How To Deal with Big Emotions In Your Children with Guest Rachel Bailey

Nellie Harden: 00:00:03

Hello and welcome to the 6570 family project podcast. If you are a parent of a tween teen or somewhere on the way, this is exactly the place for you. This is the playground for parents who want to raise their kids with intention, strength and joy. Come and hear all the discussions, get all the tactics and have lots of laughs along the way. We will dive into the real challenges and raising kids today how to show up as parents and teach your kids how to show up as members of the family and individuals of the world. My name is Nellie Harden, big city girl turn small town sipping iced tea on the front porch mama who loves igniting transformation in the hearts and minds of families by helping them build self love, discipline and leadership that elevate the family experience. And set the kids up with a rock solid foundation, they can launch their life on all before they ever leave home. This is the 6570 family project. Let's go Hello, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the 6570 family project podcast. We're putting aside our power struggles finding a path forward with our young women, and helping them build that confidence, respect and wisdom that they need in order to prepare them for the world out there. And today we have a very special guest on today, Rachel Bailey. Now Rachel is an expert in big emotions. And I don't know about you, but I know I have had big emotions. I know my kids have had big emotions. And I'm not really sure in this human experience. We're all going through if we can avoid it. But some of our kids are even more inclined to those big big emotions than others. And she is an expert. And here to talk to us today about the Yuck, right about what's happening in our brain, when all of that is happening, and what we can do to get through it, how we can talk ourselves and our children off the ledge. And so we can give them these coping and therapeutic methods in order to help not suppress help move through these big emotions that they're having. We don't want to suppress them, right, that can lead to something else. But anyway, we are going to talk to Rachel here. And this was such an enlightening conversation. I took a couple of pages of notes here. And I know that you are going to get so much out of this too. So without further ado, let's go ahead and welcome Rachel to the show. Hello, everyone. Well, you guys, I know I have given you some insight on Rachael here that we are talking to today. And I just want to welcome you to the 6570 family project podcast.

Rachel Bailey: 00:02:52

Thank you so much for having me here.

Nellie Harden: 00:02:53

Oh, you're so welcome. And I cannot wait to dive into you and your work. Because working with these children that have highly sensitive emotions, big emotions, it really is I work out in the community, I see it in my home, sometimes I definitely see it out in the community and and what we're dealing with out there, so I just can't wait to dive in and see what you have to say about this and what you are seeing in different trends. But before we get there, I want to know how did you get to this place that this is what you are studying and working with and have such a passion about in order to work with? And what is your story in your journey to get here.

Rachel Bailey: 00:03:37

So it's not most people probably tell you this. It's not where I thought I was gonna end up. It's not what I plan to share with them that I actually was in the corporate world for a while and then realized I wanted to go to the field of psychology. When I was in graduate school. My goal was to become a neuro psychologist, really fascinated by the brain and how it affects behavior and emotions and cognition. So I eventually got pregnant though along the way and did not become a neuro psychologist, but was setting it for so long that I started to apply it to other things that I was doing. So I've been in the field of psychology for 17 years. Studying neuro psychology then I also was an ADHD coach for kids and teens. I went into people's homes for a living to help with the family dynamics. And then after a few years of working with kids and teens, I actually realized that parents were first of all, unintentionally doing things to make situations worse. They just didn't even know like there was you've heard the cliche, there's no manual. Right? I actually shifted to working with parents about 13 years ago now. And when I did it, there weren't that many there weren't like parent coaches or anything like that. I just really my goal was to give practical tools so parents were less stressed and could really foster more resilience and better behavior and moods in the home. But then about I don't even know I guess a year, year and a half ago, I narrow down to working with parents of children with big emotions, partly because I was doing a lot Have that anyway. But also because I am a highly sensitive person, there is a term and I am definitely fit the category. I'm raising two big emotion girls. So there are a lot of emotions in my home. And I really do understand it. And I really do some people, someone once called me the big emotions translator like I can translate any illogical, disrespectful, seemingly out of the blue behavior and explain to parents what's going on. So I really have focused on that, because I do get it, I live it. And I really can help bring more peace to homes that seem really chaotic.

