Handling Your Kid's Persistence Without Losing Your Cool

In today's episode, I invite you into my real-time coaching session with a mom of two and twins on the way. Listen as we unpack what to do when a child keeps asking the same question over and over and how to respond without frustration, without guilt, and without giving in. Welcome to the Parent Coaching Chair podcast. I'm your host, Julie Fragnito, and your partner in parenting. Here we'll talk with real parents about their real moments. Come along as we grow from each other's experiences and receive practical, high-structure, high-nurture tools that you can use to lead confidently at home. In today's episode, we zoom in on a moment that feels small, but can be incredibly draining for parents. When your child asks the same question again and again, even after you've already answered clearly. These moments can quickly trigger irritation, self-doubt, and the feeling that your voice isn't being heard. We'll explore what's really driving this behavior in young kids and why repeated questions aren't about disrespect or defiance. Let's get started.

So my daughter came in my room and asked if she could have a Ring Pop. She knows they're for my son's birthday party this coming weekend. I put them out of sight, out of mind. I told her, no, they're for the party. She asks, just one? I shook my head no, and then she walks away. We have many instances like this where I give an answer and they will ask me the same question that I just answered. Usually I find myself getting frustrated. Irritated, and you can hear it in my tone if I have to re-answer the same question. I don't want them to think they're a burden, but I also don't feel like I should have to keep repeating my answer. And then I have another instance where the same kind of thing happened, just different scenario. She asked me, let's say less than 20 minutes ago, if I would do a puzzle with her. I had literally just woken up, started making coffee and loading up the dishwasher. I told her that I just woke up and that I needed a minute, but that I would play with her later after lunch. Less than 20 minutes later, she comes back and asks if I can do the puzzle with her. She's only 5, so I understand that she doesn't know how long it is until lunch, but I figured that she would at least understand that we haven't eaten yet, even if she doesn't understand time. It's not realistic for me to set a timer in that instance because we still have an— over an hour until lunch. I know an hour and a half seems like a lot of time for me to sit down for a second, but it's not just me sitting down for a second. I still had to finish loading the dishwasher, get their homeschool stuff set up because we do homeschool before lunch. And that's why I told her after lunch. How do I handle the repeated questions that have already been answered without feeling and sounding annoyed?

So you're making your answer pretty darn clear and she is seemingly not taking that answer and sitting with it.

I feel like I give a straightforward answer, but I also give a little reason as to why, because I never just wanna say no. Or yes, you know, I always say no, you know, maybe later, or no, it's for the party, or, you know, so I feel like I'm not just shutting her down immediately. And I think that's why I get frustrated when she asks me again, because I've already given the answer and a reason.

The first thing I wanna mention is that this takes an incredible amount of patience to handle from the parent's perspective, right? It's extremely frustrating to feel like your voice is not being heard. You're really making efforts to make your child understand, right? You're giving her. A definitive time of when you can play the game. You are explaining to her when the candy is okay to have. You're like, what more can I do at this point? Yep. The first thing is 5-year-olds are impulsive. They have poor self-regulation skills and their brains are still developing, which means that their impulses are not always the easiest to control. And they're not always focused on remembering the answers. They're more focused on knowing that it will come soon. And so this could be impulse combined with excitement. In these two instances, getting candy and being able to play a game with mom are very exciting things. So based on these patterns, it sounds like she's just generally pretty excited. So that's kind of where my brain is going. Initially. Now in the world of a 5-year-old, it's not always that they're forgetting what you said, but it's also curiosity, right? Our little 5-year-old brains are constantly calculating and testing and understanding the world around them. And so they're curiously trying to see, hey, did the answer change? Maybe mom will give in this time. They are constantly using our consistency as a gauge. For those limits and boundaries. There are certainly times in our parenting where one day it might be okay for our kid to do something, and the next day it's not okay for our kid to do something. And sometimes it depends on our mood, sometimes it depends on the situation, but our kids pick up on these little things. Another thing that this type of behavior can point to is attention-seeking behavior or some sort of reassurance. Seeking, and what I mean by that is when a child is repeating their questions, they can be simply looking for your attention on the matter, your eye contact, your words, whatever you're feeding them. And the way I like to look at attention is that whether it's positive or negative, like mom is happily telling me we can have a Ring Pop over the weekend, or whether she is so frustrated and telling me I already said the weekend. It's attention. And our kids are getting our eyes and our words and our focus for a small bit of time, whether it's good or bad. So just to reiterate them, we have the idea of impulsiveness, just general 5-year-old behavior of excitement, developing brain, poor self-regulation. Then there's curiosity, testing boundaries. Checking to see if mom's really gonna be consistent this time. And then there is the third option of attention. If it's getting her more of you by repeating her questions, well, she's picking up on this pattern of when I repeat my questions, I get more connection time and attention from mom.

So does that mean that I'm not actually giving her enough attention and that's why she's doing it? Or is it more so of like, it's just her age?

