TPP 213a: How to Talk to Kids When the World Feels Like a Scary Place
episode
Full-Tilt Parenting: Strategies, Insights, and Connection for Parents Raising Neurodivergent Children
40 min
1 speaker
6 chapters
transcribed 14 hours ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Why is it important for parents to have essential conversations with anxious kids?
Hey there, it's Debbie and welcome to Playback Friday. Most Fridays, I re-release one of my favorite conversations from the archive. So unless you're a longtime listener of the show, there's a good chance you haven't heard this one yet. And even if you have, you just might get something completely different from it listening to it this time around.
So we tend to deal with emotions in a variety of different ways, often depending on, you know, who we are and how we've been brought up. So we certainly have parents who really talk about kids' feelings. But we also have parents who unknowingly, you know, they say, there, there, don't worry. There's nothing to worry about. And the message that gives the kids is my emotions aren't important signals or they're things to be sort of brushed under the carpet.
Welcome to Tilt Parenting, a podcast featuring interviews and conversations aimed at inspiring, informing, and supporting parents raising differently wired kids. I'm happy to be bringing you an important conversation for our current moment. I'm talking to the author of the new book, When the World Feels Like a Scary Place, Essential Conversations for Anxious Parents and Worried Kids. And it seems like it's the exact right book for this exact time in the world. I wanted to have a very practical and helpful conversation about how to handle those sometimes difficult but important conversations we are all no doubt having more than usual right now, or are perhaps wanting to have with our kids, but we don't know where to start or what to say.
Because we as parents and caregivers often have our own emotions and anxiety surrounding scary, uncertain, and unsettling current events. making it really difficult to know how to both broach and be in those conversations with our kids. That's why I'm happy to bring to the show Dr. Abigail Gewirtz, a child psychologist, mother of four, and a leading expert on families under stress. Abigail is also a professor in the Department of Family Social Science and the Institute of Child Development at the University of Minnesota, where she has devoted her career to developing and testing award-winning skills-based parenting programs that promote children's resilience. I was able to preview a copy of Abigail's book and I can tell you it is truly full of examples of essential conversations, as in actual scripts with dialogue, talking points and prompts that are age appropriate and centered around different issues.
In our conversation, Dr. Gewirtz explains the reasons why it's essential to have these conversations, how to make sure your own anxiety doesn't get in the way, and what simple thing to do each day to facilitate more open and thoughtful conversations with our kids. And now here is my conversation with Dr. Gewirtz. Hello, Abby. Welcome to the podcast. Thank you, Debbie. It's a pleasure to be with you. Well, your book kind of landed in my lap at the perfect time. And, you know, your book is published through Workman as well, which is who did Differently Wired. And so I know your publicist, and she sent me a note. I was like, Oh, my goodness, this is the book that all parents need right now. So I'm so excited to get into all of it.
And before we do that, I always ask my guests to just take a minute to do their own introduction. I've already read your formal bio, but just take a few minutes to introduce yourself and what you do in the world.
Thank you, Debbie. Well, I am a mom of four. My kids are older. My youngest is 17 years old. My oldest is 26. It's hard to even say that. But like every other parent, my husband and I gave birth and no one had told us what to do. I happen to have a professional advantage, which was that I was a psychologist by training, but that conferred no personal advantage in bringing up our kids. And it was a thrilling, it still is a thrilling and exciting ride and sometimes an impossible ride. And it's really the best job I've ever had. And when in about the mid 2000s, 2015, 2016, I began to notice referrals to my private practice increase specifically
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
Why is it important for parents to have essential conversations with anxious kids?
0:00–6:31
2
How did Dr. Gewirtz’s research on rising anxiety shape her new book?
6:31–14:25
3
What simple daily practice can parents use to create space for important talks?
14:25–20:41
4
How can parents identify and validate their child’s emotions during scary events?
20:41–28:54
5
What three questions should parents ask before discussing topics like racism or COVID‑19?
28:54–36:28
6
How do conversation strategies differ for toddlers versus teenagers?
36:28–40:01
Speakers
1 identifiedMore from Full-Tilt Parenting: Strategies, Insights, and Connection for Parents Raising Neurodivergent Children
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TPP 091a: A Conversation With Steve Silberman About His Book “Neurotribes”
TPP 521: A Conversation with Dr. Peter Gray About Restoring Childhood
TPP 253a: Advocate and Author Jonathan Mooney on Why Normal Sucks
TPP 520: Dr. Özgür Bolat on Why Rewards Backfire and the Real Science of Motivating Kids