Awareness of Communication Blocks is the First Step

Parents rarely try to shut down their kids. We want them to talk with us. Often, when our words and attitudes break down communication and everyone becomes upset, we are confused.

What happened? Our words, without our awareness, suddenly felt hurtful to our kids, and they either got very angry with us or stopped talking. Our loving ally relationship suddenly became adversarial.

Michael Popkin, PhD, states that a communication block is any remark or attitude on the part of the listener (the parent) that injures the speaker’s (the child’s) self-esteem to the extent that communication is broken off.

When you feel an emotional wall has gone up between you and your child where there wasn’t one before, something you said or did was probably a communication block.

Everything you learn about blocks with children is applicable to communication with adults, as well. When you start to understand, acknowledge, and stop communication blocks, have your whole family work on this together. Show your kids what you are learning and bravely ask them to identify your blocks and which ones they want you to stop doing first.

In the communication blocks chart below, there are four columns. The first includes the name of the block, the second gives the underlying intention of the words, the third tells you the hurtful message the child hears, and the fourth gives examples of how the blocking sentences often start.

Communication Blocks

Communication Blocks	Parent’s Intention		What it really says to the child / teen	Examples
Commanding	To control the situation and provide the child with quick solutions	“You don’t have the right to decide how to handle your own problems. “			“What you should do is…”“Stop complaining.”
Giving Advice	To influence the child with arguments or opinions	“You don’t have the good sense to come up with your own solutions.”			“I’ve got a good idea…”“Why don’t you…”
Placating	To take away the child’s pain; to make her feel better	“You don’t have a right to your feelings; you can’t handle discomfort.”			“It isn’t as bad as it seems.”“Everything will be okay.”
Interrogating	To get to the bottom of the problem and find out what the child did wrong	“You must have messed up somewhere.”			“What did you do to him…”
Distracting	To protect the child from the problem by changing the subject	“I don’t think you can stand the discomfort long enough to find a real solution.”			“Let’s not worry about that, let’s…”
Psychologizing	To help prevent future problems by analyzing the child’s behavior and explaining his motives	“I know more about you than you know about yourself. Therefore, I’m superior to you.”			“Do you know why you said that?”You’re just insecure.”
Sarcasm	To show the child how wrong her attitudes or behavior are by making her feel ridiculous	“You are ridiculous.”			“Well, I guess that’s just about the end of the world.”
Moralizing	To show the child the proper way to deal with the problem	“Don’t you dare choose your own values.”			“The right thing to do would be to…” “Oh, how awful.”
Know-it-all	To show the child that he has a resource for handling any problem, namely, the parent	“Since I know it all, you must know nothing.”			“The solution is really very simple.”
Me-tooism	To show the child that you understand and can give advice	“My experience is more important to talk about now.”			“I had that happen to me when I was your age.”

Communication Block Chart developed by Active Parenting Publishers.

Me-tooism courtesy of Barbara Whiteside of Whiteside Workshops.

Don’t miss out on this fantastic opportunity to download the“The 7 Most Common Phrases Parents Say That Stop Kids From Listening”! You’ll also receive my weekly emails where you will learn how to transform conflict into cooperation in your home.

Copyright 2022 – Cynthia Klein, Family Happiness Expert – Coach, speaker, and author of Ally Parenting: A Non-Adversarial Approach to Transform Conflict Into Cooperation. Learn more about Cynthia’s services and contact her at her website, https://bridges2understanding.com. Contact Cynthia for permission to reproduce any information from this article.

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