Something that this made me think about that I have seen quite a few times with parents of small children is when they hurt themselves the parent will say "you're okay!" It strikes me as minimizing or dismissing the distress the child is in from their injury, even if it's not significant. Could that be an example of failing to attune to your child or is responding to their injury and reassuring them they are okay actually an example of good attunement?
Mike, your instincts are correct. While parents may have the good intention of assuring their child after an injury, not acknowledging their pain/distress would be a failure on their part to attune to them. I would suggest attending to the distress first ("You got really scared when you fell off your bike, didn't you?"), and then you can assure him/her that you are there to help comfort them and feel better. Thanks for an excellent question!
Something that this made me think about that I have seen quite a few times with parents of small children is when they hurt themselves the parent will say "you're okay!" It strikes me as minimizing or dismissing the distress the child is in from their injury, even if it's not significant. Could that be an example of failing to attune to your child or is responding to their injury and reassuring them they are okay actually an example of good attunement?
Mike, your instincts are correct. While parents may have the good intention of assuring their child after an injury, not acknowledging their pain/distress would be a failure on their part to attune to them. I would suggest attending to the distress first ("You got really scared when you fell off your bike, didn't you?"), and then you can assure him/her that you are there to help comfort them and feel better. Thanks for an excellent question!