In this episode of Emotionally Wealthy, we're joined by parenting researcher and coach Jen Lumanlan, M.S., M.Ed., host of Your Parenting Mojo and author of Parenting Beyond Power, for an honest conversation about children's behavior, parental triggers, and what happens when we look beneath the behavior instead of simply trying to stop it.
Parenting can bring up some of our strongest emotional reactions. A child refuses to cooperate, melts down, pushes back, or repeatedly does something we've asked them not to do, and suddenly our response feels much bigger than the moment. This episode invites us to consider that the behavior may be communicating something important about what our child needs, whether that's connection, autonomy, movement, sensory support, or simply the experience of being heard and understood.
We also explore how our own childhood experiences can shape the way we interpret our children's behavior. Sometimes what feels like a frustrating or defiant behavior in our child is touching an old pattern in us. Jen shares how early experiences around emotional expression and having her needs heard influenced her understanding of relationships, and how that awareness has informed the way she parents today.
This conversation is especially relevant for parents and caregivers who find themselves repeatedly triggered by age-appropriate behavior. Together, we look at how curiosity can create more flexibility, how parents and children can work toward meeting both of their needs, and how repairing after conflict can strengthen a relationship rather than define it.
In this episode, we discuss:
The difference between a child's need and the strategy they're using to meet it
Why behavior that looks defiant may actually be an attempt to meet a need
How connection, autonomy, movement, and sensory needs can show up through behavior
Why our children's behavior can activate patterns rooted in our own childhoods
How recognizing a child's need can change the way we respond
Finding creative solutions that meet both the parent's and child's needs
Why parental openness and curiosity create more flexibility in difficult moments
How the pressures accumulating throughout the day can affect both parents and children
Why conflict is inevitable in relationships and how repair can strengthen connection
What emotional wealth can look like when both people’s needs matter
This episode is for you if you've ever wondered:
Why does my child's behavior trigger such a strong reaction in me?
How can I tell what my child actually needs beneath the behavior?
Am I being too permissive if I try to understand the need behind the behavior?
Why does the same behavior keep becoming a source of conflict?
How can I honor my child's needs without ignoring my own?
What can I do when I realize I'm already triggered?
Is there a different way to respond when my child's behavior brings up something old in me?
Once we understand what the child is trying to accomplish, we may be able to find another strategy that works for both of us.
00:00 Introduction to Emotional Responses in Parenting
02:17 Understanding Emotional Expression and Needs
09:55 The Parent-Child Dynamic: Needs and Strategies
13:08 Exploring Universal Human Needs
15:39 The Importance of Early Emotional Awareness
26:53 Navigating Expectations in Child Development
Self-Paced Masterclass: Why You're So Angry With Your Child's Age-Appropriate Behavior (And What to Do About It) ($27). Use coupon code WEALTHY for $10 off: www.go.yourparentingmojo.com/tl/305
Taming Your Triggers Workshop ($397), with scholarships available.
Even though most of those behaviors are normal and developmentally okay, they can still feel incredibly activating and very triggering.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Half of parents expected a two-year-old to be able to stop having a meltdown when told to stop. That's just not a realistic thing. They do these things that drive us up the wall so that we will engage with them.
Karen Conlon (:
What have you seen change relationally?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Parents have more capacity than they had before. Underneath all of those needs is the ultimate need that we all have is to be seen, known, understood, and loved for who we really are.
Karen Conlon (:
Welcome to Emotionally Wealthy. I'm Karen Conlon. If you've ever reacted to your child in a way that felt bigger than the moment, parenting can bring up some of our strongest emotional responses when a child is, I don't know, refusing to listen or is having a meltdown, pushing back, just doing exactly what you asked them to not do. And even though most of those behaviors are normal and
Developmentally okay, they can still feel incredibly activating and very triggering. In those moments, it's especially easy to just focus on behavior. But what if behavior is not the whole story? What if underneath there are needs that may have not yet been met or even understood? Not just in your child, but in you as the parent or caregiver. My guest today is Jen.
Lumanlan Jen is the host of Your Parenting Mojo, a podcast that translates academic research on parenting and childhood development into very easy to understand and practical tools that parents can actually use and apply right away. She holds a master's degree in psychology that is focused on child development, another master's in education, and she's also the author of Parenting.
Beyond power, how to use connection and collaboration to transform your family and the world. She helps parents break the myth of a common misconception that respectful, needs-based parenting means just being permissive. This conversation today is going to be amazing for you if you're a parent, a caregiver, or someone who in general has children in their lives, because we're going to learn about what a need actually is.
We're gonna learn about why parenting so often becomes a mirror for our own childhood conditioning. And most importantly, we're going to learn to pause long enough to ask, what is really happening here so that we can start responding with more connection, clarity, and intention.
Karen Conlon (:
Jen, welcome to Emotionally Wealthy. I'm so glad you're here.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Thanks, Karen. It's really great to be here.
Karen Conlon (:
Jen, I wanna start by asking you about in your earliest childhood messages. When you and I spoke before this recording, we shared some commonalities and we shared about some of our childhood experiences. And one of the things that you shared with me is was that your mom passed away. And I believe you said about when you were about age ten, you had you had a younger sibling at the time and your father.
So all three of you were left with this experience of this traumatic loss. So I'd love to start by asking you if you would share with us what were some of your earliest messages or experiences about emotional expression or the expression of needs. What were some of the early messages that initially shaped how you understood these things and what role they were supposed to play?
In your life.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Mm. Yeah. Thanks for that. you know, my mom died when I was ten, and that sort of provided a a fairly even divider in the early years of my life, those sort of before and after. And in in the before time, I don't ever remember talking about feelings at all. It just I from from my memory, it didn't even come up. It was just not relevant. It was not useful. It wasn't it just wasn't a part of our lives.
