Honey You're Ruining Our Kid - Ep 23 Morning Madness Managed, Imaginary Friends Who Lie & When Should My Child Talk?

Episode Date: March 6, 2023

Trying to raise your kids not to be gobshites is flipping hard. Thankfully we have our in-house expert, Tina, on hand to answer some of the toughest parenting situations imaginable. With more than 20 years of experience in the business of child behaviour, her advice has helped so many people to find the joy in having kids again. We also hear back from a mother who applied a "Tina strategy" and had major breakthrough this week (Patreon bonus content). Did you ever have an imaginary friend? This week Tina helps a mom whose little boy is using his imaginary friend to engineer some pretty funny stories. How do you get your child to reign it in when you know they're not telling the truth. Independent little ladies are our favourite kind of people but what do you do when they just won’t listen and their behaviour is upsetting the whole house. Listen in and hear how Tina helps a very busy mom get her mornings back on track. What do you do if your child still isn’t talking? When should you start to worry. What tools can you use to help. Can you frighten your child into talking? Does this sound ridiculous? Desperation will take you to strange places as a parent. There are some great language techniques that may help any parent out there who is going through this. Email us [e-mail] Support us on Patreon and receive bigger episodes each week with even more craic and content. www.patreon.com/irishmanabroad

you might remember a few weeks ago the mom who got in touch with the child that wouldn't wear shoes it was my favorite question it was the cutest question that has ever occurred on your in your kid the kid just wouldn't wear them yeah like if you've got a kid that i'm now wearing a coat you know what this is like yeah when it's shoes but this was a one and a half year old and i just loved imagining how how sassy she was. Yeah, with the soother in her mouth going, I don't do shoes. I'm not wearing shoes. That's not something that's going to be in my life.

And it was ruining their lives. I mean, it was effectively changing how they interacted with the world, whether they could go on walks, they couldn't ride bikes. Yeah, and we talked about it in the Patreon bit, but the extra bit on Patreon. More developments have occurred. Yeah, because I was really upset for this mom. the nursery would take these on very personally yeah i do i get too involved i get too dismissive yeah and the doctor was dismissive and i just my heart went out to her so we gave her a plan even considered ringing the nursery yeah i did oh my god i did charlotte oh my god i didn't ring them, but I did consider it.

But then last night, just before we went to bed, an email came in from the mom, an update. Saying that she had applied Tina's strategy. So Tina obviously sends over a strategy. The mom applies it and they have the breakthrough. Yeah. And what had been a huge issue for months and months and months. Yeah.

Is no more. Well, I was just so happy i mean i did cry reading the email she sent a picture and everything just gorgeous and i loved getting to see this little girl because she just looks great and happy out happy out and proud of herself but i'm really proud of this mom because you know this is a tired mom with another little baby as well and she's just learning how to be a mom her both her kids are really um. And it's a very vulnerable time when you've just become a mom. Because you're not really sure how everything works. And I'm really happy.

I'm happy, first of all, that she had the courage to follow through and follow the plan. But secondly, she stood up for herself. Yeah, she went back to the nursery and said, I don't think it's okay that you're fine with her missing out on her lunch breaks. And here we are. I think that's important. if there's one piece of advice I can give today if you want to complain to your nursery or earlier setting or school do because the people who do complain are getting work done for them I am a teacher the squeaky wheel the squeaky wheel I've been teaching for a long time and it's you know you think you're doing well by yourself not

complaining they are more focused on the people who are because they just don't want that in their life so never be afraid to go and say what you want to say to them it's the squeaky wheel hour from honey you're ruining our kid work for you we have got some doozy questions for you this week hi tina not jarlet that's weird okay so my wonderful baby brother called yesterday to ask my advice he and his amazing wife have four children their eldest is severely autistic and largely non-verbal but such a beautiful boy their oldest girl just turned seven fabulous little girl in every way smart and sassy in equal measure their other daughter

