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Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
Last post 02-09-2009 10:29 AM by caroleco. 5 replies.
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05-14-2008 6:59 AM
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ChristineM
  - Joined on 06-15-2007
- Amersham, England
- Posts 71
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Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
I wrote this case study as it illustrates both why the words we use with our children are so important and the usefulness of using EFT for clearing remainder unresolved aspects of a family issue. About four months ago, I was driving one of daughters back home from school. I was chatting to her about upcoming video filming of children’s issues. We mused as to which children and families to invite and which issues we could cover. Anyone who knows me and my work with children, young people and families know that I actively involve the EFT target audience every time for inspiration and material. The answer I got back from my 11 year old was a surprising discovery. “Well”, she said, “you can work on me”“What about ?” I asked“I’m still a bit angry ……. She had said enough in a few brief comments that made me see that we needed to work together. Before I finish explaining what was said, perhaps I should back track a few years to explain. About 8 years earlier, when Rachel was about 3.5 years old, and before I was familiar with EFT, we lived in another house. One summer night unbeknown to me an opportunist burglar entered a neighbours’ house on the opposite side of the road, through an open window of their downstairs living room, took car keys, let himself out of the front door and took the family car. The next morning as we having breakfast a policeman knocked on my front door. I answered and he enquired as to whether I had seen or witnessed anything. I had no idea it had happened, I hadn’t seen or heard anything and said that my husband hadn’t mentioned anything either. As both daughters we both quite young at the time it didn’t even dawn on me to ask them and I was glad that they were sitting at the back of the house where they didn’t hear the conversation. When I returned to the kitchen, my elder daughter (5 years old) asked who called. I tried to skirt around the subject a little as I didn’t wish to make them frightened and too wary. For me they were too young yet to fully understand without perceiving the world as a scary place. I told them that a policeman had been asking me about cars in the street. “Oh”, said Rachel,” I saw a man at Andy’s window last night” she piped. “I think he might have been a robber.” She was right, but again I judged that she was too young to hear the whole truth as we only lived a few yards away. “How did you see that?” I asked. A bit puzzled. “You said if I can’t sleep at night that I can look out the window at the moon. I did and I saw a man in the garden.” I consciously made the decision that I felt was right at the time and that was to play the incident down a bit. I must say that I wasn’t sure what to think, she couldn’t describe him as it had been dark and I was beginning to wonder maybe whether she could have heard some of the conversation that I had with the policeman. I told them that he had said that someone had been messing with a car, but they were not to be worried about robbers because we are safe at home. It didn’t seem to affect her too much at the time, although she did have a tendency to worry about robbers getting into the house occasionally over the subsequent years. I put these expressions down as part of normal development and totally forgot about this original incident. A few years later, the house of a friend of Rachel’s was burgled. This reminder Rachel of the original incident, she had a few sleepless nights saying things like ‘I need to keep awake in case a robber tries to get into the house’. Again this was prior to working with EFT, so I did my best to talk her through her fears. She was settled enough again. Apologies, as this is a bit like a flashback movie, but back to the present day. At 11 years old now, she explained, “Well, I sleep OK now because we worked on scary robbers” True enough, Rachel had tapped herself to sleep on several occasions in the last couple of years over thinking about robbers - all my family are active tappers.We had tapped on ‘robbers in the house’ and ‘I believe that it won’t happen’ , ‘we’ve got an alarm’ and ‘Mum and Dad will hear if anything happens’ “But now that I’m older I still feel angry that you never really believed me that I heard something. You never believed me that I got out of bed and saw him. I still think sometimes that it will happen again.” She said all this calmly, but I did take real notice as Rachel is a girl of few words but usually wise words.I thanked her. It seemed that EFT could be useful. So with Rachel’s permission, we set up the filming for a one to one session with Rachel to dig a bit deeper. First we started by working through what happens in Rachel’s body when she hears noises in the night. We tapped together, working through the various aspects and reducing the intensity of feeling as we went. “When I wake up at night and even if it’s quiet, sometimes I’m frozen to the bed” “ My legs are like jelly “ “I’m too scared to get up in case I see someone in the house” We made reasonable progress but I was getting a feeling that more lay beneath. Although her demeanour was fairly relaxed, I sensed that there were more layers to emerge and clear. I didn’t have to wait long. As Rachel relaxed, she made comment on words that I had used to her in the past. This is when I, as a mum received a bolt of insight and I was a bit ashamed. “When I have talked to you about robbers, you’ve always said, ‘don’t be silly’, but I’m not silly.” This piece of information held the core for Rachel, I really had no idea that this throwaway comment had meant so much to her. Whenever she had talked about robbers in the house I had said, ‘Ah, Rachel, don’t be silly’.I had broken a basic parenting rule. It seems that my attempt to dilute her fear by saying it was unlikely to happen to us had indeed done more damage. More talking and tapping revealed that importance of allowing validation of your children’s feelings. We tapped on her feelings about being ‘labelled’ silly. We tapped for her feelings about not being believed. We tapped on mummy’s feelings about how I had affected Rachel. Working with each of these aspects Rachel showed emotion and then cleared distress after a couple of rounds each time. Being able to use the tapping process Rachel clearly benefited from unloading her feelings. After this, she talked more and explained that, “I think that because you didn’t hear anything when it happened before (all those years ago) that I’m the only one that can hear stuff at night. I know that’s probably not true, but that’s the way I feel.”Wow, it seemed that my daughter at the age of 3.5 years had decided that she needed to be night watch man, because she was the only one that heard anything. She had told her parents that she had seen a real robber and they had not believed her and then had the cheek to tell her not to be silly. She actually believed that because she couldn’t be sure that we would hear robbers she felt she was the only one who would be able to hear or see robbers in the night. With this all off her chest and using tapping as we talked, Rachel did her own healing. She taught me a huge lesson about allowing your own children to talk and validate their feelings whenever possible. We finished off with tapping on, ‘Even though Mummy was silly for not listening to my expert night watch lady, Rachel aged 3.5 years, she’s usually a good mummy’. Rachel showed huge physical relief by the end of all this. She said she felt really strong, she uncharacteristically punched the air. She was pleased with herself for being able to explain so much about how she felt. She reported that even though she knew that she had felt like this inside for many years that tapping had made it easy to ‘get it out’. We both learnt important lessons. I am glad to say that Rachel no longer feels the responsibility on her to be vigilant for robbers, she says she no longer gets those feelings in her body if she is awoken at night and she is happy that her parents don’t say ‘Don’t be silly’ any more. Happy sleeping. Christine Moran
Christine Moran
Parent's Discussion co-moderator
Bsc. Psy.
