Don’t Raise Your Kids in a Bubble

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1:02Hi, this is Janet Lansbury. Welcome to Unruffled. This episode is going to be centered around a really important point that I actually don't think I've had a chance to make on this podcast. And what makes it important to me is that it's a common misconception about the approach that I teach. Sometimes people get the impression it's about making this perfect bubble for our child to be in where everyone respects them and is kind and polite about boundaries and is interested in them, lets them have their feelings. And that maybe this could become a problem if our child is with other people that don't have this same approach, that don't have this respect for children, or I don't even want to say it's respect for children because a lot of people do respect children.

1:58but the way that they do it is different. And what we want to do as parents, our goal is to raise children who can flourish in any kind of environment. We want to give them the foundation, the sense of themselves, the sense of boundaries that other people have, how to respect others, and that we believe in them to be able to navigate their life with people and experiences and experience disappointments, experience situations of conflict, to be resilient in all of these situations. What made me think of this is that I have two notes from parents. Both of them are emails that I received recently.

2:43And the topics are quite disparate. So one is a five-year-old girl that's having trouble getting along with her grandma. And the other is a two-year-old who's finding that her hugs aren't well-received by some of her peers. So what these have in common is they're both about children adapting to other people's boundaries that aren't their parents, and how important it is that we set them up to succeed at that as best we can. We're not going to be perfect. So that's what I want to talk about. But yeah, Mostly I want to dispel this idea that what I'm suggesting is that we create this world that's so ideal for our children, where they're so treasured in the center of it, and that now our child is going to need to expect that others treat them that way, or that we expect others should treat them that way.

3:40That could be in a school program with different rules, or maybe on a play date at a friend's house. This is the world our children are going to be living in, and what we want is for them to thrive in it, and they can. Okay, so this is going to become clearer, I think, through my sharing about these notes. This first one is, hi, Janet, we recently moved from our perfect home to be close to our family in preparation for the school years. The move, while inevitable, was rushed and difficult for my partner and I. We moved three months ago, leaving kinder that we loved, and have been very busy renovating the new house.

4:20During this time, and for a few more months, we will be living with my mom. We're looking forward to the flexibility of living close to mom for babysitting and support. During the chaos of the move, though, I left my five-year-old daughter with her grandmother for longer than usual and saw a change in my daughter's behavior. Now that we have settled into a bit of a new routine, some behavior problems continue. I'm trying to be a considerate parent and give my daughter choices within limits. I will admit the boundaries are difficult to stick to at times, especially when my mom and I disagree on them.

4:56Mom is used to doing this very quickly, whereas it takes my daughter a while to work things out. For example, if mom washes a vegetable, my daughter might think, I can do that. I want to help. And we'll gear up to wash a bunch of things when mom just wants to move on to the next task. At home, we would let my daughter explore washing, if that's what she was inspired by in that moment. But mom is not used to this. There's also a lot more, you can't do that and you're not allowed from mom, when I would normally try to redirect a little gentler and with a please don't do that or an explanation of why we don't do something, suggesting we do something else or a yes we can after we've done with what we have to do.

5:44So what I think is happening is a power struggle between my mom and daughter, and we don't have the tools to fix it. Mom will start to say, don't do that, and my daughter will automatically react by pinching my mom. Then mom will say, don't pinch me. Look, I'm bruised from the last time you pinched me. My daughter is even asked to be pinched back. They shook hands and promised not to pinch or hit or bite again, but went straight back to their routine the same day, which now ends with grandma suggesting my daughter is a problem child. I know it's us as responsible adults that set the tone and need to fix this.

6:21If you could offer some advice here, it would be much appreciated. We can't wait to live in our own home. And I know it's all the disruption that is causing the problem. So I'm scheduling in quality time with my daughter, but we don't know how to break this pattern with grandma. Okay, so I thank this parent for reaching out to me. And yeah, so her daughter, the whole family is in a transition. That's hard. There's feelings around that. And now here is grandma, who has quite a different style and different boundaries than this parent has. It sounds like this parent is fine letting her daughter sort of follow a whim, like, oh, you can wash a bunch of stuff now.

