Honey You're Ruining Our Kid - The Danger of Unsolicited Advice, Terrible Twos and That Inconsolable Child.

Episode Date: October 21, 2024

Halloween is just around the corner and like any celebration it can sometimes lead to our little ones losing the run of the themselves in the excitement of it all. "Honey! You’re Ruining Our Kid" is always here if you need help getting your kid back on track. On Wednesday we went to a special Aldi Halloween celebration which we loved. It reminded me, I watched way too many films that I shouldn’t have when i was very young. I know first hand the long lasting damage this can do. Jarlath find this hilarious of course and often jokes that I’m afraid of everything. He's right, I really am terrified of a lot of things. Trying to find the best way to keep things spooky rather than scary is the opening segment of our show today.Question 1- What do you do if your kid never seems happy. Bursting into inconsolable tears 8-10 times a day. How can you possibly keep your patience while coping with this much distress? Can this behaviour be changed? At Honey! You’re Ruining Our Kid we believe every habit can be broken, every child can be reached and every parent can be helped.Question 2- A supportive friend gets in touch wondering how she can help her friend who is struggling with single motherhood. This one has us stumped. Is it ever really okay to offer advice or help an individual who hasn’t asked for it?Do you risk causing offence or worse, ending the friendship? Is it better to just be the rock they need rather than the solution they didn’t seek? Question 3- Are the Terrible Twos a real thing? As a parent do you just have to resign yourself to this being a particularly tough time or is there a way to navigate your family through it. Thank you so much for listening in to our show. If you want more please head on over to Patreon for our ad free plus extra content. www.patreon.com/irishmanabroad

It's Honey, You're Ruining Our Kid, the parenting podcast from the Irish Man Abroad Podcast Network with me, Jarnath Regan and Tina. Me, Tina Regan. My wife, the behavior expert, you email in your questions and she provides strategies that'll help you cope. I would say 100% success rate at this point, Tina, would you say? Oh, I don't think I'd ever. You haven't had one yet though that you've been like, no.

No, no, but I mean, I would never say 100, you can never say 100% about anything, right? I would say 95. You definitely provide help to each one. Yeah, I've had a lot of happy people get in touch saying that things are working out and that makes me really happy because it's empowering them, isn't it?

Yeah, well you might have a few emails coming your way this week from the parents of kids that are seeing Halloween movies that they definitely shouldn't have seen. Oh my God. What do you do when your kid sees a movie that you brought them to and you realize, while sitting there, they're not able for the Addams Family from 1991? We were so lucky. We got invited to this Aldi event this week.

They were like, come along to this movie thing for Halloween. Stella Cinema in Ralla, which is just a gorgeous place to go. But it's one of Mikey's favourite movies. So I was like, yeah, let's do it. Why not? We'll be cute. Let's drive in in the piss and rain, no one will know there's no parking around there whatsoever. Like I did have that moment before we left the house going,

are we mad? Should we just not do this? Yeah, but I was like to Gerard, but we've said we're going. That's not nice to just cancel an hour before. On the basis of rain and parking. Yeah, rain and parking. Well, I did think it was in Rathmines where there's much better parking. Yeah, we did think it was in Rathmines.

But anyway, Tina put the foot down. I did not. She put the foot down anyway. I did not. And said, well, going whether I like it or not. She sits in the passenger seat, I did not. I said, well, going with it. I like it or not. She sits in the passenger seat, I drive her and she checks her messages. It was a really cute event, actually, and we got like 50 euro vouchers for Aldi.

You're skipping the bit. You're skipping the bit. We arrive at this thing and it's clear that everybody has dressed as Adam's family. Yeah, I didn't read the invitation properly. Oh, to the point where I did you not know where it was? everybody has dressed as Adam's family characters. I didn't read the invitation properly. No. To the point where- Not only did you not know where it was, you didn't know that it was a fancy dress event.

I remember just showing up and we were like, oh, daddy clothes, what are you doing? You can't believe you're dressing up. People had made such effort. It was amazing. The Gomez sitting next to us was unbelievable. He won a prize. So there was lots of clues for these parents

to know exactly what their kids were gonna be seeing. And like this movie, The Addams Family, like Mikey probably saw it when he was eight. The 1991 version. Yeah even then it was a little bit hardcore for him and I mean he really enjoyed it this time because it's so absurd. When did you show it to him? I think he was eight. But there was kids, tiny kids. Tiny kids. And I mean, this movie is like, it would never get made now. It would never get made.

Oh my God, no, there's so much cartoon violence in it. There's so much, like she electrocutes her brother, they have an actual seance. Yeah. There's a lot of sexy talk between the dad and the mom. The dad and the mom, what's the name of the characters who are the dad and the mom in the Addams family? Gomez and Patricia? No, that's not her name. What's her name?

Morticia. Patricia. Morticia. You were close, you were close, you're definitely close. As Mikey said afterwards, he said, we need the runtime of the movie to be 90 minutes, roughly, but it's coming in at 60. Why don't we have Gomez and Morticia to, you know, make out a few times during the movie? This happens at regular intervals, all of a sudden they are having a very romantic scene. Everything seems to turn them on. Everything.