That's the ultimate question here, right? Is this just developmental stuff? Is this attention related? I'm gonna give you practical tools for each of these things, but before we get there, I'm curious to know where your brain is going as I'm saying these to you. We know our children better than anybody else. If you could rank them, how does it feel to you? Does it feel like excitement? Does it feel like testing the boundaries, or does it feel like attention seeking?

I think it feels mainly like curiosity. And then second, I would say that it's attention seeking because she does have a sibling and we've got twins on the way. But of course my mom guilt automatically goes to, I'm not doing enough. I'm not playing enough. They're not receiving enough of my attention.

The most challenging moments with our kids is usually a balance of all these things. It's never just one. It is all of the above. Let's talk about impulsivity. So I'm really excited for a Ring Pop. I can't stop asking, is it time to get a Ring Pop? Is it time to get a Ring Pop? Even though you're like, I said after dinner, did we eat yet? Have you seen dinner on the table? We can come back with very sassy answers in these moments. But the idea here is that if we can recognize it as impulsiveness and a lack of ability to regulate excitement, well, what we need to do is provide a a skill that takes the place of repeating these questions, but fulfills the same need of expressing her excitement. So what does that sound like? The thing I like to call it is the I wonder game. Mom, can I have a Ring Pop? No, you can't have a Ring Pop until your brother's birthday party. That's what they're for. So they're gonna sit there and we're not gonna touch them. 30 minutes later, mom, can I have a Ring Pop? Instead of reacting with a, is it your brother's birthday yet? What did I tell you? I will not answer again when you can have the Ring Pops. Do you remember when I said you could have the Ring Pops? For my brother's birthday. That's right. For your brother's birthday. So now moving forward, I don't want you to ask me that question again. You wanna know why? Cuz I'm not gonna answer it. I don't like repeating the same answers over and over. So what you can play instead is the I wonder game. Every time your body feels really excited about the Ring Pops, I want you to say, I wonder how many Ring Pops we're gonna have left over after the party. Or I wonder what the cherry flavored one is gonna taste like. Or I wonder if I'm gonna be allowed to bite the Ring Pop or if I'm only gonna be allowed to lick it cuz they're really hard. Do you see what I'm doing here?

And now that you you say this to me, I'm thinking maybe she wants more conversation from me. And I think sometimes I don't provide that, but I think she's just trying to maybe conversate and I'm giving her like short, quick responses because I want it to be age-appropriate responses to where she understands. But I don't think I'm like stimulating that conversation connection part of her brain.

I think that's really reflective of you and your answer leads me into the attention-seeking possibility that I think is important to address here. Is she repeating her questions over and over again because I'm giving her me and she wants to talk to me? Our attention is like gold. They just wanna connect to us. They wanna be a part of our lives. They wanna talk to us. Behaviorally speaking, our kids will continue repeating behaviors that get them what they want. And so if By continually asking the same question over and over and over again, she gets mom's attention. Well, her body is calculating that when I do this, I get this in return.

Mm-hmm. That makes sense.

And we need to break that cycle because this is what I like to call a tricky cycle. And how do we know that? Because you're frustrated, you're irritated, and when we feel like we're getting into repetitive irritating cycles, We need to stop them. So how do we do that practically? We want to divert our attention to her when she is doing the right thing. And the reason I address this one after the impulsivity conversation, the focus conversation, the I wonder game, is because now we've equipped her with the tools, right? A replacement of what she can do instead. So now we can actually use our attention as the next tool to reinforce the skills that we just taught her. Mom, can I have a Ring Pop? 30 minutes later, Mom, can I have a Ring Pop? So now what you're simply gonna do is divert your attention in this moment. I will not answer that, but I'm happy to play the I wonder game with you and turn your attention to something else. Washing a dish, folding a blanket, washing your hands. Stay present, but don't overfill her with attention. We need to be very careful. About how we're giving attention, the type of attention that we're giving. She's excited. She wants you. She wants to chat with you about it. So we need to teach her how to chat with us about it in a way that is not, in general, irritating.

So how can I do these types of things with her, this connection with her through conversation, like throughout the day when she's doing positive things? I think my brain is so busy and like constantly moving that sometimes Maybe the kids feel like they're going unnoticed. You know, if I see her doing something nice to her brother or playing nicely, I always say like, that was very nice. Like, what do you know? That's a good big sister and stuff. So I do try to give the positive reinforcement here and there, but I don't think I'm good at having conversations with them at their age. So I wonder how I can notice the kids more throughout the day and like make conversation without them coming to me first.

