401. Q&A: What should I do when my toddler hits or pulls my hair?

Dr. Sarah Bren (00:02):

Ever wonder what psychologists moms talk about when we get together, whether we’re consulting one another about a challenging case or one of our own kids, or just leaning on each other when parenting feels hard, because trust me, even when we do this for a living, it’s still hard. Joining me each week in these special Thursday shows are two of my closest friends, both moms, both psychologists, they’re the people I call when I need a sounding board. These are our unfiltered answers to your parenting questions. We’re letting you in on the conversations the three of us usually have behind closed doors. This is Securely Attached: Beyond the Sessions.

(00:43):

Hello. Welcome back to the Securely Attached Podcast. We are going to answer a listener question on the Beyond the Session segment. And I’ve got Dr. Rebecca Hershberg here and she’s going to weigh in. Thanks for coming.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (00:59):

My pleasure, as always.

Dr. Sarah Bren (01:01):

So this parent wrote in, I’m really feeling for her because I have very much … I feel like this is very relatable internal experience that she writes about. She says, “I’ve been having a very difficult issue with my toddler who’s three years old and it’s been happening since he was younger. It usually happens around sleep where sometimes he can’t sleep at night or during the day. He starts hitting me and pulling my hair. This also happens when he’s very tired, like when he doesn’t have his daily nap, and I try to enforce a limit of some sort, like turning off the TV after we made an agreement to do so. I believe it’s because his emotional and mental resources are depleted and maybe we didn’t succeed in giving him suitable tools for regulating himself, and it’s very hard to co-regulate in those moments because I am very much triggered by this. And I feel so out of control that I can’t help but feel either very much hurt, sometimes also physically from all of the pulling, or I feel very guilty for not being able to help my child regulate and get his need met. I honestly feel powerless in dealing with the situation in the right way. I would love to get some advice as to how I should handle this in a way that helps him develop the tools he needs to regulate in the future. My heart wants to hug this mom so hard.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (02:16):

I was about to say this message makes me want to cry because of how much we’re failing.

Dr. Sarah Bren (02:22):

We’re failing.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (02:23):

We’re failing moms. We’re failing as a country. I won’t … Don’t worry, go into the details on that right now. I know you don’t want me to. But I mean, the fact that this mom who is doing so many things right is feeling like she’s failing in some way because her three year old is pulling her hair and she’s getting triggered. So she feels either like she hasn’t taught him … It’s game over, he’s three, and so I’ve already messed up teaching him things or I’m just so guilty for getting triggered. I just want to cry and I will get to answering the question, but I have a hard time believing that in countries where there’s not this parenting industrial complex, that this is where … Someone is profiting off of this mom’s feeling like there’s a failing on some part. And I’m so glad she can write you to us for free. And I just want to shout from the rooftops. You don’t have to feel this way. You are a wonderful mom. You are aware of your toddler’s regulation tools. You are aware of your own triggers. You are aware that getting your hair pulled is not fun and that it’s not necessarily your toddler’s fault.

Dr. Sarah Bren (03:37):

And you’re still, despite of all of that, holding limits, you aren’t giving up. You aren’t abdicating the things that are your job.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (03:46):

It’s like you’re crushing it. And I get so angry at the people that are profiting from continuing to make moms, women, whatever, feel like if they only do more … I just …

Dr. Sarah Bren (04:02):

I mean, amen. And I’ll take it. I just want to even take a moment to just name at least three points in this question where my heart broke a little and I was like, “Ooh, yeah, we are not doing right by these parents if this is what they’re hearing.” There’s one moment where she’s saying, she’s having a thought. She’s noticing a lot of her cognitions, which I think is really, really phenomenal here. One, so also kudos to you there, that self-awareness and that reflective functioning is high, but I think the narrative and the conclusions that are being drawn is where I would say, let’s take a little bit of a time to just tease this apart. One, she’s saying maybe we didn’t succeed in giving him suitable tools for regulating himself because it’s hard to co-regulate in these moments. I’m also really triggered by this. If he’s three, and I’m not saying this, you’re not getting this wrong. You’ve internalized a story someone has been telling you, and a lot of people probably also have, that by three, a kid should be able to regulate themselves regularly. And if they don’t, we did not succeed. That right there is a myth that I want us to pin it so we can go back and just debunk that a little bit and give some developmentally appropriate kind of context for why what you’re seeing is actually developmentally pretty on par.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (05:27):

And I would even back up to that sentence because it starts, “I believe it’s because his emotional and mental resources are depleted.” I’m not particularly great at regulating when my mental and emotional resources are depleted. It’s not because I don’t have the tools. It’s not because someone failed me. It’s because that’s the whole point of having our mental and emotional…

Dr. Sarah Bren (05:48):