Nellie Harden: 00:05:34

So I'm pretty sure we were definitely created from the same cloth. Yeah, and I. So yes, very emotional person, myself, my kids laugh at me how often I cry, and what's really interesting, and just be like, I'll just watch something, I don't have to be pregnant to watch a coffee, commercial and cry. It can just be Tuesday afternoon, you know. And so, it but it's interesting, because when I was younger, I used to hide all of that, like, I was like, Oh, I cannot do that I you know, that makes me wimpy that makes me weak, you know, and, you know, even I've been married to my husband now for, gosh, 20. It'll be 21 years this year. And even in the first half of our marriage, I would say like, I was not open about being as emotional as I have. Now, since working in this field for so long. I started my career working in the animal field of behavior and psychology. So I was out in the wild, and I was doing captivity and zoo work and all of that with psychology behavior. And I moved into humans a bit over a decade ago. And but since I moved into humans, I have just allowed myself to just be more. And so now I'm like, Oh, just just, you know, let it come?

Rachel Bailey: 00:06:53

Absolutely, absolutely. And we can talk about the science behind why you actually have to let it come. Go Well, when you push it down, oh, Sona.

Nellie Harden: 00:07:02

Well,

Rachel Bailey: 00:07:04

but it's like you do get those messages. And this is one of the first things I do in the program that I have for parents, is I ask them, What are the messages you got about big emotions from as a child, and you do get the messages, you know, if you're doing that all something so sensitive, something so dramatic, you get made fun of by peers, right? They even have relationships deteriorate because you feel so strongly. So you get a lot of negative messages growing up about big emotions. So it is it is very common to hide them as well. Yeah,

Nellie Harden: 00:07:29

but here's the thing, too. I remember when I was a kid, like if you cried, it was like, Oh, my goodness, cry baby, right? I don't hear that as much anymore. But that was a big term when I was growing up, right cry baby. And but then if something was happening, and I didn't cry, my heart was made of stone. And I was just like, I cannot win. Like, you know, I either if I hide it, or and I like cover it up, and I camouflage it, then I'm cold hearted. And if I do show it, then I'm a crybaby you know, so it's just this, like, I don't I don't know what to do. And then the

Rachel Bailey: 00:08:07

ground is you know, you don't know what it is. And there is actually is one but no one teaches us that yes, yes.

Nellie Harden: 00:08:13

Oh, my goodness. Okay, this is gonna be great conversation today. Okay, so that is how you have kind of found your place and where you can really dive in. So with that, is there some general trends that you've seen over time? And, and I say this because I have, I have some trends that I've seen in my neck of the woods, and I'd love to hear your, your perspective on that. Have you seen with these high emotions, high sensitive with, uh, with our, you know, late elementary, early middle, you know, especially Have you seen some trends happening over the last decade? Or you said you've been doing for 13 years?

Rachel Bailey: 00:08:58

Yeah, definitely. I will say there's clearly a trend between our our parents generation and our generation. I mean, that is so obvious change. But in the past, I would say 13 years, the biggest trend, not surprisingly, was when we had a global pandemic, right. And I was asked to speak about anxiety and big emotions a lot before the pandemic. Yeah, but during the pandemic, and since the pandemic, I mean, seriously, I do do a ton of public speaking. But I am probably asked to speak about it maybe once a week now, I'm going to speak maybe three times a week, once a week at least is on an anxiety and on how do we foster resilience? And no, because there was a lot of protecting that was happening before COVID We could protect our kids a lot more, but we couldn't protect them anymore. And so all these feelings came out in both parents and children. So I think probably the biggest, huge, you know, shift was after COVID I mean, not surprisingly.

Nellie Harden: 00:09:49

Right. And in that anxiety, was it how was that showing up? In our kids?

Rachel Bailey: 00:09:56

That's a great question because I also get question asked the question a lot. How do you know Job has big emotions. How does it manifest? And it's not always what we think. So other people hear big emotions and they think meltdowns, which certainly it is, but to your point a lot of kids have big emotions are holding it in. And then it turns out as irritability, they get when kids have big emotions, they tend to be inflexible and maybe controlling, it seems like they're always negotiating. That's a symptom of having big emotions, you feel something so strongly, and I can explain that a little bit more later. Kids with big emotions tend to be very focused on fairness and justice. And that's not fair. And you let him do that. But you didn't let me do that. And comparing, you know, if you let me I should, he should. There's that. There's also the sensitivity, both to the environment, you know, like lights, noises, sensitivity, that inside being hungry and tired will lead to a lot of, you know, big reactions. And then this is just sort of, like you were saying this, we feel things really strongly like a coffee commercial, or I cry it every single movie, every single movie, pretty much unless it's a comedy. And my husband looks at me, he's like, it's their actors. I'm like, I know what they're really people going through that I just, you know, so Oh, we feel about animals. So this is really how it manifests. That can be a lot of different symptoms. But a lot of parents of kids with big emotions will resonate with a lot of minutes.

