Good Inside with Dr. Becky - “Your Haircut Looks Crazy!” and Other Not-So-Nice Comments

Episode Date: February 1, 2022

Kids say a lot of wild things. Sometimes nice and sometimes … well, not-so-nice. We’ve all experienced a moment where our kid makes fun of a friend, comments on a stranger’s appearance, or acts inappropriately. We know we feel uncomfortable, we know our kid didn’t *mean* to be mean, but we might not know what to do. Well, this week’s episode answers just that. Dr. Becky hears from three parents and walks through the nuances of responding to our kid’s rude behaviors. She models practical in-the-moment strategies to soften tension and outside-the-moment ones to help kids build the skills they’re missing in the first place. And, most importantly, she reminds parents that this behavior is all developmentally appropriate: You have a good kid, even in the trickiest moments.  Join Good Inside Membership: https://bit.ly/3cqgG2A Follow Dr. Becky on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drbeckyatgoodinside Sign up for our weekly email, Good Insider: https://www.goodinside.com/newsletter Order Dr. Becky's book, Good Inside: A Guide to Becoming the Parent You Want to Be, at goodinside.com/book or wherever you order your books. For a full transcript of the episode, go to goodinside.com/podcast

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

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I love translating deep thoughts about parenting into practical, actionable strategies that you can use in your home right away. One of my core beliefs is that we are all doing the best we can with the resources we have available to us in that moment. So even as we struggle and even as we are having a hard time on the outside, we remain good inside. In today's episode we'll be talking about tricky moments that happen for all of us with our kids.

The type of tricky moments where your kids says something, that's a little bit inappropriate or maybe herful. Or your child says something mean to another kid or your child blames someone for something that never happened. And you're there witnessing the entire thing. What's our role in that moment? We know we feel uncomfortable. We want our kid to learn and develop the skills to better manage these situations in the future. But I think we all know that publicly reprimanding our kid or chastising them probably isn't the way to get there.

So today we'll be talking about what is effective, what to do when those moments arise and what we need to do outside of those moments to build the skills our kids were missing in the first place. So with all of that in mind, let's jump in. Our first caller is Maggie. Hi Dr. Becky, this is Maggie. I am an Eastern Texas and I have four kids under five. I have a five-year-old, a one-year-old, and I have three-year-old twin boys.

And my question is about social situations. I have my oldest daughter is a highly sensitive child. And I have difficulty navigating social situations. She tends to use harsh and rude words when she's feeling insecure or sad about something. And I try to help a tune to what's underneath the words and behaviors when we're on play dates or at the park with other kids. But is there anything else that I could be doing to kind of help her?

And what else can I say to the parents who's kind of looking at me expecting for a correction? Hi Maggie. First I want to say what I think is on everyone's mind right now. For kids under five. And you're calling in with such a thoughtful, nuanced question. I really mean this. I wanna give you a standing ovation.

You're a powerhouse to be parenting so many young kids and doing it in such a thoughtful way. So I hope you take a moment and give yourself that acknowledgement as well. A couple ideas. Number one, I would model your daughter's struggle around her. So in a way, you're playing your daughter's role and your daughter can be a little bit of an observer. So what might this look like? And then I'll talk about why it's so effective in change. So let's say you're building a block tower with your daughter or you're drawing something and you mess up, right? Or your daughter hits your elbow. And so the block tower falls down,

or your drawing doesn't turn out the way you wanted it to. As you, yourself Maggie, I'd say this. I'd say, oh, why did you mess that up? You ruined it. One second, one second, one second Maggie. I'm disappointed. Doesn't have to be anyone's fault. No one has to be bad or wrong.

Not anyone else, not me. I'm disappointed. I'm allowed to be disappointed. And then I turned to your daughter right after and say, whoa, sorry, I just started yelling at you. That really wasn't about you. I just, oh, that disappointment came over me and then go back to your drawing. What am I doing here? Instead of trying to teach my child a coping mechanism by talking to them about what they're doing, I model what they do in front of them and then work through it in an imperfect way. This is the best lesson a child could get. First, we de-shame the situation because we essentially say to a child,

see, you're not the only one who does this. And we also say, you're not a bad person. Um, your parent, and we are really revered in our kids eyes. And I also can do this thing you do. Then we work through it in a realistic way. This is really important. We don't get hit in the elbow and mess up a drawing and say, ah, deep breath. No one's fault. No big deal. That's so far from where our child is.