my fairy god daughter i love that reference turned five last month and the baby is five months old okay got this lay the land their five-year-old girl has had some speech development issues largely linked to hearing issues which have been addressed with grommets and she is attending a speech and language school that has been phenomenal it go it does mean however that she has to be up very early each morning to get on the bus and this is one of the causes of the stress in the house currently i think the poor girl is exhausted it's a long day for a five-year-old my god and she resists coming downstairs in the morning and doesn't want to eat breakfast very tough obviously this is hard for the poor mama and my niece's incredible stubbornness means that it is regularly descends into a standoff sometimes shouting match there are other triggers too daddy's away new baby

encroaching on her patch older brother issues i mean we've all had those but deep down my niece is an unbelievably special child fiercely independent capable and loving lover to bits any advice at all you might have in terms of handling the standoffs screaming fights etc would be so appreciated i've given them my tuppence worth as a mama of four myself but i defer to you tina the expert because tina she's right this is your bread and butter isn't it this is what you work for ages with kids with these issues yeah what do you do well what a cool auntie we all need an auntie like that in our life right she seems to really adore her nieces and nephews here so on it so on it and also even though she has her own kids she's still she's not preaching to them she's just looking to help them.

So there's so much going on here. Obviously, the new baby, the older brother who would have a lot of additional needs. But like incredible parents that they had, they recognized very quickly what was causing the speech delay. Got that sorted. And she's in that incredible speech unit. Well, you know what i'm gonna say no well i never know this was your idea back in the day when we were having struggles in the morning and we've mentioned it before i think they need a visual a visual timetable poster

i'm getting i'm getting better team yeah visual time at table bearing in mind i did draw these things yeah you did Jesus he drew one for Mikey and then and the neighbours the neighbours and the other people in the school

but it changed our life and loads of lives yeah and she's already said this is a very independent little lady she will love it she will like this

and it's it's just sometimes when they're little like this they just don't really they can't connect what is the pattern of the morning what am i supposed to do it doesn't matter if they have issues or not

i needed this when i was a kid yeah like all kids can benefit from this it changed their life also they kind of enjoy it and you can do it lots of different ways like you can do it like we did it where it's just a poster with pictures obviously jarlett can draw he's an artist i couldn't but you can easily you know with clip art or whatever yeah you can easily you can make one so easy and you just do it the way your morning works or the way you want your morning to work uh wake up so it's just like sitting up in bed arms in the air drawing yeah then the next one is go do your way yeah go to get dressed come down for breakfast time for the Yeah, whatever you want to add in there. Bring mum and dad a cup of coffee.

Ideal scenario. Feed the baby. Put your clothes on. Bring yourself to call. Bring yourself to... Sorry, I nearly said call away. I don't know why I said call away there. Take yourself to call away for a day out.

But it works. It's worked. It flipping works. And if, you know, that's the easy way to do it but if you feel like your child prefers to look and do you can do it where they fold up each thing as they go so they or take off or take off and i think this would really work in this house because um poor mommy doesn't have time first of all, to be shouting all these instructions. You know what I'm going to say next? What? The visual thing, right, we know that it works, right?

But what about a screaming match, a standoff, a heels dog game? Yeah. What do you do there? Well, see, well, first of all, I think this little girl having the visual timetable will take away the screaming thing because she sounds like she's very much her own woman anyway and now she's getting to follow her own instructions and she knows completely what she needs to do in terms of the screaming match i mean poor mommy must be exhausted like she's exhausted um i think she needs to meet the little girl with empathy about her journey to school and her like she's aware this little five-year-old is into fairness all five six seven-year-olds are into what is

fair and what is not fair and she's saying that her other brother and sister do not have to get up as early as me she's also probably eating breakfast on her own because she's going off for this bus so empathizing with that and you know rewarding her and saying you're such a good girl and look how much this school is helping you and it should be a special prize for doing what she's doing i don't need a special prize i'm just saying a little bit of praise you're always with the special prizes that's why we have so much lego but on the one hand you're like you've got to be like well done you you're doing this extra thing. Yeah, but that's verbally. She doesn't need a present for that. She just wants a hug and a kiss on the cheek and a pat on the head.

