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Transcript of Episode 2:

Is that Normal? The bumpy trail of healthy development

 

[00:00:00] Kimberly Bell: Are you interested in knowing your young child in a whole new way? Understanding what’s really going on in their developing mind? Does your child say or do things that make you stop and wonder, where did that come from? Well, stick around because this podcast is designed for you. Hello friends and welcome listeners.

I’m Dr. Kimberly Bell, the clinical director at the Hanna Perkins Center for Child Development in Cleveland, Ohio. And this is the Hidden Language of Children, a podcast dedicated to understanding the children we love and helping them grow. We created this podcast to help parents and caregivers understand the inner life of children, the constant churning of feelings and emotions that goes on inside of us.

This is the work Hanna Perkins has been doing with children and families since 1951. We help kids become the boss of themselves. We want to share it with you because our approach to understanding children reduces conflict and makes life better for everyone. Today, I’m welcoming Deborah Paris, a [00:01:00] child psychoanalyst and social worker in Cleveland, Ohio.

Debby works with children, families, and also adults, many of whom find their way to her because of issues they’ve had since childhood. Welcome, Debby. Happy to be here. So today, Debby and I are going to be talking about the way that we think about normal development at Hanna Perkins. And it’s a very broad subject.

We won’t be able to cover absolutely everything But we want people to basically understand the movement from this very dependent infant to a fully functioning human being that’s out in the world doing the very best they can. That’s just a small topic, right,

[00:01:43] Debby Paris: Debby? I think we can cover it in a few minutes.

[00:01:49] Kimberly Bell: So can we talk just in general first about this idea of going from dependence to independence, and what are some of the stages in between?

[00:01:58] Debby Paris: Well, I think it’s important [00:02:00] to think about it in stages because it is a progression. It doesn’t happen in a day. It doesn’t happen overnight. And often as parents, we don’t always see the different steps.

We can just feel them over a long period of time. But we have different stages in growing up that we look at that are helping the child master certain things in terms of being more independent, not totally independent immediately. So we talk about eating, or we talk about bodily independence around cleanliness, or we talk about figuring out where we fit in the family, and we always talk about the gradual separation from the total unit of caretaker and child, to the child becoming gradually more and more autonomous.

Does that make sense, Kim?

[00:02:46] Kimberly Bell: It does. And so, why do you think it’s important to break it down into those different things? Why do we talk about eating specifically or toilet mastery specifically or socialization specifically?

[00:02:59] Debby Paris: [00:03:00] There are a lot of different answers to that, but one of the things is that children are very much growing through their bodies.

They start with how their body is taken care of by the caretaker. They’re talking, they’re feeling eating, they’re feeling things about being taken care of, cuddly and skin. And then they’re talking, uh, then, then they’re having different feelings as their bodies change, as their muscles get stronger, as they’re able to stand.

And then the world looks like a totally different place. And all of a sudden, they’re They’re not just the unit with the caretaker, they can go away from the caretaker and come back. And then there’s the different feelings they have about who they love and how much they love that goes into the relationship piece of it.

So the different stages are just a way of formulating what you were talking about, Kim, the gradual growth from total dependence to being autonomous and feeling good in the world on their own and being able to take care of themselves. And we often talk about [00:04:00] this in lots of different languages, but some of it is the development of self.

And the self is a gradually evolving thing over the first number of years until, really, school age. And then there’s different elements of development of self, but those early stages are about self.

[00:04:18] Kimberly Bell: So, at Hanna Perkins, one of our, um, sort of standing phrases is “Doing for, doing with, standing by to admire, and independence.”

And talk a little bit about each of those sort of stages and, and what they … what they look like.

[00:04:35] Debby Paris: Well, the funny thing is that we’re talking about the stages for the child, but we’re also talking about stages for the parents and for the caretakers. Because as a caretaker, at first you’re doing something totally for a child that can’t do anything for themselves.

