Since when did we become a nation of whimps? As parents, we fear the whining of our children. Even the slightest expression of discomfort by a child brings it's parents into compliance with nearly anything they want.
And once you establish a baseline of inappropriate behavior, the child uses that as a new base from which to negotiate more inappropriate behavior. Every step in the wrong direction just brings more opportunities for whining to get even more.
That is the job of the young ones... to test our limits. And whining is the hallmark of a limit being tested. I don't WANT to go to bed yet. I don't WANT to eat my peas. I didn't WANT a hot dog, I wanted a HAM-BURGER!!! WHAAAAAAA!
Next thing you know, Mom is turned into a short order cook, making sure every kid gets their own whims addressed. Suzy won't eat rice and Johnny won't eat pasta. So we make two of everything, every night... one with a side dish of pasta, the other with a side dish or rice. WHEEE!!!
Failing to set limits and enforce them, even with all the whining going on, only sets the stage for more difficult moments later on. I have a friend who is struggling right now with her daughter's need to purchase a new car. A few days ago, her old car was totalled. This is the second car that this child has totalled, and Daddy believes that of course his 22 year old baby girl has not been at fault for ANY of the problems she's had. THey're taking the insurance money and looking for a brand new car. A BRAND NEW car. Not a USED car, like what Mom & Dad always buy, and what Mom & Dad and big brother drive.. no... a BRAND NEW car... because baby girl has been researching cars and found one that she likes and of course it happens to be a NEW car model and why would anyone get an OLD car when they CAN get new...
Baby girl doesn't have a real job yet... just an internship that's scheduled to start in a week or so... but never mind, Daddy will co-sign. Because after all, if he doesn't, she will be disappointed. And we have not been teaching our children (now young adults) to withstand the crushing disappointment of having to accept a car that is not what we might have hoped to get. If he changes his mind now, she might have to re-research the whole thing, go shopping for a USED car (one that she can afford without a loan and a co-signer)...
It's all so sad, poor kid. Did all this work to find the PERFECT car for herself, and without her parent's help, she might be denied the opportunity to HAVE that car. Mind you, Mom & Dad do not drive new cars. They are NOT the "new car buying" types.
Somewhere along the line, this Daddy stopped wanting to endure baby girl's whining. I'm sure he figures he's finished with the hard part of parenting and it's time to enjoy the kid as she sails into adulthood, finds love, gets married, finds job fulfillment, has babies, and starts to visit on holidays and beg for Mom to PLEASE do everything the way it was done when she was little... because all that stuff that she fussed & whined about back then, is suddenly precious to her now.
But she's not there yet. None of them are. Parenting doesn't really stop, ever... does it? Hopefully, someday, I will train my kids how to gracefully accept aging, how to manage the long term planning and thriving... how to continue to be a lifelong learner, long after the job requirement for continuing education has ended.
Unfortunately, too many people today are letting the kids' whining change their minds about stuff... about requiring the kids to study... about requiring the kids to entertain themselves without the use of electronics... about requiring the kids to eat WHATEVER Mom puts on the table.
Today, on Fox News Network, there was an interview of an educator, about Common Core. Suddenly, I understand. It's about having common requirements for what kids should know. It's not about "teaching to the test"... but unfortunately, that's what a lot of teachers and school systems have turned it into. They teach to the test, not to the information. They're not as much about teaching the kids how to think, as they are about teaching them to memorize a lot of standard information. I suppose this is an improvement over the dumbing down of education where 1 plus 1 didn't ALWAYS equal 2... or rather answering things OTHER than two didn't necessarily mean that the kid was going to fail the test. If he could come up with an explanation of how he GOT to the other answer, he could get partial credit. At least Common Core, in theory, SHOULD do away with that nonsense.
SO, what does this have to do with my Whining rant? Well... the educator being interviewed pointed out that the biggest complaints about Common Core was that parents were upset that the children were whining, having difficulty with the concepts, upset about their homework. And this educator pointed out that this is the job of a parent, to make the kids DO the homework, to help them learn the hard concepts, and not to let the kid's whining stop them from that goal.
BRILLIANT!
Why didn't I think of that?
OK... so here's what I think. There's a saying, "if you look good while you're exercising, you are not exercising hard enough"... I think maybe we should apply this principle to parenting and whining... "if your kids are not whining, you're not parenting properly"... hmmm... maybe it'll work.
Showing posts with label single parenting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label single parenting. Show all posts
Monday, May 5, 2014
Tuesday, November 12, 2013
Adoption
Wayne & I have this feeling that we are not quite finished with parenting. For what it's worth, his own children choose not to soak in the opportunities that our parenting could provide. Their birth mother, Wayne's ex, has given them some information about how to be an adult, that conflicts with the information we've given to them. I'm astounded at the things they come up with from time to time, more astounded by the stuff they've come up with after a recent visit from her, but I've learned to live with the fact that they will always think we're pretty stupid and boring for thinking that a J-O-B is an important thing, and a TRIP TO EUROPE is something that comes after years of working, planning and saving up for it. We will never convince them that the summer before a last year of college is NOT their last chance for fun in life before the drudgery starts, but...
We hope they will eventually all be happily employed, and that the drudgery they anticipate will not be as bad as they fear. At this point, we have more energy to provide information than they have willingness to take.
So what does a parent do when they have more parenting in them than children available? They consider adoption. Well, not all do, some just consider waiting for the opportunity to be a grandparent, but we think grandparenting is the proper moment to spoil a child, and we hope that our older children will be launched, at least further than they are at the moment, before grandchildren arrive.
