Welcome to Home Education Matters, the weekly podcast supporting you on your home education journey.

Hello and welcome to another episode of Home Education Matters.

And today is going to be the first in our look at supporting your child's well being.

And not just your child's well being, but your well being as well as.

There's nothing more pressured than being at home on your own with your children when they're having a bit of a meltdown, you're having a bit of a meltdown and everything feels really overwhelming all of a sudden.

So I thought I would bring Charlotte Webb on today.

Charlotte Webb is a psychologist.

I did, yeah.

Psychologist, therapist, many hats to help guide.

Us through this is Charlotte Webb.

And Charlotte Webb is going to be telling us some of her top strategies for helping us with overwhelm.

And Charlotte, first of all, thank you so much for joining us on Home Education Matters.

Do tell us a little bit about your home education journey.

Okay, so I trained as, originally I trained as forensic psychologist.

I quickly realized that that was not a bit of me and I was very scared at the prospects of working with really traumatized prisoners.

And I quickly changed my mind very, very swiftly.

I went back to uni, I did a masters in clinical Child psychology.

I did loads of extra courses on top dbt, cbt, yada yada, yada yada.

I then my.

I'd always loved the idea of home ed.

My eldest is, he's now nearly 14.

He's autistic and ADHD and school never seemed to sit right.

It was always very, you know, it just, it just felt wrong from even.

I had him very young and I was only 20 when he went to school.

And even at 20 I was like this, I don't like this.

Why am I leaving my baby for six hours today?

This is really strange.

Anyway, obviously as society provides, you just follow suit and do as you're told to do and yada yada.

So he went to school and then my, I had my next two children and it wasn't until my second one got to year two I started realizing, okay, my children are not suited for this environment.

They're too emotional.

You know, I'm not a strict parent, I'm not an authoritarian parent.

I don't do the whole punishment system, all of that.

So it was a completely unknown social cue to them.

They didn't know any of it because we don't do it at home.

Right.

So they didn't know that that was a normal thing.

My eldest, because he's autistic, he probably chameleons A little bit where he just sort of blends in with his environment and does what everybody else is doing.

But my next one down, she does not.

She is not fit for the crowd.

She doesn't blend.

She is a product of me, me only.

And she's not in the box by any imagination.

So she started to really struggle.

And then my third one went to school.

And she is the epitome of adhd, bless her.

If you put her name next to the word ADH, PhD, it probably matches up very well because she is just.

She's like Tigger.

She just bounces, just constantly.

Love her.

And she was only at school for six weeks and the teacher came out to me and was like, oh, she's going to really struggle next year, isn't she?

And I was like, right, that's it, I'm done.

I was like, I'm not doing this.

I was like, this is silly.

I've done this with three kids.

I'm not doing this anymore.

So I pulled them out that I'd had the baby.

He was only, I think he was only about three weeks old.

And I was just like, you know what?

My masters is nearly done.

Let's just do this, Pull these out.

Let's just see what happens.

And that was nearly two years ago now.

And we've been living our best life for two years the whole way through.

I did do in lockdown.

I didn't send my kids to school at all.

So even when they were meant to be going back, I kept them at home.

So we had sort of like a year trial run of home ed anyway, which obviously looking back now, I did really well.

But at the time I was being told that I was doing everything wrong, which now I'm like, oh, no, this is fine, we're all fine.

So, yeah, so now we're on year two and the kids are just so much better.

They'll talk more in public and they meltdowns, especially for this episode, meltdown wise.

We used to have daily meltdowns.

We used to have daily meltdowns all the time, all three kids.

And I struggled to know what to do because I didn't have a clue.

And even my work at the time, where I'd been doing adults, they don't really teach you much about how to deal with it.

So I then had to adapt my own strategies and research lots of strategies and go on extra courses and join seminars and all the rest of it.

And then I then started up my business doing therapy for kids and parents to sort of coach them through any issues that they've got going on.

It's kind of worked out that I now sort of specialize in neurodivergence in a roundabout way.

I think just because my children are.

And a lot of children in my area in home ed are, so I end up having quite a lot of those through the door.

So it's, it's kind of.

I've rolled it all into one and just created this big, big, big, big landing net of.

Yeah.

Work and home ed coaching.

And now I'm running home ed trips and a group and we've just opened a home ed center.

Yeah.

So we're now full go steam ahead.

Busy, busy, busy.

You're one of these people, right, that has like a hundred projects on the go at one time and like a football team of children that you're home educating, basically.

Yes, all of the.

Very cool.

I think I'm on Project 5 at.

The moment, just in case, God forbid, you're quiet at any point in your day.

And I can't cope with being quiet.

If I'm quiet, I don't know what to do.

And then I'm doing something else because I'm like, oh, well, if I just do this.

And then my husband's like, what are you doing now?

Just stop, just put it down.

But I can't, can't sit still.

Yeah.

So it's.

Yes, but a lot of hats.

But I now focus on helping home ed mums deal with children.

