm like being bullied at school and now I think you're going to go crazy. You're going to show up at school. Yep. That's really scary for a kid. Yes. Really scary.

All right. Your kid comes home and says they were left out at recess. Let's roll. how a conversation could go between you and your kid. I'm going to be the kid, and Dr. Cheryl's going to be the parent. I had the worst recess today. Oh, no. What happened? Well, I wanted to play basketball.

I went up to the group playing basketball. They were just like, you can't play with us. You're short. Oh, I'm so sorry, buddy. I must have been so hurtful. It was. Okay, pause. I know what you might be thinking. Okay, and then what?

Do I call the parent? do I come up with a solution for my kid if they want to play basketball tomorrow? Actually, no. Just pause at this moment, your kid might ask for a snack or walk away. The most important thing to do is what you've already done. Just essentially say you're able to hear it. You validate. This was hard.

And from there, just let your kid take the lead. They might not need anything more than that. Hope that was helpful. And honestly, whenever anyone, learning kind of a new language, seeing it acted out in a roleplay is something that always helps things crystallize. If you're a good inside member, please check out the other two role plays I'm going to drop right into membership. One is about when your kid is hanging out with a kid that is a bad influence, but they just won't stop hanging out with them. And the second

one is what happens when you get a call that your kid was mean to another kid and how to handle that conversation. All right, let's end the way we always do. Place your feet on the ground and a hand on your heart. And let's remind ourselves, even as we struggle on the outside, we remain good inside. I'll see you soon.