Nellie Harden: 00:11:18

Yeah, yeah. And it's so funny, you're going down that list. And, you know, I work with a lot of people in here, but just even looking at my own home, you know, we have a, I have four girls all within four and a half years, right. So they are 1214 14, and 16. So there's a lot of, and I homeschool the lower three. And so they're home with each other 24/7 There's a lot of trying to control that is happening, you know, there is, and they're all, you know, adolescent young women. So they're all the hormones are all over the place. And but I can't even just say that they've always, you know, been this way of, and I love their teaching and their leadership and their mentality, but when you have them all colliding at the same time, right. So just yesterday, we had an situation in the home where I was working on a project, so I couldn't do our group teaching for the day. So they were going to do all their individual work. Well, one thing that they had to do was mutual, they all had to do it at the same time. Well, each one of the three of them that I have at home, woke up and they were like, I have a plan today, I'm going to conquer this day, I'm going to do it. And they all have this great plan. But the problem was that that one thing that they had to do at the same time together was at a different time and each one of their plans. And so all of them, were going to be disappointed and frustrated. And they were and then they were all like well, this is the plan. I was like, Hey, guy, so that's not the plan. That was your plan, right? There's a big difference here. And so we had to just kind of calm down, we had to look behind the behaviors. That's something I talk about a lot. And I'm sure you kind of do this too, right? They're having this behavior. But we as parents, we need to get behind the behavior and see what's what is actually making that behaviors or the last thing that show up in this entire mind cycle that's happening. And so we had to kind of climb back there. And I was talking to my husband about it. So it's just kind of funny. I mean, I see all of these things in a day in my house.

Rachel Bailey: 00:13:28

Absolutely. And what you brought up is so important in understanding kids and teens and even adults with big emotions is that they do have something set in their mind. And this is very, very true. If you have a child or teen with big emotions, they imagine how it's gonna go. And if it doesn't go that way, because they are big feelers, they feel it so strongly, they feel disappointed or frustrated or angry or out of control. And what we see to your point is that behavior is just a symptom, the meltdown the controlling the bossiness. It's just a symptom of how big they're feeling that feeling inside the symptom,

Nellie Harden: 00:14:02

right. Yeah. And I think I think you bring up such a good point that these big feelers and I am definitely a big, big feeler and the imagination that comes alongside that is so cool, right? And I remember when I was a kid, I could put myself in stories, and I could feel the things I could smell the things I could see the things all around me. And it made me a really good writer. I didn't realize I was a good writer until I took I was terrible at writing because it was in middle in high school because they were like, read The Grapes of Wrath and give me a literary blah, blah, blah. And I was like, oh, and I would get like C's and you know, B C's whatever. And then I went to college and I took a creative writing course my freshman year of college, I got solid, A pluses and they're like, you're such an amazing writer. And I was like, No, I'm like a C minus writer and they're like, no You're not. And so but you know, that just goes to tell you listening to people who define you right instead of listening to who you are and what your capabilities are. But I think imagination when you are such a big feeler, it helps you connect so much to the world of possibilities around you, fiction or nonfiction. And it's I think that is one of the superpowers of being a big feeler.

Rachel Bailey: 00:15:26

It is such a superpower. And to your point, it makes you I'm also a good creative writer, I can get into anybody's shoes, it makes me really good at my job, because I can help any parent understand their child. It's hard to raise though, because when you have a child with a, you know this with a big imagination, they can come up with all the reasons they should get what they want. If they're controlling, they have in their mind how it's gonna go. And then they have a good imagination. They'll come up with like the best reasons. They come hard, especially if you want control and they want control. We have a lot of power struggles in homes. Yes, yes.

Nellie Harden: 00:15:57

Not to mention the time spent and listening to the stories this morning. I was trying to get out of the shower and get out. And I have I have a lot to do. I'm in the middle of a big event right now and everything. And my daughter comes in. And she was like, so I had a dream. And I was like, Oh, here we go. Like

Rachel Bailey: 00:16:13

you got a little while. Yeah.

