Author’s practical guidance
The one thing you cannot stand
Source named in the book: emotion regulation research (Gross) · Emotion coaching (Gottman)
Most parents have one specific thing that produces a reaction out of all proportion — a sound, a texture, a phrase, a way of being asked.
Say this now
(to yourself) "This is my nine, not their nine."
Separates the size of your reaction from the size of the event.
“That sound is hard for me. Can you do it quieter, or in the other room?”
Honest, small, and it treats them as someone who can help.
Do this
- Name the trigger to yourself in advance, in one word.
- Warn the other adult, so they can take that one thing when they are there.
- Reduce exposure where you can rather than trying to increase tolerance.
- Respond earlier and smaller — at a three, not at a nine.
- Expect it to fade as the behavior itself fades.
Avoid this
- Pretending it does not affect you until it comes out at ten times the size.
- Punishing that one behavior harder than you punish anything else.
- "You know exactly what you're doing" — at three, they do not.
If it repeats
If the reaction is very large and always the same, it is usually attached to something older than this child. That is worth saying out loud to someone once — a partner, a friend, a professional. Saying it out loud reliably shrinks it.
Why the book suggests this
Most parents have one specific thing that produces a reaction out of all proportion — a sound, a texture, a phrase, a way of being asked. Whining that goes straight through you. Being interrupted. Chewing. Someone hanging off your arm while you are talking.
The size of the reaction usually says something about you rather than about the behavior: something you were not allowed to do, or something you were shouted at for. That is worth knowing — not to excavate it, but so that you stop treating a nine on your own meter as evidence that this particular child is unbearable.
Related prepared situations
What happened next?
From this collection
Same Words: Every Grown-Up
45 prepared situations in this family area.