The Real Reason Children Need to Hear No

If you think it's going to cause a scene and you know you're in the right, do it anyway. Remember behind every scene is a lesson. You've got to be willing to go through those storms to get to the rainbows. That is them learning. Give them the gift of no. The gift of no. The gift of accepting the fact that they can't get what they want, when they want, and how they want it all the time. And is that how you approach it without feeling mean? Because I do think there are some parents who feel like the bad guy when they say no. Welcome to the Bratbusters Parenting Podcast. My name's Lisa Bunnage. I'm a parenting coach. I'm a mom. I'm a grandmother. And I'm Amy Bunnage. Lisa's daughter. And I handle the marketing and planning here at Bratbusters. While I don't have kids, each episode will dive into parenting topics and Lisa will answer your questions. Let's get started. Okay, sweetie pie. What are we talking about today? Today's topic is why your child needs to hear the word no. Why are child... Oh, okay. I don't think I've ever said that before. I don't think you have either, but I think would you agree with that statement? Yeah. Because no is part of life. Yes is part of life and no is part of life. They can't have them have one and not the other. It doesn't make any sense. So the reason why we're doing this podcast topic in general is you have your top five tips for parenting toddlers. And one of them is you often say you childproof the home, so you never have to say no. Some people interpret that as you saying you should never say no. Yeah, it makes sense, but I'm exaggerating. I always exaggerate. I speak in what do you call it? Absolutes? Yeah, you're going to have to say no sometimes and that's okay, but you're trying to minimize it, right? Yeah. Saying no is okay. They need to hear that word. There's nothing wrong with the word no. We hear it. Kids can hear it. It's reality. Well, I think there are some parents who feel like their child shouldn't hear the word no when they try and redirect in other ways. What are your thoughts on that? I don't agree with it. I think it's okay to hear the word no because they're going to hear it and they don't think it's a bad thing. You don't see a kid scream because they heard the word no. They might scream because of what it means. They want that toy back, but it's not the word that upsets them unless you scream. Oftentimes, the reason why parents don't want their kids to hear the word no is because they were yelled at no. They have a bad attachment or detachment or whatever to that word. The word no doesn't mean it's not negative to them. It just means that, yeah, you shouldn't do that, but it's not a horrible word to them. Put it that way. Oh, yes. Another thing too is I remember a long, long, long time ago, I was working with some kid and the parent had said to me, oh, no, he doesn't like to hear the word no. Then the kid asked me a question about the universe or something and I said, oh, actually no, the sun is bigger than the earth and the mom corrected me because I said no, because the kid said the sun is smaller than the earth or something. It was something that ridiculous and the mom didn't want me to use the word no at all. How's this kid going to function in the real world? Yeah, I thought that was odd. She had such an aversion to the word no. I was a lot younger then. I didn't realize that she probably had some bad experience with that word. She was probably yelled at and the word was no that she was yelled at. I can see that. If that's been your experience growing up, you probably do want to move away from that. I can too, but the reality is they're going to hear the word no and that's okay. I think with your approach, you're essentially with calm leadership. It's the idea that the child is not always going to get what they want in the real world. You're teaching them that. How are you teaching them that with calm leadership? What age are we talking here? Let's say three to 12. Three to 12? Okay. So calm leadership to me is all about guiding them into making good choices. They already know right from wrong at that age and if they make a wrong choice, I'm right in there like a dirty shirt. Okay, you chose that. Here's your consequence. I don't use anger, disappointment or frustration. If you show any of those things, then it's not good. It's not, you're not a leader. You're bringing emotions into it and it's not appropriate. When you're disciplining a kid, don't bring emotions into it. It's like a business transaction. Also, I'm accountable too because I'm a leader. Leaders are accountable because remember, leading within the word leader means you're leading. They're following you. So if they see you being accountable, they're more likely to be accountable because there's no shame in it. There's no shame in making mistakes. That's what you want to teach them. It's okay to make mistakes. I make them too, but we got to make amends for them. We got to make up for them. There's got to be a consequence. Remember the first consequence on the behavior board is a positive action. So