Like literally everything. It was like a carry on movie. Yeah. And I was just watching it. It's funny when you watch it. It is a good movie, but it's just not suitable for tiny kids. Christ, I was watching these little kids, these tiny little kids. One mom left. Yeah.

And I was like, yeah, that's a smart choice. Yeah. There was a lot of kids who weren't going to sleep that night. I'd love for anyone who was at the LDU event, can you get into it? Like, are your kids having night terrors now? But I went out to get a drink during it and I said to the organizers, it's going to be a lot of nightmares tomorrow. They were like, you know, some people were

asking, can we bring our two year olds to this? But like, I couldn't believe there was a lot of four and five year olds here. And I was like, this is not suitable. But Tina, like it is so funny to me that you are the host of a podcast where you're now discussing what movies are suitable for your kids. When Tina, listeners, as a young one, if you haven't already heard this, saw The Omen, As a young one, if you haven't already heard this, saw The Omen, The Exorcist, all of these movies at the age of?

Six. Six years old. Now, how much has that messed you up? Oh, completely. Like I'm a mess. I am a mess and I really do connect it to that. Watch this, lads. Do you believe in vampires?

Oh, shut up, Gerard. You don't believe in them, but are you afraid of them? Yeah. The potential of them. The potential. I don't like to think about it. The goodbyes said to you right now. OK, don't do it. Don't do that. That's not nice. That's not nice. This is what you would head into if you show your kids these movies. Honestly, I am so afraid of anything to do with God and churches at all.

I mean, Halloween I love, but like I told her that yesterday, there's a part of me that still thinks maybe there's witches in the air. Well, we're going to be heading over to Salem. Yeah, on Monday we're going to be in Salem. We're going to go to Salem as I'm doing a show in Boston at the Schubert Theatre on October 26th. That's so exciting. There's still some balcony seats available if you fancy it. That room is so big. It's a massive room.

I definitely undressed how big that room was. We got distracted by how beautiful it was and we're like, it's a big room. It's nearly sold out. Yeah, that's the great thing. And all the other shows are sold out. But then just to come back to this before we start the show, we have some banger questions for you. If your kid won't stop crying, cries over absolutely everything.

If your kid is starting to hit the there's two questions in here you're going to need to hear or maybe your kids not doing any of those things and you just need to feel like, well, at least my situation isn't that stick around for these questions. And I do think we get a lot of those listeners who are like, well, at least that's not happening in my house. What's interesting this week is, well, somebody just emailed in saying that their friend was going through this. And that's great to hear as well. You can email the show, honey, you're ruining your kid at gmail.com.

If you know of somebody else going through something, they don't have time to email you because of the shit is hitting the fan in their house. I did want to ask, though, on the Halloween thing, because there is a fine balance to be struck. Like, what do you show your kid? What do you tell your kid you can't watch? What's your rule of thumb on this for people that, like, they're like, you can have kids that are so deathly scared of absolutely everything.

Like, we've seen these kids that are afraid of Spider-Man. Oh, yeah. Like, you know, I feel like we have experienced Halloween two ways in that in Ireland it's so celebrated and then in England where we lived a little bit more by the time we were leaving. But certainly when we first moved there, it wasn't a thing. I was like, what's going on? There's no Halloween decorations or anything. And our house was always spooked up to 90, but they didn't celebrate it at all.

You're the people that always put up their decorations too early. That's what this kid said to us outside the door. This is Jared not being able to let go. What a six year old child said to him about. I think he was just echoing something his mother had said. Comes up to us as we're leaving the house, you're the people that put up the decorations to worthy. I leaned down, got down to his level and said, and you're the young lad who everybody says the little cranky prick. Oh, Charlotte, that's not nice. He was a beautiful child.

We were moving back to Ireland, it was fine. Yeah, Charlotte was... He didn't know. Charlotte was loose. You were like the child who's finishing school, who thinks they're never going to see their teachers again. Just that little fucker. I was like, oh my God. OK, Tarra, let it go.

There is no personality. Let it go. Yeah, so because they didn't really celebrate it there and we did, and then a few more Irish people moved on to our street, I found myself quite often in conversations explaining Halloween and what it means to us in Ireland culturally. The inventors. Yeah. And then, you know, so with that I learned, because I would do it in the classroom then.

I was like, fuck this. I'm celebrating Paddy's Day in Halloween. You're coming to school with me. And I think through that, I learned that that's the way to approach Halloween. It's getting informing kids of why we do the celebration. What are the pumpkins for? It's not about the dead or rising appearing to many. Well, that is what the pumpkins are for, though.

You know that. I do know that, but it isn't about the thriller video. No, no. OK. But like I think with everything, once children have information and they feel informed and they understand, that takes the scariness out of it. You know, there was a lot of when we were kids just kind of wondering, you know, you're in your thoughts a lot like, what is this? What are we celebrating?

