December 10, 2025 • 38 mins
In this episode, Jon digs into the real reason transitions feel so “impossible” for kids — not because they’re being dramatic, but because shifting out of a moment they love can feel like a genuine shock to their system. Through stories, neuroscience, and deeply relatable parent questions, he explores why task-switching is so hard for developing brains and how a “satisfying end” can change everything. Listeners walk away with clarity, compassion, and concrete ways to support their child through the chaotic in-between moments without power struggles or guilt.
To support the Podcast, Subscribe on Substack
- Get Jon’s Top Five Emotional Regulation Games
- Get Jon’s Book Punishment-Free Parenting
- Preorder Jon’s Children’s Book Set My Feelings Free
- Follow Whole Parent on
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Jon @WholeParent (00:00):
If you've ever tried to get your child out the
door, off the playground, intothe car, or just simply from
point A to point B, only to bemet with a tantrum or a shutdown
or a full body.
No, you're in the right place.
Because today we are talkingabout something that almost
every parent struggles with, whyeven the simplest transitions
(00:21):
can feel impossible for kids.
And why it's not about defianceor drama or knowing better.
In this episode, we're talkingabout exactly what's happening
inside your child's brain andbody when you ask them to make
that shift.
We're going to be looking atreal neuroscience of tasks
switching, the emotional cost ofleaving a moment that they love,
(00:44):
and the hidden hurdles thattransitions present for kids and
honestly for us adults too.
And by the end of today'sconversation, you'll know
exactly how to support yourchild through these chaotic
in-between moments without powerstruggles, guilt, or giving in.
Let's get into it.
(01:06):
So I often start these episodeswith kind of an anecdote for my
life, and I could give you amillion anecdotes with
transitions.
Actually, today I will give youone.
I was trying to get all of mykids out the door to go out to
dinner and to the library.
This was only three hours agonow, when I'm recording this.
And I can tell you that eventhat little act, I was like,
(01:28):
man, I don't know how I'm goingto do this because all of them
had just been on screens.
And so I knew that dysregulationwas like a guaranteed.
And so I was literally talkingto my wife about this.
Like, okay, do we just kind oflike put their shoes on and
their coats on when they're notpaying attention and then just
kind of usher them out the door?
Or what do we do?
Because I knew there's a veryhigh chance that we're going to
(01:50):
have a huge meltdown here.
And luckily, I was thinkingabout this episode because I
knew I was going to record ittonight, and I did one of the
emotional regulation games.
Um, we did Penguins Attentionand it just kind of got them all
into the mode of moving theright way.
And then uh totally went off therails because my kids found a
(02:11):
plastic bag full of lollipops.
And I don't know why it waswhere it was.
Actually, I do know I knowexactly why it was where it was.
It was because I just left itthere.
It had come out of one of thecars during clean out.
They had gotten them, I don'tknow, where, probably somewhere
in the last couple of weeks asthey do holiday stuff, and they
had found these lollipops andthen they were like, We want the
(02:32):
lollipops, and all of thedysregulation came back on
board.
And I am not ashamed to say Idefinitely gave every single one
of them a lollipop because itwas way easier than fighting
that power struggle in thatmoment with everything else that
was going on.
Boots were already on, coatswere already on, and the only
thing that I said was, Hey, uh,let's let's not make this ruin
(02:55):
our dinner.
Thankfully, it didn't.
That's kind of a myth.
One little lollipop's probablynot going to totally destroy
your life.
And so if you need thatpermission today to not fight
the battle, you have it from me.
Do not fight the battle.
But what I really wanted tostart the episode with,
actually, was this idea thatevery parent struggles with
(03:16):
transitions.
I have a quiz that I put out, Idon't know, probably two and a
half years now, maybe two yearsago.
And it's how to know if your kidis highly sensitive.
And this is kind of relevantbecause it kind of directly ties
into what I was talking about atthe end of the last podcast
episode with question numberthree.
And that kid was, in my mind,displaying a lot of tendencies
(03:39):
that were kind of typical highsensitivity things.
Well, struggling withtransitions is one of those
things.
And I marked on that quiz,anybody who filled out that quiz
and put in their email, I markedhow what percentage of those
people answered that question.
Does your child struggle withtransitions?
And you might be surprised,maybe you're not surprised.
(04:00):
I was surprised that over 70% ofthe parents who filled out that
questionnaire is your childhighly sensitive.
And this is thousands ofparents, by the way.
Over 70% of them, I think it waslike 73% of them, marked that
their child struggled withtransitions.
So if you feel like you're alonein this, I just want you to say,
(04:22):
just want you to know thatyou're not alone.
And in fact, one of my earlyquestions about how to manage
transitions came from none otherthan a parenting influencer on
TikTok.
I don't have that one as one ofmy questions today, but
literally one of the earlythings that happened to me when
I was first starting out onTikTok, when I was first giving
parenting advice, is thatanother parenting influencer
(04:43):
reached out and said, Okay,John, I'm supposed to be this
like parenting guru, but I can'tget my kid off of the
playground.
That's where that line off thepark comes from.
I cannot get my kid to leave theplayground ever.
And I walked her through a lotof the stuff I'm gonna talk
about in this episode, and shewas like, Man, this has totally
changed changed my relationshipwith her.
(05:04):
It has like completely reshapedmy experience of going to the
park with my daughter.
I used to dread it because Iknew the end would be so brutal.
And now I'm like, it's no bigdeal because we can manage that
transition together.
So I want to jump into thequestions and I want to kind of
touch along things along theway.
But the main thing for her, andI'll I remember this still, and
(05:26):
I'll talk about it a little bitas we as we go, was that there
had been a neural pathway builtup for that child that every
single time that we left thepark, there was a meltdown.
And that was just neurons thatfire together, wire together.
That's Heb's law.
It's a basic neuroscienceprinciple that uh basically we
are conditionable as people, ashuman beings, that we can be can
(05:47):
grow into patterns and habits ofevery single time we leave the
park, I have a meltdown orwhatever.
So, with all that said, if youfind yourself in really, really
struggling with tradition withtraditions, with transitions, as
you can see, holidays are on thebrain.
If you're struggling withtransitions, one, you're not
alone.
70 plus percent of the peoplewho have filled out my quiz
(06:09):
where I ask about that havesaid, yes, my kid struggles with
transitions.
Two, even the parenting expertsout there, the people who are
giving advice, often don't knowhow to do this.
And three, I'm guessing thatprobably in the midst of this
episode, you might realize, oh,I have allowed, and this is not
your fault.
Again, this isn't this is justwhat it is, and we can work
(06:31):
through it, but I have probablyallowed for a pretty negative
association with transitions tobe built.
So without do any further adoand no more gilding of the lily,
let's go to the question fromMaddie R from Instagram.
It is a direct message that Iwas sent, and it says, Okay,
John, I'm losing it over here.
My four-year-old absolutelyfalls apart anytime we have to
(06:54):
stop something.
Like we left the playgroundyesterday, and she literally
screamed the whole walk homesaying, You ruined my game.
Sounds exactly like that kidfrom a couple years ago.
And I'm standing there justlike, it's time to go.
I don't get why leaving the parkhits her like a truck, even
though I gave her a five-minutewarning.
(07:14):
I feel like other kids don'tfreak like this.
So, first and foremost, Maddie,what did I just say?
I want to repeat this again.
Other kids do freak like this.
This is a totally normaldevelopmental thing for a
four-year-old to do.
It's a normal developmentalthing for a five-year-old to do,
even a six-year-old to do.
(07:35):
I also want to highlight herethat you did the right thing in
giving the five-minute warning.
What I will say about that isjust as we talked about
yesterday in the episode thatwas about um just struggling
with waiting, kids have a reallywarped sense of time.
And so, five minutes to a kid,they're they're not actually
internalizing that.
(07:56):
So, what I prefer to do withkids is to say, okay, here's a
10-minute warning or afive-minute warning or whatever,
and then here's a two-minutewarning, and then here's a
one-minute warning.
You don't have to do theone-minute warning.
You can do just five minutes andone minute, or five minutes and
two minutes, you don't have todo all of them, but a more
closer to the time to go.
And then the last sentence isnot okay, it's time to leave.
(08:18):
It's okay, it's time to do ourlast thing on the way out.
And I think this would havehelped you remove that you
ruining the game thing.
And by the way, you didn't ruinthe game.
Games end on their own terms.
