March 5, 2024 • 50 mins
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Conquering Bedtime Battles
Every parent has felt that tug at their heartstrings when they have to leave a child who's clinging to them, pleading for just one more hug. That's the moment you wish you had a magic wand to ease those tears and fears.
Join me as I guide you through the emotional landscape of separation anxiety in children, exploring its nuances across ages two, three, and six. We'll unwrap the layers of this complex issue, offering a blend of professional expertise and personal experiences that will arm you with strategies to help your child build security and independence.
You'll discover that the delicate balance between fostering resilience and providing comfort isn't just about toughing it out or giving in—it's about the dance of attachment and development. We discuss the importance of the non-preferred parent's role, the power of comfort objects, and the gradual exercises you can employ to strengthen your child’s coping skills.
These are the small, achievable victories that can lead to big changes, and we'll explore how to create these opportunities within the rhythm of your everyday life.
As we round out this heartfelt conversation, we'll focus on the importance of establishing a solid foundation for your child's emotional well-being. From the reassuring rituals that cement secure attachments, to innovative techniques like role-play and 'yes and parenting,' we'll cover methods to validate and reassure your child through transitions.
And for families navigating the complexities of divorce or simply day-to-day goodbyes, we provide guidance to ensure your child feels the stability and love needed to thrive. So, whether your little one clings to your leg or waves goodbye with confidence, this episode is your companion in nurturing their growth every step of the way.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I know that when you get home whether you just
commuter to the train orwhatever it can feel like, you
know what.
I got to just go upstairs, Igot to.
You know, take my work clothesoff.
I got to put my work clothes on.
Whatever it feels like.
You know, I got to go to thebathroom right when I get home,
like whatever the thing is thatyou feel like I have to do this
right when I get home.
I want you to take that.
(00:21):
I want you to say I can do thatfive minutes after I get home,
but for the first five minutes,deeply connect with your kids
and this is going to help.
So much separation anxiety.
It's a brand new day.
Wake up every morning and sayit's a brand new day.
Take a good day, make it great.
(00:43):
Okay, hello and welcome to thewhole parent podcast.
My name is John and I am atwhole parent on all the social
medias.
This is the podcast that isdesigned to help you parent more
effectively, with confidence,and raise resilient and healthy
kids.
Today, on the episode, we aregoing to be talking about one of
the most popular questions thatI get all the time what do I do
(01:06):
with separation anxiety?
How do I help my child dealwith separation anxiety and we
are going to talk a little bitabout some different aspects of
separation anxiety.
I'm also going to link in theshow notes that, if you want to
specifically have an episodeabout bedtime, we had one of our
first episodes I think it mighteven been the second episode
(01:28):
ever of the whole parent podcastwas about bedtime and referred
to some separation anxietyrelated to bedtime.
Also, just in general handlinganxiety things.
There's another episode on thattoo.
So as we continue to build upour repertoire in our library of
podcast episodes, I stronglyrecommend that you go back and
you listen to some previousepisodes, because I'm going to
(01:49):
try not to go over the samethings over and over again in
the same pieces of advice, butit may relate to one piece of
advice or another, and the samething is true with the sleep
episode.
So we had a whole notherepisode Our first guest episode
all about sleep, and we havemore awesome guest episodes
coming up soon, and so thatepisode is another one that you
(02:09):
can go to to think about sleep.
But I want to talk aboutseparation anxiety and today, on
the episode, what we're goingto do is we're going to go
through three different types ofseparation anxiety.
Three questions, as we alwaysdo, from parents just like you,
and the first one is for a twoyear old and the next one's for
a three year old and then,lastly, an older child.
I believe they're six years old, yep, six years old.
(02:29):
So we're going to be goingthrough all three of those and
we'll take a little break in themiddle just to let you know how
you can support the podcast.
But before that, let's get intothe first question, which comes
from Shannon.
Shannon says hi, I'm Shannon.
I'm really struggling with mytwo year old daughter, who has
developed severe separationanxiety.
Whenever I try and leave her,whether it's for work or just
(02:50):
run a quick errand she becomesextremely distressed and clingy.
I've tried various strategiesto help her feel more secure,
but nothing seems to be working.
Help, shannon, I am right herewith you.
I totally understand how youfeel.
I am not the person in my familywho tends to have the
separation anxiety issues withmy own children, but I have
(03:13):
definitely been through thiswith my wife as it relates to
our kids.
So we have had three kids whohave been two years old at some
point.
One of them is two years oldright now, and I am right with
you in that this can be such astressful thing, especially as a
parent, where you feel like man.
There are things that I have todo, right, not just from a
practical standpoint there areplaces that you have to go,
(03:34):
there are errands that you haveto run but also just from a
mental health standpoint.
Right, we can't constantly besurrounded by our kids 24 hours
a day.
Parenting is, by all respects,a full-time job, an eternal job,
seemingly.
You just kind of, once you're aparent, you're never not a
parent, but we need that timealone, and so I totally
understand where you're gettingto with this, and it's really
(03:56):
easy to feel like man.
But I could just never be awayfrom my kids, right, I could
just do all those errands or Icould just practice self-care
when my kid is asleep.
And I actually don't think andfrom the experts that I've
spoken to about this that is notthe best way to approach this.
I do think that we wereexperiencing a little bit of a
(04:18):
pendulum swing, where in thepast, especially in the 80s and
90s, there was this very, veryhigh premium placed on
independence in young children,and that was, in many ways a
reaction response to the 1940sand the 1930s and just going way
back to the post-Victorianchild-during practices of the
(04:40):
first half of the 20th century.
What you have is this extremeaversion of trying to build in
condition in by-behaviorists,total and complete individual
self-sufficiency in very youngchildren two years old, even
younger, six months old and thisis where you get a lot of those
behaviorists who said reallyhorrible things and gave really
(05:03):
really poor advice that we nowknow from psychology and
longitudinal studies did notwork effectively.
Our goal should not be to raisecompletely independent kids.
However, we're experiencing alot of times a pendulum swing
from that.
So where that was on oneextreme, now we're experiencing
a little bit of the otherextreme, because parents are so
(05:27):
I don't want to say attuned,because that's not really the
word, but so unwilling to allowtheir child to express any
frustration or any distresswhatsoever related to separation
, related to being away fromtheir parents.
That actually what winds uphappening is that you condition
your kids to do the opposite.
So one of the most importantthings that you can do as a
(05:49):
parent is to actually work withyour child so that they can move
towards a more robust view ofattachment which sees them
attaching to multiple people,not just you, and is that going
to create some dissonance anddisconnection?
Will it feel that way?
Will there be some tears?
Will it feel challenging attimes?
(06:11):
Yes, but what we know aboutattachment is that attachment is
as much about how we prepareour children for long-term
mental, emotional, relationalhealth as it is the things that
we do in individual moments, andso we're going to talk about a
couple of things here that canreally really help with
separation anxiety.
But there is also going to be alevel of parental movement that
(06:33):
has to happen.
So if you're totally andcompletely unable to hear your
child in any sort of distress,for you want you and then not
immediately go to them, that'ssomething that you're going to
have to work on as well, right,and so I am totally the type of
parent personally who, when mykid cries for me, I go to them,
and so don't hear me saying thatI'm not going to advocate for
any sort of extinction methodwhere you're just going to let
(06:56):
your kid cry for you, you know,for a long time and not help
them and not go to them.
I'm not saying that at all.
But there is going to be somedifficulty and some frustration
and some level of distress inyour kids, because they do want
to be with you 100% of the timeand that isn't feasible.
And so as we go through thesethree kind of things and as we
(07:18):
continue on this is true for allthe parents, not just for
Shannon but for anybody who'sstruggling with separation,
anxiety in your child they aregoing to have to learn to build
up a little bit of a toleranceto that separation.
So what we're going to do iswe're not going to erase this,
we're not going to magically fixthis.
It's not going to fix itselfovernight Again.
We're not going for theextinction method of just like
(07:40):
we're going to let them screamand cry for us until eventually
they just get over it and kindof become numb to our absence.
We're going to go through some,some really consistent things
that work well, without feelinglike man, I'm totally abandoning
, abandoning my child.
But if you're like I can't doany of it, I can't allow my
child to want me at all and notgo to them, then this is going
to be challenging for you,without a doubt.
(08:01):
So let's kind of go through acouple of things that I might,
that might help, and the firstone is to understand that small
wins in parenting and this is auniversal parenting truth but
small wins in parenting becomebig wins in parenting over time.
So if you want to help yourchild do anything frustrating,
it starts by small stepsbecoming slightly larger steps
(08:25):
becoming big steps.
Now sometimes kids in, forwhatever reason, whatever
they're learning or whateverthey're, you know, working
toward it, can feel like man.
It's not, it's not a lineargrowth and that's a normal thing
.
That's a normal thing intochild development, it's a
totally normal thing ineducation.
Educators have known this andchild education specialists have
(08:48):
known this for a long time.
You know, when your child'slearning how to read, it doesn't
tend to be like a linear thing.
They don't learn.
You know what?
They don't get 1% better everysingle day.
Sometimes it feels like theyhave made no progress for a week
.
Sometimes it means it feelslike they've made and this is
the same thing with trying toget some acclimation to
separation.
It feels like they have noprogress in a week.
Sometimes it feels like they'reworse this week than they were
(09:10):
last week.
We're going to kind of get intothat here in a moment with our
next question, but but over time, over the aggregate, when you
look at it.
Step back and take the longview.
You'll see that thatprogression does happen.
Some days it'll feel like man.
Yesterday they were strugglingand struggling.
They hadn't made any stepstowards feeling connected and
secure, and then all of a suddentoday it's like night and day.
(09:32):
That can happen.
And so take the long view.
Understand that you're not goingto win this battle in a matter
of moments or days or orindividual things.
We're going to go for thegradual approach and to do this
effectively.
You are literally going to setdown times when you're going to
separate from your child, evenif it means you leave the house,
(09:53):
you go sit in the car for fiveminutes and then you come right
back in For short periods oftime.
And this kind of goes back toour bedtime episode as well,
where they're going to haveshort wins where they feel like,
okay, I can do this Now.
This is especially true forlittle kids, but it is no less
true for older kids.
Small wins turn into big wins,and so my first step if I had a
(10:15):
child who had severe separationanxiety could not let watch me
walk out the door, could notwatch, let me be gone for any
period of time.
And, by the way, like I said, Imight not be that person, but my
kids have definitely felt thatway about my wife, and so I've
navigated this from the insideright, I've been the one inside,
I've been the securely attached, non-preferred parent who's
trying to navigate this at homewhile my wife is at work or away
(10:39):
or whatever.
