Family Rx

 We've all experienced it

• Homework not completed
• Glued to tv or computer
• Curfews missed
• Eats only junk
• Door Slamming
• Yelling (both theirs and ours)
• Bedtimes dragged out forever
• Meltdowns/Tantrums

1. When you think of your child, do you often times feel your stress level going up?
   
   
2. Is there more time being spent playing video games than doing homework?
   
   
3. Is there more yelling back and forth than any real communication?
   
   
4. Is the bedtime routine lasting for hours with one more story  or one more drink of water?
   
   
5. Do you sometimes want to trade in your child for a puppy?
   
   
6. Are you addressing the same issue with the same actions over and over and expecting different results?
   

If you answered yes to one or more above, read on.

Struggles and conflicts with your children can be reduced, but not eliminated. Why? Because there will always be some kind of struggle where relationships exist. It's working through these struggles that strong family connections are built. You will find, the time you do spend with your children, more enjoyable. Your focus will be shifted from looking at the problems with your children to looking at their strengths and uniqueness.

Let's look at an example of shifting perspectives by looking at the word discipline. Typically discipline is viewed as a punishment; however, this can be flipped to be viewed as an avenue of teaching or guiding. Many times, a shift in perspective shifts the relationship.

As all parents know, children do not come with instruction manuals. For some parents, parenting skills come naturally. For others, we need some guidance or really just acknowledgement that what we are doing is right. And for others, we are so caught up in what’s not working; we need an objective view to give us some guidance.

 

As most parents with more than one child knows, each child is unique. What works with one child does not necessarily work with another. In addition, what works with one family, does not necessarily work with another, also. Each parent and each child brings a unique relationship and unique situation.