Parenting Under the Stars

While some structure and planning is essential for life to run smoothly, you can go overboard with it and become too rigid. There’s something to be said about being spontaneous and childlike.

Planning every minute of a child’s activities is not good for them either because they won’t find it very easy to entertain themselves when they finally do get some time alone.

This doesn’t mean everyone should become irresponsible but maybe more flexible. Every child is different so will not react the same to ongoing structured activities.

Two of my children for example are like night and day. One would thrive being on the move with lots of people around because of being extroverted. The other is introverted and would tire of the crowds and noise much sooner, and may prefer to go home and read a book. Neither is better, just different.

Examples of being too structured and rigid

• Refusing to stop for an ice-cream because it wasn’t scheduled that day.

• Spending the whole weekend cleaning and not taking time to play with each other.

• Not allowing a child to ever get dirty by playing in the sandbox, playing with chalk, climbing monkey bars etc.

• Taking the same route home just because that’s the way you always go.

• Refusing to stop for a minute to look at the flowers and/or bugs with your kids.

I’m sure we can come up with more but for now, I have a game of Operation to play.

If you would like to read some more about indoor games, Erinn at Parenting Children has a good post on Indoor Fun to combat cabin fever.

I was reading Jean’s wisdom or heart post the other day and it got me thinking. She was pondering whether a mother should listen to her heart and bail a child/teenager out of jail or listen to wise advice and let him stew for a few days.

Let them stew

My parents mostly let us stew. It’s hard to say exactly what would happen from immediately bailing out this particular child but I know some people who were bailed out several times in more ways than one. In other words, they continued the behavior.

Sometimes when you try to save a teen or even an adult from pain it becomes enabling and is actually doing them more harm than good. Their pain becomes prolonged because they don’t learn properly from the experience and they don’t endure the consequences most others have.

Protecting Children

It is natural to want to protect a child and in many cases, it’s part of parenting and expected and appropriate. When they’re too young to know better, they must be taught and constantly supervised and told not to go near the road. If they do not listen to you the first time you will probably make sure they don’t do it again since it could be life or death.

Eventually children grow up and sometimes defy someone else by breaking their rules. Since you can no longer be there to watch over them all the time, they will likely rebel and/or make mistakes. To what extent depends on the individual, but constantly rescuing a teenager prevents them from facing consequences and growing up.

Tough Love

People sometimes use this “tough love” too harshly however and have a hard time differentiating when to show support and love and when to let go. Since many of us were brought up in dysfunctional families, it can get confusing.

Tough love does not mean scream insults and put downs at children to toughen them up, nor does it mean to abandon a child completely.

My parents always loved me, but did not love my actions. They mostly made sure I knew it was my behavior they did not like and not me as a person. It’s an important distinction when you think about it. It is a lot different hearing “You are a bad person.” compared to “That was not a nice thing to say.” or “That behavior was rude.”

• Some parents think if you make children feel bad enough about themselves and/or ashamed that this will prevent them from acting out or misbehaving. This backfires because they will often find someone or something else that will make them feel better about themselves but is not always good for them.

• Jean asks at Parenting and Religion on her Wisdom and Heart post: “Is tough parenting called for at times- regardless of what the heart might say?” I say yes.

The bottom line to what I would do is not bail the teen out and let him know I love him, although do not approve of his behavior. It’s tough talk though since I have never had a teen in jail and hope it’s not put to the test.

A calm has settled upon our home and family and the children seem more content and relaxed. The fact that no one is sick anymore helps but all the commotion from the holidays gets tiring as well.

Getting family back to a regular schedule

• Getting the children back into regular schedules and healthy eating patterns will take a couple days. I figure that’s how long it will take us to eat all the junk people gave us. My mother, the slimmest of us all keeps shuttling over treats since she can’t have them in her home. I have not hoarded the chocolates this year but shared them, so I am making progress. I do draw some lines though and don’t allow them to run rampant with treats and they have a proper breakfast of course.

• Giving the kids a regular bedtime is important for their health and happiness. They will also be able to function much better once they have to go back to school. It does not seem to matter how obviously tired a child is as they will not admit to it anyway. At least none of mine have.

My husband doesn’t even usually admit to it which is why I sometimes find him asleep on the couch. I do believe everyone is different but children generally require a certain amount of sleep or else they act out. Don’t we all? A lot of problems and squabbles happened when one or all of us were overtired so enough sleep is essential for a calm and happy family.

Avoiding over stimulation

• This seems somewhat of a challenge since the children have received toys they want to play with all at the same time. There’s four children living here (five counting my 20 year old) so they are all into different things. It can be quite chaotic for example if one has their paint and play dough out, one wants to read, one wants to blast music and one wants to watch television. There’s something to be said about structured activities but it is challenging with the varying age groups. How do you manage it? We generally get them to take turns with things but of course sometimes a couple of them can do different things in different rooms.

There is no one right way to parent but Erinn over at Parenting Children has shared with us some of the parenting tips she has learned.