06 – Validate my owies

Welcome to Trusting Children Podcast episode 6.

I’m Aisha your host and I loooove talking about children. I have 3 young children myself and have worked with little ones for over a decade.

I created this podcast to support parents in finding respectful ways of dealing with parenthood. Thank you for sharing your time with me today.

Children fall over and hurt themselves multiple times a day. This can sometimes be quite stressful to parents and other times we don’t really think it’s that big of a deal. If you’re wondering what the best way to respond when our kids inevitably hurt something this episode is for you.

We can’t avoid our children getting hurt and we can’t control their actions or their bodies. What we can control is our response. In this episode we’ll take a look at a few most common responses, why they aren’t helpful and what to say and do when our children do hurt themselves, whether it’s a smaller or more serious injury. By the end of this episode you’ll hopefully have a slightly calmer approach towards minor injuries and also start building a collection of phrases you can use when your little one comes up to you with an ‘owie.’

Hello everyone, I hope you are all well. I have to tell you this funny story from a few days ago. My kids have been driving me crazy with spilling stuff recently. Water, I can cope with it dries off and doesn’t smell…my worst pet-peeve spill is milk. A because it smells and b because I don’t like the waste. Anyway, the kids were having a drink of milk. I have 3 children, so I poured 3 cups of milk and left them to it. Came back a few seconds later, one twin had spilled his milk and drank his sisters’ which of course caused her a lot of distress. So I poured her another cup. She took one sip and put it on the side. One of the twins poured her milk into his cup (spilling some as well obviously) so when she went back to drink it her cup was empty. Her cries are getting more intense as is my patience with spilled milk everywhere. So I pour her a 3rd cup, and as she’s standing there holding it her brother literally swipes it out of her hand, knocking the cup to the ground. She’s totally distressed and I had to just cover my face with my hands. I heard Mark saying “don’t be angry” and honestly, I was laughing so much I just didn’t want her to see I found her distress funny. Do you ever find something your children are upset about so incredibly hilarious, but you don’t want them to see you laughing? And you have to be there for them and comfort them while you’re shaking inside? Tell me, I want to know!

So let’s talk injuries. Or more specifically, our responses to our children’s injuries. I’m sure we’ve all seen a child take a fall, and the first thing they do is look back at the adults with them. To be honest, I could end this episode here, because that’s exactly the point. However we respond, that’s how our children will learn to respond too. That’s the whole point, the main message so remember this. And if you want to hear more stick around and I’ll go into a little bit more detail. I’m not sure about your children, but mine definitely have some sort of minor accident happen multiple times a day. There are the injuries, that you can barely see without a magnifying glass, there are the ones that are obvious but we feel they aren’t so bad and then there are the ones that make us feel dizzy and about to pass out. And the cries, sometimes they match the injury and other times they are the complete opposite to what we think an appropriate reaction should be.

Let me ask you a question. When you accidentally hurt yourself and someone is nearby what would your ideal response from your friend or partner be? What would you like them to say to you? I just want you to hold on to that thought in your mind for a while.

There are a few most common responses that we adults tend to respond when our children hurt themselves. On one extreme we have a complete over-reaction “OMG what happened” <checking all your bones are intact> when they’ve stumbled, and on the other extreme there is the “it’s nothing, you’re ok” “pull yourself together” type and in between we have blaming and shaming and guilt-tripping “why were you climbing there” “I told you not to jump off that” “if you listened to me you wouldn’t have hurt yourself’ etc. I want to take a look at these and explain why we shouldn’t respond in this way, what the problem with these responses is.

Of course we are worried about our children getting hurt, of course we want to protect them, keep them safe from harm but the reality is: they ARE going to hurt themselves. As painful as it is to our parental soul, we need to accept that accidents and injuries are going to happen multiple times, and the way we respond each time will have an effect on our children’s attitude towards this.