7:04And that's convenient for her. It works for her, works for the parent. But grandma doesn't want that. That's not comfortable for her. So the granddaughter and the grandmother are in a bit of a conflict. As his parents said, it is a power struggle. But I think where this parent could help make this better is by, first of all, instead of seeing this as kind of a problem that her mother has this different style, to accept, of course, everyone is going to have their own way and their own needs. and setting boundaries is about listening to and respecting our own needs. And that's what children want us to do.

7:47That's what children need us to do. So this grandma, this mom isn't doing anything wrong or that she shouldn't be doing. In fact, she's doing exactly what she should be doing, which is expressing herself to her grandchild. This is me. This is what I like. This is what I can put up with or not put up with. And this is the way I react when I'm not comfortable. So what I'm saying is I think that this parent's outlook on this as it's a problem that her mom has, it's really a problem that her daughter is having adapting to this other person. I believe she could do this a lot more readily if her parents weren't second-guessing grandma themselves.

8:34If they were fully endorsing, this is grandma and this is what she wants, and this is how she does things. And so when you're with her, she's going to teach you what she needs and how to respect her. And that this is a really important thing for her daughter to experience this or anyone else's boundaries. So for the parent to see this as a positive situation that her child can learn from, what happens when we're kind of, oh gosh, mom is doing this and that, and she's not doing it the way I do, and we're kind of undermining it with our child. We're undermining the situation as, I'm not comfortable with this.

9:17I wish mom was doing it this way. And that's what's not helping her child to adapt as she needs to do to be able to respect every person's boundaries, not just have everything catering to the way that her parents do it. So it's that perception of what's going on that's going to be the basis for helping this child. And then from that perspective, when we see that way and we see, yeah, you're having a hard time with grandma's different rules, but these are her rules. And when you're with her, as when you're with anyone, you respect their rules. This doesn't mean she's going to magically not have any conflicts with grandma, but it's going to empower her and empower grandmother to be able to figure out this conflict.

10:08Because both of them have our endorsement as to this is a positive situation and an important situation for both of them to experience. This is their relationship that they're working on. It's not ours to step in on, really. So I would back them both up by hearing either of their point of view. Oh, gosh, you're having a problem with her. You feel like she's a problem child because she's not listening to you. From now on, I'm going to make sure I encourage her on my side that she should listen to you. Because these are your boundaries. This is your house. This is your relationship with her. and I support that and I trust you to handle it in the best way.

10:50This is how we strengthen both parties. And then with our child, we might say, again, like what I just said before, grandma does it different. She does a lot of things differently. We expect that you respect what she's telling you, the way that she does things at her place. And if you have a problem with her, we believe you can work it out. But when our daughter doesn't have that united front, and grandma doesn't have that united front, endorsing this, it's much, much harder for both of them. Another thing this parent can do, because this is almost always the case when our child is having difficulty with somebody else's boundaries, it's almost always the case that there might be reason to look at our boundaries.

11:36And if we are really standing up for ourselves with our child, and if we're believing in them as people who can handle not getting what they want, maybe having a big uproar about it, this child sounds very strong. And she doesn't sound like somebody that would be shaken or sad if she didn't get to explore her wish to wash everything when she had that desire. It's not going to harm her spirit to be told no and for her to get really, really mad about that. I think where my approach gets confused as permissive is that I'm very strict in my boundaries. What I'm not getting into is what I consider the other person's lane, which is their feelings about my boundaries, my child's feelings about it.

12:27That I'm not going to try to control or tell them how it should be. But I'm going to be very strong in saying, you know, I just don't feel like doing that right now. No, you can be mad. I'm not afraid of the word no. I try not to overuse it with a little child because they tune it out. No, no, no, no, no, no. But there's nothing wrong with saying no and being strong and standing up for ourselves. In fact, it's what our child needs to set them up for success in all these other relationships that they're going to enter into, that they're going to need to navigate from a place of understanding, oh, other people are going to tell me no to things sometimes, and they don't have to have a perfect reason.

13:13They're just saying how they feel and standing up for themselves. And that's a good thing. And that means I can do it too for myself. So this parent said, when I would normally try to redirect a little gentler with a please don't do that or an explanation of why we don't do something, or suggest we do something else, or a yes, we can after we've done what we have to do. So it does sound polite. It does sound gentle. But I wonder if there's a little bit of tiptoeing around by this parent, because that's what that sounds like to me, that she's a little bit maybe wearing kid gloves. She doesn't want her daughter to explode.