Sometimes they end becausepeople have to go home because
the streetlights go on, orwhatever, if it's you know, the
1990s, or it games end becausesomebody has to go home from the
(08:41):
park, or somebody gets hurt, orsomebody wants to stop playing.
You didn't ruin the game.
Don't internalize that.
It was just time to go, and youwere holding a boundary, and
that's an okay boundary to hold.
It's a good boundary to hold.
So the only little tweak I wouldmake to that whole thing is
saying, okay, five-minutewarning, add a second warning on
top of that, at two minutes orone minute, or whatever.
(09:02):
And then I would say, okay, wehave to do one more thing.
We have to finish what we'redoing before we go.
And this creates a literal inyour child's brain, a
conclusion.
It's like it's a satisfyingconclusion.
Imagine watching an episode of asitcom or maybe reading a book,
and you don't get to see theending.
(09:24):
Like the ending stops.
You're on an airplane.
I had this experience not toolong ago.
I was on a f on a flight.
It was an international flight.
I guess it was a long time agobecause it's been decades since
I've flown internationally.
But I was on a flight and we'reuh was one of those where you
can pick the movie that you wantto watch on the screen in front
of you.
(09:44):
I don't even know if they stilldo that, or if they just like
have you hook up to in-flightWi-Fi now.
But you could watch all thesedifferent movies, and and there
was a lot of movies on therethat I hadn't seen.
And you could pick your own andyou could start where you know
your movie whenever you wanted.
So it was kind of anindividualized media device on
the seat in front of you.
But when the plane started toland, when it started descending
(10:06):
or whatever, going in, I don'teven remember where exactly we
were when this was happening,but when it starts to descend,
they would shut the movie off.
And I had this experience oflike we're watching this movie,
and like we got kicked out of itbefore the movie ended.
You know what it was recently?
Now that I'm remembering this,it was like we had got hooked up
(10:27):
to the Wi-Fi and and we gotkicked out.
Anyway, I this is my tangent,but I'll tell you whatever that
movie was that I was watching,uh it felt pretty infuriating to
not have it come to a satisfyingconclusion because I had been
booted out of it right as theplane was coming down.
And so remember that that's whatit's like for your child who's
(10:48):
kind of in these reallybeautiful play state.
And play for kids is like flowstate.
It's it's where they do theirmost learning, it's where they
do their most development.
Uh, kids don't get nearly enoughplay already, not to seeing your
child, Maddie, but all childrendon't get enough play because
there's literally no limit tothe amount of play a child
should have.
(11:08):
They should have more play.
If you think you're giving yourchild enough play, just know
that with more play, they doeven better.
And so, with that all beingsaid, it can feel literally like
a micro crisis in their brain.
It can trigger the exact sameneural response as they're like
(11:29):
a threat to their system.
It's it's like a mini emergencythat they experience.
And so when we then come in andsay, it's no big deal, come on,
like I told you a five-minutewarning, or or you know, it's
it's just the park, we're gonnacome back tomorrow, whatever.
That actually invalidates thatexperience and it kind of pours
gasoline on that fire.
So the better thing to do, firstand foremost, is to say, okay,
(11:52):
do one more thing, give thatexperience a bookend.
And this is the same, by theway, if you're transitioning a
kid off of a tablet or somethinglike that, give that kid a
bookend.
That'll help them a lot.
So that's the first piece.
And then two, I would, you know,have given those additional
warnings before that.
Three, I would try and validatethe experience that, yeah, I
(12:16):
know it's frustrating when wehave to leave the park.
It just kind of gives voice andlanguage to that experience that
they're having.
If we say it's not a big deal,stop being, you know, so whiny
about it, which by the way, Ihave totally said that.
I have totally been in thatplace.
Uh, if we do that, then our kidis just gonna go, no, I don't
think you understand how big ofa deal it is.
And then, you know, then we canstart to move off of that like
(12:41):
process and move into somethingelse.
But the last tip that I'll giveyou, and I think this is a good
place to put this in theepisode, there may be uh
another, you know, time wherethis is important as well, and
I'll reference it again.
But this is a good place to useone of the emotional regulation
games if that satisfying enddoesn't land.
(13:02):
I I'll tell you, for a lot ofkids, like for example, this
influencer mom two years ago,she I think it was maybe three
years ago, I'm just thinkingback on this.
She actually said that simplytelling her daughter, do that
one last thing.
Do you want to go down the slideas the last thing?
She'd often give her a choice.
Do you want to go to the slidefor a last thing, or do you want
(13:22):
to go on the merry-go-rend forthe last thing or whatever?
And whatever her daughterdecided, then it felt like a
satisfying end, and then she'dgo running off to the car.
What we don't want to do is kindof do the opposite thing, which
is saying, All right, car'sleaving.
Like you've heard people do thatas well.
But that satisfying end canreally solve the problem.
But if it doesn't, you can useone of the emotional regulation
(13:44):
games.
And if you have not beenfollowing on social media on
TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook,I've been putting out daily
emotional regulation games forthe 20 first 25 days of
December.
You can feel free to use any ofthose.
You can also get my top fiveemotional regulation games in
the show notes below.
I link those to all of thepodcast episodes.
It's just a freebie, it's a PDFthat you can download.
(14:06):
Or you can buy my full emotionalregulation game guide, which is
uh 19 of my, or not 19, which is$19.
It's 25 of my best games.
And by the way, my wifeillustrated that.
She's an illustrator, and it's areally, really cool resource.
And so if you want all of yourmy emotional regulation games in
your pocket, you can get that aswell.
(14:27):
But I would pull out one ofthose emotional regulation
games, even if it's just one ofthe free ones that you found on
TikTok or whatever, or if it'sone or Instagram, this was an
Instagram DM, or if you downloadthe free five, I would use one
of those in those momentsbecause that can be a real
lifesaver.
Okay, so that's what I have forthat one, Maddie.
(14:48):
I think that you can build someneural pathways.
And I and I will say, kind of aswe continue to move through this
episode, I'm gonna keep sayingthis, you've probably built up
at this point a um a conditionedresponse that your daughter may
feel like melting down everytime she leaves the park because
maybe the transition wasn't goodfor a couple times in a row.
(15:09):
And then now she kind of goesinto that fight or flight state
of like, oh, I know what this islike.
When mom says it's time toleave, it's always terrible.
And I always have a meltdown ina tantrum.
And so then she starts to godown that path.
Until you break that with theemotional regulation game, with
the other tips that I've givenyou, you're going to keep seeing
(15:30):
the meltdowns no matter what youdo.
And that's because they're justkind of it becomes a
self-fulfilling prophecy.
They anticipate that they'regoing to, and this is all
subconscious, but theyanticipate that they're going to
have a meltdown.
And then, of course, they dohave a meltdown because they're
anticipating it.
Okay, my next one comes fromAdam.
It was an email in, and he says,My son is doing this thing
(15:51):
lately where he totally shutsdown.
It's not really a meltdown.
It's like he turns into astatue.
When I say something like, it'stime to get ready for school, he
stares at me and at the or atthe floor, and I'm just like,
hello.
I get mad because it seems likewe're always late.
Why does that one sentence stophis whole system?
(16:12):
It's not even a big thing.
I swear he was fine two secondsago playing with Legos or
whatever, and then nothing.
Okay.
So I kind of took this one and Isaid that this one was a
transition problem, but Adamdidn't really flame frame it.
I guess he sort of did as atransition problem.
He was more framing it of like,what do you do when your kid
doesn't want to go to school andjust freezes?
(16:34):
It was in response to one of myschool emails.
I actually think this is atransition problem.
And this is because kids'brains, especially six years
old, seven years old, five yearsold, preschool, four years old,
transitions actually cause a lotof like a shock to the brain.
(16:54):
And the reason why I say thatthey cause a shock to the brain
is because conscious attentionis something that children
struggle to intentionally put inone place or another.
Their attention is drawn bywhatever is novel or whatever is
interesting to them in thatmoment, or usually whatever
they're actively doing at thattime.
(17:15):
And so when what we're askingthem to do is to get ready for
school or anything else, leavethe park again is a great
example, or whatever transitionit looks like.
When we're asking them to dosomething, we're actually asking
them neurologically to do thislike rapid task switching, where
it's like you were doing thisthing and now you're going to go
do this thing.
And that's actually cognitiveflexibility that kids really
(17:39):
struggle to have.