And so just understand, I'vebeen there, I totally understand
it.
I don't necessarily, I can'ttotally and completely empathize
what it's like to be the parentwho has to walk out.
You know, I've had that happena couple of times, but not near
with any sort of consistency,and so I don't want to make it
sound like you know, I know youwhen I can only imagine what it
would be like.
I haven't experienced it, but Ihave been the parent on the
(11:01):
inside and so maybe that'shelpful as well.
So the first thing I would dois I would literally, like I
said, set a time and anticipateI'm not actually going to go
anywhere.
I'm going to go, sit in the carfor five minutes and then I'm
going to come back.
Or I'm going to go, get in thecar and I'm going to drive
around the block and thenliterally park back in the car,
like however you want to do itright If you want your child to
(11:23):
physically see your car goingaway, because maybe they're not
two, maybe they're three or four, and that would be helpful for
them so that they don't knowthat you're just sitting there.
One of the things that I'lloften recommend to parents who
are struggling with separationanxiety is that if one of the
parents is who they're, whothey're asking for, if they know
that they're specifically inthe home, somewhere they're in a
bedroom, upstairs that can beincredibly disconcerting to the
(11:48):
child, because the child canwill then call out for their
parent.
They know their parent can hearthem and then their parent
isn't coming.
It's much easier for the childto at least understand in some
way that the parent is whothey're preferring, who they're
having the separation anxietywith is physically gone for a
period of time.
And this is the same thing withpreferred parents.
Right, I'll have anotherepisode on preferred parents
(12:09):
sometime in the future, why kidshave a preference for one
parent over another, where thatcomes from evolutionarily, and
all that other stuff, and how wecan kind of move towards some
more holistic understanding ofhierarchical attachment, which
is actually a good thing in kids.
But this is going to be the sameadvice that I give them, which
is you're going to walk outside,you're going to get into your
car and you're going to drivearound the block and then you're
(12:31):
going to come back five minutesand in that five minutes your
partner, you can I'm going toget here into comfort objects
and routines as like two aspectsof this as well.
So this is kind of it's notlike three step process here.
I'm kind of giving you anoverall three tips that can be
used kind of with each other.
But your partner's going to dois your partner's going to be
(12:52):
reminding your child the wholetime yes, mommy is coming back,
mommy is coming back, mommy willbe back soon.
Let's go over here, let's reada book and then by the time
we're done, mommy will be back.
Mommy will be back for gone forfive minutes.
Then mommy will be back,whatever it looks like just a
constant reaffirming of hey, weunderstand the connection has
(13:12):
been broken, mom has left.
That is a struggle, but we'regoing to build up that tolerance
to that disconnection or Idon't want to say disconnection,
because it's not disconnection,that distress tolerance related
to separation.
We're going to build up thatdistress tolerance related to
separation by having these shortconfident wins right, the short
(13:33):
wins that build confidence, Ishould say.
So drive around the block bythe time you come back.
You know, the worst, worst,absolute worst case scenario is
that your, your child, is upset,but with an attached caregiver,
and they're expressing theiremotional distress by saying you
know, I don't like this,whether that might just look
(13:53):
like crying for a two year old,but they're not just crying
alone, they're not crying andinconsolable, they will be with
a securely attached caregiver.
And so even if, in the worstpossible case scenario, that
they cry for the whole time thatyou're gone, whether it's five
minutes or two minutes orhowever you want to start, you
know that they're safe and thatthey're with a securely attached
(14:15):
caregiver, now that caregiveris going to have to have a level
of distress tolerance as wellto be able to affirm hey, it's
good actually that your kids crywhen you leave.
It means that they care aboutyou, it means that they love you
, it means that they feel secureand attached to you.
And so if you have a child whoshows no emotion, right in
attachment studies, we can lookat this stuff.
(14:38):
There are literal studies doneon this of parents leaving and
coming back and how kidsinteract, and that can be the
basis for whether we definechild as being anxiously
attached or securely attached orambivalent or disorganized
attachment, like we.
We actually define that basedon how the child responds to
their preferred caregiverleaving and because of this,
(14:58):
when your child is crying,that's actually a good sign that
you're securely attached toyour child, that they feel
comfortable with you and thatthey want you to be there.
That's okay.
Now, if they have anothercaregiver who they're securely
attached to, over time, what'sgoing to happen is, as they
build the confidence that mom isgoing to come back, they're
going to be able to kind of getthrough that disconcerting
(15:20):
separation more quickly and then, when you come back, they'll be
able to reconnect moreeffectively.
And so when you know, when Ihear about parents who say, oh,
my child never had separationanxiety.
Oh yeah, I just dropped themoff and they didn't even care,
and then when I came back itdidn't seem like they cared
about me.
They were just having so muchfun that they didn't even
acknowledge my presence Okay,that's a sign of not necessarily
(15:41):
the most healthy attachment.
I'm not saying that kids are notunique personalities.
They absolutely are.
Some kids will show theirconnection with you differently,
some kids will be more overt init.
Some kids will hide theirdistress for whatever reason.
But just understand that ifyour child is like seemingly
doesn't care when you leave anddoesn't care when you come back
and just has no indication thatthey, you know, are wanting to
(16:03):
show you what they've been doing, et cetera they ignore you when
you come back that's a signthat they're trying to cope with
a really some function ofattachment wound that you may
not be aware of.
And so we're going to startwith five minutes and then we're
going to go to, you know, 10minutes.
Then maybe you'll run to thestore and over time these small
(16:24):
wins are going to kind ofaccumulate and get to bigger
wins.
So bigger wins.
And so what are two tips that Ihave?
And again, this goes for all ofthe people on here.
Right, I know I'm going kind ofsuper in depth on this one
specific aspect, but this isgoing to go for all of the
people on this list, all of thequestions that I'm answering
(16:45):
today.
But the next thing that I wouldsay as far as trying to build
this with your child is Numberone, to have a consistent
routine as it relates to youleaving and returning.
That can look like a lot ofdifferent things.
I know parents who are justlike, okay, I have to give you a
hug and I have to wave to youas I, you know, get in my car.
Or we have to wave as the carpulls out of the driveway.
(17:08):
Or, you know, we set a timerfor when mom's gonna be back,
even if that timer is eighthours from now.
Right, all of those can be youknow specific phrase, that you
say a poem, that you say a song,that you sing.
It can be any of those thingsthat Help to build toward
consistent Kind of neuralpathways that you're building in
(17:30):
.
So when you leave, here's whatyou do, and when you come back,
here's what you do.
And and one of the major majorpieces of this I would say as a
parent and I know that this canbe really, really hard for
parents who are working, but Ijust want to emphasize this one
of the major pieces is I knowthat when you get home, whether
you just commuter to the trainor whatever, it can feel like
(17:50):
you know what I got to.
Just go upstairs, I gotta getmy clothes on.
I gotta, you know, take my workclothes off.
I gotta put my work clothes on,whatever it feels like.
You know, I gotta go to thebathroom right when I get home,
like, whatever the thing is thatyou feel like I have to do this
right when I get home.
I want you to take that.
I want you to say I can do thatFive minutes after I get home,
(18:11):
but for the first five minutes,deeply connect with your kids.
Deeply connect with your kidsand this is gonna help so much
separation, anxiety.
Same thing is true withnighttime, right, if you're like
I just cannot be present withmy kids until I have that first
cup of coffee, get up beforethem and have the first cup of
coffee so that the first fiveminutes when they're awake, you
can connect deeply with them andit's gonna make bedtime so much
(18:31):
easier on the other side,because they know that that's
what's coming.
So now they're tying youleaving and you returning with
this deep, intimate, connectedtime, and so if you can spend
that couple minutes before youleave with your child, then go
and then connect with them whenyou come back and make that
really, really, really important.
So, whatever that routine is,make sure that it includes to
(18:53):
some extent a Connection period,a re.
You can almost call it a repairperiod.
Right, because you've left andI don't want to make it sound
Like you didn't have to leave,you probably did like I again,
no parent can be on the clock 24hours a day as the only one.
If you are, you're settingyourself up for for not Healthy
parent, child dynamic andrelationship.
(19:14):
They should learn to to cope toan extent with other Caregivers
.
They should form hierarchicalattachment again, we'll get into
this in another episode butwhere they have multiple people
that they're attached to, beingonly attached to one caregiver
is not good for kids, and so ifyou are allowing for that by
(19:35):
because you are Unable to copewith any level of distress in
your child, you're not settingthem up for long-term physical,
mental, emotional health.
And so just establish thatroutine related to a hug,
whatever, and it can feel alittle bit like repair, like,
hey, I was gone.
I didn't want to be gone, but Ihad to be gone.
Now here I am, I'm back, tellme what happened, tell me about
(19:56):
your day.
This is gonna be a great timeto do some affirmation practices
, to do some reflectinggratitude practices on the day.
This is gonna be a time for youthem to tell you about their
day.
I think that that's so awesome,because kids will tell you
about their days if it's likethis Crazy thing that happened,
but like really all thathappened was like they colored a
picture of a banana orsomething, and so I would say
(20:16):
that that predictability thatcan really really help kids.
And because, ultimately, whatseparation anxiety is about I
should have gotten to this a lotearlier in this episode, but
what separation anxiety is allabout at the core is the fear
that you will be gone foreverand so anything that you can do
that says no, no, no, I am gonnacome back and I am Predict this
(20:36):
is what it's going to look likewhen I come back Helps your
child to set that predictabilityup, because children are
terrible predictors of thefuture.
This is where most of theiranxiety comes from.
Anxiety is thinking about thefuture and kind of I don't know
what the right word is hereObsessing about the future and
the potential negative outcomes.
Children are experts at thisbecause they are not good at
(20:58):
predicting the future.
They don't have the prefrontalcortex development to to be able
to adequately predict thefuture, to be able to take into
account things you know, likeprobability and time.
They don't have a really clearunderstanding of how long time
has passed, especially kids thatare this young two years old,
three years old, etc.
And so because of this, thiscan be really really helpful.
(21:18):
And so, setting up that clearroutine and I'm gonna get to the
comfort object here in the nextquestion, but you'll, as we
continue on Shannon here, theother things that we're gonna
say and and and just Take heartin knowing that the confidence
comes and it comes from the slowacclimation to the separation.
(21:40):
And so the more you can buildin the routines and then the
more that you can make thatreally predictable and have some
really quick wins, the betteroff you're gonna be okay.
So the next question is for athree-year-old and I'm gonna
wait and do our kind of ourbreak in the middle of the
episode After this question,because I really want to tie
these two questions together.
So this one's Mary, who needshelp with her three-year-old son
(22:03):
.
