Triggered By Kids’ Noises & Messes, Sibling Fights, Backtalk, Dawdling? #534

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2:04I've got them on right now. Cozy Earth is my wardrobe. So head to CozyEarth.com and use my code CALM for up to 20 % today. So do you get triggered by tantrums, by kids pushing your buttons, ruining your busy agenda, leaving messes everywhere? Do you get triggered by their smart aleck responses or siblings fighting with each other? Of course you do. I got triggered just saying that myself. But when you react, you make power struggles worse, behavior never changes, and relationships become strained. So I want to show you exactly how to overcome your triggers and break those generational patterns.

2:44So that is what we're going to discuss on today's episode of the Calm Parenting Podcast, which I am super excited about. And I'm super excited about our Black Friday sale at CelebrateCalm.com. All 17 programs, 35 hours of detailed strategies I can't fit into podcasts for the price of a trip to a therapist. So here's the thing. We all have triggers, probably since childhood. So these are often deeply ingrained. And if you don't deal with these, you will have constant and unnecessary power struggles with your strong-willed kids because they know your buttons and they know how to push them well. You will end up hurting your relationship with your kids and you won't ever get them to stop doing what they are doing.

3:28you will end up frustrated by this and you'll miss opportunities to bond and to teach them life skills and to focus on what's really important. All because you and I get triggered by things inside of us that are not your kids' issues. And this will sound a little tough. You know I don't do blame or guilt. But don't force your kids to be responsible for your triggers. These are for you to deal with, not for your kids to work around your triggers. Look, that's what our son had to do with me and my wife had to do with me before I could control myself. They were walking on eggshells. Why? Because I couldn't control myself.

4:10Otherwise, watch, think what we're saying. I have never dealt with my own triggers and can't deal with this. So you need to change so that I won't react and be triggered. and you need to change because I can't or won't change. Look, we're breaking generational patterns so your kids won't struggle with these things like we have. And we are modeling for them how to control ourselves, transform ourselves and handle difficult situations in life because that's what life is, just a series of difficult situations and we're all flawed and have these issues. I will tell you that is so much more important than just getting your kids to do homework or clean their bedroom or make their bed or have good hygiene.

4:57Those things are important, but they're not really that important. But teaching kids how to own their own issues, their own triggers, and make healthy choices with relationships, man, that's everything. So we're reconciling our past. We're making peace with it so it can stay there. We're making generational changes and creating a new family tree. So I want to take you through four examples and the final example is my favorite because it's what an everyday parent like you did when his kids triggered him with their backtalk and sibling squabbles. So let's tackle messes. So you've got messes everywhere after you've cleaned up and even if you don't struggle with messes left by your kids, apply the exact same action steps to your triggers in order to be free.

5:48Now, I did some other podcasts, Seven Killer Ideas to Get Kids to Clean Up Their Emotional, Relational, and Physical Messes. That was episode number 477 from May 7, 2025. That's excellent. I go through in detail many different ideas how to get your kids to clean up. That's the easy part to me. What I want to focus on today is not fixing the problem, but learning how to not let this trigger you anymore. So step number one, which you all hate, and I'm okay with your hate toward me, is this. Sit in the midst of it without fixing it. And I would say sit in the midst of it without fixing it yet. I want you to practice this.

6:32One day, just sit down in the midst of the mess or the chaos, if that's your trigger, without fixing it right away. Think about it. You could even journal if you like doing this. First, identify what you're feeling in your body. Does your heart race a little bit? Do you feel short of breath? Does this give you a headache? Next, identify why this triggers you so much. Does it feel overwhelming? Do you feel guilty over letting it get out of control like this, like you failed because your kids are slop, you know kind of acting sloppy. Do you fear your kids will grow up and be unable to be organized and have to live a chaotic life?

7:15Is it irritating because you work so hard for five hours to keep the house organized and then your kids come in and mess it up within five minutes? Do you feel resentful toward your kids or even a spouse who not only doesn't help but complains about it or yells at the kids and now you have to be a mediator? Do you take it personally as disrespect towards you? I kind of get that. Do you feel judged inside by your parents, right? Like they would have never let this happen. All of those things are very normal. So let's take a tough step. For the next few days, I want you to sit in the midst of the mess or the sibling squabbles or the tantrums from a toddler or a teen without fixing them until it doesn't trigger you so much anymore.