That if we do that, that actually adds shame because it's child realizes, wow, I don't do anything like this. I guess my parent has it right and I have it wrong. When I take that deep breath and speak to as you refer to the underlying issue, I'm allowed to be disappointed. It doesn't have to be anyone's fault. I'm showing understanding and building my child's kind of real emotional intelligence. But I'm doing it so indirectly that it won't activate my child's defensiveness. That's step one.

Idea two. I talk about these dynamics with your child before a plate. I do it like this. Ooh, what would it be like if and then film the blank? What would it be like if you're running around with your friend and by accident, you trip. By accident, she touches you in a way and you fall down. Ooh, I know for me, it might feel like it was that person's fault.

And I might want to yell. It might feel like that for you, right? Too often when our child has a recurring problem on a play date, we say some version of this. Don't blame your friend. Instead of saying what's helpful, which is you might have the urge to blame your friend. And that's okay. So let's talk about how you might have that urge and think about something else you can do.

Instead of telling a kid not to do a certain action, we actually want to prepare them for the fact that they'll have the urge to do that action. Now we're talking because we can recognize the urge before it comes up and plan to kind of discharge it in a different way. So you might say, oh, I wonder when you want to blame your friend, which I get, you can instead try to find me

and we can do five really angry stomps together. Stomp, stomp, stomp, I didn't want that to happen. I didn't want that to happen. Why don't we try that today? There's no shame, there's no bad kid, there's just an opportunity to end the story differently. Last, when you're around friends and I totally know it, you mean, Maggie, you get that look up, are you going to do anything about this, right? First of all, ground yourself and remind yourself, I actually don't know what these parents are

thinking. For all I know, these parents might be looking at me thinking, ugh, I've been there myself, what a tough spot you're in. If you do want to offer words, I'd say something to them that shows you understand the situation without throwing your kid under the bus. We always want to preserve our kid feeling like a good kid while not making excuses for their behavior either. That might all come together with something like this.

Ugh, so hard when something happens that we don't want. That's so hard for me too. Sometimes I look around for someone to blame and then let's say my daughter is playing with a friend named Jesse, right? And my daughter doesn't apologize. I might say, Jesse, I know that wasn't your fault. I think it's just really, really hard to feel so disappointed.

I'm working on managing that disappointment so I don't blame you when things happen. What am I doing there? I'm showing empathy to my child and I'm kind of being the voice that they can't find themselves. Now Jesse's the good kid and I preserve my child as the good kid. Once you and your daughter are alone Maggie, there are so many other things you can do as well. Things I'll talk about as this episode goes on so keep listening. Our next caller is Jen. Hi,. Becky, my name is Jen. My daughter just turned six actually and my son is two and a half. This situation just happened right now and I immediately looked up your number to ask.

So this morning my daughter was on Zoom actually and her teacher got a new haircut. And the kids were all piping in about it. And my daughter said, it was crazy. I don't really like it. And I immediately felt so ashamed and embarrassed. And I don't know how to handle that. When your child does something wrong, that you know she should probably be more sensitive,

that maybe that would hurt somebody's feelings. If they say something that hurt somebody's feelings, what do you do? Like, I don't want to shame her, but I also want to be able to talk to her about it later and say, hey, you know, maybe, how would you feel if that happened to you? You know, I guess I'm just not sure how to handle that. When is the right point to tell her that that maybe wasn't the kind of thing to say? What would you do? Hi, Jen.

Thank you so much for raising a topic that is on so many of our minds. We hear a child say something and we think, oh, that wasn't so nice. Or, ooh, that might have hurt someone else's feelings. Or sometimes I think kids say things. And we're not even sure, is it really rude to say that? Or is it just that most of us by adulthood have been socialized not to say that? Right? Because in this case, it doesn't sound like it was the most hurtful thing in the world. It doesn't sound malintention, but it definitely leads to that kind of cringe as apparent as we think, oh, I know I don't say that to other people in my life.

