4 Attitudes to avoid with your kids

Being a Mother was the best thing that happened in my life, but at the same time, it will take you to your limit of patience. Who said it would be easy? Who said that would be a fairytale story? Who said it would be just kisses and hugs? Well, if someone said that to you, they were lying big time. 

I'm a mother of 2 young children, first a boy and the second a girl. My son is an angel; he really is. He likes to speak, tells everything, and doesn't know how to lie (lucky Mom I am). He loves to be surrounded by his family, like watching a movie and playing a game together. During dinner time, he loves to talk about his new adventures at school.

With my son being the first, it was an easy decision to go to the second!

The second arrived our little girl. So so funny, full of energy, loves to be the center of attention, has a lot of creativity in her head, all the time dancing, she's hilarious, but with a strong personality (to much in my opinion) where she doesn't listen, she likes just doing what she wants, when she wants, and to be honest, it's tough for me to handle sometimes with her attitude. 

When I feel exhausted, I try to read articles where perhaps can help me understand or deal better with this kind of situation. And I found a good article where they wrote 4 attitudes to avoid with your kids, which I want to share with you, and I will be very honest on each of them.

Here they are:

1. Don't listen to them

Children talk and also ask a lot. They take you by surprise with a thousand questions, countless doubts, and hundreds of comments at the most inopportune moments. They want to know, experience, want to share, and understand everything that happens in front of them.

Be very clear that if you tell them to be quiet if you force them to be silent, or if you don't heed their words by responding harshly or rudely, it will, in the short term, stop the child from being direct to you. And it will do so by privileging its own spaces of solitude behind a closed door that it will not want you to cross.

This first point, I totally agree with this, and fortunately, I listen to my children. I love when they tell their adventure of the day, their experience in the class, a funny moment with their friends, etc. However, what I do wrong, and I know that is sometimes I talk on top of them when their behavior or attitude in a particular situation was not the best one, and they want to explain, and I keep talking on top to explain my point also. 

But I'm not a perfect Mother, and I learn every day with them too.

2. Punish them by giving them a lack of confidence

Many parents associate the word education with punishment, prohibition, and firm and rigid authoritarianism. Everything is imposed, and any error is punished. This type of educational behavior results in a very clear lack of self-esteem in the child, insecurity, and, at the same time, a break in the emotional bond with them.

If we punish, we don't teach. If I just tell the child everything he does wrong, he will never know how to do something right. I don't give her measures or strategies. I just humiliate her. And all of this will generate her anger, resentment, and insecurity. Always avoid this attitude.

Totally agree also, but I defend that a child should be punished when they don't respect or listen to their parents, like ignoring them and doing whatever they want. That I disagree. I punish them, like not giving the toy that I promised to provide to them (and I really do what I say), or not playing PlayStation for 3 days, or not playing with their friends on that weekend, or canceling the pizza time that we sometimes do. This kind of punishment, not physical but has days that their ears are open to.

3. Compare and label them

Few things can be more destructive than comparing one sibling to another or one child to another to ridicule her, make sense of her meager skills, failings, and lack of initiative. On occasion, a mistake many parents make is speaking out loud in front of children as if they weren't listening.

"It's just that my son isn't as smart as his; he's slower, which you can do." Expressions like these are painful and generate a negative feeling that will cause hatred towards their parents and an inner sense of inferiority.

About this point, I also agree, and I'm guilty. I tend to speak with friends (like every parent that talked about their kids) about my kids, and sometimes I think they are not listening, but they are. And unfortunately, I do a lot, without the meaning of hurting my child, of course. 

I try every day to be a better Mom, and when I notice that they listen, I speak with them, explaining what I really want to say.

4. Yelling at them and relying more on orders than arguments 

We will not deal with physical abuse here, as we believe that there is no worse way to break the emotional bond with a child than to commit this unforgivable act. But we have to be aware that there are other types of maltreatment implied, almost equally destructive. This is the case with psychological abuse, in which the child's personality, self-image, and self-confidence are entirely ruined. Some fathers and mothers do not know how to address their children in any other way, and it is always through shouting. 

Photo by Charlein Gracia on Unsplash

Raising your voice without justifiable reason causes a state of euphoria and continuous stress in children; they don't know what to lean on or if they've done something good or bad. The constant screams infuriate and hurt, as there is no dialogue, only orders, and criticism. One must be very careful with these fundamental aspects. Not listening, talking, showing openness, understanding, or superimposing the sanction on the dialogue are ways of gradually pushing children away from us. They will see us as enemies to defend against, and we will break the emotional bond. 

OK, OK...I scream, and I know that I need to fix this. When I talk with my husband, I feel guilty because I'm screaming with my kids more times than not. And I don't want that, but it's stronger than me because I'm too tired, too stressed, with to many things to do at that moment, and I don't want that. My husband says I'm a lot better than before, and that comforts me. I'm working every day on myself on that.

What about you? Do you also make a lot of mistakes around these 4 points? It's vital for us, moms, to be aware that we are not perfect, and we can easily fall into mistakes because of our daily tasks in life.

I try to remember that educating is a lifelong adventure where no one is a true expert. And also, remember, that little person you are raising is part of you, forever in your life.

Lots of love