Before I met Wayne, I was considering adoption as a single parent, and several years ago, when I mentioned it to him, he thought it was nutty, until I mentioned that I had no intention of starting from scratch, at day one. I do NOT want to adopt an infant. I am selfish enough that I want to be able to retire someday. And I would like to have the kids finished with college before social security sets in... or at least close to finished. I don't want to be attending undergraduate graduation parties at age 75! Once he hear that, and realized how many young people are stranded without families at very vulnerable ages, he decided that it was a good idea.
We started with foster care, and got a home study for foster-adoption. With the groups of kids (some sibling groups) that have come through our house, we've developed a feel for how to manage certain issues with children who have come from a chaotic environment. If normal parents need to be pretty organized in order to maintain a sense of security in their household, then foster parents need to be extremely organized. Certain forms of discipline are not permitted... frankly, forms of discipline that I had never considered are on the "unpermitted" list, so that's not much of a problem, but when you see the "unpermitted" list, you start to think... so.. if not that, then HOW?...
In most cases, anticipating the issues and resolving them before they become issues is a big tactic. First, it's tough for kids to just take whatever shows up on their plate at dinner time. It's a whole lot easier if they have time to anticipate and think through the dinner plans. So we have a basic plan for every week. Tacos on Tuesdays, for example, and Pizza on Fridays. When we're just on our own, we are a little loose about the schedule But if we have kids in the house, we post the schedule on a calendar and teach it to them. Knowing what's going to be on the plate solves a ton of tantrums when it's not the mac & cheese that they were hoping for.
Another food-related rule... we have the kids help us prepare the vegetables. Usually in the form of a salad. Since vegetables tend to be a challenging thing for children to eat, we get their hands involved in the making of it. They get to taste the dressings and put a few nuts or raisins on the lettuce. They get to taste the little popcorn tomatoes and feel how they pop in their mouth, and choose whether to put them on the salad or maybe try the on the side with some dressing to dip in. We find that if they help make the salads and we all eat it around the breakfast bar while we're cooking up the rest of the dinner, they get a whole lot more vegetables into their tummies before they even know what hit them!
And then dessert only happens after they've eaten enough of what is on their plate. They don't need to save space for dessert, they can have it an hour after dinner, but they don't get dessert until they have eaten at least an appropriate amount of the nutritious dinner that we have made. Whether or not they are allowed to eat the sweets is entirely their choice. If they whine that they're hungry, they can finish their dinner (we can warm it up for them), and if they whine that they want their dessert, we tell them that they can have dessert as soon as dinner is finished. It's as simple as that, and while it does not entirely cut out all whining, we have effectively cut down on it by a giant step. Given that the kids we get in our house are children who have been raised on diets that are often VERY MUCH NOT LIKE what we usually eat. Maybe they eat potatoes for every meal, or McDonald's happy meals 7 dinners a week... or mac & cheese as a staple. The fact that they will not get exactly what their chaotic previous home gave them, makes mealtime difficult from the start, so every little step we can make in helping the kids understand and be more comfortable and willing to eat and participate, the better.
A clutter rule... anything not put away properly (after warnings) goes to jail. It simply disappears. If they ask for it, then they don't get it back until 24 hours passes. This works well for a favorite jacket that didn't get hung up, or a toy they were playing with and didn't put away. If they let it drop where it landed and did not put it away despite my reminders, it will disappear. After they ask if I know where it is, I tell them that it's went to our jail for being out of place, and now that they're noticed it and want it back, they need to wait until the next day. "This time tomorrow, you can have it back." It becomes a little game. But they know they'll get it back and can anticipate the fun of having it again. And we can discuss where it lives so that they won't it again.
Yes, this kind of parenting is more intensive, requires more work, more listening to whining... cooking for ourselves, making whatever we have ingredients for, putting it on the table without having to supervise them doing the cooking... yelling about stuff that's not put away or putting it away to avoid the yelling... it all makes the chores easier to accomplish, but these things do not teach the children how to manage things... how to eat what is fixed for them by someone who is not a short-order cook... how to clean up after themselves.
The theory is that if you do this enough, they'll eventually require less supervision. The reality is that as they learn these lessons, there are others that we need to impart, other labor-intensive parenting tasks that will help the kids get a step closer towards adulthood, independence, success. If we do it right, it's labor intensive. But we've done it with a few kids so far, in relatively short term (1-3 months long), and so far it's successful. No need to do all the "no-nos" when you parent like this. No withholding of food or sending them to bed without their dinner, if you avoid the food struggle before it starts, you know?
We hope they will eventually all be happily employed, and that the drudgery they anticipate will not be as bad as they fear. At this point, we have more energy to provide information than they have willingness to take.
So what does a parent do when they have more parenting in them than children available? They consider adoption. Well, not all do, some just consider waiting for the opportunity to be a grandparent, but we think grandparenting is the proper moment to spoil a child, and we hope that our older children will be launched, at least further than they are at the moment, before grandchildren arrive.
Before I met Wayne, I was considering adoption as a single parent, and several years ago, when I mentioned it to him, he thought it was nutty, until I mentioned that I had no intention of starting from scratch, at day one. I do NOT want to adopt an infant. I am selfish enough that I want to be able to retire someday. And I would like to have the kids finished with college before social security sets in... or at least close to finished. I don't want to be attending undergraduate graduation parties at age 75! Once he hear that, and realized how many young people are stranded without families at very vulnerable ages, he decided that it was a good idea.
