Maintaining Connection with an Angry Kid

Does your child struggle with anger, and do you struggle with how to help them? Tune in to our discussion today with Jessica Sinarski, a certified adoption therapist and author of the picture books Riley the Brave and Your Magic Backpack series. She also serves on the editorial board for The Journal of Child and Adolescent Trauma.

In this episode, we cover:

• All kids get angry, in fact, all people get angry, so how do we know if our kid has bigger issues with anger management?
• Why do kids who have experienced trauma often struggle with anger?
• Does it matter the type of trauma: abuse, neglect, adoption?
• Does the prenatal environment that is not ideal (maternal stress, alcohol or drug exposure, poor nutrition) impact a child’s or youth’s emotional regulation?
• Why do kids seem to overreact—big feelings for what feels like a small issue?
• What are some typical triggers that elicit big responses?
• Steps for managing natural feelings of anger. 
  • Name with few words.
  • Working our way back to calm. Co-regulate back to calm. Suggest a break, model deep breath, let’s stop and think, etc.
  • Give a chance to re-do. Fixing the thing that they broke.
  • Read books about regulating emotions.
  • Lots of physical activity.
• Steps for maintaining connections with big angry feelings. 
  • Compassion for yourself. It feels hard because it is hard. They have a lot to be angry about.
  • PACE-playful, acceptance, curious, empathy (from Daniel Hughes)
• What do you mean by upstairs and downstairs brains? (from Dan Seigel)
• How do we help our kids understand why they are reacting the way they do and how to handle their feelings better?

Resources:

• Brave Brains
• Hands Are Not for Hitting by Martine Agassi (ages 0-6)
• My Many Colored Days by Dr. Seuss (ages 0-6)
• Ravi’s Roar by Tom Percival
• Grumpy Monkey by Suzanne Lang
• Gorilla’s Muscles
• The Riley the Brave series (including Riley the Brave’s Big Feelings Activity Book)
• Hello, Anger (age 7-13)
• Samantha Snowden’s Anger Management Workbook for Kids (age 7-13)
• Your Amazing Brain: The Epic Illustrated Guide (age 8+)
• “Unpacking Anger” (blog post with additional recommended

Transcript

Please pardon any errors, this is an automated transcript.
Dawn Davenport  0:00  
Welcome everyone. This is Creating a Family talk about foster, adoptive and kinship care. We want to say, welcome back to our regulars. We so appreciate you guys. And for those new guys, our new listeners, we want to send a special welcome to you. We are really happy to have you here. I'm Dawn Davenport. I am the host this show, as well as the director of the nonprofit creating a family.org Today we're going to be talking about a topic that I think will resonate with a lot of you guys, and that is maintaining connections with an angry kid. We'll be talking with Jessica Sinarski. She is a certified adoption therapist. She's the author of the picture book Riley the Brave as well as the your magic backpack series, and that helps children talk about big feelings and tough topics. She serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Child and Adolescent Trauma and on the board of directors at Cardinal McCloskey Community Services, which is the largest Head Start provider in the Bronx, Jessica was awarded the National voice for adoption drenda Lake and Memorial Award in 2021 in recognition of her valuable post placement support and services to families who've achieved permanency for children in the foster care system. Welcome Jessica to creating a family.

Unknown Speaker  1:22  
Thanks so much. Dawn. Glad to be here.

Dawn Davenport  1:24  
I am looking forward to this topic. Before we started recording, I mentioned that we were discussing this topic in our all staff meeting, and Tracy Whitney, who is one of our content creators, said she thought that far more people thought they had angry kids than actually had angry kids, and that both made me smile, and it made me think, because, you know, all kids get angry. In fact, let's be honest, all people get angry. We're human, so how do we know if our kid has bigger issues with anger management than just the run of the mill? Life is hard right now, and I'm mad, or I'm hungry or I'm whatever, and I'm going to act out, yeah,

Speaker 1  2:05  
I think that's a really good point. Anger is a natural part

Dawn Davenport  2:09  
of life, the human experience, yes, and

Speaker 1  2:12  
especially of certain stages. It makes me think of a friend of mine who was new to parenting. He had a toddler and a baby, and so they had just hit this toddler stage, and his son had, like, thrown himself on the floor and was having a tantrum. And my friend said, who taught him that? Like, how? Like, why? You know, where is he getting this from? And I was like, Oh, sweetie, Boo Boo, no one's taught him that it's just frustration

Dawn Davenport  2:42  
and it's just a human emotion. But the reality is, some of our kids, it's more. It is bigger, and we as parents, especially if we're not as your friend was a new parent with a toddler and probably was tired and frustrated and hungry herself, but she responded that way. But I don't want to dismiss the fact that the reality is we can tell that some of our kids are really struggling. How do we know when anger is a problem versus just anger being run of the mill, a human emotion?

