Episode 7 - Gabe

Episode 7 - Gabe: Audio automatically transcribed by Sonix

Episode 7 - Gabe: this mp3 audio file was automatically transcribed by Sonix with the best speech-to-text algorithms. This transcript may contain errors.

Malia:
And you're listening to the Autistic Tea Party podcast, I'm Malia

Cat:
And I'm Cat. And together, we will be your hosts as we explore some of the hottest topics in the autistic and

Malia:
Neurodivergent communities at large. We'll be speaking with parents, therapists, experts, educators and more to dig into the more nuanced discussions being had in and about the disabled community.

Cat:
So join us as we sip and spill the tea.

Cat:
This is the artistic Tea Party podcast. Auteach has been hard at work to bring you some of our greatest content yet, join us this summer for 12 weeks of free and brilliant webinars every Wednesday starting June 16th at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. When I tell you that you're not going to want to miss a single talk, I'm not saying that lightly. We've got therapists, educators, parenting experts and more. So head to auteach.com Now to see the lineup and get your tickets to the event. Hi, everyone, today with us, we have Gabe, also known as the indomitable black man on Tiktok, where he talks about parenting and gives so many tips to parents and caregivers about ways to connect with children and gives incredible guidance. Gabe, can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

Gabe:
Sure. That's the million dollar question that nobody is really prepared for. I am an Atlanta native living in central Florida. I work with special needs kids from my day job. I'm also a performer. I've been a teacher. I'm going back into teaching exceptional student education. I'm really tall, that's something about me, I'm six foot eight now.

Malia:
Wow, you are really tall.

Gabe:
Yes, yeah. I did not play basketball. Please don't ask. Oh, but yeah, that's that's pretty much it.

Malia:
I love it, I love it. My husband is six six, and he literally says the same thing when he introduces himself to people, he's like, No, I did not play basketball. You have to realize that's what people are going to ask you. You know, it's coming

Gabe:
Of like what it's all people do before basketball was invented.

Malia:
But whenever I see a very tall person, I'm like, you see a whole other world than I do not. So what got you, So you work with special needs, disabled children. What kind of got you into that? How did you find yourself in that line of work?

Gabe:
They're not I never actually saw myself as a teacher, I wanted to go into biomedical research. However, around like twenty five, I found myself in a very insecure living situation, I will say, and I needed a job desperately and a friend of mine was doing what I do, but at a lower level. And he was telling me how I should apply for his job because I won't need a college degree. At that time. I didn't have one. I just had a high school diploma. And so he told me I could do this, make pretty decent money and I can work with kids, which I want to do. I swear I would never work in retail or food service ever again. So this is what I was going to go into. I did the training, I got certified and I got my first kid. And from the time I saw him, I was like, OK, this is my job. This this is my career right now. I am perfectly OK with that. So that's kind of how I fell into it. But I have been working with kids my entire life in some capacity or another babysitting, taking care of my other family and friends, kids I taught as a teacher in a private school. Yeah, I've always worked with kids, I've always been really good with kids, I've had a very good understanding of how kids operate and think so, I guess my life was kind of leading to this moment.

Cat:
It's amazing and how did you, you know, working with kids does not always mean that you work with them well, or in a I want to use the word progressive, but like in a in a self-aware way, you know, there is a lot of parenting, child care advice that's very, you know, well, like they'll eat if they're hungry or, you know, things that can border on, like negligent sort of parenting but or child care that have kind of been around forever. So how did you find yourself in in the position that you are? Because when we look at your Tiktok content and things like that, it is you're promoting a lot of very self-aware parenting and gentle parenting techniques and gentle caregiving techniques. Was that sort of always how you viewed things or was there something that opened your eyes to sort of like the way a lot of people do? Things aren't right and are not healthy for childhood development.

