Dr. Becky Kennedy
speaker
3,434 appearances
7 recordings
6 series
first heard Feb 2024
last heard 18 Jun
Dr. Becky Kennedy’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
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recordings per month · last 12 monthsRecordings per month over the last 12 months — 3 in all, peaking in Jun 2026 with 2.
Appearances
In all those situations, I'm not communicating what I would do and the success of the intervention requires my kid to do something, which is just not a bet. We really want to make a boundary in that situation would be saying it looks like it's hard for you to get off the couch. If by the time I get over to you, you're not off.
I will pick you up and put you on the ground because it's just not safe to jump near that glass table. So. This actually always leads to the second part of your job because we have some fantasy that when we deliver that boundary well, your kid's going to say, oh, dad, I really needed that. Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. They never do that.
They always protest, which is what we do as adults. Also, when people set boundaries that we don't like, we get upset. And then you can do the other part of your job. which is validating their emotional experience. Oh, you really wanted to jump on the couch. Oh, you're really upset. You really wish you could make your own decisions. And so the boundary is the limit we set to keep our kids safe.
And then validating their emotional experience that generally comes up in the face of our boundary is how we stay connected to our kid and actually how we also help them build emotion regulation skills.
Great. We already kind of talked about what a lot of people struggle with boundaries. One of the things we struggle with validation is we have this false equivalence that validating my kids' feelings means I agree with those feelings or I would have those feelings. That actually goes back to multiplicity. I I am not upset. My kid is upset.
And part of being in any healthy relationship is recognizing that other people feel the way they feel and that that's okay. Exactly. I pick them up. Oh, you wish you could keep jumping on the couch. You wish is generally a great statement to start any validating phrase because you're speaking to the thing you're not allowing your kid to do that they really wish they could do.
You wish you could have ice cream for breakfast. You wish you could stay up later. You wish you could watch another TV show. And this is the other thing. People think when you say that, that means I'm letting my kid watch another TV show or I'm letting them know I'm holding my boundary and I'm validating how they're feeling.
Yeah, we have this kind of obsession with punishments and threats. I think it's because it's how we were parented.
But I thank you for being honest because I think me too. I've said those things. Here's how it usually looks in my house if I'm not setting a boundary. I'm like, hey, if you don't get off the couch, I'm taking away your dessert tonight. And then my kid probably doesn't get off the couch. And then it's whatever time at night. And then I think most of us, okay, this is what I do.
I'll be like, sorbet isn't dessert. Like berries and whipped cream isn't really dessert. Like I make something up because I don't actually want to deal with another meltdown. And then we totally undermine our authority. We're just like making stuff up. So we just feel desperate, I think, when we say those things.
Well, and if we, again, if we think about, because I really do think what we give parents is leadership training, which is, again, just something, why wouldn't we need leadership training? This is a harder leadership job than any CEO position. It is. CEOs like to say sometimes, like, it feels like I'm dealing with toddlers. No, no. In your home, you are literally dealing with toddlers.
So again, I just picture a CEO for someone who's late to work a couple of days in a row saying, if you don't come in time tomorrow, I'm taking away your ability to expense lunch. I'm sorry, if I heard that, I'd be like, that's the best you've got. That just doesn't feel like what excellent CEOs say. You know what? Hey, let's meet. Look, I'm on your team.
Something's getting in the way of you being on time. I know you don't need me to lecture you about that. Let's get to the bottom of this. Let's work together because getting to work on time is really important. And we both know that. Like you're working with someone, you're being on their team. And if a CEO said that, I don't know anyone who'd say that CEO is really permissive.
They'd be like, that CEO is effective. And punishments and threats, I actually think we know they don't really work in the workplace or on the sports field anymore. It's just the last place to modernize is parenting.
It's such a good question. So there's a couple things that we need to understand, I think, about development. And I think there's other things we can just reflect on in terms of why do I listen to people? Because when we say kids don't listen, what we really mean is my kid isn't cooperating when I ask them to do something I want them to do and they don't want to do.
Because again, if you said to your kid, iPad time for two hours, they all, quote, listen. So that's not really what we're talking about. So number one, in terms of just development, and I think this is one of the core things that drives almost all of our interventions, is that kids are born with all the feelings and all the urges and none of the skills to manage feelings or urges.
And that gap between a feeling and an urge and a skill, that gap always explains bad behavior in children or adults. Why do I yell at my husband sometimes? I don't know. I was overwhelmed with my own frustration from the day, and that frustration overpowered my skill in my body to manage the frustration, right?
Why do we sometimes speed our urge to speed, even though we know we're in an area where there's cops around, is greater than our ability to manage it? So The thing about that gap and why it's so helpful is then you can look at your kid's bad behavior through the lens of my kid doesn't have the skills they need. to meet the feelings and urges they have.
And then it transpires from there, okay, what do I do with my kid who doesn't know how to swim? I think swimming is a beautiful example because we really understand that it takes a while for kids to learn the skill of swimming. And none of us would pay for a lesson where the teacher goes, go to your room and come back when you can swim. If you can't swim next week, no iPad.
What's even the theory of why that would work? And at the same time, when you have a good swim lesson, I don't think any of us think the next week our kid is going to swim successfully. And so I think it takes time. Anything worthwhile takes time. I have a kid who's a little more people pleasing and I have another kid who has about 0% people pleasing in him. Their arcs look different.
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