Okay, so the last one was atwo-year-old, this one's a
three-year-old.
I'm looking for advice on howto help my three-year-old son
cope with separation anxiety.
Recently, he's been having atough time when I drop him off
at daycare.
This has never been an issueuntil now.
He becomes very upset andscreams when I go off to leave,
which makes it hard for both ofus.
I want him to feel secure andcomfortable when we're apart,
(22:23):
but I'm not sure where all thisis coming from and from what and
from what changed.
Okay, so the short answer isyour child grew up a little bit.
That's where this comes from,mary, and I don't want you to
feel like you did anything wrong.
I don't want you to feel likeyou're a bad parent.
You're not.
You're probably an amazingparent, especially if you're
(22:43):
asking questions on this podcastand you're a listener of this
podcast.
That means you're probably anamazing parent, and because of
that, I don't want you to feellike this is somehow your fault.
It's not.
Kids go through separationanxieties and it can Track with
some developmental things, andso this is happening at three
years old for your son.
(23:04):
This often happens later.
Five years old, even six yearsold kids will develop separation
anxiety where there seeminglywas no separation anxiety before
, and so we can we can talkabout a lot of the things that
we just talked about in the lastanswer the slow acclimate.
The Slow acclimation, eventhough it feels like, well,
(23:26):
we've already done that, yep,but we're gonna need to do it
all over again.
And the reason for this and theroutines that's gonna become
huge.
We're gonna have to reestablishthose.
And the reason for that isbecause, developmentally, what
happens is that as kids grow andGet smarter, they also get more
robust Imaginations that allowthem to predict worse and worse
(23:50):
potential outcomes.
So we're an 18 month old whomaybe became a two-year-old and
a two and a half year old whomay have been in daycare for
that entire time.
Some kids start in daycare veryyoung, or maybe it's a home
daycare or something like that.
Those kids may actually begindaycare before they have the
cognitive ability to have askedthe question what if mom never
(24:15):
comes back?
What if dad never comes back?
What if?
And then these are usually thequestions that happen with
four-year-olds andfive-year-olds what if they get
into a car accident?
What if something happens tothem while I'm gone?
What if they forget about me?
All of these questions comefrom the, the budding
development of young children,where, in their internal world,
(24:38):
all of a sudden they're able tothink more comprehensively and
more Thoughtfully and they cankind of catastrophize in these
ways, and the reason for it isactually because they're growing
and changing and Getting older,and that's a beautiful thing,
but it can make our job a littlebit more difficult.
This is why, like I said a lotof times, four-year-olds and
(25:00):
five-year-olds will just all ofa sudden get afraid of the dark.
Why would they do that?
Why they were never afraid ofthe dark before.
Well, now there can think aboutthe things about the dark that
feel scary.
Not all separation anxiety comesfrom this innate drive,
evolutionary drive, to be aroundour primary caregivers.
(25:20):
A lot of it does, but not allof it.
Some of it comes from our ownOveractive imaginations, and
that is a beautiful thing thatkids have such active
imaginations.
But it can pose difficult youknow unique circumstances like
this where all of a sudden, achild who never had separation
anxiety has separation anxiety,and so in this case I want to
(25:42):
offer you a couple of things, acouple of unique ways in which
you can do that.
But the first thing I want to dois offer the tip here and this
again goes for all of thedifferent separation questions
that we have today of finding acomfort object, and so comfort
objects can be anything fromhome, whether it's a toy or a
blanket, but the one that I likethe most of all is actually a
(26:06):
picture of you and your childtogether, and the idea of a
comfort object is that the childcan tie the existence of that
object, which is very concreteand firm, to you and also keep
it with them when you're notwith them.
And so you know, we talk aboutobject permanence and things
(26:26):
like that.
You know, when you go away,it's like you cease to exist.
With young kids, with a threeyear old, having a physical
picture of you with them whileyou're gone can feel so
incredibly comforting because itkind of reestablishes for them.
Here's the person, here's whatthey look like, they're not
(26:47):
gonna forget about you, they'recoming back in X, y and Z amount
of time, and so if this workswith your two year old, I'm to
this is to Shannon this workswith your two year old great.
A lot of times with two yearolds it can't work by three.
This can be really, reallyhelpful Mary the person who
asked this question to give thema picture of Polaroid, whatever
of you and your child and theycan take it to school with them,
(27:11):
or you can give them somethingwith your scent on it, right, if
you wear a certain perfume or acertain cologne and you wanna
spray it onto their blanket alittle bit, I mean, be careful
with that, because you don'twant them like shoving a bunch
of chemicals in their nose andburning out their nostrils,
because these are things thatare designed to be diffused and
kind of create an aroma.
But, you know, spray it in theair and wave their blanket
(27:33):
through it or something likethat.
That's fine, because for themthat physical object becomes a
concrete sense that you arestill in existence somewhere in
the world and that you arecoming back for them.
And so that can be a thingthat's incorporated into the
routine, where you just say tothem do you have this thing, are
(27:55):
you ready?
I'm gonna leave now, here I go,but you have this and I'll be
back and I wanna hear about yourday when I come back.
And so setting that expectationthis kind of goes with the
routine thing of what it's gonnabe like when you reconnect that
can be very, very helpful Withkids who go into separation
anxiety sometimes they're also.
What this signals to us is thatthey're also old enough for some
(28:18):
role play based or open endedplay based therapy.
And when I say therapy here,I'm not using the term in the
clinical sense, I'm using theterm in the way in which you can
do therapy with anyone at anytime.
But play based therapy can bethings like role playing with
(28:39):
toys.
This person goes off over here.
Right, you can do this withpuppets.
Very famously, fred Rogers wasreally really good at using his
puppets, which were kind of likeaspects of his personality, and
using those in role play in theland of make believe on Mr
Rogers neighborhood, and actingout stories and visuals for kids
(29:02):
of like, okay, well, here'swhat happened when Daniel Tiger
if you didn't know this, danielTiger is based off Mr Rogers
neighborhood.
When Daniel goes off and isaway from his mom, or when
Daniel goes off and is away fromMiss I forget what her name is,
the woman who the only human inthe land of make believe, or
not the only one, but one of theonly ones when he's away from
her.
This is how he feels.
(29:24):
These types of role playing withtoys can be super, super
helpful for kids who have movedinto separation anxiety over
time, because it kind of showsus okay.
Well, now they're tellingthemselves a different story,
and that means if they're ableto tell themselves a different
story about how separation ishappening and what that means,
(29:45):
then that means that we can alsoleverage that same imagination
to tell them a different story,a better story about coming back
and continuing to be inconnection with us, and then, as
always, validation andemotional support.
This is the age where it starts,and so you know, a lot of times
, with kids three years old justexpressing to you I was afraid
(30:07):
that you were gonna be goneforever, or I don't like it when
you leave, just reflecting backto them, instead of I call it
blocking versus accepting, justaccept that that is their real
inner world and that that innerworld is real to them, rather
than trying to block that andsay, no, you know, I always come
back, which is our instinct asparents.
We want to oftentimes make ourchildren feel better, and I
(30:32):
don't wanna say we'regaslighting them, because it's
not really the proper use of theterm, but we can kind of take
their emotions from them and saythat's not a good thing to feel
, you don't need to feel thatway.
But instead of saying you don'tneed to feel that way.
We often say you shouldn't feelthat way.
Right, you shouldn't feel likeI'm not coming back.
Look at all the times when I'vecome back in the past.
(30:52):
Instead just say, wow, you feltlike I was going to be gone.
That must have felt scary.
I would never leave you.
So that's different than sayingyou don't need.
It's different than sayingdon't feel this way because I
would never leave you.
You say you did feel that wayand that's very scary and I will
never leave you.
And so this is what I call yesand parenting.
(31:15):
So just always yes, thefeelings.
Yes, you feel like I was gonnabe gone forever and I won't be
gone forever.
I will never leave you.
You know you feel this way.
Yes, and this and this, by theway, goes the same when we
talked about discipline stuff inthe last episode, or maybe
those two episodes ago, we weretalking about discipline and we
were saying you know, holdingboundaries, you can, yes,
(31:38):
validate experiences and holdboundaries.
Yes, I see that you're so madat me right now and I'm not
gonna let you punch me in theface.
I had to do that one thismorning with my three year old.
He was very frustrated at meabout it being done and we were
moving from one activity toanother.
Three year olds have a hardtime with transitions.
They have an even harder timewith transitions when they're
(31:59):
responding to their seven yearold older brother, who is also
having a hard time with thetransition.
And in this case I had to holda very difficult boundary and in
doing so, my three year oldtried to punch me or hit me with
something and I said yes, I seethat you're so mad and that
you're so mad that we had tostop doing this and I'm sorry,
you can't hit me, I can't letyou hit me.
That's not good for you, it'snot good for me.
(32:20):
So, in all things, validate,find a way to validate the
feeling underneath, includingtaking into account everything
that we've already said.
That is gonna be super, supereffective and helpful.
And now we're about to get to.
How do we do this with six yearolds and older kids.
But I wanted to lay thisgroundwork first and before I
get to that, a brief note fromme talking about why you should
(32:44):
rate and review this podcast.
So why should you care enoughto rate and review this podcast?
Well, the short answer is ifthis podcast is helping you to
parent better, more effectively,with more confidence, if it's
helping you raise resilient kids.
If you're just feeling like manI really just wanted more long
form content from you, john andyou feel like this is benefiting
you in any way, then whywouldn't you wanna share it with
(33:06):
somebody else?
And one of the easiest ways foryou to share it with somebody
else is by simply rating andreviewing this podcast.
By saying, hey, I'm gonna writea review, I'm gonna say what I
liked about this episode, ormaybe this series of episodes.
Or here's a way in which Iimplemented something that I
learned on the podcast andreally was effective and helpful
.
And when you write that, you'rewriting it to me.
(33:26):
You're telling me in thatmoment hey, this is helpful to
me, thank you, please keepproducing this podcast, please
keep making episodes.
But you're also saying at thesame time to other parents who
may just have stumbled upon thisMaybe they just searched
parenting on Apple Podcasts, orthey just searched how to parent
better on Spotify and theyfound this podcast.
(33:48):
You're signaling to them hey,look, here's another parent who
is parenting more effectively asa result of listening to this
podcast.
So, please, if you're willingto read a review, you are doing
me a tremendous service.
It's an amazing way to saythank you to me, but it's also a
service to other parents.
