The Power of Healthy Relationships
Challenging behaviour can be both exhausting and all-consuming. Managing this behaviour requires a healthy relationship between children and parents/caregivers. Children are still learning to predict what the world is like as well as how they fit in it and this pandemic has shifted our children’s view of how predictable, reliable, and safe our world is. This puts a strain on our children’s mental flexibility, emotional control, and other executive functioning skills. Relationships with adults are integral for helping children develop these executive functioning skills. Without this adult-child relationship present, children are unable to navigate the world on their own.
A research based early intervention program has focused on the importance of relationships between parents/caregivers and children and emphasizes three categories of basic relationship needs for children. These are identified as: exploration needs, comfort needs, and a strong caregiver. Essentially, our children need to know that it is okay to explore their environments while we watch them, delight in them, help them and enjoy it with them. They also need to know that we will welcome their return, protect them, comfort them, and help them organize their feelings. These two categories of needs (exploration and comfort) are only successful with the third, which is a strong and kind adult. This concept is known as the Circle of Security.
A strong Circle of Security has many positive outcomes, two of which are as follows. First, it helps us build relationships with our children. When children feel supported, loved, cared for, safe, and delighted in, the relationship between the adult and child naturally develops. Second, this developed relationship then becomes the necessary support system for any challenges our children face (e.g.- scraping a knee, dealing with disappointment, conflict with others, etc.).
When our children are showing challenging behaviour (i.e.- tantrums, emotional outbursts, etc.) it is typically due to a need not being met. When these needs are not being met, it is important to try and understand what the need is, and how to meet it for our children. In other words, behaviour is a communication of needs rather than the surface appearance of defiance, disobedience, disrespect, etc. For example, when our children get into conflict with one another, they may yell, scream, fight; however, oftentimes we see the behaviour and want to respond/resolve it. In these moments, our children are, though in their own way, expressing the need to be comforted as well as assisted in organizing thoughts and feelings. If we start with empathy/comfort and then begin to help them organize their thoughts and feelings, they are able to begin developing these life skills, i.e. problem solving, emotional control, communication, etc. When we have a healthy relationship with our children, we as adults are better equipped to be patient, strong, and kind; providing our children with opportunities to follow our lead.
Dr. Jody Carrington captured this concept well in her book called Kids These Days: “Kids are hard wired to turn it up louder and louder until we meet their needs and assist them in making sense of their worlds.” Essentially, children will have meltdowns. They will cry, yell, scream, fight, and sometimes more, but ultimately it is not an indication of anything other than their needs. Children will continue to show us that they need something by ramping up their behaviour until their need is met and this is sometimes done in ways that can be difficult to understand as well as navigate. However, as Dr. Jody Carrington also said, “we are better at handling the hard stuff when we are connected”.
Sources:
Carrington, J. (2019). Kids these days: a game plan for (re)connecting with those we teach, lead, & love. FriesenPress.
circleofsecurityinternational.com. (n.d.). https://www.circleofsecurityinternational.com/resources-for-parents/.