Tag Archives: techniques

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Four Ways to Respond to Back Talk & Sidestep Power Struggles

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How do you respond to kid’s back talk?

Inside the Emotion Guide Collective, our peer support community, one of our members shared a genius way she responds to her child’s back talk and it got me thinking more about the connection between back talk and power struggles.

When we view back talk as rude, disrespectful, and argumentative behavior that is unacceptable and must be stopped, we create an environment for power struggles to thrive.

Here are four other ways to think about back talk and sidestep power struggles:

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3 Tips For Tending To Children’s Big Emotions

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In the past hour, Jacob must’ve texted his mom, Andrea, fifty times and called her three. All she wanted was to have dinner with her friends without the constant interruptions.

Besides, he was supposed to be in bed asleep. She knows he has trouble falling asleep without her laying down with him first, but she hoped this time would be different.

It wasn’t.

Andrea can’t figure out when to push Jacob to deal with his anxiety and when she should just let it go. She feels helpless and at the mercy of his emotions. She is out of ideas and nothing she does works long-term.

Does this sound like your client, child, or student?

What does Jacob need?

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Are Your Emotions Getting In the Way?

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What’s up with kids’ shoes? If they’re not entirely missing, they take at least a million painful hours to put on. If you’re running late? Forget it. The shoe battle just intensified ten-fold.

If you’re anything like me, at this point you might be thinking, “Ugh, do I really have to deal with this again?”

In situations like this, do you ever find yourself time traveling to the future? You see exactly how the shoe battle is going to play out because it’s the same every single time, right?

Are you stuck in a shoe battle rut?

Welcome aboard the Here-We-Go-Again Cycle. Buckle your seat belts!

When habitual patterns are activated in our relationships, there’s a strong pull to get caught in the Here-We-Go-Again Cycle.

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