The Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically I

Learning Curves 165

Mother: What’s the matter, honey?

Charlotte (rubbing her eyes): I just don’t want to go.

Mother (squatting down to Charlotte’s level): Is there

something about going to the beach today that’s

bothering you? You usually can’t wait to go to the

beach.

Charlotte: It’s too early to go to the beach!

Mother: I don’t know what you mean that it’s too

early to go to the beach.

Charlotte: We don’t usually go to the beach until

after church. We never go to the beach in the

morning.

Mother (Refined Empathy): It’s bothering you that we

don’t usually go to the beach in the morning.

Charlotte: We never go to the beach in the morning.

We can’t go right now.

Mother (Defining the Problem): I’m glad you told me

what was the matter. The thing is, we’re all ready

to go. But let’s think about this a little. Maybe we

can figure out what to do.

Much nicer.

My child has to have each solution spelled out in per-

fect detail. Is this normal?

Many explosive kids don’t handle ambiguity in their
lives well, and this extends to their solutions to problems.