Just the other day while conversing with a friend about parenting we both commiserated about how hard it is BEING a parent.
And it is.
In my profession I see hundreds of parents each day. All kinds. Not bad ones...not really. I think parents now a days try to make everything easy for their children. Happy. And that is not setting them up for real life. Real life is fucked up, and children need to learn a few things about coping with it all....in a nice way of course.
I get asked for advice a hundred times a year. I wish I could publish a book. It would be titled:
Common Sense Parenting 101
or
(Don't parent like a douchebag)
Hey....Being in change of a human being was never meant to be all giggles and sunlight.
They did not float down from heaven on a cloud. They were not placed in your arms by a mythical beast.
No...... They came kicking and screaming and bloody.
Parenthood is a battle that you should always stay on top of.
Children are not born with respect for you. You have to earn it, instill it and nurture it.
Beanie CSP Rule #1
" BECAUSE I SAID SO..."
You don't HAVE to make everything fun, it is perfectly fine to tell your children No. And the best part about it all...you
DONT have to give them a reason for it at all.
YOU are the parent.
YOU are in charge. It is a very poor mistake if you ever let your children think that they are.
"I want candy"
First of all this is rude. I am sure that you are reading this and thinking about how rude it is for a child to say that
...right?
Well it is.
It is also a statement and not a question like..."
Mom, may I have some candy."
(I would be more apt to say yes to a politely worded question, then I would be if my child forgot their manners.)
You reply with a
"No."
Do not console your child.
DO not try to make them see it your way. You cannot. THEY are a
child. with
child brains and
child candy wants.
"WHhhhyyyyy?" They whine.
"Because I said so." You reply. And that is enough.
There is a very good reason WHY parents have been saying that phrase for years, and this is it:
You are a parent and if you say no, that should be good enough for them.
What you are teaching them: Do not question your parents answer.
If they are ALLOWED to question you when they are 3, what the hell do you think they will do when they are 13?
Beanie CSP rule #2
"NO means NO"
When my children were small, I use to worry that they would run toward the street and I needed them to listen when I said "NO." And when I say "Listen" I mean, their whole body freezes and they STOP whatever it is they are doing.
I cannot even tell you how many times I said to my children
"What did mommy say?"
Their shoulders would sag and they would mumble "You said No."
"And what does No mean?" I would further question
"No means No."
The end. It does not mean "lets negotiate."
Granted I rarely said No to my children when they wanted to DO something creative like painting their bathroom by themselves. Leaving wavy flowers and sickly looking snails all over the walls.
.......Or dig a mud hole to crawl in and out of all day or add soap to the floor of the kitchen to make it an indoor slip and slide.
Whatevs.
But when Mommy DID say No. It meant
NO.
So you are standing there and your child whines..."
But I waaaaaant it."
"I said no."
"Pleeeeeeeeeeeeease!" They whine. At first very cutely...then it turns into a growl.
"PLEEEEEASE!" And within 2 seconds your child goes from cute little angel, to wildabeast.
Please for the love of God, DO NOT:
A) Give in and Say okay because you are embarrassed by their behavior.
Who CARES. In fact when you stand firm, more parents (and teachers) will admire your tenacity.
B) Think up a reason why they should get it even though you have already said No. Like..."
ummm you HAVE been a good boy at school...okay go ahead."
C) Bribe them.
"I have candy in the car." or "
We have candy at home."
Doing any of those things is showing your child that what their parents say, they don't
mean. And hearing the word "No" means whine a little louder.
Which means that later in life, when you say "NO you cannot have sex at 15 or NO you cannot smoke the Ganja" it really means "I can do whatever I want, my mom doesn't really EVER mean it."
What you SHOULD DO:
"I said no, do you want to open the door to leave or shall I?"
"What did I say? Its time to leave are you walking on your own or shall I help you. Choose."
"I said no. If you whine again you wont have any tomorrow either."
Each one of these options gives your child the CHIOCE on how they will react. It also establishes you as the ultimate decision maker. PARENTING WIN!
If it helps, imagine that your little angel is asking for a crack pipe. Be THAT firm.
Beanie parenting rule #3
Suck it up and win.
Being a parent is embarrassing. When a child in a wheelchair goes by, they WILL point it out. If you see a huge gargantuan fat woman hobbling by with a cane, they WILL ask in a VERY loud voice why she is so fat. And most definitely without a doubt...they WILL throw a fit in a store before they are grown.
One time, when Shane was 2, he screamed in a store for an hour before he passed out on my tear soaked shoulder gasping and whimpering in his sleep.