We started with foster care, and got a home study for foster-adoption. With the groups of kids (some sibling groups) that have come through our house, we've developed a feel for how to manage certain issues with children who have come from a chaotic environment. If normal parents need to be pretty organized in order to maintain a sense of security in their household, then foster parents need to be extremely organized. Certain forms of discipline are not permitted... frankly, forms of discipline that I had never considered are on the "unpermitted" list, so that's not much of a problem, but when you see the "unpermitted" list, you start to think... so.. if not that, then HOW?...
In most cases, anticipating the issues and resolving them before they become issues is a big tactic. First, it's tough for kids to just take whatever shows up on their plate at dinner time. It's a whole lot easier if they have time to anticipate and think through the dinner plans. So we have a basic plan for every week. Tacos on Tuesdays, for example, and Pizza on Fridays. When we're just on our own, we are a little loose about the schedule But if we have kids in the house, we post the schedule on a calendar and teach it to them. Knowing what's going to be on the plate solves a ton of tantrums when it's not the mac & cheese that they were hoping for.
Another food-related rule... we have the kids help us prepare the vegetables. Usually in the form of a salad. Since vegetables tend to be a challenging thing for children to eat, we get their hands involved in the making of it. They get to taste the dressings and put a few nuts or raisins on the lettuce. They get to taste the little popcorn tomatoes and feel how they pop in their mouth, and choose whether to put them on the salad or maybe try the on the side with some dressing to dip in. We find that if they help make the salads and we all eat it around the breakfast bar while we're cooking up the rest of the dinner, they get a whole lot more vegetables into their tummies before they even know what hit them!
And then dessert only happens after they've eaten enough of what is on their plate. They don't need to save space for dessert, they can have it an hour after dinner, but they don't get dessert until they have eaten at least an appropriate amount of the nutritious dinner that we have made. Whether or not they are allowed to eat the sweets is entirely their choice. If they whine that they're hungry, they can finish their dinner (we can warm it up for them), and if they whine that they want their dessert, we tell them that they can have dessert as soon as dinner is finished. It's as simple as that, and while it does not entirely cut out all whining, we have effectively cut down on it by a giant step. Given that the kids we get in our house are children who have been raised on diets that are often VERY MUCH NOT LIKE what we usually eat. Maybe they eat potatoes for every meal, or McDonald's happy meals 7 dinners a week... or mac & cheese as a staple. The fact that they will not get exactly what their chaotic previous home gave them, makes mealtime difficult from the start, so every little step we can make in helping the kids understand and be more comfortable and willing to eat and participate, the better.
A clutter rule... anything not put away properly (after warnings) goes to jail. It simply disappears. If they ask for it, then they don't get it back until 24 hours passes. This works well for a favorite jacket that didn't get hung up, or a toy they were playing with and didn't put away. If they let it drop where it landed and did not put it away despite my reminders, it will disappear. After they ask if I know where it is, I tell them that it's went to our jail for being out of place, and now that they're noticed it and want it back, they need to wait until the next day. "This time tomorrow, you can have it back." It becomes a little game. But they know they'll get it back and can anticipate the fun of having it again. And we can discuss where it lives so that they won't it again.
Yes, this kind of parenting is more intensive, requires more work, more listening to whining... cooking for ourselves, making whatever we have ingredients for, putting it on the table without having to supervise them doing the cooking... yelling about stuff that's not put away or putting it away to avoid the yelling... it all makes the chores easier to accomplish, but these things do not teach the children how to manage things... how to eat what is fixed for them by someone who is not a short-order cook... how to clean up after themselves.
The theory is that if you do this enough, they'll eventually require less supervision. The reality is that as they learn these lessons, there are others that we need to impart, other labor-intensive parenting tasks that will help the kids get a step closer towards adulthood, independence, success. If we do it right, it's labor intensive. But we've done it with a few kids so far, in relatively short term (1-3 months long), and so far it's successful. No need to do all the "no-nos" when you parent like this. No withholding of food or sending them to bed without their dinner, if you avoid the food struggle before it starts, you know?
dogs & kids ... not so different
I just read an article in Modern Dog magazine about how there are groups of therapy dogs who help children learn about bullying. In general, the dog and handler will spend an hour a day for a week in a class, where the handler will teach the children about how to be a good pet owner. They use this opportunity to teach the children any number of interesting concepts. In this case, mostly concepts about bullying. How to recognize it, how bullies often start by being mean to pets or other animals, how bullies behave and how bullying can be stopped. It is easy and natural for a child to feel empathy & become protective of an animal, some will recognize that they have been bullies, others recognize that they have been bullied. And others have watched bullying and not known what to do. This program helps them learn how to intervene, and to choose to intervene in the first place.
Apparently, the program can work miracles. I believe it.
I have used dogs to teach another issue... about our internal energies, and our food needs, and our socialization and our need for discipline and to know our place in life.
Dogs need to be fed healthy food. They will eat what you give them, and if you give them junk, you will end up with an unhealthy dog.
Dogs need a certain amount of exercise. Inertia is not natural. We train ourselves and dogs to learn to sit quietly, but naturally, both people and dogs have a certain amount of energy that they want to work out. Learning to self-regulate behavior without taking the opportunity to work off this natural energy, is counterproductive. We end up feeling stressed, distracted, and even physically uncomfortable. We self-medicate with foods that cause sluggishness, and we wonder why our society has started being more pudgy than healthy.