Gabe:
So it's kind of I describe it like this. My mom and my dad were raised old school, so I'm black. And in the black culture by and large, not saying that it's a monolith by any means. But in the American black culture, there is this firmness, the strictness, this authoritarianism that exists in the black household where it's do as I say, no matter what. And if you don't, will beat you or spank you or verbally, emotionally or physically abuse you. And so I was raised in an environment that wasn't abusive, but it was kind of close not to say I don't love my parents and they didn't do what they could. They did what they could based on what information they had. But I always recognized that there was a different way to approach anything that I did even as a young kid. So I'm a kid. I don't have full control over what I say or what I do. There were things that I knew I was going through but couldn't express. And so. As an adult, knowing that as an adult, being a kid that could not express himself or communicate how I wanted things to go or understand things, I now have to revert back to that mindset when I'm working with different parents or working with their kids and say, OK, when I was a kid, this is how this situation would make me feel. So I wonder if this kid is going through the same situation. I should probably try to find a different way to approach the issue at hand.

Gabe:
An example of this would be I would get in trouble a lot at school. And I was actually talking to my dad about this this past weekend, and he came down from Georgia to see me acting up in class and to the teacher, to anybody who's just looking. I'm bad. I'm a troublemaker. I'm always talking with people. But none of them ever actually stop to think. Maybe he's not being challenged enough in the class. Maybe there's something that he needs in addition to what he's getting in terms of curriculum to enhance his. His academics, because I came from Georgia, where I was in the gifted program, I was going into a different school to learn advanced curriculum every week. And then I came to Florida and they took me out of the gifted program. They put me in gen ed where I did not think or learn the same way other kids did. So it was. It was me being a frustrated child with not enough to do where I could finish homework really quickly, so I'm looking at each kid as what are they trying to convey? What are they trying to learn? What are they communicating? And how can I meet those needs? And I feel if a lot of parents looked at it from that approach, you would have a lot fewer issues than we're seeing now. Like there wouldn't be as much stress. You wouldn't have to be so upset about things. You know how to help them.

Malia:
One thing I noticed, because I worked as a para-educator to one thing I noticed is. That there is sort of like a and you bring this up and a lot of your videos that, like children are their own autonomous People like they are people and that a lot of parenting techniques and a lot of therapeutic techniques and things like that seem to kind of toss that out the window and the goal then becomes compliance to whoever their caregiver is, their caretaker is and things of that nature. But what and and I take issue for that with that for several reasons. But what are your thoughts on compliance based programs or therapies and why is that not always the best? Approach to take, I guess

Gabe:
So that's a really good question. When I was first starting out in the field I'm in now. There were there are different, I guess, agencies at one of the agencies was big on the compliance, and I can understand compliance in terms of task completion, where you're trying to get them to complete a task that's going to be beneficial for a life skill, like learning how to tie your shoes. OK, I need you to comply and finish this task. However, there is a thing called picking your battles and being aware of what the child's behavior is trying to convey. Again, as I said before, so when I'm looking at compliance, I have to also recognize that this person isn't a pet. This human is not a dog that I'm going to force into submission to obey my will. What what what is that going to get me? What's that going to get my child? What's going to get any person if I am trying to force them to comply? The goal isn't necessarily to get them to do that. The goal is for them to pick up the skill and that doesn't have to be picked up instantly. That can take time. It has to be based on the child's level of one, cooperation, understanding, and are they capable of doing it. So compliance for me isn't this requirement. It's OK. You don't want to do this right now. I need you to do it right now. I'm going to explain why I need you to do it right now and I'll help you do it right now. Like, for example, I had a kid who needed to take his medication and this medication has to be taken at a specific time.

Gabe:
So in that case, I need him to comply because the medication has to be administered. At that time, he didn't want to do it. In situations like that where you need compliance, it's still very good to have some sort of wiggle room or some sort of patience or in my case, administer the medication sooner. Not that I was administering the medication at all, but the nurse who was trying to do it. We start that process sooner because we know it's going to take this person longer to get the medication administered. So instead of me getting frustrated because it's down to like the last thirty seconds before you have to take this medication and, you know, it's going to take him fifteen minutes to do it, start fifteen minutes sooner to try to lead into that and then work on decreasing that time as you go on. So I'm not really a fan of compliance in that sense. I would imagine that in instances of life threatening situations where you have to have immediate compliance at that moment, that's one thing. But when it comes down to just basic skill acquisition, it's like teaching. It's like going to school. You're not going to be perfect. Is something right off the bat? Kids aren't going to be perfect right off the bat and they're going to think for themselves because they are autonomous. They're all they are their own beings. So it's best to work with them instead of against them.