8:07Because when you get triggered, you tend to lecture, yell, repeat yourself 14 times, which actually makes you sound and feel powerless and weak, cause you to complain, you get resentful, you try to bribe and plead, and you go on and on, and eventually just yell and nobody takes you seriously. Now, while you're sitting, realize this is normal. Expect it. It doesn't mean to accept it, but you can expect that it's normal. Look, when you sign up for marriage, you forfeit your right to do what you want all the time. When you sign up to have kids, you forfeit the right to expect to have a quiet home with no messes.

8:50Read a book during this time, scrapbook. So listen to music. Do that while you're just sitting there. You could even do something with your hands, organize something, because that brings a sense of order. The rhythm and order of music actually helps quite a bit with this. Now here's an option for perhaps a certain room or several rooms. You just happily clean up while listening to music or a podcast, and you go about your day. No drama, no complaining. I'm not saying this is what I recommend. I'm just saying it's an option. It alleviates your stress and drama and you get what you want without lecturing or yelling.

9:35A neat home without any negative feelings. Now, if you need the dishwasher loaded a certain way, then you just need to be the dishwasher loader for the entirety of your life. Don't let anybody else near it. You just handle it. Look, it's unfair to ask other people in your home to do what will never really please you. Because if they can't please you, then you have to relinquish that right to yell at them and just do it yourself instead. Because you and everyone else will be much happier. Now look, you can go hardcore. You can declare martial law in your home until the messes are picked up. You can give your kids some practical tools.

10:17I went through that in that podcast from last May for cleaning up, like creating videos with them. We go through those tools in the updated Discipline That Works program. We have a ton of this. So check out your app because I just updated the Discipline program. But I really want you to practice sitting in this without fixing it. Over the course of the next few days and weeks and months until you have some limited mastery or control over it so that it doesn't trigger you in a visceral way. It will still bug you, but it won't trigger you in that visceral way and cause you to react and hurt relationships.

10:58All right, practice that. Number two, I'm doing this for me. Discordant noise is a huge trigger for me. So back in the day, we had these camps where we'd have 10 to 15 loud kids. They were all like little cops, judges, and attorneys all wrapped into one, like your kids, in our home, squabbling with each other or building with Lego blocks while humming and making weird noises, not to mention the venting and complaining. It was like nails on a chalkboard. And that bothers me naturally, but I couldn't react and yell at kids. So I began focusing on this. So think about this. Discordant noise to me is especially irritating because there's no rhythm to it like there is in music.

11:43So I began, I'm kind of doing this now, balling my hands up into fists and then kind of gently hitting them against my thighs in a rhythmic motion. So I was focusing more on the vibration that sent through my legs and the rhythm of it. Then I focused on trying to control the kids and their noises. I controlled the one thing I could myself and I'd encourage you to do that. That's why I mentioned when you're sitting in the midst of the messes or other things be doing something that gives you a sense of control whether to organize something, what's cleaning the dishes maybe, loading your dishwasher, whatever it is that makes you feel some of that internal peace.

12:29I would also encourage you, and I'm not being funny with this at all, get some noise-canceling headphones. Put it on your Christmas list. I want noise-canceling headphones. You don't have to hear every single thing that your kids say, but if it just, even just some AirPods that drown out some of that noise, that's just very effective. Put music on in there. Okay, I'm going to add a bonus one here. Kids dawdling. That was a huge trigger for me with Casey because my dad was career military. So if you weren't five minutes early and standing at attention, he considered you late. And of course, we ended up having a strong-willed child who took his time.

13:09And what I ultimately realized is that Casey's dawdling was directly related to the pressure and anxiety he felt from me. So he'd intuitively slowed down as if to say, look, I'm not dealing with your childhood issues. You deal with that, and then it will work much better. And it did. When I stopped rushing him and realizing that when I realized that he wasn't rejecting my authority, he was rejecting my anxiety, I began to lead him instead of trying to rush him and that worked so much better and it still works today. So what about squabbling kids who back talk or little kids who just ruin your agenda?