if they do something naughty, then you have them clean a window or something. So the consequence itself isn't necessarily a negative, not the first one. The second one is if they choose not to do the positive action, then you come in with a negative deprivation, but that was their choice. It was their choice to break a rule to do something naughty. So it's their choice to get that first consequence, which if they don't do, then it's their choice to get the second one. So you really want them to feel like they're in total control of their own lives. They can choose whether or not to break the rule or follow it. Then they can choose whether or not they get the first consequence or not. So you see how I'm trying to empower them? Why do you think it is so important for our children to feel like they're in control of their own lives? Because then they'll have self-respect and high self-esteem and self-discipline. Then you don't even have to discipline them. Then they'll just discipline themselves because they'll feel like they're in control. They will make good choices once they understand it's all up to them. What if parents listening right now and thinking, you know, my little Timmy is not going to make some good choices? That's your job to sort of train them into doing that. And that's okay because, you know, most of my clients, obviously they've got kids that maybe aren't making good choices, but it is your job to guide them into doing so with using the behavior board and teaching them that, look, if you make a poor choice, just like if I make a poor choice, there's a consequence for that. It's a lesson learned every time they act out. Look at it that way. Say, well, here's a good opportunity for a lesson. And do you think it's important for kids to see parents making mistakes? Oh, huge, huge, because a lot of parents try and shame their kids whenever they do something naughty. I don't like that. You don't shame them. Say, well, you know better, you shouldn't do that. All that shaming and bullying and blaming. I think it's horrible. Just say, yeah, you messed up just like I did yesterday when I yelled or whatever. So you got to show them there's no shame in not being perfect. Okay. There is a little bit of shame in not owning up to it and making amends as time goes on. Okay. Like let's say you yell and you didn't want to make amends to your kids by having a consequence. I'd be a little bit of a shame to myself if I wasn't willing to be accountable. So the shame is not in the action of making a mistake. It's in not owning it. And you want to sort of, yeah, it's okay to feel bad about yourself if you're not willing to own it. I'm talking to the parents here. It's okay. You're allowed to feel bad and think, you know what? I would even do this with kids. Let's say you really messed up and you yelled at them yesterday and then they said, you yelled, your rule is no yelling. And you said, no, you just pushed too far. So I had to yell. This is what I would do. The next day I would say, and let's say you had to impose 24 hour media blackout as a consequence because they wouldn't do the first consequence. Okay. So they acted out, you yelled at them, then they wouldn't do the first consequence. So you resorted to 24 hour media blackout. Right. Now the next day, so there's still in the 24 hour media blackout, what I would do is I'd say, you know what? I made a mistake yesterday. I yelled. I didn't want to be accountable for it. Not only that, I made you kids accountable for what you did wrong. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to remove that 24 hour media blackout and we're going to go out and get you some treats or something. Yeah. You got to own that, own it. And look at the way they're going to look at you when you do that. That is leadership right there. You're owning your own mistake, taking away what you, here you didn't punish yourself, you wouldn't take it, but then you punish them. You got to own that, eat it and then say, Hey, look, I'm really sorry about that. I'm going to remove that 24 hour media blackout. Plus on top of that, I'm going to take you out for a treat. I do feel like the ownership part is so important because even as adults, I think we all know those people who just start pointing fingers once they've made a mistake. Yeah. Well, I know how they were raised. They were raised that there's shame in making mistakes and yeah, they weren't taught how to apologize or how to be accountable. So yeah, a lot of adults can learn from this too. Now I think when it comes to the word no and children hearing that sometimes people or parents, I would assume avoid it in fear of a tantrum or in fear of some sort of reaction from their child. Yeah, but you can't be afraid of that. And also watch how you say the word no. And like I said, I really believe that one of the, that the main reason my parents don't want to use that word is they were yelled at. They heard the word yell, no, said in anger. So we just want to remove that when I say no, I just say no. It's like that. It's no big deal. Okay. So then it's, let's say it's going to cause a tantrum fit