Any issues that they have, especially with other people, that seems to be coming through quite a lot.

The outside influences and opinions that people have in their life just seem to be really negative and horrible.

So I actually started a thing on my Facebook, like a theme on my Facebook where I posted the activities that me and my children are doing and I link it up with the actual curriculum from the government and sort of explain to people how they can cross over curriculum.

So when people say to them, oh, well, you know, they're not going to learn anything, and it's like, well, actually we're still kind of doing curriculum, but we're just not doing it in your standard way of sitting at a desk and writing 10 ton of crap on papers.

But yeah, it's, it's, you know, it's just teaching them a different way to look at it, which I think people need.

I think it can be reassuring, particularly with relatives that have opinions, like you say, about home ed, for you to be able to say, oh, well, actually we went to this group today and we covered this bit of the Curriculum, that bit of the curriculum.

It's a shame that we have to do that, but realistically, sometimes, sometimes we do.

Right, so.

So you mentioned about meltdowns there.

And I know that today we're going to be covering techniques to really sort of go through the arc of a meltdown.

So we're going to start with ones that might help prevent it, what to do in the midst of it, and then maybe what to do afterwards to kind of settle things down and consolidate.

So Charlotte, what is your first technique or tip for us to use if we feel that a meltdown is coming?

Yeah, so if we're.

So we all know our signs of our children, right?

Like we can all see when our kids are starting to get a little bit flustered, a little bit overwhelmed.

Especially if you have young children, it's normally being tired or hungry or bored or whatever the situation is.

As they get older, you, you can kind of gauge by language.

And you know, I, I know with my six year old now that if she starts to like grunt or make funny noises, I'm like, oh, okay, there's something going on here.

She's losing the ability to speak.

So let's figure out what it is.

I play this really cool game with all of my clients and on my online classes, it's called the five Senses game.

And you can sort of use it as a pre preventative measure.

If you can see it starting to go a bit ski whiff and you think, oh, need to catch this before it blows up.

So you.

It's really easy.

You can do it wherever, whenever.

I've done it in the car, I've done it out in the street, I've done it at home.

You can do it wherever because you, it can be adapted to your environment.

So you ask them to go and find something they can see, something they can feel, something they can hear, smell and taste.

Lots of kids cheat and bring me one thing that they can do all five with which if they do that, I do say that to you, I do say that to them that you know, as long as you can explain to me what each bit is and what it smells like or tastes like, then I will let you have it.

But I would like five different things.

However, when you're dealing with an autistic PDA kid that if you've told them five, they then go, I don't want to get five, I want to get two.

And I'm like, okay, fine, you can have two, let's just smell it, shall we?

But the idea behind it is that when you ground with your senses, you lock into your nervous system a little bit and you can touch on the inside without realizing that you're touching on the inside.

So if they're feeling a little bit, you know, icky with whatever it is, or even if they don't know what it is that they're feeling a lot of the time, if I play that and then afterwards my, my third one will be like, oh, mom, actually I'm hungry.

I'm like, there we go.

There it is.

So you've locked into your senses, you've listened to your body, you've paid attention to how you're feeling, and then you can now tell me what's wrong.

It can get you out of a jam, hopefully, is the plan.

Obviously kids don't always, it doesn't always go to plan, but yeah, using it as a preventative measure can sometimes get you caught it before it goes overboard a little bit.

Yeah.

And it's a lovely, it's a lovely kind of kinesthetic way to build in that 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, DBT approach of five things you can see, four things you can.

I can never remember.

Whichever way around.

Yes, yeah, yeah.

I always say to my clients, it doesn't really matter.

Honestly, the order does not matter.

It's a distraction technique.

So, yeah, it's.

That's a really nice idea that you get the children going around looking for things that will cover these different senses.

Okay.

So we've got that period in the run up where you think something's going awry and so you've maybe tried to distract them and then you've got the period when they're just kind of on the cusp.

But now one thing I like to recommend with my clients is, is nervous system regulation.

This is really nice.

I think for older children, younger children, I, I find struggle a little bit sometimes with this, but.

But for children over the age of about 10ish, I find that a nervous system regulation can be a really nice preventative.

It can just sort of settle all the tension down in the body.

It is really good for parents as well, I find, because we can find.

We know we are on high alert, so we notice, okay, there's something happening now.

We then get triggered.

Our nervous system starts getting sort of quite flooded.

And what I like.

There's two nervous system regulation techniques that are probably my favorites.

One is the peripheral vision technique.

I don't know if you've ever, have you ever come across this one?

I think I have, yeah.

Yeah.

It's like, it's like a sniper one.

So what you have to do is you have to look at a spot straight ahead and slightly up.

And then you have to really focus on it for about 10 seconds.

Then you have to soften your gaze for about 10 seconds.

And then what you do is you bring your awareness to two points on your periphery, but you keep your eyes looking straight ahead.

Now this is such a lovely one.

A lot of my clients like it.

You get a kind of almost like an elevator drop feeling in your nervous system.

