Rough (but safe), boisterous physical play is incredibly helpful to young people (and it’s good for us grown-ups too).  The goal is to allow your child to safely and successfully test her limits, so building her confidence.

When you master the art of roughhousing, you send a strong message to your children: Your power is welcome here, this is a place for you to be strong and confident, I will keep you safe, and we will be closer and more connected than ever.^[1]

One of my favourite resources for this kind of play is The Art of Roughhousing by Anthony DeBenedet and Lawrence Cohen.  Read on for a summary.^[2]

Ramp up your enthusiasm

You want the physical play to look more compelling and exciting than TV programs or video games.  I know!  That’s a challenge for most tired parents!  But our children find our (understandable, but boring) serious, careful, subdued, tired approach to things very wearing.  In Roughhousing, we are trying to create a (sometimes quite short) playtime that is the opposite.

It’s not just for boys

Boys and girls benefit in different ways, but it’s not just for boys.  Boys may need their parents, especially their dads, to show them how to have physical contact that isn’t aggressive, and to cuddle as well as wrestle.  Make sure your son has a secure home base and that he can always climb into your arms for a cuddle or a good cry if his body or his feelings get hurt. Your girl may need a chance to test out her strength and power, so that she can step out into the world with confidence.

Tune in, don’t swoop in

You aren’t aiming to play for yourself, the way you like to play (though over time, you may find you sometimes quite enjoy yourself).

Neither are you necessarily playing the way you were played with.  You’d be lucky if you grew up with an adult who was able to notice what you could handle, pitch the play a little higher, pull it back when necessary, and let you shine 😊. If that isn’t your story, you’ll need to be careful not to go over the top, but to adjust your play to where your children are at, extending them a little where they are timid, but ensuring that you follow their lead and their cues. And you can lower the stimulation if necessary.

Freeze the action frequently to keep things smooth

Being able to manage the play in this way, to stop things from spiralling out of control, was a revelation to me. Cohen et al recommend an agreed word that means “stop” – “silly code words like “banana cream pie” often works best.” This helps you and your kids to practice revving up and calming down. Timed rounds, such as this mother does here, are also a good way of keep the play at a manageable level of energy.

Rev it up earlier in the day

You’ll need to give your children time to come down from the tremendous excitement of this kind of play. Don’t organise your roughhousing date right before something else (more boring) has to get done, or you ‘ll end up in a fight you probably don’t want to have. (That said, as this parent says, good, joyful physical play as part of the bed-time routine can help your child feel connected enough to sleep easily.)

All children are born to roughhouse

Even those with special needs. As always, we need to be tuning in and adjusting our strength, resistance and response to meet our children in play so that they are tested rather than overwhelmed, and so that everyone is still having fun.  Children with special needs are no different in this respect – you might choose a thumb wrestle rather than an arm wrestle, for instance.

You are the Safety Manager

You want your child to take risks and be adventuresome, and if they are worried you’ll be harsh or blaming if things go wrong, then it will cramp their style. For roughhousing to be emotionally safe for children, when something goes wrong, they need to know you will not be hard on them about it, or let them be hard on themselves.  Play can get so vigorous that your child loses track of what is safe and what is not. (That said, as you get more skilled at facilitating and supporting this kind of play, you will get better at anticipating when things are about to go into orbit, and you’ll learn how to step in, and contain things, before that happens.)

And sometimes, rough, challenging physical play like this brings up feelings. Once that happens, your child is in their “feeling mind”, not their “thinking mind”, and won’t necessarily be able to remember what is safe and what is not.

So don’t expect your child to be able to keep things safe. You need to take full responsibility; during this playtime, you are the Safety Manager. Before the play, secure the perimeter by noticing any sharp corners loose rugs, valuable glass vases, ceiling fans and other potential hazards. Take off jewelry, watches, or anything which might break or injure someone. As a glasses wearer, I would add glasses to that list!

Take responsibility – if they could, they would

If someone gets hurt, it is your job to apologise: “Sorry honey – I didn’t get there fast enough to stop you from hitting your head” or “Sorry sweetheart, I didn’t get there fast enough to stop James from doing that.” In fact, because your eye was not on the game closely enough, James had thumped his sister – but now is not the time to get into that. You just need to intervene (hopefully with a warm, firm tone) to prevent any, or more, damage.  Listen to whoever needs to be upset (the hitter or the hit or both) and perhaps de-escalate the energy levels.  Later, once the strong feelings have been dealt with, you may be able to have a conversation about safety – but chances are, your child already knows all this but can’t take care of it when they are excited– the motto is “If they could, they would.”

If you got blamed a lot or were treated harshly around mistakes when you were young, you may find this part of the “referee” job difficult. It will be worth getting some Listening Time for yourself, at some point, about the feelings that this kind of play brings up for you.