I'd still get some Lego. That's why we have a lot of Lego all over our house. And then if, you know, also the mummy, while she's tired and everything, she does need to remember that she needs to find her cam and she also needs to let the child face the consequences, the odd morning of missing the bus, you know,

get the school involved, tell the school what their morning is like, you know, maybe she... But you think you can still short circuit all of this through the visual timetable. I think the visual timetable... I threw that in just as a curveball

because I do think that all parents, regardless of their situation, find themselves in a standoff sometimes. And, you know, it's a kind of a separate question. But in this instance, the visual timetable and a sit down to explain, here is your visual timetable. Isn't it cool?

Yeah. Isn't it cool? It's going to make your life so easy. You're such a big girl. We really trust you. yeah isn't it cool and we know you're such a big girl we really trust you you're so independent we know that you're able to follow this and if you're forgetting something you can just check and see if you've done this it's a game changer we have actually i've been in touch with a lot of parents for this show and they can't believe it and they pass it on to their friends and the feedback we get on these visual

timetables is amazing i mean it worked for us too we've seen it work it's so straightforward yeah and what's mad is that then after a while yeah it kind of it'll fall off oh you know yeah you don't need it it just becomes they'll sometimes like i used to do this thing with mikey where you know tina would be away for the day and i would oh daddy mikey fun day daddy mikey fun day and i would prepare a visual timetable for that day he loved it and it just made that day like he treasured the timetable but it was so calming for him too because he completely knew what was ahead but this mom is also this auntie has mentioned that she has problems getting up in the morning getting out of the bed so i feel like they need an alarm with a radio music needs to come into this room or light music or light something that she wakes

up happy like a nice happy song something special for her it's really important that the child feels this is special because we know you're doing this bigger thing we know you have to go to the school you're trying so hard and we're really proud of you and this is to help you get up in the morning just the empathy of that because it is it's a who likes getting up in the morning and getting out and leaving and going to your own school you don't even get to go to the school your siblings are in it's tough that sucks and but i i know i cut you off there i'm so sorry but she needs to go to the school and let them know what's happening because yeah because obviously well we don't know i shouldn't say obviously but maybe there's she hasn't mentioned any behaviors with this speech

thing and a speech and language intervention school will be well used to kids with behaviors so she is exhibiting these behaviors at home so get the advice of the school and they will help it can be as easy as them saying stop doing that you know so to broaden it out right to widen the lens because i think that you're right this will work for these people everyone listening to this has a morning and it's funny that you said that when you were a teacher in horizons montessori uh that you didn't have an appreciation of what had happened prior to 9am. Oh, when I wasn't a mom. Oh, yeah, it was terrible.

This question relates to the morning. And every parent has some sort of either head melt or just, oh, my God, I can't believe this is my life, pre-out the door. oh my god i can't believe this is my life pre out the door is the visual timetable the the short circuit for all of this or what what do you say to those people that are having these standoffs in the morning that are resulting in these meltdowns oh well absolutely the visual timetable is an incredible tool to save a lot of this drama but coming back to what you said there about me teaching in horizons before i was a mother i mean that is completely where all of this never judge another mother thing comes from because i was awful and the minute i had a baby

i was like i was like get your shit together Come on, what are you doing here in your pajamas? Then I had a baby and I was like, holy crap. The fact that they got those kids to school is amazing. So I think, yeah, sometimes you're right. These parents in the morning need to go a bit easier on themselves. They've had no sleep. You know, this person is managing four humans. You know, I know it's stressful but they won't get out the door but you know they do have to live with their own mistakes and i'm saying this as someone who

warm we're still trying to work this out still trying to work this out ourselves you know and also from really lived experience with our own child sometimes they really enjoy you can wind up in the morning like the clock element of trying to get it through to the kid the passage of time yeah like does that come into this is this part of your advice at all because i noticed with mikey our son you're not going uh early on in his life you couldn't go mikey it is 10 past eight he just didn't know what that meant so yeah but he should have it was weird that he didn't get the concept of time it was worrying yeah it was where yeah i mean they could use a timer with this girl they could give her so much time to do so many but that would create more anxiety you know i think um i think the

visual schedule will really work i think empathizing with yes this is hard it is tough that you have to get out this visual schedule does it then get to if you get all this done you have a chance to read before we go or look at your favorite book no because i don't think there should be a reward obviously if there is time the child should have her, you know, to do whatever she wants. But, I mean, this is expected behaviour. You have to be really careful of not rewarding stuff that your kids should just do. I just always want to give rewards. I know, but you really shouldn't do that.

