Helping Little Kids Manage Big Emotions

Parenting is the most challenging job in the world. Children need love, attention, patience, meals, clothes, guidance, boundaries – all before 8.30 am. It’s exhausting, draining. But also incredibly rewarding.

I’ve seen other parents talking about how to handle toddler emotions. But we’ve recently experienced the full force of raw emotions, coming from my feisty little pumpkin. She is full of sass at the best of times – it’s just her personality! But these recent emotions, which she is clearly unable to handle, are coming across as anger and moodiness.

As a parent, it’s easy to react in these situations (trust me I have, we all have – no parent is perfect). But the correct way to deal with this situation is to help your toddler handle the feelings they are experiencing. Put simply, they don’t know how to do it themselves. I’m in my late 30’s and sometimes I can’t handle my own emotions. As such, we’ve recently explained to her that adults also struggle with emotions and created some emotion cards to help her communicate how she is feeling.

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Let’s explore the range of emotions your toddler might be feeling:

This is not an exhaustive list. We know as adults, there are many more emotions we deal with on a daily basis.

I wanted to share some of the tips and tools we’ve used:

Children sometimes don’t have the tools or vocabulary, or actions to communicate emotions effectively. it is up to us as adults to help them communicate effectively. And sometimes verbally speaking about it just isn’t something they are equipped to do yet. How many adults do you know who struggle to verbalise their emotions? I know a lot!

As a family, we are all going to benefit from these tools we’ve put in place, to effectively communicate our emotions.

Emotion Flash Cards

I was going to buy some of these. However, being okay at designing, due to running three blogs and a t-shirt business (all self-taught), I thought I would have a go at creating some myself. And of course, as a blogger, I will be sharing them with you all. In the hope they also help other parents out there.

Feel free to click download below, for access to the flashcards.

Check out my blog post – 14 Age Appropriate Chores to Encourage Independence

These cards are great because sometimes toddlers need adults to question, help or prompt them. To start a conversation about how they are feeling. When they are unable to initiate this. I’ve started off by printing some of the cards, to see how well they work. But, I’ve included a full set for you to download.

I’ve already arranged mine in the living room. In an easily accessible place.

As a family. we’ve agreed that if we are struggling to express our emotions, we will show someone the card. And we can start a discussion about how we are feeling.

Read my blog posts about our journey with gentle parenting:

Explaining it’s okay to not be happy all the time

As someone who struggles mentally, with anxiety and depression, I’ve now accepted the fact that as humans, we are not all happy all of the time. It’s important to feel our full range of emotions, as and when they come up. Being happy is a wonderful feeling. And as a family, we try and create as many happy family memories as we can. However, it’s natural we will all feel tired, scared, alone, and sad at various times throughout an average week.

There are many factors which can impact your emotions. Due to the health conditions we face as adults, sometimes our communication can be poor and as human beings, we lash out.

For a while now, we’ve explained to my toddler, that it is normal and completely okay to feel these other emotions. And to become frustrated in the moment, when we don’t know how to deal with them.

Fight or flight is a real thing. A pre-historic reaction to stressful situations. We often cannot control it.

Equipped with this knowledge, we humans need to give ourselves more credit. And accept we will sometimes react in the moment and apologise later.

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Finding safe & appropriate ways to manage emotions

If my little one is sad, moody or tired we talk about cuddling and laying down to have a nap. And I explain ‘Mummy is also tired and it’s okay to feel this way’. Luckily, she has a few days with us during the week, where she can relax and chill out if this is what she wants to do.

Set a good example

Toddlers learn about managing their emotions by watching us. As adults, it is our responsibility to set a good example of how to behave. However, as humans, we don’t always get it right.

Something we do as parents is apologise if we displayed incorrect behaviour. And we talk as a family about why we did that.

Other great online resources to deal with emotions

CBeebies

BBC videos exploring emotions

BBC Bitesize emotions & feelings

Books to help you on your parenting journey

Final Thoughts

I hope you enjoyed reading about how we put tools in place to manage my toddler’s emotions.

Do you use different techniques?

How is it working for you?

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