I have one child, a six year old boy. He is every bit the spitting image of his mama both on the inside and out. That can be a bit of a problem sometimes.
Lately we have been struggling a lot with him feeling like he needs to be in control. For example, he always wants to decide what we do during the day, where we go, what he wears in the morning, what he eats for breakfast and so on. Sometimes it is no big deal, but this morning he pitched a fit about every thing I asked him to do. His main objection lately is that he doesn't want to wear pants. It is fifty degrees outside and he wants to make sure he wears his shorts. He feels like he can move around better without the pants to hinder his mobility.
While I agree with him and am thrilled that he is so athletic and gets plenty of exercise at school, I insist he wears pants if it is cold out. He doesn't want to and so he fusses.
At this point I feel like I have three options
- Insist he wear the pants. When he later whines, insist again. Try ignoring, doesn't work
- insist again.
- Give in and let him wear the shorts because it's "not that big of a deal"
Thankfully I have a few of Dr. Kevin Lehman's books in my arsenal and this morning after said power struggle, I decided to pull some ideas from his book, "Have a New Kid By Friday". I've read it before, but sometimes the information doesn't quite take hold and it's great to have a copy to refer back to!
He said that when the child is refusing to do what you ask you have entered into a very dangerous power struggle where you have MUCH more to lose than your child. You can lose all power by letting the child win, or you could lose your temper and then you BOTH lose.
Dr. Lehman's advice is to let the child win the power struggle by not fighting it. I'm sure this doesn't apply to every situation, but I think it would apply to mine. The child will go on about their business thinking they have won the fight. Your job is to set up consequences for refusing to do what you asked and then sticking to them.
So instead of fighting my son about wearing his pants, I would let him change into the shorts and go off to school happy as a lark. Then upon returning home from school he would learn that he was grounded for not listening. The important thing here would be to make sure I stick to the punishment. I have to make sure he knows that if he crosses the line, he can't get away with it. Mom is to be listened to, all day, every day.
This is my new strategy that I am going to try to apply. I am also planning on laying out his clothes before the week begins and working together to put outfits that we both agree on together in advance to avoid the morning struggle. I don't want to completely control his every move, but I don't want him to feel like he is in control either.
Parenting is tricky. If you have power struggles with your kids or know how to avoid them, leave me a comment below! I'll be updating the blog if anything happens where I can test the new plan. I'm sure it will.