If we do not give our dogs enough opportunity to work off their energy, we end up with a chewy, yippy dog. The same happens with children... oh, you're right, they probably won't chew up your shoes if you don't take them for a morning walk, but ... just try this experiment. For one week after school, bring them home, sit them down, make them do their homework immediately and don't let them bounce around. You'll see distracted, frustrated children whose adrenaline is not being worked off... the next week, bring them home from school and have them do 45 minutes of physical activity, then give them 15 minutes to calm down, before they sit down and do their homework... I'll BET you see less of the chewy-puppy-like behavior and a lot more calmness.
But start also looking at the other aspects of responsible dog ownership and you'll see more similarities. Dogs need to be properly socialized. So do humans. Dogs need to have consistent, easy-to understand rules with many reminders... so do young humans. Dogs respond better to positive behavior controls rather than physical punishment... don't be surprised to hear that humans ALSO respond better to positive behavior controls.
My dog knows that treats come to good puppies, and pups who jump up on visitors do not get treats. Pups only get treats if they sit properly and politely. (oh yeah, and treats for her are less about food and more about praise, attention, or the opportunity to play fetch).
And children in my house know that if they want to watch TV or use any electronic device, they need to finish their homework first. If they want to fuss & delay over the homework, the ability to watch TV or play video games will be delayed until they have finished their work first.
It's not a perfect system, but it's amazingly effective, and all done without anyone ever having to worry about time out, or spanking, or yelling... Like I said, it's not perfect. I've had a dog bark at me because I'm not throwing the Frisbee fast enough... or a child yell because she really does not feel like doing her homework right now... but there is always a choice. I'll throw the Frisbee after you stop barking, we'll turn on the TV once the homework is finished... you can keep barking or yelling or delaying as long as you want. I'm fine with that. When you're ready, we can get on with the fun.
Of course, if the dog is too full of barking or the child is too full of bouncing, maybe I've not given them enough activity, and so if I want to encourage them to succeed, I need to re-think my organization. Make sure they've worked off their friskies before I expect them to be able to sit quietly... it's not rocket science.
Apparently, the program can work miracles. I believe it.
I have used dogs to teach another issue... about our internal energies, and our food needs, and our socialization and our need for discipline and to know our place in life.
Dogs need to be fed healthy food. They will eat what you give them, and if you give them junk, you will end up with an unhealthy dog.
Dogs need a certain amount of exercise. Inertia is not natural. We train ourselves and dogs to learn to sit quietly, but naturally, both people and dogs have a certain amount of energy that they want to work out. Learning to self-regulate behavior without taking the opportunity to work off this natural energy, is counterproductive. We end up feeling stressed, distracted, and even physically uncomfortable. We self-medicate with foods that cause sluggishness, and we wonder why our society has started being more pudgy than healthy.
If we do not give our dogs enough opportunity to work off their energy, we end up with a chewy, yippy dog. The same happens with children... oh, you're right, they probably won't chew up your shoes if you don't take them for a morning walk, but ... just try this experiment. For one week after school, bring them home, sit them down, make them do their homework immediately and don't let them bounce around. You'll see distracted, frustrated children whose adrenaline is not being worked off... the next week, bring them home from school and have them do 45 minutes of physical activity, then give them 15 minutes to calm down, before they sit down and do their homework... I'll BET you see less of the chewy-puppy-like behavior and a lot more calmness.
But start also looking at the other aspects of responsible dog ownership and you'll see more similarities. Dogs need to be properly socialized. So do humans. Dogs need to have consistent, easy-to understand rules with many reminders... so do young humans. Dogs respond better to positive behavior controls rather than physical punishment... don't be surprised to hear that humans ALSO respond better to positive behavior controls.
My dog knows that treats come to good puppies, and pups who jump up on visitors do not get treats. Pups only get treats if they sit properly and politely. (oh yeah, and treats for her are less about food and more about praise, attention, or the opportunity to play fetch).
And children in my house know that if they want to watch TV or use any electronic device, they need to finish their homework first. If they want to fuss & delay over the homework, the ability to watch TV or play video games will be delayed until they have finished their work first.
It's not a perfect system, but it's amazingly effective, and all done without anyone ever having to worry about time out, or spanking, or yelling... Like I said, it's not perfect. I've had a dog bark at me because I'm not throwing the Frisbee fast enough... or a child yell because she really does not feel like doing her homework right now... but there is always a choice. I'll throw the Frisbee after you stop barking, we'll turn on the TV once the homework is finished... you can keep barking or yelling or delaying as long as you want. I'm fine with that. When you're ready, we can get on with the fun.
Of course, if the dog is too full of barking or the child is too full of bouncing, maybe I've not given them enough activity, and so if I want to encourage them to succeed, I need to re-think my organization. Make sure they've worked off their friskies before I expect them to be able to sit quietly... it's not rocket science.
Thursday, March 14, 2013
how to help your kids
I just heard the most astute saying EVER, about raising kids to be a success.
If you want to help your kids, give them nothing. If you want to ruin your kids, give them everything.
It should go without saying, but too many people of my generation have flipped their priorities, and have ruined the kids. There are lots of excuses... such as feeling guilt for not spending as much time with the kids, or wanting to give the kids everything that Mom & Dad didn't have while growing up... perfectly noble causes, despite being misguided. Parents with those excuses (or similar ones) can be helped. If they think about this, recognize their errors, and work at it, they can change.