What were you like in the morning? Oh, on top of my shit. On top of it, of course. To the point where it probably annoyed my mum. Why would it annoy your mum? I don't know. I was just a very independent lady i remember getting up at before seven specifically because i wanted to have the time from 8 to 20 to 9 to myself wow i wanted just to have my cup of tea

and just you know contemplate the world. Yeah. And have this chill time. It was the most relaxing time of the day for me. I used to regret having got up and done everything so early because the person I walked to school with was always late. Always late, yeah. And I'd spend maybe 40 minutes just looking out the window going, any minute now she'll come along. And it was always late.

Couldn't walk by yourself? Well, eventually I did. But, you know, when when you first start school you don't want to be doing do you want to shame these people that were late no no as the time thing but i do remember i do remember that i refused to be walked to my nursery when i was three you know doesn't surprise me but also just the whole thing that you feel with your kid in the morning. Yeah. It's like it's the kind of climactic edge of sanity. Oh, my God, is this person, is this who this person is going to be for the rest of their life?

Yeah. You've got to walk that back a little bit. It is. It is hard. But you know what's hard is when this little girl is probably not doing it because she's very young but it's hard when they start then

all of a sudden being like we're going to be late and I'm like I've been telling you that all morning. Now we're going to be late. Yeah, 100%. Hiya Tina.

Again no jarlets. Holy moly. I'm trying not to take offence to this. Hey Tina and guy who reads out the emails Quick question for you on the parenting front Well that's good It's good that it's on the parenting front

Bit of a fantasy versus reality issue My five year old is a great talker And also has a great imagination Just like myself back in the day He has an imaginary big brother, unlike myself, that he tells us all about at dinner every day. We enjoy it. We play along. Now, his teacher has said he has started telling her things that simply aren't true.

Nothing bad, just random stories, inverted commas, such as, Mommy is pregnant. Oh, no. And having a little sister. You can imagine how I loved it when I was asked if I was pregnant. What he's got, that,

that he's got, oh, yeah, here's the next one. The next story he told was that he's got an ear infection and he's on antibiotics i love how his stories are quite lo-fi very detailed stories and very believable stories yeah very detailed stories and pictures about bowling on holidays which we have never done i love this kid i have talked to him about the importance of telling the

truth and that people use people need to trust his words as true and i talked about the boy who cried wolf my version she says i'm just not sure how to preserve his lovely imagination and also teach him to tell the truth sometimes i think he genuinely believes his own stories like donald trump yeah well that's the worry isn't it we've all seen what happens if you let them become this fantasist so what's the advice tina what do you say to this mom first of all whose imaginary friends leading a better life first of all it's super normal for a five-year-old to behave this way yeah uh unusual that the imaginary friend is an older brother a sibling like that is unusual but um still very normal for this age for them to have the imaginary friend or someone that they blame no i didn't my

sister did did she yeah nisha nisha what a fancy name did it oh no we would rag on her for years after it's like i didn't do it nisha did it terrifying so she was actually doing both stuff and blaming it on the imaginary friend because this no, mummy, that wasn't me. Nisha did it. So scary. This is so harmless compared to Nisha crashing the family car. Yeah. Which didn't happen.

Which didn't happen, okay. So I think the first thing they need to do is, while it is so beautiful that they've been enjoying this so much at dinner and, you know, him talking about it. Unfortunately, they've probably encouraged the behavior to develop. A tiny bit too much. Yeah, a tiny bit too much. Give him an audience. Yeah, it's become something, a way that he entertains his family at mealtime maybe.

And it's become a habit without them realising that he is now in the habit of making up these stories. Look, she's right. You want to nurture this imagination. It sounds incredible. But it is important that he's not telling lies. Now, what she's talking about when he's told teachers, that's so normal too.