If you get that, you know it's working for you.

So it's 10 seconds focus straight ahead, 10 seconds blurring your eyes, and then 10 seconds just with an awareness of two things on your periphery.

You can put your fingers up at your periphery or you can just notice something sort of in at the sides of your room.

That's a really nice one.

It doesn't work for everybody.

And some children particularly who have eye issues, they won't like it.

So I always have a backup, which is something along the lines of the Americans call it like instant noodles or something.

Or like cooked noodles or something.

I prefer cooked spaghetti.

And it's this idea that, you know, when you cook spaghetti and you put it on a plate and it's all just like flip, like flurpy.

You tense all your muscles in your body and then you try to like spaghetti them.

Yeah, you'd like flurp everything.

Now the only caveat I will say is if you do this with young children, they can do wheeze, which is like the last thing you want to do because everything relaxes.

But it is really nice and it's quite fun.

And you can kind of like say, oh, let's, let's do the kind of cook spaghetti thing.

And it's very quick.

So I think both of those nervous system regulation things are quite nice to tuck in if you feel like things are getting very heightened.

Maybe they're feeling quite tense, a bit shouty, or you're feeling tense and a bit shouty.

I think something like a nervous system regulation technique like that can be good.

So we've got the five Senses game.

Yeah, we've got a nervous system regulation.

What about then when you're more sort of towards the height of the main.

The main event.

The main.

Yeah, the main goal.

Exactly.

So actually using what.

What you just said, one of them that ties in with that is dancing or singing.

So the same.

Same as what you're saying, instead of like where you tense your body, just start randomly dancing and flapping and singing.

Some.

I mean, my kids look at me like I've lost my mind when I do it.

They do look at me like, what on earth are you doing?

But sometimes you just need to dance it out, because if you're going to shout, it's a lot better to sing or to dance than it is to shout.

So get out of the way.

Literally, if it's in the car with my kids, I turn my volume up full blast so I can't hear any of them speaking and I just sing at the top of my lungs.

And then eventually they all start copying and then everyone's calmed down and we're all fine.

If it's not a situation where you can do very big dancing and very big singing, breathing is a really good one.

So I always have done box breathing.

You can demonstrate it quite easily wherever you are, because you need a square.

Right.

So most things are a square.

You got your phone, a bank card, what, whatever it is that you've got.

Something square.

You don't have to have anything physical, but just having something is a little bit more visually effective.

You have a square and you do.

In for four, hold for four, out for four, hold for four.

And you track it along the square.

Yeah, obviously, if you're, you know, older kids, again, like you said, older kids, you can just tell and they.

They get on with it quite easy.

Younger kids need a little reminder sometimes.

I actually bought these square stickers.

They were from, I don't know, Teemo or some nonsense, wherever.

And you.

They're like, you know, a bit like Braille, like what Braille feels like.

Like the bumps, they're like that, they're a square and they've got the arrows.

So I have them stuck like, you know, places, so that if I'm in anywhere and need to use them quickly, they're always there.

But, yeah, you can use a phone, a card, a box, a paper, whatever, but just the.

In for four, hold for four.

Sometimes you're gonna get to the point where your kids are not listening to it and, you know, especially if we're in full height, we're at top tether.

They're not going to listen, they're not going to see it, they're not going to hear it, they're just too far gone.

But that's when you modeling it sometimes can help.

So even little, little kids, you know, babies, just holding them or sitting them on your lap and you doing 1, 2, 3, 4, you will start to feel that their breathing will eventually start to catch up with yours and they will Get a little bit calmer.

A lot of the time in that situation, less is more.

So less words are gonna, you know, if you're giving it all, oh, I can see that you're feeling really.

They're gone.

They haven't heard it.

They've heard the first two words and they've gone.

So just sometimes you're angry right now, then breathing, you.

It can just cut off the big meltdown.

Obviously, neurodivergent cases are slightly different, but for the most part, meltdowns, if you escalate it with more shouting or more arguing, it's just going to keep building and building and building and building.

It's not ever going to come down until the point where you're both exhausted of shouting at each other and then that's it.

Everyone just cries for the rest of the afternoon.

So, yeah, doing box breathing, there is more techniques than just box breathing.

I always type in on YouTube, like breathing for kids, and there's loads of fun videos that come up.

There's like a lion one where you have to like, roar like a lion instead of breathing.

I use those on my online classes just because it keeps it a bit more fun rather than keep doing the box breathing with them again.

But, yeah, there's loads on there.

There's lions and bears and whatever.

It's all still the same technique of breathing, but sometimes just quickly grabbing your phone, YouTube breathing video and sticking it in front of them, they will then learn to breathe it out.

And it's all, it's all a coping mechanism for when they're older, because if you get it into them enough when they're younger, eventually they'll just start to use it without even thinking when they're older.

So, yeah, two birds with one stone and all that jazz.

Yeah.

And I think a lot, I think a lot of.

A lot of the techniques that you use when they're young and they're having meltdowns, realistically, they're probably still going to have a bit of a meltdown and.

