Crying Children

I feel like this issue is just one more of the many topics that make parents feel like they are being judged or are wrong. There is not one right answer. Ever. I totally get that children communicate through crying. They also manipulate through crying. And the original question was a 3rd party observational report - I'm not convinced that grandmother even heard the mom correctly, her ears were so filled with judgment. Moreover, her report was a very biased depiction of the event - even if the mom said it, she had her reasons - they may have been good or they may have been bad. None of us were there or in her shoes to know the context.

I have a 12 year old who cries constantly. Some of it, she can't control - she cries easily, as I do, as my father does. It's something uncontrollable. She also has learned to manipulate with tears, and it completely sucks. So damn right, I tell her to knock it off. But only I can recognize when it's appropriate to say that and when it's not. No one has the right to judge my situation without being in it all day, every day.

oh i'm totally with you. a child crying in sadness or fear will get comfort. a child crying in frustration will get understanding, then an expectation to get on with it. a child crying to get her own way will get a quiet firm 'off you go to make this noise in private. i'll be happy to see you again when you're finished.'
i don't really subscribe to 'whatever it takes to get the crying to stop as quickly as possible.' there ARE situations where a good cry is called for, and i don't think parents need to jump through hoops. if the child's crying is disruptive, the child needs to be taken somewhere else.
but for the most part you and i are on the same page.
khairete
S.

One of my kids was a crier, and when he was sad I just allowed him to cry. I comforted him a little, and then allowed him to cry and long as he wanted to. He wasn't screaming or having a fit, just crying, so I figured it was his business if he wanted to cry.

I'm not familiar with the post you reference, so I'll just give my answer straight:

I don't have a hard line about crying. My goal as a parent is to help my child to feel safe, secure, able to depend on me, and to help him learn resilience as he grows. So yes, when he was an infant and toddler, I was very responsive to crying. As he got older, I could sometimes give empathy ("I know, you really like the park, let's say goodbye to the swings and slide, they will be here next time.") and sometimes, it was more "well, I guess he's going to have to scream in the stroller as we are walking away, because he's mad to be there and he won't walk" and just ignored it.

I think kids are little people who need to express themselves, and hopefully, as their parents, we can help them do it as appropriately as possible. Sometimes, it's going to be awful, esp. when they are sincerely sad that they have to leave off something fun or can't have a desired item. There's a difference between sad crying and a self-indulgent tantrum. Their developing brains haven't really progressed beyond "fight or flight" and "loss=pain" responses, so the anger of a two year old is processed in the part of the brain which processes pain; the anger of a seven year old (as my son is now) is more easily listened to (they have better expressive skills), can be addressed with problem-solving strategies and is less likely to have a profound or long-term impact because the child is more mature.

All that to say, much of how I deal with tears is related to what I know of child/brain development and the individual child's level of development. Keeping in mind, too, any significant transitions which may be happening in the child's life. I was a nanny and preschool teacher for years and so I worked with children going through various transitions; they each needed to be individually considered. Transitions often throw children off and threaten their sense of security and predictability-- that child needs more empathy and guidance than they go separation.

My motto is to 'never, ever try to reason with a tantrum'. I just give him a place to have the tantrum safely and walk away. Tantrums mean that a child's emotions have become out of control, even for them-- not a time for a long discussion.

I will also say that while *I* might think there's 'no good reason' in the moment, I do try to consider not just the one incident which started the crying, but the whole of the day. If it's been one disappointment after another, it CAN be a little, insignificant-to-us-adults thing which will set kids off. Then, I'll offer some empathy and see if I can't throw them a bone by helping them consider what they have to look forward to. Because we all have bad days--- kids just process it differently than adults. Adults may not cry in the face of disappointment, but I have seen parents pick at their kids for every little thing out of misplaced frustration or anger. We are just as much of a problem sometimes as the kids can be, just in different ways.

I find it's better for me to parent with an open heart and being aware, trying to connect to what the 'root' of the problem is than for me to have any hard and fast rules. Self-indulgent behavior -- my son has the option of cooling it or taking it to his room, and I also try to make sure that I'm clued in enough to know what's troubling him.

ETA: I see your SWH. I guess what I'm wondering is if the kid needed to just hang out and watch for the first couple of sessions. Some kids are observers. Don't know....I know my son took some time to warm up to jumping into his judo class at the beginnings, now he readily joins, he's seven. Each kid has their own personality and their own anxieties. If he'd cried, I would have removed him to outside instead of telling him to stop crying. Dunno...

When my son cries, I let him. Who am I to decide whether his crying has enough of an impetus that it is acceptable to me. Once, I had flown back from HI, had a red eye and arrived home at maybe 10 am. DH said something to me (probably something highly offensive like 'you look tired') and I completely lost it. More tears than I had seen in decades. And my husband was sensible enough to realize that telling me not to cry would have been just about the world's stupidest decision ever.

