Good Inside with Dr. Becky - What Can I Do to Stop My Kid’s Aggressive Behavior?

Episode Date: May 25, 2021

When our child is kicking or biting someone, our first thought is probably, "How do I protect the other person?!" But here's something to consider: We also need to protect our child from associating their bad behavior with being a bad kid. In this episode, Dr. Becky advises three parents on how to respond to aggressive behavior while keeping everyone safe. She walks through distancing "the urge" from "the action," emotionally vaccinating kids for frustrating moments, and enforcing boundaries instead of punishments. In every situation, she gently reminds each caller that they're a good parent with a good kid. Join Good Inside Membership: https://bit.ly/3cqgG2A Follow Dr. Becky on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drbeckyatgoodinside Sign up for our weekly email, Good Insider: https://www.goodinside.com/newsletter Order Dr. Becky's book, Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be, at goodinside.com/book or wherever you order your books. For a full transcript of the episode, go to goodinside.com/podcast

You're listening to Good Inside with Dr. Becky. I have so many ideas, strategies, and scripts to share with you right after a word from our sponsor. Hey, Sabrina. Hey. So, I've been thinking about toys recently. I don't want the toy to do that much of the work. I want the toy to inspire my kid to do the work.

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everyone listening to this podcast, 20% off. Visit MelissaAndUg.com and use code Dr. Becky20DRBECKY20 for 20% off your order. Melissa and Doug, timeless toys, endless possibilities. Hi, I'm Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside. I'm a clinical psychologist and mom of three on a mission to rethink the way we raise our children. I love translating deep thoughts about parenting into practical, actionable strategies that you can

use in your home right away. One of my core beliefs is that we are all doing the best we can. With the resources we have available to us in that moment. So even as we struggle and even as we are having a hard time on the outside, we remain good inside. Today we're going to be talking about managing really difficult Today, we're going to be talking about managing really difficult behaviors and situations, a child biting, kicking, hitting, throwing. Before we jump in and go into a ton of actionable ideas and strategies, I want us to consider something together. When we have a child who's engaging in these dysregulated behaviors,

we often think about the kids kids there doing these things too. So maybe it's my older son who is kicking his younger brother. Maybe it's my older daughter who's pinching or hitting her younger sister. And I think we often think of this question, how do I protect my child who's being kicked and who's being hit? Now, I think that's a really important question to consider.

Of course, those kids need protection. But here's something else. How do I protect my child who's doing the hitting? How do I protect my child who's engaging in these behaviors? No kid likes to kick or hit or feel so out of control and then witness their body act so out of control. It feels awful. And one of the things we also need to consider

is how do we protect our kids from feeling like bad kids? How do we help those kids regain the feeling of being good inside? With that in mind, let's jump in and hear from our first caller. Hi Dr. Becky, thank you for your service and thank you for setting up this podcast and very excited about it. I wanted to share a struggle that I've been having for a super long time. I'm a single mother of two and a half year old twin boys and I would say for at least a year and a half almost the majority of their lives they have been engaging in biting each other. They primarily take turns so it's like a phase that one of them will go in for a few weeks

by being the other one, and then when one is done, the other one will then use that as a means of aggression. And I have tried all sorts of different methods, including redirecting, explaining to them that we don't bite, biting as for food, smothering the victim with a lot of attention, tried blocking. It's just impossible for me to be next to them 24-7 and constantly prevent it, and it's really heartbreaking. So I'm looking for advice with respect to that, because although they do like also occasionally hit each other and take away toys and that sort of stuff, that sort of stuff just seems like it's just not

you know just more typical and it's easier to deal with. The biting is really painful and is really ongoing. Thank you very much. Stephanie thank you so much for calling in and sharing the story with us. I want to start with this important truth. Nothing is wrong with you and nothing is wrong with your kids. I know that's not something you explicitly said or asked, but I think so many of us go there right away when we see something that feels really upsetting with our kids.

