Okay, I confess that it’s too much for me to do chapter-by-chapter reflection for this book. Ha ha. I shall do my reflection based on topics which speak to me.
From chapter 5’s ‘The Joys (and Challenges) of Initiative’, it talks about how a budding toddler’s initiative in doing new things could turn into manipulation when their efforts were discouraged by adults. Hmm, it rings true for us. After being familiar with her day-in, day-out routines at home and out-of-the house, Hannah has started to wander out of her ‘boundaries’.
Example 1: Mommy fetched nana home from her nanny’s place. The standard route was to walk through a carpark. One day, nana decided to ‘go upstairs’ rather than cutting through the carpark. Well, that means it would be a longer journey home. Instead of saying ‘no, etc etc reasoning’, mommy allowed nana to take the stairs as she showed initiative of wanting to gain a new skill of mastering stairs-climbing and enjoyed the experience as well. There were days when the stairs underwent some renovation and she agreed with me that it was not safe to use it. “Only uncle can go upstairs” – when she saw a security guard went up despite of the warning sign. Simple reasoning seemed to work.
Example 2: Hannah walked into a lift and her fingers couldn’t help gravitating towards the lift buttons. Instead of stopping her from possibly punching every button within reach and enduring a subsequent outburst of angry wailing, we told her which button she could press and ‘press once only’. We showed her that we recognised her desire and also taught her some civil behaviour.
Example 3: Hannah is not fond of drinking water. One night, we had a power struggle where I insisted that she drink some water by man-handling method and she threw a huge tantrum. Both of us were upset and neither would give way. But I had to give in eventually as she needed to go to bed. The next few nights, I felt manipulated as she knew she would ‘win’ in the end. She would say “don’t want drink water ah!”. SIGH. Much later on, she did give in to take 1-2 sips or sometimes she would help herself to her water bottle when I gave her the option of drinking it later. She knew mommy expected her to drink water (& I reminded her about it, gently, every now and then). The book advocates the use of kind and firm approach when dealing with our perceived notion of misbehaviour. I was expecting total obedience but in situations such as this, there can only be one winner (and one loser) and it would not bode well for the parent-child relationship if this battle continue to wage on. Being kind and firm is not the same as being permissive. Permissiveness spoils a child. Showing kindness with firmness means that we try to understand the child’s perception of her world (more on that in the next post), age-appropriate behaviour and give limited options (to engage her meaningfully and also with safety precaution in mind).
Directing her budding initiative to develop in the positive way is often challenging, inconvenient and time-consuming. But I totally agree with the book that our investment of time, patience and energies (both physical and mental) would reap long-term benefits as compared to having to deal with consequent misbehaviour of a discouraged kid because her initiative was thumbed down repeatedly.
Who said parenting was easy and shouldn’t take much time?
How abt where safety is an issue? For instance Our girl has taken to a liking for standing on the bed n sofa. Which prompts us to grab her n issue a stern no-no. Sometimes we give her a quick smack on her diapered butt but she seems to think it’s a game n continues her dangerous act with much glee, shrieking with delight. Which makes us feel even more frustrated. It inevitably escalates into her screaming n wailing as we forcefully lift her off the bed/sofa.
Any suggestions? We can’t possibly not give her any attention n let her fall though it’s clear that our attention is what she’s out to get.
Hi LisaC,
If attention is what your girl is after, try to distract / engage her to do something for mommy/daddy if she does the sofa act again. According to experts (not me), she wants to do something and feel useful. Of course, it is a must to continue to emphasize that her action is dangerous (e.g. “if fall down, pain pain”) and tell her to get down from the sofa on her own. Let her do it on her own but show her the how-to if necessary. Give her time to understand and react to your guidance. Suggestions to distract her to come down: “Come down and sit on the cushion on the floor and read with mommy”, “Come down and help mommy wash rice (let her feel the rice in water for a bit)”, “Come down and help mommy sweep the floor (give her a short broom and dust pan)” :)
Hope this helps :)
Hi LisaC,
Another thought. I allow Hannah to take some risks but set boundaries for her. There was a period of time where she liked to climb onto the sofa and stand up leaning against the back rest. We told her sternly to sit down unless mommy/daddy is around. So yes, she could stand and walk on the sofa but only when parents are around. Give her options. BTW again, how old is your girl. Because if she’s too young, her understanding would be limiting. Supervision and distraction are still most useful for age 0-3.