My son can cry when he doesn't get his way. He is likely sad and/or frustrated and he can and should experience these emotions when he doesn't get something he wants. When he is human again, we can move on.

While I do strongly believe children should be able to cry, I do NOT believe crying children should disrupt other people. Parents should immediately remove their crying children from restaurants and other venues. It annoys me no end when people waste time trying to stop their wailing children from disrupting an entire restaurant rather than scooping them up and taking them out.

I believe that the smartest thing a parent can do is to teach their child that their emotions are their own. While they are babies, yes, a parent has a special role in soothing, meeting emotional and physical needs, and teaching the baby to self soothe. This further evolves when they become toddlers, teaching them to start being a part of meeting their own emotional and physical needs, and becoming more adept at self soothing. And as they grow and mature, these skills also mature. Parents are supposed to take a back seat in meeting the child's emotional and physical needs, as well as self soothing, teaching the child to do it themselves.

This isn't about how much crying I will tolerate. To me, it's important that my kids' crying (and any other emotional response) be appropriate to the situation and their level of maturity. If it isn't, I know that I have some work to do as their mother. I have to guide them the right way to help them to recognize the appropriateness of their emotional response, to take ownership of their role in the situation, and how to manage it.

My job as a parent is to raise my child into an emotionally healthy and mature adult, so I respond to them with that in mind.

If my child is hurt then crying is totally normal.
If my child's feelings are hurt then crying is totally normal.
If my child is scared then it's normal.
If my child is trying to manipulate me, get me to do something, throwing a tantrum, then she better pipe down. Mama don't play that.
L.

Well, for newborns and babies- I generally can tolerate quite a bit, esp in public places. As a mom whose baby had severe colic, I understand that babies sometimes cry for no reason at all. In fact, I can hone in on a colic cry in a split second and I usually try to give words of encouragement to the mom. I have been there with the disapproving looks and the parents think that I am neglecting my baby. So frustrating.
For toddlers- if the child is hurt or scared. But not throwing a tantrum. When my kids want to cry for no good reason, I make them go in their rooms to get it all out. I tell them not to come out until the tears are gone.
School aged- very little outside of hurt or scared. My son is a very sensitive kid who will cry when he's not winning the basketball game or feels frustrated. I don't get upset with him, but try to teach him skills to redirect those tears.

Thankfully mine isn't prone to crying in that fashion. He brushes off most boo boos, and those which bring tears, can be resolved with something cold for a count of 10.

If he is protesting, he tends to whine. Whining is a form of complaint which is easier to handle. I just remind him that I can't understand him if he whines, and ignore until he stops. It usually doesn't last a minute. If it goes longer than that, I tell him that he is making my ears hurt, and he'll have to go to a time out if he can't stop whining. I've only had to make good on that threat once.

I am not opposed to your approach in principle, but would find it harder to apply if it were crying I was contending with.

Best,
F. B.

First, I suggest that we, most of the time, are unable to know when crying is legitimate or not. Yes, crying can be an attempt to manipulate. Deal with the mmanipulation. Leave the tears out of your response.

When a child appears to be crying to manipulate I suggest that ignoring the tears is the way to stop the tears most quickly. My daughter and her husband send the kid to their room, something I thought was a good idea. Now that I'm just an observer I see that this starts a new round of more intense tears. Now I completely ignore the tears meaning I don't even notice they're crying and the tears stop almost immediately. I do have to be actively doing something. I may go get a drink or start picking up clutter.

Often what parents call as no good reason really does have a good reason. If you don't ever give in to tears I suggest that the child is crying from frustration or disappointment. I briefly sympathize. "I know you're disappointed" or "that would make me mad too" and then either ignore ir distract.

I believe it's always important to acknowledge feelings, our own and our children's. When tears get on a parent's nerves I suggest saying "I can't listen to those tears. Please go to your room. I've noticed it's easy to judge the child's tears to be manipulative when they may not. When we decide the child's motivation and get it wrong we are discounting their feelings. We are telling thttp://health.alot.com/conditions/shingles-information--3hem they are wrong to feel that way. Really, do we know how anyone is feeling? We can deal with the tears without assigning blame or motive. In a neutral tone say, "I don't want to hear you crying. Either stop or go somewhere else."

I haven't seen the post to which you refer but based on what you report I suggest the girl had good reason to cry. She wanted to stay. She was angry is my guess. She was probably telling her mother to let her stay. So let her cry and not respond to her pleas. Mom follows thru. Mom knows leaving is a natural consequence and that daughter will learn from this. It's also natural for daughter to be upset. If tears/attitude is upsetting to mom then she can say, again in a neutral or better in a sympathetic tone, say, "I've had enough with the tears. Please stop." If daughter is pleading then telling her to stop is not about feelings. It's about inappropriate behavior. I suggest there is a natural consequence for that. "I don't want to hear any more from you." Then stop the car and get out. Tell child we'll be on our way when you stop begging.