If we majorly over-react to every single injury we will start projecting our own fears onto our children. And that can in turn compromise their confidence, their sense of self-preservation. As human beings we learn through mistakes, and the same goes for our physical abilities. Children are learning how to control and move their bodies all the time, and they are going to make mistakes: they will trip, they will fall, they will lose their balance, they will tumble. These are all mistakes, but they are also opportunities for our children to practice and learn from them. Children take soo many of their cues from us, their trusted caregivers, and whatever our repeated response to something is that’s what they will start to mirror. So if we overreact to every single little scratch or scrape, guess what our child’s reactions will start to look like…? If we start sowing our own worry and panic into them, they will become afraid of falling, or scraping their knee or bumping their head. And the fear will probably be not of the actual injury, but more of our reaction. If we can allow them to experience these cuts and scrapes and falls, they will learn on their own what it feels like and start developing a sense of care in order to not get hurt themselves.

On the other hand we have this “tough-love” response. Get up and go, it’s nothing, you’re ok. Sometimes the intention behind this is good. We want our children to become resilient, we want them to grow up strong be brave and be hard as nails, not a softy etc. But in fact what we are doing there is we are ignoring their feelings, we are invalidating their experience. We are telling them “you’re pain isn’t important.” How would you feel if you smashed your shin into the corner of a coffee table so hard it made you dizzy, and your friend sitting beside you who saw the whole thing said to you “that was nothing, you’re ok, you’re fine.” It’s infuriating to have someone tell you you’re ok when you’re clearly not. Children probably won’t get infuriated by this, but they will start to internalise that message “my pain doesn’t matter.” And this is not how bravery or resilience are built. It’s actually the complete opposite. Resilience and bravery grow from a place of safety and security. Think about the times when you’ve felt brave to try something new or do something a bit risky. I know for me, it’s usually when there is someone I trust with me, or I have the feeling of security that if it goes wrong I know that person will help me, or at the least, they will understand, not judge and comfort me. I doubt you ever feel brave when someone makes you feel bad about yourself.

I know that these responses are sometimes automatic, and I know that they aren’t meant to cause harm, but just be aware, and next time before you tell a child “you’re ok” just stop and check if they actually are ok before you say anything, because they might not be.

So we don’t want to coddle our children and we don’t want to force them to feel ok when they’re not…what DO we do? The answer is: Empathise. Validate. Acknowledge. Similar to how we acknowledge their emotions, we can acknowledge their pain. It isn’t up to us to decide that it doesn’t hurt them enough to warrant a hug, it’s not our body. We aren’t feeling it. Pain is so subjective, I know that sometimes I might tumble down a couple of stairs and hurt my ankle and feel fine and other times I’ll bump my finger on something and it really really hurts! I don’t want someone else telling me that my ankle pain should hurt more than my finger pain. I am the one feeling it. And we want our children to learn to recognise their pain cues too. We want them to learn and listen to their bodies, we want them to decide for themselves “is this how I normally feel?” does it feel a little bit bad, or really bad?

The easiest way to do this is to be natural. What’s the first thing you do when you see someone hurt themselves? You ask “are you ok?” Say that to children too. If you don’t know what else to say, just say that. “Are you ok? Do you need help?” That gives the child a bit of time to take in what happened, feel their body and then let them decide for themselves if they are ok or not.

What about when it’s really, really funny you ask? Well, I will say: try to contain yourself and still ask if they are ok. And if they are, then you can both laugh together. I know Mark will completely call me out on this moment of hypocrisy…He likes to tell a story of one of our snowboarding trips, he jumped onto this massive blow up pillow and kind of missed it. He was fine, but he says the first thing he heard after his fall was me laughing and then a complete stranger asking him if he was ok? He was fine! Anyway, when my children have a funny fall, I DO check if they’re ok before I laugh. Sometimes laughter can diffuse the shock. I’m the type of person that if I have a funny fall I really do HOPE that someone saw it and at least had a good laugh out of it. What do you do, pull off a smooth-ass exit move as if nothing happened or laugh it off?

Anyway, “Are you ok” is just so much more compassionate and empathetic than “you are ok”. It’s basically the same 3 words. So if you’re used to saying “you’re ok” switch the words up and profoundly change the message you are giving your hurt child. Such a small change, and such a big impact.

