Tag Archives: compassion

January ’18 Q&A – Sharing & Hogging, School Resistance and The Dark Side

Sharing and Hogging

Q. My three-year-old has a very big issue with sharing and hogging. She has an 18 mo. old sister who is not allowed to touch anything. I understand that my daughter still is having a hard time with her arrival, she has to share me, she doesn’t get to have me all to herself, she doesn’t even get to read books alone with me and on top of it all I am three times as tired, have to do a lot more chores, can’t play with her at the drop of the hat, and she doesn’t get to have all of my adoration just for her. I still feel really guilty about that. At first I thought, fair enough the toys were hers, so I opted to buy my youngest toys for herself. I told my eldest and explained before we bought anything that I was buying for her sister so she doesn’t have to touch hers. She agreed but once the toy is bought she wants to have it and play with it. She gets so

Q. I have two sons almost 3 and 5. The 5 y.o. seems to take his anger out on his brother with some physical violence when he’s upset. After an incident, I take the 5 y.o. upstairs to his room and we talk about our family rules (respect others, respect ourselves and respect things) and about the feelings attached to the situation/hitting or kicking. He gets upset and doesn’t like when we go upstairs and often cries. I know his impulse control is still not there, but I want to stop him from hitting again and teach him it’s not ok. I try very hard to control my emotions. Sometimes he hits just to be a “pain in the neck” and bug his brother. I assume he’s doing it at times for our attention. Should I approach it differently?

A. Probably the reason your son gets upset when you take him upstairs and talk about the rules and how it’s not okay to hit is that he already knows that. But at 5 (and for a good long time to

You want to interact and make connection when your kids get home from school. Your kids do too but not in the way you might think.

You’ve missed them, you want to know what they did all day, how they got along, if they had any problems. But questions can feel like an interrogation.

How was school today?
What do you have for homework?
When are you going to do your homework?
What did you get on the test?
What did you learn today?

They have just spent a long hard day meeting (or not) expectations, doing things they might not want to do, following orders, coping for hours, and hopefully working hard and learning. Probably the last they want to do is go over their day with you. They need a break. They need to know here is the place where I can be myself. They need to chill.

Each of these 5 questions is filled with an expectation.

How was school?

What if school was terrible? Your child may or may not want to tell you because

How to be a More Confident Parent

Confident Parents, Remarkable Kids: 8 Principles for Raising Kids You'll Love to Live With

Do you want to feel more confident in your parenting decisions and actions? Do you want a mutually respectful and loving relationship with your kids? Do you want a little more cooperation in your family?

Here is the book you’ll wish your parents had — because then you would have more of that confidence you long for.

When a child believes he is bad, he behaves badly; and parents react badly. This reconfirms for the child that he is bad. The age-old cycle of reward and punishment keeps spinning in order to maintain control. But punishment (consequences) is only an illusion of control. Most parents know it doesn’t work, because they end up feeling more out of control, their children “don’t listen” and resistance grows. But they don’t know what else to do.

If you find yourself in this most unhappy place, you want answers.

I hear parents complain all the time, “I’ve tried everything and nothing works.” The problem is that “everything” does not include what you truly need — a new understanding of your child and what her

Gaming: Hobby or Addiction?

Do you worry that your child who loves gaming more than anything else has an addiction?

If so, chances are you panic and fear a future for your child that is not pretty. In that emotional state you react in anger and wield threatening consequences when your child resists and get into ugly power struggles that create a wider and wider gulf between you. You feel hopeless and your child grabs for every screen second he can. “Consequences” do nothing.

There is a big difference between a hobby gamer and an addicted gamer — and you need to know the difference.

Gaming is a thrill for many kids. It’s an arena where success and feeling in charge are more easily achieved for children who don’t find it in school or social relationships. It’s easy to connect with others through a game, and mastery is euphoric. It’s the mastery part that can be addictive, especially for the child who finds it nowhere else.

When gaming is a hobby:

I am a big proponent of trust — allowing your child to

Taming Temper Tantrums

For the child, a temper tantrum feels like swirling in the middle of a tornado. It is frightening and there is no way of knowing when or if it will end.

A temper tantrum is not a parent’s favorite aspect of their child’s development. Tantrums are often accompanied by shrill screaming and physical kicking and hitting. And they result from “unreasonable” situations.

“I asked him to put his coat on, and he acted like I had pulled his arm off.”

“She wanted the blue plate that was in the dishwasher. I gave her another one and she threw it across the room.”

“All I did was tell him it was time for a bath. You’d think I told him I was leaving him for good.”

“What doesn’t he understand about ‘no’?”

Our adult reasoning brains have forgotten what it is like to be a child trapped in a body that often will not do your bidding. Impulses take over body parts, and words are emotional and dramatic and do not mean what they say. Our adult brains, together with our

Does Whining Drive You Crazy?!

I’ve never met a parent who likes—no, is even okay with—whining. For me it was like nails on a blackboard. Many parents don’t know of another torture that would be worse.
Whining is as developmental and normal in a toddler’s life as discovering the pleasure of saying “no”. Don’t think about teaching your child not to do it. Do think about ways you can help yourself deal with it calmly and perhaps shorten it’s duration. Here are a few:

1. Don’t call it whining. It’s very hard to talk to your child about whining without being critical and blaming. “Stop whining.” “I can’t hear you when you’re whining.” These proclamations will not get you what you want. It may only make it worse.

2. Make a compassionate association when you hear it. Can you instead think about how frustrated your child is feeling—even if it’s over something you won’t allow. I once heard Aletha Salter say that whining is stuck crying. A child who whines is actually trying hard not to cry so the cry gets stuck. Sometimes validation of