Honey, I Wrecked The Kids Part 4

It's common for feelings of futility and apathy to set in. Th at's all part of the dance. Don't underestimate the child who has mastered avoidance. They are working to make all your parental eff orts fall short, so, of course, you're going to feel discouraged. At some point we all feel like throwing in the towel. Don't feel rotten about that.

Instead, marvel at how brilliant your children were at getting you to back down and avoid your own discouragement. Powerful thought, isn't it?

How Does Your Child Respond?

Here we are busting a gut to reach these children and they give us nothing in return. It's as if they see us coming and retreat further.

They are remarkable at holding their position or stance on NOT getting better, at NOT showing improvement. They really are like the living catatonic, unfettered in their commitment to stasis and inertia. And they do it so well. We don't feel duped or like we need to make them snap out of it; we really do believe in their charade.

We become convinced that they really are incapable at a root level.

It doesn't seem like a facade to us. We're their parents, after all. We'd know it if they were faking it-wouldn't we?

So now you have had a tour through the four goals of misbehavior and how to diagnose each one. I have emphasized the goal-directed Chapter Three 65.nature of the behavior and how our interactions provide the outcomes our children are after. Keep in mind that while I have presented these as four "distinct" dances, they do run into one another. I mean, you can hardly have a fight with someone without paying attention to them, right? And you are going to feel hurt if you had a fi ght and got wounded, so the line between power and revenge can blur as well. The tools you will acquire as you read on will help you to move between the dances and use appropriate parenting techniques, so don't worry about a bit of overlap in the particular dynamics you are experiencing.

As children get older, their needs and motivations become more complicated. Children under the age of ten will always be striving to attain one of the four goals we have studied here. In children over ten, you will find that while these goals may still apply, there are a few more that come into play that are beyond the scope of this book-things such as "thrill-seeking," "masculine/feminine identification," and so on. However, these initial four dances are by far the most common, and the most powerful for you to understand. As promised, at the end of this chapter is your handy-dandy reference chart.

A word of caution about your new understanding of your child's inner motivation: these powerful forces are not understood consciously by our children, and they shouldn't be revealed to them unless with the guidance of a trained professional.

Pulling your child aside and saying, "Hey, Sue, I'm reading this book and the author says you're a tyrant who wants to take over the king's chair I've abandoned. Apparently, it's all about power for you.

Also, you're just doing this because you don't really believe you're capable or competent, so you are trying to compensate for what you think are shortcomings," is not only bad form-it's dangerous!

Please, never use this information as a weapon.

66.Take heart in knowing that with this new information you will be able to do your part in changing your actions. However, also know that the ultimate decision to change always lies with our children. We can proceed in ways that either improve or erode our family dynamics. We can create an environment that challenges children to alter their mistaken beliefs and their approaches to life. But we also have to respect the democratic idea that children are responsible for their own choices and decisions. It may also be that for some children the training and expertise of a therapist or counselor is required. Th at's okay, too. Just be aware of it, and don't read into it something more dramatic than it is.

Before you put the bookmark in and turn off the bedside light, I have one tactic to kick off your morning that you can try right away. It's a tactic that every parent can do immediately, in every situation. I call it, "Doing the George Castanza." Remember that episode of Seinfeld when George has the realization that everything he does has a 100 percent failure rate? He has an epiphany and decides that instead of doing his usual thing, he'll try doing the opposite. In psychological circles, this is called the "fallacy of first impulse," and it speaks to the idea that our knee-jerk reactions, our first gut impulse, is the payoff our children are hoping for. If you want to start making changes right away, disrupt your repet.i.tious dance by NOT doing whatever it is you have been doing, over and over and over again. Hey, if George Castanza can do this, there is hope for all of us!67.e lvov o eel f (continued) ant t o tice me, in t me help.

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CHAPTER FOUR.

THE ATTENTION DANCE.

It wouldn't be suppertime at Josie's house without the fi ve-year-old twins chasing each other around the kitchen island where she is trying to pull together a meal. They race like madmen running with the bulls in Pamploma. Sock-footed and sliding, they bank the corners, smas.h.i.+ng into cupboards as they go. It's fun! And especially since Mom shrieks (which sends them giggling) and engages in her nightly repertoire of "Boys, stop that. Boys, I mean it. Someone is going to get hurt! Boys, that's enough. I'm working with a hot skillet; be careful."

Ahhh, good times. I don't think there is a parent among us who hasn't had some firsthand experience dealing with an attention-seeking child.

With Susan, it's her little guy. Seems he likes to get chased when it's time to get his PJs on each night. "Stand still; come on. Let's go; help Mommy."

Gerald refuses to take his kids with him on trips to the Home Depot anymore since he spends all his time policing, telling his 70 boys, "Don't touch that. Put that down. Don't run in the aisle- watch where you're going-you just about hit that cart!" Since when does buying a sheet of drywall take three hours and two Tylenols?

But, isn't it a relief to know that our kids are not just being inconsiderate pests or whining nuisances? Now that we are sympa-thetic (because we understand the goals of misbehavior and we have done our diagnosing), we can see that it's a child's gallant eff orts at connecting with us. Understanding the human dynamics helps us to have more empathy for their behavior.

That said, having empathy doesn't mean we have to accept it or excuse it. No-that would be permissive parenting. Understanding the dynamic helps us to see with a fresh lens, so we are less discouraged ourselves and better able to handle the situation eff ectively. Ultimately, it's the key to plotting our course of corrective action.

With the child whose goal is undue attention, we need to address the mistaken belief "I only count when I am being paid attention to." We know that our children are important and signifi cant all the time, and not just when we are attending to them.

However, our typical responses to attention-seeking (nagging, reminding or giving of service) don't counteract this internal belief.