Speaker 1  3:18  
I think if you see the impact on others. So I think when it's getting extreme, we're seeing violence in the home, outbursts at school that go beyond the you know, so and so, hit a friend in preschool, kinds of things, or even, you know, exploded at a teacher one time when we're seeing frequency notch up when we're seeing others getting hurt by that person's anger more regularly. Those are signs that there's something bigger going on. And

Dawn Davenport  3:50  
I think a lot of the parents in our audience, foster, adoptive and kinship parents, have a gut feel when it is it's not within the normal bounds, and so I think we do. So why do the kids and the kids that most in our audience are dealing with are kids who've experienced trauma? So why do kids who've experienced trauma struggle with anger, or often struggle with anger? Not all do. Of course, sure,

Speaker 1  4:19  
it takes lots of help from adults for kids to learn to manage big feelings like anger. So with that story that I just shared, the toddler years are full of those moments I remember when I was parenting my own boys and going through those toddler years and thinking about the 1000s of times we had to name the feeling and work it through and get back to calm and repair and right, like all of those steps over and over and over again that are part of managing this natural feeling of anger. Well, we know that most kids involved in child welfare didn't get that and even on top of that, so when I start. Working in foster care. I was in the South Bronx. It seemed like every kid on my caseload came in with an oppositional defiant disorder diagnosis. I know, isn't it the truth? Yes, and that grew to infuriate me, because it wasn't a disorder. It was that these kids had learned not to trust. So not only did they not have lots and lots and lots of help managing their big feelings, but the adults, you know, whether that be birth parents who are struggling at the time, or even even sometimes hard working foster parents and adoptive parents or social workers and and therapists who they didn't know if they could trust, sure, so they don't know who to turn to with these big feelings, and so that turns into a lot of like, I'm going to shut you out, I'm going to defy you, I'm going to rage, I'm going to explode, not because I'm consciously thinking, I want to make your life difficult, but this is inside me, and I don't know what to do with it, and I'm alone with it, and that is one of the most insidious things with developmental trauma is this sense of aloneness that comes with that. You mentioned

Dawn Davenport  6:07  
developmental trauma, and that brings up the question of, does it matter the type of trauma? You know, that's something that people are talking about more now in our community, some call it Big T for big T trauma versus little t. And then our kids, many of them, have experienced neglect, some have experienced abuse, and they've all had the trauma of being removed from their home. Does it matter the type of trauma that our kids experience in the likelihood that they're going to struggle with things like anger? Yeah,

Speaker 1  6:41  
I think this is an interesting question. There's no monolith like this is exactly how it's going to be if there's neglect or abuse, of course. But I also know that parent heart of wanting to understand what's going on with your kid and make sense of their world. So I think if we're going to tease out neglect and abuse, they each have their own impact. Neglect feels extra damaging in a way, because we are designed for connection. We literally cannot survive without it. So that neglect is so disorienting for the young brain and heart and so I think that can lead to some disorganized attachment where I don't know how to get my needs met. I'm not going to anxiously cling to you, necessarily, but I'm not going to be mad at you like it can lead to this very confusing presentation of symptoms, for lack of a better word, where abuse, abuse has its own way of being confusing from a brain perspective, at least someone is there, like our brains need to develop in connection to another human. And

Dawn Davenport  7:47  
a child is seldom abused constantly, so there's usually something, yeah, it's that intermittent aspect of it

Speaker 1  7:53  
that's right, you know, I think about like a gambling so you lose money, lose money, lose money, but one time you get the big jackpot, and so you keep coming back for more. Well, that's kind of what's happening with abuse, where it's not great and there's lots of cause for anger, but there's often this mess of conflicting feelings toward an abusive parent, because they are what you've known for safety in whatever way they've been able to show up for you safely. That parent and I often get the question, but he's been with us for so long, why is this one issue?

Dawn Davenport  8:26  
Yes, yes, yes. We adopted him at two, or he's been in our home and we've had him for two years, or we've adopted him at two and he's 12 now. Yeah,

Speaker 1  8:35  
yeah. So I think of there was a kid who I worked with. This is not his real name, Derek. He was adopted at birth, I mean, like into adoptive parents arms, and he came to see me around age 10, very, very angry. Lots of big rage episodes. Parents were like, What is going on? And part of what was mixed in with his experience, not only was there the loss of the birth family that had maybe not really been addressed in the family, but there were also secrets. And so a lot of our kids, who are I'm not saying this is why kids struggle. All kids struggle with anger, but I have seen this frequently, that when there are secrets, there's anger under the surface, because their body knows right. Something inside them knows that this isn't quite the story. This isn't quite what happened, and I need to know my story. And so one of the ways that we can quell anger, as hard as it is, is being honest with our kids in developmentally appropriate ways, but always helping them hold their story so that their insides aren't in conflict that ends up coming out in anger.

Dawn Davenport  9:49  
That's interesting, and I was going to raise the issue of some of our children have not been neglected or abused. They were adopted at birth, though they were moved to grandma. House, you know immediately from the hospital, and it's confusing for parents now, they may have experienced some type of prenatal trauma that's not a universally accepted term, but the trauma associated with substance abuse during pregnancy, or high levels of stress, lack of nutrition, things like that. So that's possible, yeah. And many of those children have experienced that, and it is confusing to parents, because we know for a fact that this child was never neglected. I was there, you know, doing everything for them, and that type of thing interesting about the knowledge that there is something that they don't know and don't understand. Yeah,

Speaker 1  10:39  
yeah. I think that prenatal piece gets overlooked sometimes. I think about when I was pregnant with one of my boys. I was seven months pregnant, I remember at vividly, I had had this really, really stressful conversation with a family member who there tends to be a lot of stress around and it was very upsetting, and I remember that night, it was about 24 hours before my seven month pregnant belly settled down. My kiddo was doing somersaults inside me for about 24 hours afterwards, processing all of the cortisol that was pumping through my body into his little body. And I say that with tremendous compassion for all the mamas out there, because we can't control our environment like we can't live stress free. That's not real. And so if you are parenting a kiddo who's experienced in utero a lot of stress, which most of our kids who, whether voluntarily, made a plan for adoption or certainly in the world of foster care and kinship care, even to some extent, there has been stress, and that has an impact on the developing baby. And if there are substances involved, so especially alcohol, one of the symptoms of Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders, FASD, is poor emotion regulation and impulse control, right? So in my mind, if we're not working from a brain based perspective, we end up punishing kids for symptoms of their brain injury. You know, we wouldn't punish a kid who doesn't get out of the wheelchair and walk for not getting out of the wheelchair and walking. So we need to scaffold what we're doing for our kids whose brains have been impacted by these prenatal experiences,