Malia:
Well, I'm like I feel like in those situations, like. It's our job as adults to like every moment is a teachable moment with kids and that like, you know. Trial and error is a good thing. We're teaching them how to problem solve in these different ways, even though they may not see it that way in the moment. Like if you're just focusing on the compliance of it, like there's so much that you're missing out on and especially like when it comes to discipline. I've worked with families. Since for as long as I can remember and these type of interactions and conversations are often overlooked or not even considered, it's just there's so much focus on the compliance and then kids grow up with that. And then they are also not thinking outside the box until there is something that intervenes, that it's like, no, there's other ways to do this. Right. And it seems like it sort of stifles intrinsic motivation. If compliance is the goal. At the end of the day, it's like at a certain point, like there's not going to be anybody there to tell you what to do. So how how do we develop that, like intrinsic motivation when compliance is the end goal for a lot of things. And I think that leads to a lot of problems down the road and into adulthood, you know, like with self starting and things like that. And I think that can actually be really detrimental in the long term.

Cat:
One thing I really want to dig into, because a lot of your content is about this explosion of like I think and I think it comes with social media becoming so big and people recording every part of their their lives and sometimes exposing parts of their lives that like I mean, in some cases, thank God, because people can be like that was really unsafe and scary and I feel bad for that child. But you also see a lot more punitive punishment by parents like online. You know, there was I was going through your page last night in the videos of like parents, like showing how they punish their child and this kid runs laps. This kid, I'm just going to, like, yell at them on Snapchat and public humiliation and shit shaving kid's heads, just like as a form of punishment and things like that where like it's very shame like and humiliation oriented. Can we I mean, it seems so obvious and disturbing to me that people would do that. Why do you think that like I mean, is very clear from a lot of things that, like shame is not actually an effective motivator. It just causes a lot of resentment and like a lot of emotional trauma. So, like, why do you think that parents will use that as a I don't know, like what you call it, like a punishment tactic?

Gabe:
So this is going from a very OK, I have to say a lot to even get to that point. There's a book that I read that was recommended by the situational therapist called Spare the Children. Why Spanking Why Whoopings Won't Save Black America. And in the book, the author is talking about how. Corporal punishment was really big in Europe, but it was never we don't have it, we don't have evidence of it being in West Africa or in the new world. And when you're looking at the European society and how they treated children back then, even up into the Victorian era, it was very compliance. Children are wicked. You have to beat them into submission. They were almost no different than the way you would treat a dog. They were essentially a pet. And so because you you would do stuff like that, like I remember seeing a TV show I want to say was what's that TV show? It's like super romantic takes place in Scotland. I want to say, Hylander, I could be wrong.

Malia:
No, I think you're right.

Gabe:
Hylander where the lady goes back in time or something,

Malia:
I haven't watched it, but I think is it all I know what you're talking about, the way I know it is because, yes, it's in Scotland, but also lots of nudity.

Gabe:
Yes.

Malia:
Well, that's it. I've I've only heard about it. I haven't watched it yet.

Gabe:
Unfortunately, I saw it like a few episodes. It lost my interest. But in one scene, this little kid, I think stole some bread or light or something, and they nailed his ear in the middle of the town square to a stake like a little post or whatever. And he had to be brave enough to pull his head off of that stake or just be left there. This was a common punishment for kids in that region at that time. And it was seen that if you would do something so humiliating and so horrible, the kid would not do it again. But we have repeat offenders. We have kids who don't think what their prefrontal cortex, they think with their amygdala and a lot of cases where they're impulsive, they don't have this idea of long term consequences. So you humiliating them and beating them isn't going to work. Punitive punishments for kids don't work like we intend them to. They don't even work for adults. We can see that with the American prison system. Yeah. And so that is a remnant of the mindset that's been around for hundreds of years and has not actually gone anywhere. I mean, we have, gentle, parenting. Now, what we're seeing that positive behavior is or positive reinforcement is being popularized more. But that's recent. That's like the last 30, 40, 50 years. We still have people who are holding onto these archaic mindsets and are justifying it. So when you're looking at humiliation. It's I think it's the worst thing in the world and it can lead to disastrous consequences.