What happens is they're in,they're they're they're in
what's called the default modenetwork, which is this kind of
inward system where they're justkind of you know, going about
their day, they're in flowstate, they're daydreaming,
whatever.
They're just thinking aboutthinking they're just having
they're they're in their ownworld.
And then all of a sudden youkind of focus them into the
(18:00):
executive mode network wherethey're they're they're fo
forcing themselves to betask-oriented and do like
executive functioning, the thenecessary steps to get ready to
go.
And that kind of shocked theirsystem, especially
neurodivergent kids.
I'm not saying your kids areneurodivergent, Adam, but all
kids kind of have certain uhqualities that make them seem a
(18:21):
little bit neurodivergentbecause neurodivergent adults
struggle with executivefunctioning as do most children.
And so that rapid switch betweenyou turning off the default mode
network and swapping over to cogconscious executive function
functioning can can feelstartling.
And kids need like a beat tounderstand that.
(18:43):
And so I don't know, and I'mmaybe I'm kind of stepping too
far into this question of whatI'm seeing going on.
I would ask clarifying questionsif I could.
But if you are in groupcoaching, the first question
that I would ask you is how longdo you wait when he is in that
frozen earth to kid, you know,state that before you start to
(19:05):
physically either you know movehim into the next thing or you
know, repeat yourself, hey, Isaid we gotta go.
Because in that moment, heprobably needs like three to
five seconds just to processyour request.
And if he's actively engaging insomething like Legos, which is
the example that you gave, whichis a very high-intensity
(19:27):
play-based activity, which isthey're very much so in flow
state, you may have tophysically put your hand on them
to get their attention beforeyou even give that request.
Because what he might be doingwhen he's freezing in those
moments is going, Oh, I knowsomething's being asked of me,
but my brain couldn't switchover to listening mode fast
enough to actually even hearthis stuff.
And so, a better like thing todo in this case would be to
(19:52):
intervene with kind of a microstep of moving them more out of
that default mode networkbecause.
Because what you're at risk ofis actually a huge meltdown.
Because being pulled away fromsomething that they're doing
that's that's in flow state isabsolutely feels like a survival
threat.
This is why I said in the lastone that being told to leave the
(20:14):
park can feel like a, you know,an emergency situation or it can
send your kid into fight orflight.
Same thing being told to stopdoing something that they feel
is adaptive.
And by the way, when kids areplaying with Legos creatively,
they're learning.
So you're you're pulling themaway from what their body is
trying to do in order to learn.
And ironically, we pull themaway so that we can send them to
a place where probably lesslearning actually functionally
(20:37):
happens.
But I'm not going to get on mysoapbox about that right now.
And so instead, we have tofigure out how we can give kind
of like an intermediary stepthere because moving directly
from this kind of high-intensityplay, which I'm saying high
intensity because of theneurological activity that's
going on, not high intensity asin like active play.
In some ways, active play iseasier to transition away from
(21:01):
than really, really rich defaultmode network, like you know,
flow state play that can happen.
So I would walk over and I wouldsay, Hey, can you hold on to
that Lego for me?
And can you bring that Lego overhere so that I can start to put
(22:53):
your boots on or so that you canput the boots on, or to put your
coat on, or to you know, getyour can you bring your Lego
over here?
Because then it kind of bringstogether those activities.
Like, oh, can we get your Legocharacter ready for school?
Can we uh oh, can we put yourLego character in his home
before we go to school?
(23:13):
So now I'm I'm engaging withthem at their place in their
moment.
And it's like that that you'reyou're kind of meeting them
where they are and you'releading them out rather than
kind of coming in with your ownagenda and they have to kind of
match your energy of whereyou're going.
And this, by the way, is exactlythe same hack that I say when
we're transitioning a kid off ofa tablet.
(23:36):
I'm I'm I'm not here to say thatkids should have tablets.
I'm also here to say, like, Ithink no tablets is much better
than any tablets, but I also amrealistic in that most parents,
their kid uses some sort ofdevice, whether it's watching
the TV or a tablet or even aphone, which I think is probably
the worst of the of them becauseit's so mobile and they can kind
(23:59):
of use it.
And because they get used tousing a parent's phone most
likely when they're little, itjust becomes a thing that we
lean on more and more and morewhen we're out at dinner or
whatever.
And it doesn't become like aonce-in-a-while thing, it
becomes like a regular uhmaladaptive coping mechanism for
any emotional distress that ourkid faces.
But it when you're getting a kidoff the tablet, the best thing
(24:21):
you can do is sit down next tothem and say, Oh, what are you
doing?
Show me what's going on.
Oh, tell me what's going on inthis show or show me what you're
building in Minecraft or orwhatever.
Because just like thatsatisfying bookend, telling you
what's going on actually snapsthem out of their play state and
they go into a different stateof thinking and and reasoning,
(24:41):
which is where they'reexplaining something to you.
So when you're offering him thatintermediary step of like moving
with the Lego to the next place,you're meeting him where he is
and you're leading him ratherthan you're just kind of barking
orders and he's like a deer inthe headlights because he's
having trouble because his brainis underdeveloped with that
rapid task switching from thisto that.
(25:03):
And I will say older kids tendto rapidly task switch more
easily because they have ahigher degree of anxiety for
being late typically.
They don't want to be late, andso they rapidly task switch as a
coping mechanism, but that's notnecessarily good either.
So I would just say the more wecan, and and also like I guess
(25:23):
this is maybe a the more to gowith that the morning episode
that I did a while back, andthat's why I was thinking about
this question because I wasgonna put it in that one.
But that question when we weretalking about mornings before, I
said just leave yourself moretime in the morning than you
think you need.
A lot of people can't do themicro step because they haven't
(25:44):
left themselves enough time todo it.
So that's what I would say.
If you can leave yourself alittle bit more time, you're
gonna be a lot better offbecause then you can do the
micro steps.
You don't wind up freezing hissystem with you know a cortisol
spike because you're tellinghim, hey, go do this right now.
And he's like, Oh, I don't evenknow what you're saying.
I just you just inter intervenedwith me, and I was in a
(26:06):
completely different fantasyworld.
And so that that's that's how Iwould lead with that.
And I got time for one morequestion, and so I'm gonna go to
Alyssa.
And this one came from uh themembership.
I have it inside the membership.
You can DM me.
And so Alyssa said that I couldshare this one with you.
She DM'd this one to me.
I said, hey, she says, Hey, doyou ever find that kids just uh
(26:30):
sorry, do you ever feel likekids should just be more
flexible?
I swear my daughter loses itover the tiniest shift.
I'm going like going from TV todinner.
Okay, so we just kind of talkedabout that a little bit.
I'm sitting here thinking, lifeis full of transitions, kid.
You're gonna have to learn this.
But then I catch myself snappingwhen I'm answering work emails
(26:50):
and someone asks me a question.
So maybe I'm not exactly as goodwith the flow as I'd like to be
either.
LOL, it feels hypocritical, butalso I genuinely don't know how
to help her without just forcingit.
Any thoughts on this at all?
Uh Alyssa, my first thought is Iam right with you.
When somebody it interrupts mewhile I'm making one of my whole
(27:10):
parent videos or responding toan email or recording the
podcast, I snap all the timebecause I get into these modes
of being in this flow state, ofcreating, of loving what I'm
doing.
And when you say you're not gowith the flow, what I say, what
I'm actually saying is you arein flow, right?
It's not that you're not go withthe flow, it's that you are
(27:32):
flowing.
And it's hard to move out offlowing into the other parts of
life, like going to dinner ordoing something boring.
And so the first thing that Iwould say is kind of everything
that I've said thus far, andmaybe I should have saved my
book and make a satisfying endto the thing now, but it's much
easier for all of us to breakfrom that when we have a
(27:55):
satisfying end to what we'redoing.
And so this is where the thingwith the kids interrupting, we
talked about this a couple daysago.
With kids interrupting, one ofthe things that we can do as
kids interrupt is we can say, Ineed to finish this and then I
want to listen to you, right?
Same thing with a kid in flowstate.
We actually should allow them totell us, hey, I need to finish
(28:16):
what I'm doing here and thenI'll go.
This is why giving a five-minutewarning can be helpful, because
maybe you give your child afive-minute warning, and if
they're actually able to pullthemselves out of it enough,
which, you know, I don't knowhow old your daughter is.
I don't remember.
I think I DM'd you and asked youwhy or what the age was, and
then we went back and forth alittle bit.
