During a recent session with an eight-year-old client it became clear that how a child understands of what adults say is not always what we intend.

We were talking about the decision of her parents and physician to try some medication to help her with her hyperactivity and focusing.  According to the family, there was a significant shift in her behavior and attention span after a couple of weeks on the meds.  I asked her what if anything had she noticed in her body since she has been on the medication.

She said, “I feel calmer.  I can focus on my work at school.  But I have been very scared about taking it.”

I asked her, “What about taking the mediation has been scary for you?”  I was curious about what she meant.

She asked me, “Have you heard about the DARE program?”

“Yes” I said.

“Well, at school we have this program and it tells us not to do drugs.  My mom has told me not to do drugs.  Therefore, when she gave me drugs I was scared about it because you are not supposed to take drugs.  I wasn’t sure that it was okay.”

I expressed my understanding of her feelings and confusion.  I gave her a short explanation of the difference and then we went on to something else.

This experience reminds me of the times parents have brought their children to see me because of behavioral problems to find out they were reacting from fear from misunderstanding of a significant adult’s communication.  Some examples:

Frustrated parents brought their 10-year-old son to counseling because ‘out of the blue’ he was refusing to go to sleep at his regular bedtime.  I learned this behavior had started after his grandfather died.  During our work together, he revealed that a well-meaning Aunt trying to comfort him at the funeral said, “Your grandpa has gone to sleep so he isn’t hurting anymore.”   Since then he was afraid to go to sleep because he was afraid he would not wake up.

A mother worried about her four-year-old little boy, brought him in because he was not eating and sleeping very well.  He had started hitting other children at PreK class and at home his 2-year-old sister. When asked if there had been any recent changes in the family she said the only thing she could think of was her and his father had divorce.  She stated that they had been fighting for years and felt that the divorce was the best thing for the children.  The little boy told me about a night burned in his cellular memory when his parents were having another fight.  He was taking a bath and needed a towel.  When he asked for a one, his dad came in with an angry face and threw it at him saying, “You are too much trouble.”  Later that night he left.  The parents went on to divorce.  He sees his dad infrequently even though dad has regular visitation.  He believed that because he “was too much trouble” that was the reason his dad left making the divorce his fault.  He felt very responsible but could not change any thing.

A 14-year-old female client shared how difficult it is for her to reach out to her dad.  She told me he has a very frustrating job and is gone a lot.  When he is home, he yells a lot.  She said, “It makes me feel bad inside.  I shake and I do not know what to do around him.  I’m afraid to tell him my problems because he might yell at me.”

These are some of the examples of how our lack of understanding the emotional needs of children keep them from reaching out to us.  Most of us did not grow up with parents that understood the emotional needs of children.  We still do not.  As aware as I have been about the emotional needs of children, I get forgetful in my hurried life.  I know other adults must too.  However, our lack of knowledge is no longer sustainable if we are to help our children create a more response-able world.  We need to stretch to understand that children are not little adults.  That is an old paradigm belief.  Today’s children, who are technologically in touch, yet emotionally and cognitively growing, intimidate us.  We think they do not need us or pay attention to us, since they have all their gadgets.  That is not the message I get from the children I work with.  They long for a relationship and emotional closeness to the adults in their lives.

We need to slow down and take the time to get to know our children.  Mostly what we are doing with our children is barking orders at them because we are in such a hurry to get from Point A to Point G every day.  We are pointing out what they are doing wrong but not telling them what to do instead.

Getting to know children is easy when we take a moment to pause and use our two greatest resources:  Our ears.  By listening more than talking, we can learn their view of life.  Why is that important?  How can we know what they need if we do not know what they are thinking and feeling? When we react to our children from what we believe about them rather than what we know from being with them we project our histories upon them.  We frustrate them because they feel not heard.  They do not feel felt.  Children have taught me that they are desperate to feel felt and heard by their parents and other significant adults in their lives.

Over the years, I have asked hundreds of children, if they think that adults are just supposed to let them do whatever they want and not follow healthy rules for living.  I have yet to have one tell me they did.  What they have shared consistently, no matter what culture or economic background they come from, is that when adults yell at them, call them names, tell them how they think and feel, that their future will be based on a present mistake and punishments rather than discipline and guide, they lose faith and trust in the us.  They turn away from the adult world.  They have told me they may not like the rules but they know they need them and they need limits and boundaries. Their complaints and reactions about the meanness and harshness inflicted upon them without regard for their spirit, their person and their thinking and feelings are adult issues.

How can we expect them to listen to us if we are not listening to them?  How do you feel when you are misunderstood and don’t feel heard?  See, you do understand your children because they feel that way, only from you.  When you slow down and breathe, you connect to your inner wisdom.  That part of you that remembers what it was like to be a child or teen in an adult world that views you as “less than” when you want to feel valued and valuable.  When you slow down, breathe, and connect to your inner wisdom you remember those experiences when adults listened to you and spoke with you not at you.  Those memories connect you to your felt sense of the experience of feeling valued.  That is what we need to tap into and create that space with our children.