Gabe:
The video that I, I duetted No stitched not too long ago was a black woman yelling at her son and posting it on, I guess it was a Snapchat or his Instagram. And you can see the emotions that this boy has on his face where it's completely unwarranted. And there was a point where she yelled at him and he said, speak up when I'm talking to you or something like that, and you saw the absolute rage he had and the resolve that I will never trust you, talk to you, be vulnerable with you. You aren't my mom moment. And I think that's the most devastating thing for a child to go through, because now you're thrusting that child into a world that is already unforgiving without giving him the remaining tools that he needs to be successful in life. And that's going to cause mental issues down the road, God forbid, but the pattern is usually that and you see it time and time again. There was another kid who I think he stole some money and his mom put money on the table and he said she said, hold on to the money. And every time he tried to touch it, she would just slap the crap out of them while she's recording this. And it's like, to what end are you trying to do this? You're just stripping his spirit, like, OK, stealing is bad. We understand it's bad. I'm not saying don't provide any sort of correction or discipline to this this action.

Gabe:
But let's look at what caused the action in the first place. What's the root of the issue? What caused this child to think that they can do that? Let's deal with that issue and let's change the environment that they're in so that the behavior doesn't continue humiliating a child. This is going to make the child go to school, get ridicule, picked on, bullied, and then God forbid that child winds up with crippling anxiety or depression. God forbid that child goes off and does something brash. And we've seen it time and time again. And so if we know it doesn't work, why do we keep doing it? Because it makes us feel better. I was reading a study recently and it was talking about parents who used punitive punishment, specifically spanking. And one of the things that talked about was how a lot of parents who abuse their kids have an external locus, meaning they find validation outside of themselves or things happen outside of their control and they're trying to respond to what's happened. So you have these people who have low self-esteem, who are finding validation by doing horrible things to people they have power over and then posting it in places where they know they'll get that same validation from. And I'm not saying this is the case with everyone, but if you were doing this to your kid, I could only assume that you care about what other people think.

Malia:
That's always blowing my mind up the public display of it. I can't. It's like it, doesn't it? It's weird because it almost seems like it's like it bypasses the sense of self-preservation. It's like you can't post a video on Snapchat. You can't posting video on social media if you like, slapping the shit out of your kid and then go, that's not going to come back to like there's not going to be any consequences for this. Which speaks to another level of like how removed from reality are you in those moments that you can't see that that it's going to have CPS like on your at least CPS on your doorstep? It's very like it's terrifying. I don't know. I don't. Well, I think when that's not the case, when CPS doesn't show up on the door, that it's reinforcing in itself in some ways for. Yeah, for these parents. And like when you talk about like watching that, because I know which one you're talking about watching like the expressions on that kid's face, parents and caregivers like we are these kids is like their lifeline. We are everything to them in their formative years. And so, like, when this kind of stuff is happening, this kind of abuse, like you can see that like you are no longer trusted to them, like you're still their lifeline, you know, but like they don't trust that lifeline anymore.

Malia:
And so it's like now they're in this traumatic state that they may or may not be able to leave as kids, but also. So, so alone in in their minds, in their bodies, in their homes, like it's so devastating and it's like I don't understand how people can watch those videos and not see that happening. Completely unaware that that is happening or or the logic that like, OK, so this is another question I had. How do you how do we deal with a lot of these responses? And you brought this up in your videos to give us the day, like, how many people are just so like like cheering these people on? Like it's acceptable, like it's something. And then you get the whole. Well, I you know, my parents did this to me when I was younger and I turned out fine and I'm still here. Or the people who are being like, well, yeah, he deserved that or they deserved that or, you know, they had it coming or whatever. How do we grapple with people like that are so removed from that reality, so removed from the consequences of their actions?