They can’t feed themselves. They can’t change their diapers. They can’t, they can’t soothe themselves originally at the beginning of their lives when they’re uncomfortable. Um, so we’re doing for them, [00:05:00] then we’re helping them learn to do some things for themselves. Maybe be able to feed themselves, maybe being able to feel things in their body and know when they need to do something to keep it clean.

And then we’re talking about their ability to move away from us. So we are helping them by going along the path with them. Towards the path where they can do it themselves, and then we, as the caretakers, stand back and can admire that they are able to do it on one hand, and also for them to know that we’re not disappearing just because they can do things on their own.

So it’s a progression in the relationship, both the caregiver and the child is what we were describing in that language.

[00:05:46] Kimberly Bell: So there’s two, I think there’s two really interesting pieces of that, that I think it’s important that parents understand the normality of. The first one … um, I’ll give them to you one at a time.

The first one is that [00:06:00] “standing by to admire phase” and why it’s so important because in the morning we can be so busy, right? And it’s like, “Oh good, you’ve learned to tie your shoes. Now I’m off to do something else and now why haven’t you gotten your shoes tied? You know how to tie your shoes.” And that’s usually indicative of a child being in that standing by to admire phase So can you talk a little bit about what’s happening in the child’s mind around that particular need?

[00:06:26] Debby Paris: Well, I think one of the things you’re referring to in this example is the need for things to be gradual rather than abrupt, and the things to keep the relationships surrounding the tasks that the child is mastering. So a kid may be able to tie their own shoes, but they might still need mom’s dad’s ‘caregivers support and connection around their developing task. And I think one of the hard things in our culture, and I think the hard things for caregivers is recognizing how [00:07:00] gradual things are as they emerge and that we have to let things emerge rather than make them happen. And it’s a fooler because kids can be very able to do things, and then refuse to do them. But the refusal to do them is part of the process of the mastery. It isn’t the sign of a problem in general. In general, that’s just part of normal development.

[00:07:25] Kimberly Bell: The second thing that I think is really important there is that that movement from dependency to functioning adult, not only will NOT be conflict free, but in our way of thinking MUST include frustration and conflict.

Can you speak to that a little bit?

[00:07:47] Debby Paris: I think that’s one of the most important things in trying to understand what’s normal in development. If the idea that normal development is, if you do everything right, there’ll be no conflict, it misses everything about what’s going on inside the [00:08:00] child. Because the child has all kinds of conflicts inside that actually promote growth.

The yes-no; the being big-being little, the wanting to be clean-wanting to be dirty… many different kinds of conflicts that are actually part of the emerging mastery. And so if you try to eliminate all conflict, it actually deprives the child of a chance to master something in a progressive way. So what we do is we try to understand that the is having a two way feeling, is having a yes, no feeling.

And we often just put language to it, but we understand that that’s healthy, not a sign of a problem when there is something going back and forth inside the child.

[00:08:43] Kimberly Bell: Mm hmm. I like that idea of like back and forth. In grownup language, we call that ambivalence. In Hanna Perkins language, we call that two-way feelings, and in a developmental sense, we talk about it as for every push forward inside of a [00:09:00] human being, there’s a pull backwards to an

earlier

[00:09:05] Kimberly Bell: way of relating to the world that seems easier at the time.

[00:09:10] Debby Paris: And I think what you’re referring to is, uh, is so important because if you think that development is just a… you know, a single movement forward, you’re setting yourself up for a lot of surprises because development is forward, back, forward, back. But it’s not going all the way back. There’s a purpose in a kid going back before they move forward.

It’s sort of a part of reorganizing how they are living in the world. That’s very normal and very healthy. It just can be a surprise sometimes to the parent who says, “You know how to tie your shoe. Why are you not tying your shoe,” right? “You know how to put your products in the potty. Why are you not putting the products in the potty?”

But it’s often a child working through that forward motion with not wanting always to lose the earlier motion, but [00:10:00] also the conflict of being big and being little, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:10:05] Kimberly Bell: Because being big means a separation from mom or from dad or caregiver, you know, primary person and being, and so the bigness of mastering this skill can bring about the anxiety of the loss of the caretaker and in the parent as well: That feeling of, “I want my baby to thrive and grow, but then I miss the baby times.”

