"stop being silly"

[AliceAbsolum]

MIL has DD (21 months) 2 days a week. She's really good with her overall. BUT she doesn't share my (very high) gentle parenting standards.
She rarely takes DD out so by 5pm she's running around the house with loads of energy and MIL will often tell her to stop being so silly.
Or if she's crying she'll say don't cry, don't be upset.

Now maybe I'm being a batshit pfb. Highly likely.
But basically I'm worried DDs being invalidated and it'll impact her mental health in the future.

I don't intend to say anything obviously. It's just hard to hand your child over to your village.

This is very true. You can drive yourself mad trying to get it perfectly right. Which is silly because I know it's good to have ruptures and repair them.

---

DD and I were playing earlier and when I said it was time for bed age started crying. I cuddled her and said something like "it's hard to stop playing isn't it but we need to go to bed". I can't imagine saying.
"don't be silly it's only bed, don't cry". Just seems mean and not meeting them where they are.

Truthfully, if you'd used a gentle tone as I'm sure you would, there would have been no difference in the impact of those two sentences on a 2 year old. Your DD was upset at going to bed. The only thing that would have made any difference would have been to say 'OK stay up then' which of course you couldn't. The 'I know it's hard...' is to make you feel better that you're upsetting her in the 'right' way. Makes no difference to her.

What @5128gap said.

And that age conflict resolution is all about tone of voice, listening to/acknowledging their concerns, emotional connection........ and lots and lots of cuddles.

OK maybe. But it would matter in a few years time, so I'm glad I'm getting into good habits.

It really won't.

But what if when she’s 4 she’s crying because she’s snatched a toy off another child and has to give it back?

Or she’s pulled the cat’s tail and you’ve told her off?

Im not suggesting btw that these are things your child will do…

But are all feelings valid? Like is bitterness valid? Is intolerance or the feeling of snobbish superiority?

Surely people shouldn’t grow up thinking all their feelings are relevant or right. Some feelings are just ‘silly’ no? Or even worse…

This is a very good question and I'd be interested in the answer. Say for example Melissa is hitting Johnny with a stick. Melissa's mum explains about kind hands and takes the stick away. Melissa gets very upset because it was really fun to hit Johnny with the stick. What is the validating response then? "I understand youre upset because you were enjoying hitting Johnny, and I had to stop you; and that's OK that you feel that way..."?

I do think the risk of excessive validation is that what kids hear is

"Mummy understands why I'm upset...so why won't she give me what I want?"

Rather than

"Mummy says no. I understand that, even if I don't like it."

Personally I wouldn’t validate to a child that stopping playing to get much needed and healthy sleep is a hardship.

It’s a shame you haven’t taken in what people have advised on this thread as in a few years if you don’t have a resilient child school, friendships and everything outside your control will be SO much harder than it has to be

Yeah unless Johnny is particularly irritating, I’d say that Melissa’s feelings do not need validating!

I have always had difficulty as an adult where I can't avoid crying in difficult situations. It can be very embarrassing (work context for example).

My mum was lovely and very sensible but I fear I have made a deep association between tears and people being sympathetic and nice to me, which is hard to break.

As a result I try to encourage my kids (nicely!) to pull themselves together when I think they are over reacting.

This is an excellent point. I had a manager who was big on the reflective responses. "The case load is becoming unmanageable" "I can see that's a concern for you" "These new hours don't work for the clients and they're complaining" "I hear that you find that frustrating" It was beyond irritating, as not only was it obvious he was parotting his phrases, it felt like one huge waste of time when all we wanted was can it be changed? Yes or No. I can't imagine it would be long before a perceptive child saw through Mummy's technique and knew these phrases were coming, rendering them trite and rather meaningless. I'm all for empathy and think its a powerful tool, but dragging it out for every tiny job is like taking a sledgehammer to a nut, and ends up sounding inauthentic and predictable. Also ironically a barrier to the listening you're supposed to be doing as the focus lies on making the 'right' response rather than genuinely hearing and responding to your child.

The validating response would be I understand your feelings but Jonny's feelings about not being hit trump that.

Gentle parenting is just one variant of regular decent parenting really.

But do you understand Melissa’s feelings? Why are they understandable if Johnny did nothing wrong?

But would you be comfortable in saying you 'understood' your child was enjoying hitting another child and that it was a valid thing to feel that enjoyment and be upset at no longer being allowed to do it? Because that is what you'd be saying. All feelings are valid mean ALL feelings are ok. I personally don't think they are, so couldn't say that authentically to a child.

But I’m not mad at it. As long as Melissa is made to stop hitting.

But also, what if Melissa is given a consequence for hitting and is sad. Would you say, I’m understanding that it’s upsetting you but I’m taking this toy because of your hitting etc.

Doesn’t that then just feel weird like I know I’m making you sad with this consequence but I’m doing it anyway?

The issue here is this is not empathy, these responses are dismissive. Same as non-apology apologies.

I don't know that it matters does it, if my child stops hitting and grows into an older child (then adult) who doesn't hit? I do understand why people of all ages 'want to' hit people, the point is it is not ok to do it.

Loads of kids who regularly punch others are told they shouldn't want to do it. Does that work? Nope.

When my 3 year old threw his cup of milk up the wall, he was in fact being silly.

When my 3 year old then cries because he has thrown his own milk up the wall, he is both being silly and shouldn’t be upset as he is suffering a natural consequence of his own actions.

sometimes silly, and being told to buck up ARE emotions that need validating. Experience and validate the full range, not just the ones that you are afraid will cause “harm” in 20 years.

He was being age-appropriate. Is that silly?

What benefit does he derive from being told he's silly? Nothing, developmentally. He'll learn the lesson just as well without the word silly - if milk is thrown, you can't drink it.

But ultimately I agree with this. I don’t think feeling:

• judgement based on prejudice
• a desire to hurt
• an attraction to anything other than a human adult
• entitled to someone else’s property
• etc

…are understandable feelings that deserve to be validated.

My DS5 gets angry with me because I refuse to spell out his name with his food since I did it once and he saw it on CBeebies. His anger doesn’t need validating and I do tell him he’s being silly 🤷🏽‍♀️

I think it does matter actually. Because for me the aim would be to raise an adult who didn't hit people because they didn't want to hurt them rather than one who believed it was valid to want to hurt others, but you can't because you'll be prevented from it. To not want to hurt others is learned through developing the child's empathy with the feelings of others, not by having their own negative feelings validated. So in this situation the focus should be on Johnny's feelings, not Melissa's.

I am just very keen on validating my child's feelings. No one learnt to regulate their emotions by being told they shouldn't have them!

I don’t think every single feeling needs to be validated, it’s ok to tell a child to stop being silly, or to stop throwing a tantrum or crying over something and nothing. The outside world isn’t going to validate every feeling your child has, nor should every feeling need external validation.

Is it wise to tell children that violence is understandable? I don’t think so. I think that’s fucking terrible parenting.

Why so afraid to tell off bad behaviour