Guidelines for Creating a Happy Family:
1. Set limits without being angry or cruel. – Limits should be in the best interests of the children and should be clearly explained from the beginning.
2. Reduce angry interactions at home. – While everyone gets upset sometimes, your home should primarily be viewed as a place for love and support.
3. Demonstrate the importance of dedication. – Whether you work hard at your job or contribute time to church or community, your devotion to something will serve as a useful example for your children. They will learn to incorporate this type of behavior in their own lives by working hard at school and knowing the value of community service.
4. Enrich your life through others. – Make friends feel welcome in your home, and expose your children to people you like, thus demonstrating the strength you receive from others.
5. Encourage open communication. – Family members should always be allowed to talk about what’s bothering them and to share happy news,
6. Praise your children whenever you have an opportunity. – Noticing your child doing something good and acknowledging it is one of the most loving things you can do.
7. Spend time together. – Establish a family mealtime or playtime when you can all be together to share on many levels.
8. Encourage thoughtfulness. – Demonstrate the importance of helping others. Children raised in this environment become thoughtful and caring adults.
9. Respect your children. – Children who are respected will learn to respect you and others in return.
Mistakes that Create Family Unhappiness:
1. Showing no respect for each other or your children.
2. Allowing ridicule to be an accepted part of your family’s life.
3. Using threats and punishment to control each other and your children.
4. Demanding control; using anger and rage to get your way.
5. Complaining frequently.
6. Forcing or manipulating children to take sides in parental arguments.
7. Emphasizing the importance of making money over spending time together as a family.
8. Discouraging open communication.
9. Failing to praise your children when they do well.
10. Seeking revenge when things go wrong.
Fulfilling the Basic Needs of Children:
1. Children need to be respected. – Show your respect by listening to your child when she is telling a story, talking about her day, or expressing an opinion, even if it differs from yours.
2. Children need to be liked and loved. – Every kid has likable qualities. Find those characteristics and focus on them.
3. Children need to feel approved of an accepted by others. – Approval and acceptance are the foundation of self-esteem and self-concept. When your child misbehaves, you must separate the behavior from the child.
4. Children are naturally self-centered. – The infant is totally absorbed in his own needs; the kindergarten’s do not yet have the maturity to understand the feelings of others; and anyone who has ever seen a teenager react to a new pimple realizes that even at this age an enormous amount of energy is going into worrying about oneself.
5. Children need time to play and to fantasize. – Some adults regard play as a waste of time, but play is actually constructive for a young one. Kids learn through experimentation and in play they learn to cooperate and to play by the rules.
6. Children need to feel special. – They feel more secure and loved when they feel that they bring a unique quality to the family.
7. Sibling rivalry is perfectly normal. – To modify it, you need to be sure each child has private time with you and is made to understand her special role in the family.
8. Children have real fears, worries, and anxieties. – The first fear many kids have is separation anxiety, and this fear may gradually transform itself into fear of the dark, animals, monsters, and other things. Listen to your child and take her fears and worries seriously.
9. Children tend to blame themselves unnecessarily. – Since children are egocentric and assume that they are the center of the world, they may think that when something bad happens it’s their fault. Remember to reassure your youngster, even when something really was his responsibility.
Unconditional parents strive to meet the needs of their children rather than trying to control their children through punishments and rewards. Children whose needs are met are more likely to feel confident in their parent’s love, be agreeable and grow into grounded, capable adults.
Punishment Drives a Wedge in the Parent/Child Relationship
Parents who practice unconditional parenting believe that punishment of any kind leads to a child feeling alienated and unloved. Even time outs, once heralded as the perfect non-violent form of punishment, can lead to a child feeling ostracized and abandoned by her family.
Instead of time-outs, unconditional parents can practice something called a time-in. When a child is having a tantrum or difficulty behaving, it is often a sign that more attention is needed from the parent. Spending time reconnecting with the child through cuddling, hugs, reading or rocking in a rocking chair will often soothe a distraught child and teach compassion and kindness.
By: Jonathan Potkins
Free Parenting Information
by adminParenting – Emotional Incest
by admin
Jacob, a participant in one of my telephone support groups, was exploring the fact that he generally didn’t like to be touched. He was sharing with the group a situation that used to happen with his mother.
“She used to sit me on the couch with her and grab my arms and look intently into my eyes, telling me how much she loved me and how important to her I was. I don’t know exactly how to describe what I felt when she did that.”
“Was it a yucky feeling?” asked Sarah, another participant.
“Yes, that’s exactly the word! Yucky! So yucky! Why did it feel so yucky?”