People gave me dirty looks and made rude remarks. The store clerks asked if they could give him a lollipop In which I replied quite loudly because he was screaming at the top of his lungs
"You seriously want me to REWARD him for this? NO THANK YOU."
It was embarrassing. My cheeks were bright red the whole time. But as I told my then 2 year old.
"I have shopping to do." I did not drag him out of there and leave my cart because that would teach him that his little 2 year old self, had control over his mommy.
And that was NOT going to happen. Embarrassing or not.
I would win. And I did.
When we got home he rubbed his eyes and laid against my chest. "I cwy." he mumbled
"Yes. You cried. But mommy had to shop." I kissed his head and he nodded.
"If you cry again like that. You will not shop with mommy again."
He nodded, kissed me (leaving snot behind) and waddled off to play.
He never threw a fit in the store again, and was rewarded for it every time.
Beanie CSP rule #4
Mean it.
It is my firm belief that you children should ALWAYS be a little scared of you.
Sometimes you have to be the boogy man.
If I stare at my daughter too long for any length of time she looks away. Even if I am only admiring her beauty. "Stop staring at me! It scares me."
I gasp and I pout and I loudly moan
"How saaaaaad! I am only trying to LOVE you."
But in reality, that fear of the mommy look was placed there by me years ago. I fought for that fear and I won that fear.
I am her
parent. For so many years I have been the reason that she keeps her grades up, the reason she is a good girl, and I will continue to be that reason until
SHE is her own reason to excel.
My children are no longer babies. And I feel like I have placed in them a firm understanding of evolutionary respect.
Now I get to tease with them and play with them and whine to them. We have hand slap fights and campout in the living room on hot nights.
But to this day, BOTH of my children know that when I say something. I mean it.
CSP for teachers
Modern day mothering
Every year in my classroom I get children that get the "hard to handle" label slapped on them.
I love these children. I itch to have these children in my classroom, and despite what others may think, it is not to boss them around or be mean to them.
It is to teach them what it means to have respect.
They don't know it. Either from neglective parenting or bad teacher-ing they have no idea how they should act.
So I take that opportunity to Teach them. This literally takes one on one teaching for awhile. But In my head, I have a system for this.
Last year I had a boy slap me across the face. I was aghast, appalled even. I cannot tell you the last time that a child hit me.
When Shane was small he did it once.
ONCE.
I looked down at him and his face was twisted up. He wasn't mad. In fact he looked quiet scared.
I knelt down and looked in his eyes.
"Do you think that you are allowed to hit me?" I asked him. This was an honest question. Maybe he hits everyone, who knows.
He shook his head.
"You are never allowed to hit me."
He nodded.
The next day he hit me again and then he hid his face. I knelt down and asked
"Are you allowed to hit me?"
He shook his head
"So since you have hitting hands I will hold then until they are calm." I placed one of his hands on top of the other and held them in his lap.
He cried and moved a bit but eventually calmed down. He just stared at me. And I stared back, until he looked away.
"I will win." I smiled at him.
The next morning when I entered my class, I smiled at him and asked him if his hands felt like hitting. He shook his head and sat in his chair. He had just come from another school and I knew nothing about his background.
All I knew, was that he interested me. All of the naughty ones do.
SO I took him by his hand and walked over to the wall. I sat down pulled him into my lap and hugged him. At first he was tense. You could tell he did not know what I was doing. This was unfamiliar to him.
I held him until he relaxed against me.
"You are such a good boy. I know it."
He nodded against me.
"I love you and I want you to have fun here. But you cannot hit me and you should try your best to listen."
He sat up and looked at me "Okay I will."
"You have to remember that I am your teacher, and I will win...every time."
Our struggles did not end that day. It took him awhile to conform to my classroom rules and expectations. But the reward that we both received from mutual love and respect was worth every struggle and every sad face day.
Parenting is hard. Teaching is hard. but you hope to instil in your children mutual respect, love and the ability to move forward from you with ease and knowledge.
....And as Birdie and I sat down last Friday and told a soon-to-be parent how HARD it was to be a good parent, we both smiled at each other with the knowledge that WE DID IT.
We knew how difficult it was.... How we would discipline and then cry in our bedrooms alone because sometimes...You don't WANT to be the asshole, but you have to.
SOMETIMES disciplining your children, means that your life sucks for awhile.
It is hard, but it is worth it. And when they grow up you get to sit back and reap the benefits of your hard work and THIER good choices.