And those teachers should know better than to believe a five-year-old because that is your biggest mistake as a early years teacher believing anything those kids to a parent oh my god so pregnant so many times i've been like oh i heard what happened in your house last night nothing nothing happened in our house damn it i believe the kid again you know it's so funny because they're so convincing though when they tell these stories. They're so convincing. And they tell them with that little sincere little face. And equally, the parents need to take it with a pinch of salt when the kids come home telling them stories from school. Because in the same breath, they are oftentimes just making up stuff that did not happen. Filling you with excrement.

Yeah. With excrement. But how do we help her? Well, that is the first thing I would say. Look, don't disencourage the imaginary friend. That'll go away by itself. It's so normal, especially for a child with a massive imagination. It's so normal.

But maybe don't encourage him to talk about him so much. Distract. Distract and what's the word? Distract and maneuver the conversation to another path. Right. Okay okay you don't have to shut it down just yeah just show that you don't have as much time for yeah lead it somewhere else yeah lead it somewhere else because you know what will happen he's getting older and if he starts this with his friends they will make fun of him because kids are so tough on each other

i was going to say mean but that wouldn't be nice but the kids are so tough on each other and you don't want him getting into a situation where it's so his normal that now then he slips up around his friends and stuff he's obviously it's become quite normal because he's sharing it at school but yet again i have to stress that is very normal kids tell all sorts of things in school i love though how believable it is i have an ear infection of my antibiotics it's amazing um but yeah i mean the thing about truce i mean it's so important and it's so hard because what you need to tell them is that i need to be able to trust you my job is to be have back, be on your side. She says she's tried to do that.

Yeah, she's done the Child Who Cries a Wolf, but, I mean, I don't think... I don't know, is he old enough to write? Because, like, Mikey had a writing shed under his bed. Oh, yeah. And, you know, if you want to write stories about this kid, we'd love to read them. Oh, she should absolutely channel

this down that direction he's got an incredible imagination but he's got an incredible imagination that she wants to nurture she's enjoying him get him absolutely this it's very hard to get children writing this is a great opportunity to show him that he can do pictures and writing and these things that he's dying to tell us that aren't true can be put into stories. And we won't mind what you say in your story because it's just a story. But you can't be telling that in real life. And because, you know, you want and you can say things to him like we tell you the truth and you believe us and you trust us. But we can't trust you if we if you're not telling us the truth.

And again, definitely, definitely get the teacher involved in sharing some groups and stories and circles about honesty and truth and our job. And what you're laughing at. I'm laughing because when Tina talks about do a circle with the kids about this, because a tip off from a mom. Yeah. Something's happening. I always remember you telling me about doing these circles about certain kids do certain things that aren't

truthful. The kids are so honest. Yeah, they'd be like, it's me. She's talking about me. One of the kids nudging his friends going, this circle's all about what I'm doing. I'm doing this. Because you had to keep it so general. You're never allowed to name or shame.

But they know. They were nudging each other going, wait, wait, this one's about me. Yeah, this one's about me. I'm the cause of this. I definitely did this. Yeah, yeah, this is me. This is me.

But that's kind of cool too. That they were like, you know, I recognize. Means they're tuned in and listening. But yeah, no. I just love though that this kid is, cool too well they were like you know it means they're tuned in and listening yeah but uh yeah no um i just love though that this kid is but she's right it's it's a fine line between telling stories and then pure fantasy and we do know kids can like if you're not careful your child can prefer their own world to the real world i'm not saying this well that's the extreme end of it right but i have seen that happen before yeah yeah but the other thing is

like dishonesty creeping in like yeah we're back in ireland right it's not conscious dishonesty dishonesty yet he's not consciously being dishonest he's just experimenting with the truth yeah because he's too young to be doing it consciously yeah but it's very quick that you're right it'll become you know the way he's operating but i'm sorry economical with the truth and you know back in ireland now we're aware of the catholic guilt that is on so many of the kids yeah in the schools that we grew up with where they literally can't live with themselves if they've told a lie yeah well just this morning it's not something that kids that went to school in england are burdened with well just this morning i went on my first mom date and this

morning a really nice local mom took pity on me she's very nice it was lovely and she was you're just hanging around by the walls. Took pity on you. What do you like? Well, it's been very hard to make friends because all our kids get dropped off. Because of your obnoxious personality. And your preachy parenting podcast. Don't go near her. You'll end up on the podcast.