But when you have a child who'sa little bit older who can hear
(28:39):
that five-minute warning, theymight respond back with, I'm
gonna need more than fiveminutes.
And then we can say, okay, well,what stopping point can you get
to in the next five minutes?
How can we make this have asatisfying conclusion?
And I think that it's reallyhelpful to identify that you
yourself struggle with thisbecause as soon as I realized
how hard it was for me to switchoff of the tasks that I was
(29:01):
deeply engrossed in.
And again, we can use fancyterms here like hyperfixation.
What we really mean is just theperson is deeply engrossed in
what they're doing.
If we once we realize that wetoo struggle with that, we can
start to be the people who enterthat space with a degree of
empathy.
(29:22):
And we can, you know, do aregulation or a grounding
exercise ourselves and use thatin those moments to practice for
them.
And so what I would do with yourdaughter to increase flexibility
is number one, I'd have aconversation after the fact.
Hey, when we had to do thisshift, that was really hard for
you.
(29:42):
Life has a lot of transitions.
What are some things that we cando to transition?
And immediately I'd follow thatup with empathy of saying, you
know, I struggle with empathytoo.
I struggle with empathy too.
And I struggle with empathy.
I struggle with transitions too.
That is empathy.
(30:03):
And here are some of the timeswhen I struggle the most.
And you can start to identifysome of the things, right?
Is it surprising that yourdaughter snaps right before
dinner because when she'shungry?
Of course not.
We are more likely to snap andand not be able to be flexible
when our basic needs are notmet, when we're hungry, when
we're tired.
We have chronic stress in thiscountry.
(30:24):
We have chronic sleepdeprivation, we have c chronic
overstimulation from devices.
And I agree that I'm probably ahypocrite for saying that
because I put out a lot ofcontent for you to be consuming.
But I hope that the content thatI put out actually helps you to
slow down your life more thanspeed it up.
And so adults are modeling allof this to our kids that this is
(30:48):
just how we're supposed to be.
And if you are modeling that yousnap when you go off, then you
also have to model how you canprocess through those things
more effectively.
You have to model the regulationtechniques.
And so I would go back to thatgame guide again and I'd go,
okay, what grounding exercisefrom this can I appropriate for
(31:08):
myself?
Can I use myself so that inthose moments I can come to a
satisfying conclusion?
And if I can't come to asatisfying conclusion, I can
take some deep breaths, or I canblow a big bubble, or I can find
colors around the room, or I canuh feel the proprioceptive input
of the clothes on my skin and onmy body, or I can push against
(31:29):
the wall, I can do some heavywork, I can just do my stomping
or my breathing or my, you know,in for a count of four, out for
a count of five, like any ofthose things, intentional
activities that you can do, Iwould practice those things.
And I wouldn't even necessarilygo on and on teaching and and
you know, preaching a sermon toyour kid lecturing about how
(31:51):
they need to use these tools.
I would focus on fixing mytools, fixing me and fixing my
stuff.
And I'll tell you that in mypersonal experience, when I
stopped snapping at my kidsbecause I did the regulation
work to not snap over that typeof stuff, very quickly, I saw
(32:12):
the response that my kidsstopped snapping as much at me.
And so all of this was aroundabout way of saying
everything we've said so far inthis episode, but also modeling.
Also, if if you're coming fromthis place where you're
snapping, have that empathydrive you to doing the work
yourself.
You cannot do, you cannot askyour kid to do something that
(32:34):
you're unwilling to do yourself.
Like that's just unfair, andthey don't even have a developed
brain, and you do.
And so if you think it's toohard to regulate your emotions
when you're answering emails, orwhen you're hungry or tired, or
you know, when you don't want tostop doing an activity like
making a video for Instagram,that's my problem all the time,
right?
(32:54):
If you think that it's toochallenging for you, it's going
to be too too challenging forthem.
But in the same way, if youlearn how to make the old dog
that is your brain do some newtricks in regulating down before
you snap, you're gonna see howthat's immediately mirrored, not
(33:15):
immediately, but within a veryshort period of time, begun to
be mirrored by your kids.
And this is so, so important tounderstand because that empathy
piece is where a lot of thiscomes from.
And a lot of people parentsthink of empathy as just like,
oh, I just need to understandthat my kids are doing the best
that they can.
And I think that that's good.
I think that that's a good thingto think.
(33:35):
But it goes beyond that.
Understand that given if youwere in their circumstance,
you'd probably be doing the samestuff.
And you can fix that becauseyou're an adult now and you can
do a lot of this work.
And so that may be a challengeto you, but I if you're
listening to this, I really hopethat you can see this for what
it is, which is an encouragementand an opportunity to grow in
(34:00):
that way.
And I think that as a on thewhole, it will become much
better.
Okay, that's what I have for youin this episode about
transitions.
I hope that all of thesedifferent pieces, whether it's
finding a satisfying conclusionor understanding what's going on
in your child's brain when itcomes to switching activities or
modeling some healthy emotionalregulation activities for you or
(34:22):
your kids, or any of thesethings.
I hope that all of this stuffhas helped you to have some
ideas of what you can do thenext time that you're struggling
with a transition.
As always, check below for allof the notes and links to things
that I mentioned in the episode.
And yeah, that's what I got.
I hope you enjoyed it.
I'll see you next time.
(34:45):
Thank you again for listening tothis episode of the Whole Parent
Podcast.
If you are listening to thisright now, yes, you in your car
driving somewhere on a walk withyour kids, perhaps your kids are
melting down and you'relistening to this on your
headphones with the noisecancellation turned on.
Whatever you're doing whileyou're listening, doing the
dishes at night after your kidsgo to bed, I don't know.
(35:05):
That would just be me if I waslistening.
Stop right now.
I have three quick favors to askyou.
I promise they're not going totake you very long.
The first one, very, very easy.
Go in to wherever you'relistening to this podcast and
rate it five stars.
That's one, two, three, four,five stars.
The more five star reviews thatour podcast gets as we
accumulate episodes, the morelikely it is to be pushed out to
(35:27):
more parents who are searchingfor parenting podcasts to solve
their problems.
Whatever you got out of thisepisode, whether it was
something that to try with yourkids, whether it was a new way
to think about parenting, maybethis episode was not
specifically about a problemthat you're having, but you're
somebody in your life who'shaving this problem.
Go in and rate it five stars.
And if you have an additional 30seconds, that first one only
(35:49):
takes you 10 seconds.
If you have an additional 30seconds, just type a few words
for me to read.
I'd love to read, I'd love toread the reviews.
If there's something specificthat's helped you, write it out.
It helps me to know what weshould keep doing here on the
podcast, week in and week out.
The second question that I havefor you or request that I have
for you, favor, let's call it,is to share this episode with
(36:10):
somebody in your life who youthink could use it.
Uh, it might be a parent,another parent in your kid's
class.
It might be a sibling who hasyoung kids, maybe it's your
kid's teacher or a faith leaderin your life, whomever it is
that you think should have thisepisode of the podcast or any
episode of the podcast, send itdirectly to them.
I know it's vulnerable to sharepodcasts with people who you
(36:32):
might not have that close of arelationship with, or even more
vulnerable if you do have aclose relationship with them.
But I promise you, so many ofthe people who listen to this
podcast listened not becausethey followed me on social
media, but because they got apersonal recommendation from
somebody in their life who said,Hey, this guy has a way of
talking about parenting thatjust works for me.
You don't know if they listen toit or not, they might never
(36:53):
reply, but maybe, just maybe,they'll love the episode so much
that they become your newparenting partner out there in
the world, doing things the sameway that you are, and you might
have just made your newparenting bestie.
The last thing that you can dois definitely the biggest ask
from me, but it is to go over toSubstack.
That link is down below in thebio, and to subscribe so that
(37:14):
these episodes can keep comingto you.
Paid subscriptions on Substackis the only way currently that I
am being funded here on theWhole Parent Podcast.
That is the only money that Ireceive.
It is$5 a month.
I think that this podcast isworth the price of a coffee for
you.
If it's not worth the price of acoffee for you, obviously don't
do it.
But if you're extra cheap likeme, you can just subscribe
(37:36):
annually.
I know that you're gonna listenfor the rest of the year.
If you know that you're gonnalisten for the rest of the year,
just give me 50 bucks up front,and then you don't have to think
about it coming out of yourcredit card every single month.
Those are the ways that you cansupport me.
And as always, I think thatyou're a great parent already.
