Can Tadpoles Leap?

Some very well educated, young parents are currently embracing the technique of instructing their toddlers (children under the age of 6) to express with words what they are feeling in the midst of an emotional outburst. At face value, this may seem like a helpful attempt by the parent to teach the child how to identify and manage upset emotions. Let’s look closer to see just how helpful this parental requirement to “…tell me with words,” may actually be.

Picture a pond with tadpoles swimming near the surface of the water. Would you ever expect any of those tadpoles to suddenly leap out of the water?  Obviously, that would be impossible; after all, those little guys have tails for swimming, not little legs for leaping. Yet, we know with absolute certainty that one day those tadpoles will, in fact, develop into little frogs with legs and they will most definitely leap! So, it’s really about development and the time needed for any creature to fully mature and develop naturally. So, what’s this got to do with saying to a screaming 4 year old, “Tell me what you’re feeling with words”?

Allow me to back-peddle for a moment and talk about my own experience with respect to using words to describe what I’m feeling when I’m upset. Recently, I went to visit one of my best friends at her office. I didn’t know the way and asked for directions, which turned out to be sketchy and didn’t warn me of the dangers at a confusing roundabout. Closely following her instructions, I was almost blind sighted by another car. In a split second, I avoided an accident but my heart was racing wildly and my legs were shaking as the situation worsened with mass confusion over the valet parking etiquette at her place of work. By the time she greeted me in her lobby, we were both ready for battle. She was feeling blamed and attacked by me; I was feeling angry, neglected and hurt by what I considered recklessly careless driving instructions.

For the first time in our friendship, we were trapped in a classic blame/defend dead-heat. All I wanted from her was empathy—for her to understand how the near-accident freaked me out and why it did—but she couldn’t or chose not to give me empathy; she was entrenched in defending her traffic instructions as entirely appropriate. I was experiencing an amygdala hijack that was controlling my brain and my body. Clearly identifying my feelings and putting them into words was the last thing I could possibly have done in the moment. I was too preoccupied being out-of-control.

Simply put, the amygdala is the part of the brain whose job is to keep us safe from perceived mental or physical threats.  When it kicks into action, it triggers the release of hormones and the “fight, flight, or freeze” response. Once the amygdala is running the show, our thinking brain gets less oxygen and we react without thinking.  The experience of the hijack requires time and skill before we are able to recover from it and return to our reflective, thinking brain to analyze the sequence of events leading up to the hijack. That day, it took me several hours of focused attention and reflection to sort out why I got so triggered with feelings of anger, frustration and hurt.

So, I ask you: if someone like myself who has been studying the brain and emotions for over forty years can sometimes find it impossible in the heat of an emotional upset to “tell with words” what I am feeling—how is a toddler of 3 or 4 years old going to be able to do it?

You know the answer.

Rather than instruct the toddler to “tell me with words,” what he/she is feeling, the parent can instead, observe what emotion the child is experiencing and then state that observation to the child in a soothing, caring voice as follows:

“I see that you are looking really________.” The parent can fill in the blank with whatever emotion is observed (angry, frustrated, disappointed, sad, afraid, etc.) If the parent has had some training and practice in speaking and listening with empathy, they can continue with follow up such as:

“I know how ______ it can feel when ______________ happens.”

“I bet you wish the baby wouldn’t grab your things and break them; I would be _____ too if that happened to me.”

“However, no matter how angry you are at the baby for breaking your things, hitting is never allowed.”

When a child, (or anyone, for that matter) encounters this kind of empathic response, the result is that they begin to calm down because they feel heard and understood and because they are being given the right to feel their feeling (whatever it is) rather than being forced to not feel it.

Toddlers will gradually learn the names of their emotions by receiving clear and informative, neutral assistance/feedback from their caregivers who name their feelings and report them objectively to the child with a kind and tender voice/tone. While they are in the midst of an amygdala hijack, it’s impossible for them to suddenly pause, reflect, and say, “I’m angry because the baby grabbed my my new crayon and broke it!” To expect the toddler to be able to do that is akin to expecting the tadpole to leap.  Recognizing and naming our emotions is an emotional intelligence skill that takes time and practice over the first twenty or more years of life until the brain is fully mature enough to master it.   However, toddlers can learn to slowly develop the necessary vocabulary that identifies and defines their feelings and over time, along with patience from their parents, and repetition, they will ultimately be able to “tell with words,” what they are feeling.

Will they be able to do this while the amygdala hijack is occurring?

Ask yourself; could you?