And here you are about to tell the story of your first coffee with the mom at the school. But she was mentioning how her kids have all this catholic guilt and i was mentioning how it's so funny because mikey doesn't have it but he's catching up with it and i was saying how for example they teach ukulele in the school and when i asked mikey about it he was like oh no you have to be invited to do that class that's an invitation yeah and i believed him until the teacher was like no that's for everyone everyone can do it if they want but he just figured he knew

cute whore he knew if he told me about it I'd sign him up so he was like I better just tell my mum which is not good it's not good

it's cute whore but it's not good but you like I talked about this in my last stand up special that you do want your kids to be blick yeah

which is to me doesn't mean sly it's an Irish word for street smart. Street smart. Street smart. You know, cute. Yeah. But you do want them to have that certain.

Yeah, because when I realized what he had done, in my head I was thinking, well played. Well played. Well played because you knew. He knew well. I'd be like, we're getting a ukulele because i am dying for him but what he needs to be able to say is love mama yeah ukulele and i think i would have been okay with it but probably you would have had to be like tina he doesn't want to play so here's my final idea on this right final thing okay in the same way as you were saying when a story about

this older brother comes out and you know they're entertained by it maybe they need to be a bit more entertained by his real life daily stories from school so if you're giving a huge response to what this fantasy friend did and then when he goes and we played football at school yeah but that's what i mean when i say deflected somewhere else but yeah you can imagine why it's become so entertaining yeah and also kids stories from school are so boring it's their little five-year-old experimenting with his imagination i love that they got on board they should not regret that they did nobody was to know he was going to take this far he was going to give this kid a netflix series Nobody was to know he was going to take it this far. He was going to give this kid a Netflix series. Nobody was to know.

But she's right. What she spotted is he has a talent for storytelling. And it's lovely that she spotted that. She just has to give him another avenue. Even if he can't write or he's not interested in the pictures, she can give him a little dictaphone where he can tell his stories into them and keep them. Treasure those tapes. Yeah.

Forever. Before we hit our final question of the day, Tina, we need to tease or get people into the idea that in the coming weeks, we are going to talk about bigger kids, like teenage dirt teenage dirtbags oh my god they are exceptionally difficult like there's no doubt about it this podcast is focused on the tricky younger years but now we ourselves are heading into these teenage years and maybe that is the evolution of this podcast that now that that's where mikey goes there's going to be a lot more talk about this because that's our lived experience from this point forward yeah well yes and uh yeah you're right there's a genuine interest in us in this this stage of development and it's so scary to everyone i

think because you what's happening you're gonna have to give your child respect to develop their own independence right it's it's taking the reins off of it isn't it it's yeah it's like them being douchebags to you that's a massive no no no this is what like this is what parents of teenagers are dealing with. You're trying your best to help them. Yeah. You've done everything and paid for everything. You're ferrying them here and there.

Yeah. It's the entitlement. And what you get in return is, fuck off, mom. You know, like, or just a complete, like a complete like ignoring like just completely being ignored i think that these kids are luckier than we were might i say that because there's such a there's a greater understanding now for what a teenager is going through yeah than there was when we were kids yeah and there's a greater understanding of how little control they have on their moods or different factors that are affecting them during that day yeah and you know

and i maybe i think we were are more aware as parents because our parents didn't really get to be teenagers they had to go to work so early and they didn't get to go to college and stuff and we're drunk all the time i think i think i i don't think that and we're closer to the age of our children i'm joking yeah but i do think that a lot of the people uh like are the educators now they're our age yeah who remember being teenagers and the challenges that are facing it we want to hear from you if you've got teenagers and what the challenges you're facing and we can start piecing together these episodes or parts of these episodes around us because it's gonna happen if you've got kids it's on the way but i mean did anyone think of our mental well-being when we're teenagers absolutely not like now it's part of schools.

Like we went to our child's new school, the secondary school he's about to go to. He's going to do five mental health classes a week. It's unbelievable. Seems like a bit much. Seems like a bit much. They have a, they've linked up with a mental health charity. I mean, it's unbelievable. We didn't have that.