And in a way that became sort of more so after she died. and I think one sort of story that that illustrates how that happened was a period, it was probably, I don't know, six months or so after she died. And I was walking along the hallway, heading down the stairs and going past my my father's bedroom and he was sitting on his bed and he was holding my mom's jewelry box and I could see that he was crying. And
It had never been told to me, but I somehow knew that he wouldn't want me to see him crying and that I shouldn't see him crying. And so I didn't go to him. I tiptoed very, very quietly down the stairs. And that was just kind of how feelings were handled. We just didn't acknowledge them, even when they were bubbling up really close to the surface.
And I think that was sort of especially true for anger, right? And and I think this comes up a lot for for people socialized female, is that anger is really just kind of not permitted. And there was another incident in that period where my my dad was really disagreeing with something I was saying. I don't even remember what the thing was. And I got up from the dinner table and the the back
two legs of the chair caught on the rug and so the chair tipped over and so it looked like I was being really belligerent and throwing furniture. Of course it was absolutely an accident. And and I went upstairs because I just couldn't take being with him anymore. And he shouted at the top of his voice, You get back down here. And like he never hit me. He'd never threatened to hit me, but for some reason I just knew that staying up there was not an option. So I came back down. And and
Jen Lumanlan (:
He he couldn't hear my side of the story. and from that I learned you you do not rock the boat, you do not express what is going on for you because it will not be heard. And that was sort of how I continued throughout my teenage years and early adulthood.
Karen Conlon (:
So there's so many things going on in that scenario, in the scenario before and in all of the experiences that I can imagine you had afterwards when faced with a situation where you had some feeling or you had some need, but you had already this sort of this situation establish what you should do with those needs and with those feelings. Can you tell us a little bit about what you have since figured out about what a need is versus a want?
And even if you want to use that example, what was what was it that you needed at the time versus the request or the strategy? You know, for those of us hearing this for the first time, so I think we all confuse or maybe use these terms interchangeably. I'd love to have some clarity around that.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think this is a great example to work with. And this really this distinction between needs and wants, right? And and strategies is another word we can use for wants is really at the heart of my work. And I think we get tripped up when we mix up
needs and strategies, needs and wants, because the English language allows us to do that very easily, right? It's very easy to say, I need you to put your shoes on. Yeah. That's not actually a need. That is a strategy to meet a need for ease, for collaboration, for maybe responsibility to my coworkers if I'm trying to get out the door in the morning to go to work. I'm might be trying to meet a need for competence and to appear competent in my parenting by getting you to school or preschool on time.
And so the strategy that I have chosen to meet those needs is to tell you, my child, to put your shoes on. And so we we all, you know, needs are are universal in that we all have them, but we all have them in very different ways. we can have different expressions of them. For some people, some needs are very, very important, like autonomy and connection are very important, particularly for young kids for
For some people, sensory needs are super, super important. I cannot focus if I have labels scratching my neck, that kind of thing, if my seams on my socks are are irritating me. for other kids, that's like not a big deal. It doesn't matter that much. And they have much bigger needs for movement, for play, those kinds of things. And so, in in my view, underneath all of those needs is what the ultimate need that we all have is to be seen, known, understood, and loved for who we really are. And so
So that that was really what I was trying to express as I and again I don't remember what the inciting incident was, but I wanted to be heard, right? I wanted my opinion to count. I wanted my ideas to be considered and held with equal importance to whatever my dad's opinion idea was on that topic. And because he was raised in a traditional, you know, top down hierarchy family.
Jen Lumanlan (:
that was what he knew and that and and so the parent is the person in in charge, the person with the power, and the child's need is not really considered worthy of of firstly being expressed, right? It's not okay, particularly for a girl, to be angry. and certainly nobody's gonna look underneath what what is that anger telling us? Yeah. What is that signaling? hey, I've I I have a really important need here to be understood for you to hear me, for you to consider what I'm saying.
And so so that was never considered. And so that was how I learned that it was not okay to express this. And and that's how many of us grow up is we we hear these both verbal and non-verbal communication, right? The side eye, the the withdrawing of approval, of love and acceptance when we do things that we're not supposed to do, the sort of welcoming, belonging, praising that we get when we when we do things we are supposed to do.
And we take those signals and we kinda learn implicitly, yeah, this is not okay when I do this. This is okay when I do this. And we shape ourselves to to to fit into that mold and and that has implications for the ways we get triggered by our kids later that I'm sure we will be talking about.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah. Jen, with that example, you brilliantly explained the child's perspective, like what you needed in that moment, right? You needed to be heard, you needed your ideas and your thoughts to be considered. Let's put it to your dad's side now. If you were to look at it now from him in the parent's role and the dad's perspective in that moment, what would you identify was
His need, want and or strategy in that scenario.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah. In Yeah, what a great question. And I think this is so easy for us to consider in our role today as parents with our own kids. It can really help us to understand our relationship with our parents when we try to f see what were their needs in the situations they were in with us. and then maybe that can also help us provide a little bit of the curiosity that we need to then be able to see our our own children's needs as well when we can see
how our parents were trying to meet their needs. It's not that they were trying to hurt us. My dad was not trying to hurt me in that moment. My best hypothesis was he probably had a need for ease, right? he he's six months to a year off his spouse dying and and figuring out all the logistics associated with that and and dropping us off at a friend's house before school every morning and picking us up on the way home and I was cooking dinner every night and
so I I I'm I am sure that ease was a primary need for him in that period. And you know, a a a daughter expressing anger over something, asking to be heard over something, might not be something I have the emotional capacity to be able to deal with. And so his first reaction was to shut that down, right? Yeah. And and I think that that is often the case when we're when we're working with our kids and and we're so stressed from everything that's going on in our lives.
Even if nobody's died, right? Even if it's just we're surviving day to day with all of the, you know, what it what it means to live in a late stage capitalist society where we're running around all the time doing corralling all the things. And we just don't have the space to be able to hear our child expressing themselves and and find that curiosity that says, What is really underneath what they're trying to express here? And can I f can I find that need that they're trying to express and help them to meet that need?