Whereas, you know, when you armed kids with information. What's to be said then for the American approach, which is it's about candy. And kids dress up in the cute costumes and it's about candy. I can't believe we're going to be in New York for Halloween this year. I mean, it's so exciting. I mean, we have been lucky enough to be in New York for Halloween once before. And it blew my mind. Like, people are literally going to work in their outfits.

In full costume. It's not just houses people trick or treat at, it's shops and bars and stuff. The whole city's involved in Halloween. There's jokers and harlequins everywhere. I did find it a tiny bit scary there because there seems to be a bit of menace. You're having a bit of a find everything scary. I do find everything scary. This is what happens if you show your kids a movie.

So don't show your kids something inappropriate to you. Let's just stick to the cartoons. Like Adam Sandler's made all those cartoons. Watch those. What are they, Transylvania or something? Yeah, Hotel Transylvania. There you go. Perfect. Perfect.

If you have a kid at Halloween that is scared of everything, there's a chance that this won't be all fun and games for you. There's just gonna be a lot of tears and a lot of pretending that this isn't happening in the house. This next email is about a lot of tears and I don't know what you're going to say to this team.

I'm sure you've read the email beforehand, but this is my first time saying it. This is a real doozy to your team. Enjoy. They absolutely love the show. Long time listener. First time email. My four year old is in a stage where all she does is cry about anything and everything. We give her her way. She cries. We don't give her her way. She cries. We try and distract her with something she has something else. She still cries. My mom watches her when I'm at work and she's not a very patient person.

It's safe to say that's one way of putting it, right? So she just, uh-oh, screams and yells at me like I can snap my fingers and make her stop crying. The mom screams at her. Yeah. Oh, yikes. I don't know what to do anymore. I feel like she's gonna just refuse to watch her when I lose a job where, and then I lose a job

where I have lots of opportunities to make enough money where I will no longer struggle and live check to check. I don't know how to get her to stop. It's just overwhelming sometimes because it's like a constant eight to ten times a day crying over the slightest things. OK, you've seen this, right? Yeah, I have seen this. Now, the first thing I would always say, your child is crying this much, please make an appointment with your GP and just get her checked in case there is something else going on there. Right. And the GP can just know that. Well,

they'll do a routine health check and maybe take some bloods, check her chest and stuff because, you know, it can of course just be a behavioral thing, but there also could be a health thing. And I think you got to rule that out first, because this is a very unhappy child. And that doesn't that could mean they're unhappy in themselves and that they're just feeling awful. You know, they're crying all the time. Maybe they have an ear infection. Maybe they have something stuck up their nose so many times they just need to go to the doctor. Crying eight to ten times a day over absolutely anything isn't an alarm bell in your book. Yeah, it's not normal.

It's it screams of a child who doesn't feel happy or doesn't feel secure, which is not easy for the mom to hear. So but there are ways to fix this feeling. So if you bring her to the GP and the GP rules out, I'd imagine this child probably has an ear infection or something if they're crying that much because their patients are low. They're going to tears straight away because they're just feeling crap. But sometimes it can just be a child that's crying a lot.

So if that's the way, if it's just a behaviour thing, we can fix that. This kid needs praise and smiles and hugs and you need to, you know, start greeting this. It sounds so silly but so many people are just so busy they don't even remember to smile when they see their kid first thing in the morning. It's actually the best piece of parenting advice I ever got was my sister-in-law told me whenever your kid wakes up or whenever they see him, make sure you smile and tell them you love them. And it really does lead to you having a really smiley kid because smiling is contagious and they feel your energy and they give it back.

And they see it as the default setting. Yeah. When I wake up, I'm not like, where's my battle? Yeah, my mom's happy to see me. My dad's happy to see me. Fun times are about to begin. But I think this kid probably just feels like everything's a little bit out of control and she never knows what's happening next.

So I would think that even using the now and next with her on everything she is feeling out of control she is not happy because she doesn't know what's happening or where she's gonna be or who's gonna be minding her she needs visual aids I think she needs you know really she's four so a really nice visual schedule where of the week or just daily of what's going to happen that day. Get up, go to nanny's house, picture of nanny, picture of nanny's house. Mommy goes to work. What she's going to be doing. Mommy comes together, go home, story time and bed.

I'd love to know when this is at its worst, because I think you could then pinpoint, well, what's the most unsettling thing? Yeah. That if it is the morning, which isn't usually the case, people listen to this often email about the morning routine. Yeah. You see a lot of moms crying after drop off at school because that's such a nightmare. You just don't know what they've been through, right? And if you can figure out, right, start there, I would say, right? Start with the one that's causing the most ruckus, causing the most tears.

Yeah, well, I would also say you're going to have to change what you're doing when the crying occurs, because whatever you're doing is reinforcing the crying. She thinks crying works. Gets her stuff. So for me, like, I don't know this kid personally, but if my kid was doing that, when they're crying, I would just hold them. I would just give them a hug and be quiet. Like, you know, if they're being physical, obviously you'll have to wait till they calm down. And as long as they're safe, I just wouldn't go near them.