Nellie Harden: 00:16:17

And she's like a misshapen. And then this happened. And then there was paint and like, and it just kept going on. And then I finished doing what I was going to do. And I was like, wow, that's really cool. You know. And so you I want her to know that she's seen and heard, but also that imagination piece. Take some time some time. That's so funny. Okay, so you have something called the yuck cycle? Yes. Right. So tell me about this and where it fits into parenting in our homes.

Rachel Bailey: 00:16:49

Okay, so I do talk about this concept of yakking. It's so relevant with raising kids with big emotions, but also with thinking about discipline and behavior, which Nellie, I'm sure you're gonna relate to this very easily. So basically, if we think about this concept of how we feel and how we act, when we're in a good place, we act positively when we're in a good place where calm or patient, but when we're in a place that I call yuck. And yuck is a blanket term I used to describe anything uncomfortable. So yeah, it could be we're hungry, we're tired, we're feeling overwhelmed, stressed out, disrespected, disappointed, anything uncomfortable. What happens is when we are in Yuck, we do not have positive behavior, moods and attitudes. And that's actually because if we go to the brain now, the there is a part of the brain that allows us to be calm and patient and aligned with our values. It's called the prefrontal cortex, it's in the front part of our brains. When we are in Yuck, we send some sort of discomfort, our brain senses discomfort as a threat. So it turns on an alarm. And that alarm is our fight or flight response. And one of the first things our fight or flight response does is it shuts down any part of the brain and body or shuts have access to that doesn't shut it down, or access to any part of the brain or body, that it doesn't feel necessary for survival. So it shuts down the part of our brain where our values live, where our ability to solve problems lives, where our ability to regulate our emotions lives. So when we are in Yuck, we don't align with our values, and we don't behave maturely. We aren't considerate of other people. And so what happens in homes is this cycle of yuck. So what happens is a child feels Yuck, for whatever reason, you just told them, they can't go to their friend's house because they didn't finish their homework. They go into yuck. And they have what I call it yuck behavior to your point behaviors are just symptoms. So yuck behavior. There are three types of behaviors I talked about. But the most common probably is Yuck, turn out. So when they're in the UK, because you said you can't go to your friend's house, they become disrespectful. That's their yuck. They've turned it out on you. Now their yuck behavior triggers the UK in you. So now you're in yuck and UVA yuck behavior of trying to control them. Oh, yeah. If you're being disrespectful to me, I'm taking away your phone for the next you know, three months, your yuck behavior, because you just threaten to take away their phone creates more yuck. And man, they have more young behaviors and the cycle of yuck occurs. This is especially true when you've become anybody with big emotions because they go into yuck more quickly. People who have big emotion sense yuck more easily more quickly, and they feel it bigger. So lots of big cycles of yuck. When we are dealing with big questions, although even when we're not, there's still cycles of yuck.

Nellie Harden: 00:19:21

Oh, gosh. Absolutely. And, you know, when you say that, I find it so funny. You know, one of the things especially in, you know, discipline, disciplining and consequence work, right, which I deal with a lot dealing with teens, especially teen and tween young women and things like that. But when you get into these cycles, some of those when and I've totally been guilty, my husband's been guilty too. You get into these cycles of when it comes to you, right? So the kid is doing something and then all of a sudden you're like crap, and you're like, you were just taking everything out of your bedroom, and you're gonna live on water and oatmeal for the next year, you know, and my, we've never said that. But my point is you just go. So above and beyond, you're like, are you? Like, are we actually going to follow through with this? Like, No, we aren't going to take their beds in their dressers and everything out of their rooms, a that would be way too much work.

Rachel Bailey: 00:20:19

We're tired. Let's be honest,

Nellie Harden: 00:20:21

right now. I mean, disciplining is just as much, you know, physical and mental work for the parents as it is emotional work for the child. But anyway, I just I see that happen a lot like this over exaggeration of consequences, but then they don't follow through because of everything we just said,

Rachel Bailey: 00:20:42

the consequences when we're in the UK, which is one of the things I talked about with consequences. Don't make them one year in yuck. Yes.