Dawn Davenport  12:32  
and it's invisible in the sense that oftentimes these kids look perfectly normal. Yeah. And so as a parent, it's a myth to think that all children exposed to drugs or alcohol are going to have the facial anomalies that people think about with FASD number one. FASD is only alcohol, and so not drugs. Drugs don't affect the facial structure, that's right, and only very few of the children. In fact, the standard one is about 10% that's what the standard percentage is. Of children who are exposed to alcohol will have any of the facial dysmorphology. So anyway, so interesting. But you know, one of the frustrating things is that it feels oftentimes, and this is probably a sign that your child is struggling with anger issues, it feels oftentimes that the response is not in proportion to the event, right? Whatever it is, no, you can't go outside to play right now because we're getting ready to go to grandma's, and you got to get your shoes on. That's right. So it's a small event, a frustrating event, but it should have a one inch response, and our kids will have a foot response. It's a huge response, and it's very, very frustrating as a parent, it's one thing. If the house was on fire and your kid is reacting dramatically, you would think, yes, that is a good reaction. That is the reaction. But it's the mundane, and it just wears us out,

Speaker 1  13:59  
yes? So first of all, it's normal that it wears you out. It's very exhausting. So if you're listening to this like, yes, why does it wear me out? Because it's exhausting, because

Dawn Davenport  14:09  
it's exhausting, that's why

Speaker 1  14:11  
sigh of relief. You are normal to have that feeling as a parent, we react to each other as humans. That's totally normal. This is part of why I'm so passionate about helping people understand the brain, because these big reactions come from what I call the downstairs brain, right? So how we act in any moment depends on which part of the brain is running things. And for our kids, with all of the things that we've been talking about maybe prenatal injury or trauma histories, or maybe they just have a really sensitive amygdala, maybe they were just born a little bit more anxious or on edge or something, right? It's not always trauma related.

Dawn Davenport  14:55  
It isn't that I'm so glad you said that, and it's not always prenatal substance related. Like we all have different temperaments, and that truly is a genetic connection there. Yeah,

Speaker 1  15:04  
we're all wired differently. So I'm parenting three boys who are all mine by birth, and two of them have some sensory processing stuff that leads to big feelings, that leads to what looks like outsized reactions. For a simple thing for our kids with trauma, this is an important piece to hold on to, because they had to develop sort of a strong protection mechanism, strong downstairs brain protectors. I call them. I speak a lot in terms of animals. So we have a tiger brain and we have a turtle brain and we have a chameleon brain that we can sort of call into action when we need these things. And if you have had really tough experiences in life, then those protective parts of your brain get stronger instead of your slow it down, feel and deal, think things through part of your brain. So one of the stories that I feel like pulls the adaptive nature of this into like a fine point is I was working with a teenager who was in kinship care, and we were working on some anxiety stuff, because he was in a relatively safe setting at that point, and, you know, he'd walk into a store or something, and he was just always on guard, and he had started dating Somebody, and he didn't want to be so on edge all the time with his girlfriend and as we're working together, one of the things that came out was that he could smell when a gun came out. One of the adaptive things that his hyper focus on potential threats of danger, his brain was always on alert for danger, so much so that he could smell when a gun came out. Well, I feel like that's what's happening for our kiddos in little ways. You know, I have to put my shoes on instead of finishing this game. Doesn't feel like smelling when a gun came out, but it means like no one cares about what I want to do, or I have no control over my life, or I'm going to miss this person whose house I'm leaving, and I don't ever know if I'm going to see them again, because people disappear from my life, like these hidden triggers are everywhere, and that what seems like an outsized response is that those downstairs brain protectors Just sort of being on edge all the time and just ready to jump out at a moment's notice. It's exhausting, but when we can talk about the real thing, oh, I think your Tiger brain is really loud right now, you know, I see porcupine quills. I think you're trying to push me away because it's really hard to say goodbye right now. You know, those kinds of things can be so helpful,

Dawn Davenport  17:41  
and from a kid's perspective, always being on guard is exhausting, and it's exhausting for us as parents, but think about how exhausting, and then when you're exhausted, you're less able to cope, and their stress levels are higher and their frustration levels are higher. It's a lot. So

Speaker 1  18:01  
I was talking with one of my boys, who's got some other neuro divergence stuff going on, and so he can melt down some and get sort of, there's some behavior stuff that comes from that stress little brain. So we were walking into a family situation that I knew was lots of noises and lots of stimulus. And so I was doing a little prep work with him. Was like, Okay, if you're feeling stressed, come grab me, okay, and we'll take a break, or we'll do whatever. And he said, Mom, I feel stressed every minute of every hour, every nanosecond of every like, that was his experience. And I think about, you know, I'm glad he had words for it. But how many of our kids are having that experience and they don't have words for it? He's been in a safe environment his whole life, and that was his experience. And so how much more for our kiddos who are just living in that tension, which then gets exhausting for everyone else involved,