But I wouldn't engage with words. I can see why she's flummoxed, because it's like. The kid's still crying when she gets her way. How is that possible? That's an unhappy child. And I really feel bad saying it, but that's a child who doesn't feel secure. That child doesn't know if she's coming or going. And that's what can happen.

They're like nothing pleases them because they don't feel secure and safe. Like this can be fixed so quickly, like just saying to your kid, hugging them and saying, mommy loves you. My job is to keep you safe. All those kind of phrases can really help a child feel grounded and know they're OK. Nanny sounds unreachable. If she's losing her patience with the kid for crying, that's going to be hard to convince Nanny to give her the hugs and say.

And look, that's a very common thing too. It's like you're whoever your carer is, an aunt or an uncle or a grandparent, that they're not on the same page with you. I would think that if you were going to take Tina's approach here, you share it with that person, right? And you say, look, this is how I'm dealing with the crying, right? And we need to do this across the board. Yeah, but you might be met with a lot of pushback because sometimes the more old school they are and if she's responding to it, it can be really, really tough. I know exactly what I'm doing.

You might like if the hug and the quiet doesn't work, distraction is always great. Yeah. Get the kid who's crying to brush the floor or hit the mat off the wall or fill the sink with bubbles and get them to sleep. She actually mentions distraction in the email. Yeah. That that's causing tears too. Yeah, but they're doing too much verbal cues then they need to stay quiet. So if we broaden the question out, right, from like if you're going to take that approach

and you know we've seen that work, like countless emails similar to this across the three series of Honey Rooney Arc Kid, this does work. The visual schedule that Tina's described, even if it has like one cartoon picture of pick up from school and these kind of fun things that you tick off together on the chart. Yeah, you know, you know, you know how as a grownup, you know how your day is going to pan out. Why do we not extend the same respect to our children? We expect them to just roll with it all and not be absolutely OK with not knowing

what they're doing next. And that's not fair. That's what we had. We didn't know. We didn't know. You're telling your parents you just rock up and go, we're going to mail. Yeah. It's like that is unsettling. And we think the kids don't need to know, but they do. They'll all be much calmer if they do know.

But the wider question that I wanted to ask you about was about dissatisfaction among kids. And that goes right up through teens where it's like, look, you said you wanted this. You said you wanted this and you're still, you're still grouchy as fuck. Like, what do you do there when your kid, somebody listening to this now is going, oh, my kid doesn't burst into tears, but they're just constantly in a mood. No matter whether we give it to them, whether we don't give it to them, whether we say we're going here instead. Yeah, well, they say the practice you should follow there with a child like that

is to have them earn the thing so that they feel the feeling of self-gratification what's the gratification themselves. Yeah, they earned it. And they're building that. But you know, the whole thing, and especially with this email is, it's really hard to find the time in your day as a very busy parent to deal with all these outbursts in the right way, because you're so fraught yourself. And that's why these habits emerge with these kids where they turn to crying all

the time, because when they cry, the problem seems to get fixed much faster than if they talk about it. And it's just really hard because that's all it is. It's a habit. They're in a habit now of this. I hope, like I do need to stress, I really feel this kid has to go to a GP because there's every chance that child is exhausted and crying like this because they're just not feeling well. And I've seen that a lot. I've seen a kid who finally gets taken to the GP and they have a near

infection and the change and then once they get that antibiotic is unbelievable. I'm losing my voice. Fingers crossed. Let's give you a break there. Fingers crossed something can be done quickly for this kit. And thank you so much for your email. Keep your emails coming in. Honey, you're in your care.

Yeah. And when you bring this kit to the doctor, please let me know. Because if it's not that, then, you know, let's start a plan. Over here next week is the midterm. Yes. And just like Christmas, it's going to throw a microscope on what is happening. Way worse than Christmas. Halloween in Ireland. Yeah. They dress up and they become the characters. Like you're allowing them to be monsters.

You're encouraging it. And there's a build, isn't there? There's a build from the moment they get their holiday from school, where they were like, dress up on the final day. And all the sweets. All the sweets. Like it is, this is going to be a test, lads. Yeah, it's the worst time of the year for parents.

Oh my God. There's a lot of cuteness. The demand on the costumes, like when TikTok throws me these videos of the costumes from the 80s and 90s, the bin bag, the Hulk Hogan mask. I know. I'm Hulk Hogan. I'm wearing a bin bag and a mask. It was so easy back then. I mean, parents were getting away with murder.

The welts on your face and the sweat of the mask. Oh my God. The elastic band snapens every 15 seconds. Oh yeah, because your older brother would do it. God. But like, it's such a challenging week, this one. I think that you have to kind of steel yourself a little bit. What would be your advice to somebody who's going,

right, now he's thinking or she's thinking it's just going to be screen time a go go this week that it's back to doing whatever the hell I like on this break? Well, you need a plan. You definitely need a plan. Plan each day? Yeah, you definitely do. Because a lot of parents are working as well. Working, of course they are.

