Last post we ended with not taking thing personal.
I’m going to go into that a little more.
Step 3 continued – Don’t take it personal
It’s tough to raise kids and no one bothered to give us a set of directions! We get a set of directions for assembling furniture and driving a car and there sure should be one for raising children. In light of a set of directions, these steps will help.
Your child or children are going to fight, yell, call you names (like seriously bad names) just to push boundaries. What their behavior is really saying is “please mom/dad/parental figure give me a consequence to my behavior because I don’t know what I am doing” An example for me is when my daughter gets frustrated with the way I do or say something because it’s not what she wants to hear. She will get in my face and yell and/or tell me loudly how my parenting is subpar to what she would do if in my shoes! Usually there are swear words thrown in there and ones that she knows will push my buttons. I mean she is my kid and has been watching me for over 17 years.
So what do I do when she is acting like this…….. NOTHING I do not say a word. By the way, that drives her crazy. I give her no reinforcement of any kind. I try to keep my body language the same and my facial expressions the same-although if you know me keeping my eyebrows from moving is difficult- but just the same, I try to not react. When things calm down, I come up with her consequences. This can involve taking away the phone or sometimes if the teenager won’t give it to you, then I resort to shutting off wi-fi and her phone. These episodes could easily blow up and become disastrous, but NOT taking anything they say personal can help your mindset so that you too can not react.
Step 4 – Extinguish the behavior and reward when behavior is no longer present.
This is a play off of the other steps. If we want to extinguish behavior we can not under any circumstances feed into the behavior. Part of this is trusting yourself that at each point of your child’s life you have provided them with the necessary tools to self-sooth. If you are like most parents (including this one) your natural instinct is to scoop them up and hold them and give into their demands but that is the opposite of what needs to happen if you want that behavior to disappear.
I have a lot of examples but the recent example that comes to mind is that of a parent of an 11 year old girl who appears to be having the worst anxiety of her life. The mom describes the anxiety as painstaking to see and hear. The mom’s heart just breaks each time the child gets anxious. Sound familiar? The child’s behavior gets amped up towards the end of the day when they are getting ready for bed. This is when the child’s behavior goes from a 6 to a 10+. She comes into the parents room, cries for mom or dad, sometimes goes into their room to use the bathroom when there is one in the hall where her bedroom is, etc you get the picture. What do you think I told this mom (and lots and lots and lots of other parents)?
STOP STOP STOP.
Do not give her any attention at all when she is like this. Stop and walk away. Go to your bedroom or a bathroom or outside or in the car. I don’t really care but do not stay present while her child is doing this behavior. Because it is a behavior and it is not anxiety the way we think of anxiety. This kiddo is awesome. She comes up with every reason you can imagine why she needs her mom or dad. Once this mom decided enough was enough, she was able to listen to my suggestion and did not say one word when the child’s behavior happened. This mom had to actually lock her and her husband in their bedroom. Even when the kid was knocking and begging at the door the parents didn’t say a word. The dad had to yell in the pillow out of frustration and the mom cried but they didn’t let the child hear any of that which is really important. It took 3 nights after they committed to stop feeding into the child’s behavior and the kiddo stopped banging on the door or crying or coming up with every trick she could think of to get mom and dad’s attention.
Of course kids are adaptable and the child started a different behavior to get mom’s attention.
Mom caved but quickly realized what was happening and immediately stopped. It has been over 2 weeks and that kiddos extreme anxiety is down to less than a 5. That’s right, after 3 nights the behavior was almost completely eliminated and after 5 nights it is no longer present. Imagine how this could benefit your particular situation.
I know I mentioned rewarding when the behavior is no longer present. This is another blog post in it’s own so for now, you’ll have to stay tuned.
These two steps are a lot to take in. I know. I understand. I’ve done it. Since they are so much, I’m going to leave my final step for next week.
If you’d like a 1:1 session with my for parenting, I am available. Call Transformation Mentors at 860-787-0178 and Shawna will help you get on my schedule.
Stay well friends. You are important.
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