Adv Prac EFT
Practitioner of MBTI and NLP
www.eftworld.co.uk - EFT for Children and Young People, Parents and Educators
Author of the TAP with ME Programme - see website for details
www.eftworking.co.uk - EFT for adults
email me at contact@eftworking.co.uk
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caroleco
  - Joined on 05-29-2008
- Posts 3
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Re: Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
Dear Christine:
You have hit the nail right on the head with this one. I have a 13 year old son, he is the youngest of 5 children who have all left home. He is introverted. He comes home from school and stays in his room. Barely venturing out. The kids pick on him so bad at school, they have convinced him that he is gay. He has no friends, no outside interest, he is a hell of a cartoonist. He starts high school in September for heavens sake. I have to help him through this transition. His father is out of the picture, and my other half is about as emotionally cripple anyone can be at 50. I am making plans at this point to leave this relationship as soon and my son gets out of school for the summer. I need any suggestion that you can give me.
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ChristineM
- Joined on 06-15-2007
- Amersham, England
- Posts 71
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Re: Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
Hello Carolco,
Sounds like you have tough decisions facing you.
Do you use tapping currently? Does your son tap? Happy to make suggestions if it can help. Whilst your son is introverted and that's no bad thing, I'm guessing that he's not shining in a way that you know he's capable of. Which area do you or your son feel would be a good place to start addressing first? What does your son feel? What does he say?
Christine Moran
Parent's Discussion co-moderator
Bsc. Psy.
Adv Prac EFT
Practitioner of MBTI and NLP
www.eftworld.co.uk - EFT for Children and Young People, Parents and Educators
Author of the TAP with ME Programme - see website for details
www.eftworking.co.uk - EFT for adults
email me at contact@eftworking.co.uk
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caroleco
- Joined on 05-29-2008
- Posts 3
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Re: Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
That is the point he does not say anything. It appears on the surface that he is content with his isolation. I mean I stayed to myself as a child also. I had more fun by myself than with others. They didn't want he around anyway. He does a lot of writing, stories and such. He looks at TV too much though. Don't know where to start. I don't tap like I should and he definitely don't tap. Have not introduced this to him yet. Any suggestion that you can offer will be greatly appreciated. I am sorry that I have not responded before now. I had forgot about the post. I don't use this email that often.
Carolyn
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parentmod
 - Joined on 05-28-2007
- Indiana
- Posts 25
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Re: Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
Dear Carolyn,.
For some reason reading your interaction with Christine, whome I respect very much,. just reminded me of a recent interaction I have had with a Mother about her son. In fact her terrorizing fear was that due to the childs behaviour,. she thought her kid was gay.
I will not get into what we tapped on, but! I will tell you the final conclusions we had,.
1. Yes her Child seems gay when put in to a regular Jock mold!
2. Yes her Child seems gay when she expects him to be chasing gilrs and fitting in to the macho mold!
3. No her child is not gay,.... there are many ways of being, and it is OK to be reclusive and keeping to your self.
4. No her Child is not gay! as being a cartoonist and artist with own views of life based on his own experience and observation. Being tranquil at heart is and can be a sign of great strength is acompanied by great support from a loving mother.
5. No her child is not gay, as looking deep within, he carries many of the traits that his progenitors carry and exhibit on a daily basis.
And as always,. I like to point out that there is no greater healing and strength for a kid, than to stand in front of a parent that has ans is clearing issues out of their lives so as to actually be a more effective and solid parent. Remember, you give meaning to things,. you react to them, you judge by them. Change that meaning and your support will be different and charged with a whole new energy,..
Love & Blessings
Till
PS: Never push tapping on a kid! Just do it yourself, and only once they ask,. can you gently,. over time ever so softly introduce them to it. Take your time with this one,.. please
Till Schilling
Cocreator of TappyBear
www.tappybear.com
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caroleco
- Joined on 05-29-2008
- Posts 3
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Re: Why the words we use with Children are so important –Validating their Feelings
Sorry it took me so long to get back to the subject at hand. I have been without a computer then forgot the user-name and password to the site. As an update, I did get out of the emotionally abusive relationship. Section 8 came through and I moved on. I found a school that was smaller than the traditional high schools. It is military based but smaller and much more effective. His grades is still good. He won a computer for having perfect attendance. Not as withdrawn as he used to be but he is able to relax more that it is only him and me.
He does believe he is gay. The mannerism in his walking and standing and overall appearance suggest that. I am holding off solidifying my conclusions because his father behaves the same way. Always fussing about his hair, clothes horse, in the mirror longer than most women. Don't know??? I have to start somewhere and it may as well be with me.
Thanks for the support
Caroleco
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