Roughhouse with caution – but not too much caution

Accidents happen, and must be attended to. When in doubt, call your doctor.  That said, while some of the thumps and bumps encountered may require medical attention, by far the majority are quickly healed from.  (I’m recalling having to explain to our family doctor why my daughter’s elbow was dislocated – my husband and I had been playing “tug of war” – each vying for our daughter in a game which is wonderful for bringing out the giggles in an episode of wanting to be with one parent rather than the other (often wanting mummy and “rejecting” daddy, but it can goeither way).  I definitely don’t recommend trying to hurt your children, but their joints are flexible, and generally no lasting damage is done.)

Unfortunately, if we are too cautious in our play, our children will not have the chance to be “safely on the edge of fear”, which is what good roughhousing allows.  In the safety of this kind of “no-fault-play”, where we adults are taking responsibility for any damage done, children can take risks and experiment;  the laughter that accompanies this kind of play is the release of lighter fears, possible because the play is structured to reassure children that they are safe but allows children to get close enough to danger to feel the fear, rather than be held back by it.

No obnoxious tickling

If we were tickled as children, it’s likely we will either have a fierce aversion to doing it to our children, or have not-much-judgement about how to do it well.  If the latter, we will tend to go in too hard and too vigorously, overpowering our child in the process. This defeats the purpose of roughhousing.  As Cohen and Debenedet say  in these circumstances “Laughter is an involuntary reaction and doesn’t necessarily mean that the tickling is fun for your child.  See how much laughter you can get with a fake tickle, where you almost touch your child in ticklish spots, but not quite.”^[3]

Children sometimes ask to be tickled.  I think this is often because it was the only way adults have been prepared to offer physical play.  Games that involve tickling games have been as close to light-hearted-and-fun as adults can get, and children have settled for that rather than nothing.  You really don’t need to tickle.  There are a million more elegant ways to get your kids laughing.

Follow the giggles

“If you do something that makes your child laugh, do it again.  And again… To bring out the giggles, act silly, lose your dignity, and fall over a lot.” ^[4]

When things get serious

Sometimes, the play will pull up heavier feelings. “Roughhousing is sometimes accompanied by no giggles at all. If your child seems ‘dead serious’ with an edge of real anger, then stop.” ^[4]

DeBenedet and Cohen distinguish this from quiet, focussed play. “if there’s a sparkle in your child’s eye, focused concentration, and beads of sweat, that is a sign that you and she are working on mastery. This is a wonderful form of play that leads to deep learning and great satisfaction, like when kids get the hang of the monkey bars, or they finally build a tall block tower that doesn’t fall over, or they shoot baskets over and over from the same spot until they get a rhythm going.” ^[4]

Welcome feelings

Sometimes, after a while of playing like this, deeper feelings start to bubble up for your child. You’ve matched your childs strength and ingenuity while allowing them to win, and there’s been plenty of laughter – for you and your child.  Then you notice that your child is no longer laughing, and is really trying to hurt you.

At this point, you need to set a limit – tell her in a matter of fact tone that you won’t let her hurt you, and make sure that you move out of the range of whatever damage she looks like she wants to inflict – or move in close enough that you can stop the “attack”.

At this point, the good play you have been doing has made it safe for your child to bring up some deeper, more difficult feelings. Patty Wipfler, in her great little booklet “Playlistening” has these wise words to say:

When a child’s behavior goes beyond the boundaries of good sense, we usually expect her to listen to what we say and obey. She will almost never meet this expectation. She can’t. She is no longer thinking. She is showing us troubles she hopes we can fix. She wants help badly, so she keeps on trying to pinch or to kick the window, showing how mean she feels. If you tell her what you won’t allow, and then take gentle but firm responsibility for seeing that the limit is kept, she will often be able to let the underlying tensions bubble up to be worked away in laughter, tears, or the sweaty struggling that expels fear.^[5]

Other ways that children show that they are ready to offload deeper feelings is that they will knock or bump themselves in the play, and then start to get very upset. Their upset may feel out of proportion to the hurt, but in fact, your child has created a pre-text to bring up some feelings. You can safely stop the play, stay close and pay attention, and listen to the upset.  (See this lovely video of a father playing with his daughter here.

You can find more information about the HandinHand Listening Tools, including Playlistening, here.

Endnotes:

[1] Cohen, Lawrence, and Anthony DeBenedet. The Art of Roughhousing: Good Old Fashioned Horseplay and Why Every Kid Needs It. Quirk Books, 2010, p 26. [back to article]
[2] Ibid, p27-33 [back to article]
[3]Ibid, p31[back to article]
[4]Ibid p32. [back to article]
[5]Wipfler, Patty. Listening to children: Playlistening. San Francisco, CA: Hand in Hand, 2006. Print. p14 [back to article]

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