It's not easy, you've got to live with some whining from children who are used to getting everything, who have been taught to have self-esteem without achievement, to have pride without having worked for anything to be proud of... and that everyone gets a trophy, whether they win or lose. There have been no "losers" in their teams, schools or clubs, so the introduction to the rejection of the adult world will be harder on them. If you can, introduce them early, to the fact that you don't ALWAYS get a trophy, that you don't ALWAYS get what you want, that unconditional love does not mean unlimited spending. If you have bought into the theory that everyone should be a winner and "learning to lose" involves getting a crown at the end of the tournament even though you did not make as many points as the winner, then it's going to be hard to pull back and help your kids learn these harder lessons, but you must. If they do not learn how to acknowledge a mistake and learn from it, rather than ignore it and be proud of themselves for simply being themselves, then they will not succeed in our world. If you raise your children to take whatever is given without ever having to work for it, or to give back, then you are raising future welfare mothers.
But if you understand this principle, then you can succeed at being a parent. Do for yourself, what you need to help them learn to do. Acknowledge that you may have made a mistake, that you need to change, and that it will not be easy. Then set some limits and guidelines for yourself and work at it. It might be hard work, and it's not fair that you have to work this hard, to endure your children's cries of "unfair", when you have just come home from a 9 hour workday and 2 hours of commute time... you're exhausted, barely had time to shop for dinner, and now have kids with homework and a preference for plopping in front of the TV and cellphone rather than finishing the homework... they want you to pick up McDonald's rather than cook a balanced meal. It's very easy to let them do as they want, and then find ways to excuse it... look for loopholes for turning in the homework late, or do it for them, or ... well, whatever... rather than listen to their complaints. But that is the job you took on when you decided to become a parent, and it's not supposed to be easy.
Luckily, the rewards for a job well done will be plentiful, when the time comes.
With children, you need to learn the value of deferred gratification. And to the extent that you have learned it, you must also teach it. It is well worth the effort.
There is a different kind of parent, the type whose excuse for giving everything to the kids is less about the kids and more about themselves, more particularly, about their battle with their co-parent. The type of giving that is about bribing the kids to like you more than your co-parent. For parents who are busily telling the kids, "life would be better with me because I can afford more fun for you", or, "your other parent WOULD pay for you to have fun if they loved you enough... but since they don't, I will pay for it... it may put me in the poorhouse, but I'll give you EVERYTHING" (and believe me, as a divorce lawyer, I'm sorry to say I learned that this is not as rare as it should be)... they are not only messing up the kids' relationships with the other parent, they are messing up the kid's relationship with money, and the kids' understanding of what it takes to work to get something.
Those parents, with that excuse for giving everything to the kids, are probably never going to really understand the depth of how big a mess they are making. The infamous problem of children of divorce is undoubtedly in large part caused by parents who are continuing their personal battles by raising the children like this.
This type of parent, unfortunately, does not have the instinct that tells them how to protect the kids from their own inappropriate feelings. With luck, they have simply been in too much pain to recognize this. With luck, for the sake of their kids, they will be able to open up their minds to the possibility that maybe they have made a mistake, and then be able to correct it. For many, it will take therapy.
This type of parenting, the RIGHT type of parenting, that will give your kids the tools they need to work, is humble. It's less about the price of being a mother, the motherly instinct, and mother's day,... it's less about being a martyr... less about being a soccer mom, less about being praised for being motherly, and more about being a traditional, self-sacrificing mother. The type of mother who supports the child and is willing to let them fall so they will learn better to walk. Who endures their kids' claims that they are not cool, that they are mean... because Mom knows that being mean and un-cool is what it takes to get the homework done and keep the inappropriate media options away from the kids' eyes. The RIGHT type of parenting is learning how to maintain the connection between your co-parent and the child, even if you are estranged from the co-parent. And if you are the parent who does not get to have the child overnight at least half the time, it's about learning how to maintain the connection without resorting to tricks like giving the kids expensive gifts.
When you are separated as co-parents, learning how to give your child "nothing", (and thereby, giving the child the experience they need to get themselves EVERYTHING), involves learning how to be a cooperative co-parent rather than a competitive co-parent. Because in a competition, the co-parent who wins will be the one who spends more. And that, ultimately, is what spoils the child.
Spoil your child with attention, with closeness, with letting them work side-by-side with you in the yard or kitchen. Spoil your child with your time. Spoil the child with your emotional toughness. Be impervious to their begging for random stuff. But don't spoil them with the stuff. PLEASE. The best thing you can do for your home economy, is to exercise extreme caution when it comes to spending on the children.
If you want to help your kids, give them nothing. If you want to ruin your kids, give them everything.
It should go without saying, but too many people of my generation have flipped their priorities, and have ruined the kids. There are lots of excuses... such as feeling guilt for not spending as much time with the kids, or wanting to give the kids everything that Mom & Dad didn't have while growing up... perfectly noble causes, despite being misguided. Parents with those excuses (or similar ones) can be helped. If they think about this, recognize their errors, and work at it, they can change.
It's not easy, you've got to live with some whining from children who are used to getting everything, who have been taught to have self-esteem without achievement, to have pride without having worked for anything to be proud of... and that everyone gets a trophy, whether they win or lose. There have been no "losers" in their teams, schools or clubs, so the introduction to the rejection of the adult world will be harder on them. If you can, introduce them early, to the fact that you don't ALWAYS get a trophy, that you don't ALWAYS get what you want, that unconditional love does not mean unlimited spending. If you have bought into the theory that everyone should be a winner and "learning to lose" involves getting a crown at the end of the tournament even though you did not make as many points as the winner, then it's going to be hard to pull back and help your kids learn these harder lessons, but you must. If they do not learn how to acknowledge a mistake and learn from it, rather than ignore it and be proud of themselves for simply being themselves, then they will not succeed in our world. If you raise your children to take whatever is given without ever having to work for it, or to give back, then you are raising future welfare mothers.
