“He ended up in prison because he was conditioned for it from childhood,” a motivational speaker said, when talking about the importance of the words we say.  He explained that parents who tell their children they’re no good, they’re a failure, they’ll end up in jail, etc. are conditioning them for these goals.

Image: sxc.hu

 The words we say to our children and the way we say them have a great effect.  That’s not to say that we’re to ignore discipline and sugar coat everything.  But if youngsters hear repeated emphasis on their failures and where these will lead, they’re encouraged to plan in this direction.

 I once asked a psychologist about a boy with Aspberger’s how best to help the child as he progressed through school and prepared for life beyond the home.  “Build upon his strengths,” the psychologist replied.

 I’ve often thought of this when working with any children, whether as a substitute teacher, a grandmother, a friend or neighbor.  Encourage them in their strengths and teach them to turn their weaknesses into strengths or at least minimize them.

 Think about how you’re talking to your children and how you’re conditioning them with the words you say.  

Did you know that showing stress or fighting in front of your kids can actually lower their immune system capabilities and cause physiological side effects? With the economy in a sad state of affairs, gas prices soaring toward that dreaded five dollar per gallon mark and so many home owners being foreclosed on, there is a lot of potential for marital tension and individual stress. It is common knowledge that stress about finances is the number one reason for divorce. Are you letting your own financial stress or other such issues, ruin marital bliss and cause anxiety? If so, do you kids see it happening? Chances are, they do.

Kids are very perceptive creatures. They can pick up on even unspoken emotions but be ignorant of how to deal with them. The side effects of harboring the second hand stress are numerous. Your normally happy child may become depressed. They may become suddenly introverted. They may complain of stomach aches, sleeping problems or have separation anxiety. They may regress to baby stages or behaviors. A potty trained child may start wetting the bed. One of the most obvious signs is a sharp increase in cases of illness. If your usually healthy child becomes repeatedly ill, it may be a sign that your stress is rubbing off on them.

What can you do to remedy this problem? Talk to your kids. Reassure them that you have everything under control even if you don’t feel that way. Ask them about their concerns. Some of them may surprise you. My daughter once heard my husband and I bickering about an over indulgent shopping trip. He casually made a comment about having a house payment to make. My daughter overheard and interpreted his comment to mean that we were going to lose our home. We did not know why her stomach started hurting, until she finally blurted it out one day. We were so shocked, but in retrospect, could see how a child might derive such a conclusion from a passing comment.

Younger children, although not as verbally capable of expressing fears, can still communicate them through play. You can play pretend and let him be the parent, or even use puppets to act out his emotions. Kids wear their hearts on their sleeves and will usually let you know in some form, that they are stressed. If you know what to look for and how to deal with it, they should be back to their happy selves in no time! 

I remember, all too vividly, the day that my parents told us about my dad’s affair. I knew that something wasn’t right, because the night before, the sounds of my mother’s sobbing could be heard through the walls. It kept me awake all night, pondering the meaning behind those agonized, yet muffled sounds of a woman’s heart being broken. My mother never cried, so I knew that something was seriously wrong. The next morning, my parents sat my sister and I down in the living room. I do not remember much about the details of what they said, but I do remember our reactions. I remember my youngest sister, she was only 10 at the time, trying to run out the front door. I remember feeling like it was just a bad dream. My dad was not the kind of person to cheat on my mom.

I also remember the day we found out that my dad was gay. It was a year after my parents split up. My dad was away on business, as usual. My mom sat us down, again, in the living room. She began by telling us that she had some suspicions toward my dad and his recent interests. She divulged that she had hired a private detective to follow my dad. Her findings were congruent with those suspicions. He had been sleeping with men. Again, I was left in a fog. I could not grasp the idea of my dad, a true blue family man a conservative Christian and wonderful father, leading a life that contradicted so much of what he had raised us to believe. I still wonder how any person can decide to make such a radical life change in the midst of raising a family. Yet, I know that it happens everyday.

My mom was always very open with us, throughout the divorce process. So was my dad.  Mom shared her feelings of confusion, feelings of inadequacy and anger towards my dad for leaving her to pick up the pieces while he gallivanted around the country in search of selfish pleasures. He was still our dad, but he was not the dad we knew. My dad was always more than willing to share his side of the story. From what I gather, they love and respect each other, but did not have a great marriage. My dad decided to pursue a life that, he claims, had been his true identity since birth. He still loves us. I believe that. Will I ever fully comprehend how he hid his true feelings for 41 years, only to decide that the right time to live his truth was right smack dab in the middle of our childhood? Probably not. I don’t obsess over it. It does, however, make me wonder how many parents are stifling their true identities because they made the choice to have children and commit to a marriage that they do not belong to, whole heartedly. I’m willing to bet that it happens a lot more than you and I would suspect.