And we always need to ground ourselves in our goodness when we see our kids spiral or do something far from ideal. The other thing I think we need to ground ourselves in is the moment versus our fear. When we see a behavior in our kid that's particularly aggressive or boundary violating, I think many of us project down the road and we think something like, oh no, I can't have my kid who's a bite or I can't have my kid

be the kid who bites other kids when they go to preschool, when they go to kindergarten, when they go to fifth grade, I can't have my kid be the kid who fill in the blank. I think a really important skill to develop is just saying, oh, doing that future thing, come back to the moment and remind yourself this. Nothing is wrong with me.

Nothing is wrong with my child. I can cope with this. Let's talk in more detail about biting. I want you, Stephanie, to kind of place your hands out in front of you with some space in between them. I want you to think of one hand as the urge to bite. And the other hand as the act of biting, biting, hitting, throwing, what's so important about these seemingly impulsive behaviors is to separate urge from action. So you have your hands separate.

Now bring them together, almost like they're clapping. This is what happens when your kid's bite. There is no space between the urge and the action. Now what's really important is this framework. The problem isn't the urge to bite. The problem is the lack of space between the urge and the action and we end up changing behavior, not by changing the urge, but by inserting more time and space between the urge to bite and the actual biting. And so this is where some interventions are going to be aimed. So where would I start? I'd probably talk to each of my kids separately.

I'd say something like this. Ooh, when something happens, you don't wanna happen. Do you ever bite? Hmm, why would I kind of use that whisper voice? Whispering feels kind of sacred, it feels really special. And when we're talking to our kid about something that is kind of encoded in some shame or kind of quote badness,

we wanna really establish that we're connected with them and that we want to enter their inner world with them. And there's something about a whisper voice that accomplishes that. Then I'd keep going and I'd say this, sometimes when I'm mad or when I'm upset, I have so much energy in my mouth and I want to get it out.

I feel like that sometimes. So what am I doing there? energy in my mouth and I want to get it out. I feel like that sometimes. So what am I doing there? I'm making my kid feel less alone and I'm also giving a little nuance to the idea of biting, which is seen as just such an awful behavior. A child who bites has energy in their mouth, their angry energy is kind of exploding

out of their body there. And most of us want to get out our energy. And so that's what a bite is. Now what's really important in what this language is building is even that idea, the energy is building in your mouth speaks to an urge that's separate from the action. What I'm not doing to my child is this, we don't bite in this family. Where did you get that idea?

Right? We don't want to shame a behavior. Shame is sticky. When you add a shame, you make a child more stuck in the behavior that you are seemingly wanting to help them shift out of. Now, after I kind of joined my child and started to de-same, the next day, I would want to practice, have some type of role play.

It might look like this. Build a block tower with your child, right? And let's say yours falls. I would say this, or you're gonna make it all. Oh, my block tower fell down. Oh, those feelings are coming. They're coming into my mouth. I kind of want to get it out, get it out, get it out.

I feel like my teeth want to bite, bite, bite. And then I would have a chew necklace or a pillow or something else in my mouth. And I'd actually model moving away from the situation, moving away from my child, turning through that object and having it in my mouth. I am modeling awareness of an urge, and then I am modeling moving away, instead of moving toward, and discharging that urge in a way that's not harmful to someone else.

Then I'd reverse roles. Ooh, that was really helpful. Ooh, do you wanna try? I'm gonna knock down your tower. I know we're saying we're gonna do it. I'm gonna knock down and you might feel mad and here's your tune necklace. And I would teach my child to take a deep breath.

Ooh, I have that feeling, and I would teach my child to take a deep breath. Ooh, I have that feeling. And I would teach him literally to move back. The moving back is key in space and turning to the necklace. And then I'd give my high five. Wow, how awesome. We're gonna keep practicing this. We're gonna keep practicing this. So we have other things we can do

when all that energy builds up. Stephanie, I have one more thought. So what about when the biting actually happens, right? So great, I'm doing all this, but the biting happens. I'm a realist. These things don't change overnight. When it happens, you want to put up a boundary, remove your child from the situation, and affirm that your child is a good kid who's still working on this new skill. So what might that sound like? I'd pull my child away and I'd say this,

I will not let you bite. My tone is purposely firm, not scary firm, sturdy, showing my child that even when he is out of control, I can be a container to help keep him safe. Then I'd pull him away from his brother and I'd say something like this. I know we're still really working on the other things we can do to bite a necklace instead of a person.

