Welcome to Tantrum of the Week, the parenting podcast that helps you make sense of your child’s hardest moments. Hosted by Lynn McLean, a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and Registered Play Therapist-Supervisor™, each episode explores one real-life tantrum and uncovers the emotional needs, triggers, and stressors underneath.
You’ll learn how to:
Understand the why behind your child’s behavior
Respond with calm and confidence — not frustration
Build emotional regulation skills through connection
Use play therapy-informed parenting strategies that actually work
Whether you’re dealing with bedtime battles, sibling fights, or after-school meltdowns, Tantrum of the Week offers practical tips, expert insight, and a reminder that you’re not alone.
🎧 New episodes weekly. 📍 Based in Houston, Texas — helpful for parents everywhere.
•Lynn McLean, LCSW-S, Registered Play Therapist-Supervisor ™
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
0:00
|
9:26
A familiar school, a big surprise, and a stomachache that won't quit. This week's tantrum: a third grader finds out their best friend isn't in their class — and refuses to go to school the next morning. We talk through why anxiety can cause very real physical symptoms, how to respond without arguing or getting stuck in a power struggle, and how to send your child off with confidence (and welcome them back with pride). If mornings have been rocky at your house lately, this one's for you.
Thanks for listening to *Tantrum of the Week* with Lynn McLean, LCSW-S, Registered Play Therapist–Supervisor™.
New episodes each week to help parents understand and respond to their child’s biggest feelings with calm, confidence, and connection.
Hi, welcome back to the Tantrum of the Week podcast, where we talk about the tantrums that are happening at your house. You know they change every week, and we're trying to keep up with them, give parents some ideas about why they're happening, and some ideas for how to solve them.
School can be the most amazing thing for a kid. It can be a great place for them to connect with their friends, be around trusted adults, and of course learn about things that are gonna really set them up for success and make them excited. However, school can feel really hard when things may not be exactly what they expected. For this tantrum of the week, we have a third grader who's going back to a familiar elementary school. So it's not a big shift. But the night before the second day of school, it's not even the first day of school, it's the second day of school, they've been there and they figured out last minute on the first day that their best friend is not going to be in their class. They counted on this for the whole summer. There was a last minute change, and they just found out when they showed up and they were so disappointed and so sad. And now on the second morning of school, everything is ready. Parents running late, they need to get to work and they need to get other kids to other schools. And this one is at home. The third grader is saying they can't go, they're sick, their stomach is killing them, and they can't go. Now, parent knows that probably this child doesn't have a stomach virus because they were able to eat breakfast and they don't show any other signs of illness. So that's on the table. Parent has a pretty good idea that this is not a physical illness and not a reason to keep them home so they don't pass it on to somebody else or feel really bad at school. What they do want to say to the child is, you're not sick, you have to go. Second day of school, I gotta go to work, and you're fine, you need to go. The child, though, is not backing down, and the parent doesn't necessarily want to say those things. They want probably to smooth it out, make it happen, and still have their child somewhat okay in going.
What I'm gonna say here is that even when a physical complaint doesn't seem to be related to a physical illness, it still can be a very real physical feeling in the child. And anxiety and stress can lead absolutely directly to stomach discomfort of all kinds, especially a stomachache, like this little one is talking about. When we're facing this kind of distress in our kids, it can be a hard path to know how to walk. So, first up is understanding that it probably is absolutely real pain. Arguing with your child about whether it's real, whether they're really sick, all of that is probably not going to help anybody. And your end goal as a parent is really to get them calmed down enough and positive enough to want to go to school. And maybe you could think of even helping them try it out. Like, okay, I hear that your stomach is hurting you. Maybe there's some um home remedy options that have helped your child in the past. So maybe you can use some of those. Let's give you some ginger ale. We're gonna let your stomach settle down a little bit and we'll leave for school. I don't know,
maybe you have a few minutes to let them settle down at um home a little bit. If you can and it doesn't really upset them a whole lot more, you could talk about what you think is happening in a very even calm way without trying to convince them of anything. You don't want to distract them, and you're not trying to talk them out of having a stomachache. But you can say, you know, I think it feels hard to go because yesterday, what a big shock. Your friend is not in your class anymore. And all summer you thought y'all were gonna be in third grade together. What a shock. And how disappointing. And I bet you're feeling really sad and maybe a little nervous about being in class without them. So maybe talking about those feelings can help the child. It's not probably gonna make the stomachache go away completely. But just that's called reflective responding. What you're doing, you're just talking about the feelings, and it's like holding up a mirror to them and saying, Here's how it is, here's what's going on. And it can really help a child feel heard, and it can help them, especially at this age, they're able to take things in and make some sense of them. It can help them understand how they are feeling, and it can go a long way toward reducing some of these physical complaints.