And you may not even make it that much better, but you are modeling really good behavior.

And so that when they do get older, they remember that, oh, what was it that Mummy always did or always said I should do, or things like that.

Because realistically, in a meltdown, my children didn't have many, but I know that when they did, there was very little intervention that was going to be of much help.

Yeah, a little bit at the start, a little bit at the end, but in the middle you just have to kind of ride that Roller coaster a bit.

Yeah.

There's not much that you can do to get them out of it, but there is a lot that you can do to not make it worse.

That's, that's probably the important part is that you're probably going to have the meltdown regardless.

It's going to happen.

You need to let it ride out because the more you shout, the more stressed you get, the more you're.

Then, you know, if you're screaming, well, now you can't have this or now you can't have that.

Whatever it is that you're trying to do to get them to see reasoning, that part of the brain at that point, it, it's not switched on.

So you're trying to reason with a part of the brain that is not turned on.

So it's never gonna, it's never gonna work.

You're never gonna have reason in the part of the brain that reasons that then shut down.

It's just, this is going to be completely pointless for everyone.

Yeah, exactly.

Because your, your brain is not focusing on that kind of prefrontal cortex.

Like let me be rational and reasonable.

So I'm getting, we will segue off very slightly then in the middle of this meltdown to talk very briefly about the things we shouldn't be doing.

So we shouldn't be escalating it by matching in.

And, and this is why a lot of these techniques that maybe not running around the house yourself looking for sensory stuff, although that could be fun, but certainly nervous system regulation and breathing is a good thing for parents to do as well.

So don't escalate, don't suppress it by sort of like shutting it down.

Don't feel, don't ignore it.

So my rule is kind of acknowledge, empathize, and then I'd probably call it resting.

You need a good acronym.

Yeah, I need, I need to think of a, of a thing.

Because you need to acknowledge it first.

That's how we don't create, you know, self esteem issues and internalization and yada yada, yada.

We need to make sure that we not.

They know that we've heard them.

So, you know, we need, they need to know.

Okay, Mommy's listened.

She knows I'm angry.

Yeah.

Okay, cool.

I can hear you.

You're screaming like you get it, you're angry.

Simple things with that, you know, oh, you really wanted that toy.

Oh, you really wanted that book.

Oh, that little girl's got that and you wanted it.

Those sorts of things.

That's just acknowledging it.

Fine, Done.

Then you need to empathize with it.

It's really hard when someone has something that you want, tell them how it is, how you feel to match what it is that they are feeling.

One thing parents forget that I deal with quite a lot.

They forget that these are little children.

They haven't lived through bills and rent and all of that.

Literally that toy in that moment is the most important thing in their whole existence.

And if someone else has got it, that's like someone's just walked into their house and burnt it down.

But they are mad.

They're mad mad.

They're not even just a little bit mad, they're super mad because it's the only thing that they know.

It's very nice for parents to empathize on a level that they get.

And then, yeah, resting, ride in the storm, whatever we're going to call the last bit.

But let them be upset, let them have the tantrum, let them have the meltdown, let them kick and scream.

Importantly, another one, keep everyone's body safe.

So if we're hitting and throwing and doing whatever that can't be allowed.

So, you know, if we need to move them away or we need to move ourselves away and just saying, I need to keep my body safe right now, I'm going to stand up so that you don't hit me or, you know, you're not being very kind, you're hitting.

I'm going to move you away from the situation.

It doesn't need to be a big thing.

It doesn't need to be a punishment.

It doesn't need to be anything like that.

It just needs to be a simple.

Just room check.

Are we safe?

Is there any adverse objects that are going to get thrown at my head at any point and then the rest is just riding it out.

And it depends a lot on the child as well.

I know that with my two children, my son liked distance.

He liked space and distance.

My daughter liked to be held close and tight.

And you, you'll know that through a certain amount of trial and error, because if you try it and they hate it, you're like, okay, so, so that's not, not a good move.

I noticed that when you're talking about empathizing, that comes on to what I was thinking about not escalating, not suppressing and not shaming.

So guessing that the empathizing is part of this.

It's okay.

It's all right.

And actually the next technique I was going to talk about, which is a really good one, I think, for, for the parents as well.

A really good one is art slightly after the event, or, you know, just.

Just on the sort of the tail end of it.

That's right.

What was it Churchill said?

It's not the beginning of the end, it's the end of the beginning.

So, like, kind of more towards the beginning of the end.

I think naming what you.

What you're feeling is really important, particularly for parents, actually, because I know that you.

You work with children.

I. I don't work with children.

I only work with adults.

And I find that.

Just saying I'm feeling angry because I'm feeling angry, because I'm feeling sad, because I'm afraid that.

And just getting these emotions out, particularly as a parent, because we can focus everything on our child and then we just bottle everything up.

And then we go to bed that night and we're like, wow, I am wound up tight.

Yeah.

And then.