[00:10:33] Debby Paris: Which is really why we always talk about gradual development as being normal. Because …let’s take separation. The child is totally a unit with mom and dad or caregiver at the beginning, and there’s a gradual separation, not only physically, but mentally, that they’re a separate person, that can do different things, and can, move away, literally walk away from a [00:11:00] parent. But is the parent still there and going back? All kinds of back and forth things. And I think that, um, the gradual idea that children need to have a solid base from which to grow and to move away from and move back to, is really a helpful thing to know and is very normal. And that for parents, there’s always a little bit of a feeling of loss as their child masters the next step.

Um, where did, where did my baby go? And I think the classic example is when a child starts school, and they are able to have an experience away from mom and dad or caregiver that maybe not everybody is so aware of at the moment and it’s a, a double feeling of this is big and this is a big movement, but it is all normal.

But that is why we keep talking about gradual rather than

[00:11:53] Kimberly Bell: abrupt. Well, and I, I think one of the reasons why it’s important for us to do this particular episode on [00:12:00] what we consider to be normal development is because there’s so much pressure on parents, I think, today, and on kids, to give your child everything.

Enough resources, enough after school classes, enough of this, enough of that, enough of this, enough of that. And, then this spotlight on, well, if they aren’t doing, um, if they aren’t mastering the toilet work, let’s talk about toilets specifically, because I think it’s a great example, but if they’re not mastering that, um, as quickly as the kid down the road, is there a problem?

And I think sometimes we over pathologize. And so I think for us, it’s important to get the message out there of, you know, I’ll say it from — this is the hill I will die on — imperfect parenting, that it’s about being good enough. A parent is going to feel happy and sad at the same time about their child progressing, um, [00:13:00] and is going to worry and the child is going to feel happy and sad about progressing to the next developmental phase.

But that all of that churning is normal and helps us develop what in the end is frustration tolerance. I think. Would you call it something else? Yes.

[00:13:15] Debby Paris: No, I think frustration tolerance, being able to manage the frustration, is one of the big progressive steps of growing up, but I want to go back to what you were talking about from the parent point of another child accomplishing something before your child accomplishes something — accomplished being a wide range.

And I think Kim, you and I talk about all the time about what a wide range of normal there is. There isn’t just, you know, if they haven’t met this benchmark on this date, your child is behind. That is not how development goes. But when you’re the parent and you’re hearing about other children, you always think, “Am I doing something wrong? Is there something wrong with my child?”

So we want to emphasize that not only is there a wide range of normal, there’s a [00:14:00] wide timetable. And there’s also a variation among children. Not all children are exactly the same. So that’s why it’s not a recipe or a cookbook for how you raise your child.

It’s a mutuality of getting to know your child and helping them at their pace move forward to master a task rather than to make them perform. We are really talking about mastery. And when you look at it from a mastery standpoint, the relationship between the parent or the caregiver and the child is the way it happens because you know your own child.

You know where they are and when it’s ready. And if you apply somebody else’s timetable, it makes for a problem and more frustration and maybe a problem with being able to tolerate the frustration. So I’ll just emphasize again: Normality is a very big range and a big topic and there are lots of ways that it works.

[00:14:57] Kimberly Bell: So, since we’re talking about the word mastery, that’s a Hanna [00:15:00] Perkins word that we use all the time. We prefer this idea of mastery to the word learning or skill development. We just like that because the word mastery for us means that something is integrated deeply, not just in the task itself, but that it’s had an impact on the developing personality or self, as you said.

So that’s a very big kind of technical way that we speak about it, but it brings us back to let’s, let’s talk specifically about an example. So let’s talk about toilet mastery, because we call it mastery, not training, right? Not toilet training, because we think about that as being part of the whole body, the whole body.

So talk about the phases of that particular thing.