And if you can't find a way toreview it for whatever reason
(34:08):
maybe you don't have an accountor something like that wherever
you're listening, almost alwaysit is really easy just to hit
that five star button and say,hey, I think this is valuable,
and every single week I say thisand every single week we have a
couple people take that stepand soon we're gonna have enough
reviews and ratings where we'regonna really be pushed into
those main search engines forthese podcasts and then the
(34:31):
podcast will really take off.
And so if you love this content, if you wanna see more of this
content, that is how you cancommunicate that to me by rating
and reviewing this podcast.
Without further ado, let's getback into the episode and talk
about Andrew.
All right, our last questioncomes from Martin.
He says Hi, my name is Martinand I'm a father to a
six-year-old boy, andrew, who isexperiencing some separation
(34:52):
anxiety.
Whenever it's time for him togo to school or say with a
babysitter, he becomesinconsolable and refuses to be
apart from me.
This has been a major challengefor us, and I'm not sure how to
help him feel more confidentand secure when we're not
together.
For context, his mother and Igot divorced about a year ago.
First and foremost, thank youso much for submitting this
question.
It's a really good question andI just want to affirm that the
(35:15):
fact that you're even thinkingabout this and you're not just
kind of at six a lot of parentswill just dismiss this and just
say you know they'll get over it.
The fact that you're trying tofigure out a way that this can
be more effective and that youcan connect and separate more
effectively is really reallyhealthy and helpful.
Thank you also for the contextand the bravery to share that.
(35:36):
You know it's possible and, infact, potentially probable that
some of this comes from the factthat you're not with his mom
and that that creates someanxiety in kids.
Divorce can be one of thesereally challenging things, and
so because of that, it'sdifficult on everyone in the
family and so because of that, Ireally am grateful for that
(35:59):
context.
You know, if you've listenedthis far in the episode which I
hope you have, martin,everything that I've said about
two-year-olds andthree-year-olds can be applied
to Andrew, who's six.
You spoke about confidence.
That's what we're talking about.
We've got to get back to howcan he feel confident in you
being gone for any period oftime?
Probably not gonna start withfive minutes or two minutes with
(36:19):
a six-year-old, probably morelike half an hour or 45 minutes.
But how can you build upon that?
How can you go out for 15minutes, 45 minutes, whatever I
shouldn't have said 15, 45 to anhour and then and then come
back and reconnect.
That can be a really reallyhealthy kind of foundation
building thing that you do.
Secondly, all that role-playstuff that I talked about.
(36:40):
That can be effective withsix-year-olds.
How do you feel when I leave?
Do you want to act that out?
Do you want to play that out insome way?
Play with toys and get intothat.
Tell a story about this.
This can also be helpful whereyou read books.
You can look at books relatedto separation anxiety,
children's books.
I mean not books like academicbooks, but children's books
related to separation anxiety.
(37:01):
You read those together.
That can be a really helpfultool.
But really working this out andplay can be very helpful.
And then you know as much.
As I said, validation for thelast question.
This becomes imperative with athree-year-old I'm sorry with
the six-year-old, where it is agood and positive thing for
three-year-olds.
It is imperative for asix-year-old that they
(37:23):
understand that what they'reexperiencing you take seriously.
Their inner world is very, veryserious to them, in fact,
deadly serious, right.
What happens in their innerworld feels, as it does to all
of us, incredibly serious andbecause of that, oftentimes
parents who may want to dismissthe inner world of their
(37:43):
children because it's illogicalor it's not based in reality,
it's just based on imagination.
Even at six years old you canfeel like dismissing it is the
right thing.
Talking about Andrew's feelingsopenly and empathetically I
have to experience that, even ifyou haven't experienced it in
that way can be really, reallyhelpful.
Again, it may not feel like hecan discuss that with you in
(38:06):
that way, but discussingcharacters in books who go
through this, characters in TVshows, like, like I mentioned
before, daniel Tiger I'm surethere's probably 10 episodes on
separation anxiety of DanielTiger Maybe for six years old
they're to a point where thatdoesn't really work for them.
They might be a little too oldfor that, depending on kind of
the maturity level of asix-year-old.
But that can be something whereyou can discuss hey, how did
(38:28):
this character feel when theirparent left for a period of time
?
Well, they were really upsetabout it, etc.
The other piece of this is youcan rely on a lot of positive
reinforcement here and focus onthe positive aspects of the,
whatever situation they're in.
How did you feel about schooltoday?
What were some fun things thatyou did?
(38:48):
All this comes with thatreconnection that you have at
the end of the day.
So reconnecting with your childat the end of the day becomes
that much more important whenthey're older and experiencing
separation anxiety.
And trying to focus on some ofthe positive things that
happened can kind of redirectthat attention, although you
don't want to focus on thepositive things that happened to
such an extent where it feelslike you're invalidating the
(39:10):
negative experience ofseparation.
So just trying to do that inways and highlighting especially
the vulnerability points, ofsaying, wow, I'm really amazed
and not amazed, that's a badword but I'm really proud of you
for your bravery, that I knowthat you didn't want to go to
school today and you did, and Ithink that that's really, really
(39:30):
awesome.
I see that bravery and I'mreally impressed by it and I'm
grateful that you'reexperiencing that and you should
be proud of yourself too.
Right, always redirecting backto that internal validation.
You should be proud of yourselfbecause this is a challenging
thing.
You can also you know you canmake babysitters a little bit
more fun.
I like to say that I let mybabysitters spoil my kids more
(39:51):
than I spoiled them myself.
This is because I'm prettyconfident in my own ability to
parent, and I think all of usshould be.
We're all amazing parents.
Like I said, even if you don'tfeel like it all the time, you
are an amazing parent and sobabysitters sometimes can.
Can you know, doing a movienight or something like that
with a babysitter, that can be away of making that person a
(40:15):
little bit more fun and a littlebit, you know they maybe some
of the rules about candy afterdinner or something can can kind
of go away, or you can have anextra special treat when a
babysitter's here.
That can be some of thatpositive reinforcement.
And then the last piece and thiskind of goes with the divorce
aspect is just continualsolidifying and stability in the
(40:36):
environment Because of thedivorce.
You know the separation anxietymay be coming out of school or
during a babysitter, but it mayreally be a cry for attention or
a cry for help related to youknow, my life feels unstable.
This is one of the mostchallenging things about divorce
with young kids is.
You know?
I think a lot of us think youknow this is how kids are going
(40:59):
to feel about it.
Really, the thing that's mostdisconcerting for kids is the
lack of stability in a divorcesituation, oftentimes, unless
you're doing and this isbecoming increasingly popular, I
know this has been a thing inpsychological community for a
long time, but but nesting, orbird nesting, this is where you
have a child who lives in thefamily home and, instead of the
child going from one home toanother home, the parents
(41:22):
actually take turns in the home.
So you might have you know I'mnot sure if this would work,
martin, for you and I'm not, youknow, recommending this even,
but just for context of how somefamilies have done it where you
have the child who stays in thefamily home and so the
stability is there.
Maybe it's mom getting up forschool this morning, or maybe
it's dad, but you know, maybemom and dad have different rooms
(41:44):
in the house.
Even that's okay, as long asthey and they may never be in
the house at the same time.
Maybe that's what's healthiestfor you.
Having a child who's constantlyaround fighting and bickering
and derogatory statements oraggression is not a positive
thing for children.
We have known this now for along time.
It's much healthier for a childto have one stable, secure
caregiver or even two stable,secure caregivers who are
(42:07):
together, than it is to have tobe in a home where neither
caregiver is healthy and stableand secure because they are, you
know, in a hostile environmentwith a partner or an ex partner.
But but if they're in thatsecure environment where it's,
you know, as little as possiblecan change for the child, that's
usually a good thing.
So finding ways to make thoseschedules with your partner as
(42:31):
solid as possible and theroutines as solid as possible
will help Andrew feel moresecure in your relationship and
then, as as a byproduct, willprobably feel more confident in
these separation moments andpoints when the schedules are
constantly changing and and okay, well, you're supposed I'm
supposed to have you thisweekend, but now I'm not,
because I'm doing this and likedoing that, and parents can kind
(42:53):
of just do this like real fastjuggling act A lot of times.
That's not really good for theirkids, especially young kids,
because they get the sense of Idon't, I never know what's
coming next.
And so because of that, it'sreally really important as much
as you can to make the routinepredictable and the schedules
predictable, and so that solidfoundation of feeling that their
(43:16):
life and their world ispredictable and stable, that
things happen in the same orderevery day, that if mom is
watching us or dad is watchingus, we still have dinner at the
same time All that type of stuffcan really really benefit in
the child's overall physical,mental and emotional health and
in the process can can mean thata lot of those other aspects
(43:36):
whether it's separation, anxietyor something else those things
feel less threatening tochildren when the rest of their
environment is more stable.
And so the more you can do thatwith plenty of reassurances of
love and connection for Andrewin the process from both parents
, if that's possible the morehe's going to feel at home in
(43:57):
his own body and in his own skinand in his own world, and that
can really really lead to somepositive dividends as it relates
to separation with babysittersor school or other things.
And this is, by the way, is whykids a lot of times struggle in
school, when their parents getdivorced, et cetera, is because,
as their exterior worldseemingly feels like it's
(44:20):
unpredictable and falling aparteven if that's not necessarily
true, but it just feels that wayto a child, then you know, the
higher levels of learning andthings like that will often
follow suit.
They'll they'll kind of crumbleand fall apart too.
And so the more secure andestablished and predictable the
routines can be in a home duringa separation or a divorce, the
(44:41):
more you're going to find thatit's going to be possible for
the child to reconnect andestablish healthy boundaries and
routines.
So I hope that that helps and Ihope that everything else I've
talked about up to this pointalso is helpful to you, martin,
as you handle Andrew, and Ithink it's like I said, I think
it's amazing that you're askingthis question, and I'm really
grateful to you for doing so, asI am to the other parents, to
(45:03):
Mary and to Shannon, who askedquestions about separation
anxiety, because this ischallenging.
It's challenging for so manyparents, you know.
I do know that there is a daythat, like I said, I know
there's a day in the tigerepisode, because I, because now
that I'm thinking about it, youknow enough to come back,
establishing a song that yousang with your child or that
your caregiver sings with yourchild, whatever it is, to remind
(45:23):
your kids that you are indeedcoming back, that you are indeed
not leaving them forever, thatyou are there for them.
That can be incredibly,incredibly helpful and
productive for your child.
So I hope all the all thesethings can be helpful and have
been helpful to you so far.
And if you have not yetsubscribed to this podcast,
please go ahead and do so.
As I said before, if you canrate and review it, I would be
(45:44):
eternally grateful.
And if you have a person inyour life who would benefit from
this podcast, this episode oranother episode, go ahead and
shoot them a text with with alink to this podcast.
