I first shared this reflection with my newsletter subscribers on 7 May 2026. If you'd like to receive them before anyone else, subscribe here.
The other day I was in a hurry. I parked, turned off the car and rolled up the windows myself, like I always do before getting out, to make sure it's properly shut. My little boy, in the back, in his car seat, started crying, repeating "I wanted… I wanted…" without finishing the sentence. And me, not even looking at him, barely pausing: "come on, let's go".
By the time I realised what was going on, he'd been crying for a good while. And by then the crying was no longer about the window.
What was happening, and I couldn't see
What he wanted was to roll it up himself. It was one of those things of his I hadn't caught on to yet: he was right in the middle of the "all by myself" phase, asserting himself through small gestures. For him, rolling up that window with his own hand mattered for a very concrete reason — he was learning to do it on his own, and I, without noticing, hadn't given him the chance.
But that was only the start of the problem. I was watching the clock, and an adult watching the clock isn't watching the child. The little one notices it before he can name it: he notices it when you speak without looking at him, in the "come on, let's go" with no pause.
And from there, what he's crying about changes. It's no longer the window. It's that I'm beside him without being there.
Why rushing breaks almost everything
For a little one, his still-developing brain doesn't let him calm down on his own when an emotion overflows. What he needs in those moments is to borrow the adult brain of whoever's nearby — it's called co-regulation, and it basically means your calm rubs off on him because his own is still being built. If you want the detail of what goes on inside his head, I tell it in the article on what happens in the brain during a tantrum.
But that adult calm falls apart over one very concrete thing: rushing.
When I'm in a hurry, my voice goes faster and my gaze is two steps ahead, outside the car, already on what's next. In that state I can't lend my son the calm he needs, because I don't have it myself.
And it's a bit absurd: the rush sets off the tantrum and, at the same time, it's what leaves me with nothing to meet it with. That's why so many storms break out during transitions —leaving the house, leaving the park when we're already running late—. Rushing doesn't exactly cause them, but it makes them worse.
Thirty seconds, or not
That day, if I had got out of the car, crouched down to his height and said "I know, you wanted to roll it up yourself, I didn't realise", we'd have been out of the situation in thirty seconds. Instead it took a lot longer. I don't know if it was twenty minutes, I wasn't holding a stopwatch, but it felt endless. What I do know is that it wasn't because my son was more difficult that day. It was because I, to save myself thirty seconds, stopped being there with him.
The story The House of Calm tells this same thing from the other side. Little Wolf huffs and breaks things not because he's bad, but because underneath the huffing there's a little one wanting to belong and no one has crouched down to see him. The story doesn't ask the wolf to huff less. It asks the world to stop for a second and ask him what he needs.
An Adaptation of The Three Little Pigs
The House of Calm · Where huffing and puffing doesn't scare
Wolfie arrives at the park eager to play. The other children are so absorbed in their own games that they don't notice him. When his frustration gets too big, Wolfie blows — and things break. But when he finally cries, something changes: the others come closer. It turns out everyone was, in some way, alone.
Read this children's story in the Semillita appWhat I'm slowly learning
I won't always manage it. There'll be days when the rush is real and I don't notice until the crying has already started. And even today the "come on, let's go" still comes out without thinking, before I turn to look at him. Knowing what I've just told you doesn't take that away overnight, but the warning goes off more often now, and that helps.
When I remember in time —when I get out of the car and crouch down to his height— things settle sooner. It doesn't always get resolved quickly, but at least the two of us know the other is there and, above all, he knows I want to understand him.
Sending you a hug,
Adrián