14:00So I get this. You're a busy parent and you've got this agenda and checklist you need to get through every day in order to be a good parent. I'm just going to encourage you when your kids are young, throw away that checklist, simplify your life. You can't get it all done and what will happen is you will become kind of a slave to your checklist and you'll end up marking off the boxes will begin to be more important and actually connecting with your kids and that will cause more conflict and more power struggles and then you won't get as many things done. It's kind of counterintuitive but the more that you slow down your life with these kids the more you'll actually get done.

14:39So here's a quick example and again it's kind of related to messes, but a great mom said, hey, I've been triggered lately by these messes. All my kids want to do is drag everything to do with a house into giant piles they call forts. They're doing it in closets in the living room everywhere, and it really sets me off. And so I get that. You should be triggered by that. Now, let's walk through some steps. One is reset expectations. little kids are just supposed to do irritating things that ruin your agenda. It's part of being a kid. And so I want you to relieve the expectations of yourself, right?

15:18Like, oh, well, if I were a good mom or dad, we wouldn't have messes and my kids would just do exactly what I said and they'd be immediately obedient. I did a whole podcast on that one. And so relax a little bit with that. Now, I also want you to get perspective. Imagine the opposite. If your kids had their heads in screens all day, you would be coaxing them, even bribing them relentlessly to play and create and build forts and anything else constructive. Then you'd be thrilled that they stopped playing on screens and were actually being inventive and creative. Your kids are just being kids. That's what they're supposed to be.

15:58Stop imposing your grown-up responsibilities on kids. Sometimes I like to say kind of in a funny way. It's like, hey, we're all adults and we're all miserable. And it's like, we want to be like, you know what? Well, I have to be miserable and responsible and do things I don't want to do every day. Well, let me impose that on you. I'm not talking about raising entitled kids, but chill a little bit. Now, you can put limits on this always, right? You know, I love giving kids ownership of their choices, but always within my boundaries. Hey, I love that you're building forts, but from now on, you can only build those forts in this room and that room.

16:35No forts in the closet, no forts in this room ever. You could also require that they pick up the fort at the end of the day. And I know many of you are thinking, but if you allow your kids to be messy, they'll grow up to be slobs and they'll get rejected by society and I'll be embarrassed for them. It's just not true. That is your anxiety speaking. Your kids will follow your example in time. If you leave messes everywhere, then your kids will inherit that as kind of part of their environmental DNA and they'll think that's the norm. But if you're relatively neat and tidy, your kids will eventually be like that.

17:16Just not on your timeline. Casey's room was horrid as a kid. Today, if you visit his house, which I am tomorrow because he's making me dinner. We're having a Sunday night football night together. He'll make you take your shoes off so you don't track dirt in from outside. Why? Because he owns his own home and he grew up. So chill a little bit. That's just your anxiety projecting into the future as if your kids are going to be at 35 and 45, just like they are when they're 5 and 8 and 15. So control your own anxiety first or you will create endless power struggles. Instead of reacting, sit down, grab a drink and a book, watch your kids building their forts.

18:01They're playing well by themselves, entertaining themselves, not hurting anyone or anything. It's a dream for modern day parents. Encourage them by asking questions. Hey, I'm curious why you use that for the top of your fort. Do you think you could make it even bigger without it caving in? Affirm them. Man, that's so creative. You guys are such good builders. Enjoy them being kids. Send pictures to the grandparents bragging about these forts that they're building. Be grateful. And I'm not saying this in one of those smart meetings. Be grateful you get to work on and be free from this trigger. Although I am kind of saying it like that, aren't I?

18:42But I do. I want you to have, I want you to look at this whole process as an adventure. Instead of just being irritated all the time, parent, I think it's so hard. Be grateful. Look, I've had this trigger that has dominated my mood since I was four years old, and now I get to be free from it. Sit amidst the mess after the kids go to bed. Instead of seeing disorder and something that needs to be picked up, see it as a monument to your kids creativity and expression of their simple joy as something you will miss when they get older and they lose they're going to lose this childlike desire to make forts and you're going to miss that and one day they're going to be teenagers and they're just basically never going to see them except when they come into the kitchen and grab something out of their refrigerator while they're holding the door open letting all the cold air out and then they disappear to their rooms So enjoy that.