And if anything else happens, then we're at full pelt anyway, so the slightest thing and we're suddenly shouting stuff or.

It was funny when you were talking about music, because my children learned very early on that if I was playing Radiohead really loudly in the kitchen, they did not come in.

It was not a safe zone.

Exactly.

And so I think that allowing you to have that space to say, I am.

You know, I'm feeling this because of these things and being able to express it out loud, even if it's just you in the bathroom on your own, to the mirror, but your child as well.

Right?

Yeah.

You need to.

So the no shaming thing.

Exactly that.

Yesterday, my little girl said to me, she obviously, bless her soul, ADHD life, and she's doing cartwheels and handstands every second of every day.

And she kicked where my coffee was and the table, little table thing that I've got, and it wobbled.

It didn't break.

And she said, mommy, would you have been really mad at me if I had broke that?

And I said, no.

I said, I would have been mad that it was broken, but I wouldn't be mad at you.

I said, I would be telling you to be careful next time and that you need to look at what you're doing, but it was an accident.

So I'm not going to be mad at you that it's broken, but I am going to be upset that my favorite mug's broken.

So explaining things like that to children.

And it's like, I. I tell my eldest all the time.

He says to his sisters, you're so annoying.

I'm like, no.

I'm like, they are Annoying you.

They are not annoying.

There's a very big difference.

And growing up, if you have parents that continuously tell you you're annoying, you just did this.

You upset me.

We become people pleasers.

We become very worried about having our emotions changed by other people.

And we feel like other people's emotions are our responsibility, which they aren't in any.

There's no crossover with that.

There's no exception to the rule.

No one else's emotions are your responsibility.

You can have done something to someone that's upset them and that is your responsibility to fix it, but someone else's emotions are not yours to keep.

And a lot of us, especially now, my generation especially, we're encountering so many problems because our whole lives we've just been holding other people's emotions continuously.

And it, you know, it gets to the point where the cup is going to explode at some point.

Right.

And you're not going to be able to hold them anymore.

So, yeah, making sure that we don't shame, we just name it.

You are angry.

I am angry.

This is what's happened.

Keep it very factual.

That's probably the word to describe it.

Logical and factual.

You know, you don't need to add all the fluff.

It's the fluffing that gets us in the trouble.

But, you know, just.

You're angry because of this.

I'm angry because of this.

That's.

It's pretty simple.

It's just.

Don't overcomplicate it.

Yeah, I think that it's because you're a millennial right now.

I am Gen X.

So we are at least 50 years different.

Yeah, we are like you're 15 years or so younger than me.

And it's interesting when you're talking because I have a lot of clients who are your kind of age, and they really do struggle with just the immensity of other people's emotions that they take on.

Now.

Gen X is completely different.

Anyone, you know, between the ages of like 45 to sort of 60, you're talking a massive suppression of emotions.

Not talking about it, not saying what you're feeling, not even feeling what you're feeling, or not thinking you are.

And so a lot of this can work for both.

You're.

You're modeling this behavior to your child, that it's okay for me to say I feel sad because of this.

You know, I feel angry because of this.

And also for them to be able to explain, express that as well.

And it is really important because otherwise if you shush it down, give them a bit of cake or to try to distract them from it.

When they're properly in it and feeling it, it can teach them that actually maybe it's not safe for me to, to express what I'm feeling.

Yeah, and this is when you get into all sorts of different things.

But yes, give them a bit of cake.

This is another thing that I see parents doing.

Feed them with a snack to get them to be quiet.

Oh, we're creating an eating disorder.

When you look at mental health across adults and well being with children, it's very easy to see where it came from.

You can reverse back whatever issue it is that you have.

My thing is I used to get told that I talk too much when I was a kid, which I'm aware I talk a lot.

However, now my job is talking.

So my natural ability to be able to talk does me a favor.

But growing up, I believe that no one wanted to hear what I had to say say because I got told that I talk too much.

So it's very easy to.

It's.

And it's sometimes it's not even that you're being nasty.

It's not these really malicious, horrible words.

It's just these little things that if you say it enough eventually can start to creep the wrong way.

So it's just, it's a very fine line between, you know, being a bit harsh and just being a bit more realistic.

With the kids, there's quite similar, but it's very easy to get your head around.

Once you've got your head around it, if that makes sense, you can, you can quite easily figure it out.

Yeah, it doesn't.

And I think as well, for anyone listening who thinks, oh great, I've already screwed my children up, then I will say my daughter, my daughter always says, look, you know, like there's always, no matter what perfect parent you are, there's always going to be a reason.

They go to therapy when they're 30.

And it's true.

Like you could do the best job ever.

And they will, there will be something they need to work through.

So don't feel bad if you think, okay, like, Christ, I've been doing this wrong, or you know, wrong in inverted commas or oh, you know, I said this or I did that, because every parent, every parent guaranteed can look back at at least one instant, if not multiple ones, where they think, oh my God, did I do that wrong?

Yeah, 100%.

And there's always, there's always ways to change it.

