How to Handle Big Feelings At Bedtime

Whether it's from a feisty 3-year-old or an anxious pre-teen, big feelings at bedtime can derail a perfectly planned evening to ourselves.

More importantly, none of us wants to see our kids struggle. But one truth we can remind ourselves of, no matter what the worry or full-blown tantrum, is that whatever your child is feeling is totally, completely okay.

Whenever one of my kids is having what seems like an illogical, overblown fear, I have to remind myself that the feeling itself is normal, acceptable and justified. Feelings are meant to be felt, not rationalized. (I say this, but I still regularly catch myself trying to talk them out of their bad-guy fears.)

While our kids' emotional outbursts or worries may not make perfect sense to us, they're usually perfectly in line with whatever stage of development they're in or what's happening in their lives.

(Of course not every behaviour is okay, and it's important we hold our boundaries on anything harmful.)

So, how do we handle our kids' big feelings in a way that gets bedtime back on track, tonight and in the nights ahead?

Here is a rule-of-thumb I've learned that always helps: Be the calm nervous system in the room.

All humans pick up 'cues' from the people around us, and no one does this better than children with their parents; our brains have been programmed to clock the nervous systems of the people around us, to check whether we're safe. And naturally, when our child is having a meltdown, our stress response turns on too.

But here's the trick: you can consciously turn down the volume on your own stress response by making sure you're breathing with your belly, and once in a while taking a few deeper breaths. After about three decent breaths, you'll become 'the calm nervous system in the room'. And your child can't help but pick up on that.

In other words, when they can't self-regulate, you can co-regulate.

Pretty soon, the volume on their own stress response will be lower, making it possible for them to actually think and listen and problem solve.

So whether your child is mid-meltdown or has just started to complain about bedtime, conscious belly breathing is the best tool I've found to get things back on track. Once they start to calm, you can distract them into their pyjamas or be the listening ear for their worries at school.

Your evening to yourself might get a slightly later start, but your child will feel seen and heard, and will start to develop an association with bedtime as a positive time to connect with their favourite person in the world.