Go ahead and let them know.
Here's this guy on social mediawhole parent.
I think you should follow him.
He has a podcast I've beenlistening to and it's been
helpful.
When you share my podcastdirectly, people are far more
likely to listen to it.
(46:04):
People love getting things froma friend, even if it, you know,
is kind of a weird thing like aparenting podcast.
You're way more likely to go toa restaurant that you was
recommended by a friend.
You're way more likely to reada book that was recommended by a
friend.
You're way more likely tolisten to a podcast that was
recommended by a friend, and sodon't keep this to yourself.
Share this message witheverybody else out in the world
(46:26):
and until next time.
This has been a whole parentpodcast talking about separation
anxiety.
I know that when you get home whether you just
commuter to the train orwhatever it can feel like, you
know what.
I got to just go upstairs, Igot to.
You know, take my work clothesoff.
I got to put my work clothes on.
Whatever it feels like.
You know, I got to go to thebathroom right when I get home,
like whatever the thing is thatyou feel like I have to do this
right when I get home.
I want you to take that.
(00:21):
I want you to say I can do thatfive minutes after I get home,
but for the first five minutes,deeply connect with your kids
and this is going to help.
So much separation anxiety.
It's a brand new day.
Wake up every morning and sayit's a brand new day.
Take a good day, make it great.
(00:43):
Okay, hello and welcome to thewhole parent podcast.
My name is John and I am atwhole parent on all the social
medias.
This is the podcast that isdesigned to help you parent more
effectively, with confidence,and raise resilient and healthy
kids.
Today, on the episode, we aregoing to be talking about one of
the most popular questions thatI get all the time what do I do
(01:06):
with separation anxiety?
How do I help my child dealwith separation anxiety and we
are going to talk a little bitabout some different aspects of
separation anxiety.
I'm also going to link in theshow notes that, if you want to
specifically have an episodeabout bedtime, we had one of our
first episodes I think it mighteven been the second episode
(01:28):
ever of the whole parent podcastwas about bedtime and referred
to some separation anxietyrelated to bedtime.
Also, just in general handlinganxiety things.
There's another episode on thattoo.
So as we continue to build upour repertoire in our library of
podcast episodes, I stronglyrecommend that you go back and
you listen to some previousepisodes, because I'm going to
(01:49):
try not to go over the samethings over and over again in
the same pieces of advice, butit may relate to one piece of
advice or another, and the samething is true with the sleep
episode.
So we had a whole notherepisode Our first guest episode
all about sleep, and we havemore awesome guest episodes
coming up soon, and so thatepisode is another one that you
(02:09):
can go to to think about sleep.
But I want to talk aboutseparation anxiety and today, on
the episode, what we're goingto do is we're going to go
through three different types ofseparation anxiety.
Three questions, as we alwaysdo, from parents just like you,
and the first one is for a twoyear old and the next one's for
a three year old and then,lastly, an older child.
I believe they're six years old, yep, six years old.
(02:29):
So we're going to be goingthrough all three of those and
we'll take a little break in themiddle just to let you know how
you can support the podcast.
But before that, let's get intothe first question, which comes
from Shannon.
Shannon says hi, I'm Shannon.
I'm really struggling with mytwo year old daughter, who has
developed severe separationanxiety.
Whenever I try and leave her,whether it's for work or just
(02:50):
run a quick errand she becomesextremely distressed and clingy.
I've tried various strategiesto help her feel more secure,
but nothing seems to be working.
Help, shannon, I am right herewith you.
I totally understand how youfeel.
I am not the person in my familywho tends to have the
separation anxiety issues withmy own children, but I have
(03:13):
definitely been through thiswith my wife as it relates to
our kids.
So we have had three kids whohave been two years old at some
point.
One of them is two years oldright now, and I am right with
you in that this can be such astressful thing, especially as a
parent, where you feel like man.
There are things that I have todo, right, not just from a
practical standpoint there areplaces that you have to go,
(03:34):
there are errands that you haveto run but also just from a
mental health standpoint.
Right, we can't constantly besurrounded by our kids 24 hours
a day.
Parenting is, by all respects,a full-time job, an eternal job,
seemingly.
You just kind of, once you're aparent, you're never not a
parent, but we need that timealone, and so I totally
understand where you're gettingto with this, and it's really
(03:56):
easy to feel like man.
But I could just never be awayfrom my kids, right, I could
just do all those errands or Icould just practice self-care
when my kid is asleep.
And I actually don't think andfrom the experts that I've
spoken to about this that is notthe best way to approach this.
I do think that we wereexperiencing a little bit of a
(04:18):
pendulum swing, where in thepast, especially in the 80s and
90s, there was this very, veryhigh premium placed on
independence in young children,and that was, in many ways a
reaction response to the 1940sand the 1930s and just going way
back to the post-Victorianchild-during practices of the
(04:40):
first half of the 20th century.
What you have is this extremeaversion of trying to build in
condition in by-behaviorists,total and complete individual
self-sufficiency in very youngchildren two years old, even
younger, six months old and thisis where you get a lot of those
behaviorists who said reallyhorrible things and gave really
(05:03):
really poor advice that we nowknow from psychology and
longitudinal studies did notwork effectively.
Our goal should not be to raisecompletely independent kids.
However, we're experiencing alot of times a pendulum swing
from that.
So where that was on oneextreme, now we're experiencing
a little bit of the otherextreme, because parents are so
(05:27):
I don't want to say attuned,because that's not really the
word, but so unwilling to allowtheir child to express any
frustration or any distresswhatsoever related to separation
, related to being away fromtheir parents.
That actually what winds uphappening is that you condition
your kids to do the opposite.
So one of the most importantthings that you can do as a
(05:49):
parent is to actually work withyour child so that they can move
towards a more robust view ofattachment which sees them
attaching to multiple people,not just you, and is that going
to create some dissonance anddisconnection?
Will it feel that way?
Will there be some tears?
Will it feel challenging attimes?
(06:11):
Yes, but what we know aboutattachment is that attachment is
as much about how we prepareour children for long-term
mental, emotional, relationalhealth as it is the things that
we do in individual moments, andso we're going to talk about a
couple of things here that canreally really help with
separation anxiety.
But there is also going to be alevel of parental movement that
(06:33):
has to happen.
So if you're totally andcompletely unable to hear your
child in any sort of distress,for you want you and then not
immediately go to them, that'ssomething that you're going to
have to work on as well, right,and so I am totally the type of
parent personally who, when mykid cries for me, I go to them,
and so don't hear me saying thatI'm not going to advocate for
any sort of extinction methodwhere you're just going to let
(06:56):
your kid cry for you, you know,for a long time and not help
them and not go to them.
I'm not saying that at all.
But there is going to be somedifficulty and some frustration
and some level of distress inyour kids, because they do want
to be with you 100% of the timeand that isn't feasible.
And so as we go through thesethree kind of things and as we
(07:18):
continue on this is true for allthe parents, not just for
Shannon but for anybody who'sstruggling with separation,
anxiety in your child they aregoing to have to learn to build
up a little bit of a toleranceto that separation.
So what we're going to do iswe're not going to erase this,
we're not going to magically fixthis.
It's not going to fix itselfovernight Again.
We're not going for theextinction method of just like
(07:40):
we're going to let them screamand cry for us until eventually
they just get over it and kindof become numb to our absence.
We're going to go through some,some really consistent things
that work well, without feelinglike man, I'm totally abandoning
, abandoning my child.
But if you're like I can't doany of it, I can't allow my
child to want me at all and notgo to them, then this is going
to be challenging for you,without a doubt.
(08:01):
So let's kind of go through acouple of things that I might,
that might help, and the firstone is to understand that small
wins in parenting and this is auniversal parenting truth but
small wins in parenting becomebig wins in parenting over time.
So if you want to help yourchild do anything frustrating,
it starts by small stepsbecoming slightly larger steps
(08:25):
becoming big steps.
Now sometimes kids in, forwhatever reason, whatever
they're learning or whateverthey're, you know, working
toward it, can feel like man.
It's not, it's not a lineargrowth and that's a normal thing
.
That's a normal thing intochild development, it's a
totally normal thing ineducation.
Educators have known this andchild education specialists have
(08:48):
known this for a long time.
You know, when your child'slearning how to read, it doesn't
tend to be like a linear thing.
They don't learn.
You know what?
They don't get 1% better everysingle day.
Sometimes it feels like theyhave made no progress for a week
.
Sometimes it means it feelslike they've made and this is
the same thing with trying toget some acclimation to
separation.
It feels like they have noprogress in a week.
Sometimes it feels like they'reworse this week than they were
(09:10):
last week.
We're going to kind of get intothat here in a moment with our
next question, but but over time, over the aggregate, when you
look at it.
Step back and take the longview.
You'll see that thatprogression does happen.
Some days it'll feel like man.
Yesterday they were strugglingand struggling.
They hadn't made any stepstowards feeling connected and
secure, and then all of a suddentoday it's like night and day.
(09:32):
That can happen.
And so take the long view.
Understand that you're not goingto win this battle in a matter
of moments or days or orindividual things.
We're going to go for thegradual approach and to do this
effectively.
You are literally going to setdown times when you're going to
separate from your child, evenif it means you leave the house,
(09:53):
you go sit in the car for fiveminutes and then you come right
back in For short periods oftime.
And this kind of goes back toour bedtime episode as well,
where they're going to haveshort wins where they feel like,
okay, I can do this Now.
This is especially true forlittle kids, but it is no less
true for older kids.
Small wins turn into big wins,and so my first step if I had a
(10:15):
child who had severe separationanxiety could not let watch me
walk out the door, could notwatch, let me be gone for any
period of time.
And, by the way, like I said, Imight not be that person, but my
kids have definitely felt thatway about my wife, and so I've
navigated this from the insideright, I've been the one inside,
I've been the securely attached, non-preferred parent who's
trying to navigate this at homewhile my wife is at work or away
(10:39):
or whatever.
And so just understand, I'vebeen there, I totally understand
it.
I don't necessarily, I can'ttotally and completely empathize
what it's like to be the parentwho has to walk out.
You know, I've had that happena couple of times, but not near
with any sort of consistency,and so I don't want to make it
sound like you know, I know youwhen I can only imagine what it
would be like.
I haven't experienced it, but Ihave been the parent on the
(11:01):
inside and so maybe that'shelpful as well.
So the first thing I would dois I would literally, like I
said, set a time and anticipateI'm not actually going to go
anywhere.
I'm going to go, sit in the carfor five minutes and then I'm
going to come back.