But I do hope this episode gaveyou something to make you a
little bit better.
Take care.
If you've ever tried to get your child out the
door, off the playground, intothe car, or just simply from
point A to point B, only to bemet with a tantrum or a shutdown
or a full body.
No, you're in the right place.
Because today we are talkingabout something that almost
every parent struggles with, whyeven the simplest transitions
(00:21):
can feel impossible for kids.
And why it's not about defianceor drama or knowing better.
In this episode, we're talkingabout exactly what's happening
inside your child's brain andbody when you ask them to make
that shift.
We're going to be looking atreal neuroscience of tasks
switching, the emotional cost ofleaving a moment that they love,
(00:44):
and the hidden hurdles thattransitions present for kids and
honestly for us adults too.
And by the end of today'sconversation, you'll know
exactly how to support yourchild through these chaotic
in-between moments without powerstruggles, guilt, or giving in.
Let's get into it.
(01:06):
So I often start these episodeswith kind of an anecdote for my
life, and I could give you amillion anecdotes with
transitions.
Actually, today I will give youone.
I was trying to get all of mykids out the door to go out to
dinner and to the library.
This was only three hours agonow, when I'm recording this.
And I can tell you that eventhat little act, I was like,
(01:28):
man, I don't know how I'm goingto do this because all of them
had just been on screens.
And so I knew that dysregulationwas like a guaranteed.
And so I was literally talkingto my wife about this.
Like, okay, do we just kind oflike put their shoes on and
their coats on when they're notpaying attention and then just
kind of usher them out the door?
Or what do we do?
Because I knew there's a veryhigh chance that we're going to
(01:50):
have a huge meltdown here.
And luckily, I was thinkingabout this episode because I
knew I was going to record ittonight, and I did one of the
emotional regulation games.
Um, we did Penguins Attentionand it just kind of got them all
into the mode of moving theright way.
And then uh totally went off therails because my kids found a
(02:11):
plastic bag full of lollipops.
And I don't know why it waswhere it was.
Actually, I do know I knowexactly why it was where it was.
It was because I just left itthere.
It had come out of one of thecars during clean out.
They had gotten them, I don'tknow, where, probably somewhere
in the last couple of weeks asthey do holiday stuff, and they
had found these lollipops andthen they were like, We want the
(02:32):
lollipops, and all of thedysregulation came back on
board.
And I am not ashamed to say Idefinitely gave every single one
of them a lollipop because itwas way easier than fighting
that power struggle in thatmoment with everything else that
was going on.
Boots were already on, coatswere already on, and the only
thing that I said was, Hey, uh,let's let's not make this ruin
(02:55):
our dinner.
Thankfully, it didn't.
That's kind of a myth.
One little lollipop's probablynot going to totally destroy
your life.
And so if you need thatpermission today to not fight
the battle, you have it from me.
Do not fight the battle.
But what I really wanted tostart the episode with,
actually, was this idea thatevery parent struggles with
(03:16):
transitions.
I have a quiz that I put out, Idon't know, probably two and a
half years now, maybe two yearsago.
And it's how to know if your kidis highly sensitive.
And this is kind of relevantbecause it kind of directly ties
into what I was talking about atthe end of the last podcast
episode with question numberthree.
And that kid was, in my mind,displaying a lot of tendencies
(03:39):
that were kind of typical highsensitivity things.
Well, struggling withtransitions is one of those
things.
And I marked on that quiz,anybody who filled out that quiz
and put in their email, I markedhow what percentage of those
people answered that question.
Does your child struggle withtransitions?
And you might be surprised,maybe you're not surprised.
(04:00):
I was surprised that over 70% ofthe parents who filled out that
questionnaire is your childhighly sensitive.
And this is thousands ofparents, by the way.
Over 70% of them, I think it waslike 73% of them, marked that
their child struggled withtransitions.
So if you feel like you're alonein this, I just want you to say,
(04:22):
just want you to know thatyou're not alone.
And in fact, one of my earlyquestions about how to manage
transitions came from none otherthan a parenting influencer on
TikTok.
I don't have that one as one ofmy questions today, but
literally one of the earlythings that happened to me when
I was first starting out onTikTok, when I was first giving
parenting advice, is thatanother parenting influencer
(04:43):
reached out and said, Okay,John, I'm supposed to be this
like parenting guru, but I can'tget my kid off of the
playground.
That's where that line off thepark comes from.
I cannot get my kid to leave theplayground ever.
And I walked her through a lotof the stuff I'm gonna talk
about in this episode, and shewas like, Man, this has totally
changed changed my relationshipwith her.
(05:04):
It has like completely reshapedmy experience of going to the
park with my daughter.
I used to dread it because Iknew the end would be so brutal.
And now I'm like, it's no bigdeal because we can manage that
transition together.
So I want to jump into thequestions and I want to kind of
touch along things along theway.
But the main thing for her, andI'll I remember this still, and
(05:26):
I'll talk about it a little bitas we as we go, was that there
had been a neural pathway builtup for that child that every
single time that we left thepark, there was a meltdown.
And that was just neurons thatfire together, wire together.
That's Heb's law.
It's a basic neuroscienceprinciple that uh basically we
are conditionable as people, ashuman beings, that we can be can
(05:47):
grow into patterns and habits ofevery single time we leave the
park, I have a meltdown orwhatever.
So, with all that said, if youfind yourself in really, really
struggling with tradition withtraditions, with transitions, as
you can see, holidays are on thebrain.
If you're struggling withtransitions, one, you're not
alone.
70 plus percent of the peoplewho have filled out my quiz
(06:09):
where I ask about that havesaid, yes, my kid struggles with
transitions.
Two, even the parenting expertsout there, the people who are
giving advice, often don't knowhow to do this.
And three, I'm guessing thatprobably in the midst of this
episode, you might realize, oh,I have allowed, and this is not
your fault.
Again, this isn't this is justwhat it is, and we can work
(06:31):
through it, but I have probablyallowed for a pretty negative
association with transitions tobe built.
So without do any further adoand no more gilding of the lily,
let's go to the question fromMaddie R from Instagram.
It is a direct message that Iwas sent, and it says, Okay,
John, I'm losing it over here.
My four-year-old absolutelyfalls apart anytime we have to
(06:54):
stop something.
Like we left the playgroundyesterday, and she literally
screamed the whole walk homesaying, You ruined my game.
Sounds exactly like that kidfrom a couple years ago.
And I'm standing there justlike, it's time to go.
I don't get why leaving the parkhits her like a truck, even
though I gave her a five-minutewarning.
(07:14):
I feel like other kids don'tfreak like this.
So, first and foremost, Maddie,what did I just say?
I want to repeat this again.
Other kids do freak like this.
This is a totally normaldevelopmental thing for a
four-year-old to do.
It's a normal developmentalthing for a five-year-old to do,
even a six-year-old to do.
(07:35):
I also want to highlight herethat you did the right thing in
giving the five-minute warning.
What I will say about that isjust as we talked about
yesterday in the episode thatwas about um just struggling
with waiting, kids have a reallywarped sense of time.
And so, five minutes to a kid,they're they're not actually
internalizing that.
(07:56):
So, what I prefer to do withkids is to say, okay, here's a
10-minute warning or afive-minute warning or whatever,
and then here's a two-minutewarning, and then here's a
one-minute warning.
You don't have to do theone-minute warning.
You can do just five minutes andone minute, or five minutes and
two minutes, you don't have todo all of them, but a more
closer to the time to go.
And then the last sentence isnot okay, it's time to leave.
(08:18):
It's okay, it's time to do ourlast thing on the way out.
And I think this would havehelped you remove that you
ruining the game thing.
And by the way, you didn't ruinthe game.
Games end on their own terms.
Sometimes they end becausepeople have to go home because
the streetlights go on, orwhatever, if it's you know, the
1990s, or it games end becausesomebody has to go home from the
(08:41):
park, or somebody gets hurt, orsomebody wants to stop playing.
You didn't ruin the game.
Don't internalize that.
It was just time to go, and youwere holding a boundary, and
that's an okay boundary to hold.
It's a good boundary to hold.
So the only little tweak I wouldmake to that whole thing is
saying, okay, five-minutewarning, add a second warning on
top of that, at two minutes orone minute, or whatever.
(09:02):
And then I would say, okay, wehave to do one more thing.
We have to finish what we'redoing before we go.
And this creates a literal inyour child's brain, a
conclusion.