[00:15:47] Debby Paris: Well, and I, let’s talk about what we mean by it when we’re talking about toilet mastery, we’re not just talking about where do the body products go, right? That is not really the point of [00:16:00] it, though that is what everybody is looking at. What we’re really looking at is a child’s ability inside to recognize when they have to go, to have the back and forth feelings about, I want to be the baby where it goes in the pants or in the potty or in the diaper or wanting to be a big kid and where does it go?

And that is a back and forth process. And it is really about helping the child have the two way back and forth feelings inside that end up towards progression rather than making it happen. And it’s so interesting because my, my way of thinking in language about mastery is that the opposite of mastery is adaptation, where you’re adapting to the outside world, what the outside world is demanding of you, which, of course, is part of an important part… is an important part of growing up. But for the child in learning mastery of something, it’s learning what is going on inside their own selves and coming out on the [00:17:00] progressive side over time. And that is a back and forth process. So it’s really important and it’s a great example because so many times people think their kids are toilet trained and toilet mastery because they’re making their poop in the potty.

But that doesn’t actually mean that the process is done because like everything in early childhood, it’s both about the step they’re taking and how they’re relating to the world around it. So you can have a child that’s putting their poop in the potty, but they could be saying no to everything else.

And that is not that there’s a sign of a problem. That’s just a sign of the process. They’re working through the feelings, not just the body.

[00:17:42] Kimberly Bell: Because it’s broader, it’s not… One of the things that I often tell my students is that we start with a body and so your body is ready to learn how to put your poop in the potty.

On a body level, your central nervous system is ready to go, but you have to layer on top of [00:18:00] that an emotional life and on top of that your, your cognitive skills, your thinking skills, your ability to stop yourself. when you feel the urge to go to the potty and decide to give up your preferred activity to then go to the potty.

And so it’s so many more layers than just, can you poop on the potty? So many more layers. And we’re going to do a whole episode just on pooping

[00:18:24] Debby Paris: in the potty. But I think one of the things you’re pointing out, Kim, that is really so important is when we’re talking, you started by asking me about the developmental stages and what do we mean by that?

And part of it is that the mind and the self grow out of the body out of these things that the child is trying to master around their body, whether it’s eating, whether it’s toilet training, whether it’s walking and from that, those layers that you’re talking about, of feelings, of how you relate to the world, of how you feel about your own body and yourself, it’s very [00:19:00] molded together.

And that is what we’re talking about in these early stages. And what we keep emphasizing here on this normality segment is the back and forth piece of it. And the interrelation piece of it is very normal. It’s just not always smooth.

[00:19:17] Kimberly Bell: Right. Right. Right. Smooth is not normal.

[00:19:21] Debby Paris: No,

[00:19:22] Kimberly Bell: no, exactly. So, OK. So I, I think, um, to sort of wrap up this part of the discussion, the message we want to send people is don’t panic that there are a lot of things that are normal in development, that it’s a complex process to go from being an infant to a human, you know, functioning out in the world by yourself, human being.

And it happens in so few years. You know, when you really think about from infancy, you’re only on the planet for five years before you’re expected to go off to kindergarten, and [00:20:00] that’s not very much time to become an independent, functioning little human being. Um, and that we don’t want people to feel like there’s a perfect way to do it or that everything’s going to happen at the same time.

[00:20:16] Debby Paris: Or that there’s one measure. One piece of development, one activity that the child does that shows they’re fine. You know, I think as caregivers and parents, we’re always looking for reassurance that our kid’s doing OK. And I think what we’re trying to say in this, that OK is messy. Rather than perfect and that you if for parents, it’s so hard to think somebody else’s toilet trained before my Johnny or my Ginny, and it’s, it really is that it’s all fine and normal within a range of growth.

Um, so it’s, it’s not just one benchmark that will define it. It’s a lot of [00:21:00] series along the way.

[00:21:01] Kimberly Bell: I want to let people know that this book right here, wherever that picture is going to be put, is your ultimate guide to understanding your child’s behavior. It is called “Timeless Advice for Parents of Young Children” and was written by a group of Hanna Perkins early childhood development experts.