Here's that necklaceless practice now. I would probably also look at my other child and say, Ouch, that really hurt. I know we're really working on not doing that in our family. What am I doing? I'm acknowledging the experience of both kids without casting either child into the bad kid role. Kids have to feel good inside to make changes and so we need to remind them that we see that goodness and their ability to work on things even when they struggle. Let's hear next from Kristen who has a question about her eight-year-old son.

Hi, my name is Kristen. I live in Los Angeles. I have two kids, son age eight and a daughter age six. And my question or my comment, I guess. No, it's a really a question. My question is around time when we're going to either a play date or a park meetup or something where we're going to be meeting up with friends, I know that my son sometimes struggles with impulse control and often lashes out if he is feeling bullied or if another kid is wanting to do something

that he doesn't want to do. For example, what can I do to prepare him or to talk to him about what we expect other than just saying expect not to hit or have you not to hit other kids? Just kind of what's the language around that when we're on our way to the predate, just to prepare him for the best situation. Thank you. Kristen, thank you so much for calling in with this. And one of the things I love about how you're thinking is that you're aware that it's the before the difficult moments, that that's where we have kind of our bang for our buck. We can't do anything amazing in the moment our kid hits. It's actually how we kind kind of our bang for our buck. We can't do anything amazing in the moment our kids hit. It's actually how we kind of prepare our kids for that moment.

And I want to focus on that word, prepare. I think a lot about the term emotional vaccination, which really means preparing our kids for the feelings. They're going to have in difficult situations. I think often when we know our kids might struggle, let's say, I know my kid might hit, or my kid tends to push other kids on the slide in the playground, we tell our kids what to do.

We say when you go to the slide, keep your hands to yourself, or if your mad don't hit, but we actually don't prepare our kids because what's underneath the behavior is a feeling. And if we're not preparing our kids for the feelings they're having, then they're no better able to regulate those feelings when they come up and convert into behavior.

So given that, here's what I would do with your son before going to the park. How would I emotionally vaccinate this moment? I'd say, you know what I'm thinking about? There might be someone at the playground who says something not nice to you. They might call you a name, they might say, we don't want you on our team.

Oh, what would that be like? And then pause. Pause and almost look like you're wondering. So you're not jumping in, you're kind of modeling curiosity. Because actually this is something we want our kids to do, to start anticipating what something might be like for them. You might also add, I would get if that made you mad. Yeah, when people say, not nice things to us,

it makes sense that we feel angry. Now, there's so many different things we can do when we're angry. And I know for me, I'm kind of modeling it myself, sometimes my anger can come up in my fingers and I just have energy to hit. But there's definitely better ways to handle that anger. So if you feel angry, I wonder what else you could do. Again, pause.

If your child doesn't volunteer information, model a couple of things and then role play it. I might back up my body and say, I don't like when you say that. I might not even have words. I might just put my hands across my chest and move my body away from someone so I get in my own way of hitting.

Hmm, and then maybe I'd role play as I say, say something not nice to me. I'd say that to my son to kind of make it playful. Say something not nice to me. Who, as a child, wouldn't love the kind of invitation to call their parent in a mom, your old loser. I do not like when you say that to me, who, as a child, wouldn't love the kind of invitation to call their parent in a mom, your old loser. I do not like when you say that to me, and then I'd move my body back.

Huh, that's something I'm going to practice too, right? So you're actually getting into that circuit of the angry feeling, adding a realistic regulation skill. So then when the moment comes up, your child has actually this skill wrapped around that feeling. You've vaccinated this moment. You've kind of developed these emotion regulation antibodies by your willingness to name and validate the feelings that might come up and then engage in some problem solving with

your son. [♪ music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, I totally understand this worry. And yet to me, the opposite is true. Feeling alone in a feeling is always one of the things that further dysregulates a child, that makes it more likely for a feeling to turn into a behavior. When we talk about something in advance and we normalize and validate the feeling, now that's key, I'm not validating that it's okay to hit. I'm validating that it's understandable to feel angry.