It's like it's a satisfyingconclusion.
Imagine watching an episode of asitcom or maybe reading a book,
and you don't get to see theending.
(09:24):
Like the ending stops.
You're on an airplane.
I had this experience not toolong ago.
I was on a f on a flight.
It was an international flight.
I guess it was a long time agobecause it's been decades since
I've flown internationally.
But I was on a flight and we'reuh was one of those where you
can pick the movie that you wantto watch on the screen in front
of you.
(09:44):
I don't even know if they stilldo that, or if they just like
have you hook up to in-flightWi-Fi now.
But you could watch all thesedifferent movies, and and there
was a lot of movies on therethat I hadn't seen.
And you could pick your own andyou could start where you know
your movie whenever you wanted.
So it was kind of anindividualized media device on
the seat in front of you.
But when the plane started toland, when it started descending
(10:06):
or whatever, going in, I don'teven remember where exactly we
were when this was happening,but when it starts to descend,
they would shut the movie off.
And I had this experience oflike we're watching this movie,
and like we got kicked out of itbefore the movie ended.
You know what it was recently?
Now that I'm remembering this,it was like we had got hooked up
(10:27):
to the Wi-Fi and and we gotkicked out.
Anyway, I this is my tangent,but I'll tell you whatever that
movie was that I was watching,uh it felt pretty infuriating to
not have it come to a satisfyingconclusion because I had been
booted out of it right as theplane was coming down.
And so remember that that's whatit's like for your child who's
(10:48):
kind of in these reallybeautiful play state.
And play for kids is like flowstate.
It's it's where they do theirmost learning, it's where they
do their most development.
Uh, kids don't get nearly enoughplay already, not to seeing your
child, Maddie, but all childrendon't get enough play because
there's literally no limit tothe amount of play a child
should have.
(11:08):
They should have more play.
If you think you're giving yourchild enough play, just know
that with more play, they doeven better.
And so, with that all beingsaid, it can feel literally like
a micro crisis in their brain.
It can trigger the exact sameneural response as they're like
(11:29):
a threat to their system.
It's it's like a mini emergencythat they experience.
And so when we then come in andsay, it's no big deal, come on,
like I told you a five-minutewarning, or or you know, it's
it's just the park, we're gonnacome back tomorrow, whatever.
That actually invalidates thatexperience and it kind of pours
gasoline on that fire.
So the better thing to do, firstand foremost, is to say, okay,
(11:52):
do one more thing, give thatexperience a bookend.
And this is the same, by theway, if you're transitioning a
kid off of a tablet or somethinglike that, give that kid a
bookend.
That'll help them a lot.
So that's the first piece.
And then two, I would, you know,have given those additional
warnings before that.
Three, I would try and validatethe experience that, yeah, I
(12:16):
know it's frustrating when wehave to leave the park.
It just kind of gives voice andlanguage to that experience that
they're having.
If we say it's not a big deal,stop being, you know, so whiny
about it, which by the way, Ihave totally said that.
I have totally been in thatplace.
Uh, if we do that, then our kidis just gonna go, no, I don't
think you understand how big ofa deal it is.
And then, you know, then we canstart to move off of that like
(12:41):
process and move into somethingelse.
But the last tip that I'll giveyou, and I think this is a good
place to put this in theepisode, there may be uh
another, you know, time wherethis is important as well, and
I'll reference it again.
But this is a good place to useone of the emotional regulation
games if that satisfying enddoesn't land.
(13:02):
I I'll tell you, for a lot ofkids, like for example, this
influencer mom two years ago,she I think it was maybe three
years ago, I'm just thinkingback on this.
She actually said that simplytelling her daughter, do that
one last thing.
Do you want to go down the slideas the last thing?
She'd often give her a choice.
Do you want to go to the slidefor a last thing, or do you want
(13:22):
to go on the merry-go-rend forthe last thing or whatever?
And whatever her daughterdecided, then it felt like a
satisfying end, and then she'dgo running off to the car.
What we don't want to do is kindof do the opposite thing, which
is saying, All right, car'sleaving.
Like you've heard people do thatas well.
But that satisfying end canreally solve the problem.
But if it doesn't, you can useone of the emotional regulation
(13:44):
games.
And if you have not beenfollowing on social media on
TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook,I've been putting out daily
emotional regulation games forthe 20 first 25 days of
December.
You can feel free to use any ofthose.
You can also get my top fiveemotional regulation games in
the show notes below.
I link those to all of thepodcast episodes.
It's just a freebie, it's a PDFthat you can download.
(14:06):
Or you can buy my full emotionalregulation game guide, which is
uh 19 of my, or not 19, which is$19.
It's 25 of my best games.
And by the way, my wifeillustrated that.
She's an illustrator, and it's areally, really cool resource.
And so if you want all of yourmy emotional regulation games in
your pocket, you can get that aswell.
(14:27):
But I would pull out one ofthose emotional regulation
games, even if it's just one ofthe free ones that you found on
TikTok or whatever, or if it'sone or Instagram, this was an
Instagram DM, or if you downloadthe free five, I would use one
of those in those momentsbecause that can be a real
lifesaver.
Okay, so that's what I have forthat one, Maddie.
(14:48):
I think that you can build someneural pathways.
And I and I will say, kind of aswe continue to move through this
episode, I'm gonna keep sayingthis, you've probably built up
at this point a um a conditionedresponse that your daughter may
feel like melting down everytime she leaves the park because
maybe the transition wasn't goodfor a couple times in a row.
(15:09):
And then now she kind of goesinto that fight or flight state
of like, oh, I know what this islike.
When mom says it's time toleave, it's always terrible.
And I always have a meltdown ina tantrum.
And so then she starts to godown that path.
Until you break that with theemotional regulation game, with
the other tips that I've givenyou, you're going to keep seeing
(15:30):
the meltdowns no matter what youdo.
And that's because they're justkind of it becomes a
self-fulfilling prophecy.
They anticipate that they'regoing to, and this is all
subconscious, but theyanticipate that they're going to
have a meltdown.
And then, of course, they dohave a meltdown because they're
anticipating it.
Okay, my next one comes fromAdam.
It was an email in, and he says,My son is doing this thing
(15:51):
lately where he totally shutsdown.
It's not really a meltdown.
It's like he turns into astatue.
When I say something like, it'stime to get ready for school, he
stares at me and at the or atthe floor, and I'm just like,
hello.
I get mad because it seems likewe're always late.
Why does that one sentence stophis whole system?
(16:12):
It's not even a big thing.
I swear he was fine two secondsago playing with Legos or
whatever, and then nothing.
Okay.
So I kind of took this one and Isaid that this one was a
transition problem, but Adamdidn't really flame frame it.
I guess he sort of did as atransition problem.
He was more framing it of like,what do you do when your kid
doesn't want to go to school andjust freezes?
(16:34):
It was in response to one of myschool emails.
I actually think this is atransition problem.
And this is because kids'brains, especially six years
old, seven years old, five yearsold, preschool, four years old,
transitions actually cause a lotof like a shock to the brain.
(16:54):
And the reason why I say thatthey cause a shock to the brain
is because conscious attentionis something that children
struggle to intentionally put inone place or another.
Their attention is drawn bywhatever is novel or whatever is
interesting to them in thatmoment, or usually whatever
they're actively doing at thattime.
(17:15):
And so when what we're askingthem to do is to get ready for
school or anything else, leavethe park again is a great
example, or whatever transitionit looks like.
When we're asking them to dosomething, we're actually asking
them neurologically to do thislike rapid task switching, where
it's like you were doing thisthing and now you're going to go
do this thing.
And that's actually cognitiveflexibility that kids really
(17:39):
struggle to have.
What happens is they're in,they're they're they're in
what's called the default modenetwork, which is this kind of
inward system where they're justkind of you know, going about
their day, they're in flowstate, they're daydreaming,
whatever.
They're just thinking aboutthinking they're just having
they're they're in their ownworld.
And then all of a sudden youkind of focus them into the
(18:00):
executive mode network wherethey're they're they're fo
forcing themselves to betask-oriented and do like
executive functioning, the thenecessary steps to get ready to
go.
And that kind of shocked theirsystem, especially
neurodivergent kids.
I'm not saying your kids areneurodivergent, Adam, but all
kids kind of have certain uhqualities that make them seem a
(18:21):
little bit neurodivergentbecause neurodivergent adults
struggle with executivefunctioning as do most children.