13:53This sounds like a very strong girl. So sometimes that can make us, I know this from personal experience, as a parent, want to be extra careful, be extra gentle. But that's actually not what our child needs. Our child needs us to be confident, yes or no, or we're not going to do that right now. And to let our child express all the feelings about that, that they want to express. not let them hurt us while they're doing it, not try to fix it while they're feeling like that or apologizing for ourselves or stopping everything while we wait for them to feel better or try to comfort them. No, being strong about our boundaries and clear and honest, not to kind of tiptoe around.

14:39Believe me, I want to do that with everyone, but it doesn't work. It doesn't work for them. So that's something this parent can do to fix this. She said she wants to fix this. She can't get in there and fix this and make her mother react a certain way to her daughter. What she can do is support her in her point of view. Yes, do that. Tell her no. If you disappoint her, stay clear so she can't bite you if you can. Try to be on her side and also be on your daughter's side. It's hard. Grandma does it different. And that's grandma. And she loves you. She has a different way. Just as every person you meet is going to have a different way.

15:18So I love how this parent nails it. She said, I know it's us as responsible adults that set the tone and need to fix this. So it's not so much about fixing this, but setting the tone that this is a fine situation for them to be in. And you trust them both to navigate it. And if they need your support, you're there. But you're not going to judge that someone should do it this way or that way. You see this as a most positive learning experience for your child. So that's the tone that I recommend. Tone of confidence, a tone of belief in your child and belief in your mom's right to be herself. And also maybe looking at, am I catering to my child a little bit?

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18:34Okay, so here's another note. Again, very different situation, but it's about the same thing about our child learning that other people have different boundaries. And what a great thing that is for them to learn. Hi, Janet, I discovered your amazing series and book via our daycare center. And I now listen to your podcast most days and have shared it with my friends and family. I see small, wonderful results every day. My daughter is two years, three months, and the only child in our household. She's a very affectionate little girl who loves giving cuddles to her friends. Recently, some of those friends have started rejecting her affection, either by pushing her away, saying no, or just crying loudly when she does this.

19:16She's now starting to hit when this happens, making her friends even less likely to accept a cuddle. I haven't stopped asking her to apologize and instead am making a brief apology to the child myself, I'm sorry that happened, and taking my child in my arms to see if she wants a hug from me, then moving on. We always respect her wishes when she says no to a hug or kiss from us and try to practice getting ahead of her impulses by asking her friends if they want a cuddle or not. Is there anything else we can be doing to help her learn these physical boundaries and respect people's personal space?

19:52Thanks so much for all of this amazing work you do. It's giving us parents lifelong skills that can be applied in so many situations. Well, thank you so much to both these parents for sharing and reaching out to me and trusting me with your stories. So here again, how do we set this little girl up for success in understanding other people's boundaries and respecting them? In this case, she's only two years old, right? And she needs help with this. We can't just let her and the children figure this out. Because it's a pattern, right? And that's when our children need our help. I know I talked in another podcast about siblings and how important it is to let conflicts unfold and let them learn from them and to try to stay out of the way.

20:38But when our child has a behavior pattern that's bothering other people, other children, and they're this young, then yes, they need us to be there for them preventatively early, what I call buddy guarding, all of that. So that's what I would do for this little girl. She's hugging, but when a hug isn't welcome, it doesn't really have that sentiment that a hug can have. It's not, oh, I'm just really want to show you my affection. It can become almost this dominating thing or this kind of controlling thing with other children, almost an aggressive behavior. And then she's hitting sometimes. So she's showing that those are tied together.

21:22And yes, that's not always going to be welcome to other children. And she's having a hard time seeing where the boundaries are right now and respecting other children's boundaries with this. So for that reason, I would be her buddy guard. For now, this isn't going to be always, And I know it sounds like hovering, but you're just going to be there calmly, nonchalantly, la la la, but right there. So as soon as you see you're going towards that child, you've got your hand in between, not in a stiff, tense way, but just down and ready. You're ready. And you see your child going up for that hug. Looks like you want to hug and you're stopping them.

22:04Your hand is there. So they absolutely can't do this. It looks like you want to hug. I don't know if this child wants a hug. And then you're looking at the other child. What do you think? And maybe the child doesn't say anything. They're just looking. And if we don't sense something's totally welcome, I would say, yeah, I don't think they want a hug right now. So I'm going to stop you from that. And we just keep our hand there. Very casual, very la la la, but on it. So our child can't hug. They can't hit. If somehow it gets away from us and our child does it, which I kind of don't recommend letting that happen for now.