I know what I've written sounds lengthy. It isn't should be over with in a few minutes. It's the deciding motive and trying to get child to stop that takes up time. We get hooked into the emotion. Our discipline can be clean and quick when we insist the inappropriate behavior stops. It's OK to cry. It's not OK to try to change my mind.

Re: safety issue. Stop the car and wait til crying subsides. If it's a temper tantrum also stop the car and wait.

Would you post the address for the original question, please.

I take issue with the idea of "appropriate crying". Humans cry in response to different emotions. Some times it is wonder, happiness, contentment, or even love. Other times it is from a place of anger, hurt, sadness, or frustration. It is a completely normal human response. We do a disservice to our kids and ourselves by not allowing them/us to really feel our emotions. The reason so many adults are so emotionally stunted and unavailable is because we are told not to show or feel our emotions as children.

Of course if crying is because of sadness or hurt it is kind and good to provide comfort to help them through the emotion, but telling someone they are not allowed to cry? That they are not allowed to show a normal human emotional response? That it is "inappropriate"? I am not okay with that.

Well my Mom's approach was to tell us when we were crying over nothing.
She'd tell us 3 times to stop, take a breath, pull ourselves together.
Then she'd say 'If you want something to cry about I'll GIVE you something to cry about" and if it went beyond that then we'd get a spanking and "There! NOW you have something to cry about!".
As a kid I absolutely HATED that.
But as a parent I absolutely KNOW where she was coming from.
It took a few sessions of this but we learned to calm down when we were warned and not to push Mama's buttons.
If we were crying over a scraped knee or bee sting, we'd get comforting, first aid and sympathy.
Fortunately our son has always been pretty even tempered and not given to nonsense so I never had to do what my Mom had to resort to.

The sad thing about that post is the mother was trying to push a child into an activity she wasn't ready for, therefore the mother was to blame for making the 4 yr old miserable. Of course someone probably made the young mother feel signing her 4 yr old up for an organized activity made her a great mom...
I feel sorry for the kids at the grocery store at 8:40 at night (my son still falls apart around 8 and he's 9 so I just dont take him on errands past his bedtime, not that he cries just that he looks so miserable and begins to talk a little whiny- I do not accept whine) the hungry, need-a-nap toddlers, they have every right to cry and hopefully their parents will get the message. Even a temper tantrum is a frustration, an upset child, and I wouldn't insist they stop crying unless they are faking it, or way too old. I just would NOT give in to the tantrum and give them what they want or take them where they want or ...whatever, go cry in your room, in the car, whatever.

I don't think I could condense it to just a couple ideas.

Like crying newborns at a restaurant, kind of irks me because newborns cry when they need something, they don't do it to ruin your meal or it was just a good time to cry. So a mom sitting there ignoring their baby's needs while we all pay attention but can't do a thing is a little annoying. That and you can't help but feel bad for the poor red faced thing.

If kids hurt themselves of course they will cry. You tend to them, they stop. I don't really like the kids that then start with the attention seeking loud whining about their injuries but that is my issue so I suck it up. :-/

Now temper tantrums, if you can't shut it down take them outside!! In my experience the only moms that stay in the store with the tantruming kid following along gives in by the frozen food section so don't tell me you are teaching them a lesson, you are making us suffer and then teaching your child that if he can keep it up you will give him what he wants by the frozen food section!

Oh but the worst! and I don't see that often, the tantruming kid that mom sends away from them and towards others. Ya know, the go over there if you are going to have a fit? Err, your kid lady! Why the hell should I have to hear that in stereo while you quietly sip your latte?

Oh, myself...yeah my reading skills suck this morning. Myself, I never let my kids cry around people. Even when they hurt themselves I just reminded them to breath and they started focusing on that while I cleaned them up or whatever. Tantrums, if I couldn't shut it down in under a minute they went outside. Even in grocery stores I parked my cart by customer service, told them be right back and took the tyrant outside. Usually only took a few minutes for them to remember they are humans.

For me, it's completely situtuational.

If I feel like she has a valid reason to be crying, I try to help her find a different way to express herself or fix the problem; but if she just needs to cry, I generally comfort her/allow her time to feel whatever she is feeling. I also have a pretty liberal view on what I feel deserves a few tears- I recognize hat I may not understand everything that is going on with her, and she may have a "reason" I don't understand. Flat-out manipulation is pretty much my one absolute no tears reason. Heck, even at the store... She may shed a few tears when I tell her no toy. I empathize with her a bit-"I know it's disappointing when you really want something you can't have, but you don't get everything you ask for. You already know that." And allow her to (quietly) cry it off as long as she doesn't become excessively loud or carry on for an unreasonable amount of time. (She is usually done by the time we reach the next aisle. Lol.) then I will start putting a stop to it. I do encourage her to use her words instead of crying, and she has become pretty good about expressing herself verbally instead of immediately resorting to tears.