If you do feel the need to comfort and want to say something more, a great go-to is to just say what you noticed. You can comment on what you saw or heard. Let’s go back to your friend and the coffee table. We’ve established we didn’t want to hear “you’re fine, it’s nothing” it would be nice if they said “Wowweee that must have hurt! You hit it right on the corner of the table, I saw that! Ouch!” – it doesn’t take the pain away, but it makes us feel a bit better. To my children I’ll say things like: “Yeah, I saw you fall, that was a big one! Is something hurting you?” Or “I heard that bump! What did you bump? Your head, that must have hurt.” If I didn’t see what happened then I ask “what is hurting you” or “where did you bump yourself” – to which often the child instead of showing me what part of their body hurts, will walk up to whatever it was they stumbled on and show me that. “Ah, you hurt yourself on the chair, ouch. What part of your body is hurting you? Your arm. How does it feel now?” There’s no formula really, what I want you to remember is just to be genuine. Remember the coffee table and your friend.

If your baby accidentally hits themselves with a toy you can comfort them. I wouldn’t immediately scoop them up and start rocking. See how they are. Get down next to them, rather than picking them up. You can stroke their head and say “ow, I saw that. You bumped your head, it looked like it hurt.” If they are continuing to be upset then cuddle, and if nothing is helping then of course pick them up. I’m not saying don’t ever pick them up, I’m just saying be mindful of overreacting. They might carry on playing if you let them.

With an older child, like my 4yr old we talk about how our body heals. She likes to look at all her scratches and show me ones that have healed. So when she does get a bad scratch, she can start to connect and know that this too will eventually heal. She tells her brothers this too when they hurt themselves.

I will always comfort my children, no matter how small a scratch it is. More often than not, it usually takes a quick cuddle & kiss before they’re off again. When they know they always have this safety net, they know they can always come for a quick hug or kiss they don’t feel the need to ‘play up’ or exaggerate the injury to seem more than it is in order to get more attention.

It’s also important to remember that sometimes the reaction could possibly have nothing to do with the injury. I’ve had times where my child has fallen off a climbing frame and just got up and other times, when they have the tiniest scrape and cry for hours. I know, that it’s usually to do with something else. It’s a release. They might be tired, hungry, overwhelmed. So when you think “they don’t normally cry about something like this” you probably need to search for an answer elsewhere. The more tired they get, the more wobbly they are and then every smallest fall is an absolute breakdown. And in those cases we should comfort them because it’s a message that something else is going on, it’s not about the owie.

OK, what about those moments, when you’ve warned them about something, you’ve asked them not to climb on something, you’ve told them not to do something … they do it anyway aaaaand of course they get hurt? What then? I know, I know how tempting it is to flip into this “I told you so” mode… because well I DID tell them so! But again, as with emotions, it’s just not helpful. We don’t need to TEACH them a lesson, we don’t need to rub it in. We don’t need to make them feel even worse by adding shame and guilt to the equation.They’ve hurt themselves, that’s the lesson, that’s the natural consequence, that’s the mistake they will learn from. Will they do it again….? Yeah, they probably will, regardless of whether we lecture them or not. So the best we can do is validate their pain and comfort them. Go back to that coffee table (I’ve been imagining it so much my shin is actually starting to hurt a bit)… your friend saying “well you should have been looking where you were going” or “I told you not to come round this way” isn’t going to help, it’s not going to make us feel better. To add to our physical pain we are now also feeling a bunch of other emotions sad, silly, clumsy, embarrassed etc. We might still feel all those things, but if our friend validates our physical pain, the clumsiness, the embarrassment we can maybe laugh it off in a few mins.

Last but not least, I want to mention serious injuries. I honestly, hope that none of us will have to deal with these will very often. But it’s also better to be prepared in case we do have to deal with it. If something happens and you’re not sure about what to do… always check it out. It’s stressful, it’s nerve-wrecking but it’s always better to have the injury checked by a doctor or medical professional. This is also definitely not a time for lectures, I told you so’s, or jokes. Stay as calm as you can. Remember your child is probably in shock and also in a lot of pain. Your panic will cause them to panic even more. If you can’t stay calm you should ask for help, someone to help keep you calm, while you are keeping your child calm. Validate the experience, validate the pain. Talk them through what is happening or what will happen. “We have to get you checked by a doctor, I will be with you the whole time. You are safe. I know it hurts, the doctors will help. They are going to move your arm.” Often after serious accidents children will need time to process these events. They might want to talk about them and go over them again and again. Don’t brush it off. Talk about it as much as they want, because this is how they get to understand what happened. I’ve witnessed even the youngest toddlers repeatedly walking back and forth to a place where they hurt or bumped themselves. Your child might want to visit the area where they got hurt, it’s ok to do this. It’s ok to help them understand the accident and the pain they felt, it’s necessary. You can also be honest “It must have been very scary for you. It was really scary for me too. I was worried about you because I love you so much. We got help and now you are getting better.”