And so that rapid switch betweenyou turning off the default mode
network and swapping over to cogconscious executive function
functioning can can feelstartling.
And kids need like a beat tounderstand that.
(18:43):
And so I don't know, and I'mmaybe I'm kind of stepping too
far into this question of whatI'm seeing going on.
I would ask clarifying questionsif I could.
But if you are in groupcoaching, the first question
that I would ask you is how longdo you wait when he is in that
frozen earth to kid, you know,state that before you start to
(19:05):
physically either you know movehim into the next thing or you
know, repeat yourself, hey, Isaid we gotta go.
Because in that moment, heprobably needs like three to
five seconds just to processyour request.
And if he's actively engaging insomething like Legos, which is
the example that you gave, whichis a very high-intensity
(19:27):
play-based activity, which isthey're very much so in flow
state, you may have tophysically put your hand on them
to get their attention beforeyou even give that request.
Because what he might be doingwhen he's freezing in those
moments is going, Oh, I knowsomething's being asked of me,
but my brain couldn't switchover to listening mode fast
enough to actually even hearthis stuff.
And so, a better like thing todo in this case would be to
(19:52):
intervene with kind of a microstep of moving them more out of
that default mode networkbecause.
Because what you're at risk ofis actually a huge meltdown.
Because being pulled away fromsomething that they're doing
that's that's in flow state isabsolutely feels like a survival
threat.
This is why I said in the lastone that being told to leave the
(20:14):
park can feel like a, you know,an emergency situation or it can
send your kid into fight orflight.
Same thing being told to stopdoing something that they feel
is adaptive.
And by the way, when kids areplaying with Legos creatively,
they're learning.
So you're you're pulling themaway from what their body is
trying to do in order to learn.
And ironically, we pull themaway so that we can send them to
a place where probably lesslearning actually functionally
(20:37):
happens.
But I'm not going to get on mysoapbox about that right now.
And so instead, we have tofigure out how we can give kind
of like an intermediary stepthere because moving directly
from this kind of high-intensityplay, which I'm saying high
intensity because of theneurological activity that's
going on, not high intensity asin like active play.
In some ways, active play iseasier to transition away from
(21:01):
than really, really rich defaultmode network, like you know,
flow state play that can happen.
So I would walk over and I wouldsay, Hey, can you hold on to
that Lego for me?
And can you bring that Lego overhere so that I can start to put
(22:53):
your boots on or so that you canput the boots on, or to put your
coat on, or to you know, getyour can you bring your Lego
over here?
Because then it kind of bringstogether those activities.
Like, oh, can we get your Legocharacter ready for school?
Can we uh oh, can we put yourLego character in his home
before we go to school?
(23:13):
So now I'm I'm engaging withthem at their place in their
moment.
And it's like that that you'reyou're kind of meeting them
where they are and you'releading them out rather than
kind of coming in with your ownagenda and they have to kind of
match your energy of whereyou're going.
And this, by the way, is exactlythe same hack that I say when
we're transitioning a kid off ofa tablet.
(23:36):
I'm I'm I'm not here to say thatkids should have tablets.
I'm also here to say, like, Ithink no tablets is much better
than any tablets, but I also amrealistic in that most parents,
their kid uses some sort ofdevice, whether it's watching
the TV or a tablet or even aphone, which I think is probably
the worst of the of them becauseit's so mobile and they can kind
(23:59):
of use it.
And because they get used tousing a parent's phone most
likely when they're little, itjust becomes a thing that we
lean on more and more and morewhen we're out at dinner or
whatever.
And it doesn't become like aonce-in-a-while thing, it
becomes like a regular uhmaladaptive coping mechanism for
any emotional distress that ourkid faces.
But it when you're getting a kidoff the tablet, the best thing
(24:21):
you can do is sit down next tothem and say, Oh, what are you
doing?
Show me what's going on.
Oh, tell me what's going on inthis show or show me what you're
building in Minecraft or orwhatever.
Because just like thatsatisfying bookend, telling you
what's going on actually snapsthem out of their play state and
they go into a different stateof thinking and and reasoning,
(24:41):
which is where they'reexplaining something to you.
So when you're offering him thatintermediary step of like moving
with the Lego to the next place,you're meeting him where he is
and you're leading him ratherthan you're just kind of barking
orders and he's like a deer inthe headlights because he's
having trouble because his brainis underdeveloped with that
rapid task switching from thisto that.
(25:03):
And I will say older kids tendto rapidly task switch more
easily because they have ahigher degree of anxiety for
being late typically.
They don't want to be late, andso they rapidly task switch as a
coping mechanism, but that's notnecessarily good either.
So I would just say the more wecan, and and also like I guess
(25:23):
this is maybe a the more to gowith that the morning episode
that I did a while back, andthat's why I was thinking about
this question because I wasgonna put it in that one.
But that question when we weretalking about mornings before, I
said just leave yourself moretime in the morning than you
think you need.
A lot of people can't do themicro step because they haven't
(25:44):
left themselves enough time todo it.
So that's what I would say.
If you can leave yourself alittle bit more time, you're
gonna be a lot better offbecause then you can do the
micro steps.
You don't wind up freezing hissystem with you know a cortisol
spike because you're tellinghim, hey, go do this right now.
And he's like, Oh, I don't evenknow what you're saying.
I just you just inter intervenedwith me, and I was in a
(26:06):
completely different fantasyworld.
And so that that's that's how Iwould lead with that.
And I got time for one morequestion, and so I'm gonna go to
Alyssa.
And this one came from uh themembership.
I have it inside the membership.
You can DM me.
And so Alyssa said that I couldshare this one with you.
She DM'd this one to me.
I said, hey, she says, Hey, doyou ever find that kids just uh
(26:30):
sorry, do you ever feel likekids should just be more
flexible?
I swear my daughter loses itover the tiniest shift.
I'm going like going from TV todinner.
Okay, so we just kind of talkedabout that a little bit.
I'm sitting here thinking, lifeis full of transitions, kid.
You're gonna have to learn this.
But then I catch myself snappingwhen I'm answering work emails
(26:50):
and someone asks me a question.
So maybe I'm not exactly as goodwith the flow as I'd like to be
either.
LOL, it feels hypocritical, butalso I genuinely don't know how
to help her without just forcingit.
Any thoughts on this at all?
Uh Alyssa, my first thought is Iam right with you.
When somebody it interrupts mewhile I'm making one of my whole
(27:10):
parent videos or responding toan email or recording the
podcast, I snap all the timebecause I get into these modes
of being in this flow state, ofcreating, of loving what I'm
doing.
And when you say you're not gowith the flow, what I say, what
I'm actually saying is you arein flow, right?
It's not that you're not go withthe flow, it's that you are
(27:32):
flowing.
And it's hard to move out offlowing into the other parts of
life, like going to dinner ordoing something boring.
And so the first thing that Iwould say is kind of everything
that I've said thus far, andmaybe I should have saved my
book and make a satisfying endto the thing now, but it's much
easier for all of us to breakfrom that when we have a
(27:55):
satisfying end to what we'redoing.
And so this is where the thingwith the kids interrupting, we
talked about this a couple daysago.
With kids interrupting, one ofthe things that we can do as
kids interrupt is we can say, Ineed to finish this and then I
want to listen to you, right?
Same thing with a kid in flowstate.
We actually should allow them totell us, hey, I need to finish
(28:16):
what I'm doing here and thenI'll go.
This is why giving a five-minutewarning can be helpful, because
maybe you give your child afive-minute warning, and if
they're actually able to pullthemselves out of it enough,
which, you know, I don't knowhow old your daughter is.
I don't remember.
I think I DM'd you and asked youwhy or what the age was, and
then we went back and forth alittle bit.
But when you have a child who'sa little bit older who can hear
(28:39):
that five-minute warning, theymight respond back with, I'm
gonna need more than fiveminutes.
And then we can say, okay, well,what stopping point can you get
to in the next five minutes?
How can we make this have asatisfying conclusion?
And I think that it's reallyhelpful to identify that you
yourself struggle with thisbecause as soon as I realized
how hard it was for me to switchoff of the tasks that I was
(29:01):
deeply engrossed in.
And again, we can use fancyterms here like hyperfixation.
What we really mean is just theperson is deeply engrossed in
what they're doing.
If we once we realize that wetoo struggle with that, we can
start to be the people who enterthat space with a degree of
empathy.
