“It’s like getting the tiny box of crayons at a restaurant.”

on emotional expression with children and adults, particularly males

Photo by Jack Carter on Unsplash

As a clinician in private practice, one of the phrases that I frequently hear myself saying to parents, especially of boys is this: “It’s like getting that tiny box of crayons the server gives your child at a restaurant. That’s the range of emotional expression we tend to give males in our culture.”

This phrase usually shows up in a couple of situations. Situation one is with parents who have a child, typically male, that the parents describe as “angry”. The child hits and throws, cries and has tantrums; the parents describe the behavior as “angry”.

The second occasion for this phrase is in conversations with a couple (or perhaps an individual) who is trying to understand that other half of a couple. “They are always yelling! Even when they say that they are sad or upset or worried, it all comes out as ANGRY.”

What these two have in common is that there is a limitation on how the child or the adult express their emotion.

The solution is always more crayons.

Let’s play by Candyland rules and start with the youngest first. Without getting into a long definition of what is and is…