And it makes me think about what is okay for my child to say. And when do we need to be more considerate of other people's feelings? So let's take all of that and think about how to turn those thoughts and ideas into a couple strategies. First things first, I think we need to create two different buckets of skills. What do we say in the moment to our child when they say something that could be perceived as hurtful? Or maybe we know is perceived as hurtful.

And what do we say to our child outside the moment? Our most bang for our book happens outside the moment. This is when our child won't feel judged. This is when we'll be less reactive. What it does require, Jen, is for us to be patient with our intervention. And I know, at least for me, that patience can sometimes be hard to find. So let me go over what I would say in the moment, and then some interventions for outside of that moment. In the moment, my child says, oh, I don't like your haircut, it doesn't look good, or I wouldn't want to cut my hair like that,

or you're wearing a green shirt, I don't like green at all, right? One of these types of comments. I think what I might do in the moment is first pause and notice the reaction of the other person, and then if the other person seems upset and my child doesn't notice, maybe give another frame for my child's comment. Here's what that might look like. So first my child says, oh, I don't like that haircut It looks kind of weird. I would first pause. That pause is so important and I know

It's actually really hard for me to do in real life do. Why is that important? I might see a teacher say back Oh, different strokes for different folks or oh It's kind of cool that I know I like my haircut this way, even if other people didn't. My child's teacher, or whoever my child's with, might have something at the ready to respond, might even be using this as a teaching moment, and if I come down harshly at my child, we don't say something like that. Look how upset your teacher is. We might be responding with reactivity, but we might not actually be attuned to what's happening in front of us. So taking a breath, pausing, collecting information allows us to determine

what would happen next. Now let's say I notice the other person actually is upset. I might just soften the moment a little bit. I might say, huh? Everybody gets to be in charge of how their hair looks. Or I might say, oh, look around. There's so many people in this class who have different color hair, who have different length hair, who have different styles. How cool is that to be part of a group of people? Who all look a little bit different? So I'm not shaming my child. I'm not lecturing my child. I'm kind of using the most generous interpretation, which is that my child's noticing a difference, reacting probably to the fact that someone else looks different from they do, which is a lot for a child to make sense of.

And based on that generosity, I'm just kind of softening the moment. Now what would I do outside the moment? What I wouldn't do, or what I would try to tell myself not to do, even though I might have the urge to do it, is go to my child and say, we don't say things like that, or even lead with how would you feel if someone said something like that to you? It's not that I don't want my child to build empathy. I actually very much do want to have my child build empathy. But kids don't learn empathy through a lecture or through any type of shaming.

And they also don't learn empathy by us kind of forcing it down their throat. How do kids learn empathy? They actually learn empathy for other people by absorbing empathy from other people. Kids who are treated with empathy, treat other people over time with empathy. What I would really be thinking about Jen is I'd wanna be teaching my child how to

think about moments where they notice differences versus exactly what to think. An intervention aimed at what to think would look like this. Hey, people have different haircuts and every haircut could look nice. That's a what to think. I'm giving my child an idea. I think we all know from growing up that parents can tell us certain ideas they don't necessarily stick. What does stick?

Learning how to think through things. So I might say this, and this is a kind of how to think intervention. What happens when you see someone who looks different from you? That's a little tricky, right? What happens when you saw someone who looks different from you. That's a little tricky, right? What happens when you saw someone with a different haircut? Hmm, I wonder if different. Kind of can just feel confusing sometimes because it's not what you're used to.

Ah, so when you notice something different, what could you do as you're noticing that, right? And then maybe where I'd go with my child is something like this. Well, you know, when I see something or someone that's different from me, sometimes I just try to take a deep breath and just notice it without saying that it's better or worse without saying that it's good or bad. I really just say, huh! That person doesn't look the same as me.

Huh, that person chooses clothes that are different from the clothes I choose. Huh, that person has hair that's totally different from my hair. One of the things we need to practice is noticing differences without judging them as good or bad or better or worse. That's tricky.

We'll keep practicing that together. And what I'm really doing there, Jen, is I'm teaching the emotion regulation skill that would allow my child to notice without reacting and notice without judging and noticing without judging is kind of the foundation for being able to notice with curiosity. Notice with interest. And I would trust that over time these moments, these kind of wondering together, would add up to allow my child to show up in a more regulated, less reactive way. less reactive way. Our final caller is Katie.

