Phase 1: See It Differently: Asking Before Deciding
My daughter wakes up around 5am most mornings, before anyone else in the house is up. So by the time I get downstairs, she's usually already there, waiting for a hug.
This particular morning, my arms were full with coffee, my laptop bag, and some random clothes hangers. I remember her looking excited to see me and reaching for a hug despite my hands being visibly full. I quickly unloaded my arms, but the moment passed without me giving her a hug. I was preoccupied and stressed. Already feeling behind and the day hadn’t even started yet.
Then I saw the dog crate was open and our dog wasn’t in there. So then I checked the area he usually has an accident, and sure enough, there was pee all over the floors. We had recently started to crate him since he was having more potty accidents.
I didn't think it through. I didn’t stop to pause and assess the situation. I yelled up the stairs, “You didn’t crate Tino and he had an accident!” He called back, confused, “Yes, I did.” And that's when I heard my daughter's voice, small, tears in her eyes, "It was me. I let him out."
I wish I could tell you I slowed down, offered emotional support and thanked her for taking accountability (the way I'd coach someone else to). I didn't, though.
I said something like "Oh well, let's clean it up," and got straight to business. “Grab the paper towels,” and I grabbed the disinfectant spray. She helped me clean up her own mistake in near silence.
We went upstairs to do hair. She came in wrapped in a blanket, slow, quiet, hadn't brushed her teeth, and barely spoke. When I called her sister in for her turn, my daughter disappeared into her room instead, rather than let her sister see her like that. Again, I didn’t really stop to offer emotional support. I honestly didn’t have the patience for all of that.
By the time I was leaving for work, she came back down, still in the blanket, crying too hard for me to understand her. It took me a minute to realize what she was actually asking for. A hug. I gave it to her. She asked to come to work with me. Of course, she couldn’t. As I pulled out of our driveway, I couldn’t help but notice how “off” our morning was. It continued to feel that way for the rest of the day.
That morning, shortly after all of this happened, my husband said something that has stuck with me: “You wouldn't have used that tone with her, if you’d known up front it was her.” Oop.
I sat with that. Underneath it, I found this: I had already decided what happened before I knew what happened. In my head, a grown adult had carelessly forgotten a simple task, again. That story made me feel annoyed and then I got loud.
That wasn't the real (or complete) story. Our dog was probably clawing to get out. My daughter came downstairs into a routine that's still new. I usually take him out first thing, but I'd slept in, so she couldn't ask me. She did the only thing she knew to do. When I step back to look at the situation from her point of view, she was just trying to help.
Then I started to build a second story about what all that crying turned to silence and blanket-hiding meant. I interpreted that to mean she felt blamed and ashamed.
All day long I thought about her morning and planned to check in with her about it after school. I gave her the biggest hug and said, “We had a hard morning, huh? What was that like for you?”
“Oh, I was just tired. I woke up at 3am and couldn’t go back to sleep!” I couldn’t believe my ears. Here I was feeling so guilty for my actions and she had let it go. She had interpreted it as exhaustion.
I had made two interpretations that morning, both of them being wrong. In the moment, they seemed reasonable enough that I never thought to check them until I actually asked.
I didn't get this morning wrong once. I got it wrong twice, in two different directions, and I only found out because I stopped assuming and started asking.
That’s what we’re going to talk about today. Phase 1 of my 4-Phase Series is not about staying calm, but asking before you decide.
After this issue, you'll know:
- What it actually means when we say behavior is communication, and why that applies to you just as much as your child
- The trap that keeps loving, reflective parents feeling like they're never calm "enough," and how to get out of it
- Why awareness, not calm, is the actual key to everything in this series
- What the next 30 days looks like, phase by phase, and what "better" really means at the end of it