meltdown scene or whatever. Don't be afraid of that. Let it happen. If you think it's going to cause a scene and you know you're in the right, do it anyway. Remember behind every scene is a lesson. Every tantrum fall, it's followed up by a lesson. You've got to be willing to go through those storms to get to the rainbows. That is them learning. It's a lesson for them. Don't take that away from them. If you need to say no for something and you know they're going to have an absolute fit, say it anyway, say, no, this is going away. No, I told you, you can't have the remote and then you put it away and let the scene happen. Give them the gift of no, the gift of no, the gift of accepting the fact that they can't get what they want, when they want and how they want it all the time. That's okay. They need to learn that. That's life. Okay. And you do talk about the idea though of being careful with what you do say. Yeah. You know, say what you mean and mean what you say. In other words, be careful what you say. And then, let's say you do mess up and you say something absolutely ridiculous. That's it. No computer for a whole year. I mean, and then you got to own it. Say, look, I really messed up. That was really dumb. And so it can't be for a whole year. So I'm going to take away all your consequences, just like the last thing, right? Take away all your consequences and I'm going to get a consequence instead because you messed up. Messing up overpowers their consequence. You take theirs away and you own yours. And is that how you approach it without feeling mean? Because I do think there are some parents who feel like the bad guy when they say no. Oh, I love being a leader because I know what it does for kids. It makes them feel good. And you know what's interesting is I'm a really strong leader because I invented all this stuff that I talk about. Well, maybe other people have too, but I've never seen anyone else. But anyway, so, but when I was talking, whenever I was talking with kids, you know, one of the nicest things that they want a kid ever said to me was I didn't like myself until I met you. I had boundaries and I respected those boundaries and I had boundaries for myself and for the kids and they liked themselves when they were with me. Doesn't that kind of say it all? And you got, and I got respect. They treated me like gold because I treated them like gold. Okay. You give, you get what you give. I always said that you give good stuff. You'll get it back more often than not. Okay. Should we get into the questions? Oh, okay. Sure. First one is Gossia from Poland. I have three year old twins. How do I manage their nose? There's a lot of, there's a lot about natural consequences of kids actions, not punishments. Do you agree with that? What's the natural consequence when they refuse to tidy up? Well, I don't worry about that. And you put on the behavior board, you say, um, uh, tidy up. I don't know what that is too general of a term. I wouldn't put that down. I wouldn't say just clean up your room. I would say put your laundry away or whatever needs to be done. I would be very clear about it. And it should only take maybe, you know, they're three years old. They only take a few minutes, two or three minutes. So then I would say, like, let's say pick up 10 toys in 10 minutes is very measurable and it's very doable. Okay. So your, your rule is here's a basket each, you pick up 10 toys within 10 minutes and then you start the timer. You don't talk about the toys, but you just count them. But and then if they start complaining and saying, no, just ignore it, completely ignore it. And then when the 10 minutes is up, say, Oh, well, you picked up 10 toys. So that's great. And you didn't. So let's go to the board and go to the board, say the rule was pick up 10 toys within 10 minutes of being asked to do so. They didn't do that. Now they get a consequence. See how it's very organized and very measurable and timed. It's very fair. We did also discuss the idea of natural consequences in episode 142. So if you want to go back and check that one out, that's the punishment fitting the crime. The consequence does not have to be natural. It doesn't have to fit the crime. Okay. It can be something completely different. And what are your thoughts of parents want to raise their kids without any punishments? So no consequences in life. So how are they going to be prepared for life so they can speed, they can park, where ever they want with no tickets? Like, how are they, you're setting them up for a real rude awakening when they're older. I'm trying to think from the parents perspective, from what I've seen online about this is I think it's the idea of the parent not specifically imposing punishments, but the fact that they just learn it through life due to like what happens as a result of their actions. But you're making it harder for them. It's easier if they learn it at home before they're even out in the world. Then they're already prepared. They don't have to learn the hard way. The school of hard knocks is what they're talking about. I'm not like that. I'd rather set them up with