The poor things. But you definitely need a plan. And remember, I hate when I say things like that. And remember, I said like such a... But remember... There are things that need to be remembered. They... Kids just... They're not expecting the big extravagant days out.

Sometimes they're just happy with the park. God. You know, they just want a little bit of time. We've got all these movies now. Plan a family movie in the evening. All these things like it is just sounds silly, doesn't it? Yeah. If you ask your kid about their favorite memories.

Yeah, it's rarely that time we went to Disney on ice. Honestly, like you could have one day Halloween biscuits and just making spider biscuits. The day before can be preparing to make the biscuits. Yeah, you know, all these cute things. Like I say this, and it's still really hard to keep our kid entertained. Yeah. We're especially going to be tricky for us because we're going to be in America

doing shows, traveling around and he doesn't want to come. But at the same time, he is nearly 14. Yeah. And, you know, like we just had an amazing night at the concert hall with him. It sounds like if you're a toddler right now, it's like he's tearing the room apart. He literally flips the table every time we put food in front of him. Oh, we had a wonderful night at the concert hall. That was a pretty magic night. I remember seeing John Williams versus Hans Zimmer with our son.

And honestly, it didn't like I just had flashbacks to when he was a tiny little lad running around and he was all business and bashing his head off everything. He'd no he had no respect for his own health. He never seemed to be aware of his spatial awareness. It was really tricky to watch. If there was an edge, he'd find a way of hitting it. Although saying that in my head still really hurts from where I hit it off the boot just yesterday.

Where did he learn it from? But I'm saying the plan, not just for the kids, for you. Sometimes it really helps get through these midterms. When you have a plan, you know what's coming too. You're not waking up that morning going, oh shit, oh shit, what the fuck am I gonna do with these kids today? You've already sorted it out. You can have your plan, but your kid might be going, well, I really want to go to Oisin's house.

And you know Oisin is a fucking nightmare and that's not going to end well. Yeah. Exceptionally challenging. Keep your emails coming in though, because we've had one email in here from someone who knows their friend is going through some stuff and it's a tough email and it's kind of a broad one for you, Tina. So good luck with this one. Hi, Tina and Charlotte. I'm looking for advice for a friend who is in desperate need of some help and guidance.

She's a single mom and I feel like motherhood is drowning her. She has to fight with her son almost every day to get him ready for school. He's six or seven years old. It's nice that you don't know the age of your kids. He's six or seven or whatever. I don't know. I don't even know what age he is. It's like that height.

He's about this big. What age is that? He's six or seven and he's a menace. He's not being bullied or anything. He just says school's boring. But how would she know? She doesn't even know what age he is. Oh well. But that's the response.

That's probably her question too. It's like, how's school? Yeah. Boring. And it is. It is boring. It is, I'm sorry. Well, it was for me.

But he throws tantrums in the morning and makes it very difficult for her to get him ready for school. Has anyone else ever dealt with this? Yeah. Or has Tina any suggestions that might be a way for me to gently help here? See, that is the question. The gentle. Oh, God. I mean, I say it all the time. As a teacher, the hardest part is broaching a mom about behaviour you've noticed their kid doing and helping them fix it without being asked first. Here's another hard one. That is so dangerous. Here's another hard one. I'm your friend. I don't have kids, but

I've got an idea for how you could parent your kid better. How the fuck is that going to go down well? I don't. I mean, I know what we could tell her to help her friend, but I really don't think she should tell her friend. Just leave some pamphlets around. Honestly, because that woman, like you say, is probably drowning because like all of us, she's trying to survive her kid. Like we know what she should do. She should get the school involved. She should let her child know she's telling the school how tricky the mornings are.

Get the school involved. They will help you set up a morning schedule that he sees visually. What is expected of him? What he needs to do. Get timers going in that house or a clock that shows, you know, when he needs to be ready by. You can highlight the parts of the clock that you want him to check and keep an eye on. Put more responsibility back on him. Can she tell any of this to her friend? Absolutely no. No No you can't.

That's why this email is so great because your email comes from such a great place. Like we've all seen someone and you're going God I wish they would just do that and then like we've all had that and they're probably looking at you. Oh yeah absolutely. But you can't do it. And it's funny because she doesn't mean to judge your friend here, but she kind of is And I remember a person in our life Going up to a mom in a train station telling me about it saying how she went up to this mom I was like stop talking to your kid like that. Oh, she didn't have a kid

And I remember in that moment saying to her because she was kind of boasting about how she stood up for this kid And I was like you have no idea what's happened. I was like, yeah, there's a chance you did something nice with that kid, but you have no idea what that mother's been through or how long she didn't. Or what's underneath the baby. Yeah, or what's going on with the kid. I was like, this is not okay. That was the most judgmental stuff I had ever heard. And this mom, this friend is also being judgmental. Here's what you can do for your friend. Give her hugs, send her memes, send her gifts, send her text messages.

