Category Archives: Confident Parents

6 Warning Signs You Need to Empower Your Harmony Child

Harmony children* are just what the name implies — they thrive on harmony. They hate fights, anger and tension and will do what they can to avoid it. Unlike an Integrity child*, Harmony kids can easily comply with your wishes and back down when faced with anger. Similar to the Dandelion child* who does well in any environment, your Harmony child is likely to be flexible and can transition well.

Whereas an Integrity child has you tearing your hair out, Harmony kids make you feel like a great parent. They will work hard to meet high expectations. This child can get very upset and angry but gets over it pretty quickly. Things that stick to your Integrity kid like Velcro, roll off your Harmony child like water off a duck’s back. This child is easy to live with and doesn’t often stress you out or give you reason to worry.

They make great friends and generally have lots of them. They are easy to like as they are good at understanding all points of view. They can move from group

I know I’m not alone in thinking this school year would be sort of back to normal. But it’s not over yet and many believe it won’t ever be. We are in a new reality that we first believed temporary. Our kids are going back to school but this year with no option for remote learning. In some parts of the country that may seem fine, but in other parts parents feel like they’re throwing their kids to the wolves.

What kids care about is their own experience. Navigating masks and relationships back at school can be tricky for kids wondering where they stand. Friendships are likely shifting leaving hurt and unhappiness for many. Some kids are fine with masks and forget they are wearing them. Some are hypervigilant and feel unsafe if others are unmasked. And some are sensitive to masks or are simply resistant. Some worry about getting exposed. Does that mean quarantine, missing school, bringing Covid home, getting sick, ending up remote?

While they have their own physical and emotional responses to the situation, children are highly

Finding the “I” in Motherhood

cropped view of child holding tray with breakfast, mothers day card with heart sign and mom lettering, while mother stretching in bed

Our second Covid Mother’s Day is upon us. How will you spend it? Will your children bring you breakfast in bed and give you loving cards? Or will you be on duty once again, feeling resentful of the mothers who get breakfast in bed?

Q. I have a very strong-willed, acting out 8-year-old boy. I only recently read and started implementing your 8 principles book and watched your YouTube videos and am trying to implement your “connective parenting” approach which has already been very helpful. But I have struggled with this for so long, and I have a hard time handling friends, family, anyone in public not getting what I am doing. I get lookers, judgments, and even comments of how “bad” he is. They tell me how he needs a smack or more punishment, that he’s disrespectful, etc. I am trying to find confidence in my parenting, but this is a real brick wall. Do you smile politely and say, “My son is having a hard time”? Do you tell them to mind their own business and that you are working on it! Do you just ignore them? It makes me want to wear a t-shirt that states, “I am doing the best I can and so is my son”.

A. I love the tee-shirt idea! You’ll need several so you don’t run

A guide for conversations with kids about the virus, the protests, and race.

There’s a lot of material online about how to talk to kids about the state of the world right now. But you also want them to think for themselves. Kids are so used to being told what to do, what to think, what to feel, they don’t get much opportunity to grow opinions about the world. They need to have their own opinions to expand and develop. This needs to be cultivated. The current state of the world lends itself to cultivation. The following is my guide to help you engage your children in thinking rather than simply telling them what you want them to think.

Rule of thumb when teaching children: Start from what they know.

Fairness

Kids are great judges of fairness. Under age 6ish, cognitive development means it’s pretty hard for them to think about what is fair for another if it means they lose out. But if they’re not involved in the problem, they know what’s fair and what’s not. You will find

Q. How can I help my 8 year old son understand that I love him just the way he is AND I want him to grow, learn and improve? He says he feels humiliated and ashamed every time I ask him to learn something new because he feels like I’m saying he needs to be better than he already is. His resilience is low and I’m trying to help him using all the techniques I can find. The school is trying to help also but last term he got a detention for not following instructions and then was so ashamed of himself that it really set him back again.

A. It sounds like you have a sensitive son, which means he’s probably quite perceptive and intuitive in ways many kids aren’t. If that’s true, he will be extra sensitive to criticism and might perceive criticism when you don’t intend it that way. He may read you as telling him what to and then think you will be disappointed in him if he doesn’t do it or learn it the way

Making Peace with Fears and Doubts

How can we be so presumptuous as to think we know what is best for our children, what is the right thing for them to do, what are the right decisions for them to make? Plain and simple – we don’t know. We simply do not know, and to think we do, to believe we should know because it’s our job, not only puts us on a very fragile pedestal but truly hinders our relationship with our children.

We are so attached to being right when it comes to telling our children what to do, we overlook what might actually be right for them — and we don’t ask what they think.

Letting go means coming to terms with the fact that so much of their lives is theirs to figure out.

And yes, parenting is the hardest damn job on the planet, but it’s so much harder when you think it’s your responsibility to fix their problems or that their problems are your fault. Either you know you’re right — and who wants to live with that — or

Remember sandlot baseball? Neighborhood kids got together anytime they could down at the empty lot, out in the street or at the playground to choose teams and play ball. No coaches, no parents, no supervision. The basic rules of the game provided a structure within which the kids decided their unique rules of playing together and the consequences of not following those rules. Sure, there were fights.

Sandlot ball doesn’t happen anymore. Children learn the rules of sports by instruction from adults, many of whom are invested in winning. Adults set the rules, teams, schedules, pressure, and consequences. Parents yell from the sidelines telling their kids what to do. Children have lost the opportunity to make, play by, and problem solve the rules of any game. They must defer to adults all the time. This is not good for our future.

How much time do your children spend unsupervised? How often do they go off in the woods or down the street with friends to create fantasy play? To make up their own rules and consequences?

On Being a Parent

Becoming a parent is easy. Being a parent is the hardest job you will ever have. There are as many “shoulds” and “oughts” about parenting as books on bookstore shelves. What should you do? Who do you listen to?

Some say trust your instincts. I agree. After all we are evolved to procreate and raise children in the culture of our heritage. It should be as easy as it appears for the birds and the bees. But where are all those wise instincts we’re born with? For most of us, they are buried under layers upon layers and years and years of being told what to do, when to do it and how to do it. We’re taught if we don’t listen to parents and elders, we will be in trouble, maybe not be loved or accepted. Years of learned experience has set up detours and roadblocks tricking most of us away from our instincts to look in the wrong direction for the answers.

The answer is found in trusting yourself.

But first you have to believe that you

I doubt if there is a parent alive who is okay with a daughter being sexually compromised, unable to stop unwanted advances, or getting less pay than her male counterpart — or a son becoming a bully or sexual predator who objectifies women for his pleasure and who expects higher pay than his female counterpart. Surely, we want our children to grow strong in their voices and opinions, while respectful of all those they are in relationship with.

So how do you do it? How do you raise a strongly opinionated woman who can stop any unwanted influence if you get angry and impatient with her demands at age three, seven, ten, fourteen? What does she learn about herself when the grownups in her life shut down her strong emotions, even when they get physical, with put downs, blame, shame, and punishment?

What about your boys who may not be into sports but would rather keep close to home, or who cry and have meltdowns beyond the point at which you think they should? What do they learn when they