Managing the After-School Meltdown

Why some kids lose it when they get home, and how to deal

Words Erin Hayes Burt Updated February 2, 2024

Does this school day sound familiar: Your child is happy and upbeat when they leave in the morning, and by all accounts, they have a great day. But the minute they get home the switch flips. Yelling, crying, whining, moodiness—an altogether different kid than the one you dropped off at school. It’s not just your child. This after-school meltdown is a phenomenon called after-school restraint collapse, and it manifests in different ways in kids of all ages.

Younger children may completely melt down or be unable to cope following a full day of school. In older elementary kids, it may look more like a lack of impulse control—picking on their sibling or freaking out over something they are usually able to ignore. Tweens and teens might just not want to talk. No matter their age, after school can be a tough time for kids. And most likely, they’re going to take it out on you.

School-aged kids’ brains are learning executive function. It’s essential for making it through a school day, but it’s a complex skill set involving three separate skills: working memory, mental flexibility, and emotional restraint. It’s these skills that allow kids to coexist in a classroom together. In fact, at the lower grades, often the entire first week of school is devoted to strengthening kids’ executive function so the classroom isn’t chaotic all year. Kids use their working memory to learn classroom rules and put them into practice. They use mental flexibility to be able to shift from task to task and make daily transitions. Emotional regulation helps them remain calm when frustrated, annoyed, or angry.

If executive function is a muscle, after-school restraint collapse is when that muscle cramps up; they just can’t hold it together anymore. When they are with familiar people in a familiar place—like home—they let that muscle relax. It presents differently in all kids, but hitting, crying, tempers, attitudes, shortness—these are all signs that their executive function is worn out.

Chelsea Acree, a mom of three in Rockwall, has a system for avoiding these kinds of meltdowns. It involves healthy food, outdoor playtime and no small talk. “After school, my kids know they can pick a fruit or veggie snack and one snack from the pantry, and I don’t ask them about their day,” she says. “Then we go on a walk, bike or scooter ride around the block. They seem much happier to talk about their day then, so I make sure to spend a little time walking by each one to give them my full attention.”

Emily Millican, a licensed clinical social worker at Terra Therapies in Fort Worth, says this strategy works for a few reasons. At school, kids often eat very early or don’t get enough time to eat all their lunch, so by the time they get home their blood sugar can be very low leading to crankiness or anxiousness. So make snacks a priority after school, she says.

Provide items with a good mix of easily absorbed sugar and fiber, such as fruit or vegetables, and some sustaining protein to help them get to dinner, like a granola bar, cheese stick, beef jerky, or nuts. Consider taking these in the car with you when you pick them up, and don’t ask too much of them until the hangry is gone.

Then, let them play. “It’s their way to relax and let off whatever that steam is from the day,” says Millican.

But playtime doesn’t mean screentime, she warns. While you might think giving a kid their iPad or turning on their favorite show could help them unwind, that’s not actually the case. “All that’s doing is just repressing all those emotions instead of letting them kind of process and be active. So maybe they do have some TV time or maybe they do have some tablet time, but that’s also after they’ve been able to just kind of play,” she says.

Instead, encourage playtime outside if possible. Children process their emotions through free play, not talking about their day like adults do. And being outdoors helps them physically and mentally reset. So save the iPad or video games for later. Those methods of play have more guardrails and don’t let kids use their imagination as much.

For older kids who aren’t game to play, suggest a walk outside, a hike or journaling, says Cosha Joseph, a therapist at Circle of Life Behavior Solutions in Dallas. “It can be anything,” she says of helping them unwind. “Figure out exactly what makes them happy. It can be listening to music, different things like that.”

Routine can also be helpful to kids who are prone to after school struggles. When kids are spent and tired, knowing what’s going to happen next can help them relax, says Millican. “They know we’re coming home and in the first 20 minutes, everyone’s going to be in their own room playing, or we’re going to come home and we’re going to have a snack, and then we’re going on a walk,” she says. In the mornings, make sure everyone knows what the day holds so there are no after-school surprises.

Lastly, know where your head is before your kids come home or you pick them up. “What are you doing so that you can kind of be prepared for your kiddo?” asks Millican. “Have I taken a minute to do something that’s healthy for me so that I can be ready and I’m not also melting down?”

As easy as it is for us to pick up our phone to scroll in the pickup line, often the content that we find isn’t soothing and affirming, it’s divisive and grating. We might see a work email that is stressful, then the kids get in the car and start screaming, and it’s not a good time for anyone.

While you’re waiting in the pick-up line or at the bus stop, have a snack for yourself, or turn on a song that puts you in a good place. Take a few deep breaths in the quiet of your car and de-stress. Acknowledge your mood—are you hungry, angry, lonely, or tired? All four of those feelings impact our state of mind, and we know kids often reflect our own attitudes back to us, both at our best and at our worst.

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