Gabe:
It's it's really hard. And I've had to I'm if you ever go down a lot of my comment sections, you'll see me arguing with some parent who just thinks I'm I'm an idiot. I don't have kids. I don't know what I'm talking about. We've normalized abuse. We've normalized the mistreatment of children. It's been normalized for hundreds of years. It's it's a taboo to raise them differently. And to a certain extent, I had those same views as well, like I was a kid in the store and they ain't got no sense. I don't like that. Don't need to tear that child up. Like there's a there's a show called The Boondocks. And one is Brand. He's chillin in the store. And this kid is I want marshmallows. I like candy. And the mom is freaking out, doesn't know what to do. And Granddad is like you have to try beating his behind? It's it's that normalized. And I think another layer of that is you laugh at your trauma. Every family function I've been to at some point throughout the evening, we're going to laugh and joke about how we got our butts whipped when we were kids and we feel that we didn't deserve it. Funerals, cookouts, whatever.

Gabe:
We're going to laugh about it because that's how we cope with our trauma rather than dealing with it and confronting it. Also, this past week, I was talking to my dad. I was like, you know, you did stuff that I you didn't need to do. You didn't have to beat me for every two things. And he said, well, I did everything I could. After turned 16, I was going to let you be emancipated. And that hit me because I was like, so instead of trying to raise me in a way that would be conducive, instead of trying to find other ways to raise me, you would just throw me out and not have to deal with it, make it make sense, because your job as a parent is to provide me with the skills necessary to be independent. But you're not doing it. So it's that normalization of that abuse. So when people get out into the real world, they don't know any different. They don't know what it's like to be in an environment that isn't abusive. They don't know what it's like to have somebody that truly loves them and shows them that they love them. They think that love is being abused.

Cat:
Ok, so first off, for a lot of us that grew up in households where this this was the type of parenting that happens, you know, and years down the road, we finally get the courage and we have these moments. These come to moments with our parents, much like what you were just talking about. And we go like, you know, what the fuck was that? Why like, why did you do these things? Like, why did you think that that was OK? Why did you hit me? Why did you say these insulting things to me? Why did you never let me trust my own instincts and all that kind of stuff? And then you get the. Well, I did the best I could answer, and that feels like an absolute and complete slap in the face and stab to the heart. Because I'm a mother myself now and I have never raised a hand, my voice, nothing. I, I have been aware since day one and maybe that's because I went to therapy and I, I never wanted to be anything like that and I never wanted to pass that trauma on to my child. But how do like adults that grew up in that, how do we come to terms with, like who our parents are now? But like, how do you deal with the half assed sort of like, well, you know, we did what we could with what we had at the time.

Gabe:
The gaslighting.

Malia:
Yeah. Is that thank you. It's like it's easier for them to defend it than to accept and feel the guilt, the shame, the realization and move through that to get to the wow, I'm sorry. Like I did this to somebody who I love more than anything. Yeah.

Gabe:
A friend of mine. One of my best friends. His name is Will, he said if you were to use that same logic anywhere else, would it work? If you are of you play for the NBA and you lose by 50 points and you go up to the coach and say, well, I did the best I could, you're probably going to get cut if you are working for NASA and you are trying to do calculations that could make a multibillion dollar shuttle go to wherever you wanted to go or not. And you say, I did the best I could, that's not going to fly. So if it's not going to fly in. Pretty much every other aspect of life. Why do you think that's going to fly when it comes to raising another human being? People don't like to be told that they're bad, they don't like to be told that they failed. People like to feel good. And whenever people are called out for the injustices that they participate in, both actively and passively and or passively, they're going to be they're going to double down on what they believe. They're going to deny it, because that's that's how they can maintain their power. That's how they can maintain their position. They're going to gaslights you. That's a natural human response to it. It's like the backfire effect. No, this is what you did.