If she doesn't have a reason that I can discern, then it depends on what my fuse is like that day and what situation we are in. If we are out and about I am much less patient and expect her to behave appropriately and may very well tell her flat out that she needs to stop. If we are at home, I may be more patient in explaining why her crying isn't acceptable for certain situations... But if she insists on carrying on she gets to do it in her room. When she comes out is entirely up to her- she stops crying, she can come out. It has gotten to the point now that when she starts crying over silly things, she will just go straight to her room to cry. She also knows that as long as she is calm, she can come to me and say that she needs a hug and she will be comforted.

It also depends on the TYPE of crying (when unwarranted) If it's quiet crying, I typically let it slide more than I do the loud, yelling, look-at-me cries. I shut that down in a hurry and she loses any chance she had at whatever it is she was crying over in the first place.

I think it was appropriate to tell her to stop.

IMO, it depends on why she is crying and what she is crying about. I try not to say "big girls don't cry" or "that's dumb to cry about". My child cries and has had problems managing her emotions in school, and sometimes just the word "no" will set her off, so we work very very hard with her on appropriate times to cry. Not getting her way is not something she should wail about.

If DD did something inappropriate and doesn't like the consequences, I will tell her to knock it off. IMO, I think "whatever it takes to make it stop" is not always appropriate. Sure, I could give in to DD, but would that be more than a bandaid? If she bashed her head on something, that is different, but crying because she didn't want to go to dance class (that she begged for and I paid for and drove 40 minutes for) is not something where I'm going to "oh, poor baby you" her about. If she wants to be home with me vs going to school, I'm not going to tell her she can play hookey.

DD is welcome to go calm down somewhere else if she needs to cry (at home) about some frustration. But crying that disturbs her team or class or crying that interferes with my driving is not acceptable. I can tell the difference between noise crying and real crying. If she's just making noise, she can shut it off.

I wouldn't want someone telling me when it's okay to cry and when it isn't. Sometimes a person just feels at the end of his or her rope for one reason or another. If I feel like crying, I am going to cry.

Awwwwww, most of the fun of T-Ball is watching them in the outfield picking flowers, digging in the dirt, or doing cartwheels.

T-Ball is a learning experience. It's not actually meant to be a competitive sport. It's purpose is to introduce kids to a group/team sport where they can make friends, learn a few simple rules, get the ball a couple of times during the whole season, maybe even hit the ball when it's pitched instead of on the T.

It's a slow non-competitive game to introduce kids to sports. I haven't ever even had kids playing where they kept score.

It's too bad the parents of this kiddo tried to push them too hard. Now they'll probably not want to play ball again. T-Ball is only for fun not for serious play.

Kids this age really should be having a good time while being present. They don't need to stand in a certain position, yell Heeeeeyyyyy batabatabata, they need to be free to enjoy it and play along with the playing.

There is plenty of time for kids to play serious sports and compete.

I pretty much just have to say crocodile tears and my girls know that I am fully aware that they are crying to try to manipulate the situation. They know that doesn't work so they stop in pretty short order. I think most parents recognize the fake cry and some give in and some don't. My 4 year old still tries turns crocodile sometimes, my 7 year old is over it.

I enforced appropriate times to cry as well. I did not allow bratty tantrums for not getting your way. To me it's one of life's most valuable self-control lessons and if you don't do it young, it only gets harder later. I would never have made it through toddlerhood hauling three kids with me on every errand with no family near by or child care help if I was dragging around wailing kids and ignoring their tantrums or being dictated by them and staying home... There's a time for nurturing and a time for discipline. I was raised the same way and my whole extended family is the same, so it depends on what people feel is appropriate based on their own lives. I don't mind if other people let their kids cry their heads off whenever they want, but I didn't personally allow it. I think my dad had to ask me, "Do I have to give you something to cry about?" about once, and I knew he meant it so off I went on my merry way....

I am similar to you.
My 4 yr old DD cries all the time in what I refer to as her "fake cry", when she's not getting her way or just doesn't like it if I've told her no. That happens roughly 100 times/day. And I have no patience or tolerance for little "fits" like that when she doesn't get her way. I will tell her that if she cries, she is going to her room.

Now...scared, tired, hungry, hurt, etc... Of course she can cry and of course I will comfort her.

But anything resembling a temper tantrum. Absolutely not.

And I agreed with the mother's response to the poster yesterday. I would have told her to stop in that circumstance as well.