Conflicts will still happen.  How can they not?  However, the felt sense of connection will keep bringing your children back to you after the dust has settled and they and you are calm again.  Then you can re-connect and provide the guidance and discipline they need and want from you.

I don’t know how it keeps happening?  But another year and December has arrived before I am ready.  Used to, the day after Thanksgiving, found me decorating all the halls, the front yard, and most of the rooms in the house for Christmas.  It was fun.  I enjoyed it. I was ready for the decorating, sending out Christmas Cards, catching up with friends and family and cooking, cooking, cooking and shopping, shopping, shopping.

Maybe I’m becoming a ‘cranky old woman’ but what I’ve observed over the years about the “Holidays” leaves me less than feeling festive.  Making a big fuss over people you haven’t talked to or seen the whole year doesn’t make sense.  Neither does adding 10,000 more things to the to-do list because “we’ve always done it this way,” leading to being short and snappy with people you see every day.  I’m not knocking family traditions; however, ever so often I think we need to re-visit them and ask ourselves if we are really wanting to do all these activities or we’re doing them just because.

It could be that many family arguments and fights around this time of the year are a result of doing so much we get outside our window of stress tolerance because of the additional strains of:

“We have to go to Aunt June’s because we went to Uncle Joe’s.”

“I have to get a little something for everyone in the office, so no one will feel left out.”

“I know you haven’t seen your dad in 10 years but we should send him a little something.”

“Yes, your family gets drunk every time we go over, but it’s Christmas!  We need to forgive and forget.”

“I know we’ve been to the 9th Christmas program this month but we can’t let our children and nieces and nephews down.  They expect us to be there.”

“Where are you going?  Oh, you have to go shopping for the 5th time this week because you forgot about the figgy pudding for your Aunt’s great-grandmother’s cousin’s daughter’s Christmas Party on Friday, that we have to go to in order to keep the War of the Worlds from happening?”

“Why are you so tired?  Oh, you’ve been up for two days making all the food for the 10 Christmas Parties we have to attend? No, I’m not being sarcastic.  No, no.  Don’t cry.  No, I’m not making fun of you. Please don’t yell at me in that tone.  Look I’ll keep an eye on the turkey so you can go take a nap.  What do you mean I think you can’t handle it? I know you love doing all this but why are your eyes so red and your hair sticking up?  What is happening to your face?  I think I’ll just go out for a while?  What do you mean I never help?”

Okay, maybe I exaggerate, but not much.  We are already a group of stressed-out human beings and holidays can push us past our already s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d limits.  What is the good in that?  This is the time of celebration:  Celebrating the promise of a new life to show us a better way to live; the importance of family and friends; of giving and receiving and of unconditional love that came to us in the form of a baby.  How much we truly need each other.  And, most of all, the present of the power of a calm loving presence in the world wailing for love.

It is like in the last two months of the year we try to warp time and space to connect with all our relationships that need that love every day of the year.  In the process, we often miss what is the reason we are doing all of this extra activity.  We are doing it as a way to connect, appreciate, love and be loved by those we care about.  We open up and show our generous spirit of love to those less fortunate as we give to Angel Trees, Food Banks and other charities.

Instead of saving this for the last couple of months of the year what would our world look like if we lived from this unconditionally loving place every day of the year?
I’d love to live to see that happen.

Blessing and love now and for the New Year!

My Eyes

By:  Deborah Chelette-Wilson

My eyes have been witness to

Unspeakable terrors

Debilitating sorrows

And the healing waters

Of self-redemption and grace

My eyes have hidden unspoken truths

Laying dormant in silence

Frozen in fear

Yet

Yearning to give voice to experiences

My eyes have watched relational traumas

Played out on self and others

Immobilized to change their course

Locked in ancient biology

Disconnected

Disembodied

And

Hidden from conscious awareness

My eyes know the body’s wisdom of protection

When safety no longer exists

This moment in time

Organizes all experiences thereafter

Growth slows or stops

As trauma becomes transfixed

My eyes know only when safety is felt

Does trauma begin to thaw

Opening up possibilities for healing

But healing is such a fragile place

And real or imagined demons can

Close the door

Keeping trauma trapped inside again.

My eyes know my life-long struggles

To become free from traumas grip

It has taken a long time to reconnect

Enough to find the cords of my voice

My eyes now see increasing integration

Of my body, mind, emotions, and soul

It is a spiritual journey to wholeness

I gain courage to stand tall

Let fear pass through me

As I speak my truth

My eyes reflect my ongoing journey

Forged from relational traumas

Lessons learned from the fires of

Walking this earth with

Wounded others

Seeking forgiveness, redemption and

Grace

That must come from within

My eyes know that I have had to STOP

Running from myself

Face my own experiences

For integration to take place

Where I find power and courage

To give voice

To pain’s wisdom

And live in freedom

My eyes would like to see

YOU

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