“Because,” Sarah said, “It was emotional incest. I know all about this yucky feeling. My father did the same thing with me.”
Emotional incest occurs when a parent energetically uses a child to fill an inner emptiness that the parent is not taking responsibility for filling. When a parent abandons himself or herself, that parent might latch on to a child to fill the black hole that occurs from self-abandonment. While it might not be as traumatic as sexual incest, it occurs for the same reasons – a wounded parent using a child addictively to get love and avoid pain.
“Oh no!” said Phillip, another participant in the support group. “I think I might be doing that to my 15 year old daughter. No wonder she’s been locking her bedroom door.”
“What have you been doing Phillip?” I asked.
“Lots of times when I’m feeling badly or when Leitha (his wife) and I are having problems, I go into her room before she goes to sleep and tell her how upset I am. I complain to her about things that are going on in my life. I thought I was being a good dad – you know, spending time with her. But lately she has been asking me not to come into her room. Since I started this group, I’ve been realizing how much I am not taking care of my own feelings. When I feel bad, I often blame Leitha or complain to my daughter.”
“Phillip, how wonderful that you are realizing this! How terrific that you are open to learning about this! What a huge difference it is going to make to your daughter for you to start to take responsibility for your own feelings.”
“You know,” said Phillip, “I’m excited about this. My daughter has been having some problems lately and I think this is why. I really do want to be a loving father, and I can see that I haven’t understood that I have to be loving to myself before I can really love her in the way she needs to be loved. This is going to make a big difference in my relationship with Leitha too.”
“Sarah and Phillip,” said Jacob, “I am so grateful to both of you for putting a name to what I experienced as a child. It is really a relief to know that there was a good reason for the yucky feelings, and for not liking to be touched. I think that I have associated most touch with that yucky feeling of being pulled at to fill up my mother. I feel like knowing this, maybe I can start to give normal hugs to the people who are important to me.”
A parent with a gaping inner hole that comes from inner abandonment cannot just stop the emotional incest. Certainly you can stop the overt actions, but to stop the energetic pull, you need to be doing your own inner work so that you learn to fill your own inner emptiness.
By: Margaret Paul, Ph.D.
Parenting Teenagers Today
by admin
The thought of parenting a teenager today is enough to make some people think that maybe they don’t want children at all. Parenting teens is often filled with turmoil and stress. While very few parents will truthfully say that there was no strife while raising their teenager there are ‘tricks’ to making this time of life a wonderful adventure.
The first thing a parent needs to recognize is that the focus for teen parenting is different than raising a child. The child needs to learn the basics, so to speak, the ‘how to’ of life: reading, social skills and such. They need to learn how to become independent while conforming to a group. Teens are learning their values in life, who they want to be as a person. The only way for them to do this is to question what they know and compare it to all they see and hear in school and the community as they venture out more and more on their own.
Parenting, then, becomes a fine line to walk between letting the teen make decisions that can affect the rest of his life and establishing and maintaining guidelines as they make those choices. This is no easy feat. The parents need to evaluate the guidelines to determine whether they are in place for the teen’s sake or for their own needs. Parenting the child means having total control over all of the child’s aspects of life. Parenting the teenager means letting go of that control. This in itself is scary for many parents.
The key to parenting the teenager is recognizing that while there will be conflict; it does not have to be destructive. There are many things the parent can do that will allow the teen the freedom she needs while still preserving the boundaries and values that will keep her protected.
First and foremost is a combination of unconditional love and communication. The teen needs to always believe that he can come to you no matter what. This only comes by the constant reinforcement that the parents provide as they deal with situations that arise during the pre-teen years. If the teen knows that while there will be consequences for his choices he will not have to worry about so disappointing his parents that he will lose their love or respect. There are many parenting courses, books, videos and magazines that will help the parent establish and keep open the lines of communication with their teen.
The parents of teens need also remember that despite what their teen may say, they one of the greatest influences in their teens life. It is therefore absolutely necessary that the parents spend as much time as possible with their teen. It is easy today, with so many parents and teens’ schedules being filled with jobs and social activities for families to spend little time together. So many teens today have their licenses that the time spent together driving to and from these activities is lost. So be certain to spend quality time with the teenager listening to what she has to say. Don’t react with shock or disapproval at the things they say. Instead ask them how they feel and why. Parents need to help the teenager evaluate what the consequences in the future might be from the choices they make. Parents also need to share their own values and why they feel the way they do during these conversations.
So parent of a teenager do not despair. Rather that dreading this time in your child’s life, remember that your job as her parent is to prepare her for life on her own. There is no greater reward than that.
By: Robin Welch