Nellie Harden: 00:20:48

Exactly. So we we like to take a pause in there, like, take a pause, everyone needs to cool down. We do a lot of letter writing and things like that in there. So we can actually form like, take the cloud and make it a solid. And so anyway, I just see that happening a lot like, oh, you cannot do anything you will never ever friend again, you know, you can't date until you're 40. Whatever

Rachel Bailey: 00:21:12

things about our fight or flight response is, it's it's very strong, because we wouldn't be here if our ancestors didn't have a really good fight or flight response. Sure. And it's not very discriminating. So it doesn't know the difference between being chased by a tiger and your child didn't turn in their homework, right? It responds almost in the same way, especially because we go into the future, we think about all the potential threats, and we're like, we have to make that stop, we have to prevent that from happening. So we do have these big responses, because our brain doesn't really know that you know what, right now, it's not the end of the world, we can't see that when we're in fight or flight. We don't know that is the end of the world.

Nellie Harden: 00:21:49

Well, I've I find that very interesting, too. And one of the reasons that I work, especially in the teen tween realm of parents of young women is because of the brain difference between men and women, young men and young women, right. But I want to put that aside, I want to table that for just a second because I want to say out in the community that I work in, right, we have. I mean, we have probably 100 kids or so in our community. And I live in a small town on the east coast of the United States, real small town. I think some high schools have more people in their graduating classes than I have in my town. And we've always lived in big cities. But we started coming to this charming little seaside town for spring break and 98 and came back 17 times and decided to move here. So that's what we did. So now we live in a small town. But it's really interesting perspective, having lived in Chicago, Indianapolis, I grew up in suburbs of Detroit, and all of this, and then coming to this very small southern seaside town. And when I see these kids, though, I live in a place that every like it is a mixing bowl of just everything a socio economic, cultural, you know. And so I find it really interesting to see these high anxiety, big emotions that are coming out in our kids on all different levels. And I think that's the point that I'm trying to get at is some people think, oh, you know, it's this group that has the high emotions and high sensitivity, it's this group or what have you. But I see it across the board. And I see it coming more and more and more. And unfortunately, with that, I also see this divide happening between the kids that are having it, and the kids that are hiding it. I don't know if there's any kids that don't have big emotions. I mean, there's bigger, there's certainly kids that have bigger emotions and bigger, higher sensitivities. But there's not a kid there, I don't think there's a human it's not in the way that we're made up that have no sensitivities, or, you know, no big emotion sometimes, but they're taught to hide it. And then those insecurities, you know, have them make a separation between those that do and that isolates that person which creates even more, right, absolutely. So what are some things when we see those kids that are out in public or what have you that are being isolated? And you know, we, we, as adults, try to befriend them, try to connect them and things like that. But we're adults, right? We're not as cool as the other, you know, fellow kids. So what are some things that we can do in order to help them along in their journey?

Rachel Bailey: 00:24:41

The kids who are isolated and yeah, maybe not feeling their feelings?

Nellie Harden: 00:24:45

No, the kids that are isolated and they are having these big feelings?

Rachel Bailey: 00:24:49

Gotcha, gotcha. I think one of the first things that when you think about isolation, it's are they self isolating or they pure isolating? That would always be my first question too, because a lot Have kids self isolate? Because they believe that their big emotions, there's something wrong with them. So I have a daughter who actually isolate slightly because she's embarrassed that she might cry or that she might, you know, do something that would get her made fun of. Yeah, but one of the things we work on a lot is normalizing her her feelings. And instead of her seeing them as something I need to hide, you know, I do, everybody I think knows now who Brene Brown is? Oh, yes. Yeah, I mean, I actually, you probably have to Nelly, I've been studying Brene since way before her first. Yes, exactly. You have the book right there. I do. I've been I got introduced to her even before her first TED Talk, which is talking mostly about shame and vulnerability. And she talks about shame being, you know, this belief that we're not good enough. And we do isolate when we want to hide a part of ourselves. In order to undo shame and self isolation, we absolutely have to talk about our stories. That's a Brene term, talk about your stories. And I actually introduced my kids to other kids with big feelings. And when I was a therapist, too, I used to have groups of kids who even when they went to school, and maybe didn't see kids like them, they knew there was a group that they were going to see like on Wednesday nights that were all like them, and there was nothing wrong with them. And then they could talk in their group about all the experiences they had that week, you know, with their own big emotions, so self isolating as a lot of understanding how they perceive themselves. And I think others isolating too. I mean, if there are peers who are isolating them, I think they also here's the thing, especially in the teen and tween years, because I was a therapist for teens, they are just protecting a lot of putting down of others is protecting themselves. Oh, yeah, yeah, I used to do talks in middle schools. And I would say as soon as your child walks into middle school, they start building a wall. Again, there's so much meanness they start brick by brick building these walls to protect themselves. And often it's just making fun of others so that no one makes fun of me. Right? So I'm a big believer that we need to honestly be very real and understand what's going on. If someone is isolating someone else, what's going on for them, that they have a desire to be cruel. It's often just a lot of yuck in them that they're just turning out on others. Oh, yes,