We weren't allowed to talk about our feelings. No, you know, they had a great method in my day uh it was called a snap out of it you're feeling a bit down snap out of it yeah snap out of it was you know something that could be said to you at any moment of self-reflection uh or anytime you opened up like well you know what i think you need to snap out of it i i think come back to reality there is a lot of harder stuff our kids have to deal with now than we ever had to do but in terms of actual respect and understanding from grown-ups i don't think that was there when we were in school i remember when i first started having my period and knowing that i couldn't leave the class go to the toilet because that wasn't allowed whereas now that would never happen if you need to go to

you just get up and go of course you should offer a child that respect yeah so um yeah i mean we are all shit terrified of parenting teenagers right you just don't want to lose them but you're not in it on your own yeah you're not in it on your own but we all have the same? You just don't want to lose them. But you're not in it on your own. Yeah, you're not in it on your own. But we all have the same fear. We just don't want to lose them. You want to arm them with the cop on to not be a sheep. And to be able to come to you.

And to be able to stay, keep the conversation open. That's the thing. So as we mentioned before, jigsaw.ie are our chosen charity partner on the show. And way ahead therapy. So we're going to try and enlist

and employ as many people as possible around this area and uh get your questions and get them answered and get you the best help possible and be that resource that we all need with zero judgment as always and in april we are going to do a podcast that's completely focused on teenagers so if you have any questions you want we have a honey ruining our kid at gmail.com remember i do need to remind you really quick to come over to patreon.com forward slash irishman abroad if you'd like to support the show and its continuation into the rest of the year we cannot keep the show going without people like you who love the show supporting it over on yeah and you know the emails i got back this week from parents who have put the strategies in place and they've worked out

they all said that they became patrons which i think is really lovely but i hope people don't feel like they have to do that just because i've been helping them but it was a really nice thing to do as well well the other thing that they get in return it's not just kicking in money into the piggy bank in return you will get extra large size episodes with the resolutions of the strategies that tina sent so if you've heard a question on this and you thought this question applied to me chances are we'll give you the outcome of it in the extended cut over on patreon.com forward slash irishman abroad hey teenager finally oh my god you're both such legends my child is two though and a two in a bit okay and still not talking okay that's okay i really girl or boy seems to be

a little girl i really thought she would start but she just hasn't she seems to understand everything and responds with gestures pointing to stuff and um all the all the other gestures. Okay. She seems to understand everything and responds with gestures. Her older sister speaks for her a lot of the time. Should I be worried? Otherwise, she is a happy, healthy kid. Keep up the podcast. It's absolutely class anonymous.

I'd imagine this is really common, but there's not a lot of info contained in there. Well, what we know is there's no behaviours. She says she's happy and healthy, so she's not worried about anything else. It's just the speech. I would say my first instinct is, yes, I would be worried if my two and a half year old girl is not talking yet. first instinct is yes i would be worried if my two and a half year old girl is not talking yet i would get her name down bring her to gp and get her name down for you know some kind of speech and language advisory thing uh because the earlier that's not going to come against you or anything god no why would it come against you to get early intervention no not at all um also she

if you've recognized that the older sibling is finishing a lot of her sentences you need to have a gentle chat with your older sibling about how together we're going to get your younger sister talking so there's some habits we're doing that we need to stop and when you feel yourself going to answer for her you need to stop and just give her the time to answer herself because she could just be really clever and maybe a tiny bit lazy and just don't want to do it. She's gesturing, so the comprehension is good. She's able to explain what she wants, which is why she's getting away without not talking.