Dawn Davenport  18:59  
right? Yeah, exactly. Let me pause here to ask a favor of you the powers that be, be they Apple or whomever is rating podcasts do so based on both the star ratings as well as the reviews that we get. And we really need for you to give us some star ratings as well as potentially please write a review wherever you are listening to this podcast. If you open it up, scroll down to the bottom where the show notes are, there will be the option for you to click on to leave a review or give us a star rating. But if you have the time, if you would drop us a review, I can't tell you how much we would appreciate it. I personally read every single one of those, if nothing else, it really does make me feel good, of course, if it's a good review. But anyway, please do us a favor and rate and review this podcast. At the beginning, you spoke about the steps for handling the natural feelings of anger, the things that parents are doing. Going along the way. Let's talk about what those steps are, and then I'd like to use that as a jumping board to talk about how to maintain connection with our kids, who are feeling bigger feelings of anger and who may not have had from infancy on, or perhaps toddlerhood, on the modeling of managing natural feelings of anger. So let's start with the steps we would take with our young children, and not just our young children as they age, to handle the natural feelings of anger that are not the huge emotions. Okay,

Speaker 1  20:37  
so if we're thinking about our toddler, preschool age kids, there's so much repetition in these in these years, even in the best of circumstances, and that much more if your kids are experiencing trauma, or, you know, maybe you're foster parenting, and they're still in the cycle of visiting with family and just so much upheaval. So even in the best of circumstances, we want to name it with very few words, oh so mad, oh so hard. Oh, it's so frustrating, right? Just really your face makes the facial expression with some compassion for the big feeling that they're having, and you're not trying to rationalize or get them to talk about it right that moment. You're just saying it out loud, lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of times over the course of those years. And then we're co regulating back to calm so that can look a lot of different ways. So maybe it's Should we take a break? Should we walk it off? Maybe it's just modeling that deep breath. Maybe use some cartoons are great with their little phrases. I remember one of my boys was really into Dora the Explorer, and she would say, let's stop and think in that little rhythmic way. And so we would say that, let's stop and think. So if you have one of those things to go back to that sort of sing song that can be so helpful if they have done something they're not supposed to do. So I'll give an example. So we were on our way out the door, and my sister and my nephew were at the fridge. He usually has like a cheese stick on his way out the door in the morning, and she handed him a cheese slice, and he slapped it out of her hand and said, Ah. And she's like, what? And he said, No. And he was having a hard time describing he was expecting the routine. He thought it should be the cheese stick instead of the cheese slice, even though they were exactly the same cheese. And so she figured out what he was kind of saying, and said, Oh, it's the same it's just flat. And he, you know, his grumpy face sort of settled. And she said, can you ask nicely, like she gave him a chance to redo as opposed to punishing his knee jerk reaction to slap the cheese away. And he said, Sorry, Mommy. And they went on with their day. So maybe she said, You seem frustrated or something like that, like we're naming it. We're being curious and figuring out what the problem is. We're working our way back to calm, which is when that kiddo can practice their upstairs brain skill of asking nicely or saying sorry, or fixing the thing that they broke right like picking up the thing that they knocked down. So she let him pick up the cheese that he had knocked down, or whatever it is. That's sort of the in the moment phenomenon. But then the other thing that's so important in this age is lots of practicing playfully reading picture books about these kinds of things, you know, these little micro moments of regulating emotion that help them in those heated moments. The other thing that I feel like I have to mention is all kids, but especially young kids, need lots and lots and lots of physical activity. So you are going to see more anger if kids are not moving their bodies

Dawn Davenport  24:01  
and lots and lots of repetition, yes, so many times, yes, and being aware of whether your child is tired, whether your child is hungry, whatever, just the physical environment is, the child uncomfortable kids with sensory issues, oftentimes, even Though it seems silly to someone without a sensory issue, you know, cutting the labels out of shirts and things like that, so just reducing the stressors that we can all right? So that's the everyday parenting. That's the things that we expect, and we would do that for all kids, nonetheless, but for kids that are struggling with handling big emotions. Kids that we would call this kid is an angry kid, although let's try to put people first. This is a kid who is struggling with angry emotions. Would be better than an angry child. What are some steps with those kids that we can take that again will help make. Maintain our connection with the child, because when a kid is raging at you or embarrassing you by throwing a tantrum, or if this is the fifth time today that a small thing has gone wrong and this kid has reacted, it's hard to maintain connection, because what you really want to do is get the heck away from this kid, you know, put this kid in their room, shut the door and say, I'll see you tomorrow, yeah, yeah, but that's not maintaining our connection, yeah. So what can we do for those kids?

Speaker 1  25:27  
My brain is going 1000 directions, so one thing that's coming to mind is just compassion for yourself. Like I even find myself wanting to put my hand over my heart and just like just reminding yourself it feels hard because it is hard, not because this kid is bad, right? But the real story is, this is a kid who has a lot to be angry about. It doesn't seem like they should be angry at you for it being bedtime, because it's bedtime every single day. And this is not a new phenomenon, but it feels hard, because it is hard, and so I just want all the parents listening right now to take a deep breath and remember that that's the reality. You are doing good work, and it takes lots of repetition. You're not doing it wrong, because this kid is struggling. So that, I think that really is part of the first step is just to hold compassion for yourself in the moment. And sometimes that's just a big, deep breath. Sometimes it's taken two minutes to text a friend real quick and be like, I want to pull my hair

Dawn Davenport  26:31  
out. Or what my friend did I would do. I'll trade kids with you right now. Exactly?