Gabe:
There's proof that this is what happened. This is empirically evident. What you did did not work well. I did the best I could. You've been met with information and you feel defensive. So you're doubling down on that that wrong position. Yeah, you're a bad person. And they may not ever you may not ever get it. I've never gotten an apology for my mom has apologized more for it, but my dad has not. And I may never get one. And I had to say, OK, this is who my dad is. He doesn't understand. He was raised in a time where he thought that that was right. I know it's not right. So the best thing I can do for myself is to raise my children, to be raised not in the way that I think they should be raised or in a way that's going to benefit me. But what's the best thing I can do for my kids to make sure that they grow up emotionally, mentally and physically healthy? So I would say that's the best thing that any any of us can do to to deal with that. I don't I don't think it's I don't think you're going to get the apology that you're looking for. So it's best to just cut your losses and then focus on being better for your kids? In my opinion, yes.

Cat:
It's an interesting situation and especially when you, as I do like I have a child and then watching how your parents who did these things to you growing up, who disciplined you in these very like, you know, abusive ways, watching them interact with you like your child in ways that are so much more affectionate and gentle and loving and all these things that they could they could never be for you is, I think, a special hell for people who grow up in households like that, because it really does become this sort of like there's also a grieving process of watching this person change in these ways. You know, these people who are abusive to you, watching them change to become a better person. And then the anger comes up with that because it's just like, where the hell was that? Where was that all those years? And now it's here for my child. And I'm deeply grateful for that. But where the hell was that my entire life? How can you be this big? And it's tough because it's like at the one time you want to, like, applaud the growth, but it is a massive slap in the face.

Gabe:
Yeah, that's real. I don't have I don't have kids, so I can't see my parents doing anything different. But I would imagine that you would you would have to come to the understanding of two things. One, your parents may have grown, they may have absolutely changed, which is great. But two, they give the kids back. It's going to be better with your kids because they give your kids back. They had to deal with you and they had to deal with you in a time in their life where they were focused on trying to make ends meet, trying to raise you, trying to raise your siblings, trying to balance the house checkbook and all that stuff while they're also growing. Meanwhile, your children, that's your that's on you now. So now the parents. Well, I knew what to do. I know what to do better now. I know all the mistakes I made with you. So now I can do it better with your grandkids because you're also I'm going to give them back to you at some point. That's that's what I would imagine. I don't have kids yet.

Cat:
Yeah. It's something I think that I really just, you know, through watching a lot of different Tiktok and thinking about that kind of stuff and noticing anger come up in myself recently and not really being able to identify where that came from and finally being able to be like it's happiness that people are growing and healing themselves and then grief and anger that that couldn't have been for you. And now you have to deal with all the baggage that.

Malia:
in your witnessing of that happening with your kids and your parents. It's like you're seeing it happen and there's like a complete bypassing of the conversation that, like, we were just talking about like there was no like. Reconciling or anything, and so you're just like, wait, what?

Cat:
Yeah, yeah,

Malia:
I'm like, am I not here anymore?

Cat:
Like, that's what it feels like. It feels like a complete erasure. It's like they notice the mistakes they made and then they erased them,You know, and then if you just never address it, it just never.

Gabe:
Gaslighting.

Cat:
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.

Malia:
And to keep sweeping it under the rug here,

Cat:
It's lovely. And it means let me pull myself out of my trauma response for a second and let's go ahead and talk about actually this. I really don't wanna talk about lying and cognitive development. One of your videos that lying is actually a very healthy part of a child and adolescence like cognitive development. Yes. And incidentally, that is also one of the things that children are most punished for. Can you explain how parents can handle that? Well, sort of like you say, you talk about accountability versus punitive punishment. So how can people apply that? And also appreciate the fact that cognitive that it is a normal and healthy part of cognitive development.