Hi Dr. Becky, thank you so much for sharing all of your wisdom both here on your podcast and on Instagram. My name is Katie and I have three boys. They're 8, 6, and 3 and we live in the Midwest. And I'm calling because we're having a tricky situation with my 8-year-old who also is a deeply-feeling kid. And he right now is going through a phase where he is trying to be funny, particularly while playing with some other 8-year-old boys in our neighborhood.

And it started out fine, and they were just kind of being silly eight year olds. But I've noticed lately that he has been picking on some of the younger kids in the neighborhood and being a little bit rude or inappropriate around some of the adults to get less from the other boys that he's playing with. And it's working. He's getting the last. But I would love some help to figure out how I can help him still try to be funny, but also be kind and respectful of other grownups. Hi, Katie.

Thank you so much for sharing this kind of evergreen topic with us. I am just thinking back to the various things I did growing up to try to get a laugh out of my friend or to try to feel like I was fitting in. And so I both identify with your son and I identify with you as I watch my kids try to figure out the same thing. And maybe that's just a good place to start. It's just reminding ourselves that we probably did so many of these things as well. And we probably don't do all of these things now, right?

My guess is many of us, when we were younger, tried out a wide range of behaviors to figure out our place. And some of them probably were not so proud of. And actually, my guess is going through those experiences helped us learn and change. And I'd also bet that when we're trying to figure out our place in a group today, we don't do the same kind of ridiculous things we did when we were eight and ten, right? And I think

the reason this perspective is important is we often have kind of this thought error with our kids. We see a behavior today. And instead of just noticing what's happening today and thinking about what our kid needs today, we fast forward their life. Maybe it's six months from now or if you're like me, you fast forward, six or 16 years from now.

And we essentially say, oh no, I don't want my kid to be a 16 year old who does these things. I can't want my kid to be a 16 year old who does these things. I can't have my kid being on a job doing these things, you know, with work colleagues, right? And what's important is to kind of tell yourself, oh, high fast forward. Let me rewind.

Nope. Keep rewinding. Keep rewinding. Keep rewinding. Come back to today. Today I have an eight year old. And he's actually doing something, although annoying, very developmentally appropriate.

He's trying out different strategies to figure out who he is in relationships with other people. Now, this brings in our role. Our role, I think, is to help our kids kind of look at the various things they do, be kind of critical consumers of their own strategies. So what would this look like? All right, let's say it's you and your son and it's after one of these moments you overheard. Just like I said to Jen, I would encourage you to think about change in the same way. Maybe there's something non-shaming I say in the moment, but the bulk of the

conversation is going to happen away from my child's peers. I don't think any of us like to get reprimanded or lectured by our parents in front of our friends, right? It just leads to a total shutdown state. Now, I would use the most generous interpretation when approaching your son. What do I mean by most generous interpretation or kind of MGI, right? That's what I like to call it because I try to think of it as often as possible in the acronym, makes it come to my head right away.

MGI, MGI, MGI. What's my MGI of my sons? Kind of inappropriate comments to get a laugh. I guess my most generous interpretation is that he doesn't have a ton of social skills. He's trying to get a laugh, like you said. He's figured out how to be successful, and he doesn't yet have a much better way to feel included and noticed and special beyond the rude comments he makes to other adults. Huh, whenever we use a most generous interpretation

We can usually activate our role as coach instead of a role of a Thartarian parent or kind of Punisher, right? What do I mean? Well, if my child doesn't have any other skills How is he gonna learn those skills probably not from a specific class except the class of life that you have with your parents in your home. So what would this look like in an intervention? Hey, you know what I'm thinking about? I'm thinking about how good it can feel to say something and have all your friends laugh, right?

You're not in trouble, I'm serious. I remember being eight honestly, even me in my age now. It's really fun to say something and get people to laugh because when people laugh, right, they kind of all look at you. You kind of feel noticed and special in that moment. And actually, most of us are trying to figure out how to feel noticed and special in a group of friends. So what I'm doing there is I'm setting a baseline of connection and kids and adults are the

same. When someone approaches a behavior of ours through the lens of generosity of connection, we feel safer with them and we're more willing to look at that behavior. So I think this gives you an opening to say something like this. Here's the thing. There are different ways we can get laughs from people. Some of them might be a little rude. Some of them could be a little hurtful to others.

