Sometimes kids will say something that is triggering and even when you intellectually know you a better way to handle it, you don’t rise to the occasion.
And then you do something you regret, sometimes just one minute after the words leave your mouth.
Here’s a real life scenario from my home last week: a son noticed the challah and bread knife weren’t on the Shabbos table, and when he brought them, told me in an annoyed voice things would go much faster if everything was already in place and he didn’t have to do it.
Now, I appreciate his noticing what was missing and initiating the effort to take care of it. I could have commented on that and shown my appreciation. That would have been good and it would have ended right there.
But I didn’t. It didn’t seem an unreasonable effort to make and I don’t think it’s something to complain about. Especially since the table was set, the food was purchased and prepared, the house was clean, everyone had laundered clothes to wear – and almost all of that happened without his involvement.
Here is the trap I usually don’t fall into…but this time I didn’t make the best choice: “I hear you.” Stopping right here would have been perfect. But I didn’t.
“But (here I invalidated his message because I wanted to be appreciated for my efforts rather than complained about…) do you notice everything else was done? (Enumerate all the things that he didn’t have to do.)”
Irritated teen’s response: “It’s not helpful when you tell me that.”
He’s right.
Every parent has her personal triggers and hearing my kids complain about how hard they work when they’re not doing very much is one of mine. Interestingly, my older kids who objectively did a lot more than their younger siblings at the same age rarely made comments like this.
Often I’ll laugh and make jokes when they make a comment along those lines, often I’ll empathize – but this time I pointed out how little is expected of this child.
Now, it’s good for kids to learn to be appreciative. But there’s a time and a place for that message, and right when they’ve complained about doing too much isn’t a good time to tell them how little they really do!
No matter how right you may be (and you’re usually not as right as you think you are), you can’t make someone see your point of view. The only way someone is willing to hear what you’re saying is when you’ve first shown your willingness to hear him.
What would have been the best response in this case? “I hear you. Thank you for taking care of that.”
When I put the focus on all that I’ve done, I haven’t taught him to be appreciative of someone else’s efforts. Instead, I’ve hinted that whatever he does is nothing compared to what I do. And the hint inside of that is, he’s lazy.
Is that what I’m intending to convey? Absolutely not. That’s not my intent, but that’s what he hears.
When in doubt, I find a good rule of thumb to be to close my mouth.
My twenty year old son sometimes protests when I don’t respond forcefully to a misdeed of a younger sibling, that he couldn’t have gotten away with that when he was younger. He’s right, because I’ve learned that in the moment of challenge is very often not the right time to teach a constructive message. I was more actively corrective when he was young, but I now see the value in silence and patience.
Avivah