We’re going to show a QR code for the next little bit. And you can scan it to find it on Amazon for less than 20 dollars. From tantrums to preschool jitters it unlocks the mysteries of your child’s mind. It’s easy reading, which is important. It is in short chapters that are organized by common situations, so you can go right to the source of what you’re looking for.

And it offers gentle and loving strategies to help you through so many of the challenges that you face as a parent. Timeless Advice can bring out that nurturing, patient, and resourceful parent that lives in all of us. Plus, every purchase supports non-profit Hanna Perkins Center. You can find it on Amazon.com.

We [00:22:00] have another segment, um, that we can go into now and, uh, it is called “Let’s rephrase that.”

[00:22:08] Debby Paris: OK. Are you ready to try that?

[00:22:11] Kimberly Bell: I’m ready. All right. This is where we talk through things grownups typically say to children and come up with alternatives that may be more, well, we can say constructive to the mind of a child, but In keeping with these conversations we’re having about the backs and the fourths, right?

So, here’s a good one. You have a child who is engaging in a frustrating, let’s say, repetitive behavior. Or, they’re a little bit, um, what we might call hyperactive. And you say to them, “What’s gotten into you?”

[00:22:49] Debby Paris: OK. Well, actually what’s gotten into you is the question the parent has. That’s right. But it doesn’t help the child.

[00:22:58] Kimberly Bell: You know, oh wait, I got to stop you there. Hold [00:23:00] on, hold on. I think what you just said is so important. Wait, I want to, I want to make sure that That we talked specifically about that piece of it, I would say nine times out of 10 that initial impulsive thing that we say to Children is our question. And I think I want to underline that before we go on to the next piece, because when we rephrase that, we’re trying to look from the point of view of the child, right?

That’s a beautiful way to say that. All right. So what would you say instead, Debby?

[00:23:29] Debby Paris: Well, I would say, first of all, let’s know how to think about it, which is, um, behavior has a meaning. And when a child is not listening and you’re saying the same thing over and over again, or when the child is running around and seeming not to take in, it’s actually conveying something.

So, the first thing we might say is, you are having a hard time listening, and you’re having a hard time stopping. I think maybe you’re having something going on inside of you, or you’re worried about something. What, what [00:24:00] are you worried about? But often it’s starting by addressing that the behavior is conveying something.

And then we move from that to, What’s going on? Now sometimes as the observers, we can know what’s going on — that somebody grabbed a toy; that somebody said no to something. I say when… let me break it into two different parts: When a kid isn’t listening, and you’ve said the same thing over and over again, the best way I think of rephrasing it is to say, “You know, um, I’m saying the same thing over and over again. And you’re not listening. You’re saying no and no; I think you’re you’re telling me that you’re having a feeling about something else. Not about what I’m asking. What are YOU wanting to know about?”

Because really when a child says no, it’s not that they’re not listening, it’s that you’re not speaking to what’s going on with them. Does that make sense? I might have had too many words for that.

[00:24:51] Kimberly Bell: No, no, I think it makes, I think it makes perfect sense. And the other thing I think that is important to remember is that, going back to what you said earlier about [00:25:00] how we start with a body and then we have sort of a self and an inner life and oftentimes if a child is acting out with their body in a hyperactive way, if they could tell you what has gotten into them, they would have used their words, right?

But if they are using their body, odds are good when you say what’s gotten into you, they’re going to be like, I don’t know, because if I knew I wouldn’t be doing what I’m doing, right? If I could use my words right now, I wouldn’t do what I’m doing. I need your help. And I think that’s what you’re saying is that’s the parent needs to think about it as how, how can I help take this from a body thing to a words thing. A words thing. And I think,

[00:25:45] Debby Paris: yes, many times it’s the children don’t know how to use it, and we use words for them, and then they can use the words. Sometimes it’s that there’s a feeling that they don’t think is a good feeling to have and they’re trying to stay [00:26:00] away from that feeling.