Like all of these things, even if you have Been doing it and you're now listening and thinking, oh my God, what have I done to my kid?

There's always ways to undo it.

And the good thing is with a lot of these techniques is as soon as you implement them, you see them working pretty straight away.

The naming, the feelings.

I know with my six year old, she's the kid that I got right, right?

Like she's the kid that I learned through the first two.

They were the guinea pigs.

And my parenting changed a lot through having them.

Obviously I was 17 when I had my first.

That parenting was probably horrendous because I had no clue what I was doing.

He's alive.

But whether I knew what I was doing or not is a completely different story.

But you can see the difference.

And she is the kid that, because I changed my parenting style and because I changed my words and what I was choosing to say, she's the one that picks it all up very quickly.

And you know, if she, she now is the one where I don't have to, I don't have to navigate through her being upset or anything because she will just come to me and be like, mom, I'm really upset that this happened.

She's the one, like, she's obviously, she's not the youngest, but she's the youngest out of three of them.

And she's the one that can articulate her emotions the best.

And it's because I changed my parenting style and I made it better with her.

And it shows that, you know, if you do it, it does get a result.

You can see it happening.

So even if you have been doing things that may not be, you know, this perfect, inverted, perfect parenting that, you know, everyone talks about, it doesn't mean that you can't change.

And if you're aware of it and you can make it better, then try it.

Of course you'll see the results.

But if not, then you know that it's not going to be a perman damaged cause that you've created.

It's just, you know, there's things that everyone needs to work on, even us.

We're, you know, we do this as a job and we're still not getting it completely right all the time.

It doesn't happen otherwise.

There's no such thing as perfect, is there?

There really isn't.

And I think if you start comparing yourself to other people or comparing yourself to your ideal vision of yourself as a parent, you're always going to come up short and then it just makes you feel like crap.

So don't do that.

So, so what is the.

We've.

We've arced our way through the meltdown, and now let's think that we're coming out the other side.

We have played the five Senses games.

We've tried to veer them, veer them off.

We have done some nervous system regulation.

Just kind of, okay, let's settle everything down.

Settle everything down.

We've done some beautiful breathing.

We have named the emotions, and this is probably slightly after the event, because trying to get a child to name their emotions when they're feeling it is really difficult, especially when they're young.

So what about now, the final of the five techniques or the five strategies?

What can we do really, almost to consolidate things at the end of the meltdown?

First thing would be like a mini debrief.

I would have a mini debrief.

Like, again, readdressing the naming and, you know, acknowledging yada, yada, yada, that happened because of xyz.

Again, keep it very factual, very logical.

You just want to state the facts, statements only.

We don't need to be asking questions and all of that because we might reopen it.

But just saying, you know, this happened because of this and that resulted in this end of story debrief, hug, kiss, makeup.

Let's do that.

Sometimes that works.

However, if you're struggling in this, like, lose stage, where, you know, they're still not quite right, but they're calm, there's this amazing thing called tapping.

It is.

It's gonna.

I obviously can't show you, however, it's.

It is a nervous system reset, I suppose you kind of can call it that.

It taps in with all the meridian points in your body.

So they're like different points in your body.

Everyone knows, like, your temple, right, is a pressure point and whatever.

It's all of those points in your body where it matches your energy in your nervous system.

So a lot of it is just getting two fingers and tapping different parts of your body.

So you tap in between your eyes, the top of your head, your chest.

There's a really.

He's an American man.

He's called Nick Ortner on YouTube and he does lots of videos.

He does lots of ones with different times.

There's some that are only two minutes.

There's some that are 20 minutes, depending on how much you need it.

But he guides you through it and he sort of does a routine of, like, top of the head, eyes, temples, chest, nose.

It goes through your body, and then he tells you to say to yourself, whilst you're doing it, like, I now feel safe or I now feel calm or whatever it is, it's a really good way to get them to recognize how their body's feeling.

That was, it's the same reason why we name the emotion because what we want to do with especially little kids, we want to match their feelings that they can feel because they don't know the words, right?

So they know the feeling.

We want to match whatever it is that their body feels like to what it is that they're feeling.

So again, doing it the other way around, when they're then calming down and, and you know, it's starting to settle, we need to also name that.

Because if that's how you feel when you're safe or you're calm when we're then telling them, you know, you need to calm down, they know that that's where the point is that they need to get to.

So it's very good.

It's equally as good to name the calm down emotion as it is to, to name the heightened emotion.

Because you can, you can tell a kid, oh, you're angry, you're sad, you're, you know, whatever.

But if a kid doesn't know how they're feeling when they're happy or safe or calm, they have no reference to get it back to, right?

So they need a, they need a center point of gravity.

They need to be able to know where can I bring it back to?

How does my body feel when I'm back at that point?

Whether that be with a cuddle, with tapping, with a debrief, whatever.

It works for your kids.

Like you said, your kids are different.

I have a kid that needs to just go off and have his time and listen to his music and then he comes back to me and talks.

