Do you expect your child to have emtional control?

I think your ds is way too young to control his emotions right now. My ds is a bit older than your son( 32 mos) and his emotions are right now very much in control of him. I'm 36 and most times I have a hard time being in control I know what has tricked me in the past with my older kids is thinking just because they are super verbal they have extra control. I've now seen the error in this. Maybe your dh is putting pressure on him to talk about it because his expectations are too high. It may even help to give your husband new words. Obviously the stop crying isn't working , but he's not ready to cuddle and rock it out. Maybe he could find his own catch phrase for he and ds. My dh is from the Carribean and his phrase is "brace up". It means the same thing and said with an accent it's kind of cute. Also when we call ds Dude it tends to difuse the situation. HTH These two year old emotions are very hard.

Quote from The Natural Child Project by Jan Hunt

"Adult-like behavior matures by the time we are adults"

Always the one I use when I'm trying to help someone else understand why I treat my children with compassion and respect, ESPECIALLY when they are in the midst of a meltdown!

I agree with the other posts that children can't control there emotions , gosh adults can't always either, you should see me PMS time Dracula beware. No let them be kids and comfort them if that helps ,sometimes it makes it worse. I think it's sad when I see kids fall and hurt themselves and parents say get up you'll be right, my first instinct is to comfort. I have found comforting them when they are hurt at least slows down there emotional outbursts, other times when they are crying for tantruming or other reasons comforting doesn't always work. Still working on what does work, aren't we all.

Yes.

Some

Of course my dd's are all over age 9!

A two year old. No way. No how!

My ds is almost 27 mos, and no way does he have emotional control!! There are so many things that are new, confusing, frustrating, and sometimes even painful in his life. Heck, I don't have emotional control all of the time. The best I can hope for is that I can make him feel a little better when he gets overwhelmed, and best case, he can tell me what upset him after he calms down. I have printed a few pages from Jan Hunt's website and keep them on the fridge to remind me and dh of the "big picture." That ds is a child and needs more than anything our love and support. Maybe you could put this one on your fridge for you dh to see? http://www.naturalchild.com/jan_hunt/misunderstand.html He may just not understand that ds is not developmentally even close to "controlling his emotions."

And do you want him to be? Ever? Emotions are feelings, and feelings should be expressed. No emotion is ever wrong. But there are unpleasant ways to express them. And these unpleasant ways are definitely more likely to happen if feelings are bottled up. With GD our children are learning to express their feelings in ways that are helpful to them without hurting anyone else. But thinking that you can actually control an emotion is a dangerous path. This was really common in how our generation was raised, though. Don't cry. Don't show any weakness. Don't express your fears. My dh and I have always struggled with his ingrained need to hide any emotion that is considered negative, and it has taken us years of counselling to work through.

Good luck to you. Trust your instincts, and have faith that you and your dh can come to an understanding and work together. This is pretty novel stuff for a lot of people. It's hard to get past the way we were raised.

By the way, I just bought Archie Kohn's dvd Unconditional Parenting for my dh. I loved the book, and I thought the dvd would be easier for him to get through.

Quote:
Your instincts are right. I wonder if this is a calm guy thing. Our ds is also good natured and rarely melted down. My dh is very like yours. He's a great dad in many ways, but at about this age, he too kept telling ds to that he "needs to calm down".

I kept saying "just HOW is he going to calm down just like that? You have to teach him TOOLS to calm down." I'm not sure that ever really got through. Dh is very good at controlling his emotions. He considers it to be "carrying on" when I get upset and say something like "I really wish you'd clean your crap off the couch. There's no room for me to sit and I feel like you're taking over the house." Apparently the 2nd sentence is carrying on : !

Maybe you could suggest to dh that instead of saying "stop crying" he could give ds something specific (and positive) to do.

Lynn

Quote:
Lynn, I think that is a perfect idea! Dh doesn't always do so great in the redirecting area (and I'm still definitely learning), but there are plenty of things dh could entice ds to do that would be fun and get his mind off the meltdown subject.

And, to colleen, no, I don't particularly WANT ds to control his emotions all the time. Although, I do know there will be times in his life when this is valuable (work is my first thought), so I do want him to have the tools - but at this point it's not at all important to me.

Thanks everyone!