Or I'm going to go, get in thecar and I'm going to drive
around the block and thenliterally park back in the car,
like however you want to do itright If you want your child to
(11:23):
physically see your car goingaway, because maybe they're not
two, maybe they're three or four, and that would be helpful for
them so that they don't knowthat you're just sitting there.
One of the things that I'lloften recommend to parents who
are struggling with separationanxiety is that if one of the
parents is who they're, whothey're asking for, if they know
that they're specifically inthe home, somewhere they're in a
bedroom, upstairs that can beincredibly disconcerting to the
(11:48):
child, because the child canwill then call out for their
parent.
They know their parent can hearthem and then their parent
isn't coming.
It's much easier for the childto at least understand in some
way that the parent is whothey're preferring, who they're
having the separation anxietywith is physically gone for a
period of time.
And this is the same thing withpreferred parents.
Right, I'll have anotherepisode on preferred parents
(12:09):
sometime in the future, why kidshave a preference for one
parent over another, where thatcomes from evolutionarily, and
all that other stuff, and how wecan kind of move towards some
more holistic understanding ofhierarchical attachment, which
is actually a good thing in kids.
But this is going to be the sameadvice that I give them, which
is you're going to walk outside,you're going to get into your
car and you're going to drivearound the block and then you're
(12:31):
going to come back five minutesand in that five minutes your
partner, you can I'm going toget here into comfort objects
and routines as like two aspectsof this as well.
So this is kind of it's notlike three step process here.
I'm kind of giving you anoverall three tips that can be
used kind of with each other.
But your partner's going to dois your partner's going to be
(12:52):
reminding your child the wholetime yes, mommy is coming back,
mommy is coming back, mommy willbe back soon.
Let's go over here, let's reada book and then by the time
we're done, mommy will be back.
Mommy will be back for gone forfive minutes.
Then mommy will be back,whatever it looks like just a
constant reaffirming of hey, weunderstand the connection has
(13:12):
been broken, mom has left.
That is a struggle, but we'regoing to build up that tolerance
to that disconnection or Idon't want to say disconnection,
because it's not disconnection,that distress tolerance related
to separation.
We're going to build up thatdistress tolerance related to
separation by having these shortconfident wins right, the short
(13:33):
wins that build confidence, Ishould say.
So drive around the block bythe time you come back.
You know, the worst, worst,absolute worst case scenario is
that your, your child, is upset,but with an attached caregiver,
and they're expressing theiremotional distress by saying you
know, I don't like this,whether that might just look
(13:53):
like crying for a two year old,but they're not just crying
alone, they're not crying andinconsolable, they will be with
a securely attached caregiver.
And so even if, in the worstpossible case scenario, that
they cry for the whole time thatyou're gone, whether it's five
minutes or two minutes orhowever you want to start, you
know that they're safe and thatthey're with a securely attached
(14:15):
caregiver, now that caregiveris going to have to have a level
of distress tolerance as wellto be able to affirm hey, it's
good actually that your kids crywhen you leave.
It means that they care aboutyou, it means that they love you
, it means that they feel secureand attached to you.
And so if you have a child whoshows no emotion, right in
attachment studies, we can lookat this stuff.
(14:38):
There are literal studies doneon this of parents leaving and
coming back and how kidsinteract, and that can be the
basis for whether we definechild as being anxiously
attached or securely attached orambivalent or disorganized
attachment, like we.
We actually define that basedon how the child responds to
their preferred caregiverleaving and because of this,
(14:58):
when your child is crying,that's actually a good sign that
you're securely attached toyour child, that they feel
comfortable with you and thatthey want you to be there.
That's okay.
Now, if they have anothercaregiver who they're securely
attached to, over time, what'sgoing to happen is, as they
build the confidence that mom isgoing to come back, they're
going to be able to kind of getthrough that disconcerting
(15:20):
separation more quickly and then, when you come back, they'll be
able to reconnect moreeffectively.
And so when you know, when Ihear about parents who say, oh,
my child never had separationanxiety.
Oh yeah, I just dropped themoff and they didn't even care,
and then when I came back itdidn't seem like they cared
about me.
They were just having so muchfun that they didn't even
acknowledge my presence Okay,that's a sign of not necessarily
(15:41):
the most healthy attachment.
I'm not saying that kids are notunique personalities.
They absolutely are.
Some kids will show theirconnection with you differently,
some kids will be more overt init.
Some kids will hide theirdistress for whatever reason.
But just understand that ifyour child is like seemingly
doesn't care when you leave anddoesn't care when you come back
and just has no indication thatthey, you know, are wanting to
(16:03):
show you what they've been doing, et cetera they ignore you when
you come back that's a signthat they're trying to cope with
a really some function ofattachment wound that you may
not be aware of.
And so we're going to startwith five minutes and then we're
going to go to, you know, 10minutes.
Then maybe you'll run to thestore and over time these small
(16:24):
wins are going to kind ofaccumulate and get to bigger
wins.
So bigger wins.
And so what are two tips that Ihave?
And again, this goes for all ofthe people on here.
Right, I know I'm going kind ofsuper in depth on this one
specific aspect, but this isgoing to go for all of the
people on this list, all of thequestions that I'm answering
(16:45):
today.
But the next thing that I wouldsay as far as trying to build
this with your child is Numberone, to have a consistent
routine as it relates to youleaving and returning.
That can look like a lot ofdifferent things.
I know parents who are justlike, okay, I have to give you a
hug and I have to wave to youas I, you know, get in my car.
Or we have to wave as the carpulls out of the driveway.
(17:08):
Or, you know, we set a timerfor when mom's gonna be back,
even if that timer is eighthours from now.
Right, all of those can be youknow specific phrase, that you
say a poem, that you say a song,that you sing.
It can be any of those thingsthat Help to build toward
consistent Kind of neuralpathways that you're building in
(17:30):
.
So when you leave, here's whatyou do, and when you come back,
here's what you do.
And and one of the major majorpieces of this I would say as a
parent and I know that this canbe really, really hard for
parents who are working, but Ijust want to emphasize this one
of the major pieces is I knowthat when you get home, whether
you just commuter to the trainor whatever, it can feel like
(17:50):
you know what I got to.
Just go upstairs, I gotta getmy clothes on.
I gotta, you know, take my workclothes off.
I gotta put my work clothes on,whatever it feels like.
You know, I gotta go to thebathroom right when I get home,
like, whatever the thing is thatyou feel like I have to do this
right when I get home.
I want you to take that.
I want you to say I can do thatFive minutes after I get home,
(18:11):
but for the first five minutes,deeply connect with your kids.
Deeply connect with your kidsand this is gonna help so much
separation, anxiety.
Same thing is true withnighttime, right, if you're like
I just cannot be present withmy kids until I have that first
cup of coffee, get up beforethem and have the first cup of
coffee so that the first fiveminutes when they're awake, you
can connect deeply with them andit's gonna make bedtime so much
(18:31):
easier on the other side,because they know that that's
what's coming.
So now they're tying youleaving and you returning with
this deep, intimate, connectedtime, and so if you can spend
that couple minutes before youleave with your child, then go
and then connect with them whenyou come back and make that
really, really, really important.
So, whatever that routine is,make sure that it includes to
(18:53):
some extent a Connection period,a re.
You can almost call it a repairperiod.
Right, because you've left andI don't want to make it sound
Like you didn't have to leave,you probably did like I again,
no parent can be on the clock 24hours a day as the only one.
If you are, you're settingyourself up for for not Healthy
parent, child dynamic andrelationship.
(19:14):
They should learn to to cope toan extent with other Caregivers
.
They should form hierarchicalattachment again, we'll get into
this in another episode butwhere they have multiple people
that they're attached to, beingonly attached to one caregiver
is not good for kids, and so ifyou are allowing for that by
(19:35):
because you are Unable to copewith any level of distress in
your child, you're not settingthem up for long-term physical,
mental, emotional health.
And so just establish thatroutine related to a hug,
whatever, and it can feel alittle bit like repair, like,
hey, I was gone.
I didn't want to be gone, but Ihad to be gone.
Now here I am, I'm back, tellme what happened, tell me about
(19:56):
your day.
This is gonna be a great timeto do some affirmation practices
, to do some reflectinggratitude practices on the day.
This is gonna be a time for youthem to tell you about their
day.
I think that that's so awesome,because kids will tell you
about their days if it's likethis Crazy thing that happened,
but like really all thathappened was like they colored a
picture of a banana orsomething, and so I would say
(20:16):
that that predictability thatcan really really help kids.
And because, ultimately, whatseparation anxiety is about I
should have gotten to this a lotearlier in this episode, but
what separation anxiety is allabout at the core is the fear
that you will be gone foreverand so anything that you can do
that says no, no, no, I am gonnacome back and I am Predict this
(20:36):
is what it's going to look likewhen I come back Helps your
child to set that predictabilityup, because children are
terrible predictors of thefuture.
This is where most of theiranxiety comes from.
Anxiety is thinking about thefuture and kind of I don't know
what the right word is hereObsessing about the future and
the potential negative outcomes.
Children are experts at thisbecause they are not good at
(20:58):
predicting the future.
They don't have the prefrontalcortex development to to be able
to adequately predict thefuture, to be able to take into
account things you know, likeprobability and time.
They don't have a really clearunderstanding of how long time
has passed, especially kids thatare this young two years old,
three years old, etc.
And so because of this, thiscan be really really helpful.
(21:18):
And so, setting up that clearroutine and I'm gonna get to the
comfort object here in the nextquestion, but you'll, as we
continue on Shannon here, theother things that we're gonna
say and and and just Take heartin knowing that the confidence
comes and it comes from the slowacclimation to the separation.
(21:40):
And so the more you can buildin the routines and then the
more that you can make thatreally predictable and have some
really quick wins, the betteroff you're gonna be okay.
So the next question is for athree-year-old and I'm gonna
wait and do our kind of ourbreak in the middle of the
episode After this question,because I really want to tie
these two questions together.
So this one's Mary, who needshelp with her three-year-old son
(22:03):
.
Okay, so the last one was atwo-year-old, this one's a
three-year-old.
I'm looking for advice on howto help my three-year-old son
cope with separation anxiety.
Recently, he's been having atough time when I drop him off
at daycare.
This has never been an issueuntil now.
He becomes very upset andscreams when I go off to leave,
which makes it hard for both ofus.
I want him to feel secure andcomfortable when we're apart,
(22:23):
but I'm not sure where all thisis coming from and from what and
from what changed.
Okay, so the short answer isyour child grew up a little bit.
That's where this comes from,mary, and I don't want you to
feel like you did anything wrong.
I don't want you to feel likeyou're a bad parent.
You're not.
