Parenting promises

Yesterday marked a very sad day for America.  A troubled  young man entered a school and shot 20 six and seven year olds and 7 adults before turning the weapon on himself. 

Many of us take our kids to school every day. We trust that they are safe there.  The children trust that they are safe there.  So, how do we possibly wrap our brains around what happened in Newtown, CT?  The parents of Sandy Hook Elementary School thought their kids were safe, too, yesterday.

Where do we go with all of this?  The grief is profound.  Everybody - parent or not - feels a pit in their stomach and a pain of unknown location that just hurts and hurts and hurts.  I almost feel as though I can't sit still, I can't find the right place for myself, I want to crawl out of my own body.  I don't know what to do with all of this pain.  I know I'm not alone.

As parents, we have to file this experience somewhere in our minds.  Perhaps we could become activists for something we believe in strongly...gun control, mental illness education, media exposure, etc...  In the meantime, how do we send our kids to school next week?

This is where parenting gets hard. (As if it weren't hard already)  We have to talk to our kids about these types of tragedies (if they have heard about it).  We have to speak to them in a way that is age-appropriate and not scary.  We have to tell them that they are safe and we have to believe it ourselves.  Shootings are happening more.  The media would like you to think that they are happening daily in your town and every town.  That just isn't the case.  These are tragic and isolated events.  We are fearful, of course.  It is essential that we also be trusting, confident and filled with faith that all will be well. 

Our kids need to grow up with a sense that they are safe and secure and that Mom and Dad have everything taken care of.  This is the foundation on which childhood SHOULD be built.  Terrible things do happen and when they do, we deal with it by teaching our kids the coping skills to move forward.  These tragedies are far enough removed that we should not allow them to traumatize our kids and to destroy what I call their "veil of security".  They need to feel safe so they can explore, grow and develop without the burden of worry, too.  They need to trust that the world is a place they can trust and predict.

My professional recommendation to parents is this.  Sit with the discomfort of this horrible tragedy.  We can't make it go away and we don't want to suppress it so much that it takes root in our bodies.  Feel the pain, share your thoughts with other adults, and be okay with the fact that life is filled with discomfort.  This is an appropriate reason to feel it.  Stay with it, accept it and let it pass naturally in time.  Don't let it interfere with your life, nor with your parenting and allow joy to peek through at times, too.  That's when the healing begins.

Some observations on parenting...

I have just returned from vacation. A much needed vacation, I might add. For the first time in a long time, I took a break from parenting; parent coaching, writing about parenting, speaking about parenting and even parenting my own kids. Of course, I didn’t stop thinking about parenting, but I guess that’s just how I’m wired. The break allowed me some distance and a little perspective as I traveled through Alaska and British Columbia.

I watched other parents – not judging or measuring in any way – just watching. Here are a few of my observations.

• We talk too much to our kids: We don’t just talk TO them, we talk AT them and we repeat ourselves over and over and over. Perhaps if we’re more succinct, we’ll hold their attention longer.

Read more here on the LifeBound website.

Ch…ch…ch…changes: Transitioning Kids to Summer Vacation

Change is in the air. School is ending, summer is beginning; saying goodbye to this school year and hello to something new and different for the summer.

Schedules are off. Swim lessons have begun. Siblings are at home who are usually at school. Some days we stay in pajamas all day. The routines have made way for willy-nilly “what-should-we-do?” days.

For some kids, the changes are a welcome respite. Taking a break from grueling schedules, alarm clocks and high-pressured school and homework feels great after a long school year. For others, the changes are stressful and upsetting. The structure of their normal routine is comforting and makes life predictable. Even in the same family, there may be two kids who differ in their reactions to these changes.

Our goal is always to teach flexibility and adaptability, but some kids come preprogrammed with challenges in this area or even an absolute inability to tolerate it.

The best tools for kids who struggle with the changes are:

Click here to read more!

Happy Cinco de Mayo - Celebrate your Victories!

Happy Cinco de Mayo: A day of celebration in parts of the U.S. and in sections of Mexico, especially the State of Puebla. From strife comes joy as Cinco de Mayo celebrates the victory of the Mexican militia over the French army at The Battle of Puebla in 1862.

Perhaps many of us didn’t know what Cinco de Mayo represented before now, but we celebrate together with our brothers and sisters from Mexico.

I love any reason to celebrate and especially love to teach my kids about different traditions and celebrations from around the world and the history behind them. Celebrations bring families and friends together with laughter and festivities – erasing all of the worries of life, for now.

Read on here!

Raising Optimistic Kids!

“Optimism: a disposition or tendency to look on the more favorable side of events or conditions and to expect the most favorable outcome.”

Few people naturally default to optimism and many people are actually annoyed by it. Those who believe everything is “meant to be” or “happens for the best” can certainly drive those crazy who believe only what they can see, hear, touch, taste or smell. Frankly, most people I talk to don’t ever give optimism a thought.

Lucky for you, I think about this stuff all the time! To self-disclose, I was a mildly depressed young adult who didn’t even realize that I was depressed because I never remembered feeling anything different. I entered therapy because it was required in my graduate program and the healthier I got the more I was able to see the contrast. When I would feel depressed again, I had little tolerance for it because now I’d had a taste of feeling good! Being depressed was no longer an option. But I didn’t know how NOT to default to it.

Click here to read some great tips to growing your kids' and your own optimism muscles!

The Importance of Honoring Your Child’s Defiance (within Reason!)

On March 25, 1965, Martin Luther King, Jr. led 25,000 marchers to the state capitol in Alabama to protest the denial of voting rights for black people. For many of those marching, that day may have been the first time they stood up for themselves and used their voices and the first time anyone said to them, “You’re worthy of better”. There was great strength, confidence and hope that day.

I get a lot of calls from parents asking me:

“Why is my child so defiant?”

“Why does he fight me on everything?”

As parents, it is our job to teach kids where the limits are, but not to squash their ability to test those limits. That’s their spark, the fire in their belly and the life force of who they are. Strong-willed kids are harder to raise, but aren’t they better equipped for some aspects of adulthood? They already possess an inner strength that many people only wish they had!

“I do not agree with what you have to say, but I’ll defend to the death your right to say it.” Voltaire

How do we honor our children’s protests?

Read the whole article here!

Raising Heroes!

A couple of weeks ago I read a very sad article about a shooting at a school outside of Cleveland, Ohio. What happened at that school and in other school shootings is inconceivable. When we send our kids off to school we want to know and believe that our children are safe. In the midst of the sadness of this article which included the deaths of 3 students as well as other injuries, came an incredibly uplifting aspect to this story. A story of a man – a reluctant hero – who saved countless lives that day by confronting the shooter and, literally, chasing him out of the school. The brave man’s name is Frank Hall. He’s the assistant football coach at the school, a husband and father of four adopted sons.

Frank Hall’s actions were heroic.

Read the rest of my article here!