Turn up with flowers and a bottle of wine, you know, things like that. That's going to help your friend. That's going to help your friend think somebody cares about me. Yeah, you know. Yeah. An afternoon. But don't give her advice on her child. Just don't do it. That's not OK. You know, I don't think we've ever had this as an answer on the show,

but it's such a valuable one. And there's going to be an awful lot of moms and dads listening to this. Yeah, I might. I might be I might be wrong, but I just don't. I've never seen a mom take advice well. So, right, when you're a mom or you're a dad, right, this is your full time priority, your number one thing is you're trying your best to try and raise this kid not to be a gobshite. That's the plan here.

And I always say that that's under all of the questions. Is my kid going to be a gobshite? Is this who he is? Yeah. Oh Oh my God. Well, think about it for this person or anyone who's listening in the same kind of way. And we have loads of people that listen to the show who don't have kids, but just are interested because they someday like to, or they love the banter. If you think about it in terms of your own job, right?

Yeah. So me doing stand up. Somebody who doesn't do stand up comes up to me after the show and says, I think you need to do not do that joke. You're offended straight away. People do it. Yeah, people do it. They think. Especially the work in progress. I have a great sense of humour myself. They think they're involved in the show. People think I'm gas. And I really think you need to not mention the pandemic because it changes the tone of the show. Yeah.

Now this may or may not have been said. You're like, thank you for the completely unqualified opinion. Yeah, I know. Like, I, in a weird kind of way, I, in your job job is so different from your parenting job. Because whenever I get feedback like that on my job job, I'm like, there's something in there. Even if this person isn't a comic, there's something in there. It changed the tone for her.

Yes. And that's worth bearing in mind. I never dismiss it. I'm like, you know nothing. You are not a comedian. Leave me. But when you're a parent, you're actually making a comment on them as a person, as a human being. And also, she might not need you to tell her how to fix it. She just needs to be able to talk to somebody about it. And this took you a long time.

I used to have to say to Jarlett, Jarlett had a lot of friends who were girls and he'd be like, had, had, had, OK, had, had, they're all gone now. You'd be like, and then she was annoyed at me because I was like, I offered her a suggestion. I'm like, you do it every time. She doesn't want the suggestion. She just wanted you to listen.

She does not want you to fix it. She's going to fix it herself. She just wanted you to listen. She does not want you to fix it. She's going to fix it herself. She just wanted you to listen. And this friend, like, if you go back to her with all these ideas, first of all, she's going to feel judged. She's also going to feel, I can't talk to her anymore. I can't. I also can't be around her with my kid. Yeah, I wish I could help you and say, tell her to do these things.

But I can't. Those I'm just I just said a moment there was reminiscing on when I used to have female friends. Were you good at sharing as a kid? I mean, Tina had a brother and has a brother and sister. Was I good at sharing? You're the middle child, just for a bit of background here. Middle child. I think I was good at sharing with my friends. I think I don't know if I've ever been great at sharing with my actual siblings because they annoy me so much.

Well, what would have been the things that you were asked to share? Hmm. My toys with my sister. I shared a room with my sister for a long time. I think I was telling you during the week I was such an idiot that one time I divided our room. Yeah, because you'd seen it on Tally or something. I'd seen it on Blossom or something. Was that what that show was called? Yeah, with a piece of tape down the middle. My side, your side. Yeah, and I was so like... Tina's side didn't have a door on it. I didn't remember the door. So you had to stay in your room from that table. I was like, oh God, I even forced a room. Your sister is younger than you must have thought. What a door on. I didn't remember the door. So you just stay in your room from that table. I was like oh god, I even forced the room. Your sister is younger than you

must have thought. What a fucking idiot. Yeah, I bet she did. I bet she did. But yeah, I shared a room for a long time and that's pretty tough for any kid to have to do. I think I think was a decent sharing like I think you're really havesharer with your feelings. Now, I don't know if I was good at sharing. I definitely still am not good at sharing food. I try, but it really annoys me when people pick off my plate or anything. I'm like, bye. Well, do you remember in UCD when you were

doing the LNH and I was working and I would come in the evenings and I would buy everyone a bag of crisps and stuff when we were in Montrose. I was like, she's so generous. And I was like, I just don't want to share my crisps. You just don't want to share mine. Yeah, I'd buy a round of drinks and crisps because I'd be like, just leave me alone. Just let me enjoy my bag of crisps. That makes me think that you were a good share as a kid, but

you longed for the day when you didn't have to share with anyone. I don't know if I am a good share because I don't like losing things either. Is that connected? Who likes losing things? Yeah, but it stays with me. Like I get so sad. I lost that grey sparkly hat. I held a hat in a taxi 23 years ago. She's still talking about this hat. I still go, God, I was a good lad.

Yeah, I had a t-shirt stolen out of a locker 24 years ago in UCD. And I actually just went on eBay and found it 10 years ago. To me, that would never be the same. It'd never be the same hat. Yeah. It is very rare to find a hat to fit your head. Oh my God, it really is. It really is. I laugh at that, but that is mean.