[00:26:00] Kimberly Bell: Oh, that’s a good point.

[00:26:01] Debby Paris: By sort of running ahead of it. You know, they, I always say with children, they either go like this and shut down the thinking so they look like they’re not hearing or they’re running to try and stay ahead of the feeling or get rid of it through their bodies. So we’re trying to understand what’s the motor and what’s the motive.

Right. Oh, that’s really good. OK. One more. OK. And this is kind of coming from the other side, I think, a little bit. Uh, when a child asks “why” once too often or at the wrong time and a grownup says, because I said so, how would we rephrase that moment?

When the child was saying why, why, why, why, I think what we want to go back to is. You’re asking the same thing over and over again, but that’s not really what your question is. Let’s find out what your question really is. That said, there is a time when parents do need to say, because I say so — not as a power struggle, [00:27:00] but because sometimes when kids can’t stop themselves, they need our help in stopping themselves.

It just shouldn’t come through being angry. And that’s a hard part in being a parent, because you want to cut in before you’re angry, but it can happen pretty quickly. We’re trying to help redirect it from an interaction to a containment. So when you say, because I said so, it’s a little bit of an imposition of power.

And you can, another way of rephrasing it would be to say, you’re having a hard time listening and you’re having a hard time stopping yourself. So I’m going to help you until we can figure this out.

[00:27:37] Kimberly Bell: Excellent. In a perfect

[00:27:38] Debby Paris: world, which doesn’t happen all the time in parenting.

[00:27:41] Kimberly Bell: Like I said, imperfect parenting.

[00:27:43] Debby Paris: Right.

[00:27:44] Kimberly Bell: Um, all right. Last part. We are always glad to get questions from our listeners. When time allows, we answer them in the podcast. Uh, if we can’t get them to them here, we do try to follow up with them, um, directly from our website or from our email. So [00:28:00] here’s a question. A mom asks, when I catch my child being mean to another child, I make him apologize.

But it only seems to make him angrier. Is there something wrong with him, and what should I do?

[00:28:13] Debby Paris: What a good question, and no, there’s not something wrong with him. This is very much a part of normal development. And again, we’re talking about normality. When a kid has done something that makes them feel uncomfortable inside, there’s a little bit of outsourcing.

You know, you get to be the one that’s the critic and they can sort of not feel bad inside. What we’re trying to do with an apology is not get the form, we’re actually trying to get the content of, you know, gee, it doesn’t feel good when you’re mean to someth… somebody. Do you think there’s something you can do to make yourself feel better, rather than complying to the external authority?

That is where the developmental progress happens. You can get any kid to say I’m sorry by saying you can’t have your dessert unless you [00:29:00] say you’re sorry. That doesn’t get them any place and it makes them feel worse and angry that you’re trying to force them to do something they’re not ready to do. So when somebody, when a kid is mean to somebody else they are struggling with a mean feeling that they are discharging rather than just having the feeling or not putting it in words. But what we want to help them with is it doesn’t feel good inside. What can we do to make you feel better inside? That’s the arc of the developmental piece.

[00:29:31] Kimberly Bell: Thank you so much, Debby.

This has been a fantastic conversation today.

[00:29:36] Debby Paris: I’ve totally enjoyed it. Thank you for having me.

[00:29:39] Kimberly Bell: Excellent. Excellent. Um, and as a reminder, please visit our website at hiddenlanguageofchildren. org if you’d like more information. Thank you so much for joining us. We are grateful to all of our listeners. We hope you enjoyed this conversation and found it to be helpful when making parenting decisions appropriate for your child.[00:30:00]

Hidden Language of Children Podcast is a production of the nonprofit Hanna Perkins Center for Child Development in beautiful Shaker Heights, Ohio. If you like this podcast, please subscribe to hear future episodes and share it with all of your family and friends. We welcome your comments and your questions.

Contact us by email at hiddenlanguageofchildren.org. For more information about our approach to healthy child development, visit hidden language of children.org. I’m Dr. Kimberly Bell, and we’ll see you next time.