Some Nice Advice

One of my pet peeves (it's a monster pet) is unsolicited advice.  I'm getting better at blowing it off, because I know I've become overly defensive about it at times, especially with family (strangers--who cares?).  But still, it irks me. I guess I feel that behind every piece of advice, there is a judgment of the situation and an opinion about what I should do with my life (or my children's lives, now that I have them).  There is also the implication that the person doesn't think I know what I'm doing or have a plan already, or they haven't asked. Plus, there's the "none of your business" factor. 

Becoming a counsellor only solidified my feelings.  Counsellors have to walk a fine line between giving skills, ideas, techniques, to clients--but not advice, which clients often expect.  Rather we have to figure out how to make the client see for themselves what they need to do--which may not be what we have in mind for them.  Advice disempowers. If the person follows it, they haven't learned how to own a decision and its consequences, and act out of their own mind.  If it fails, well, that's not their responsibility, they were just following their counsellor's advice.  If they don't follow it, it can create tension in the relationship. 

However, when I find myself in a situation where I don't know what the hell to do, I often solicit advice from anywhere and everywhere.  Usually people who won't care if I don't follow it.  Dear friends, moms at playgroups, grandparents, total strangers who write websites, professionals.  Everyone has a different take on it and I put together the pieces that feel right.  Just before I became a parent, a friend told me, "The best advice I ever got about parenting is to only follow advice you agree with in the first place." Amen.

Lately I've become conscious of a change in Boodge and also in our relationship.  He's crying a lot, having meltdowns that go on and on when he wakes up from nap and several times a week, sometimes several times a day.  And he's what some friends called "willfully obstinate".  I tell him something that I don't want him to do, he looks me in the eye and does it again, laughing.  He does all kinds of things that are against the rules when he wants our attention.  He'll even come and tell me he broke the rule if I didn't notice, to see what I will do.  I started to realize that so much of our day was spent with me speaking sternly to him and feeling frustrated.  By the end of the day my face was tired from scowling so much.  I don't want to feel angry, and I don't want my children to see an angry face on me all day. 

I know a lot of this is normal developmental stuff, and it's inevitable that he will need to test my boundaries. But I wondered if there was more going on.  We've started weaning, and I know that is a loss for him. His sister is sitting up, grabbing toys, laughing, and eating. She's full blown competition, and he mostly pretends she doesn't exist and always pushes her reaching hand away from him.  Except that he's totally aware of when she's getting our attention and that's when he jumps in and does any song and dance that will take it away from her and give it to him.  Slowly, over the months since his sister arrived, he's learned that negative attention is still attention, and he's smart enough to figure out how to get it. 

I've talked to everyone, and I've picked out some things that are helping. From mom's in playgroup, I got that some sibling rivalry is inevitable, and every child is different in the way they handle it.  From my mommy mentor D I got, "Welcome." She helped me realize, again, that I have entered a new kind of parenting, and a new phase in the parenting relationship. She also talked about how much attention Boodge was used to getting from me, and planted the idea that I may need to help him get "un-used" to it.  From the moms in my prenatal group, I understood that though much of Boodge's behavior was totally normal for this age, some of it was beyond what they are experiencing with their sibling-less, weaned kids.  Yes, he is probably having a hard time with the sibling and weaning adjustment.  They suggested, among other things, pouring on the positive attention and acting as bored as possible about the misbehavior. 

The positive attention, probably more than anything, has given me immediate results.  I've started focusing on telling Boodge everything he is doing that is really awesome and helpful.  When I first read the link I posted on positive attention, I remember scoffing at the example given, in which the author chides a parent who storms in to address an argument over a TV show, but never gave any positive attention to the kids while they were sitting quietly for half an hour watching TV.  I thought, "Whatever! Watching TV is what they WANT to do."

But I quickly realized--Boodge quietly watches TV four times day so I can take his little sister to bed and get her to sleep.  He likes it, sure, but so what?  He's also waiting quietly and I don't have to worry that he's drawing on the walls with a sharpie or climbing out a window, and that deserves acknowledgement.   When anyone is behaving just as you want them to, it's easy to not notice because nothing is bugging you.  Looking around, I've found a million reasons to praise him.  He really is a great little person.  Focusing on positive attention has helped me remember that, and stop scowling.   

The funny thing is that now he'll point out the negative things he did.  When  I told him he was really good at staying near me and listening and keeping his hands off things in the grocery store, he said, "But I crashed into the ladies cart."  But sometimes he'll also ask for specifics "But Mommy, what did I do good?" And I can just see it on his face that he feels better about our relationship, and even himself.  He wants to be a good guy, and positive attention reminds him how.  Today I asked him, when he was running away instead of going pee before nap, "Do you want me to feel frustrated?" and he said, "No."  Two weeks ago, that same question got a "Yes."  And what's better--he has started to acknowledge his sister's existence again, and even gave a squishy "I love her!" the other morning.

That change may also be helped by some advice I got from a site I stumbled onto called "Hand in Hand Parenting".   Hand in hand has an articles section which includes a lot of writing by a total stranger/parenting "expert" named Patty Wipfler.  Her writing included a few things that really resonated with me with regard to helping Boodge with the crying.  She suggests that when children have meltdowns, it is a positive thing, a release of pent-up emotions that will help clear them out, and then they will behave better naturally, having been allowed their feelings.  As parents, we need to help them get these emotions out by inviting them to cry and providing a safe holding space for the feelings. 

Even if the tears are because of a limit we're setting, we can comfort our child while holding the limit for as long as it takes for them to cry out their feelings. (In theory, as long as baby isn't crying, dinner isn't burning, older child isn't waiting at school for a pick up, we're not overwhelmed and exhausted, etc).  She even suggests that sometimes when children need to blow their top, they will bring on a tantrum by forcing you to set a limit through their bizarre demands ("I need the ketchup THERE! NO, THERE!!!").  My next post will talk more about what I learned through my experience trying to apply Wipfler's "Staylistening" technique for meltdowns. 

Wipfler is not the only one who talks about this.  Gordon Neufeld in "Hold On To Your Kids" also discusses "tears of futility".  He says we parents need to be willing to put up walls for our kids so that they can come up against them, realize the futility of their path, and move on in a different direction.  This is how we all adapt to change and loss.  We have to at some point allow ourselves to feel the futility of hanging on to an idea or a relationship or a goal, and cry it out of us. Then we can adapt and mature.

Crying is emotional "poop".  It's our body shedding waste, in the form of futile emotion. That idea totally resonates with me. I'm not afraid of a good cry myself, and Wipfer and Neufeld have really helped me not fear them in Boodge either.  I'm just working on the complicated mix of being the heavy and the softie at the same time.  Not easy. 

So there you have it.  That explains why I haven't been posting lately.  Too busy soliciting advice, and trying to apply it.  Too busy stepping up my parenting game and giving more time to my little troubled man.  And too scowly and preoccupied to have anything useful to say.  The other great thing about soliciting advice--you get to talk about the problem, and that helps release emotion too.  People are so kind and giving.  Thanks to everyone who has given me some time with their ear, their keyboards, their writings, and their hearts.  When you need it, good advice is a wonderful thing.