And and the the awesome thing about working with needs is once you understand things from that perspective, ninety percent of the time we can actually find strategies that meet both of our needs. And and in the introduction you kind of set up this idea that that we all have needs and that this doesn't mean when when you hear your child's needs and you meet them, it doesn't mean you're a permissive parent because you're also acknowledging that you have needs and that your needs are equally valid and equally able to be met.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah, it brings me to the thought around universal human needs. Your work has a very deep connection to this idea that there are universal human needs. What does that mean exactly? Because I think we're we're kind of on the verge of or maybe already in it, and talking about what what exactly is that and why is it important to look at?
Jen Lumanlan (:
It's a little hard to pin down in a definition, actually. The definitions kinda come across as a bit fluffy. And I want to be clear that I didn't originate this idea. This this came from Marshall Rosenberg, who created this concept of what's called nonviolent communication, which I really struggled with when I first learned about it, because I was like, does that mean I've been communicating violently until So I find it really hard to work with that naming. So I don't really refer to it in that way very often. But it's it's it's a very similar process.
And so a need is basically something where when it's fulfilled, we feel kind of present and alive and vital and like, yes, this feels right to me. And we can often kind of get a sense for what our needs are when we do something like looking at a needs list, right? And there's one at yourparentingmojo.com/needs. And you can print it out. There's picture-based versions for kids and
And when you look at that list, particularly when you bring to mind a situation that you've been struggling with, with your child or or anyone really, and you look at that list and and you see something and you're like, Yes, that's it. And you get this kind of settling feeling. And it's like, okay, that that is my need in this situation. And and very often for parents, the same needs are coming up over and over again, just like they are for kids. It's very often ease.
it's competence in parenting. I want to know that I'm a good parent and I want to be perceived as a good parent. It's self care, right? Because we're all doing all this running around and our kids are are r asking so much of us as well. We have a need to make sure that we can express ourselves and and have some kind of life outside parenting. And then of course, underneath all of that, as with everybody else, we all have a need to be seen and known and understood and loved as human beings, which doesn't go away when we stop being children.
Karen Conlon (:
You work specifically with ages zero to ten. And what you were talking about now just made me think about not just these universal needs that we all have, but specifically in that age range where children's concepts of the world and emotional safety, those things are being formed, right? What is the importance or the significance for parents in particular?
Around learning earlier on to look and consider both sides of needs. Why is that important? I asked that because I'm a parent of a teenager and I had just to share an experience, I had an early experience that I'm actually grateful for. Wasn't comfortable, but I'm grateful for it because she was four years old and I remember one time she was just crying. She was just like, my gosh. But I I don't remember what it was.
I, you know, she maybe she was uncomfortable. It wasn't anything that I could really pinpoint. And I had this moment of I felt my body just kind of get very fatigued. I sat down on her bed and knowing what I know now, I just dissociated. I literally felt myself just kind of go. What snapped me out of it was this child of mine all of a sudden began screaming like.
Bloody murder. She looked at me as if I I I don't know, if somebody was like hurting her. Nothing there was I wasn't doing anything. I was in my master's, I had just started my master's program at the time, and one of my professors was luckily an attachment specialist, and that is what she worked from lens of attachment. It's what made me fall in love with attachment work.
I asked her after class, I was like, Can I, you know, can I ask you a question about something that happened? And I'd I'd like, I'd love to know your thoughts. And she basically explained to me, well, it sounds to me like you were overwhelmed. You were overwhelmed in the moment, and your nervous system took control and said, Okay, we need to go because this is too much. I don't know what to do here. So I'm gonna shut you down. And in the moment, your child ended up responding to that shutdown.
Karen Conlon (:
With terror, because even though there wasn't a verbal communication about what was happening, her nervous system was responding to yours. And it was the most fascinating thing. it changed my approach not just to parenting, but it also made me realize, I've got some work to do on myself.
So, well, look, I wasn't expecting to share all that, but here we are. So back to my original question for you, which was Is it important for parents to learn to look at these things early on? Or is it too, you know, is it too late later? What are your thoughts?
Jen Lumanlan (:
I mean, I think it's never too late, right? That that's that's why therapy exists. And and when I talk about being seen, known, understood and loved for who you really are, essentially what I'm saying in another way is I'm in an attachment, a secure attachment relationship, right? It's it's the same kind of idea. And so we all have a desire to do that. And I'm wondering if you would allow me to dig a little deeper into what happened in that moment. Would that be okay with you?
Karen Conlon (:
Absolutely.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Okay, interesting. So your your daughter was four at that time and you said you didn't remember what the inciting incident was, right?
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah, I don't remember. It was something that I think wasn't that big. Apparently for her it was. Right.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Right. Yes. And that's really important. We'll come back to that. so do you remember, do you know from stories that have been told? What would have happened to you if you had behaved in the way that she did when you were around that age?
Karen Conlon (:
Okay, so I don't think I did because the one I do have a memory actually. The one time I was about five, the one time that I did, you know, have a tantrum of sorts or whatever. I remember hmm, I went into the bathroom.
And I closed the door. And then when I tried to get out, I couldn't. It was somehow locked or something from the outside. And then I was terrified because I didn't know how to get out. I couldn't get out. I knew that my mom was on the other side of it. And I was hitting the door and saying, I can't get out, I can't get out. And and then eventually, of course, after a few minutes, I
you know, was let out. now of course, as an adult, I know that there wasn't any lock on the outside. Obviously now my my mom was holding it and you know, kind of to teach me a b a lesson, I guess. Yeah.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Right. And so what did you learn about expressing your feelings from that, do you think?
Karen Conlon (:
well, I learned that it was dangerous and that it was going to result in very a very scary situation if you express if you express quote unquote bad feelings.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. And particularly as a female socialized person, right? It's it's not okay. Yeah.
Karen Conlon (:
Yes. Yeah. No, absolutely not. I yeah, no, absolutely not. Especially being being the eldest daughter, which there there's something to that as well, I think.
Jen Lumanlan (:
There is, yeah. And I'm guessing you were supposed to be the caretaker, the responsible one, the one who was basically the substitute mother figure for everybody else, right? So you gotta tow the line. You g you gotta achieve, you gotta do what you're told. Is that right?
