“I told you NOT to colour the monkeys!” she screamed. 

“Take that off, NOW!”

I was doing colour by numbers with my 4 year old this morning. It’s her current favourite activity to do together. She had specially asked me not to colour the brown monkeys on my page so she could do it. I had completely forgotten. 

I took a breath, squashed all my impulses to tell her to calm down, madly try to fix this and otherwise stop the noise, and let her yell a bit more. 

I gently tried some logic. “Oh no, it’s crayon, and that doesn’t erase”

More yelling and furious scratching at the colouring monkey. It was clear my daughter was beyond logic at this point. 

I took another breath or two and tried to summon all my empathy (it was 7:30am and I hadn’t had breakfast yet, so my mind was more on toast and eggs) I put a bit of sadness in my voice, 

“You really wanted to colour those monkeys.”

“Yes!” She yelled and suddenly began to really cry. 

“I’m sorry I forgot” And she cried a bit more. 

“Can we look for another monkey page?” she asked tearfully.

“Oh course!” So we flipped through the book together and our morning continued.

Parenting is filled with these mini dramas every day. The broken granola bar. The syrup on the pancakes, not beside. The preferred underwear are in the wash. Three shows instead of two. Mommy help me, not Daddy. The brown monkeys. I could go on forever. 

Sometimes these little moments are just that, a little moment. Other times they grow into a tantrum and perhaps further into a meltdown. All completely normal in those first 5 years; our little children have big feelings and no impulse control. My goal here is to not aggravate the situation and to remain calm so I can help my daughter co-regulate. I want to help her move from mad to sad, that vulnerable place where growth happens.

Did you notice that as soon as my daughter cried about her brown monkeys she suddenly became open to finding a solution and moving on? Or have you ever found that you feel better about something after you’ve had a good cry? As a mature adult, we know that before we can change and adapt to our situation we had to first accept it. 

When my daughter first discovered I’d coloured the monkeys she was full of frustration, she yelled, scratched and did everything she could to change things. I stood by supporting her emotion and when she seemed ready, I gave her a little push towards sadness where she cried and had her tears of futility. Deborah Macnamara explains this process at length in her book, Rest Play Grow, “A child can accept something is futile only if they are moved to feel sadness, disappointment, and loss when they cannot effect change.”

So before I could start problem solving with my daughter, she had to accept she wasn’t going to get what she wanted in the first place. If I tried to skip this step, her frustration would persist and would likely snowball throughout the day creating many more problems. Continually helping them through the adaptation process will set the stage for maturity and resilience.

It may seem a bit frivolous, talking through these steps about a botched colouring page. But this takes practice and a lot of repetition. When we can regularly go through this cycle with our kids we are ready for the big stuff. And hey, in the eyes of a 4 year old, the brown monkeys were big stuff!