A mom asked how to handle her anger when her 3 year old didn’t listen to what she said. She said that she felt her problem was her anger, not the child’s behavior (though the 3yo was disobedient, threw tantrums, and ignored her mother whenever she told her to do something).
My response: Please, please look at the post I just wrote about sibling issues – you will see a loving, firm approach that will keep you from getting angry and ensure your daughter clearly gets a sense of her boundaries. In my experience, I have seen that this is probably the most common issue for moms, not knowing how to effectively discipline, and then feeling guilty because they feel angry/hateful towards their child. But it’s very exciting when you see what a major change it makes in the home environment to get this aspect of things under control; you’re happier, your child is happier, and you can enjoy each other lots more.
I feel very passionately about this because I really struggled with this issue earlier on in my parenting. I’ve been very fortunate to learn better ways to deal with things, but have continued to see the same mistakes I was making be made all the time – and the same ineffective suggestions continue to be made to parents in how to deal with it. I also see many people with older kids who have gotten out of control. Effective discipline is crucial to the short and long term relationship between the parent and child. It’s interesting but sad to note that many of these parents were so concerned about gentle parenting that they didn’t want to even say ‘no’ to their children now have hostile and strained relations with their resistant teenagers. It’s hard to enjoy being around undisciplined children, even (especially?) if they are your own.
I’m not saying mine is the only approach that works well, and if someone finds something else that works for them, then that’s great. I haven’t, and I’d read just about every book out there at some point! But I do have enough years of parenting behind me (my oldest is 14) to really see the fruits of using an approach like this. I spend all day, every day with my kids (we homeschool) and love it. I rarely get angry (annoyed, yes, but angry, no) and it’s not because I’m super patient, because I’m not at all. I’ve just taught my kids that when I say something, I mean it, and I’ve invested the time and effort into really building relationships with them.
It’s reasonable to get angry when what is important to you is regularly being trampled on. I really don’t think the answer to being a calmer parent is to try to understand your child more. Yes, it’s really important to be respectful of her and to think about her feelings, but at the same time, justifying her bad behavior isn’t helping either of you. You should to respect your own boundaries and emotional needs as much as you respect your child’s!
Avivah