Gabe:
Yes. So I'll talk about the the lying aspect first. And you might have to remind me for the second part, because the way my brain is set up, but essentially when you have lying kids get to a certain point cognitively where they're learning to understand themselves apart from other people, they're starting to develop individuality around like two and three. So one of the most important words that a child will know and we'll know first is no. When they start saying no, a toddler is going to use that like there's no tomorrow, because now they're understanding that this word has power. If I don't want something, I can say no and it goes away and that starts to separate them from their parents. They're starting to realize, oh, I have a say in things. So now we're looking at perspective. And so one of the skills that you have when you're lying is perspective taking what they want to call it and. It basically is a kid understands what the truth is, because in order for a kid to lie, they they have to know the truth. And so they're starting to recognize that there is a shared perspective that humans have or a shared reality. But then they notice that their words can be used to alter other people's perception of this shared reality.

Gabe:
And that's where the cognitive development lies. They're recognizing that other people think, other people feel, other people perceive. That are different than them and so this is an exciting mindset for a toddler or for a young child with a like well, I can say something, of course, and I think in this consciously, but their brain is like, I can say certain things and have people feel a certain type of way. And so we also have to look at and this goes into the next part of it, dealing with it. We have to understand why kids lie. Kids can lie intentionally. Well, they pretty much always lie intentionally, but it's we have to look at the reason of why they're lying. Usually it's to avoid some sort of unwanted consequence or it can be just for something fun, like, I don't know, little kids telling little white lies or something like that. Or say, for instance, a friend comes up to them, you know. It's raining outside. No, it's not that they know it's not raining, but they're going to say it is and it's ha ha. It's funny. It's cute. We have to recognize that. One, kids are impulsive, they're trying out new social interactions, they're trying on new social dynamics, and it's your job to facilitate when and how they use it.

Gabe:
Now, every adult I don't care who you are, has lied. And according to a study I read a couple of days ago, I think the average adult lies at least 13 times a day. I don't because I'm perfect, but others do. And so because we know that people lie, but we recognized when it's acceptable in society to lie. Our goal shouldn't be trying to get them to be these non liars. Our goal is to be teaching them how to be appropriate in society, how to be good morally. So if I have a kid who's lying about taking things or hurting people, that's a problem. I'm going to start explaining from a very early age why we tell the truth. I'm going to put them in positions where they have to think about why you wouldn't want to lie, why you want to tell the truth. And I want to also put my child in an environment where they can feel safe to tell me the truth, where I'm not going to give them some unwanted consequence. I'm not going to beat my kid because they lied. I'm going to give them a consequence for it. Say, for instance, if I tell you, don't eat these cookies, I come back. There were forty two cookies and now there's twelve.

Gabe:
I'm a be like, who ate all the cookies. I didn't. There's literally only me and you here. I know you ate the cookies. So for the rest of this week you cannot have any cookies and I'm going to throw these cookies away so nobody can have these. If I can't handle cookies, can't nobody have no cookies. But it's getting them to understand there's a reason why and then having a conversation. Let's explain why it's bad to lie when you're lying to me. I can't trust you with other areas. I can't give you bigger tasks. I can't give you bigger responsibilities because I feel that you will lie to me about what's happening. If somebody hurts you and you lie to me, how can I help you? You know what I mean? It's about understanding why these things happen, understanding the functions of why it's happening, understanding kids don't know that they don't know, and they're just playing with new toys. And then you teach them how to use that toy to their advantage. Because, I mean, if you have a kid that's good at lying, they might be a good salesman they could sell salt to a slug, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. They could be an excellent lawyer. I'm just saying. So it's about teaching the child. What's socially appropriate and what's ethically appropriate, morally appropriate.

Cat:
And I think that people don't give children enough credit to make those distinctions.

Gabe:
At all, you know,

Like at all like children are incredibly capable. Of understanding, nuance.

Malia:
I would love if and I'm sorry for lack of being able to gracefully segue into this question, but do you have advice for parents or even if not from the parent perspective, like how they can parent themselves in the process while they're growing this capacity to regulate themselves to be better for their kids?