Speaker 1  26:35  
Tap out. Tap out. Yeah, you know, sometimes if you are co parenting and have the option to tap out for a second and the other parent is able to step in for a minute. That's great. I know that's not always possible, so one of the sort of de escalation things that I hold in my head frequently was developed by Dan Hughes. So pace is the acronym playful, accepting, curious, empathic, that when we can approach a meltdown with that sort of sense of ourselves and those skills, it tends to go better. So I think so many things can be diffused with a little bit of playfulness. The challenge is that requires some upstairs brain power from us, right? Like, I have to have enough oomph to be like, I'll race you to do this. Or, I know it's so frustrating to brush our teeth, let's sing a song like it takes a little brain power from us, but it tends to be so helpful, so a little playfulness, that acceptance piece goes back to what we were just talking about with how we help kids learn to manage emotions that we're naming it you're really frustrated. Oh, bedtime is so hard. Saying goodbye is just tough. You didn't want to leave right now, right like putting words to that in little ways, not rationalizing with them, but just in little ways, naming their experience can be so helpful and being curious with them about what's going on. This is a tricky one. You had a great episode with Katie. Yes, if you haven't listened to that episode, I encourage you to go back and listen to it, because she just I feel like that episode had so much about being curious about what the need is behind the way that your kid is communicating. You know, holding some curiosity is just so powerful. E is for empathy that can help us really feel with the kiddo about what's happening in this moment, even though it's very frustrating for us. The tricky thing with empathy, and you guys talked about this in that episode as well, is we as parents can't feel all our kids feelings with them. It's too much. Many of you are parenting multiple children, plus you got your own feelings to deal with and your own life and work and whatever else. And so if you're feeling that, like, I want to shut this down feeling maybe flip back into a little acceptance, like, yeah, you're really mad. You know what? I'm tired too. We're just going to keep plugging away and get through our bedtime routine. It's hard. I know you don't have to feel all their feelings with them to still communicate that you are accepting that this is hard for them.

Dawn Davenport  29:29  
Okay, yeah, that makes sense. Many years ago, we did an interview with Dan Hughes, and that would be a good one to also go back and listen to as well. Before we get back to the interview, let me remind you that we have a Facebook group. It's a Facebook support group. I hang out there on Facebook, so do many members of our staff. It is a very supportive place. It's a place you can ask questions. It's made up of people who are doing what you're doing, foster adopting or. Caring. You can find it on Facebook, at facebook.com/groups/creating a family. All right, you've mentioned earlier about the upstairs brain and the downstairs brain. What do you mean by that? I'm guessing the downstairs is the non reasoning part of our brain and the upstairs would be the part that can connect to logic, reason, things like that. Yeah.

Speaker 1  30:28  
So this language comes from Dan Siegel, who's sort of the father of interpersonal neurobiology. This house model of the brain where we have an upstairs brain, which is your big human cortex. It's the whole outer portion of the brain, including that, not to get too nerdy, but that medial prefrontal cortex, your executive function, your logic and reasoning and all of those kinds of

Dawn Davenport  30:53  
things, understanding consequences, cause and effect, exactly

Speaker 1  30:57  
right. That's exactly right. Being able to plan, being able to even language, language lives in the upstairs brain. And one of the things that was surprising to me, as I was learning this science was play lives in the upstairs brain, like joy and connection with other humans. That's an upstairs brain phenomenon.

Dawn Davenport  31:20  
Interesting.

Speaker 1  31:21  
It is, right? And so that's part of the power of playfulness to wake up that upstairs brain. We're talking about. How do we hold connection with a kid who's angry a lot? Well, the natural thing that our brains do in the face of lots of angry outbursts, which come from the downstairs brain, is flipped to our downstairs brain,

Dawn Davenport  31:42  
yep, which is the controlling part, which is the All right, you are going to bed. I am going to physically pick you up and plop you into the bed. Yes, yes,

Speaker 1  31:51  
right. So power and control live in the downstairs brain reactivity, so those quick responders we need that downstairs brain. It's not bad. This is one of the things that I am so passionate about helping people hold is that downstairs brain acts without thinking. It makes our heart beat, it lets us breathe, it lets us do all of the automatic things that we do.

Dawn Davenport  32:17  
Yeah, we want this. Yes, yes, that's right. We want it,

Speaker 1  32:21  
and we want some upstairs brain control. Upstairs brain influence when it starts to get extra spiky, or when it starts to shut us down for protection, so that upstairs brain is all of these technical things and logic and talking things out, as well as connection that downstairs brain is protection mode. So one of the things that I have found so helpful with all ages is a little bit of externalizing how we go into protection mode that our kids, who have lots of angry outbursts. Angry outbursts sounds so like technical and I don't know, like, no one wants to be like, I have lots of angry outbursts, but some of our kids have lots of Tiger moments. And understanding that it's a tiger moment that their tiger brain is lashing out can help that parent, teacher, counselor, brain hold some connection. Hey, there's that that my whole sweet kid is there somewhere, and right now I'm seeing their tiger, and I'm going to help their tiger settle down. I'm going to help them feel some calm, but to recognize that that kid is not a rage monster. Their downstairs brain protectors are a little extra loud, and they need some help getting that upstairs brain back in charge.

