Easing Transitions through Alliance-Building

0:00 I'm Dr. Becky, and this is Good Inside. And I'm on a mission to rethink the way we raise our children. I think most adults in their own childhoods would say, yeah, my parents didn't really approach me with the full respect that I probably even deserved as a kid. So we're also just not in the habit of talking to kids with the amount of information and respect they need. So we're both not in the habit of communicating that way, and kids actually actually probably need more things concretely communicated because they don't have a life experience.

0:33 So if you think about both of those things, there's so many ways, I think, you can make the car process much smoother that actually has nothing to do with the car process, but has everything to do with the state kind of Robin is in before you make those requests. Because I think one of the ways to think about his, oh, what about this? And I need this and I need this. It's he actually doesn't need all those things, he's trying to cling to a world he knows, which is his world at home, because he's about to enter into a world he has no idea about, and that feels very scary to everyone, right?

1:08 So, what does that mean? I don't think you have to do it weeks in advance, right? The night before I would actually get out, like, I don't know, little figurines and blocks. And if you don't even have that, it could literally just be anything concrete. It could be like a soda can, it doesn't really matter. But it'd be like, this is our house. This is where I am and you are and your baby brother and your mom, and almost have like four little people.

1:33 And then I would have another block kind of far away. Tomorrow, which means after we wake up and after we eat breakfast and maybe even show like, oh, we'll have a waffle or whatever you eat for breakfast, this is what's gonna happen. And then I'd have something that looks like a car, or again, it could be any block, and show how the four of you are gonna get in the car and then show how that car is gonna slowly go, right?

1:57 And if traffic is an issue, what I would even do in this scene, right, is do something like, ugh, traffic, and show how the car stops. So annoying. What can we do in traffic? Well, hmm, Robin, what could we do? What song could we sing if we get into traffic? Now you're actually helping them understand that and you're building a coping skill in advance, everyone wins. And then you keep kind of going until you get to the house.

2:25 Then you could add another layer. For example, let's say you're going to a house with no kids or you're going to a house that has, I don't know, four older kids. You can imagine almost playing out the scene there. And again, maybe they're bigger blocks. Oh, those are big kids. There's no kids who really love to do puzzles like you do. Oh, that's tricky. Now Robin has a mental model. Now he's not leaving a known world to go to blank, existential nothingness, you know, which any of us would say, no, thank you, right?

2:54 He actually can picture what's happening. And like all of us, when you can picture something happening, you immediately feel more competent. Nobody ever says to us, when you have kids and you're making a transition, right, here's something that eases the process. As soon as we hear it, it's like, oh, that makes sense. Yeah, that's actually kind of easy to do and that would make sense. But these things aren't intuitive because you just leave the hospital with the child and they're like, go forth, raise that human, right?

3:24 So I think that will be hugely helpful. Now, you also, Paul, alluded to something before. I don't know if you heard yourself say it, but I'm gonna bring it back, 'cause it's your idea and not mine. You're like, we haven't even really set ground rules for what he's gonna bring in the car and what he's not gonna bring, right? It's just like he starts grabbing stuff. So that's another kind of area where I think the two of you could set the stage in advance to at least now have language for what's gonna happen.

3:54 So you might say in the morning, hey, we are gonna be leaving right after breakfast, just like we talked about. Maybe you refer to that little scene you acted out. You can bring, and then it doesn't matter, whatever you wanna say, you can bring two toys from our home. I know it's nice to bring something from your home so you know you have it. Right, what two toys do you want? Or maybe you've set this up before.

4:15 You're gonna bring two toys. I know you might wanna bring five. The limit's gonna be two. So let's get ready. You're gonna want five, Dad's gonna say only two, buddy. Show me the other three you wanna keep at home right near our garage so you see them when you come in. Let's pick the two now. So you've even almost gotten ahead of this moment, right? Really alliance-building, really respectful. And it also as apparent kind of gives you a baseline to refer to, that when he says, no, but I wanna bring my five bikes, and you're like, I can't bring five bikes in the car.

4:50 You wouldn't even have five bikes, but if we did, wouldn't even fit. Hey, oh, remember how we talked about bringing two? He still might be upset, but now you feel like you have footing instead of feeling like you're flailing. 'Cause it seems like when the car situation happens, Robin is flailing. But it seems also for you, Paul, you feel like you're flailing. You're like, I don't know what I'm doing here. I'm just going with the flow.

5:11 That it's not a bad way to parent at all, if it's not working, I think it's a sign like, I'm just gonna feel better if we've discussed some of these things in advance. So that's the preparation, that's a way that you lower the confusion.