The emotional healing is as important to tend to as the physical healing. It’s also an incredible opportunity to learn about how amazing our bodies are, talk about how they heal. And honestly, children’s bodies are made to deal with injuries. Their bones are constantly growing and fusing, and in fact the chemical composition of their bones is different from adults bones, they are more porous. They are a lot more flexible, they are more likely to bend than break. And also, they heal and recover so much quicker than we do.

Ok let’s wrap up. We want our children to feel safe when they hurt themselves, we want them to come to us. We should comfort them, even if it’s the smallest injury. Wait for your child’s reaction before you respond. Wait to see if they are ok before you jump in with ice packs & bandages …they might be ok. And if they’re not ok validate their feelings, try not to dismiss their pain by telling them that they’re fine. Check first, “are you ok” is a great place to start, and after that you comment on what you saw, show them you understand how much it must have hurt.

Let me know how it goes. As always my inbox and DMs are always open. You can find me on instagram, Facebook or email. I want to hear from you.

That’s the episode done, and now it’s time for our Everyday Heroes series.

Parents are the unrecognised and unappreciated heroes of our world. We do so much important work on an everyday basis, and it needs to be talked about more. All parents are heroes and every parent’s story deserve to be heard.

Welcome everyone. Today our guest is Hannah. Hannah is from England, and she currently lives in The Hague in the Netherlands. She has twins; a boy and a girl who are 2 years old, 2 years and 3 months. And Hannah wanted to talk about how unprepared she was as a mother, ha-ha, for raising 2 very different children and how she found having twins as a first-time mum. Hi Hannah, welcome.

Hannah: Hi, thank you. Thanks, Yeah I mean unprepared is kind of an understatement but also, you know, I was thinking about how I was going to start talking about this and the fact that when you discover you’re going to have twins…after reading a few things and hearing stories from people you hear about how connected they are together, and how they could potentially share a language and so obviously you start thinking of them as a pair from the very beginning. But actually, as my pregnancy progressed, I knew instinctively that I had 2 very, very different individuals inside me. And with the movements and what we saw on the many scans that we had, it was very clear, you know, we did have seemingly a dominant one and a submissive one and one that had a lot more energy than the other. So, I was prepared in a way for different challenges, in an instinctive way. But yeah, essentially, I’m bringing up 2 completely different individuals despite the fact that they were born a minute apart. And that is something that is a real blessing but also as a first-time mum and having 2 at once just being prepared for the different individual needs of the 2 from the get-go was quite interesting and you know anything that I’d read about twins synching up for sleep and feeding patterns completely went out of the window from day 1. They were not sleeping at the same time, one with colic as well, my boy Alfie had colic. So, the needs were really, really different to Jeannie’s who slept through the first 3 months of her life and, ha-ha, was barely awake. Now they’re over 2 and toddlerdom is well and truly kicked in and they are completely different in everything from their development stages to the skills that they’re developing and mastering at different rates. Also, just the responses to new experiences. So, we’ve just gone to Centerparcs for the first time since they whole pandemic has hit, left the house and taken the kids to a completely new environment and just seeing how these 2 children reacted to this new environment was amazing actually. So, when we got to Centerparcs, Alfie was completely terrified of everything and was quite clearly out of his comfort zone whereas Jeannie was strutting confidently like she’d owned the place. And that was just a reminder to me that from the beginning these 2 kids have kind of gone against the grain from anything that I was told and expected with twins.

Aisha: When you said that you started hearing from people and the first thing people started saying when you had twins and you said it was ‘oh how synched up they are’ I actually thought you were going to say something like ‘ooh double trouble’ because that’s a lot of comments that people sort of in the street or sometimes even friends and family, it’s sort of almost a stereotypical comment that twin mums here – double trouble and double work and all that. How do you find that, like how do you feel about that statement?

