CHALLENGING BELIEFS
We all know parenting isn’t an easy
task. For most of us, we begin our
careers as parents without a lot of
training or preparation. And because
children don’t come with their own
instruction manual complete with a
cross referenced easy-to-look-up
trouble shooting guide to fix things
that go suddenly wrong or
unexpectedly appear, we have to
learn by trial and error.
Of course, we don’t start out with a
completely blank slate — every adult
is able to express a view about child
rearing whether they have children or
not. Having been children ourselves,
our adult beliefs about raising
children are strongly influenced by the
kind of role models we felt our parents
were. These beliefs are further
affected by later experiences with
children, the opinions of marriage
and relationship partners, and the
media.
Over the many years I have been
working with families I have seen
three commonly held beliefs about
raising children that actually result in
making parenting more difficult.
“It’s just a phase”
Explaining away your 2-year-old
child’s tantrum as just a normal part
of that often feared and much
mentioned “terrible twos” is missing
the point. Yes, many 2-year-old throws
tantrums, but not all do. And children
who do throw tantrums don’t always
grow out of it. Many behavior
problems are not an inevitable and
necessary part of normal development
and parents need to account for
enormous differences between
children of different ages and
personalities.
I can recall one mother who insisted
that her 3-year-old’s constant
aggressive behavior towards other
children at a local playgroup was just
a phase and consequently nothing to
worry about. That assurance did little
to convince other parents whose
children were victims of the
aggression as well as the
kindergarten director who asked her
to remove her son from the group. It
was another two years before the
mother realized her son’s misbehavior
was not going to suddenly go away
and she had to seek professional
help. Dealing with the misbehavior
earlier would have made life much
easier for both parent and child.
“It’s all my fault”
Some parents deal with misbehavior
by blaming themselves. I have talked
with many guilt-ridden and worried
parents over the years. These parents
blame themselves for almost
everything the child does and in some
cases may become severely
depressed. The truth is, some
children are simply harder to raise
than others. Those who have feeding
problems, cry excessively as babies
and have sleeping difficulties are hard
for almost all parents to deal with.
And as our children grow, while we
play a large role in shaping their
character, some things are out of our
influence. We can’t control what
happens in a classroom or a
playground, the friends our child will
choose, the influence of the media, the
family interactions of our spouse, or
the unique personality of our child.
Self-blame is destructive and won’t
help a parent to make the necessary
adjustments to daily routines that are
sometimes required to deal with
difficult behavior.
“He’s doing it deliberately just to
annoy me”
Few children with behavior problems
are actually able to explain the
reasons for their actions. Most simply
do not know why they do certain things
and all would have difficulty putting
their reasons into words. The subtle
complexities involved in everyday
communications within families, both
verbal and nonverbal, are more likely
to contribute to a problem than some
inbuilt personality flaw or mean streak
within a child. Blaming constant
misbehavior on the personality of a
child can often result in a parent
ignoring important actions of their own
that may be able to be altered to help
bring about a resolution to the
problem.