But we want her talking. So here's what you have to do. You have to start singing loads with her. Singing? Yeah, singing loads and getting her to finish the parts of the song. We're going to start reading books choose like maybe five books that you read in the week and that you reread them all the time and then you start reading them and pausing and letting her finish the sentences wow so we're getting her to practice sorry we're talking this is class what that's just very normal yeah but this is brilliant

okay and then you're gonna have songs the books yeah then you have to start you know asking her questions and waiting for the answers and if she doesn't answer them so if you say uh what would you like for your lunch and she's not saying anything you need to say things like i would like and then wait and hopefully she comes in or give her choices do you want the banana or the toast and you say i want banana or toast and also i've stopped there because this just jumped into me you might need to use sign very simple sign called love that you can just look up on google love as in the irish for hand yeah love as in the irish for hand yeah yeah love as in the irish for hand la father mh yeah it's very simple sign language like it's so simple it's like

opening your hands is a book gotcha you know it's like charades yeah that's really offensive offensive thing to say yeah what it's an incredible tool but like if your child is not if your child is not talking start signing with them and the speech will come in no maybe i am getting old but it's like that will help oh my god it's proven to speed up the language so quickly okay for whatever reason also it gives your child a voice just because they're not using their voice doesn't mean their hands can't be their voice. Talk to me about the finishing of the sentences, which happens so often.

The older siblings doing that? Yeah, you see it all the time. Like I do it for my siblings now. You do it for me. It's very annoying. I get it. It's very annoying. Well, it's just a habit, isn't it?

And they just think they're doing it to get a big favour. You're the most annoying man in the world so you just have a chat with them about it you just go yeah you just say you know what you're such a great big sister i know you're helping your little sister all the time but you know what she should be talking by now so me and you and you don't blame it on her you say i've been doing it too me and you have to be careful that we stop answering for her because she's not talking yet and she should be talking by now and i'm getting a bit worried about it right because then the little the big sister can also read the books and use the tools and get her to finish the sentences and sing the songs and wait and what

you're doing is just kind of planting the seed that oh i can i know the end of this sentence i can do this this is part of me and don't don't have a huge reaction when she starts talking either you know just be very normal about it because sometimes you can frighten them into regressing aren't you the best girl in the world i didn't know also you could talk all along good yeah i mean that's the most irish thing i've ever heard but i do remember well able to talk after all i do remember though when we were turning uh to be teachers and we were doing a lot of early language intervention and uh the this is a major obviously, for a lot of families. And there are a lot of kids, it's called selective mute, where they actually decide not to talk.

This happens a lot and it's very scary for the parent because you think, oh my God, is my child non-verbal? It's a decision. It's a strange little decision the child has made just to not talk. It's a little bit of, we think our child couldn't hear it couldn't possibly be controlling but they are they can be super controlling unconsciously and one of the techniques they used to say was you can actually frighten your child into talking like i don't mean like jumping out from behind yeah i don't mean that but i remember one of the lecturers saying that when

she was with her little grandson who wasn't talking she took out her false teeth and that got him talking because he had so many questions you know and another person used to say that they would give out about the child another grandparent actually maybe there's wisdom with age would give out about their father to the child and it annoyed the kids so much he started talking because he needed to tell i'm not encouraging those methods frightening them to talk it's more giving them an urgency yeah and yeah that's better finding and something that they'll urgently need to tell you about and perhaps games are the way to do that but that's a game where you've got to warn people that that thing yeah and that that is obviously if it's selective mutism.

What is that, mutism? Is that a word? No. That's if your child is, oh, that's if that's what they're displaying. If there's an actual language problem, language delay, you need expert help. And that's when you go to speech therapists and they will encourage you to sing the songs, do the rhymes rhymes read the same books get them to finish in the sentences what a ridiculously thorough answer for a free podcast

thank you so much for that we're gonna head over to patreon.com forward slash irishman abroad for the extended cut where we'll find out what's the what is the particular one that you're finishing off this week well this week we heard back from the mom whose child is a chronic bedwetter remember the lady who's such a frequent thing yeah and you're going to explain what happened yeah okay well come over to patreon.com forward slash irishmanabroad to hear the rest of this story and perhaps there'll be something in there for you too there'll obviously be more crack as well between myself and Tina. It's all over there on patreon.com forward slash Irishmanabroad. But thanks for tuning in wherever you're listening to this free.

This is, of course, Honey, You're Ruining Our Kid on the Go Loud podcast network and the Irishmanabroad podcast network. Email honeyyou'reruiningourkid at gmail.com to send a question to Tina. But there's no harm in saying hello, jar. Start.