It really is. It really is. I laugh at that, but that is mean. Hi, Tina and Jareth. I'm emailing you at 3 a.m. in the morning as I can't sleep. Holy shit. Imagine being so desperate. Yeah. You're waking up in the morning going, I got to email Tina and Jareth about this.

Oh, the poor thing. Thank you so much for emailing. Thank you all for listening. Yes. Hoping you're you can help me. My daughter turns two this month and she started to hit other kids and not sharing. That's why I brought her up.

She hasn't done this before, but lately she's been getting like this. And I know it's the terrible twos, but I need advice on how to stop it. I need it to stop. I don't want my child to be a bully. I also really want my sleep back. Oh, so she's not having a kid that won't sleep. She's having a kid that's keeping her awake with her behavior.

She's lying awake in bed going, maybe this podcast with the comedian idiot is vastly overqualified. Why can't help? Because honestly, we see this on the show all the time. All across the three seasons, there's been a person in this person's situation where they're going, my two year old has completely turned into a different human being. Yeah. Yeah. And they do because they move into a different sense of order within their

brain, of fairness and what's fair and what makes sense to them. They have their own idea of order going on. And it can come across like they're being really selfish or they're not being kind, but really they have their own rules about how this should go. about how this should go. And that's why it's really important at that age that you don't slam it down because it just, they're just doing what makes sense to them. Shear them out. Yeah.

Is that what you're saying? It's never gonna make sense to you when they're two or three, but they have an idea and they're not just being, you know. A dictator. No, they're not just being the dictator. To them, it makes perfect sense. So that's when really reasoning with them or being rational and, you know,

actually acknowledging what they're doing and saying, I can see you love this toy. I really like how you play with this toy. Let's check how many of these toys we have in the house. Oh, we just have one toy and your friend wants to play with it. So when you're finished, it's their turn because that'll be fair. So you have your toy. Yeah. Well, you can say it is your toy and we are in your house. And now our friend is here.

And when we go to their house, we play with their toys, don't we? And they they help us. So really get in total on this level. Yeah, absolutely. I don't like actually using the word share because sometimes you hear kids going sharing is caring and you're like, that's just something they're hearing. You said to them and then you're like, well, we're telling them not to share certain things. So it's more about being really like very straight with them saying,

I know you don't want to give her the toy because you love that toy and you are playing with it. But it might be nice to just give her a turn of the toy. And when she's finished, Mom, you'll make sure she gives it back to you. Right. You know, so to get you've got to give that kind of thing. Well, and it's also they have to learn to wait. I mean, that's why the Montessori classroom is so amazing right? In a Montessori classroom there is one piece of every single activity, one piece of material for everything and so every child has to learn to wait their turn for that for that thing. If they want to

do the pink tower they've got to wait for the kid who's doing the pink tower to put it away and be finished. So I mean, it's really tricky when they're crying about like a child who's two or three will cry sometimes or have a tantrum about you holding your coat instead of wearing it. Because the world does not make sense. And they're like, why would you hold? Yeah. And it's also a time where parents get really stressed out, especially now about, well, God, has my child got autism?

Because all of a sudden they're doing all these things that we say they tell us to watch out for for autism. But it's very hard to judge because at that age they all tend to act that way. They all tend to line up their cars and they all tend to, you know, do these things that can make you go, oh, God, do I need to actually keep a closer eye on this because it's just a very heightened sense of order time for them. And again, the worry here is, have I now got a kid that just won't share? Well, it's the hitting.

You can't let them hit other kids. And I always find the thing that helps explain that to a two year old is to like, I'm holding Jarla's hands right now. So you hold the little two year old's hands and you talk about how lovely their hands are and what do we use these hands for? What can we do with them? We can clap.

We can use them for writing. Jarla just used them for sticking his fingers up at me. We can paint with our hands. We can play with our hands. We can play with our hands. Should we use them for her thing? And then you're like, no, of course not. We don't hurt with our hands. When we feel like we're going to hurt somebody, we need to use our words,

never our hands, and then help her vocalize her emotions because she just doesn't know to do that yet. And that's why she's striking out, it's okay for your little girl to say, I don't want to give you my toy right now. That's okay. You don't have to say to your kid, no, give her. You have to share. You can say to your kid, I hear you.

You do not want to give your toy right now. When you're ready to give that kid a turn, let me know. And like the kid will be way more reasonable because they'll be like, oh, she's listening to me. And how long do you need, how long should you expect this to take? Two years. I'm not even joking.

It's a constant battle. Exactly. I actually think that it still goes. Like here we are with a teenager of our own and this discussion, this is going to be a dialogue. I think you need to strap in for a long dialogue around generosity, care for others. Yeah. How, like I always say to Mikey, when it comes to playing games, we're not after the win. Yeah. We're after return business. That hasn't quite landed yet.