22:38Just for this interim period where she needs another consistent message from us. And needs to be able to express that feeling of wanting to hit, which is part of why she's wanting to hug actually right now. Ah, you don't like that when I stop you. You really wanted to hug. Letting her express that feeling. But let's say it gets away from us and our child is hugging, then I would go up there as soon as possible, take my child's arms off of the other child, pull them back and say they were saying no. And I'm sorry I wasn't there to help you with that. And then to the other child, I'm sorry I was a little too late.

23:13And if we think they're hurt, are you okay? But not making a big deal out of this. What I would avoid actually is where this parent said she picks her up and tries to hug her herself. You know, I think it's almost like we're being blasphemous to say that a hug isn't the answer to everything. And I'm a hugger. So I could feel that too sometimes that, oh, everybody loves hugs and hugs should be the answer. But in this case, a hug isn't really a hug as we know it, as adults would do it. So I wouldn't hug her when she's showing that she's actually being aggressive. I wouldn't try to make that go away with a hug or fix it in some way.

23:55That's giving her, I think, a confusing message. You're not letting me do this with other kids, but you're doing it with me. And I know the parent does not mean it that way, but children receive different messages than we think we're sending a lot of the time. And she's confused right now, this little girl, about what she's allowed to do with other kids and what hugs are. Is a hug just something that's automatically this great thing? No. Not when somebody doesn't want it, not when it's not given with genuine affection. So yeah, I wouldn't hug her. And then the other thing I would look at, and this is how this is all going to go away.

24:35The other thing I would look at is just as with this other parent, with the grandparent and the daughter having a hard time, I would look at the boundaries this parent has with her child. And what this parent says is, I always respect her wishes when she says no to a hug or kiss from us. That's great. I would also consider her own wishes when maybe her child wants to hug. And this is a very hard thing for us. So I know, again, it's like blasphemous to say your child wants to hug you and you would say, not right now, or I'm not available for that right now, maybe later when I'm sitting down, when it's comfortable.

25:16So not only are we respecting our child's boundaries with that, but we're really listening to ourselves and we're not seeing that every hug or kiss or give me attention, mommy or anything is this magical call that we have to answer to in a certain way. No, this is what boundaries need to be for kids to be able to understand them and how they work with other people that we're really listening to ourselves. So when we're like, I don't feel like picking her up right now. I don't feel like carrying her. We don't. Maybe we find another way. Like I'll sit down over there and then you can sit with me, but I'm not going to carry you all around.

25:53Or I can do it later. Or, you know, I'm cooking now, you can be mad, but I'm not doing hugs right now. That confident, that comfortable, that in tune with ourselves. It's the best gift we can give not only ourselves as parents to help us not get worn down, but our children so that they can actually learn. It's okay if I don't get what I want sometimes or what I think I want. What I really want is my parent to be clear with me and not do things she doesn't really feel like she wants to do, like when she hugs me just because I demand it, but she's not really into it. This can be a hard thing for us to see in ourselves and in our children, but it's the key to, first of all, free to be ourselves, which we deserve to be, and for children to understand this important thing that's going to be a life skill for them, including with us as we're older and we want to be close with them and friends with them.

26:49If we don't start establishing our boundaries now, it gets harder to do that. We can always make changes as parents, but it gets harder for us because we get into patterns and we get into, oh, my child needs this or that, or they're too attached and I've got to give into that. Our child wants to be with us, the real us, not the us that just wants to please them, which is a wonderful thing that we want to please our kids, but it's not as loving as being honest and being boundaried in ourselves. So again, I thank both of these parents, and I think they can make a shift here. It is a big mental shift.

27:28But once they do, it's going to be very easy to turn these situations around. It's all in the way that we're seeing it and seeing our role with children and seeing what they actually need instead of what they're just telling us they need in the moment. That can be hard, right? Because as babies, everything they were trying to tell us they needed, we wanted to fill. But as they become toddlers and older than that, it gets a little more confusing. So I hope some of this helps. Thank you for listening. And there's a lot more on these topics in my No Bad Kids Master Course. So please check it out at NoBadKidsCourse.com and my book, No Bad Kids, available everywhere.