19:42Here's a cool thing. Make your own fort with your spouse one night and just lie down in it. Let your kids show you how to play again and have fun and not just be productive and responsible. And then maybe on Friday nights, all of you crawl into a fort and have a snack and laugh and giggle together. Do that. I promise you will not regret it. Change your expectation of yourself and your kids. Stop trying so hard to be the perfect parent. Change the narrative in your head from, my kids are so messy and never pick up things, to, man, my kids are so creative. They have a great imagination. They love to play.

20:23Okay, here's my favorite one. So I save this for last because I just love this. A dad said one of his boys provokes the other son, and then dad would get involved and in his words, I would make it infinitely worse. So let's see how this dad, the dad worked through our process. He's got the 30 days to calm program. It's the first one I want you to go through among the 17. And he said he began working on this first step, identify your triggers and then diagram how you typically respond and what the result is. So watch how this works. It's really cool. and I know a lot of dads like this because it's kind of like an engineering process.

21:06One brother provokes the other. One brother responds. This encourages the provoking child to keep going, and then their heightened voices provoke my response as the dad. When things go for longer than a minute or two, I respond by barging into the room and or standing over them and lecturing them. One or both of the boys then raise their voice or provide a smart aleck response. My response is then to escalate, usually yelling, barking orders. And this results in chaos and the boys end up yelling, kind of rightly, for mom. Which gets me even more worked up. I can tell you as a dad, that is humiliating to us because it's like, hey, I'm the dad here.

21:59I should be able to handle this situation. And then the kids are going to mom for it. Man, that's a big trigger for me as well. So by this stage, the dad said, I'm usually yelling and barking consequences I can't keep. And everyone is upset. All of this happens in probably 60 to 90 seconds. Okay, good. The next step is to practice a new and planned response to the sibling situation. So I encourage them, I'm like, hey, brainstorm two or three opposite responses. What can you do differently next time, even if it makes you uncomfortable? And the shortcut you'll learn in the programs is do the opposite of what you normally do now.

22:44Because what you're doing now isn't working. So maybe if you do the opposite, you'll get the opposite response. So here's what the dad began doing. He said, I can walk by and say casually, hey, I'm headed to the garage to do X if anybody needs anything or wants to help me. Or, hey, let me know if either of you wants to grab a snack with me. Dad said I can walk into the room and sit with earbuds in listening to music or a podcast. If it's a podcast they might be interested in, like something on, because some of the kids are into history and World War II, he could even say, hey, what do you guys think about this guy's theory or ideas?

23:26He said I can go find something else to do out of earshot. This was an interesting insight from the dad. nine out of ten times they're not hurting each other and they can learn to sort it out themselves moms and dads we often make these situations worse by jumping in and trying to fix them dad said and he heard this in the programs i can be curious and ask the provoking child hey but in my experience when you pick on your brother it's usually because you're bored is that what's happening and then offer to give that intense emotional engagement see that's what your kids are looking for, oftentimes when they're picking on siblings, it's either boredom or they're looking for intensity.

24:10And so dad said, oh, give him some intense emotional engagement, making something in the garage with me, rather than giving him that intense emotional engagement by yelling at him. And dad's final option is sit in the room and literally say nothing, just sit in the discomfort of it. For someone who yells and raises his voice too much, the discordant noise for others is triggering. And I was like, well done, Dad. See, that's how you do it. There are so many different options. So this week, I want you to choose one situation that usually irritates you and you can turn it into a bonding moment with your kids and teaching moments.

24:57Be patient. Be creative. I bet you can turn that which is irritating to you into a bonding routine. Take what usually separates you and let it bring you closer to your child. See, the goal isn't to get your kids to behave. It's to build a relationship so they follow you out of a deep sense of respect and trust. Because that's what we really want. and when you have that trust and enjoy your kids, I promise they will listen to you more and they'll seek out your wisdom and you won't be triggered all the time. So let's do this moms and dads. If you want to take advantage of the Black Friday sale, I would work through that 30 Days to Call program first.

25:41It's a game changer. If you need help with it, email Casey, C-A-S-E-Y at celebratecalm.com. Look, thank you for letting me be tough with you. Thank you for letting me encourage you to sit in the midst of things that really irritate you. because I appreciate how hard it is to change yourself. And I have so much respect for you breaking these generational patterns. It is such a gift to your kids. All right, you're crushing it, moms and dads. Love you all. Bye-bye.