(29:22):
And we can, you know, do aregulation or a grounding
exercise ourselves and use thatin those moments to practice for
them.
And so what I would do with yourdaughter to increase flexibility
is number one, I'd have aconversation after the fact.
Hey, when we had to do thisshift, that was really hard for
you.
(29:42):
Life has a lot of transitions.
What are some things that we cando to transition?
And immediately I'd follow thatup with empathy of saying, you
know, I struggle with empathytoo.
I struggle with empathy too.
And I struggle with empathy.
I struggle with transitions too.
That is empathy.
(30:03):
And here are some of the timeswhen I struggle the most.
And you can start to identifysome of the things, right?
Is it surprising that yourdaughter snaps right before
dinner because when she'shungry?
Of course not.
We are more likely to snap andand not be able to be flexible
when our basic needs are notmet, when we're hungry, when
we're tired.
We have chronic stress in thiscountry.
(30:24):
We have chronic sleepdeprivation, we have c chronic
overstimulation from devices.
And I agree that I'm probably ahypocrite for saying that
because I put out a lot ofcontent for you to be consuming.
But I hope that the content thatI put out actually helps you to
slow down your life more thanspeed it up.
And so adults are modeling allof this to our kids that this is
(30:48):
just how we're supposed to be.
And if you are modeling that yousnap when you go off, then you
also have to model how you canprocess through those things
more effectively.
You have to model the regulationtechniques.
And so I would go back to thatgame guide again and I'd go,
okay, what grounding exercisefrom this can I appropriate for
(31:08):
myself?
Can I use myself so that inthose moments I can come to a
satisfying conclusion?
And if I can't come to asatisfying conclusion, I can
take some deep breaths, or I canblow a big bubble, or I can find
colors around the room, or I canuh feel the proprioceptive input
of the clothes on my skin and onmy body, or I can push against
(31:29):
the wall, I can do some heavywork, I can just do my stomping
or my breathing or my, you know,in for a count of four, out for
a count of five, like any ofthose things, intentional
activities that you can do, Iwould practice those things.
And I wouldn't even necessarilygo on and on teaching and and
you know, preaching a sermon toyour kid lecturing about how
(31:51):
they need to use these tools.
I would focus on fixing mytools, fixing me and fixing my
stuff.
And I'll tell you that in mypersonal experience, when I
stopped snapping at my kidsbecause I did the regulation
work to not snap over that typeof stuff, very quickly, I saw
(32:12):
the response that my kidsstopped snapping as much at me.
And so all of this was aroundabout way of saying
everything we've said so far inthis episode, but also modeling.
Also, if if you're coming fromthis place where you're
snapping, have that empathydrive you to doing the work
yourself.
You cannot do, you cannot askyour kid to do something that
(32:34):
you're unwilling to do yourself.
Like that's just unfair, andthey don't even have a developed
brain, and you do.
And so if you think it's toohard to regulate your emotions
when you're answering emails, orwhen you're hungry or tired, or
you know, when you don't want tostop doing an activity like
making a video for Instagram,that's my problem all the time,
right?
(32:54):
If you think that it's toochallenging for you, it's going
to be too too challenging forthem.
But in the same way, if youlearn how to make the old dog
that is your brain do some newtricks in regulating down before
you snap, you're gonna see howthat's immediately mirrored, not
(33:15):
immediately, but within a veryshort period of time, begun to
be mirrored by your kids.
And this is so, so important tounderstand because that empathy
piece is where a lot of thiscomes from.
And a lot of people parentsthink of empathy as just like,
oh, I just need to understandthat my kids are doing the best
that they can.
And I think that that's good.
I think that that's a good thingto think.
(33:35):
But it goes beyond that.
Understand that given if youwere in their circumstance,
you'd probably be doing the samestuff.
And you can fix that becauseyou're an adult now and you can
do a lot of this work.
And so that may be a challengeto you, but I if you're
listening to this, I really hopethat you can see this for what
it is, which is an encouragementand an opportunity to grow in
(34:00):
that way.
And I think that as a on thewhole, it will become much
better.
Okay, that's what I have for youin this episode about
transitions.
I hope that all of thesedifferent pieces, whether it's
finding a satisfying conclusionor understanding what's going on
in your child's brain when itcomes to switching activities or
modeling some healthy emotionalregulation activities for you or
(34:22):
your kids, or any of thesethings.
I hope that all of this stuffhas helped you to have some
ideas of what you can do thenext time that you're struggling
with a transition.
As always, check below for allof the notes and links to things
that I mentioned in the episode.
And yeah, that's what I got.
I hope you enjoyed it.
I'll see you next time.
(34:45):
Thank you again for listening tothis episode of the Whole Parent
Podcast.
If you are listening to thisright now, yes, you in your car
driving somewhere on a walk withyour kids, perhaps your kids are
melting down and you'relistening to this on your
headphones with the noisecancellation turned on.
Whatever you're doing whileyou're listening, doing the
dishes at night after your kidsgo to bed, I don't know.
(35:05):
That would just be me if I waslistening.
Stop right now.
I have three quick favors to askyou.
I promise they're not going totake you very long.
The first one, very, very easy.
Go in to wherever you'relistening to this podcast and
rate it five stars.
That's one, two, three, four,five stars.
The more five star reviews thatour podcast gets as we
accumulate episodes, the morelikely it is to be pushed out to
(35:27):
more parents who are searchingfor parenting podcasts to solve
their problems.
Whatever you got out of thisepisode, whether it was
something that to try with yourkids, whether it was a new way
to think about parenting, maybethis episode was not
specifically about a problemthat you're having, but you're
somebody in your life who'shaving this problem.
Go in and rate it five stars.
And if you have an additional 30seconds, that first one only
(35:49):
takes you 10 seconds.
If you have an additional 30seconds, just type a few words
for me to read.
I'd love to read, I'd love toread the reviews.
If there's something specificthat's helped you, write it out.
It helps me to know what weshould keep doing here on the
podcast, week in and week out.
The second question that I havefor you or request that I have
for you, favor, let's call it,is to share this episode with
(36:10):
somebody in your life who youthink could use it.
Uh, it might be a parent,another parent in your kid's
class.
It might be a sibling who hasyoung kids, maybe it's your
kid's teacher or a faith leaderin your life, whomever it is
that you think should have thisepisode of the podcast or any
episode of the podcast, send itdirectly to them.
I know it's vulnerable to sharepodcasts with people who you
(36:32):
might not have that close of arelationship with, or even more
vulnerable if you do have aclose relationship with them.
But I promise you, so many ofthe people who listen to this
podcast listened not becausethey followed me on social
media, but because they got apersonal recommendation from
somebody in their life who said,Hey, this guy has a way of
talking about parenting thatjust works for me.
You don't know if they listen toit or not, they might never
(36:53):
reply, but maybe, just maybe,they'll love the episode so much
that they become your newparenting partner out there in
the world, doing things the sameway that you are, and you might
have just made your newparenting bestie.
The last thing that you can dois definitely the biggest ask
from me, but it is to go over toSubstack.
That link is down below in thebio, and to subscribe so that
(37:14):
these episodes can keep comingto you.
Paid subscriptions on Substackis the only way currently that I
am being funded here on theWhole Parent Podcast.
That is the only money that Ireceive.
It is$5 a month.
I think that this podcast isworth the price of a coffee for
you.
If it's not worth the price of acoffee for you, obviously don't
do it.
But if you're extra cheap likeme, you can just subscribe
(37:36):
annually.
I know that you're gonna listenfor the rest of the year.
If you know that you're gonnalisten for the rest of the year,
just give me 50 bucks up front,and then you don't have to think
about it coming out of yourcredit card every single month.
Those are the ways that you cansupport me.
And as always, I think thatyou're a great parent already.
But I do hope this episode gaveyou something to make you a
little bit better.
Take care.
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
The Brothers Ortiz
The Brothers Ortiz is the story of two brothers–both successful, but in very different ways. Gabe Ortiz becomes a third-highest ranking officer in all of Texas while his younger brother Larry climbs the ranks in Puro Tango Blast, a notorious Texas Prison gang. Gabe doesn’t know all the details of his brother’s nefarious dealings, and he’s made a point not to ask, to protect their relationship. But when Larry is murdered during a home invasion in a rented beach house, Gabe has no choice but to look into what happened that night. To solve Larry’s murder, Gabe, and the whole Ortiz family, must ask each other tough questions.