information and power. And yeah, I'd rather strengthen them up before I throw them out into the world. Yeah, that's okay. It's not horrible, but it's not the way I think it's kind of meaner. I like my way better. I'm preparing them for life before they even get out there. Okay. The next one is Juliana from the United States. My two and a half year old yells no and stop at mama at me all day. I'm a stay at home mom. This usually happens when things aren't going his way. So for example, I said he can't have chocolate for breakfast. I tell him to put his shoes on when we go outside. After he yells no, he follows with a tantrum because I usually make him do the task I asked him to do or do it for him. I've tried redirecting, ignoring, offering another solution, explaining that he's being disrespectful, saying no back. I know silly of me. Having him go to his room for a bit so I can gather my thoughts after the bad tantrums, nothing is work to stop it. I also have a five month old baby. So I know I'm not as available to him as I used to be. What can I do about the disrespect? Well, there's a few things in there. So you said that he says no because he doesn't want to do something and then you go straight into having to get his shoes on. I'd put a bit of time between those two. Like he's already having a fit because he can't have chocolate for breakfast. And then you say, okay, get your shoes on. He's already kind of upset. I think it was just giving multiple examples was my gut instinct. Oh, I see. Okay. So you say no to chocolate because he wants chocolate for breakfast, then just ignore the tantrum. He's got to learn to process it. The fact that you're explaining it is what's making it worse. The more you explain, the more they complain. So as soon as you start answering him, like you've already said, no, chocolate, chocolate. And you've said, no, now he's having a fit. Now you've got to ignore him. If you talk to him or look at him during that tantrum, now you're in it with him. You're part of it. You're on the low road. You stay on that high, calm road, wait till he joins you up there. Okay. So setting an example, you're nearby, but you just completely calm. So as he's finished, oh, y'all done. Okay. So you want to read a book or do you want to go help me with a baby or something? Then you talk to him. You ignore the crazy and reward the calm, but never be afraid of a tantrum. If the word no needs to be said, just say it and just say, no, no chocolate for breakfast. Let him have a spit when it's done. Say, do you want to go help with the baby? Do you want to go read a book or something? So yeah, just follow through. You're worried too much about what he's saying. Don't give it any weight. He's just arguing with you. And as soon as you answer him, now you're on the low road with him and that latter going back up to the high road is kicked out. You can't get back up there. Once you've entered that tantrum, you're in it and he knows it. What are your thoughts on explaining that he's being disrespectful? What's the point? He's not listening to you. He doesn't care if he's disrespectful. Obviously he's laying on the ground having a fit. Yeah. This is absolutely pointless. That's the mini therapy session. That's not their world. That's your world. You think that you can have a therapy session discussing all his big feelings and big emotions and what he should do and what he shouldn't do. He's two and a half. He's not listening to anything you're saying. Are your kids driving you nuts? They don't have to. Check out bratbusters.com for my bootcamp courses if you want to learn how to become a leader. The next one is Beth from the United States. My 18 month old daughter is going through a phase where she will do great and listen to me when we're one on one or in public. However, as soon as her auntie comes, she does not listen and even ignores me. Her auntie's on the same page as us when it comes to correction and calm discipline and it's great at working with her and my daughter, listens to her too. But most of the time she prefers her and listens to her, but not me and ignores me whenever I give a command. Is there something we need to correct here? I don't know what's going on. I don't know what style. This is the auntie. She listens to the auntie, but not the mom. Is that it? Then it did say that the auntie's on the same page when it comes to calm discipline. Maybe she's doing something different or maybe she's just more comfortable with you. Sometimes that's it. How often does she see the auntie? And also I don't talk about auntieing or grandmothering or anything. She might just be the company. She's the one that, oh, I'll just do anything that she wants me to do because I don't see her that often. So I don't know the relationship there. I don't have enough context to really give you a good answer. Either she is doing something a little bit different, a little bit more leadership-like. Maybe you look angry. Maybe you're talking too much. Maybe you're not going quiet when she does have a fit. So I don't quite know what's going on there, to be honest. Do you find that