Right. That’s the gas that allows you to have access to your breaks. And so if you think about it, and so maybe I’ll identify the thing and then we can just debunk it right here and then I’ll go down the list. But let’s just start with that. If a child is going to be able to successfully regulate, at three, probably is going to require some level of external co-regulation, which again, if you’re triggered, you won’t be able to do, and that’s not being a failed parent, that’s being a human being. So order of operations, we’re going to have to rewind the tape and figure out how to give parent more resources or understand sometimes I’m just going to be triggered and I won’t be able to co-regulate and my kid’s going to be a hot mess and I’m going to be a hot mess and we’re just going to be hot messes together and no one’s failing because that’s definitely going to happen. But yes, if a child is going to regulate, let’s say they have some tools for them to be able to access and use those tools effectively, they have to have cognitive, physical and emotional energy in their gas tanks and you’re describing a child who has kind of depleted those gas tanks. So if their emotional and cognitive resources and probably physical resources are depleted, then we would never expect someone to be able to hit the brakes or regulate, right?Because there isn’t anything to drive that.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (07:19):

Whether they’re 3 or 33.

Dr. Sarah Bren (07:21):

And they’re three, right? The developmental piece, of course, is very important. At three, this is just par for the course.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (07:27):

3 or 33 that’s the whole point is that if you are depleted, even if you have skills, you’re not able to access them.

Dr. Sarah Bren (07:36):

Right. Well, at three, it’s maybe you don’t even have the skills. I’m 40, and if I don’t have emotional and mental and physical resources at my disposal, I will not be able to regulate myself. I’m a raging B when I’m really hangry and super tired and have worked all day. I have regulation skills, lots of them. But if I don’t have any gas in my tank, I’m not the most regulated person, at least not reliably, and certainly not when I get hit with something I have to really work to regulate for. So one, a three year old might not even have that many tools. They might really struggle with accessing them, what little ones they have, but also if their resources are low, like God bless you, it’s going to be a mess. And again, I think to this parent’s specific point about hitting you and pulling your hair, and we could speak a little to maybe how we can get out of that loop because sometimes that can become like a recurring kind of, “Ooh, you had big reaction.” What happens if I do it again?

(08:52):

Ooh, now it’s not I’m mad and I’m just grasping at straws, a. K.a. Your hair and whatever gets in my way I’m going to grab. But now it’s like, now I’ve actually kind of figured out the secondary thing that like is going to get you to have a reaction and I kind of almost compulsively have to keep going there. That’s a sort of a separate thing, but I think it can come when we’re highly activated by something. So we could talk a little bit about how to get out of that dance a bit, but I still want to go back to this, just I want to reset some of the expectations this parent’s putting on herself because the other thing that she said that I think is really important, she feels hurt and that’s really normal. If your kid is hitting you and pulling your hair, it physically and emotionally hurts.

(09:50):

And if we’re in a sort of this dance because of other stuff going on, that could be really emotionally painful. And so I just want to normalize that, but the guilty for not being able to help your child regulate and get his need met is also, I think, very much a product of expecting yourself to have been able to. And I think we sort of discussed why it wouldn’t make sense for you to reliably be able to do that. And so hopefully that can help reduce the feelings of guilt because it’s like, “Oh, I’m not supposed to be able to do that. I’m not supposed to be able to have gotten my three year old to reliably be able to self-regulate and not hit.”

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (10:36):

Right. And I think the other thing I just want to say about the last sentence is when she says, “I’m just looking, I would love to get some advice as to how I should handle this in a way that helps him develop the tools he needs to regulate in the future.” To me, the whole nature of this question changes and improves if we just split that into two sentences, right? So I would love to get some advice as to how I should handle this, period. And then potentially I would love to get some advice as to how to help him develop the tools he needs to regulate in the future, right?

(11:07):

Because she’s linking it, that the way that she handles this particular situation when she’s exhausted and he’s exhausted, is going to be the thing that teaches him the tools. And that’s what we talk about all the time is that the timing is so important. No. What’s most important in this scenario, it sounds like to me is that she creates a boundary that he’s not going to love, but that, for example, she stands up. Her hair needs to be out of his reach. She puts her hair up and stand … She doesn’t need to stay with him right on top of him while he pulls his hair. To me, that’s the most logical consequence in the world, and it has nothing to do with attributing any intentionality to him. It’s just, “Nope, that hurts.”