My son has been different from my other children, all his life. Even as a baby, I would notice that he was difficult to calm, impulsive, hyperactive and very angry. I discussed these matters with the pediatrician, very early in his toddler years. He assured me that it was probably just normal boy characteristics. Being that my oldest was a girl and my youngest was an infant, I had no idea what to expect from a toddler boy. So I dismissed my worries and figured that things would change. They did not.

Read more

 My kids have a clear cut bedtime routine. They know our expectations and rarely fight us on matters of sleeping arrangements. There is one thing, however, that I allow them to have a say in… the use of a night light. About half of my kids are afraid of the dark. I see no problem with allowing a night light in the room, as long as it is safe and doesn’t lead to messing around. My husband disagrees with me on this matter. He thinks that I am giving them the okay to have an irrational fear. He believes that the lights should be out completely and it is just too bad if they are scared. 

The biggest factor in my decision to allow night lights, is my own childhood experiences. I also hated the dark. I still do. I used to hide my head under the blankets, because I was so afraid of seeing anything scary looking in my room. I fell asleep every night, with fear in my heart. It was an awful feeling. I do not want my kids to feel the same. I think that slumber should be a peaceful event, beginning with a feeling of security while they drift off.

Is my practice of turning on a night light and enabling my children to be dependent on a night light, going to have a negative effect on their adulthood? Do you allow your kids to use a night light or other comfort measure? Why or why not?

When my kids have friends over, which is quite often, they are expected to follow the same rules that my own adhere to. We don’t have a formal rule orientation, of course, but if there is a minor infraction then I usually let the friend know that “In our house, we have a rule about…”. Usually the offending child acknowledges the rule from that point on. There have been instances, however, when the friend completely ignores my requests to comply with our rules. There are two reasons why this usually happens.

1. The friend’s family does not set down house rules.

2. The friend’s family has a set of rules, but the parents do not follow through on disciplining the child when a rule is broken. This happens a lot with youngest children.

In either case, it is the child who ultimately suffers, because when they visit another home and cannot comply with rules, they are most often not invited back (as is the case in our home.) My question for you all today is: What do you do when your child’s friend refuses to obey your house rules? When I asked the husband what his answer would be, he looked at me as if I was daft and said ”Call the kid’s parent and tell them to come and get their brat.” He is a tad more “Guerrilla” than I! Feel free to leave your own opinions in the comment section.

But try keeping a child who has ADHD and is recovering from an injury, down for a few days. It is a feat that requires some very creative thinking! During the past few days, I’ve had to keep my son home while he recovered from last Friday’s dog attack. Getting my son to sit still for more than a few minutes is a task that we have trouble with, at times. I had no idea how I was supposed to keep him at rest, without the use of sedation. So I turned to my blogosphere friends for their advice. Here are some great ideas that actually worked:

1. Movie day! Rent your child’s favorite movies and have a couch fest. Pop some popcorn, make some cold drinks and just chill together.
2. Arts and crafts. Recovery is the perfect time to break out the quiet activities like painting, sculpting and creating works of art. My son loved this idea, since we cannot do this very much without is turning into a seven kid circus!
3. Cooking class. Let your child have a turn in the kitchen. The both of you can sit and plan a meal, then you and your child can make it together.
4. Video games. We do not have video games in our house, but if we did, I know that it would have kept him thoroughly entertained for at least an hour.
5. A walk down memory lane. I took out our huge box of old family photos and then let him look through it. It was a lot of fun to tell the stories that accompanied each picture.
6. Journal. If your child likes to write, have them start a journal of their injury and recovery time. Expressing their feelings in written form may prove to be very therapeutic. If they cannot write, have them cut out magazine pictures to illustrate their feelings.
7. Puzzles! My son is a whiz at putting together jig saw puzzles. This kept him busy for a lot longer than I expected.  Some kids may enjoy doing crosswords or word find puzzles. It keeps their mind fresh while the body is allowed to mend.
8. Computer games. My new laptop came in very handy when all of the above ideas got stale. We popped in Star Wars Math and the complaints of boredom immediately fizzled.
9. Phone time. My son loves to catch up with old friends. I allowed him to make a few calls to tell his friends about his injury and use up some time before dinner.
10. Story hour. My son loves to read. Now that he reads to himself, I do not get the chance to read to him, like I used to. I’m usually reading toddler books to the younger kids. I remembered reading Charlie And The Chocolate Factory to him, when we were waiting to start his surgery in the emergency room, and it helped to take his mind off of what was going to happen. Today, we picked out some poetry books, some of his old favorites and then took turns telling parts of a made up story. We passed a story stick back and forth as the story unfolded and created a wild adventure in our living room!

My son has had so much fun recovering, I’m afraid he’ll never want to return to school!