Parent: What am I supposed to do when my kids are fighting? And no, they are not just arguing.
Dr. B: What do you usually do?
Parent: I usually send them to their rooms to cool off.
Dr. B: And?
Parent: What do you mean, “and”?
Dr. B: And then what?
Parent: They cool off and we go on with being nice to each other.
Dr. B: How’s that working?
Parent: Well, they haven’t been very nice to each other lately.
Dr. B: If you send them to their rooms, the fight in front of you is interrupted, but nothing gets fixed.
Parent: Huh?
Dr. B: Well, if they were fighting, there must have been some problem between them.
Parent: What do you do?
Dr. B: I usually get between the two kids. Then one at a time, I ask them to explain what is the matter.
Parent: And?
Dr. B: I let them know that I understand their point and why they feel the way they do.
Parent: Ok.
Dr. B: And then I do that for the other kid.
Parent: So you summarize and empathize?
Dr. B: Yep. And then I tell them to figure out a solution that they can both agree on and come tell me about it.
Parent: Does that work?
Dr. B: Most of the time. Sometimes I have to make sure each of them really listened when I “summarized and empathized” with the other person.
Parent: How do you do that?
Dr. B: I ask them to tell me what they heard.
Parent: And if they didn’t get it?
Dr. B: I ask the sibling to repeat it for them.
Parent: Until they get it right?
Dr. B: Yep.
Parent: You do anything else to help them?
Dr. B: In the beginning I did some coaching as they learned to negotiate.
Parent: Such as?
Dr. B: I gave them pencil and paper and told them to write down every idea each of them had, without criticism.
Parent: Kind of like brainstorming?
Dr. B: Yeah. But it also gives the message that all ideas are listened to and considered.
Parent: Kind of an extension of “being heard”.
Dr. B: Yeah. That’s important … for all of us.
Parent: Amen to that.