I'm picking up from your voice, that it's a little overwhelming to feel like I need to start pouring more into my kids and giving them more. And I wanna be super practical and blunt about this, is that our kids don't need much. It's more about the quality of the moments that we have with them, more so than the quantity. And what I mean by that is it's less about these long, in-depth conversations that we have with our kids, cuz they're kids and their attention span is super short. It's more about how can you positively be there in the little moments. I love what you're doing in terms of pointing out when she is doing the right thing, giving her attention when she is helping her brother or being thoughtful. This sounds kind of funny, but just simply looking into her eyes. Sometimes like we forget to look at our children's eyes and just be like, hmm. How was your day? Tell me about what you did with your brother before. And just looking at them, like our eye contact alone speaks measures to them. Another thing is in the middle of something, hey, can you come over here for a sec? And whisper something funny or loving in her ear and just say, I love you so much. Or I think I need something. And she'll be like, what do you need? And you'll be like, I think I need a hug. And let that be your little thing. Another thing that comes to mind is like a secret handshake, right? 5-year-olds love secret handshakes. Let's come up with a secret handshake together. And every time I call you over, maybe like once or twice a day, we have to do our secret handshake. And I wanna tell you that these little moments add up, just little drops in the bucket of, I am doing something other than judging you. I am doing something other than giving you feedback. For a minute, I am asking you if you wanna play a game of Guess Who? Or something that's, you know, 5 or 10 minutes long. That goes a really, really long way. Even if it's writing her a little note on a piece of paper, folding it up and dropping it in her room and letting her know, hey, I put a special note next to your bed. You have to go see it, right? I think you'd be surprised at how far they can really get them through a day and feeling connected to you.

I love that. I mean, I know it's probably more so just practice and repetition. But how can I make myself think about these things?

That's a great question. Super aware of you to practically ask, okay, how do I implement that? And I think the key here is starting with this conversation. Okay, we've identified a pattern that you have. It is you feel like you're constantly judging or giving feedback or shouting out praise for your kids, but you're feeling like you're lacking in the department of true connection with your kids. This is something that all of us as mothers struggle with on a daily basis is, are my kids getting enough of me? Are they getting the right parts of me? And I think practically speaking, it's remembering this pattern, right? So just random checkpoints throughout the day. Hey, have I just been shouting out feedback? Have I just been asking her if she's done her chores? Have I just been praising her for the things she's doing well? Am I just kind of like a bystander in her life? Or have I played an active role in some part of her day today? And if the answer is, I feel like I'm kind of just an announcer walking by and observing everything. Well, that's grounds for, I need to do one of those things that we just talked about, right? Let me call her over and just say, I love you in her ear and give her a huge hug. Or let me write her a little note and tell her I put a little note next to her bed. I'm just suggesting these might not resonate with her or they might not resonate with you, but it's Finding those little things that, you know, they take 10 seconds at a time of your day, and maybe you start with doing 2 things a day that's 10 seconds long that you can say, okay, cool, I'm building up this muscle. And I think you're gonna notice that it starts to become more second nature the more you lean into it.

I love how practical and, and simple that is because I feel like most of the time us parents feel like we have to do way more than that and it just becomes this unrealistic thing. And So I feel like that's something that I'll automatically remember from here on out.

The last thing I wanna add is you have a baby coming, right? You have a baby on the way. Twins. Oh my gosh. You have twins coming. Yes. Twins. You have—

congratulations.

You have twins coming. You have two already. When you have twins and you are taking care of the baby and you are feeling like, oh my goodness. My oldest isn't getting enough of me anymore. My second oldest is not getting the attention they need. Remember, it's the quality. It's those little moments of while you're feeding one of the twins, while one of the other twins maybe is napping, you can look at your daughter across the room and say, hey, let's tell Alexa to play our favorite song. And while I'm feeding the baby, we could dance along to it while I'm sitting on the And that little 2-minute song could make the world of a difference in her entire day to say, you know, mom looked at me, she picked our favorite song, we danced. And then I think you'd be surprised that she'll be like, okay, I'm gonna go play now. And you filled her cup. So I want you to keep that in mind because I think it'll serve you as a mom of 4. As we wrap up, I wanna leave you with this reminder. When your child keeps asking the same question, it's rarely about not listening or trying to push your buttons. It's about a developing brain that's full of excitement, curiosity, and a need for connection, and a nervous system that's still learning how to wait and regulate big feelings. Boundaries don't have to be repeated louder to be effective. Sometimes the most supportive thing we can do is stay steady, offer a clear replacement skill, and trust that learning is happening even when it doesn't look neat or immediate. Growth shows up in tiny moments. One fewer repeated question, one pause before asking again, one small skill practiced instead of spiraling. If you're parenting a child who asks again and again, please hear this. You're not doing anything wrong and your child isn't being difficult on purpose. You're both learning how to hold limits, how to stay connected, and how to move through excitement and disappointment together. Thank you for joining me in the Parent Coaching Chair. Keep leading your home with high structure and high Nurture. And I'll meet you back here next week. If you're looking for more support, you'll find classes and practical guides over at my website, www.transformingparenthood.com. And podcast listeners can use the code PODCAST15 at checkout for 15% off my Mastering High Structure, High Nurture course, my signature systematic approach to raising cooperative, and emotionally skilled kids.