And some of them, although this is tricky, might not be rude or hurtful, but could still get that laugh. I wonder what the difference is. Like maybe I'll play a game with you. You tell me rude, hurtful, neither rude nor hurtful, right? And then I would model it with him. Okay, let's say I'm with friends

and I'm at a restaurant and I see a waiter come and I say, get me my food right now. What do you think that would be in all my friends laugh? Right, I'm guessing my son would say, yeah, that's pretty rude. Actually, mom, maybe it's rude and hurtful. Oh, yeah, that's true. I got the laugh, but really don't like being rude

and hurtful to other people. Oh, tricky. Feels good I got the laugh, but really don't like being rude and hurtful to other people. Oh, tricky. Feels good to get the laugh. Doesn't feel so good the way I get it. Huh. I wonder if there's any other thing I could say to my friends that wouldn't be rude or hurtful, but might get a laugh. And now I'd brainstorm with your child, right?

And then I'd bring it back to your child in the situation they're in with their friends. So I'm thinking about when you're at Robbie's house and hmm, I guess one way to get a laugh is to say something a little bit rude, not so respectful to Robbie's mom. Hmm, how else could we get a laugh? And maybe then we do brainstorm about kind of a ridiculous joke grow away someone falls on the floor. And you can even say to your son, look, I get it. Sometimes friends laugh extra hard when you do something funny and rude, then when you just do something funny. And that's something we'll kind of have to keep figuring out together because over time, I'm probably not going to let you be places or I

feel like the type of funny people want from you makes you act in a way that's not really in line with what I know your values are. So maybe you could experiment or maybe we can experiment here doing something that is really funny and distilled respectful. I know we can figure this out together. Thank you Maggie, Jen and Katie for sharing stories from your home. Let's tie it all together with three takeaways. 1. M-G-I. takeaways. 1. M G I learn this acronym and let's all commit to applying it to as many interactions

as we can with our kids, with our partners, with our colleagues, with our friends, and actually starting with ourselves. What is the most generous interpretation of a not-so-ideal behavior? I just engaged in or my child just engaged in. So when it comes to our kids not so nice comments before talking to them, ask yourself, what's the most generous interpretation of why my child said this thing or did this thing. When we use MGI, we see our child as a good kid who is having a hard time or trying to figure something out, and from there we can intervene effectively. 2. We need skills in the moment of something difficult happening, and we need totally different skills outside of those moments.

In the moment, we always want to limit the damage, so if our child says something hurtful, we want to soften those moments. But remember, that's not where our child can learn. None of us could learn well if our boss was trying to teach us a lesson in front of our colleagues. We'd want to be talk to after, probably in the privacy of an office when both are boss and us calm down. Let's give our kids that same type of respectful treatment. Three, if your child struggles in social situations,

think about how to prepare them before those moments. Instead of only asking yourself, oh, what am I going to do if that thing happens? Remember, replace the phrase, don't do this with, huh, I wonder if you'll have the urge to and then whatever the behavior is. So instead of, don't say mean things to your friends when you're upset. Say instead, huh. If you feel left out on this playday, I wonder what it will be like. I wonder if you might have that urge to say something harmful because it feels so tricky. I wonder what we can do instead.

Thanks for listening to Good Inside. There are so many more strategies and tips I want to share with you. Head to Good Inside.com and sign up for Good Insider, my free weekly email with scripts and strategies delivered right to your inbox. And follow me on Instagram and Facebook at Dr. Becky at Good Inside for a daily dose of parenting and self-care ideas. Good Inside with Dr. Becky is produced by Beth Roe and Marie Cecil Anderson, an executive produced by Erica Belzky and me, Dr. Becky. If you enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to

rate and review it. Or share this episode with a friend or family member as a way to start an important conversation. Let's end by placing our hands on our hearts and reminding ourselves, even as I struggle, and even as I have a hard time on the outside, I remain good inside.