Dawn Davenport  33:47  
That goes back to the why I just like saying to angry kid, even though it's part of the title of the show, but the child isn't an angry child. The child is a child who is at this point struggling with their downstairs brain is not communicating with their upstairs brain, that's right,

Speaker 1  34:05  
and that's really key. Don I love that you pulled that out, because I think of this sort of staircase of the brain. So one of the things that we are doing in typical child development, let alone for our kiddos who have experienced trauma, is building that staircase of the brain. A newborn baby does not have a well connected upstairs brain, right? They are dependent on adults to do all of the upstairs brain functioning. And in those toddler years, we're really, really working on it, you know, 1000s of repetitions of building that staircase of the brain. My sister and my nephew doing that little dance around the cheese. That was one more instance of strengthening that staircase all through the elementary years and into teenage years. But even in the best of circumstances, that staircase is not fully formed until about each 25 like all of our kids are developing their brains. And most of our kids in the kinship, foster adoptive community have really strong downstairs brain protectors. So they need some extra help building that staircase. You need some extra help.

Dawn Davenport  35:11  
And I think it's also helpful as a parent to realize that they're overactive downstairs brain that part of them that feels to us as it is too big, too over acting served a function for them. At one point, it was invaluable function. It's not a bad thing. You said earlier. Anger is not bad. It's often very protective. It's sometimes justified. It's about, I love the concept of the staircase. The upstairs brain is not in communication. You know the back in the day when you had the wire telephone, you know the two tin cans with the Yeah, they're not talking to each other. That's the problem. It's not the fact that the child is angry, per se.

Unknown Speaker  35:55  
Yes,

Dawn Davenport  35:56  
let's break it out by age of the child, because I think that some of our techniques would be different, because what I want to do is provide parents with some practical techniques to help connect the downstairs brain to the upstairs brain help connect the gut feeling with the part of our brain that can help put that feeling into better context, and can be more effective at helping them get their needs met. So let's start with the zero to three. Let's say we have a child whose reactions are bigger. And I had one of these children. This child was more, more, everything across the board, more. So we have a child who is more and they're really struggling with their anger, and this is zero to three. Now, struggling with anger is a pretty typical thing for those ages, but some kids do it a lot more. So what are some practical techniques that you can give parents for helping kids in that very young age group?

Speaker 1  36:58  
So I think if you have a kiddo who struggles more the proactive pieces, not the in the moment pieces, but the proactive pieces become so much more important. So anytime we can practice playfully skills that you're working on building. So if it's transitions that are really hard, that we're playfully practicing those transitions before we're expecting them to do it when we're stressed and late and need to get out the door. I cannot overstate the value of practicing playfully, because if we're thinking from a brain perspective, you are building that staircase of the brain in a moment where it's open for learning, as opposed to playing catch up when they're already really upset. So playfully practicing. I think another thing that's really helpful for our kids who have lots of big feelings, is acknowledging, not just the angry feelings, but acknowledging and noticing and tuning in to the sweet moments with them, noticing the good, seeing those positive moments in the midst of the 27 tantrums that happened that day, what is the little glimmer of something that went well? Or, you know, breaking down some of the steps of maybe they didn't do the whole thing that you wanted them to do, but they had one little tiny element of it in a way that showed some feeling and dealing skills. Maybe they paused for a second before they threw the tantrum or whatever. For example, another friend her toddler was in the spitting phase. I mean, again, this is a normal thing that toddlers go through. It's not great. Doesn't feel good to anyone. It's a very primal reaction, right? When you get kind of messy, yeah, it's pretty darn gross, especially

Dawn Davenport  38:39  
when their nose is green, spitting that germ on you, yes, yes,

Speaker 1  38:46  
but that is an action coming from that downstairs brain. And so one of the things that she was working on she and her husband were working on was helping him catch it before he wanted to spit and to do something else with his mouth. And so there was one time where he didn't quite catch it, like he spit at dad, but then he stopped like, there was that little moment afterwards of realization that he had done something wrong, and dad was able to keep it together, instead of just being like, That's it, time out, right? He had a downstairs brain moment he spit when he wasn't supposed to, but he had the moment of recognition. Dad paused for a minute and he said, Sorry, Daddy. And they had a moment of repair, instead of it being an immediate consequence kind of thing, those little moments matter. It doesn't feel like it in the sea of negative stuff that you're sort of navigating, but that is really critical. The other thing I would think about for any kid who has big, angry emotions is check in with their senses. So many of our kids, especially in the child welfare system, struggle making sense of their senses. That's why I wrote Riley, the brave sensational senses. I know it's hard to find good occupational therapy. It's hard to. To understand what the heck is going like. Why is my kid throwing a fit about putting their socks on or, you know, I cook dinner and it's delicious and they won't even touch it. They're throwing a fit about that. It's really infuriating as parent, and if their little sensory systems are sending mixed signals, they're not going to be in their upstairs brain very often, when

Dawn Davenport  40:22  
you say, check in with their senses, what do you mean from a practical what does that look like for me? I say as a mother of a two year old? Yeah.

Speaker 1  40:29  
So this is probably a longer conversation than we have time for right now, so maybe we'll have to chat again about this. But we have, we have hidden senses. So it's not just our big five that we think about all the time, taste and touch and smell and hearing and what am I missing? Fight vision like

Dawn Davenport  40:50  
vision also where you are in space. Yes.