children in general tend to test boundaries when they feel a little bit more comfortable with the person? Well, of course they do. Yeah. And also when auntie comes over, she's usually just playing with the child. So yeah, like with my granddaughter, I'm just there to basically your servant. I'm just there all day to play with her. I'm not testing her at all. So yeah, maybe that's it too. Maybe you have to, there's things that you have to do more with the 18-month-old. That's why she's having a fit with you. Maybe the auntie doesn't change your diaper or have to feed her vegetables. So you're probably doing stuff that she doesn't like as much, right? It could be that. It could be that. Okay, the next one is Nicole from the United States. My two-year-old wants nothing to do with dad. Only mummy can take her out of the crib, take off her sleep sack, in the morning the struggle to get ready for work and having her only letting me do things. Is it impossible or it's impossible or it's a full on meltdown when we need to get out the door? Dad tries, she smacks his hand away and then he gets frustrated too. It's mummy upy upy. When I say patience, mummy is busy, daddy's going to help you. He loses it, help. Yeah, she's just controlling you. Okay, I'm sure that she loves her dad and she feels safe with him. So I would just say, well, dad's going to do this now and then I would leave and let the scene happen. How do I prevent the scene? You don't. In order to change this behavior, you have to be willing to go through the scenes. That is the lesson. The lesson is in the fit scene meltdown in tantrum. Parents are always trying to show them the lesson without the scene. They go hand in hand, okay? So when you say, no, daddy's doing it. I remember both my kids went through this, it was in the bathtub and I heard them say, oh, we want mom to give us a bath or whatever it was. And I yelled out from the family room, well, you're stuck with dad, so deal with it. I was already a leader, so that just stopped them right away. They realized that they weren't going to be able to control us. Their dad was a great dad. He was in there giving them a bath. They survived and they were just fine after that. And then I remember it happened with the other kid and then the dad said, well, you're stuck with me, so deal with it. Like, in other words, don't feed it. Don't talk about it. Just say, well, you're stuck with them. You're stuck with me. Just let her have the scene. The next one is Louise from Australia. My little girl is two and hates having a shower. We don't have a bathtub, unfortunately, so showers is the only option. We used to play a game where we would take turns to wash each other's hair. She wasn't keen on it, but then would allow it to happen. Recently though, she doesn't even want to go to the bathroom door. Screams, cries and hyperventilates. I'm at a loss on what to do. She's okay in a swimming pool and playing in water outdoors. Okay. I kind of understand that it's coming from a height and it's hitting her hard, right? Generally, although I'm sure you've turned it down and all that stuff. There are attachments that you can get that make a really long hose that maybe she could even hold and have more control over and turn the waterway down. So I can kind of understand that. I don't think that's a behavioral issue. I think she's got a real phobia about it. So yeah, I would have like, or maybe even just start with a, have it go into a bucket initially and she can get a face cloth out of the bucket and wash herself that way for a while. But yeah, ease her into it. So it's a separate attachment that you can put on there. They have these ones where it's a big rubber thing. It looks like a shower cap. It goes off. It goes right over top of the existing shower thing. And then it has a long white hose or whatever. And it's just this really plasticky thing. But anyway, so I've actually had a client who used that and said it worked beautifully because she could hold it and control it. Obviously, in our giving specific recommendations, just making sure it's safe. But how would you go about initiating this? Would you say, Oh, we have a new thing in the shower? Like how do you approach that? Well, you can do it. Now I would say you can do it. You could maybe even say it's just like the hose outside. You said she likes playing in water in the pool. It's just like the hose outside. You can show her, you can get it all set up and then show her with a doll. Say look, the doll can hold it and look, she's doing it now. So yeah, I would, I would do it that way. The doll loves it. You just like place the doll in the water, just getting soaked while hitting in the face. Wow. Look at how much fun your dolls have. They're better with water in the face. Yeah, but yeah, she will, she'll see that it's different, right? So just show her that. Say, look at this. Look, it's all different. I would also get fun things to do in the shower, like get those crayons, the bathtub crayons where she could draw, get something different, get bubbles going. Be careful with that because they can be slippery on the shower