Have a New Kid by Friday (32 page)

My rule with sports activities is the same as my rule for music lessons. If your child insists on trying a sport, he keeps with that sport for at least a quarter, a semester, or 6 months (in other words, a full season for that activity). Nothing is easy when you first try it. It’s like the old adage: “Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

Don’t allow your child to be a quitter. Don’t allow her to hop from activity to activity. If she wants to try something, make sure she knows the rule up front: “You’re welcometo try anything, but then you have to stick with it for 6 months.”

I also suggest that children try only
one
extracurricular activity at a time. Today’s families spend so much time running from activity to activity that they never have anyfamily time together at home. The family dinner is just about null and void . . . unless it’s McDonald’s in the car.

If you have three children and each of them chooses one sports activity, you’ll be more than busy, especially if the activity has a schedule of multiple practices a week. If this is making your family too crazy and not allowing you home time as a family, then you all need to make some sacrifices. Perhaps your high school daughter will play volleyball in the winter, your son will play baseball in the summer, and your kindergartener will do ballet in the fall. You may need to limit yourself to one outing with your friends every two weeks or once a month, rather than once a week.

Part of being a family is sacrificing for the good of the whole. What will last down the road? Your child will most likely change his interests multiple times. His friends will change. Your friends will change. But your family relationships are for a lifetime. Don’t set them on the shelf because of busyness.

Stealing

It doesn’t matter whether your child was caught in the act of stealing or not. What matters is that your child stole something. That behavior needs to be addressed immediately.

Whether it was an 89-cent candy bar or a pair of designer jeans, the item needs to be returned as soon as possible to the owner, with the child in tow. But the fact that you walk the child into the store doesn’t mean you do the talking for the child. The child herself needs to hand the item to a store clerk (or a neighbor or whomever she stole from) with an apology: “I’m sorry I took it. I know it was wrong, and I am returning it to you.”

Please, parents, do not sweep stealing under the rug because you’re embarrassed. If you discover, for example, that your son took a candy bar, march the child immediately back into the store, find the clerk, and hand the candy bar over with an apology from your child. You’ll probably notice that most times the adult tries to talk to you. Refocus the attention instead on the child, and make your child speak for himself.

If you find out after the fact that your child has stolen (i.e., you’re back at home later in the evening or a day later and see the surprise item), call ahead and find out if the manager of the store is available so the child can apologize in person. Again, make sure the manager knows that he should address your child, not you, and that you want to make a point that stealing is not appropriate.

Even though stealing is a very embarrassing situation for the parent and for the child who gets caught, there is no more need for discipline other than to return the item and face up to any action that the store (or the neighbor) requires. Stern words coming from an authority figure outside the home are usually enough to curb the behavior.

One local store owner asked a boy who had stolen a watch to come in after school and sweep the floor for a week. Another asked a girl who had stolen a purse to pretend like she was a shopper and to keep her eye on other teens who might be possible shoplifters—intriguing punishment for the crime.

Many children steal from stores. Other children steal cookies out of a cookie jar or take quarters off dressers at home. The location isn’t the issue; the important thing is that the stealing is addressed and the child is told that such behavior is not honest or appropriate. Unless he has been given something or paid for something, it is not his and should stay with the owner.

Ownership should be firmly implanted in a child’s mind.

Stomping out of the Room

Children definitely know how to make statements, and stomping out of the room is a good one. It’s often paired, seconds later, with the slamming of a bedroom door (or the front or back door).

The stomper has no idea how utterly ridiculous he looks. The wise parent will allow the child to finish the stomp through the house and exit out the door or to his bedroom. As mad as that stomp makes you, you’ll be smart to find something else to do for a while before confronting the behavior. If you go charging into the bedroom or run out the door, saying, “Let me tell
you
something, young man!” you’ll only make things worse. It’ll escalate the battle further. In power struggles with children, you’ll never win, so don’t go there. You have a lot more to lose than the child does in a power struggle, and you don’t have the single-minded focus that a child does. You have other things to get done.