You're probably an amazingparent, especially if you're
(22:43):
asking questions on this podcastand you're a listener of this
podcast.
That means you're probably anamazing parent, and because of
that, I don't want you to feellike this is somehow your fault.
It's not.
Kids go through separationanxieties and it can Track with
some developmental things, andso this is happening at three
years old for your son.
(23:04):
This often happens later.
Five years old, even six yearsold kids will develop separation
anxiety where there seeminglywas no separation anxiety before
, and so we can we can talkabout a lot of the things that
we just talked about in the lastanswer the slow acclimate.
The Slow acclimation, eventhough it feels like, well,
(23:26):
we've already done that, yep,but we're gonna need to do it
all over again.
And the reason for this and theroutines that's gonna become
huge.
We're gonna have to reestablishthose.
And the reason for that isbecause, developmentally, what
happens is that as kids grow andGet smarter, they also get more
robust Imaginations that allowthem to predict worse and worse
(23:50):
potential outcomes.
So we're an 18 month old whomaybe became a two-year-old and
a two and a half year old whomay have been in daycare for
that entire time.
Some kids start in daycare veryyoung, or maybe it's a home
daycare or something like that.
Those kids may actually begindaycare before they have the
cognitive ability to have askedthe question what if mom never
(24:15):
comes back?
What if dad never comes back?
What if?
And then these are usually thequestions that happen with
four-year-olds andfive-year-olds what if they get
into a car accident?
What if something happens tothem while I'm gone?
What if they forget about me?
All of these questions comefrom the, the budding
development of young children,where, in their internal world,
(24:38):
all of a sudden they're able tothink more comprehensively and
more Thoughtfully and they cankind of catastrophize in these
ways, and the reason for it isactually because they're growing
and changing and Getting older,and that's a beautiful thing,
but it can make our job a littlebit more difficult.
This is why, like I said a lotof times, four-year-olds and
(25:00):
five-year-olds will just all ofa sudden get afraid of the dark.
Why would they do that?
Why they were never afraid ofthe dark before.
Well, now there can think aboutthe things about the dark that
feel scary.
Not all separation anxiety comesfrom this innate drive,
evolutionary drive, to be aroundour primary caregivers.
(25:20):
A lot of it does, but not allof it.
Some of it comes from our ownOveractive imaginations, and
that is a beautiful thing thatkids have such active
imaginations.
But it can pose difficult youknow unique circumstances like
this where all of a sudden, achild who never had separation
anxiety has separation anxiety,and so in this case I want to
(25:42):
offer you a couple of things, acouple of unique ways in which
you can do that.
But the first thing I want to dois offer the tip here and this
again goes for all of thedifferent separation questions
that we have today of finding acomfort object, and so comfort
objects can be anything fromhome, whether it's a toy or a
blanket, but the one that I likethe most of all is actually a
(26:06):
picture of you and your childtogether, and the idea of a
comfort object is that the childcan tie the existence of that
object, which is very concreteand firm, to you and also keep
it with them when you're notwith them.
And so you know, we talk aboutobject permanence and things
(26:26):
like that.
You know, when you go away,it's like you cease to exist.
With young kids, with a threeyear old, having a physical
picture of you with them whileyou're gone can feel so
incredibly comforting because itkind of reestablishes for them.
Here's the person, here's whatthey look like, they're not
(26:47):
gonna forget about you, they'recoming back in X, y and Z amount
of time, and so if this workswith your two year old, I'm to
this is to Shannon this workswith your two year old great.
A lot of times with two yearolds it can't work by three.
This can be really, reallyhelpful Mary the person who
asked this question to give thema picture of Polaroid, whatever
of you and your child and theycan take it to school with them,
(27:11):
or you can give them somethingwith your scent on it, right, if
you wear a certain perfume or acertain cologne and you wanna
spray it onto their blanket alittle bit, I mean, be careful
with that, because you don'twant them like shoving a bunch
of chemicals in their nose andburning out their nostrils,
because these are things thatare designed to be diffused and
kind of create an aroma.
But, you know, spray it in theair and wave their blanket
(27:33):
through it or something likethat.
That's fine, because for themthat physical object becomes a
concrete sense that you arestill in existence somewhere in
the world and that you arecoming back for them.
And so that can be a thingthat's incorporated into the
routine, where you just say tothem do you have this thing, are
(27:55):
you ready?
I'm gonna leave now, here I go,but you have this and I'll be
back and I wanna hear about yourday when I come back.
And so setting that expectationthis kind of goes with the
routine thing of what it's gonnabe like when you reconnect that
can be very, very helpful Withkids who go into separation
anxiety sometimes they're also.
What this signals to us is thatthey're also old enough for some
(28:18):
role play based or open endedplay based therapy.
And when I say therapy here,I'm not using the term in the
clinical sense, I'm using theterm in the way in which you can
do therapy with anyone at anytime.
But play based therapy can bethings like role playing with
(28:39):
toys.
This person goes off over here.
Right, you can do this withpuppets.
Very famously, fred Rogers wasreally really good at using his
puppets, which were kind of likeaspects of his personality, and
using those in role play in theland of make believe on Mr
Rogers neighborhood, and actingout stories and visuals for kids
(29:02):
of like, okay, well, here'swhat happened when Daniel Tiger
if you didn't know this, danielTiger is based off Mr Rogers
neighborhood.
When Daniel goes off and isaway from his mom, or when
Daniel goes off and is away fromMiss I forget what her name is,
the woman who the only human inthe land of make believe, or
not the only one, but one of theonly ones when he's away from
her.
This is how he feels.
(29:24):
These types of role playing withtoys can be super, super
helpful for kids who have movedinto separation anxiety over
time, because it kind of showsus okay.
Well, now they're tellingthemselves a different story,
and that means if they're ableto tell themselves a different
story about how separation ishappening and what that means,
(29:45):
then that means that we can alsoleverage that same imagination
to tell them a different story,a better story about coming back
and continuing to be inconnection with us, and then, as
always, validation andemotional support.
This is the age where it starts,and so you know, a lot of times
, with kids three years old justexpressing to you I was afraid
(30:07):
that you were gonna be goneforever, or I don't like it when
you leave, just reflecting backto them, instead of I call it
blocking versus accepting, justaccept that that is their real
inner world and that that innerworld is real to them, rather
than trying to block that andsay, no, you know, I always come
back, which is our instinct asparents.
We want to oftentimes make ourchildren feel better, and I
(30:32):
don't wanna say we'regaslighting them, because it's
not really the proper use of theterm, but we can kind of take
their emotions from them and saythat's not a good thing to feel
, you don't need to feel thatway.
But instead of saying you don'tneed to feel that way.
We often say you shouldn't feelthat way.
Right, you shouldn't feel likeI'm not coming back.
Look at all the times when I'vecome back in the past.
(30:52):
Instead just say, wow, you feltlike I was going to be gone.
That must have felt scary.
I would never leave you.
So that's different than sayingyou don't need.
It's different than sayingdon't feel this way because I
would never leave you.
You say you did feel that wayand that's very scary and I will
never leave you.
And so this is what I call yesand parenting.
(31:15):
So just always yes, thefeelings.
Yes, you feel like I was gonnabe gone forever and I won't be
gone forever.
I will never leave you.
You know you feel this way.
Yes, and this and this, by theway, goes the same when we
talked about discipline stuff inthe last episode, or maybe
those two episodes ago, we weretalking about discipline and we
were saying you know, holdingboundaries, you can, yes,
(31:38):
validate experiences and holdboundaries.
Yes, I see that you're so madat me right now and I'm not
gonna let you punch me in theface.
I had to do that one thismorning with my three year old.
He was very frustrated at meabout it being done and we were
moving from one activity toanother.
Three year olds have a hardtime with transitions.
They have an even harder timewith transitions when they're
(31:59):
responding to their seven yearold older brother, who is also
having a hard time with thetransition.
And in this case I had to holda very difficult boundary and in
doing so, my three year oldtried to punch me or hit me with
something and I said yes, I seethat you're so mad and that
you're so mad that we had tostop doing this and I'm sorry,
you can't hit me, I can't letyou hit me.
That's not good for you, it'snot good for me.
(32:20):
So, in all things, validate,find a way to validate the
feeling underneath, includingtaking into account everything
that we've already said.
That is gonna be super, supereffective and helpful.
And now we're about to get to.
How do we do this with six yearolds and older kids.
But I wanted to lay thisgroundwork first and before I
get to that, a brief note fromme talking about why you should
(32:44):
rate and review this podcast.
So why should you care enoughto rate and review this podcast?
Well, the short answer is ifthis podcast is helping you to
parent better, more effectively,with more confidence, if it's
helping you raise resilient kids.
If you're just feeling like manI really just wanted more long
form content from you, john andyou feel like this is benefiting
you in any way, then whywouldn't you wanna share it with
(33:06):
somebody else?
And one of the easiest ways foryou to share it with somebody
else is by simply rating andreviewing this podcast.
By saying, hey, I'm gonna writea review, I'm gonna say what I
liked about this episode, ormaybe this series of episodes.
Or here's a way in which Iimplemented something that I
learned on the podcast andreally was effective and helpful
.
And when you write that, you'rewriting it to me.
(33:26):
You're telling me in thatmoment hey, this is helpful to
me, thank you, please keepproducing this podcast, please
keep making episodes.
But you're also saying at thesame time to other parents who
may just have stumbled upon thisMaybe they just searched
parenting on Apple Podcasts, orthey just searched how to parent
better on Spotify and theyfound this podcast.
(33:48):
You're signaling to them hey,look, here's another parent who
is parenting more effectively asa result of listening to this
podcast.
So, please, if you're willingto read a review, you are doing
me a tremendous service.
It's an amazing way to saythank you to me, but it's also a
service to other parents.
And if you can't find a way toreview it for whatever reason
(34:08):
maybe you don't have an accountor something like that wherever
you're listening, almost alwaysit is really easy just to hit
that five star button and say,hey, I think this is valuable,
and every single week I say thisand every single week we have a
couple people take that stepand soon we're gonna have enough
reviews and ratings where we'regonna really be pushed into
those main search engines forthese podcasts and then the
(34:31):
podcast will really take off.
And so if you love this content, if you wanna see more of this
content, that is how you cancommunicate that to me by rating
and reviewing this podcast.
Without further ado, let's getback into the episode and talk
about Andrew.
All right, our last questioncomes from Martin.
He says Hi, my name is Martinand I'm a father to a
six-year-old boy, andrew, who isexperiencing some separation
(34:52):
anxiety.
Whenever it's time for him togo to school or say with a
babysitter, he becomesinconsolable and refuses to be
apart from me.