Karen Conlon (:
There were yes, all of that. All of that. And I didn't need to be told. It was understood. Just ki almost like you know, I re I relate a lot to the story you gave about your your dad just y he didn't have to tell you. It's like you knew. Yeah. Same thing. I I didn't have to be told. I I knew that these were my roles. And you don't question it, you just do. Yeah.
Jen Lumanlan (:
And so isn't it interesting to see the parallel between right, your mom is creating the separation. You can you can see her on you you now you can see her. You couldn't see her at the time, but now you can see her holding the other side of the door, creating this separation, this distance from you. Essentially she's physically with her body doing the blank face, right? What what you did with your daughter is is is a classic example of the blank face experiment where
if you Google Edtronick, T-R-O-N-I-C-K, you can see a mother who's interacting with her kid, and then the mother just stops, right, and just just gives a blank face and the kid goes berserk because the kid is looking for this interaction and can't get it. And so you were looking for that interaction from your mom, right? Help me understand this, help me, help me know that this is okay, that I am safe. And your mom is holding the other side of the door, so you can't get that. She's giving you the door as a blank face.
And so when you get into that situation now with your kid or, you know, when your kid was four, you gave the blank face because that's what you were trained to do in those situations.
Karen Conlon (:
I mean, everything you say makes so much sense and the parallel that you're making makes absolute sense. It's very interesting. I I wanna say that one thing that also came to me now is that that didn't start happening until later because from the time she was born as a baby, I was very attuned, very much you know, responding to her needs.
There was something about her getting a little bit older. That's when that, you know, started to happen. And luckily it didn't happen that many times before I had this this resource. Dr. Paulette Landsman, if you're listening, shout out to you. But but but that's another interesting thing that just popped up for me, which was when she was an infant and, you know, even entering toddlerhood.
that this was not the case. This was something that star that I noticed happened just around age four. this probably was the second or third occasion and luckily caught it early, I think.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah. And not every parent is going through a social work program and and is able to put those dot, you know, connect those dots, right? And so I think we're kind of getting at why this is important. And this I see this over and over again in parents that I work with. they show up in a workshop that I run called Taming Your Trigger is like, Why am I triggered by my kids' behavior? When will they stop doing things that trigger me? And very often what we find is that you start getting triggered when
your child reaches an age where you had really difficult experiences with your parent. Right. And you can see that parallel in your ages. The the five-year-old you on the other side of that door and the four-year-old daughter, right? So close. And she's asserting her autonomy, right? And you don't know what the situation was, but she she was making her needs known in that situation. And you just had no framework to be able to understand that. There there was there was nothing there that could help you to
Dig underneath that and that expression and and really see, yeah, she has a need to be heard, or she has a need for autonomy, or she has a need for connection here. And when you can do that, I think parents often worry, right? c am I just excusing bad behavior when I do that? But when you can see that need underneath it, then the, you know, quote unquote bad behavior just kind of evaporates because we don't behave in that way when our needs are met.
Right. So if we can see, for example, our kid jumping on the couch and we've told them 500 times not to jump on the couch, and and we could can look underneath it and say, I can see you've been in school all day. You have a real need for movement right now, don't you? And and offer them other options for movement. Or very often a child doing something that we've told them repeatedly not to do is actually looking for connection with us. And so if we've been apart all day.
they know that as soon as they do something, and this is, you know, sibling hitting is classic for this, because they know that as soon as they hit their sibling, we are on them because we want that to stop because that is so uncomfortable for us. And so they do these prohibited things as a way of trying to get connection with us. And if you if listeners are kind of h hearing that and doubting that, right, if I I always look back to Dr. Sue Johnson's book, Hold Me Tight.
Jen Lumanlan (:
And she gave an example of a a and this often ha often happens in a cishet relationship, right? The wife will pick a fight and and and say and in the book she gives the example the wife actually says, I pick a fight with you because when you fight back, I know that you care. If you're just off in in your room doing your own thing, I don't know that you care about me. And I don't know how to engage you in a way that isn't fighting, and so I'm gonna pick a fight with you so that I can get that message back that yes, you care about me.
And I think often our kids are are doing very similar things. They they do these things that drive us up the wall so that we will engage with them. And when we see that behavior for what it is, we can offer connection a different way. We can say, Hey, do you want to sit and read a book together? Do you want me to pillow fight you? Right. So many other ways that we can get that need for connection met. And then also we get our need for ease and collaboration and and those needs met too and on on for for us.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah. And I mean, what is that saying? Even a negative attention is attention, right? And so you know, that example that you gave reminded me of that saying. And so your point right now also kind of had me think about age appropriate discussions. I think one of the things that I have seen most happen with parents is that because perhaps their child is really precocious or super talkative,
Oftentimes I see this with solo kids because they're surrounded by adults a lot. They're, you know, either included or listening to a lot of the adults speak. And so they're able to adapt a lot of the sort of mature language. But at the end of the day, their brains and and the stages that their brains are at are where they're at. So I'm wondering if you could speak to that. how do we help parents understand?
How to speak to their children, how to lean into curiosity without making the assumption that just because they're super precocious, gregarious, know how to talk the talk, that they're still children at the end of the day, and that they still have a certain level of understanding of what you're saying, that certain rationale or ways of speaking to them is not going to land.
Because that can be incredibly triggering for a parent, right? Like you should understand. You understand this. Why don't you understand that?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yes. And there that misconception of what our children are capable of doing g s really sets us up for a whole world of hurt. Yeah. Because when we have this expectation that our child should be able to do something and then they don't do it, then we get really frustrated. and the organization zero to three did some research on this. I wanna I wanna s it's kinda old now. I wanna say it's around a decade ago, and they surveyed
Like a thousand parents, and they asked, at what age should a child be able to do? And then they listed out a whole bunch of things. And they I think they called the the report like the expectations gap because there was such a massive gap between what kids on average can do and what parents were expecting. And so parents were expecting I think around half of parents expected a two year old to be able to stop having a meltdown slash tantrum, whatever we call it, when when told to stop.