So wait until your child calms down, then go into his room (or wait in the living room for him to arrive back home) and say, “You seem mighty upset, and I’ve been thinking that what I said to you was inappropriate (or wrong), and I need to apologize.”

Such an approach will startle your child.
What? She’s gonna
apologize? To me? This is new. . . .

When you say to someone, “I was wrong,” and you apologize, most of the time that person will soften toward you. You’re the parent and the adult in the situation, so you apologize first. Then say, “Hey, listen, can we start over again? Before you stomped through the kitchen and I made a fool of myself by yelling at you and then following you down the hallway? Can we take a few minutes and talk about this? How do you feel?”

Now who is going to argue with a speech like that?

And what are you doing? You’re modeling an alternative way to respond. Getting mad, stomping through the house, slamming doors, and running away isn’t the way to respond. Instead, you’re saying, “Okay, we’re both mad. But we love each other, so let’s face this thing together. I want to know how you feel and what you think.”

If you can get to that point with a child, you are establishing equality. You’re not projecting the “I’m holier than thou” approach. You’re meeting your child on even turf. Just about any child on the planet will respect that—once he’s cooled down.

Stubbornness

Children don’t come out of the womb stubborn. They learn to be stubborn—because it pays off.

Let’s say a child refuses to go with you to see his grandparent. So what do you do? You dance around the child. “Oh, come on. It’s not that boring at Grandma’s. And she’d love to see you.”

The child still refuses. He shakes his head stubbornly.

“But, Daniel, she hardly has any company. It would mean so much to her if you come. Please do it. If nothing else, for me?”

By now, you as the parent have adopted a wheedling tone. What’s the next step when the child refuses?

“Okay, I know you don’t want to go, but if you go with me to Grandma’s sometimes, I’ll buy you that skateboard you wanted.”

Aha, now your child’s interest perks up. He agrees to go. He got that skateboard without much trouble, didn’t he?

You walk away thinking you won, but did you really? Your son has learned that if he holds out for a while, you’ll offer him the moon—and he’ll get it too. Your child has you wrapped around his finger, and you’re allowing it.

What’s the purposive behavior of your child’s stubbornness? To get what he wants. So don’t give him the satisfaction of getting anything. Otherwise every child on the planetis smart enough to know that if he stalls long enough, you’ll go to Grandma’s without him, you’ll do the task yourself that you asked him to do, or you’ll completely forget your request in the first place.

It’s a game of trial and error. Your kid’s got your number. Are you going to let him win? Or are you going to hold him accountable for his responsibilities?

If you want your child to go with you to visit Grandma at the nursing home once a month, that’s not an over-the-top request. If he refuses, go without him. But then don’t drive him where he wants to go the next time.

Remember, B doesn’t happen until A is completed.

Talking Back

Nothing ticks off a parent more than a child who talks back. Who disses you right to your face. Who has attitude, and then some. Most often this happens after you’ve given the child a command to do something she definitely doesn’t want to do.

What’s your first gut reaction? To engage that child in battle, to show her exactly where she’s wrong. You want to outpower her, outargue her. But guess what? Parents never win in the “sass ’em back” game. Parents have too much to lose, and every child is smart enough to know it.

Opening your mouth in response will only escalate the battle further. The best thing to do as soon as her mouth gets going is to shut
your
mouth, walk away, and get busy doing something else.

Her jaw will drop. She’ll think,
Huh?
How come that didn’t work to get Mom
riled? It sure used to. . . .

All of a sudden you’ve taken the wind out of your child’s sails, and the sails deflate a bit. Not only that, but the direction of your child’s boat begins to flounder. She isn’t quite sure what’s going on.

Your role? Just sit back and wait for that teachable moment. It may not come for 6 hours, depending on what day of the week it is. But there will come a time when she wants something from you, when she needs you to do something— that’s the time you’re waiting for. The fact is, your children need you all the time; they just don’t realize it. You hold the keys to everything in their life and about their life, and they can do little without a parent’s cooperation. You, by nature, are the powerful one. Not them. Yet so many parents give up that position of power to their child by giving in to the child’s mouthiness and demands.