Dr. Sarah Bren (11:46):

I’m not going to let you pull my hair. Yeah, you’re really upset.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (11:49):

I get it. I’m going to stand up. “Oh, you’re hitting me. Okay. I’m going to walk over here.” Put the boundary there. And then as we’ve talked about, and maybe you can link to other episodes that I don’t know what they are right now. I know we’ve talked a lot about the idea that we’re teaching self-regulation tools all the time by what we model in moments of calm, what we talk about, what we practice, what we point out. We are building our kids’ resources. And I can tell just from the way this parent is talking that this is happening in their home outside of this moment, again, and that goes back to the fallacy that the fact that the kid is acting like this means she’s failed in that way. I’m sure she’s successful and I’m sure he’s regulating in 20 other different situations that are age appropriate for three year olds to regulate in. This isn’t one of them, set a boundary so that you yourself can stay more regulated and certainly not be in physical pain and then move on.

Dr. Sarah Bren (12:45):

Yeah. And I think, listen, this mom is saying that she understands she gets a little triggered by this. So I also think, let’s talk a little bit about unpacking triggers when our kids are having really big emotional reactions, whether it’s they’re just really emotionally dysregulated or even now they’re aggressive or behaviorally dysregulated as a result of being emotionally dysregulated, like they’re hitting or they’re kicking or they’re … These are really triggering for parents. And I want to just acknowledge that it, again, it’s very human to be activated by this, but when you are activated by something, one thing that is really helpful is not in the heat of the moment, but just zooming out in a moment when you’re calm and alone and reflecting and trying to just get a little bit of visibility on like, “Okay, what is it about this behavior that activates me so much?

(13:38):

Is it that I’m very sensory sensitive and it hurts and I get flooded and it’s very overwhelming to me to have myself…” That’s more, I would say my … I fall in that camp. I don’t get as triggered by my kids’ aggressive behavior because I’ve internalized a narrative that, “Oh my God, this means they’re going to hit and they’re never going to stop hitting and they’re going to be violent.” I don’t catastrophize like that because I think that got a good read on what’s developmentally appropriate and typical for little kids and even older kids. What I get triggered by, because I also get triggered by my kids doing things like that, is that I get overstimulated, I get flooded and I just can’t handle it and I like go into fight or flight and then I lose it. So one is trying to figure out what are you getting triggered by?

(14:38):

Is it that it’s physiologically overwhelming to you and it’s moving you to just like overwhelm and you’re getting hot and sweaty and like agitated and that’s what’s putting you in fight or flight? Or is it that you are attributing a particular meaning to this behavior that scares you or that makes you very angry or that makes you feel guilty, panicked what … There’s a lot of different things we might be telling ourselves, I’m failing as a parent or everyone’s judging me or, “Oh my God, this is going to be, my kid is never going to be able to succeed in life because they’re going to be an aggressive sociopath who…” Our thoughts are going to be very powerful in solidifying us getting triggered. And so if we can understand and identify those thoughts, because it depends on what the thoughts are is going to be a little bit of the determinant on what you need to kind of then do to reframe and check the facts and say like, “Oh, well, is this developmentally appropriate?” Yes, it is.

(15:50):

“Is this a sign that they don’t respect my authority?” And maybe I have to kind of take a little look at like, “Well, what did I define as how I feel like my authority is honored in this family? Am I comfortable with the fact that my kid is going to explode at me and can still respect my authority? Can I hold those two things at the same time?” But I think the other really important piece is to say, “My child is allowed to be really mad at me or really upset and I could still set a limit and I don’t actually need to solve for the rage that they’re sharing with me. ” If I say, like she was saying, she will enforce a limit on turning off the TV and their big, big, big feeling about that. Again, if they’re hitting you, we have to kind of set a physical boundary, I’m not going to let you do that, but we also just don’t have to solve for their being upset because actually tolerating our kids distress and rage and anger at us for holding a limit or just that tolerating that our kids are going to get really ragey when they’re really tired or hungry or just don’t have any resources to like manage the world.

(17:10):

It doesn’t feel as personal and we don’t feel like we’re failing because it’s not our responsibility to make them happy all the time. It’s just our responsibility to like keep them safe and hold boundaries that help the whole family move through the day. So I also think we could take some pressure off ourselves to say like, “My job is to hold the limit and then kind of welcome the feelings.” And I didn’t fail if the feelings are big and messy and if they move into like dangerous behaviors or like harmful behaviors, I’m going to help contain it, but I’m not going to worry about turning off the feelings and making them satisfied with my holding of the limit. I’m just going to hold the limit and say, “Ugh, I can understand you’re mad. You’re really mad. Ooh, I’m going to move a little bit back because I’m not going to let you kick me.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (18:02):

” Yeah. And the only other thing I would add, and I think about that all the time, right? It’s your job to set the limit and it’s your child’s job to have feelings about it. And just because your child is having feelings about it doesn’t mean you’ve set the wrong limit and just because you’ve set a limit doesn’t mean your child doesn’t get to have feelings about it. And the only other thing I’d add, I think you explained that beautifully in so many ways. I would just add, reading it again, that there may be a way to address some of this with regard to helping your toddler sleep. I always, when I work with families, the very first thing I ask about is sleep and sleep habits and sleep patterns. And so the fact that you’re mentioning that the listener is mentioning that sometimes he can’t sleep and this happens when he’s tired, but taking a look at kind of the sleep schedule and the sleep environment and all those things and just seeing if there’s anything we can do to potentially improve that side of things.