floor. So make sure you have a mat down or something. But yeah, just add some fun stuff. So we've got some new bubbles, but you can only do it in the shower. I personally love a good podcast in the shower. You know, maybe just put on a podcast. You know what? To get them in the shower, I would even get one of those waterproof things with an iPad or a phone or something and say, look, you can watch the very favorite show only when you're in the shower. So yeah, bribe her a little bit because I do think it could, it could genuinely just be a fear. And that's what I'm working with here. I'm not treating it like a behavior. I'm treating it like a fear. Okay. The next one is Dana from Canada. My son's going through the mind stage right now. He's two and a half. I've tried prying the toy away when he wouldn't give it back to him or when he was playing with someone else, but now my son is doing that with the other kid and others are doing it to him. How do I stop the cycle when as a parent, I have to step in and do that to with him, but he can't do that to others. What's the best way to teach a toddler to share? Well, you're not really teaching them to share. You're teaching them not to grab stuff. So if he grabs something off someone else, you say no, and then you prized little fingers off it and hand it back to the other person. So you're teaching them not to grab stuff off others. You're not teaching them how to share. They don't really understand that. Certainly he's two and a half. They don't care about that. Okay. But they do care about that toy being taken away if they grab it. So yeah, that's what I would do. I would just prized little fingers off and hand it back. And I'd say no, and then I'd hand it back to the other person. Okay. We have one final question. So Holly from the United States. I have a 19 month old and our biggest problem is her hitting. Rather, it's she's really excited, really angry or just bored. She hits with her hand. She doesn't in front of people at home in public or she will hit the dogs. Right now we say no hitting if it's towards us and we restrained her for 10 seconds, release and carry on with our day. We don't discuss the behavior after if it's towards the dogs, we say no hitting and remove her from the dog or the situation. Daycare informed me that she's starting to hit the caretakers now. What am I doing wrong? Is there a better method for this? I think you're doing what I would recommend. You just say no and then you hold her for about 10 seconds, which is the consequence, right? She doesn't like that. The only other thing you can do is you remove her from the fun or fun from her. If she is playing with something and hits, then you remove some toy away from her, but you got to be fast with that. They have to connect it because she's only 19 months old. I think you're doing it right. I think it's just going to take a little bit more time. That's all. Also, you want to be 100% consistent. When she does hit, you want to hold her so she can't get future hits in. When you allow them to keep getting more and more hits, you don't let them hit and then say no and grab them for 10 seconds and then let go and they hit again. You prevent subsequent hits. When you see them coming at you with their little hand to hit, you grab it and you say no and you treat it like they've just hit you again. Okay. Well, that was it for the questions. Okay. So while your child needs to hear no, they need to hear yes. They need to hear no. It's balance, right? It's okay to say no, but it's how you say it. Don't use anger. Don't go, no. You just go, no. It's more like that. So it doesn't have to be a negative word. It just means you can't do that. And that's okay that they learn they can't do whatever they want, right? So yeah, it's a really important lesson for them to learn. So like I said, I think the reason my parents have an aversion to the word no is because it was used in an angry way when they were growing up. I'm assuming that's what it was, but it doesn't have to be angry. It's just, you can't have that. And the way I'm communicating that is just with one little word, no, that's okay. So it's the way you use it. I think that's the biggest problem. It's the way it's used. Anyway, thanks so much for joining us. We'll be back again soon talking about another parenting topic. Be parenting. Thanks for tuning in. If you're ready to dive deeper, check out bratbusters.com to learn more about the behavior board, parenting courses, and private one-on-one coaching with Lisa. If you've enjoyed the show so far, we'd love it if you could take a moment to follow, rate, and review us on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback helps us reach more parents just like you. The information provided in this podcast is for general informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional advice. Lisa is a parenting coach, mom, and grandmother. She is not a licensed psychologist or counselor. Her services do not replace the care of psychologists or other healthcare professionals. For a full disclaimer, please visit bratbusters.com forward slash disclaimer.