Now when the anger comes up, my child feels connected to me. Feels like it's okay to feel that way. And that makes feelings easier to manage. Let's hear from our last caller. Hi Dr. Becky, my name is Kee, and my kids are trying to have four and almost two. And we are having some issues with hitting and kicking other children's clothes tonight. My son actually kicked my daughter off

of a couch and she hit her head up for the blood open and she's bleeding, has to receive stitches. So this podcast actually comes at a great time because we're really needing an effect. I'm just having to deal with the consequence of, you know, the child who isn't really seeing that aggressive behavior hurts his siblings. We also have a bio-iterrural invite the law, and he invites his sister and findings finding magical consequences for him to is a threat for us to just know what to say, what to do, and then just keep happening and feel like nothing's really

working. Hi Katie. Let me start by saying that I hear in your voice how much you care about your kids and what's happening in your house, and I hear that you have two good kids who are really struggling. So maybe you can start, I'll do it at the same time,

place a hand on your heart, take a deep breath, and remind yourself, I'm a good parent. There's some struggles in my home. I'm going to figure this out. We're going to get through this. And I'm here to help be part of that process. So first of all, when our kids are dysregulated, it's helpful to remind ourselves that what's going on

on the outside is a reflection of what's going on on the inside. We act how we feel. Your kids seem out of control. They feel out of control. And when we remind ourselves that, we can intervene in a way that's still very pound read and firm, but also helps our kids remember that they're good kids, because they need that to change. Second, our feelings are forces. And if we can't regulate our feelings inside our body, that doesn't mean suppress them,

that means manage them in our body. And if we can't give ourselves permission to be having those feelings in our body, then those feelings catapult out of our body into disruptive behavior. And so I don't have a ton of specific information, but that's a framework. What feelings feel so big, so overwhelming,

so overpowering that they come out in the form of this violent behavior. That feeling must feel so violent and unmanageable and disorganizing inside that's what motivated this behavior in the first place. A couple other things. So often I hear from parents, my child is so cold-hearted. You should see the thing my child did to her sister,

to his brother, and he didn't even care. And when we see that we want to go to our kids, they do even care. Do you see what happened? Right, we want to really double down. It's actually quite the opposite for these kids. When a child sees that his out of control behavior actually hurt someone, this terrifies him.

Because a child feels how out of control he feels. It is so desperate for confirmation from anyone that these feelings actually aren't so bad. They're not so dangerous. They're not actually as awful as they feel inside. And you have to hold on to the idea that my kid will develop empathy. Once he learns to manage and feel at home and not scared of the feelings and sensations in his own body. Children also only develop empathy for others when they receive empathy over and over and over themselves. Now this doesn't mean we say to our kid after this incident,

no worries, everybody kicks their sister sometimes. Of course not, that wouldn't make any sense, that would be very unraveling. But it means separating the behavior from who your child is, because if your child is actually, as I bet your child was overwhelmed with guilt, a child feels bad and unlovable

and that makes a child identify further in the bad kid role, which makes kind of quote, bad behavior that much more likely. So here's something I would say to your child. I know that scared you. I also know you're a good kid and you care about your sister.

I know you didn't want that to happen and I am going to work with you to keep everyone in this family safe. We're going to get through this. A consequence, a harsh punishment to a child, this doesn't change behavior. All this says to your child is that your child becomes more convinced that he is actually bad. He has to be banished. He has to be sent away.

He has to have things taken away from him. We have to feel good inside to make changes. And so we cannot confirm a child's sadness through punishment and expect him to start acting in a more pro-social manner. We also change behavior by learning to regulate the feelings that come before the behavior, not by focusing on the behavior and punishing something after. The order is totally off. So what would I do practically moving forward?