And that's that that's just not a realistic thing that kids are gonna be able to do. And and if we can kind of equate a meltdown tantrum with us being triggered by our kids' behavior, can we stop? Right? If we if we're in that state where we're just exploding or we're shutting down or however that shows up for us, and someone said, you know, just just stop doing it.
Can we do that with our fully developed prefrontal cortexes? Most of us cannot. Right. And so to expect a two-year-old to be able to do this is just kind of outside of the realm of possibility. And the same goes for sharing behavior. People think that by, you know, three-ish, kids should be able to do that. More comes online four and a half, five-ish. And so when we expect our kids to be able to share, which to a young child who doesn't understand time very well,
When parents say, you should share, that basically means give up the thing that I'm holding right now that I want to have with no understanding of when if ever I'm gonna get it back. Why would I wanna do that? So so I I think the the reason that this is really hard for us as as in the parent-child relationship is that when we have this expectation that the child should be able to perform in a certain way and they can't,
Jen Lumanlan (:
Then we set up the possibility that they're going to feel shame. And I don't like to use the language of, you know, you are shaming your child, because shame comes up differently for every person. So it's not really possible for me to shame you because I don't know what your things are, right? Your your little triggers for shame. but when we make that comparison between a a sibling, between another child who can do this activity that we want them to be able to do or not do, between a theoretical, you know, ideal child.
Who can do those things? you're four years old. You should be able to do X. You should be able to put your own shoes on to get yourself dressed, whatever it is. And they are not able to do that, then we create the conditions that are likely to arouse shame. And shame is not amazing in parent-child relationships. It's kind of the opposite of that secure attachment relationship that we want to have. And instead, when we can look at that behavior and say, what it what is happening here? Is it possible that my child is not developmentally
Able to do the thing that I'm asking? Or is it possible that, you know what, they're having a hard day? Sometimes I have a hard time doing things on on days when I've had a hard day compared to days when things have just kind of flowed a little bit better. Has today been a hard day for them? And do they just have a little less capacity? And you know what? They actually would really appreciate it if I would put their shoes on. And can I see that as a a need for ease in that moment and just kind of step towards them a little bit in the same way that I would.
hope somebody would step toward me when they see that I'm having a hard day. That's not permissive parenting. That's that's see that's treating someone in a way that n it kind of even goes beyond treating someone the way you want to be treated, but treating someone the way they want to be treated. Which to me is kind of the ultimate in relationships, right? We f we sort of fall into this, I'm gonna treat you the way I want to be treated.
But actually if we can see what their need is and help them meet their need, and then they see what our needs are and they help us to meet our needs, right? And and young kids can do this. Young kids get very adept very quickly at saying, I have a need for this and you have a need for that. And I think if we use this strategy, we can both meet our needs. I've seen three four year olds do that very successfully. They are it's a beautiful place to be in relationship with kids.
Karen Conlon (:
They are. I feel like they're actually really brilliant at doing that. And I think part of it, and this is just my personal opinion about that, I think part of why little ones are so brilliant at being able to do exactly what you just said is because they are not marred down or jaded or have these preconceptions of what this all means. It to them, it's just like, this plus this equals that.
Mm-hmm. Right. And so they haven't yet developed at that age, they haven't yet developed the abstract thinking and the ability to understand nuances. And so because of that, it's very simple. It's actually very simple in their minds. Right.
Jen Lumanlan (:
I would I would just think of it slightly differently in that maybe they haven't had as many years of conditioning to think this is how we do it. This this is the only way we can do it. Right. We get so stuck in our ways. This is how I've been doing it for so many years before you came along and now you're gonna do it my way because that's how I like it done. And kids come with so much more cognitive flexibility. particularly neurodivergent kids I find. ADHD kids are so creative.
And when we can understand both of our needs, they will come up with so many strategies that we would never have thought of to be able to meet both of our needs. And I I find that that opens up options and and flexibility and creativity that we find it very hard to access when when we get set in our ways.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah, children are quite creative in the way that they're able to manifest and execute the solutions to the problem. Right. But it does require parental openness and vulnerability, which is hard, right? Because, you know, leaning into curiosity also means leaning into vulnerability.
Jen Lumanlan (:
you might be wrong, that you might have misconceived the situation, that your kid isn't isn't being deliberately annoying or is doing it for this reason that you have you believe they're doing it for, that there is another explanation for their behavior. And that it's and and you mentioned when you were talking about your your five year old child having the meltdown that whatever that thing was was really legitimate to them, even if to you it was tiny.
Insignificant. It might have just been they wanted to make a choice about something that was really meaningful to them that was that was not so important to you. And that when we can see that as valid, right? That that that desire for autonomy or connection, whatever it is, as just as valid as our own need. That's where we get out of this kind of top down relationship that I described in in my relationship with my father and both of my parents really, and into this just
kind of holistic relationship where both of our needs are being met.
Karen Conlon (:
Jen, in in those highly stressful moments, though, it it can be really difficult for parents to separate what their child needs versus what their own nervous systems are reacting to. So when there is parental conflict and specifically emotional dysregulation happening, what role does emotional dysregulation play for both children and
and parents alike when we're having these really highly stressful moments.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah. I mean it's th those moments are incredibly difficult in the relationship and we're never gonna prevent all of them, right? And and that's not our goal. That's not our goal. Conflict is going to be a part of any relationship we're in. And when we know how to repair effectively and apologize for our part in what happened, and not require an apology, but very often our kids will give an apology if if i if it's warranted and and they haven't been forced to do it, that can
can actually improve the relationship, right? It can it can build and strengthen the relationship because we know that we can have hard moments and we can come back from those moments. So so those moments are are going to happen, but they don't have to happen as often as they do right now, right? If you're if you're in a a relationship with a child and you're finding yourself triggered or flooded w triggered from the connection to past trauma, flooded if there hasn't been past trauma, but you're maybe haven't had enough sleep or
or food or whatever it is, and you just get overwhelmed in the moment. And so thinking about, you know, what what are the levers we can pull to make i in that situation. The biggest lever that we have to pull is that with kids and particularly young kids, these are not one off situations. If your kid is refusing to brush their teeth, it is not the tonight is not the first time that has happened. It has happened many, many, many times before this. And so focusing on it in that moment is
way, way, way too late. What we actually want to be doing is thinking about it outside of that moment and trying to think both ourselves and in a conversation with our child, why is toothbrushing really hard? And coming at it with this real sense of curiosity. And in our in our last conversation, you and I kind of did some pretty deep coaching on this and and understanding what are what your needs were and what your child's needs were in a in a situation related to sort of keeping a room tidy.
