Dad, I’m Scared
How I got my son back to sleep tonight
This evening, I had a moment of connection with my son. He woke up screaming, “dad!”
A while back we watched Monsters, Inc. by Pixar—one of my favorites.
“Daddy!”
The main bad guy is Randall, that purple lizard character (shown above). Randall scares kids in the movie and he scared my little guy too.
“Daahaaad!”
I went in and in my calmest voice asked, “yes, what do you need?”
“I’m scared,” he said. And I could hear the lump in his throat—all tight and constricting his body from the inside. What an awful feeling. For me that would be like having an allergic reaction to shellfish and my throat closing up.
“Oh, okay,” I said, moving slowly as his body jerked like a puppet reaching for me.
Now my wife and I have talked about this, and I gained some good insight from her perspective. It’s something I’m still working on—not always holding a cold boundary when my kids ask for something. I make things worse when I express a disconnected version of a boundary. In other words, I’m all boundary, no empathy.
After all, I’m tired. It’s been a long day. I got them through dinner and to bed since my wife worked late. So I’m done with them on my end.
We got through some hard moments, though. Like the screaming at dinner about the gelatin stuff on the chicken. Or the fighting over who gets to hold the squishy toy.
We made our way, but there were some bumps for sure. Also, some sensitive guy moments for me, taking the words of my daughter literally. It’s not that her feelings are about me, it’s just that I let them in sometimes.
Ooof—I can get knocked over like a weeble wobble. But I rarely recover that fast.
In the end, there was this very important moment I want to share with you.
Instead of walking into my son’s room and saying, “go back to bed,” I softened my boundary. I allowed myself to be curious about his experience.
When I arrived he simply said, “I’m scared.”
As I picked up my son and took him to the chair where we would have a cuddle, I asked him, “what are you scared about?”
“Monster,” he said.
“Like one monster or a lot of monsters?” I asked.
“One monster,” he said.
“What does he look like?” I asked…
Now, check this out. I didn’t get this inquiry from a parenting tip. I got this from a book called, Feeding Your Demons: Ancient Wisdom for Resolving Inner Conflict. The book was written by Lama Tsultrim Allione, a student of the Tibetan Buddhism tradition. Within, and subsequently, in a workshop of hers I attended, the teaching follows a process like this:
Identify inner conflict to address;
Visualize inner conflict in form of a demon;
Start describing the demon in great detail;
Offer your energy to the demon as if to say, I accept you are here, let me nourish you;
And just like in Pixar’s Moana (spoiler alert), the demon may transform into an ally and stop acting out for attention.
If it sounds like hippie-stuff, that’s because it is. And I find it very effective for moving energy within my psyche and allowing things to shift so I have less inner stuckness. It is not a forceful practice, it is a try and observe practice.
Sometimes the demon transforms into an ally-type energy. Sometimes into an energy that is meant to simply be released.
…So as I asked my little guy to describe the monster, I’m following the basic question from that practice, known as "Chöd" which translates to "Cutting Through Ego."
“What does his skin look like?” I asked.
“Purple.”
“What do his eyes look like?”
“Scary,” he said.
“Is it the purple guy from Monsters Inc?”
“Yeah.”
Ever read the fairy tale, Rumplestiltskin? The lesson is this—when you name the demon, he loses his power over you.
“Mmm, you know I was scared of Randell too,” I said.
“When you were a little boy?”
“Yes.” I was improvising.
“Were you scared of nice movies?” he asked.
“No, just the scary movies.”
“Oh.”
And just like that, his body completely relaxed. He melted over my shoulder like a blanket.
“Okay, bub” I said. “Time to go night-night.”
“Okay.”
And I laid him down, pulled up the blankets, and haven’t heard a peep for at least two hours. Good sign.
How about you?
In the comments below, tell us about a time when you felt like you met your child where they were. A time when you stayed grounded, and helped them through a hard moment. What happened and what did you notice?
I was still pregnant when trying to figure out if I'd be the type of mom who lets her child cry it out or who's there for them, every single time, no matter what. I did some reading and decided that I'd follow the second approach. I knew how it works in theory but I didn't really understand it from experience.
One night, my kid was about 18 months old at the time, she starts crying as if someone was torturing her. It took me 2 seconds to get to her room and lie next to her, hugging her. She was crying in her sleep and it was actually quite scary. However, a moment later she stopped as if nothing has happened in the first place, smiled a little and continued to sleep. A few minutes later, I returned to my bed, thinking about the secure attachment that she had apparently started developing in response to my parenting style. At this moment, I knew I was doing my best to raise a child who would explore this world confidently and independently. Instead of fearing it and being cautious, it would be a safe place or her, one that is worth exploring.
It's beautiful when, as a parent, you can set aside the urgency, set aside the feeling "inconvenienced," set aside the internal time frame that occurs in adults, and be totally open hearted to your child's experience. I
n whatever moment that happens... its not uncommon that we're trying to, say, get shoes on (and we're already late heading wherever we're supposed to be), and then Quin will suddenly need all of his stuffed animals, or suddenly has to take the world's biggest dump, or any number of other things that suddenly arise when I'm really feeling like "YO, we need to get out the door." But slowing down, just hearing what he has to say.... and digging DEEPLY into the infinite patience that is, somehow, there even when I am couldn't imagine it possible. It's actually, for me, a practice....no better meditation I can think of - self connection, and then truly seeing the child.
And then in those moments, seeing my child in my state of deep self awareness....it's like a miracle. I can sit with all the feelings. I can connect to my own resistance and not allow it to manage my experience. And ultimately, a deeper bond is forged through your own self work.
Kind of a ramble...thanks for sharing your reflections.