In fact, our responses encourage our kids to keep seeking connection through these negative means. So our knee-jerk reaction can't continue-we have to do the ole "George Kastanza" by NOT giving our prototypical responses in these situations. Instead we have to show that co-operative, non-disturbing behaviors yield our engagement.

Let's look at how, in the moment, we are going to step out of this attention dance:71.1. Do not give undue attention when your child is demanding it from you.

2. Give your child attention in the form of real connection.

3. Avoid the traps that parents typically fall into: stonewalling, random reinforcement and others.

The parenting tools you will learn are: 1.

The delicate art of ignoring 2. All action, no talk Distraction Redirection Natural consequences Logical consequences 7. Training for independence And, the tools for the longer-term solution: 1. Be present and leave s.p.a.ce for independent entertainment.

2. Catch 'em being good.

3. Build the relations.h.i.+p connection in the deep and rich way the child seeks.

Are you ready? Let's start loading up your democratic parenting toolbox. I am going to go over each of these and show you examples of how they look in various situations of attention-seeking. You can begin implementing these immediately. I will give you lots of tools specific to attention-seeking and then you can choose which one seems best for the encounters you're facing. If you understand the 72 principles behind the misbehaviors and why the tools are eff ective, you'll be able to switch your tactics as needed.

THE DELICATE ART OF IGNORING.

If you have properly diagnosed the goal as attention, and if the situation allows it, simply say nothing and pay no mind. Your child will quickly realize her behavior is no longer successful in engaging you. Once the behavior loses its eff ectiveness, the child will stop.

A 14-month-old with a shrill shriek usually succeeds in getting everyone in the room to look her way, cover their ears and say something along the lines of, "whoa-that hurts our ears. Please use your inside voice." Instead, I recommend you ignore the shriek by not fl inching, not looking her way and not commenting at all.

Simply go about your business as if you didn't hear it. After a few days your child will not waste her time with it. It's not eff ective, so why bother?

I have had a lot of fi rsthand experience of the eff ectiveness of this approach as a nursery school teacher, and I've seen undeniable evidence of this with the children of deaf parents. Their parents don't respond to screaming, so those kids come up with diff erent schemes for grabbing attention, such as vibrating and shaking.

I worked with a family whose child found every opportunity to eat paper. Mom had to follow him around the house to keep him "paper proofed." If she turned her back for a moment, he would be hiding somewhere eating a tissue or toilet paper. We diagnosed this as attention-seeking behavior and talked about Mom being non-responsive. Of course, she was worried about the possible health concerns, but her doctor a.s.sured her that a few days of paper in his digestive system would not be harmful, so she agreed to ignore the misbehavior. Two years of paper eating ended after three days when Mom stopped attending to it.73.So, first see if you can simply ignore the misbehavior. I understand that this will feel permissive to you at first, but if you're accurate with your diagnoses, and you experiment with this tactic, you'll gain confidence in its effectiveness. Give it a try.

Common Parenting Pitfall: Stonewalling Who knew there is a right and a wrong way to ignore? When I observe parents implementing my advice of "Ignore the undue attention-seeking behavior," I see them instead ignoring the child. Th ey may turn on their heels and walk away coldly, as if to say, "You are a pest and a nuisance and I am not going to let you bother me. I am going to make you pay for your misbehavior by ignoring you." Th is kind of response is punitive in nature, because it is intended to hurt the child. To be more dramatic about it, it's like saying, "You misbehaved and upset me, so now you are dead to me." Ignoring the child means we have put up a wall and disconnected from them emotionally.

Given that these children are missing the crucial C of connection, and attempting to solve that by seeking undue attention, our stonewalling and disconnecting just makes matters worse.

This really speaks to the parenting dictum of separating the deed from the doer. It's only the behavior that is not worth our responding to. We do want to notice the child and become involved with him positively. If he picks his nose in front of you, it is an invitation to the dance. Decline! Decline by not offering a payoff: ignore the behavior, and instead find positive ways to engage your child.

ALL ACTION, NO TALK.

Of course, we have a hard time ignoring behavior that is destructive or unsafe. In the democratic model, we are charged with maintaining individual rights as well as the social order, so sometimes we must take action.

74.In those situations, I recommend "zip the lip" and just "do"

whatever corrective action is required. For example: If a child is jumping on the couch, instead of saying, "Get down from there!" simply walk over to the couch and a.s.sist her down with no words.

If a child is hammering on the coffee table, take the hammer away.

If he is picking the leaves off a plant, move the plant up out of reach.

If a child is pumping the foaming soap 15 times, remove the soap dispenser.

If she is hanging precariously off the railing from the tenth step, put her on the ground.

Each of these actions will maintain the order of the house without saying a word. Attention-seeking children will not be upset, as they already have a good idea they should not be doing these things. Th ey will know their tactic is not working anymore.

DISTRACTION.

Let's not lose sight of the fact that our fi cus-leaf-plucking-child is seeking connection! It's only because he can't seem to accomplish connection positively that he will turn into Edward Scissorhands.

Recognize in the moment that your child's actions are calling out for a positive connection with you, and give it to him by distracting from the misbehavior to something positive.

"Hey, Edward, do you want to help me water the plants? I have a special watering can with a really cool spout you might like learning how to use. I can show you!"75.Because Edward's intention was to engage with Mom, the off er to learn about the water solves his need to connect with her. Th is is all the child guidance required in the moment. Let's look at another example: Jenna takes her son Ben to the grocery store. He is bored watching Mom shop. He starts pulling reams of plastic bags off the roll in the produce aisle. Mom correctly diagnoses this as a bid for her attention and finds another way to engage his attention. "Ben, can you help me pick five apples?" While Ben starts picking apples, Mom quietly re-rolls the bags he pulled out, but no words are said about "the bag incident."