So let's say you're doing what you can at home, the ginger ale, maybe um a couple extra minutes on the couch, and then you set a reasonable time that you're gonna leave, and set a reasonable time that the child or reasonable expectation that the child is gonna go to school. So I tell you what, I think that you don't have a stomach virus. I do understand that your stomach is hurting. We're gonna try, and that's a great way to talk about this. We're gonna try. I'm gonna have you try to go to school today. It helps them not get into a power struggle. I am going, I refuse to go. The parent is saying, you will go. The child is saying, I'm not doing it because I'm sick. You get out of that tug of war, you get out of that power struggle, and instead you step back a little bit and say, Yeah, I'm gonna have you try to go today. I know your stomach feels not great, and my idea is that it can settle down as you get to school. So you're setting the expectation that they're gonna be able to do this. You have said, I understand why this is feeling hard. I get it. Why would you not be sad that your friend is not in your class? P.S. This is a time that we need to set our own ideas about logic and common sense and maybe thinking, okay, your child is overreacting to this development. Like they're still gonna see the friend socially and in extracurricular activities, it's just in class. Try to set all that aside. Right now, it's feeling like a huge issue for your child and a big obstacle to feeling comfortable at school. So just go with that, understand it. If your child is feeling it, then it's real for them. And it's showing up in a very real way in their body in the form of a stomachache. So just stick with, I know this is hard, you're gonna figure it out. This is gonna be something that you're gonna figure out, and I'm gonna help you.
Take them to school. You might want to do something a little extra for them. Remember, this is a child who knows the school, knows the layout, knows the people there, they're comfortable. Maybe you do something a little extra, like you walk them into the office and say, Listen, so-and-so has a stomach ache today. My idea is that they are not sick and it is gonna start to feel better. And if there's any problems, you know y'all can always call me. Have the child hear you say this to the adults in charge of them, and then a quick hug and a kiss and a transfer to the classroom. You don't want to belabor the goodbye. You don't want if your child starts to cry to start to back up about okay, well, maybe maybe you shouldn't go. Um, it's also not a time, by the way, to get punitive. Well, if you don't go to school, then you're gonna have to go to the doctor and you just might get a shot at the doctor. Don't do any of that. It can make your child more anxious and um actually sort of undermined their ability to think about how that they can step through this discomfort and find a way to um integrate into the school day in a way that's gonna work for them. So, this is the way just to transition.
At the end of the school day, hopefully, child has gone, stomach got better, and everybody's good. And at the end of the day, you just want to say, Oh my gosh, that was a hard start to the day. Your stomach was hurting, and you know what? You were so brave. You went to school and you did it, like you managed it. Way to go. Again, you want this to be pretty business like, you don't want to like, I never thought you could stay at school. That's amazing. Because you don't want them to think that you didn't think that they could do it. You want them to know, I have faith in you, you got this. Maybe the next day it might pop up again. You can just stick with your tried and true. I get it. Your stomach's feeling kind of bad. Let's give you a little ginger ale, let's give you a little extra few minutes. How about a piece of toast? It'll calm you down, and then you know what? Let's just see. You can give it a try. I hope some of these ideas work for you, work for your child. If it's not the exact same tantrum happening this week at your house, I bet there's one similar.
And hopefully some of these ideas will apply there. If any of these rang true for you, there's lots more on our other podcasts, on our website, on our YouTube channel. We'd love to see you there. We'd love to hear from you. And if you have your own tantrum of the week, send it in to us. We want to know. Take good care, hang in there. You got this.
%20(Podcast%20Cover)%20(9).png)