We're after return business, right? That's that's the thing. It has not landed. No, it hasn't. And I definitely, I definitely, probably. That's it. I think that's a Regan thing. Do you think? Yeah. All the all the Regans talk about the hyper competitive. And look, I remember you're taking it so

seriously with something that was leveled at me quite a lot. Really? Taking it so seriously. But you have changed. But the point was the crack was in trying to win. That was what I was like. That's where the fun is to be had in everybody trying to win and having a competitive chance against each other. Right. We get a lot of emails around kids and games.

Very similar to this sharing thing that we're trying to share the experience of playing the game. We're not trying to win and hold our fist in the air at the end. Freeze frame. Such a tricky one, though, because a child should still be allowed to feel that great feeling of winning. Yeah. But it's definitely a hard one to manage because they should also be OK with not winning and enjoying the experience. But it's still OK for one to manage because they should also be OK with not winning and enjoying the experience.

But it's still OK for those kids who really need to win to get to have that feeling. The dialogue around sharing never ends. I mean, it still goes on in our marriage. Yeah, like this thing of you can point to it with your two year old. You can point to examples of it in the world, everywhere and everywhere you see sharing. I think you should point that out to them. Look at that. Look at how great that is.

That guy's sharing that. It's not his and they're sharing it. And look at how much enjoyment they're getting out of sharing it rather than him keeping it for himself. Tina's going, I can't really think of an example of that. No, no. Is that a good idea? I like that. Have I said a good thing? I think so. I think so, Gerard.

It needs a bit of work. Just I have an issue with the word sharing being how the hot ladle seemed. Do you have forests on my condom? Gerard just tickled me. I have a head massager here that I use sometimes to try and stimulate the old brain. I put it on to Tina's knee. Oh, no, just stop doing that. It feels like a creepy crawly.

But, you know, you were going to say before I did that. If you do it again, I'm really going to get annoyed. And I don't like when kids are forced to share. I guess. Well, when they're that small, it's not fair to force them to share. No, no, no, no. I'm sorry. You're going to share that with your brother and you're going to have your bit and he's going to have his bit. That's how it works.

I guess what I'm saying is I don't like the word being thrown around. I think you just you should. What's wrong with the word? When you're shaking your head this much at me, I can't find my words. I think you should model it. Yeah. And show it to them and direct them towards it and help them do it. But I do not like the word sharing being shoved down their throats because they don't they should get to understand

the word like you would teach a child how to understand action words, like jumping and stuff. Yeah, but it's funny because I know someone with two kids, right, and their kids are such... well, I guess they don't... I've seen them share so many toys and things well, but then I've seen their parents say to them, this is my ice cream, you can have it. Yeah. I don't want to get into that. It's so interesting though. That's not me, by the way, I didn't do that.

Well, we didn't have two kids. But you know, isn't it interesting though that the challenge of the dialogue. That it's not being modeled. No, but the challenge of the dialogue is is she is entitled to her ice cream. Now I believe as a parent if you're eating an ice cream and your kid says they want a lick of it, I'm just like have it. But she's trying to model for them that like, no hang on I'm allowed to have my ice cream, I'm allowed to have my time here. I guess it's how you say it. I mean, when we saw that happening, it wasn't great.

Yeah, it's how you say it. It was upsetting. Yeah, it was very odd. But modeling, definitely. But forcing them to use the word, I don't think. I think you just flag when you see generous behavior. Yeah, but I mean, how often have you heard, have you seen a kid roll their eyes or get annoyed when they're told to share? Because sharing becomes a dirty word. So I'm like, yeah, let's, you know, just bring it in to being part of them, but not forcing it, you know? Yeah, I mean, I can't get over the idea that this one was lying awake worrying about this.

I know the poor thing. This too will pass, though. It has to be said. But the hitting is way more important than the sharing. Yeah, the hitting side of it. That needs to be cut out. Yeah, and the sharing will come. And really what she has to do in those moments is get down to her level, very calmly, remind her what her hands are for and what they're not for,

you know, and distract her. There is no point giving out to a two year old about hitting. They're so easily distracted lads. Distract her and then remind her about her hands. Distract and remind her about her hands. Do not give out to a two year old about hitting. They're so easily distracted lads. Yeah, distract her. And then remind your better hands, distract her, remind your better hands. Do not give out to a two year old, do not put them in timeout. There is no point.

Well, we've got some more for you. We've got one more question and a bit more discussion. We did a deeper dive on some of these topics. The Patreon always scares me because on Patreon, we're always like, let's just talk about whatever we like. Why do I think it's a safe space? Yeah, well, we definitely open up a bit more personally. And the questions are always the hardest questions.

There's a fair bit more crack and laughter over there. It's patreon.com forward slash Irishmanabroad. It's how we make the show. There's no sponsors on this show, but you will hear ads if you're listening to it on the free platform if you'd like the ad free version of the show each week In an extended form and access to our full back catalog and of course If you would like to support the continued creation of this show head over to patreon.com forward-slash Irishman abroad now and in the space of a couple of clicks and the paste of a link you will have access to

Ad free episodes right away Tina, thank you so much. Thank you, darling. And we'll see you guys over there. See you in bedroom.