This has been a major challengefor us, and I'm not sure how to
help him feel more confidentand secure when we're not
together.
For context, his mother and Igot divorced about a year ago.
First and foremost, thank youso much for submitting this
question.
It's a really good question andI just want to affirm that the
(35:15):
fact that you're even thinkingabout this and you're not just
kind of at six a lot of parentswill just dismiss this and just
say you know they'll get over it.
The fact that you're trying tofigure out a way that this can
be more effective and that youcan connect and separate more
effectively is really reallyhealthy and helpful.
Thank you also for the contextand the bravery to share that.
(35:36):
You know it's possible and, infact, potentially probable that
some of this comes from the factthat you're not with his mom
and that that creates someanxiety in kids.
Divorce can be one of thesereally challenging things, and
so because of that, it'sdifficult on everyone in the
family and so because of that, Ireally am grateful for that
(35:59):
context.
You know, if you've listenedthis far in the episode which I
hope you have, martin,everything that I've said about
two-year-olds andthree-year-olds can be applied
to Andrew, who's six.
You spoke about confidence.
That's what we're talking about.
We've got to get back to howcan he feel confident in you
being gone for any period oftime?
Probably not gonna start withfive minutes or two minutes with
(36:19):
a six-year-old, probably morelike half an hour or 45 minutes.
But how can you build upon that?
How can you go out for 15minutes, 45 minutes, whatever I
shouldn't have said 15, 45 to anhour and then and then come
back and reconnect.
That can be a really reallyhealthy kind of foundation
building thing that you do.
Secondly, all that role-playstuff that I talked about.
(36:40):
That can be effective withsix-year-olds.
How do you feel when I leave?
Do you want to act that out?
Do you want to play that out insome way?
Play with toys and get intothat.
Tell a story about this.
This can also be helpful whereyou read books.
You can look at books relatedto separation anxiety,
children's books.
I mean not books like academicbooks, but children's books
related to separation anxiety.
(37:01):
You read those together.
That can be a really helpfultool.
But really working this out andplay can be very helpful.
And then you know as much.
As I said, validation for thelast question.
This becomes imperative with athree-year-old I'm sorry with
the six-year-old, where it is agood and positive thing for
three-year-olds.
It is imperative for asix-year-old that they
(37:23):
understand that what they'reexperiencing you take seriously.
Their inner world is very, veryserious to them, in fact,
deadly serious, right.
What happens in their innerworld feels, as it does to all
of us, incredibly serious andbecause of that, oftentimes
parents who may want to dismissthe inner world of their
(37:43):
children because it's illogicalor it's not based in reality,
it's just based on imagination.
Even at six years old you canfeel like dismissing it is the
right thing.
Talking about Andrew's feelingsopenly and empathetically I
have to experience that, even ifyou haven't experienced it in
that way can be really, reallyhelpful.
Again, it may not feel like hecan discuss that with you in
(38:06):
that way, but discussingcharacters in books who go
through this, characters in TVshows, like, like I mentioned
before, daniel Tiger I'm surethere's probably 10 episodes on
separation anxiety of DanielTiger Maybe for six years old
they're to a point where thatdoesn't really work for them.
They might be a little too oldfor that, depending on kind of
the maturity level of asix-year-old.
But that can be something whereyou can discuss hey, how did
(38:28):
this character feel when theirparent left for a period of time
?
Well, they were really upsetabout it, etc.
The other piece of this is youcan rely on a lot of positive
reinforcement here and focus onthe positive aspects of the,
whatever situation they're in.
How did you feel about schooltoday?
What were some fun things thatyou did?
(38:48):
All this comes with thatreconnection that you have at
the end of the day.
So reconnecting with your childat the end of the day becomes
that much more important whenthey're older and experiencing
separation anxiety.
And trying to focus on some ofthe positive things that
happened can kind of redirectthat attention, although you
don't want to focus on thepositive things that happened to
such an extent where it feelslike you're invalidating the
(39:10):
negative experience ofseparation.
So just trying to do that inways and highlighting especially
the vulnerability points, ofsaying, wow, I'm really amazed
and not amazed, that's a badword but I'm really proud of you
for your bravery, that I knowthat you didn't want to go to
school today and you did, and Ithink that that's really, really
(39:30):
awesome.
I see that bravery and I'mreally impressed by it and I'm
grateful that you'reexperiencing that and you should
be proud of yourself too.
Right, always redirecting backto that internal validation.
You should be proud of yourselfbecause this is a challenging
thing.
You can also you know you canmake babysitters a little bit
more fun.
I like to say that I let mybabysitters spoil my kids more
(39:51):
than I spoiled them myself.
This is because I'm prettyconfident in my own ability to
parent, and I think all of usshould be.
We're all amazing parents.
Like I said, even if you don'tfeel like it all the time, you
are an amazing parent and sobabysitters sometimes can.
Can you know, doing a movienight or something like that
with a babysitter, that can be away of making that person a
(40:15):
little bit more fun and a littlebit, you know they maybe some
of the rules about candy afterdinner or something can can kind
of go away, or you can have anextra special treat when a
babysitter's here.
That can be some of thatpositive reinforcement.
And then the last piece and thiskind of goes with the divorce
aspect is just continualsolidifying and stability in the
(40:36):
environment Because of thedivorce.
You know the separation anxietymay be coming out of school or
during a babysitter, but it mayreally be a cry for attention or
a cry for help related to youknow, my life feels unstable.
This is one of the mostchallenging things about divorce
with young kids is.
You know?
I think a lot of us think youknow this is how kids are going
(40:59):
to feel about it.
Really, the thing that's mostdisconcerting for kids is the
lack of stability in a divorcesituation, oftentimes, unless
you're doing and this isbecoming increasingly popular, I
know this has been a thing inpsychological community for a
long time, but but nesting, orbird nesting, this is where you
have a child who lives in thefamily home and, instead of the
child going from one home toanother home, the parents
(41:22):
actually take turns in the home.
So you might have you know I'mnot sure if this would work,
martin, for you and I'm not, youknow, recommending this even,
but just for context of how somefamilies have done it where you
have the child who stays in thefamily home and so the
stability is there.
Maybe it's mom getting up forschool this morning, or maybe
it's dad, but you know, maybemom and dad have different rooms
(41:44):
in the house.
Even that's okay, as long asthey and they may never be in
the house at the same time.
Maybe that's what's healthiestfor you.
Having a child who's constantlyaround fighting and bickering
and derogatory statements oraggression is not a positive
thing for children.
We have known this now for along time.
It's much healthier for a childto have one stable, secure
caregiver or even two stable,secure caregivers who are
(42:07):
together, than it is to have tobe in a home where neither
caregiver is healthy and stableand secure because they are, you
know, in a hostile environmentwith a partner or an ex partner.
But but if they're in thatsecure environment where it's,
you know, as little as possiblecan change for the child, that's
usually a good thing.
So finding ways to make thoseschedules with your partner as
(42:31):
solid as possible and theroutines as solid as possible
will help Andrew feel moresecure in your relationship and
then, as as a byproduct, willprobably feel more confident in
these separation moments andpoints when the schedules are
constantly changing and and okay, well, you're supposed I'm
supposed to have you thisweekend, but now I'm not,
because I'm doing this and likedoing that, and parents can kind
(42:53):
of just do this like real fastjuggling act A lot of times.
That's not really good for theirkids, especially young kids,
because they get the sense of Idon't, I never know what's
coming next.
And so because of that, it'sreally really important as much
as you can to make the routinepredictable and the schedules
predictable, and so that solidfoundation of feeling that their
(43:16):
life and their world ispredictable and stable, that
things happen in the same orderevery day, that if mom is
watching us or dad is watchingus, we still have dinner at the
same time All that type of stuffcan really really benefit in
the child's overall physical,mental and emotional health and
in the process can can mean thata lot of those other aspects
(43:36):
whether it's separation, anxietyor something else those things
feel less threatening tochildren when the rest of their
environment is more stable.
And so the more you can do thatwith plenty of reassurances of
love and connection for Andrewin the process from both parents
, if that's possible the morehe's going to feel at home in
(43:57):
his own body and in his own skinand in his own world, and that
can really really lead to somepositive dividends as it relates
to separation with babysittersor school or other things.
And this is, by the way, is whykids a lot of times struggle in
school, when their parents getdivorced, et cetera, is because,
as their exterior worldseemingly feels like it's
(44:20):
unpredictable and falling aparteven if that's not necessarily
true, but it just feels that wayto a child, then you know, the
higher levels of learning andthings like that will often
follow suit.
They'll they'll kind of crumbleand fall apart too.
And so the more secure andestablished and predictable the
routines can be in a home duringa separation or a divorce, the
(44:41):
more you're going to find thatit's going to be possible for
the child to reconnect andestablish healthy boundaries and
routines.
So I hope that that helps and Ihope that everything else I've
talked about up to this pointalso is helpful to you, martin,
as you handle Andrew, and Ithink it's like I said, I think
it's amazing that you're askingthis question, and I'm really
grateful to you for doing so, asI am to the other parents, to
(45:03):
Mary and to Shannon, who askedquestions about separation
anxiety, because this ischallenging.
It's challenging for so manyparents, you know.
I do know that there is a daythat, like I said, I know
there's a day in the tigerepisode, because I, because now
that I'm thinking about it, youknow enough to come back,
establishing a song that yousang with your child or that
your caregiver sings with yourchild, whatever it is, to remind
(45:23):
your kids that you are indeedcoming back, that you are indeed
not leaving them forever, thatyou are there for them.
That can be incredibly,incredibly helpful and
productive for your child.
So I hope all the all thesethings can be helpful and have
been helpful to you so far.
And if you have not yetsubscribed to this podcast,
please go ahead and do so.
As I said before, if you canrate and review it, I would be
(45:44):
eternally grateful.
And if you have a person inyour life who would benefit from
this podcast, this episode oranother episode, go ahead and
shoot them a text with with alink to this podcast.
Go ahead and let them know.
Here's this guy on social mediawhole parent.
I think you should follow him.
He has a podcast I've beenlistening to and it's been
helpful.
When you share my podcastdirectly, people are far more
likely to listen to it.
(46:04):
People love getting things froma friend, even if it, you know,
is kind of a weird thing like aparenting podcast.
You're way more likely to go toa restaurant that you was
recommended by a friend.
You're way more likely to reada book that was recommended by a
friend.
You're way more likely tolisten to a podcast that was
recommended by a friend, and sodon't keep this to yourself.
Share this message witheverybody else out in the world
(46:26):
and until next time.
This has been a whole parentpodcast talking about separation
anxiety.
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