Number one, I'd keep a closer watch of your kids. I'd keep a closer watch of your kids so you can start to notice what happens before the kick, before the bite. practically moving forward. Number one, I'd keep a closer watch of your kids. I'd keep a closer watch of your kids so you can start to notice what happens before the kick, before the bite. We have to intervene before the urge and the action. And when you take closer watch, you start to notice these little flinches,

these little moments, you go, oh, never notice that before. I'm gonna jump in then. Or you notice when your child says, I want that pillow and you think, oh. I'm gonna jump in then. Or you notice when your child says, I want that pillow and you think, ooh, I'm gonna get closer, because I want that pillow could convert to a kick very quickly and that's when I jump in

and I pull my child away and I say, oh, mommy's here. I'm here, let's take a deep breath, let's calm our body. I know that was hard. I'm gonna help keep you safe. We help keep our kids safe before the behavior, not by focusing on it afterward. I would teach your child to move away his body.

I would teach him to stump, to get a pillow, to get out some of that energy away from another child. I would also definitely tell your child separately when you're calm at night, maybe when you're going through a bedtime routine, some stories of you're having at night, maybe when you're going through a bedtime routine, some stories of you're having a hard time as a kid. We underestimate how important it is for our kids to hear that we also struggled again.

So we're protecting our kids from feeling like bad kids so they can access that goodness so that they can change. [♪ Music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing in background, music playing Sturdiness because this is the start of how a child starts to feel contained Because they feel that boundary and I won't let you really establishes that Kind of steady authority So here's how that might sound when you intervene before your child. Let's say kicks. I won't let you kick While I pull my child away. I won't let you kick. I'm here. We're gonna get through this moment together Or even after the kick when you pull my child away, I won't let you kick on here. We're gonna get through this moment together. Or even after the kick when you pull your child away, I won't let you kick. You're a good kid.

You're having a hard time. We're gonna go calm down your body together in the other room. I won't let you is really, really important when our kids are having a hard time. Because these words show our kids that we aren't scared of them, and that we can still be regulated,

we can still be strong, we can be a sturdy leader in their difficult moment. Thank you so much, Stephanie, Kristen, and Katie, for sharing your stories with us, and allowing us to really dive in and learn together. Let's tie this all together. I often think about something Richard Schwartz says, who's the father of internal family systems theory. He says, kids have the developmental tendency to take experience,

and turn it into identity. And this really inspires a lot of what I think about. In terms of trying to help our kids not identify as the bad kid. And it speaks to the importance of always differentiating behavior from feelings or behavior from who my child is. And if we don't explicitly differentiate this, our kids will take the example of our responding to their behavior and form identity around this and we don't want that to happen. So instead of saying, why would you hit your sister? I won't let you hit your

sister. I know you were having a hard time. I won't let you hit. We'll figure out what was happening for you together. I'm showing my kid I see a struggle. I see a good kid while I'm clearly also saying that the behavior is not okay. Differentiating behavior from who our child is is critical in helping your kids change and learn and grow and continue to feel good inside.

Thanks for listening to Good Inside. Let's stay connected. At GoodInside.com, you can sign up for workshops and subscribe to Good Insider. My weekly email with scripts and strategies delivered right to your inbox. And if your child struggles with hitting, biting, pushing, kicking, or other dysregulated behaviors, check out my foundational course, managing meltdowns and building emotion regulation. You'll end that course feeling so much more hopeful, so much more equipped for handling tough moments when they arise, and teaching your kids the skills they need so these moments become less much more hopeful, so much more equipped for handling tough moments when they arise, and teaching your kids the skills they need so these moments become less frequent.

You can find that course and many others at learning.goodinside.com. For more ideas and tips, check out my Instagram, Dr. Becky at Goodinside. Goodinside is produced by Beth Roe and Bradage, and Executive Produced by Erica Belski and me, Dr. Becky. Let's end by placing our hands on our hearts and reminding ourselves, even as I struggle, and even as I have a hard time on the outside, I remain good inside. outside. I remain good inside.