Gabe:
Yes, when I talk to my parents, when I do a consultation, most of the time I spend is talking to the parents about the things they can do for themselves because they've been in traumatic situations and they're trying not to do the same thing to their kids. The first thing the main thing I talk about. Is taking a step back and just breathing and thinking. Even when it's it's hard, when everything is going against you, looking at your kid like an investment, let me take a step back and think, is this going to benefit my kid? How was this going to affect me and my kid? Am I talking out of a place of hurt? It's taken that step back to think about your actions, because, I mean, we're raised to think you think before you speak, before you act. This is where you put it into practice. Think about what you're doing before you do it. What is the outcome going to be? Is the outcome going to be beneficial to my child or is it going to be beneficial to my feelings in that moment? That is the main thing that that anybody can do.

Gabe:
First off, you should be doing it in every area of your life, but specifically with parenting, that's one of the best ways to reparent yourself, to retrain yourself, taking that step back, breathe and getting yourself calm. And then going forward, whenever I have a kid who is fighting me physically, like punching me or slapping me like I ain't nothin and I want to hug from the streets and my first, you have to put your hands on me like that. Well, what's up? I take a step back. I'll take a step back. I breathe. I empty my mind in that moment, OK? And I will have that inner dialogue. This is a child. This is a child that is frustrated. Is it going to be beneficial to that child or you, if you are frustrated to know, can you change anything in this moment? Yes. What? Can you change this? OK. Will that change the outcome to be pleasing and beneficial to both parties? Yes. OK, let's do that. That's what I do in almost all of my scenarios and situations. And you have to do that

Malia:
I like about a lot because there are so many situations, most situations that are not life threatening that like if you don't respond to them immediately, it's OK. Yeah. And also that I think some parents see if they do not respond right away, then they might be perceived as a weak parent or that their child will and that there will be an undesirable power imbalance there or respect balance there when actually if you can calm yourself down and get regulated and approach the situation and provide nuance and teach your child the skill that they are lacking in that moment or and connect with them like that is an incredibly strong thing to do.

Gabe:
Yeah.

And so, like for the relationship for yourself, your kid will be like, wow, OK, so my parent is smart. Thank you.

Gabe:
Yeah, modeling behavior is like I'm really big on that.

Cat:
It's it reminds me of when Leslie was on the podcast, the first episode where she said that like those moments in those breakdowns in communication that lead to altercations most of the time are due to a lack of skill and lack of an ability to either communicate or to do something that leads to that level of frustration, which then explodes on both parts. So it's a lack of skills on the parent's part to de-escalate. And maybe a child is lacking the ability to verbalize something or to emotionally regulate. But it's not done with this place of Malice or being a bad kid or just being out of control? It is most of the time due to the fact that there is a skill that is lacking that could have helped mediate that situation.

Gabe:
Exactly.

Malia:
This is going to be a very intense episode for some people to listen to.

Cat:
What what you're doing now is helping raise helping parents raise a generation of children that won't have to sit on a podcast and disassociates with their childhood memories are brought up.

Gabe:
And that's that's my goal.

Cat:
That's my goal as a parent, too, is to empower this person, to be to have that intrinsic motivation, to be their own person and to like my job is literally just to support that at all costs and to protect that, to protect what this person wants to be and can be in this world. And that's just my job to protect that. And I think that you're doing such amazing work.

Malia:
Thank you so much.

Gabe:
You are welcome. This has been great. Kind of feel the way I felt at the end of Leslie's episode where I was like, this is so validating and I'm leaving my body. But I think our listeners are going to really resonate and just have these like, yes, yes. I wish this for my parents. And so I hope that, you know, a lot of our parent listeners hear this and that it resonates with them, and thank you for all of your content on Tiktok. Again, you can find Gabe on Tiktok, @theindomitableblackman. Are there other places that people can find you?

Gabe:
You can find my Instagram, which only has my modeling and performance photos on there. But if you would like to go there and contact me, you can go to Instagram at the underscore giant underscore Gabe. You can also go to my website, massevideo.com

Malia:
Thank you for tuning in this week, we hope you had as much fun listening to this episode as we had making it.

Cat:
For more information and resources, please visit our auteach.com. that's a u t e a c h dot com and join our mailing list to stay in the loop about updates and events.

Malia:
We look forward to bringing you a new episode next week. Until then, this has been the artistic Tea Party.

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