I have another kid that literally needs squeezing the life out of because otherwise she would just not calm down.

Whether, whether I like it or not, she just has to be on top of me and you know, in my breathing space to calm down.

So, yeah, each kid works differently.

And again, like you said, you're going to learn this through parenting them.

You're going to trial and error.

You're going to do it with one kid and go, oh, that nope, that was bad.

Let's do a different one.

Yeah.

And it's going to change kid to kid.

And I think as well as a parent, once you've calmed your child down, it's really important that you take some time for yourself.

And I know that is almost impossible.

Before we came on air, I know that Charlotte and I Were talking about that period of your parenting where you can't even go to the toilet on your own, let alone spend some time, you know, regulating your nervous system.

But just a little bit of time afterwards, just.

Just to.

To have what you need.

Because I personally, I'm quite like my son.

I. I need space from people to regulate.

I don't want people in my.

In my space.

Whereas my daughter liked that proximity.

So I would do that first.

Then I would go and have my space.

I would put the TV on that beautiful babysitter, and then I would go and have like 10 minutes in the kitchen with a cup of tea.

I needed that to regulate down.

I think that it's so important what you say there about tapping.

So now for anyone listening there, I'm going to put a link to the videos that Charlotte's mentioning.

I'm also going to put a little infographic, like a pictorial.

Pictorial.

Pictorial.

I never know which word is pictorial.

Visual.

Yeah, a visual of the different tapping points.

But I think that tapping is one of these weird things.

So I just want to very quickly say, when I first came across tapping, I was extremely dubious.

And then I looked at all.

It sounds crazy, right?

Like, it sounds.

It looks and sounds crazy as well.

Right.

And.

And some versions of it have you singing Happy Birthday and stuff.

And I was like, whoa, buddy, this is not my jazz.

So then I looked at all the research papers and they were overwhelming in the evidence for this stuff.

So I thought, okay, now I need to understand why this works.

So.

And then I looked at meridian points and realized they don't kind of exist.

So then I started freaking out.

So then I realized that actually meridian points, or the points that you tap equate across to where your nerve endings kind of come up almost.

And also some of your joints meet and muscles.

So there is a lot.

That's right.

There's a logical.

And the side of your hand and stuff.

Right.

There's a logical side to the physicality of it, but also then the repetition of positive words.

We know that cognitively, just telling yourself something actually kind of ingrains it neurologically for us.

Yeah.

So there are.

There is a lot of actual scientific evidence for it.

And obviously the nervous system is an electrical system, so we talk about energy.

And I know that people listening might be like, what the hell is energy?

Energy is like.

Yeah, exactly.

But actually the nervous system fires elect very tiny electrical signals in our body.

So again, there is a logical thing behind it.

So give it a go if you're a bit suspicious.

And you're thinking, yeah, I'm not going to be, like, tapping random bits of my body and saying, oh, I am a hippie, or whatever.

Right.

Just.

Just give it a go.

Because it is surprising how.

And it's actually quite fun with children.

I do.

I've done it with both of mine when they were really cynical teens as well.

Okay.

If you can get your teenagers to do it with you.

Oh, yeah, it's.

Yeah, you can get your kids to do it as well when they're young.

So give tapping a go.

It is surprisingly nice.

It's a very nice regulating thing to do after the event.

Okay, so we have got five senses gain, nervous system regulation, breathing, naming what you're feeling, and then tapping and debriefing afterwards.

I will add one thing in, and that is that I think that the biggest gift I learned as a parent was to.

To apologize.

This was not something I'd ever done in my life.

I literally had never apologized.

Even if I was blatantly wrong.

I. I like, when I was younger, I would, like, cheat on my boyfriends.

I didn't apologize.

I wasn't apologizing.

No way.

I was owning that.

However, I learned when having children that you can sometimes get it monumentally wrong or even actually a little bit wrong.

And if you go up to them after the event, you know, in that debrief and you say, I am so sorry that I shouted.

I am so sorry that I threw your toy across the road.

Across the road.

I wouldn't do that.

That would be really harsh.

I am so sorry that I threw your toy across the room.

I had to apologize to my daughter numerous times for throwing her math book across the room during a math lesson.

So I would just own up and say, I am really sorry that I did this.

And I found that that helped a lot.

It helped a lot with both my children.

My son is super rational.

He liked to hear my explanation.

My daughter is very emotional.

She wanted to take on, you know, she wanted to sort of be like, oh, yeah, no, I know.

I can get why you were feeling bad.

And then we would kind of almost have a mutual feeling, share in that beautiful millennial's way, even though she isn't one.

I think that that apology aspect is really important as well.

I did that this morning.

So my daughter's rooms, it's a big room, and I've split it in the middle with, like, a unit.

So the older one has the outside one where she has all her nail stuff and yada yada.

And then the first One is a bit more where the toys and stuff are.

The baby likes to go in and out and just, you know, wander around and do whatever he's doing.

And he was in the further away one.

And she was trying to do.

She was on a nail course this morning.

