You know how I mentioned earlier that I did this mostly because I have a tendency to get distracted and wander off? I was totally already doing that. I made the blog, I made the charts, I made the plan...and then I was all, "Too hard." So I'm really glad that we've set this up so that I kind of have to do it. It really is going to be awesome.
So I just finished reading a book about parenting kids with attachment disorders. Not that I have a kid with an attachment disorder. It's just a subject that has intrigued me since I first learned about RAD-- how do you raise a child whose mental and emotional development has been severely disrupted by abuse and/or neglect? How do you heal wounds that cut so deeply into a child's core identity and ability to connect with others? Parenting a kid with an attachment disorder-- that's hard core stuff. It's like Extreme Parenting. I think regular parenting is tough, so Extreme Parenting-- it's fascinating to me.
But I digress.
The book had a lot of good stuff in it for those of us with non-attachment-challenged children. Beyond Logic, Consequences, and Control is written by two clinical social workers who suggest that there are only two primary emotions: love and fear. Every other emotion we experience-- anger, joy, frustration, exhilaration, depression, contentment, anxiety, courage-- is an offshoot of one of those two emotions.
They suggest that to be a successful parent the two most important things you can do are:
First, identify fear as the motivator in your child's problematic behaviors and help them replace it with love.
In our family, the big behavior problems we have right now are whining/badgering, disobedience, and inter-sibling violence. Whining, badgering, and disobedience I can see as potentially being rooted in a fear of not having enough or in missing out on something. When Soren says, "I'm not going to clean my room!" it could be because he's overwhelmed by the task and/or he's worried that all the time he spends cleaning his room could have been spent doing something fun and exciting. When Liam says, "I want gummy bears...I want gummy bears...I want gummy bears...I want gummy bears," it could be because he has this childish sense that gummy bears are essential to his happiness and that if he doesn't get them, he won't be able to be happy. And with violence-- well, now that I think about it, Soren usually physically attacks Liam when he feels threatened by him-- Liam's touching his stuff or teasing him or getting into his space.
So as a parent, say the authors, it's important to respond to the child's fear, rather than the child's behaviors-- and then later, when the child is calm and regulated, you can coach them on making better choices.
Jane Nelson, author of Positive Discipline, always says that children do better when they feel better. It's true. When you feel loved, loving, and happy, are your behaviors more likely to be positive and productive or negative and destructive? How about when you feel anxious, unhappy, unloved, and unworthy of love?
We want to motivate our kids with love, not fear. This brings to mind the scripture:
"There is no fear where love exists. Rather, perfect love banishes fear, for fear involves punishment, and the person who lives in fear has not been perfected in love."
1 John 4:18
Second, identify fear in your reactions to your child's problematic behaviors and work to replace it with love.
I didn't realize until I read this book how fear-based my parenting can be sometimes. My kids' naughty behaviors trigger a lot of fears in me-- particularly the fear that I'm inadequate for the task of mothering and the accompanying fear that my beautiful, precious children will grow up to be bad people-- and it will be all. my. fault. That's a pretty weighty load of fear to be hefting around. Especially considering that one person's fear feeds another person's fear in interpersonal interactions.
The authors of the book emphasize that a child having a fearful reaction (say, throwing a tantrum) triggers a fearful reaction in a parent (who then precedes to get frustrated, yell, and punish). And of course the prospect of punishment from a parent increases a child's fear, which increases their fear response, which accelerates their bad behaviors, which increases the parent's anger. But if a child has a fear reaction and a parent responds with love, the loving response can help calm the child, and the situation will de-escalate.
So again, it's important to address the child's fear first-- and then later, when they're calm, teach them the skills and behaviors they need to use in the future.
So this week in the 12 Week Parenting Challenge, the big Parenting Emphasis will to simply watch for fear in your interactions with your kids and work to replace it with love.
This week's Awesome Parenting Plan:
I don't want this to be overwhelming to you AT ALL, so we're just doing a little at a time each week. Today you're going to look at the parenting tracking chart and think you can't do it all. That's because you can't. (If you can, don't tell me about it, because I want to continue liking you.) For this week, don't worry about The Respectful Behaviors Chart or Kindness Elves or Nipping Behaviors in the Bud or Eating Dinner Together or Doing a Daily Celebration or anything else besides the things listed below. If you're doing the other things already, that's awesome. Give yourself those points. If you see something simple you can add in without stressing yourself out, do it. But otherwise, take a deep breath and just do the following:
1) Hold a Family Meeting. Introduce the concept. Give compliments, talk about your plans for the week, and teach about your Character Quality for the week. Don't worry about doing skills training yet. Don't worry about doing an agenda yet. Just do the meeting
2) Look for fear/love in your interactions with your kids. When your children are whining, take a second to think about how the world might seem from their perspective. Cultivate a little empathy and compassion for them. Then get down on their level and say, "I know you think that not going to McDonald's today will take away all of your happiness forever. But I promise it won't. I love you and want you to be happy and would never do anything that would keep you from being happy forever." And see what happens. My guess is that your kids (if they're at all like my kids) will keep whining. That's okay. Just keep doing whatever you've been doing in response to whining. We'll get to that later. For now, let's just focus on identifying fear-- your child's and your own--and working to replace it with love.
3) Keep track of your points-- but don't be discouraged if you don't get many! I'm sure not going to. Plan on giving yourself ZERO points for a lot of the things on the chart this week. That's okay. We're not there yet. We're just tackling one thing at a time here, ya'll, and I think that doing a meeting and reinforcing a character quality during the week is going to be plenty. Don't worry about going over the poster or doing magical goodness fairies or eating dinner together. Plus, the lower your points are in the beginning, the more impressed you'll be by your progress later on.
4) Check in on Facebook! Tell us how it's going! Tell us how your Family Meeting went! Tell us about which character quality you're working on! Tell us about fear and love in your interactions with your kids!
And remember this quote from Beyond Logic, Consequences, and Control:
"Fear sees problems. Love sees solutions."
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