As the mom to a six-year-old boy, I’ve recently noticed a failing in my conversational style: I don’t prompt him to talk about his feelings. For example, at school pickup, I toss out the question even adults tend to dread: How was your day? Or when he shares that something difficult happened, I can get easily lost in the nitty-gritty (i.e. what happened next? how can I help?) instead of cueing him to talk first about what made him upset. According to Sandra Whitehouse, a senior psychologist in the Anxiety Disorders Center at the Child Mind Institute, I need to make more of an effort to ask regular, concrete questions to encourage a feelings share.
In fact, she’s got one question I can start using every single day: What are today’s roses and thorns?
When I do this, I give him a safe, reliable place to unpack his day and a regular outlet to unload and articulate stressful and unresolved feelings. This is a critical stepping stone to the development of long-term emotional intelligence, she says.
But It’s not enough just to ask; I need to respond correctly, Whitehouse explains. “By keeping an easy manner throughout, you’re teaching your child that you’re not there to shame or judge or fix. Instead, you might help them label their feelings as they talk it out.” (For example, that playground squabble they want to tell you about? Your response: “Gosh, that sounds really frustrating.”)
After all, boys in particular tend to tamp down feelings, Whitehouse says, but “roses and thorns” can make it safe to share. “You’re basically teaching your son that you are interested in his point of view and available to hear it,” she explains.
I recently tried this with my own son. His rose? Playing a new game with his buddies at recess. His thorn? He’s not totally loving his reading partner at school. Our conversation took place on the walk home from pickup when he was focused and calm; I was also available and could help him sort through the positive and negative experiences of his day. (“That must have been exciting!” I responded when he told me about playing cops and robbers at the playground. “I remember feeling nervous when I had to read aloud,” I remarked about his classroom reading woe.)
The sharing was remarkably easy. And the emotional vocabulary that develops is just gravy.