(18:55):

Again, not because you’re doing anything wrong, not because this doesn’t happen all the time, but simply because in your question, you talk about sleep and when we talk about behavior, I always pause the conversation and ask about sleep because they are so linked. And so if this is just a normal phase and daylight savings and whatever, their sleep issues, then so be it. But if there’s a way to potentially shift schedules or look at naps or whatever it is, that’s always something that I recommend.

Dr. Sarah Bren (19:26):

Yes. I’m so glad you brought that up because I think we’ve been talking really a lot about like the internal work we have to do and in the moment work we have to do, but she actually, before she beat herself up a little bit on her assessment of things, she actually very accurately named what’s causing it, which is, “I believe it’s because his emotional and mental resources are depleted.”

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (19:55):

Right. And then this often happens around sleep when he can’t regulate.

Dr. Sarah Bren (19:58):

And if the gas and the tank is low, you’re right, he’s going to have a lot of trouble regulating and all this stuff, but so then we could also go, we can go back and say like, “Okay, well, what’s causing the tanks to be so low? Is it because it’s the end of the day and tanks are just low?” Is it because he had a crummy night of sleep the night before? Or is it, “Oh, we actually have a sleep thing we got to work on. ” Or, “Oh, you know what? He’s not eating enough or he’s been inside all day and needs to move…” I think sleep is probably number one, the single most important thing I check in on, just like you said, and there’s five others that I think I run down the list, like the fundamentals, sleep, nutrition, hydration, movement, I think fresh air and sunshine and connection. And if any of those things aren’t like wanting kind of a full cylinder, whatever that phrase is, then I’d start there because it might be that all the behavioral interventions that you could possibly work on won’t be needed because the regulation part will kind of write itself if we actually get the fundamentals righted.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (21:31):

Yeah. I just want to caveat that just knowing who this parent is and how they tend to lean, there’s no way you’re necessarily hitting all six of those every day.

Dr. Sarah Bren (21:41):

Yeah. No, it’s not like you must have all six of these things. Please have a checklist at all times and do not leave the house without your clipboard and make sure you get every … It’s more like those are the questions. It’s like, if I want to look under the hood, those are the places I might check. Could there be something here? It doesn’t mean that every child needs 100% of those things at all times or you are failing. Please don’t hear that. It’s more like, to your point, like when I meet with a family, there’s certain questions I’m always going to ask. Those are some of the things I’ll always check in on to see like, hmm …

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (22:20):

And it’s usually in the course of a week, right? There’s going to be one day your kid didn’t really eat and there’s going to be one day it was pouring rain and they watched TV all day and there was going to be…

Dr. Sarah Bren (22:28):

Yes.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (22:29):

So it’s again, it’s on balance.

Dr. Sarah Bren (22:31):

In the aggregate. Always say, parenting happens in the aggregate. All these things are in the aggregate, but also could help us diagnose the it that we need to focus on to reduce the friction. And also to the mom who wrote this question, but also anybody else who’s listening that has like asked this question or said these things to themselves before, I really just … Can we just take a moment and like, can you just sit and put a hand on your chest and like thank yourself for being such an incredible person who cares this much about your child and is working so hard because my guess is that might also not be happening enough and like the gratitude directed inward, that is so important. So please do that for just a moment and then do that every single day for the rest of your life, please.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (23:38):

Cheers to that.

Dr. Sarah Bren (23:39):

Yeah. You’re doing a good job.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (23:42):

100%.

Dr. Sarah Bren (23:43):

You are doing a good job, Rebecca.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (23:45):

Thanks, Sarah. Right back at you.

Dr. Sarah Bren (23:47):

Thank you. All right. I’ll see you soon.

Dr. Rebecca Hershberg (23:52):

Sounds great.

Dr. Sarah Bren (23:54):

Thank you so much for listening. As you can hear, parenting is not one size fits all. It’s nuanced and it’s complicated. So I really hope that this series where we’re answering your questions really helps you to cut through some of the noise and find out what works best for you and your unique child. If you have a burning parenting question, something you’re struggling to navigate or a topic you really want us to shed light on or share research about, we want to know, go to drsarahbren.com/question to send in anything that you want, Rebecca, Emily, and me to answer in Securely Attached: Beyond the Sessions. That’s drsarahbren.com/question. And check back for a brand new securely attached next Tuesday. And until then, don’t be a stranger.