But if you understand this principle, then you can succeed at being a parent. Do for yourself, what you need to help them learn to do. Acknowledge that you may have made a mistake, that you need to change, and that it will not be easy. Then set some limits and guidelines for yourself and work at it. It might be hard work, and it's not fair that you have to work this hard, to endure your children's cries of "unfair", when you have just come home from a 9 hour workday and 2 hours of commute time... you're exhausted, barely had time to shop for dinner, and now have kids with homework and a preference for plopping in front of the TV and cellphone rather than finishing the homework... they want you to pick up McDonald's rather than cook a balanced meal. It's very easy to let them do as they want, and then find ways to excuse it... look for loopholes for turning in the homework late, or do it for them, or ... well, whatever... rather than listen to their complaints. But that is the job you took on when you decided to become a parent, and it's not supposed to be easy.
Luckily, the rewards for a job well done will be plentiful, when the time comes.
With children, you need to learn the value of deferred gratification. And to the extent that you have learned it, you must also teach it. It is well worth the effort.
There is a different kind of parent, the type whose excuse for giving everything to the kids is less about the kids and more about themselves, more particularly, about their battle with their co-parent. The type of giving that is about bribing the kids to like you more than your co-parent. For parents who are busily telling the kids, "life would be better with me because I can afford more fun for you", or, "your other parent WOULD pay for you to have fun if they loved you enough... but since they don't, I will pay for it... it may put me in the poorhouse, but I'll give you EVERYTHING" (and believe me, as a divorce lawyer, I'm sorry to say I learned that this is not as rare as it should be)... they are not only messing up the kids' relationships with the other parent, they are messing up the kid's relationship with money, and the kids' understanding of what it takes to work to get something.
Those parents, with that excuse for giving everything to the kids, are probably never going to really understand the depth of how big a mess they are making. The infamous problem of children of divorce is undoubtedly in large part caused by parents who are continuing their personal battles by raising the children like this.
This type of parent, unfortunately, does not have the instinct that tells them how to protect the kids from their own inappropriate feelings. With luck, they have simply been in too much pain to recognize this. With luck, for the sake of their kids, they will be able to open up their minds to the possibility that maybe they have made a mistake, and then be able to correct it. For many, it will take therapy.
This type of parenting, the RIGHT type of parenting, that will give your kids the tools they need to work, is humble. It's less about the price of being a mother, the motherly instinct, and mother's day,... it's less about being a martyr... less about being a soccer mom, less about being praised for being motherly, and more about being a traditional, self-sacrificing mother. The type of mother who supports the child and is willing to let them fall so they will learn better to walk. Who endures their kids' claims that they are not cool, that they are mean... because Mom knows that being mean and un-cool is what it takes to get the homework done and keep the inappropriate media options away from the kids' eyes. The RIGHT type of parenting is learning how to maintain the connection between your co-parent and the child, even if you are estranged from the co-parent. And if you are the parent who does not get to have the child overnight at least half the time, it's about learning how to maintain the connection without resorting to tricks like giving the kids expensive gifts.
When you are separated as co-parents, learning how to give your child "nothing", (and thereby, giving the child the experience they need to get themselves EVERYTHING), involves learning how to be a cooperative co-parent rather than a competitive co-parent. Because in a competition, the co-parent who wins will be the one who spends more. And that, ultimately, is what spoils the child.
Spoil your child with attention, with closeness, with letting them work side-by-side with you in the yard or kitchen. Spoil your child with your time. Spoil the child with your emotional toughness. Be impervious to their begging for random stuff. But don't spoil them with the stuff. PLEASE. The best thing you can do for your home economy, is to exercise extreme caution when it comes to spending on the children.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
homemade lip gloss and lip scrub
In an effort to cut costs, going with cheap make-up is one option. But sometimes the cheap stuff has odd ingredients, changes color, aggravates allergies, etc. And of course, for a girly girl who likes to play with make-up, it's not as much FUN. Flavored lipsticks are less intense if they're the cheap variety, and then there's the whole feeling of "I'm cheapening up on myself", which never feels good.
But what MIGHT feel good is knowing you've got a homemade, (green), healthy, CUSTOM-mixed option.
In the past, I have made my own custom face masques, hair rinses, hair conditioners, and cheek blushers. Those, I will offer later. Today, I present my homemade lip gloss and scrub. All over the internet, I found recipes for a lip gloss. The result was ALWAYS gritty. Some of the recipes even admitted that they were gritty. One offered a remedy to smooth it out... "stir longer". I tried. That does not work.
You see, the recipe generally goes like this. You take petroleum oil such as Vaseline, add a drink powder such as Crystal Light or KoolAid, and voila... lip gloss.
When I made it, it was a lip scrub, and no amount of stirring will fix that. It's as though the people who made up the recipe and passed it around did not bother to test it out, or maybe they were willing to settle for less than the best they could do. I had to take it a step further.
Here's the fix for getting rid of the grit in homemade lip gloss: The night before, put your powder in a small dish. Drop just enough water into it to dissolve the grit. The result should be a little too liquid to even envision mixing with Vaseline. So let it sit overnight. The next morning, you'll find the stuff in the dish has turned gummy. PERFECT. NOW put in a little Vaseline and mix it up. You'll find no need to stir & stir & stir... the granules are already dissolved, the grit is gone, and as long as it has not crystallized again, it will now mix up perfectly.
The taste is yummy. The tint is very faint. Perfect for younger women who might crave the chance to use make up but who you might be a little worried about them taking that step just yet. And, if you use more drink mix powder, you get a stronger color. Less is a fainter color. AND, of course, if your lips are cracked or chapped, and need a little treatment... skip the step where you dissolve the granules.