And essentially what we're doing here to kind of summarize that process is we're going in with a really open mind and not saying, Tell me why you won't brush your teeth, but I've noticed toothbrushing's been kind of hard lately. Can we talk about that? And accepting no as an answer. They may not want to talk about it and you cannot coerce someone into going into this conversation. And then what you're trying to do is understand each person's feelings in that situation.
Jen Lumanlan (:
And d depending on your kid, you you may be able to start with your feelings if you're the one who perceives the problem, right? I'm I I notice that I get really frustrated when I've asked you three times and I come into the bathroom and I see that you're still not brushing your teeth and you're playing with toothpaste or whatever it is. And sometimes I feel really overwhelmed and I I'd like to find a way for that not to be the case. What what's happening for you?
And then even if they don't tell you, right, we saw this very effectively when I coached you last time that you were able to put yourself in your child's shoes and really clearly understand what feelings they were having. Sometimes our kids are excited and curious about whatever they're playing with, they're enjoying it. And then that moment comes where we say you have to do this, and then they feel frustrated or anxious or overwhelmed or whatever it is. And then we can use those feelings as signposts to the needs.
So maybe my need in a toothbrushing situation is for ease, for collaboration with my child, for competence in parenting, because competent parents get the teeth brushed. And my child might have a need for autonomy, right? Where this was huge with my kid. We actually brushed her teeth in the living room for a solid six months because she wanted to decide where we brushed.
That was really important to her. And I'm like, as long as the teeth get brushed, I don't care. if there's a kid with sensory needs, you're gonna wanna address that. If they're uncomfortable for some reason, we're gonna want to address that. So what is underneath this is is the need that we're talking about. And then from there, what are the strategies that beat both of our needs? And and brushing in the living room is a prime example. Meets my all of my needs and meets her need for autonomy.
Winner winner a chicken dinner, right? We're up to the races. And so when we can work through that process in our own minds first and then with our child in a moment that's not as we're walking down the hallway to the bathroom, knowing the teeth are not being brushed, that is the fundamentally biggest lever that we can pull. Because then we're in a collaborative relationship with our child where both of our needs are being met.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah.
Jen Lumanlan (:
And then there are gonna be times when it does happen, you're caught unawares. And then a couple of things that you can try. A lot of parents in taming your triggers will keep a hair tie on one wrist, and as they notice the physical signs in their body, right? The tension in the shoulders, the chest, the throat, the head, the belly, they take that hair tie, they take it off one wrist and they put it on the other wrist, and that takes a couple of seconds. And that is long enough to remember to take a breath.
How do I want to approach the situation? Right. Is there a word or a phrase? Some parents like to use something like the relationship is the most important thing. It's more important than the teeth brushing than anything else. When I'm arriving in the situation from that place, I'm coming in and with a very different mindset and physical bearing, right, into that situation. and I'm much gonna be I'm gonna be much more able to access that curiosity in that moment.
Karen Conlon (:
When you talked about talking to your child during moments of non-stress, right? Or like moments that you're not having the thing happening is so important. And and it made me think about even therapy with adults. One of the things that I always share with clients is you're not likely to really get things to stick when you're in crisis, right? So we're gonna work on the thing. When you're in crisis, we're gonna
Help you get down. We're gonna get you start regulating better. And the time to stop talking is not when you're feeling better. That's actually the time when we want to start continuing the talk and really digging into what happened, what went on there, because that part of your brain, the prefrontal cortex, that rational part of your brain is online. And so we can we can now talk about what happened without you necessarily reacting. Of course, everything's different. There could be some PTSD, but we're talking about.
Not those situations. And so being able to have those conversations when you're not engaged in highly stressful or conflictual moments is so pivotal because again, that's when information will stick or is more likely to stick. The other thing, too, that I thought about was about the brushing teeth. because my kiddo also went through that. What I realized early on was that.
That it was time to go to bed. And so that the day was over. Yes. And so asking her a little bit more about, you know, I I why is it that you don't like to brush your teeth? I mean, do you not like the toothpaste? Do you not like whatever? And then as we started to talk a little bit more, she's like, Well, I was having fun. And she didn't want the fun to end, or she didn't want the day to end. And for other kids, it could be that they're scared of the dark or their gums are hurting, or they're about to move teeth, or they're growing teeth.
Just so many things that it can be that it's not really them necessarily wanting to give you a hard time.
Jen Lumanlan (:
No, no. And a very common one I see in bedtime stalling is they want connection with you. And that the bedtime routine signals that that that connection is gonna be severed because you're sleeping in that room and I'm sleeping in this room. When we can see that that refusal to brush teeth is a bid for connection, is it's actually about my my discomfort or whatever it is. You know, some some kids can respond to what you said and you tell tell me more about this.
sometimes the more indirect of tell me how you're feeling and let's draw the faces. Like let's let's draw this out on a piece of paper. Most kids, when you start drawing out what they're feeling and writing it down, are like, my parents really taking this seriously. This is really important. And then you work to the needs. And the important part about the needs is the strategies that you find are then actually going to quote unquote work, right? Parents will say, I've tried everything. You tried all the flavored tooth paste and it didn't quote unquote work.
