I See That You're Upset

This is a Parenting on Track post. I've been wanting to share my experience with this program, but haven't gotten around to it. I had an experience tonight that I thought I would share.

So one of Vicki's skills that I haven't used very often is the phrase, "I see that you're upset...." to help a situation. When temper tantrums come I use the "put a bag over the weed" skill instead. It seldom works and ends up with everyone very upset. So tonight, I decided ignoring the tantrum Sweet Girl was having wasn't going to work. I want into her room and calmly said, "I see that you're upset. Is there anything that you can think of that will make it better." She shook her head no. I responded that it was okay and that I was going to leave, but when she thought of something to let me know. She quickly said that she did have a solution. She said she wanted to talk about it, that she wanted to read scriptures and wanted to have a family prayer. So that's what we did. We talked about how we got to the point of her tantrum and how different choices would have prevented it from happening in the first place. And then she went to bed calmly and happily. Now from experience I can tell you that my kids will go on forever, like hours, when they are having a temper tantrum and being ignored. This definitely worked better. There are thing that I do ignore and my kids do self correct, but tantrums are not one of them. So I learned form this experience that this is what I need to do instead.

I never would have thought it could be so easy. But then again, I have taken Vicki's class and when implemented it really does work! Often I look back on an incident and see how I could have done better. Maybe looking for how Vicki would have done it. But this is the first time I thought of it before things got out of control. Thanks again Vicki