The Easter Bunny visits some peoples houses and he doesn’t bother with others. If he does visit your house, that’s a lovely thing and I’m absolutely not here to yuck your yum and take that away from you. Just like Santa, traditions like the Easter Bunny and hunting for treasure can be magical and something to look forward to every year.

What I do want to challenge is something I see come up every single year around this time and also at Christmas - the habit of using fictional characters as a behaviour strategy. This sounds a bit like: “If you don’t stop that, the Easter Bunny won’t come”.

“The Easter Bunny is watching. He only brings eggs for children who are kind”

“You’re not having any chocolate if you don’t start behaving”.

I get it - I really do. Sometimes phrases like this tumble out of us from the depths of our brains when we’re tired and overstimulated. They’re the kind of sentences our parents would have said to us and they often feel like they work in the moment because most often, kids stop what they’re doing and listen.

But here’s why this particular strategy is worth ditching.

It doesn’t actually work

We now know from years of research and understanding human behaviour that when children comply because of a threat, that compliance is fear-based. In that moment, they’re not learning anything about why it’s important to behave, how to behave or ways to manage their feelings, they’re just scared of the consequences. So when the threat is gone, the behaviours just come back and parents end up feeling like they’re stuck in a cycle of snapping and threatening.

As I talk about a lot on here, children’s behaviour is always communication. There’s no such thing as naughty. When kids are acting out, they’re telling us something about how they’re feeling or what they need that they don’t have the words or skills or impulse control to communicate in a better way. Using a threat of the Easter Bunny being cancelled to shut down the behaviour doesn’t get to the root of what they’re actually trying to tell us, it just adds another layer of stress on top of a child who is already struggling.

It makes chocolate more exciting than it needs to be.

This one is really important and it links to everything I wrote in my blog post "How to Talk to Kids about Easter Chocolate". 

When we use chocolate and sweet foods as a reward for good behaviour or something that has to be earned, we’re accidentally putting those foods on a pedestal. They become the ultimate prize and more important and special than other foods because they feel scarce. It can make kids more obsessed with treats.

We now know from feeding specialists and research into disordered eating that these early messages about food being a reward for good behaviour or these ‘naughty’ foods being something you only deserve if you’ve been good enough can have a lasting impact on how children relate to food as they grow up. It’s such a simple thing and most of us would never connect it to something as seemingly innocent as the Easter Bunny, but the message our kids end up absorbing is that chocolate is so special that you can only have some if you’re ‘good enough’. Coupled with the old-school rhetoric that chocolate is ‘bad for you’ and ‘unhealthy’, it can lead to children having very confused feelings about their eating habits.

That’s a lot of weight (pun intended) and drama to put on a chocolate egg that’s meant to resemble a celebration of life.

It puts your relationship under pressure

You wouldn’t trust or respect your boss if she said “hey, I’ve installed these cameras to watch you at all times and if you put a foot wrong I’m not going to pay you”. You’d end up feeling so stressed and pressured and it doesn’t leave any room for human error - and your brain is fully developed!

This idea that fictional characters like the Easter Bunny, Santa or Elf on the Shelf are watching our kids at all times and reporting on their behaviour is pretty dystopian and unfair when you think about it like that.

Beyond the creepy surveillance element, this kind of thing is shaking our children’s sense of safety with us. What we know about child development is that children need to feel unconditionally safe with their parents. Not just safe when they’re behaving or when they’ve earned it - safe always, no matter what. That feeling of unconditional safety is the foundation of secure attachment and it’s what allows children to take risks, make mistakes and come back to us when things go wrong.

When we introduce the idea that something positive is being withheld because of behaviour, even through a fictional character, we’re accidentally communicating that our love and rewards are conditional. Kids end up learning that people who love them can take things away from them at the drop of a hat if they put a foot wrong. That love is conditional on how they act and whether they’re ‘good’ or ‘deserving’. It’s not the kind of message that most of us would want our kids to hear, but it’s what creeps through these seemingly innocent threats.

What to do instead

If your child is struggling to behave in the run up to Easter or on the day itself, we need to step back and be detectives as to why. For many, the anticipation of a big day or a change in routine can be huge, and all the excitement can bubble over into unwanted behaviours. Say to yourself, “They’re not being naughty, they’re showing me they need help”. That mindset shift will help you notice what it is that’s overstimulating them and help you meet their needs. The answer will always be that they need a bit of grace and support, not a threat.

The answer might be:

“They’re excited and don’t quite understand exactly when Easter is, I’ll mark it on the calendar and help them to count down”.

“There’s lots of noise, new faces and changes of routine on this Easter trip, I’ll help them to have some quiet, 1:1 time with me to co-regulate”.

“They really want chocolate and don’t understand why they can’t have it, I’ll acknowledge those valid feelings, let them know when they can have some chocolate and support them into some other play”.

The things that will actually help you with behaviour in those big moments are things that always help:

• Get down to their eye-level.
• Acknowledge the feeling you think they’re having to show them that you get it and you’re on their team and here to help (even if you don’t agree).
• Keep your own tone calm and kind.
• Don’t say too much, as they’re likely not in a space to process it.
• Breathe deeply and allow them some time to share your calm.
• Help them to meet the need they might be having - be a detective and work it out. Are they hungry? Tired? Needing connection? Worried? Too hot? Needing the toilet?
• Make sure they don’t feel ‘bad’ or like you’re disappointed that they’re having a hard time. It’s happening to them, not to you (even though in the moment it can feel super overwhelming and embarrassing).

Keep the magic, ditch the threat

If the Easter Bunny is part of your family’s Easter and your kids love it, keep it! Do the egg hunt, write the little notes, go all in on the fun of it. You can enjoy all of that without making it conditional on behaviour, just as your wages or salary isn’t conditional on the quality of your work and can’t just be taken away if you make the odd mistake.

The Easter Bunny can just be a lovely, magical thing that happens at Easter and doesn’t need to be used as a threat or as a surveillance system.

If you want to learn more about how to help your kids to regulate or how to manage behaviour, you can search terms like ‘regulation’ or ‘behaviour’ on the Zazi Hub.

Happy Easter, everyone. You’ve got this!