Because you had not identified the need. When you identify what the actual need is, then you develop the strategies that meet the need. And then, right, that's when we feel that's when we feel really good. And we stop resisting, because we don't resist when our needs are met.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah. Yeah. It's so true. And the other thing that I see that I actually just thought about was with bedtime, y it's not always fun for parents. I mean, let's be real, right? Like we're tired and y it's like, okay, now I have to find the energy to tuck you in and I want some more. Okay, well, you know, and you're really you're really wanting to wind down and you know that th the night's not over because maybe there are dishes to be done. you know, it's just maybe you have work to do and you're waiting to put the kids down and so
realistically, it's not always a fun time for parents. It sometimes becomes part of this checklist. one of the things that I remember doing, especially while I was going through my master's program and she was little, and you know, of course my husband was there and always helpful, but she wanted mommy a lot of times, was I decided to tell stories. I was, you know, I was always a storyteller and a creative in that way. And so
I created a character named Penelope. And so I would bring in Penelope and she had a specific voice. And, you know, she my kid would look at me like, What what's going on here? And I just tell her, Well, you know, Penelope's coming now. So what I ended up doing was just kind of leaning into my creativity and just like
storytelling and made up this character and she knew it was a character. She knew I wasn't like losing my marbles, right? Like I told her this is Penelope. Do you want to do that? Do you want to play? And Penelope became part of our bedtime routine that she would have like a whole storyline with and like, you know, who she played with today. So at age four and five and six even, because it didn't last after that. But it was really cool to also hear how her
imagination would go to work. And also, Penelope would sometimes be shunned by the friends and what happened today. And Penelope, you know, some of her friends didn't want to play with her. And it was really interesting to hear my daughter say, Well, that's not nice. And they shouldn't have treated you like that. And it was a really interesting and fun time.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Really connecting, it sounds like.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah, and it changed the way that I also went about parenting because it was a highly stressful time during that time. You know, I was going to school full time, I was, you know, part time working, I was a mom with the wife, you know, like so many, so many rules. So I had to find a way. So just wanted to share that.
Jen Lumanlan (:
You're reminding me of stories I used to tell about squirrels that had fart powers. So yeah, so I and I think you've you've beautifully illustrated meeting a need for connection there, right? Which which really fills a kid's cup. And and the important thing I th I want parents who are listening to this to hear is connection for some kids is the special sauce, right? It is the thing that makes everything move along.
For other kids it's autonomy and you what you already said for other kids it's they're afraid of the dark or whatever it is. And so can can we find strategies that meet both of our needs? If your kid is afraid of the dark and doesn't want to go to sleep by themselves, is it possible you could listen to a podcast or listen to an audio from one of your master's lectures or whatever it is while you're kind of with them and rubbing them on the back or whatever it is? I so so looking for those kinds of really creative strategies to meet both people's needs.
And then of course the other piece of it is important and overlooked, right? Is that we we can often see the pressures we are under and you're listing out all the context that was leading up to this for you, right? And and a big part of our of our work as adults is saying, well, is there a like what flexibility is there there? Do I have to do all of these things? Could we just eat off paper plates this week? Could we just eat cereal and frozen pizza and would that be okay for this week?
Would that open up a little bit of capacity for me to be able to be with my kid in a way that's aligned with my values? Yeah. And then I think the second piece that's really important is because our kids are people too, things mount up for them as well. We tend to look at the toothbrushing and be like, that's the thing to fix, when actually it's, it's all the 15 times we said no today already. And
the hard time they're having with their sibling and they don't get on with their teacher at school and all these other things that mount up for them in just the same way that it does for us. And when we can see all of the pressures on them, we find more levers as well, right? Is there something we can work on with the teacher to improve their relationship?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Can we work with the sibling and and help understand what's going on there? And then your kid arrives at the toothbrushing moment with more capacity too. So I think that that sort of window of tolerance widening, as Dan Siegel would say, right, is a key part of our work for ourselves and also our work for our kids.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah. Jen, when parents begin understanding the real drivers under their reactions and their behaviors, and then they start acting on that, right? In other words, making some changes. What would you say or what have you seen changes relationally, both with their children and even amongst themselves if it's
Two parents, or if it's a solo parent with themselves, what are some of the things that you see or have seen changing when they start to understand the drivers?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah. It's pretty amazing, and it's why I keep doing this work. Because the learning happens in different ways, right? For some people, it's enough to just be able to trace that through line, just as we did with you, right? That this happened to me when I was a kid, and I see this happening in my relationship with my kid today. Whoop, light bulb, now I understand what it is, that n and now suddenly I feel less triggered by it.
That does happen to some people. It's on the less common side, I would say. The far more common way that this it this learning happens is we learn the idea conceptually and then we process it in community with others. So maybe we're in a workshop where other people are are learning this stuff too, right? I remember working with one parent who said,
you know, I her and she's given me permission to share the story. Her parent was an alcoholic. The the the the parent I was working with had a super, super difficult childhood. And she said, I saw these hundreds of other parents introducing themselves and all trying to do the best they could and and being triggered by their kids. And I suddenly realized that could have been my parent, right? That was my mom doing the best she could with the tools and resources and all the carrying all the trauma that she was carrying. And that
can produce healing in ways that you just don't expect, right? Who would think that introducing see looking at the introductions in a workshop would be something that that really kind of brings about that healing. Yeah. And then, you know, as you're working through understanding where this came from and and learning these different ways of being with our kids, we just find that that parents
have more capacity than they had before. They find more levers to pull that they hadn't even realized were levers before that could be pulled. And when you've got more choices, then you have more autonomy, right? You get to make decisions that that feel really meaningful in your life. And you can see it in your relationship with your kid. one of the the practices that I often advise parents to start with and and this is this is super, super important,
Jen Lumanlan (:
Is a special time practice with your child, which is 10 minutes of predictable, consistent daily time playing with your child. If they're young, it might be with you know dolls or Legos or whatever it is. If they're older, it could be connecting over whatever they're into at the moment, whatever hobby they have. And it it's the predictable, consistent daily that's really important. Because for kids, yeah, I'm gonna spend a whole hour with you today, and then I don't get it again for who knows how long.