Speaker 1  40:52  
Proprioception, we have hidden senses. Proprioception, your vestibular sense, your sense of balance or motion that comes from your inner ears and interoception coming from your skin and your internal organs, these senses are constantly sending information to the brain, and we as parents during infancy are doing lots to feed and soothe these hidden senses. So when you swaddle a baby, when you rock, when you you know the kiddos who they won't fall asleep unless you're in a moving car, right? That is activating their proprioception and their vestibular sense. And so for our kids who are struggling with emotion regulation, often they need more or different combinations of some of these hidden senses interesting, or they need less, like you were talking about earlier, why that tag is so itchy or so distracting and so because this is a big, complicated topic, that's why I put it into picture book form, so that parents can understand it as well as help their kids start to put language to this stuff.

Dawn Davenport  42:10  
Okay, so we're dividing things between proactive and then in the moment, yeah, so I'll throw out one more proactive. And this would actually go, I think, across all ages, and that is routine, have some predictability. Not all children struggle with transitions, but many kids, and particularly kids who have had a chaotic background, they need to know what's going to happen, what's going to come. It takes away some of that stress in their lives. So that would, I would throw that into the proactive anything else for our very young children in the moment you've mentioned, see if we can find something they did right in that moment, and then something else is and this, I'm sure, will continue for our older kids too, but give them opportunity for repair. So anything else in the moment, otherwise, we'll move on to our older kids. So

Speaker 1  43:04  
the other thing that I think about a lot with anger is anger is often a well, and maybe this fits with our next age, but, but even with this younger crew, what's underneath? Like with the younger kid, with your zero to three, zero to four. It doesn't take much to be underneath the anger, right? Like, it's usually pretty obvious, right? Hungry, tired, changing routine, yeah, missing someone, right? Like those big things as kids get older, another fantastic proactive tool is being curious. Like, what is underneath this? Not asking them. Why are you mad that? I don't mean that. I mean holding some curiosity in ourselves. Does it seem to happen at certain times of day? Does it seem to be when they're jealous of a sibling? Does it seem to be like, what clues Am I getting from before the incident, and then using that, using our big upstairs brain in a calm moment for ourselves to think about what that need might be. I think this is really important when we're thinking about kids who have lost some connection with a primary caregiver, so all of our foster adoption kinship group, sometimes we think, Oh, the need is to not see birth mom, because they have more angry outbursts after they see mom. That's not necessarily the A to B. There are some kids who need to know that their birth parent is alive and safe. Our downstairs brain will want to go into quick action that might shut down the behavior. But if we can use some curiosity to just see what those deeper feelings of maybe a lack of control, or a fear of rejection, or maybe there's some scary memories that are tied to cheese puffs, and so you happen to buy cheese puffs, and this kid has. Lost their mind. It can feel daunting, but my encouragement is let your shoulders drop and settle a little bit and stay curious. Stay curious about what might be underneath that big angry feeling that you're seeing.

Dawn Davenport  45:18  
Let me interrupt this interview one more time to shout out thank you to the jockey being Family Foundation. They have been a long time supporter of this podcast. We couldn't do it without them. Thank you, jockey being family, let's move into our older ages. Let's say are no longer toddlers, but we're not yet teens, so remaining curious as to what the trigger is, the why, the when, the whatever it happens before, and that's proactive, because we need to think about it as parents, because in the heat of the moment, it's often just not terribly helpful. That's right, you may know, okay, yes, this is it's just not helpful at that point, because you can't do anything to prevent it. And if you think about it ahead of time, you could say, Okay, I see my child struggles every time they have a visitation. Therefore, what can I do to help prepare the child or whatever prior to the next time anything else proactively, I would throw out routine is still very important for this huge,

Speaker 1  46:21  
huge my son, when he was in pre K, I want to say his favorite part of the day was when they went over the schedule. He's a kid with some sensory processing issues and transitions have always been hard for him, and he needed to know what to expect. That was so settling for his nervous system, I think again, get the senses involved. So if you have a kiddo who's struggling with visits, what are some sensory and relational things that you can provide that help that transition, like, lower stress, is there a soft lovey Do they like, like, a weighted blanket? Is there a certain sippy cup with some nice cold water? Like, what can help provide some soothing when there's big stress, because we know big stress tends to lead to big anger, even as adults

Dawn Davenport  47:08  
and involve your child. Yes, yes, yes. I mean, let's go back to the example of visiting a birth parent. I know that last time we went to see your mom for the next week, you really you cried a lot, you hit your brother, you got in trouble. Because it's stressful. What are some things that would be helpful for you that could reduce this stress? And younger children may not be able to articulate it, but by involving them, it gives them power. That's right to be able to get some control,

Speaker 1  47:39  
and this is a great time to bring out the animal brain. So after we visited Mommy, I think your Tiger brain was really loud and and you hit Sammy and you know, how can we help your Tiger brain feel calm? Because so often our kids, as soon as we pull it into language that we can make sense of you are angry. What can we do? Like their little upstairs brain goes offline. They just, they just shut down. At least, I've had that experience a lot with clients where, you know, we seem to be having a totally normal conversation, but they cannot articulate, even in those elementary years, what they need in that moment, and so maybe offering some suggestions, sort of a menu of options. But I love that you brought in, you know, get them involved, because we don't know, we don't know what's going to be soothing for them, necessarily,

Dawn Davenport  48:34  
exactly, and and it's more likely to be soothing if they have identified it.

Speaker 1  48:38  
Yes, they give that power, right? That's power. Yes,

Dawn Davenport  48:42  
even if it doesn't appear to be the most soothing thing for us, if they were the one that suggested it, they feel empowered. So what about in the moment? Let's say our four to 12 year old is losing it. What do we do then? So

Speaker 1  48:57  
one thing I think is just a helpful reminder for all of us is think about your own Tiger moments, like when you are flaming mad about something. Does it help you for somebody to say, calm down, or it's not that big a deal?