Nellie Harden: 00:27:01

yes, absolutely. And, I mean, that's definitely something that we try to address when we're serving out in the community. And I just, I just hate to see it. You know, it. I hate to see when these kids with the big emotions are isolated. One of my daughters, especially is I mean, she's, she's just going to go into some sort of medical, I just know it. And she has this heart that just goes out to everybody. I am not joking. We she just wants to help every single person and it has put her in jeopardy a couple of times. We lived in our old house before this one and a little ways down the road. There was this a renter in the house that started there was some questionable activities happening at the house. And it turned out that there was some drug exchange happening or what have you. And anyway, my point is my daughter who was I mean, gosh, she might have been eight at the time, she was playing outside, whatever. And I look out, I'm like, where is she? Where is she? You know, her sisters are like Mara, oh, great, you know, great herd mentality you guys have? And then, so but I were going around were looking for she's sitting on the front porch with this kid. And she's just like, yeah, he just seemed like he really wanted someone to talk to. And I was like, I love you. But and please don't.

Rachel Bailey: 00:28:29

Yeah, exactly. Where's that line? Because we do want to encourage them, but they also need to be safe. Yeah. You know, finding that line? For sure. Yeah, I think for her to realize that there are others like her as well, because a lot of kids have big emotions again, feel like there's something different or wrong or bad. And I think you really have to understand that other people like that. Yeah. better about yourself.

Nellie Harden: 00:28:50

Yes. Yeah. No, I totally agree with that. And we talk are because I have been able to homeschool them. I did it before it was cool. So I've been doing it for seven years. And before it was COVID. Cool, I guess yes. I don't know if cool is the word many parents would put on that. But this is actually our last year. They're all heading off next year, and it will be my first time without a kid home in 17 years.

Rachel Bailey: 00:29:14

Oh my goodness. You're not gonna know what to do with yourself in the beginning.

Nellie Harden: 00:29:18

Oh, I know. It's going to be weird. My husband and I both work from home and we're going to be like, Whoa, it's quiet. Yes. So quiet.

Rachel Bailey: 00:29:26

Yes. And then you can go out for lunch every once in a while. Oh, that'd be great.

Nellie Harden: 00:29:31

It's gonna be good. Yes, we're recording this on a Friday and we do dates every Friday my husband and I for lunch anyway, and so but we're like we could do it more than just Friday. What is happening you know, exactly. So anyway, that's a big pivot in my world that is coming up and I will miss it. I have loved it. I had no desire, no background in homeschooling whatsoever. It was just this weird trajectory of dominoes that fell that led us there and And then I fell in love with it. And we've done really well with it for seven years. But now it's time for the next chapter.

Rachel Bailey: 00:30:06

Sure, there will be mixed emotions. So Oh, yeah. Yeah, I

Nellie Harden: 00:30:11

am definitely ready to have that time. But it has also just been such a beautiful experience. My I've had them my youngest, I've had her since kindergarten. So when she goes off into, you know, school at another place, it will really be her first time ever being in a classroom classroom, which will be very interesting for her because she is my, she's my fourth. So that means she's the firecracker and crazy one, you know, so she has big emotions, that one for sure. But my point is, having been home with them for the last seven years, I've been able to witness so much of their development, their emotional development that they've had, and be there to catch things, right, when they start to happen much sooner at least than I would have if they were away all day. So like the perfectionism, you know, is a big one, right? Comparison, having this, this controlling, or I gotta get the grades, I gotta get the grade. I'm like, Who? I'm not like a grades person. I was like, who was telling you that you have to get these grades, you know, last night when they were dealing with me with math problems. And my eighth graders are in geometry right now. And I lost me already. My husband, thankfully can do it. But if she got a couple wrong, she was just like, totally broken. And so I was having one on one time with her last night. And I asked her, so what, you know, what makes you get to that point that you're like, I'm okay here, but I am not okay here. And she brought up when I go from 92 to 8086. That's where I break. And she was just like, like, it was a matter of fact. And I was like, Well, why? And she just said, because I have to be in the 90s. And that's not you know, so we just explored that. And it was, it was a beautiful thing to be able to catch that and see that that's where she is. But yeah, academics and emotions can go hand in hand.