I wanna wring every moment of connection that I can out of that hour. And I'm gonna protest like heck when it's over. When I know that I'm getting that 10 minutes every day, then I can trust that it's coming again. And then I don't protest when it's over. And you'd be shocked at how much you start to see the relationship with your kids improving just from that single simple practice alone.
Because they start to have more goodwill toward you. They start to be more willing to come toward you when you're having a hard time, when you have an issue that you're unwilling or unable to see another path forward on. and that gives you more capacity in the relationship as well. And overall, what we see is this kind of movement toward I don't feel triggered as often. There is this space that wasn't there before when my kid does this thing, and I realize this is not about me.
This is her having a hard time and I can be there for her and I can witness that, right? I'm actually channeling a specific parent who I've seen them on video and they they this is posted on my website. You can see the parent just kind of saying that there is so much space now in those moments than there was before. And then because our partners are people too with feelings and needs, the same tools work with them.
We can learn to understand what needs are they trying to meet when they do something that I find super irritating. And what needs do I have that aren't being met? And can I ask for help in getting those met? And so yeah, it's it's it's the antithesis of a top down relationship where we're all getting our needs met. And and you know, the big, big reason I do this work is because I want to live in a world where everybody's needs are seen as equally valid as everybody else's and and deserving of getting met.
Karen Conlon (:
Yeah. Yeah. And it's it's empathy, right? That's what I'm hearing also. all of these practices continue, at least in my mind, to point back to a creation of many things, but one of the biggest things is empathy. If you can look at your child with from the lens of empathy and say what what could it be that they need, you actually are
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yes. Correct. Yeah. I'm trying to understand you and now I'm gonna take an action based on the understanding.
Karen Conlon (:
Yes, exactly. And that's a great point. It's not just, you're you're feeling it and you're experiencing it internally. It's also then acting on it. And I think that one of the things that parents will also see is that by doing that actively, they are role modeling that curiosity and also that creation of empathy in their children. Yeah. So
You mentioned earlier on, Jen, that you have a number of resources. You offer the needs list and a master class on understanding triggers and problem solving with your kids for the parent that's listening right now and saying, Hey, I hear myself, or, you know, there's something about this that's really resonating with me. The resources that you have available, how can they use them and and apply them in everyday family life?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Mm. Yeah. Yeah. So couple of resources I think are probably most relevant. If you go to yourparentingmojo.com/quiz, we got a couple of quizzes there, both actually highly relevant to the conversation that we've had. One on identifying your child's most important need, because again, when you see that and you can meet that, then there's more capacity in the relationship and your needs get met too.
And there's another one on your anger and how that shows up in the relationship. And so those are both available for free and those can give you some kind of getting started information. And then there's a a short sort of self-led, self-directed masterclass to help you understand the the sources of the the triggered feelings and whether that comes up as yelling or shutdown or you know, fawning, where where we're doing anything we can to get the behavior to stop.
and that's called Why You're So A Angry With Your Child's Age Appropriate Behavior and What to Do About It And that's twenty seven dollars and we have a coupon code wealthy to get you ten bucks off that. So
Karen Conlon (:
There we go. Everybody wealthy will get you 10 bucks off. And and that's a great, that's a really great title, actually. Jen, I have one last question for you. And it's one that I always ask my guests at the end of our show. And that question for you is, how would you define emotional wealth?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Mm-hmm. I think it really points back to everything we've talked about in this conversation and understanding your own needs, which most of us didn't learn to do, right? I didn't learn to do because I had no role model for that. I've had to do it in midlife. Yeah. And also raise a child who understands their needs and
I so I guess in my mind emotional wealth is when you can do that, right? When you can see, I'm showing up in this moment with these needs and you're showing up in in this moment with these needs and know and just kind of have this trust that most of the time we can find ways to meet both of our needs. That to me is emotional wealth.
Karen Conlon (:
Jen, thank you so much. I would love to give people the opportunity to connect with you. You have so many resources on your website. It's a it's a really great website. It's one of the best ones that I have seen in terms of the availability and the generosity of resources. So I would love to have people connect with you. What are the best ways for people to check out your work and to be in touch?
Jen Lumanlan (:
Yeah. I mean going to the resources that I mentioned is probably the best way I'm on social media. I don't love social media, I have to say. It's not my forte. So so yeah, really the the best way to kind of get started in doing this work is to take one of those quizzes, yourparentingmojo.com forward slash quiz and
And just kinda g get some pointers toward, okay, yeah, this is my child's most important need. I can see its connection. I can see its autonomy. Just it and it'll take you like five minutes to to be able to understand this. And then we'll send you a PDF that has for whatever their top need is, you'll get and and also the other ones as well, so you don't have to go through the quiz multiple times. but you'll start to see what are some strategies I can use that can meet that need that actually fit into my life and and are really doable. So
So I would say that's ultimately probably the best place to start. And then if you're you're hearing, yeah, I I really feel triggered a lot by my child's behavior and I don't like it and I don't want my relationship with them to be defined by this, maybe in a way that my relationship with my parents was defined by their triggers, then taking that next step and understanding where those come from with the with the self led masterclass, I think is is a great place to go.
Karen Conlon (:
Amazing. And we will have all that information in the show notes. Jen, thank you so much for being here today. I feel like in this hour, we have gotten a lifetime of education and at least three to four ways of starting a new path, a new relationship, a new way of relating with yourself, of understanding yourself, and also of understanding and relating to your children and even to your partners.
So thank you so much for your generosity. And I'm so glad that you're doing this work. It does and will change the world. So thank you, Jen.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Thanks for having me, Karen. It's a real pleasure.
Karen Conlon (:
And thank you all for listening to Emotionally Wealthy. If this episode gave you insight, clarity, or a perspective that you needed today, please share it with someone who might need to hear it. And if you're enjoying the show, please leave a review. It does help people find this conversation. And until next time, stay curious, stay connected, and stay emotionally wealthy. I'll see you next time. hey.
Quick reminder for you that this podcast is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional advice, diagnoses, or treatment. Always consult a qualified professional with any questions you might have.
Jen Lumanlan (:
Thanks to our friends at Buzzspear for helping with post-production and distribution.
