How to Stop Losing Your Shit with Your Kids: A Practical Guide to Becoming a Calmer, Happier Parent

by Carla Naumburg

Decision Fatigue. Having to make too many decisions in a day, even seemingly simple or unimportant ones, wears us out and makes it harder to make future decisions.

Not only is chronic busyness not good for your overall functioning and happiness, but it’s not so great for your kids either. They need rest and downtime as much as you do, and they’re likely to react to the stress the same way you do—with a massive meltdown.

We live in an era of overwhelming information. This isn’t always as awesome as it seems. Unnecessary, contradictory, or upsetting information will confuse and distract you, thereby increasing your stress.

Don’t read and watch stuff you don’t want in your brain. Don’t want to think about all the horrible shit people do to each other? Stop watching Law & Order: SVU. Need a break from national politics? Put down the news magazine with the in-depth exposés on politicians. While this is no guarantee that you won’t have anxious or upsetting thoughts, it’s a powerful place to start.

Give yourself more time than you think you need, especially if you’re with your children.

If you’re always late, either get it together and don’t do that anymore or just accept that you’re chronically late and write it off as a midlife quirk or genetic defect or whatever. Either way, stop rushing. If you’re going to be late whether or not you rush, then don’t rush and be late anyway.

getting a little perspective and realizing how much worse it could be makes it so much easier.

Each time you breathe intentionally, you’re hacking your nervous system and telling your buttons that everything is OK and they can chill already.

Our children don’t need us constantly by their sides. That sort of continuous attention can feel intrusive and irritating. Rather, they need us to attune to their needs, to notice when they’re calm and happy and want to be left alone, or when they’re struggling and can figure it out on their own, as opposed to when they actually need our help.

The ability to not get caught up in our kids’ psychological and emotional storms is a powerful way to keep family drama to a minimum.

If your child is happy, leave well enough alone. Don’t get involved in their game or homework or sandcastle or whatever they’re doing. Resist the urge to praise, ask questions, or offer them help.

Being bored is part of life, so your kids might as well learn how to deal with it now. Their boredom is not your problem to solve, and the more energy you expend trying to entertain them, the more stressed or annoyed you’re going to become, and we both know how that’s going to end.

Not all disagreements require parental involvement, especially if you’re already triggered for any reason. Yes, you will want to give your kids skills and strategies to resolve conflicts, but you also need to give them the space to figure it out themselves.

Say yes when you can, say no when you need to, and then Do Not Engage. Ignore the nagging and whining. Don’t get sucked into negotiations, and don’t pay any attention to the insults or threats.

It is not your job to make your child happy. It is your job to keep them as safe as possible, and to help them mature and grow into reasonably functional adults. A big part of that is learning how to experience and deal with a variety of emotions, including the shitty ones. Letting your kids feel their feelings without getting caught up in them or needing to fix them is an effective way to get a little headspace from their chaos. Stay with your children and offer comfort if they need you, but remember that there’s nothing wrong with feeling bad, and it will pass.

It’s all about noticing, pausing, and doing literally anything else,

If your mind is especially distractible, keep it focused by narrating your experience.

Unfortunately, humor is one of the most underutilized tricks up our parenting sleeves, perhaps because some folks are worried about undermining their own authority. This isn’t going to happen. Instead, you’ll be modeling an effective response to difficult moments. You might even crack your kids up, which could help you reconnect more quickly.

Be careful with sarcasm. This is not the time to mock, tease, needle, or generally poke fun at your kids. Those sorts of reactions are often misunderstood in tense moments, and are likely to make things worse.

Checking in with your kiddo after a major meltdown is crucial. Toxic tantrums are discombobulating and confusing for everyone, and your kids get just as triggered as you do. However, their nervous systems are still developing, which means that chronic stress or frequent ruptures may have long-lasting detrimental effects. In addition, triggered kids are more likely to push buttons, which is not what you’re going for, especially when you’re working so hard to not lose your shit again. Reconnecting with parents and other caregivers is a powerful and effective way to help children get calm and grounded. It can also help rebuild your relationship, which is important for lots of different reasons. Talking to your kids will help them understand what happened so they don’t go making all sorts of inaccurate assumptions, like, say, that it was all their fault and they’re terrible children.

An apology is a great place to start, and yes, you can absolutely positively 100 percent apologize to your child without undermining your own authority or upending the power dynamic in the family. Your apology will help strengthen your relationship, increase your child’s respect for you, and as an added bonus, you’ll be modeling the very behavior you want them to practice as well.

Your children won’t be able to hear what you’re saying or think clearly about what you’re trying to teach them if their little brains and bodies are still flooded with stress hormones. So hold off on The Big Talk until everyone is cooled off again. There’s an easy way to remember this: connection before redirection.

You can always identify or acknowledge your feelings, but you never have to apologize for how you feel.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with any emotion, ever, no matter how yucky it may feel. You may, however, need to apologize for your behavior.

Resist the urge to overtalk or overexplain.

K It’s OK if apologizing is hard for you. It’s

another version of losing your shit, and it’s not helpful. Step away, take a few deep breaths, get yourself a glass of cold water, turn