Rachel Bailey: 00:32:17

Oh, they sure can. Absolutely. And these these images they have of who they have to be. And then if they're not, and again, this is such a typical thing of a big feeler, if they're not who they have in their mind that they should be, there's a meltdown. And that's why a lot of kids have big emotions are sensitive to criticism, they're sensitive to not being good at something the first time, because again, they have this image in their mind of this is how I should be, and whether or not big huge discomfort comes and they don't know how to handle it.

Nellie Harden: 00:32:44

Yeah. So how do you recommend and help them with those shoulds those self producing shoulds?

Rachel Bailey: 00:32:52

Yeah. So there are two things I think about, like you said, you know, behaviors that you go deep. So I go deep with them and have them explore it. But then I also know that there's certain emotional needs that lead to, you know, these symptoms, when someone determines their worth based on, you know, whether it's academics, or I need to be smart enough or funny enough, they tend to create a role for themselves. And it's like, then if they don't fit into this role, it's like the game of operation. If you get too far away from that role, it's like and, and that's when they feel these big feelings. So I'm always exploring with them what they believe is going on because they need to, I really believe everyone needs to be as introspective as they can. Yeah, it has that ability to do that. But then also on looking at these emotional needs, do they feel significant? What have they defined? You know, for themselves? What do they think creates value? One of the things I do, one of my areas of clinical expertise is in self esteem. Self esteem and resilience are my two areas of expertise. So self esteem comes from a genuine belief, a belief that we are worthy as we are not if we get a 92 or 95. Or so I'm always looking at do they have a genuine belief that they are worthy as they are. And this is why I started working with parents, the messages we give our kids tend to teach them they're not worthy, or most kids know we love them, but willing nice to them and respectful to them when they're doing what we want. They start to create this idea of I have to be this in order to be accepted in order for people to be nice to me, I have to be this. So again, I always go a little deeper to see what has this person define themselves. And then I help them start to see this on their own.

Nellie Harden: 00:34:30

Yes, yes, that's so great. And in my program map to maturity. We really dive into that in the beginning, I want to see exactly where you are right as parents where they are as kids, we do this huge questionnaire, you know, at the very beginning, and because I want to know where you are, I want to know where you want to go and then we're going to build the map to get there. And it's unique for every family. It's beautiful, but okay, well this has been amazing. I want Can you Tell everybody I know people listening right now have some big emotion kids and have some very sensitive feelers out there. So where can people find you?

Rachel Bailey: 00:35:10

So the best place is probably I have a podcast as well. It's called your parenting long game. The first 100 Some episodes were mostly about discipline. And, you know, they have that from you. And I think that's, that's, I start talking about big emotions in episode season two, which starts with episode 200. So really focusing on big emotions there. So it's called your parenting long game, I have a Facebook group that talks about, you know, I go behind the scenes, and I talk about things that are coming up with kids with big emotions. My website has my program that I have for families, with with kids with big emotions. That's Rachael dash bailey.com. I'll give you the link. So of course, and then I have a video series, a free video series for raising children with big emotions that I will give you as well, that parents can check out because a lot of the traditional strategies that work with other kids don't work with kids with big emotion. So I talk about that in there.

Nellie Harden: 00:35:59

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You have to take a bit of a different approach. And, you know, my my work that I do is always helping I look at childhood, especially the second half of childhood as life Ed, right. It's like not Driver's Ed, but it's life Ed, right. And we're getting them ready to go off into life. That's what we do. As parents, it's what we do as a family. It's what I dealt with in the wild, right when with those animal parents to in a much more raw sense, minus all the messy humaneness that we have, and the messy, beautiful humaneness, you know, that we have, and then just bringing that in there too, but having that confidence, respect and wisdom in order for them to go out and actually be able to, you know, live that life from the time they leave home and not have to have that weird 20s that they're like, I don't know what I'm supposed to do. And I messed up nine times, and you know, this, and that might still happen, absolutely might still happen. But you're going to have those, those building blocks before then. And that's what I see with you helping with these big emotion kids, too. And parents. So thank you so much for being on here. This was amazing. It's just such a great talk, and so needed because we have kids out there that definitely need us and parents. You guys are the highest impact, highest influence in their lives, and you can make a huge difference in their lives. All right. Well, thank you so much for being here, Rachel.

Rachel Bailey: 00:37:28

Thanks for having me.