Hannah: Well for me it didn’t really apply because my kids have got an amazing way of tag-teaming everything. They tag-team their tantrums, they tag-team when they want to run away. They tag team when they don’t want to listen and when they want to demonstrate a bit of resistance to what you’re saying. So, for me it’s been less of a double trouble more of like an intense kind of, kids going at it at the same time. It’s just been that consistent tantrum that’s lasted maybe several months, or the consistent kind of whining in the background. They’re very good at tag-teaming and actually in a sick kind of way I think each one enjoys the other one having a meltdown because they kind of sit down, settle down and kind of enjoy it, a little show, ha-ha. And it’s even been like that through sleep. One wakes up screaming…Alfie’s been going through another little patch of it, since Centerparcs funnily enough, so there’s obviously a little bit of trauma there. He’s, you know, having these little episodes at the same time every night and Jeannie will just sleep through it. Which is great but then obviously from newborn stage up until probably when they hit 2, when sleep gets a lot better, it would be one waking up crying, the other one sleeping through it. But the other one going to sleep and the other one waking up. So, the situation got so bad that we were up maybe up to 14 times a night. Which is when we had to get the sleep coach in, ha-ha. And still betimes, their needs at night, they’re still very, very different. Alfie’s still very needy, will want to cuddle, wants to hold our hand while he goes to sleep but will go to sleep very quickly. Whereas Jeannie will verbally process everything she has experienced and learned that day and will go into a half an hour trance-like diatribe and will sing songs over the new words she’s learnt and different experiences she’s had but needs to be talking to you.

Aisha: How do you find, because you said you obviously had to adapt and identify what needs they have and what works best for them? How do you find that, how do you manage that…like if this what works for them? This is what he needs at the moment, and this is what she needs.

Hannah: Yeah, well despite the understanding being there from very early on, you know, it has taken a lot of time and patience to fully accept it, especially the toll it takes on you and how exhausted you are and, you’re not meeting your own needs. So, it does take a lot of patience and it has done but I found that just accepting and just sitting back and observing and just allowing them to interact in their environment in a way that they want to their own pace. The more I enforce anything or behaviour. Or enforce times to go out and not be more organic about it that’s when the issues happen. So, I’m very much child-led, for sure. I have to be because I wouldn’t, they wouldn’t, have it any other way.

Aisha: And you’re outnumbered, ha-ha.

Hannah: And I’m completely outnumbered! Ha-ha.

Aisha: Is there anything that you would say you have enjoyed about having these 2 separate humans, separate individuals, in life from the day that you became a mum?

Hannah: The fact that I am raising 2 completely separate individuals is such a blessing. I mean however hard it’s been, it’s been such a blessing to see these 2 individuals emerge and a relationship to develop and not in a way I thought it would do. It’s very much on their own terms and you know I’m very proud of the 2 individuals they’re becoming. And they both have some really lovely, beautiful qualities emerging. And I did think that with them growing up as twins that they would be very dependent and reliant on each other but they’re not. They’re incredibly independent and actually that’s really helpful for us as parents. If 1 child is ill and can’t go to day-care, there’s no trauma when they are split up and I thought that they would have separation anxiety with each other. That’s another expectation that I was worried about but actually they enjoy the time apart and it’s much better for everybody when they come together at the end of a few hours apart. But yeah, to go back to your question of what the best thing it, it is the fact, despite how hard it’s been, the fact that they are completely individual, I’m proud of that.

Aisha: Thanks Hannah. Is there anything else that you’d like to say to any twin or multiple mothers listening, or anyone that’s expecting twins?

Hannah: Try and block out the noise. Try and block out the noise because everyone has something to say when you have twins or are having them. Everyone has got a lot to say. But essentially you know your kid, you are the mother, and you have to trust your instincts and you have to block out all the noise that says otherwise.

Aisha: Great, ha-ha. Thank you so much Hannah. Thank you for joining us and sharing your story with us.

Hannah: My pleasure, thanks for having me.

Aisha: That’s all from me today. Thank you so much for joining me and tuning in. We’re all in this together and we have got this!

That’s all from me today, thank you so much for joining me and tuning in. We’re all in this together and we have got this.