Clean lip gloss pots can be bought in packs with travel-sized containers, or you can take an old one of your own and clean it out REALLY well. There is nothing more fun than using a lip gloss that you made on your own.
My next experiment will be to use coconut oil. At room temperature, coconut oil is hard, more like lipstick, and white... so maybe it will leave more color on the lips when used? Or less? I know it has nutrients that are good for the skin and lips, so it's worth the try. I'll write another post when I do that. Stay tuned.
But what MIGHT feel good is knowing you've got a homemade, (green), healthy, CUSTOM-mixed option.
In the past, I have made my own custom face masques, hair rinses, hair conditioners, and cheek blushers. Those, I will offer later. Today, I present my homemade lip gloss and scrub. All over the internet, I found recipes for a lip gloss. The result was ALWAYS gritty. Some of the recipes even admitted that they were gritty. One offered a remedy to smooth it out... "stir longer". I tried. That does not work.
You see, the recipe generally goes like this. You take petroleum oil such as Vaseline, add a drink powder such as Crystal Light or KoolAid, and voila... lip gloss.
When I made it, it was a lip scrub, and no amount of stirring will fix that. It's as though the people who made up the recipe and passed it around did not bother to test it out, or maybe they were willing to settle for less than the best they could do. I had to take it a step further.
Here's the fix for getting rid of the grit in homemade lip gloss: The night before, put your powder in a small dish. Drop just enough water into it to dissolve the grit. The result should be a little too liquid to even envision mixing with Vaseline. So let it sit overnight. The next morning, you'll find the stuff in the dish has turned gummy. PERFECT. NOW put in a little Vaseline and mix it up. You'll find no need to stir & stir & stir... the granules are already dissolved, the grit is gone, and as long as it has not crystallized again, it will now mix up perfectly.
The taste is yummy. The tint is very faint. Perfect for younger women who might crave the chance to use make up but who you might be a little worried about them taking that step just yet. And, if you use more drink mix powder, you get a stronger color. Less is a fainter color. AND, of course, if your lips are cracked or chapped, and need a little treatment... skip the step where you dissolve the granules.
Clean lip gloss pots can be bought in packs with travel-sized containers, or you can take an old one of your own and clean it out REALLY well. There is nothing more fun than using a lip gloss that you made on your own.
My next experiment will be to use coconut oil. At room temperature, coconut oil is hard, more like lipstick, and white... so maybe it will leave more color on the lips when used? Or less? I know it has nutrients that are good for the skin and lips, so it's worth the try. I'll write another post when I do that. Stay tuned.
Friday, March 1, 2013
What foster kids miss
In many states, children whose parents are unable to care for them, are allowed to make the decision on whether to continue to be wards of the state, or allow the foster care social workers to find an adoptive family match for them. Some get discouraged by previous attempts to find a placement, in what we would think of as the traditional "Li'l Orphan Annie" style... where all the orphans clamour for the opportunity for a new home.
In more situations, the children choose to remain without a permanent family for much more complex emotional reasons. Perhaps they cannot contemplate breaking the connection between themselves and their birth parents. And then there is the typical teen belief that adults are a mere inconvenience. Teens in a normal nuclear family that is not falling apart, want to find ways to separate. They want to ignore us. We are an embarrassment, old fashioned, stupid. After all, we think texting is unnecessary and that the posting of too much personal information on Facebook is a bad idea. We are holding them back. In a few short years they'll be allowed to drive, then vote, then drink. They will be on their own and supporting themselves soon. So we are excess baggage that they have to figure out how to work around until they can push their way forward into adulthood.
Like baby chicks working furiously to crack the egg and burst out on the scene, they wish we'd just get up, release them from the incubator, and let them get on with life.
In an intact family, however, the parents work hard to hold the kids back. The kids are not allowed to say "no" to family time, they are forced to sit through family meals and watch their favorite TV shows with Mom & Dad. They are given chores and not allowed to use Mom & Dad's money to buy too many treats for themselves. It does not matter how much Mom & Dad have given to them, the moment when the gravy train stops, they try to angle to get more. It's their job. To see how much they can get from us without working too hard for it. If they were offered the opportunity to live with minimal supervision, with no adult holding them back, or the promise of quicker entry into adulthood, many would choose it.
It is a shame that our government allows children in it's care to make these choices. Most competent parents do not allow their kids to have this opportunity. Our government is being negligent in allowing this.
What do the foster kids miss, when they shove aside that opportunity for permanency?
Most obviously, they lose the soft place to land when they become adults. They lose the home that they will boomerang back to when jobs are hard to find or marriages fail. They lose the connection and tradition to come home for during the holidays. The lines from the songs, "I'll be HOME for Christmas", and "Over the river and through the woods, to Grandmother's house we go"... and similar sweet, holiday memories... they become meaningless for a young adult who has no home base.
But then there are the subtle things. Things that are much more important to the young person's eventual success or failure as an adult. The Friday evenings watching "Say Yes to the Dress" and "Bridezilla" with Mom making comments about the wastefulness and budget issues brought up in those TV shows. The weekends spent renovating the rec room with Dad, where he shows the importance of maintaining safety in using tools. The dinners where Mom & Dad discuss maintaining a balance between work and home, choosing vacation destinations for that year's time off, and budgeting appropriately. The moments when either parent is chauffeuring the kids to their various events, coaching them about how to approach the event, how to be a good loser and a humble winner. There is something that a kid gets, almost by osmosis, from watching and listening to their parents talking about how to conduct their lives. Some people might not present the most perfect example of decisionmaking, but the fact that they are presenting SOME example is important. The effects of a complete absence of that opportunity is clear.
