Our kids just want to connect with us. That’s all they want. So let’s make sure we’re connecting in the right way.

When they misbehave, often it’s for attention. They feel the benefits of your attention even if the attention is you shouting at them. So they learn ‘if I misbehave I get attention’ even when it doesn’t feel good.

Let’s turn that around and try to make connections positive. No parent is perfect - we can’t do this all the time, but where possible, let’s try to meet our children’s behaviour and outbursts with calm. Take some deep breaths yourself and calmly set your boundary. Be calm and close when they lose it, to teach them how to regulate their big feelings. They learn everything from us so if we’re angry and shouting, they learn to shout when they’re angry too.

It can be so hard to be calm because sometimes it feels like we’re losing the control. We need to control our kids so that they obey us, right? That’s actually not the case. TRUST that your kid is going to turn out ok, they’re going to be good kids, they just need to push boundaries right now as they learn. We don’t need to control them into behaving perfectly just now. If in doubt, stay silent and just breathe for yourself :)

Watch the full reel here

You’ve got this.