Friday, December 11, 2009

That's Mean.....

One of the things I talk about in my parenting seminars are consequences. This is also the thing that most people have difficulty with. Some have difficulty with the concept – it seems mean to them. Some have difficulty thinking of appropriate consequences. Others have difficulty enforcing the consequences.

The other day I ran into this lady who shared how she used consequences very effectively. She said her 16 year old daughter came home with two Ds on her report card and then added nonchalantly that next quarter one of them was going to be an F because she hated that class.

The mom kept her cool and told the daughter to go take a nice long bath so they could both think about this. While the daughter was taking a bath, the mother went in and removed all her clothes from her closet, except one pair of jeans and one t-shirt. She then had a conversation about how it was her job to help her do her best and if she didn’t care about getting good grades, she would care about figuring out how to get her clothes back. The mother explained she could earn them back.

This may seem drastic, but it worked. I have to explain that the reason the mother had to take such drastic measures was that she had not been using consequences. The daughter was used to doing what she wanted and getting away with it. If you use consequences from the time your children are little, you won’t need to do drastic things like this.

So, what does this have to do with the love cup? Well, the mother was able to convey how important it was that her daughter get grades that reflected her abilities. The mother knows the implications of good (or bad) grades over the long run. By not allowing the daughter to get away with doing what she wanted, the mother also conveyed how much she cared about her daughter.

These days, neglect is what kids get from parents who are busy and/or tired all the time. Of the four parenting styles, neglectful parents as compared to authoritarian, permissive and firm and caring parents, have kids with the emptiest love cups.