So she's trying to do all of her nails and stuff.

Obviously, you know, there's now varnish and lights and whatever things that we don't want the baby touching.

So I am trying to pack for a holiday that we're going on.

So I'm trying to do a suitcase whilst I can hear them.

Mom, get Ralph away from me.

Get Ralph.

So I'm like, everyone just leave me alone.

And I was like screaming because I'm not at anybody, but just because I'm trying to do this thing that would literally take me five minutes if you just all left me alone and just didn't do anything, that I needed to intervene for five minutes.

So I ended up just shouting.

I wasn't shouting at any of them.

And then my six year old, she got a bit upset and a bit scared because she thought I was shouting at her.

So I then had to go in and explain, you know, I'm not shouting at anybody.

I was just being loud and I was just getting my frustration out of my body.

It wasn't aimed at anybody, it wasn't aimed at any of you.

I'm really sorry that I thought that you thought it was at you, but it really wasn't.

So even sometimes just explaining the situation that they might have got a little bit confused at, because we are human, we do make big noises and, you know, we scream and shout and whatever, you know, you stub your toe and they're gonna know that you've hurt yourself.

But if you don't explain it, maybe not apologize.

You don't always have to apologize if you weren't doing anything wrong per se.

But you know, just having a conversation with them to let them know that it isn't because of them and it isn't their fault and you know, they haven't done anything wrong and we're just outwardly progressing our frustration.

Not aimed at their faces.

Yeah, apologizing.

Yeah, exactly.

And it's really important that they understand, especially for when they get older, because if they have an altercation with anybody and they've shouted or they've, you know, said something or done something that they maybe shouldn't have done, they have an argument with a boyfriend and they've chucked his clothes out the window, you know, they need to then learn to say I'm really sorry that I overreacted because you use my toothbrush or whatever it is that they going on cheated or.

Cheated on someone and not taken ownership.

Yeah, I reckon you owe a few apologies along the way.

If I was, if I was an alcoholic, I would, I would work my way through the steps.

Maybe I should just do that.

Anyway, Charlotte, thank you so much for today.

It has been really helpful to, to, to sort of map across the, the arc of a meltdown.

Do let our listeners know where they can find you.

Because you mentioned about working with home ed children and parents.

So I have, I told you many hats.

So Charlotte, Web just on Facebook is my name and I post all of my things on there.

I have a business, Facebook, Break the Cycle.

That's all of my work stuff.

Therapy, psychology, yada yada.

And then I actually, believe it or not, I am doing the Tick tock.

I'm doing the tick tock and the Instagram.

I'm trying to be current.

I don't know how good I am at it, but that's all linked through there.

And I just kind of post.

I do a lot of review stuff.

So I find it really helpful when I see other home ed people doing review stuffs.

And I try and review as many places that we go to, as many programs that we use, as many, you know, curriculums that we use.

Whatever we use, I try and just update everything on there because even if I just help one person see what they're doing, it's, you know, it's so much nicer than just being a blank canvas of not knowing what you're doing.

And we've also just opened a home ed center on a Thursday in actual Acton.

Sudbury.

I don't know where everyone is, but yeah, Sudbury, Acton.

And it's a whole day thing, 10:30 till 3:30.

I've created a structure which I hope, I hope patterns and I hope people copy it and do it other places.

The idea will be eventually for me to, you know, branch out and make it a thing.

So basically it's a social hangout.

You come, you pay an entry fee, you.

There's activities laid out.

We do like topics.

So this topic we're doing ancient Egypt and America, things like that.

And we put out some educational activities and some little things for the kids to do.

We have an area for little, little kids for families that have got, you know, multiple children.

We've got a kitchen and cars and you know, whatever massive outside space with lots of games that they can play.

And then we have your usual play doh and, you know, sensory stuff.

We then have a whole schedule of groups run alongside this.

So the idea is that you can come as a family and one of you can be in the room with the little kids, and then one of you can be in the groups.

And we've got phonics and English and science and cooking and football and life skills lessons.

We've got so many things.

And you can join them all or you can join none of them, and you can just come for the social.

So it's kind of like a bit of a, you know, a whole center where you could come and do everything.

So, yeah, it's.

It's getting going.

We did a fundraiser.

We raised £600.

That's in the bank ready for us to buy things for the kids and pay for classes and stuff.

So, yeah, we're doing all right.

We're doing okay, but we're.

The main point is that we're trying to support our area with home ed, because it feels like a minefield when you first sign up to it and you think, oh, God, what have I put myself in for?

And I don't want anyone feeling like that.

So if I can help anyone, and if you ever need to message me or you want to ask a question, anyone can.

I'm an open book and I will try and help anyone at any point.

Well, everyone's moving to Acton now after that.

Yeah.

Thank you so much, Charlotte.

It was really lovely having you on.

And I'll put all of your links down in the show notes.

Lovely.

Thank you so much.

Thank you so much for joining us for today's Home Education Matters podcast.

See you at the next one.

Have a lovely day.

It.