Foster kids who age out of the foster system are more likely to lose opportunities for post-secondary education, to become homeless, or to go to jail, than children who found a "forever home". Children from intact two parent families, are the most likely to go to college, have a career, stay out of jail. And the infamous "single family home", where the parents are estranged from each other, whether or not the co-parent has tried to remain in the picture, puts out children who fall, statistically, somewhere in the middle.
Whoever in our system has decided that foster children should be allowed to decline to be adopted, needs to be held accountable for the results. It's nice, in theory, to say that teens should not be forced to do something they don't want to do, but in NORMAL families, that happens all the time. Teens from intact families are not allowed to skip the visit to grandma, they are required to go to church with the family, they must negotiate their relationships with friends and romances, with their parents' supervision. They may rebel against it, but the teachable moments that arise every day, where teens learn the most basic skills that will guide their success in life, are necessary. Our system should not allow the children who are in the system, to succeed in avoiding these moments where other teens would not be permitted to avoid them. Our system has been negligent.
To that end, if we are going to allow kids to choose whether or not to have parents, then we need to figure out how to give them the information necessary to make an informed decision on that issue. We need to find a way to explain to them what they will miss. Not some statistic-filled boring lecture, but a real, visceral understanding... We need our foster kids to be a little more like the orphans of yester-year... clamouring to find parents, not rejecting them.
Any ideas would be welcome!
In more situations, the children choose to remain without a permanent family for much more complex emotional reasons. Perhaps they cannot contemplate breaking the connection between themselves and their birth parents. And then there is the typical teen belief that adults are a mere inconvenience. Teens in a normal nuclear family that is not falling apart, want to find ways to separate. They want to ignore us. We are an embarrassment, old fashioned, stupid. After all, we think texting is unnecessary and that the posting of too much personal information on Facebook is a bad idea. We are holding them back. In a few short years they'll be allowed to drive, then vote, then drink. They will be on their own and supporting themselves soon. So we are excess baggage that they have to figure out how to work around until they can push their way forward into adulthood.
Like baby chicks working furiously to crack the egg and burst out on the scene, they wish we'd just get up, release them from the incubator, and let them get on with life.
In an intact family, however, the parents work hard to hold the kids back. The kids are not allowed to say "no" to family time, they are forced to sit through family meals and watch their favorite TV shows with Mom & Dad. They are given chores and not allowed to use Mom & Dad's money to buy too many treats for themselves. It does not matter how much Mom & Dad have given to them, the moment when the gravy train stops, they try to angle to get more. It's their job. To see how much they can get from us without working too hard for it. If they were offered the opportunity to live with minimal supervision, with no adult holding them back, or the promise of quicker entry into adulthood, many would choose it.
It is a shame that our government allows children in it's care to make these choices. Most competent parents do not allow their kids to have this opportunity. Our government is being negligent in allowing this.
What do the foster kids miss, when they shove aside that opportunity for permanency?
Most obviously, they lose the soft place to land when they become adults. They lose the home that they will boomerang back to when jobs are hard to find or marriages fail. They lose the connection and tradition to come home for during the holidays. The lines from the songs, "I'll be HOME for Christmas", and "Over the river and through the woods, to Grandmother's house we go"... and similar sweet, holiday memories... they become meaningless for a young adult who has no home base.
But then there are the subtle things. Things that are much more important to the young person's eventual success or failure as an adult. The Friday evenings watching "Say Yes to the Dress" and "Bridezilla" with Mom making comments about the wastefulness and budget issues brought up in those TV shows. The weekends spent renovating the rec room with Dad, where he shows the importance of maintaining safety in using tools. The dinners where Mom & Dad discuss maintaining a balance between work and home, choosing vacation destinations for that year's time off, and budgeting appropriately. The moments when either parent is chauffeuring the kids to their various events, coaching them about how to approach the event, how to be a good loser and a humble winner. There is something that a kid gets, almost by osmosis, from watching and listening to their parents talking about how to conduct their lives. Some people might not present the most perfect example of decisionmaking, but the fact that they are presenting SOME example is important. The effects of a complete absence of that opportunity is clear.
Foster kids who age out of the foster system are more likely to lose opportunities for post-secondary education, to become homeless, or to go to jail, than children who found a "forever home". Children from intact two parent families, are the most likely to go to college, have a career, stay out of jail. And the infamous "single family home", where the parents are estranged from each other, whether or not the co-parent has tried to remain in the picture, puts out children who fall, statistically, somewhere in the middle.
Whoever in our system has decided that foster children should be allowed to decline to be adopted, needs to be held accountable for the results. It's nice, in theory, to say that teens should not be forced to do something they don't want to do, but in NORMAL families, that happens all the time. Teens from intact families are not allowed to skip the visit to grandma, they are required to go to church with the family, they must negotiate their relationships with friends and romances, with their parents' supervision. They may rebel against it, but the teachable moments that arise every day, where teens learn the most basic skills that will guide their success in life, are necessary. Our system should not allow the children who are in the system, to succeed in avoiding these moments where other teens would not be permitted to avoid them. Our system has been negligent.
To that end, if we are going to allow kids to choose whether or not to have parents, then we need to figure out how to give them the information necessary to make an informed decision on that issue. We need to find a way to explain to them what they will miss. Not some statistic-filled boring lecture, but a real, visceral understanding... We need our foster kids to be a little more like the orphans of yester-year... clamouring to find parents, not rejecting them.
Any ideas would be welcome!
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