Dawn Davenport  49:11  
No, it does not just a word for the wise,

Speaker 1  49:18  
right? When you're super mad about something, even if it's something you shouldn't be mad about, quote, unquote, you need somebody who gets it like that's what often settles us. You also probably need some time and to maybe walk it off or to take a break, right? And so I think our kids often need those same things. They need us to get it you are so frustrated. Yep, okay, we're going to take a break. Like we're going to take a beat. Hey, I, you know, I don't like where this is going between us. Let's just cool out for a second, as opposed to get out of here with that attitude. It's a little bit of that acceptance, like you're having big feelings and cooling out. A little bit is going to help us. So there's that little bit of like, remember that it literally takes time for those chemicals to leave the body. So if you're expecting a 10 year old to immediately go say sorry to the sister that he just punched, that's not going to be a genuine apology. It's just not. It's a losing

Dawn Davenport  50:19  
proposition, because then they say it in a way that clearly is not intent, and then you say something absolutely ridiculous, which I have said before now, say it like you mean it, which is I mean, the second you get into that, oh, as I said it, I thought this is, this is not effective

Unknown Speaker  50:41  
downstairs, brains galore. My

Dawn Davenport  50:43  
downstairs brain was was roaring. Shall we say,

Speaker 1  50:47  
exactly, exactly. So in the moment, remember, the shorter the better. Let's cool out. We need a minute. You know when we can make it we language that tends to be settling for the downstairs brain. So instead of saying you need to get it together, let's cool out. We got this those kinds of things can be helpful. Give it a minute some physical again, physical motion can be helpful. Let's walk it off. Hey, let's go get a drink of water. Even that little bit of movement can be helpful. The other thing I think about in the moment is, is there a basic need that is making things worse? So I know if I'm hungry, my upstairs brain goes offline, one of my boys is very much the same, and so when we're about to lock horns about something. I've had this happen before, where I'm ready to, like, just ratchet up consequences. And, you know, we're we're gonna go at it. And I realized, Oh, we're both hungry. Like, I can settle this if we just take a minute and eat some protein and come back to the chore or the whatever it is that needs to happen, maybe you need to sleep on it. So I was talking to a friend who's like, you know, I got some bad advice, bad marital advice that, you know, never go to bed angry, but sometimes you just need to sleep on it, and then you wake up and you're like, Oh, that was a dumb fight. I'm sorry I snapped at you for whatever. Is there a basic need that is part of what is escalating this situation, and maybe it's your basic need,

Dawn Davenport  52:25  
exactly. Sometimes it is. Sometimes it is that I need a moment to myself, or I need to eat a cheese stick. Yeah, exactly. So would you throw anything in addition as we move into our teen years? Anything in addition, you would say that we should be considering at that point.

Speaker 1  52:45  
Yeah, so remember, for your teenagers, it really matters. What happened before this kid was a teenager? Did they have 1000s and 1000s of chances to practice, feeling and dealing, or did they have to be in survival mode A lot of their life? And that doesn't mean we should pity them, and they have some great adult skills. There's a phrase I think of a lot the same things that keep kids alive can get them in trouble later. So it can also be your strength. Having a strong Tiger brain isn't bad. It might mean you're going to be an amazing advocate for kids in foster care someday, right when you can channel that tiger energy toward change in the teenage years. If you are parenting a kiddo who has a very strong downstairs brain, you're going to have to go back age appropriately, to some of those naming the feeling right, externalizing it like, Hey, your Tiger brains loud. Let's take a beat. And that's okay. Another thing I find super helpful in the teen years is more and more working to empower them to understand what their brain and body needs. So we're building up to this right? Like, that's part of what's happening in the early years and certainly in elementary school. Hey, I think we're hungry. Let's have a snack. In those teen years we're transitioning into when we're not going to be the boss of them for very much longer, and we're trying to help them learn to be the boss of themselves. And so I'm usually pretty explicit about that with both parents and teens, that, hey, this is that transition period. It doesn't mean boundary list living. That's really not good for anyone, but it does mean, I want to think with them about how they can be successful. Hey, I've noticed that, you know, it seems like when you're using screens, when you're on that video game until nine o'clock at night, it's really hard to sleep, and then, you know, the next day doesn't go very well. And I'm wondering if we should do something differently. I don't mean that you're making every decision with your teens, but working with them to help notice patterns and normalize and say, Yeah, I don't do very well when I eat a bunch of sugar. Or and then whatever, right like pulling your adult experience in in helpful ways around those anger triggers. I remember when my friends didn't invite me to that thing, and that's really, really hard keeping in mind that we are transitioning them to be the boss of themselves, so the more that you can help them understand their body and brain, the better,

Dawn Davenport  55:23  
perfect. That is such good advice. Thank you. Jessica sinarsky, the author of Riley the brave as well as your magic backpack series, for being with us today to talk about maintaining connections with an angry child. So helpful. I truly appreciate your time.

Unknown Speaker  55:41  
Thank you Don

Dawn Davenport  55:44  
and before you leave, let me say thank you to hopscotch adoptions. They have been a long time supporter of this podcast. Hopscotch is a hey, accredited international adoption agency placing children from around the world. They specialize in the placement of kiddos with Down Syndrome and other special needs, and they also do a lot of kinship adoptions. They place kids throughout the US, and they offer home study services and post adoption services to residents of North Carolina and New York.