Complete Connection Parenting

Today we are going to discuss what to do when your child uses foul language, bad language, or even curses you. Specifically, when you give a consequence, discipline or do something your child does not like, and they curse at you as a response.

You have to understand what your child is trying to achieve.

First of all you told them something he did not like. That means you are exerting your power and control over your child and his natural response is to:

(1) resent you and try to attack you, and

(2) try to show he has control over you in some aspect.

That is what the foul language, bad language, or cursing achieves.

It shows, first of all, that it expresses his anger in you. Second, he controls what comes out of his mouth and you don’t. It gives him an air of control where you have no control.

The way you handle this problem is to recognize what your child is trying to do and do not get sucked in. You do not get drawn into a battle. You do not respond at this point, and you do not let your child suck you into an argument or respond really in any way.

You want to maintain your dignity and control of the situation.

For example, let’s say your child comes home late and misses curfew, your consequence is for the next week, the next couple of days, or the next couple of times he has got to be home an hour earlier. He gets angry and curses at you. You say, “Nevertheless, for the next week, you have got to be home an hour early” and you walk away.

You do not get dragged into battle. You do not say, “How dare you curse at me.” You do not get involved in any way at all in what he said.

That does not mean you let it go. You can come back later at a different time and say, “You know you cursed at me yesterday, you cursed at me an hour ago, two hours ago. You are not allowed to do that and there is a consequence for that also” and then you give a consequence for cursing.

Do not let the cursing, the bad talk, the bad language, or the anger of your child get you off track. Your child’s goal is to exert his power, exert his control and to show you that he has something over you. Do not let him get away with it.

Stay in control, stay in focus, keep on topic, and at a later time when things are calm, go back and address the cursing or the bad language. Do not let it go. Do not say you are giving in. Don’t do anything other than stay on track now and make sure you address it later.

Today we are going to discuss the idea of showing your oppositional defiant disorder child love. This is actually a mistake that parents make, thinking that they are showing their children love. I will explain what I mean by that.

When our children are very infants and small babies, we do a lot to protect them from harm and from damaging themselves because they just lack understanding. The problem happens when children get older we, as parents, tend to continue protecting our children from the mistakes that they make.

As a result, what happens is our children become sheltered and it can become a problem in that your children will never learn to take responsibility for their actions. The proper way to show that you really love your child is to help them become a healthy, normal, and well functioning teenager and then adult.

Unfortunately, this requires your children to make mistakes and then take responsibility for those mistakes. Your children should learn to suffer the consequences of their mistakes.

We cannot keep sheltering our children as they get older. Our children have to learn to grow up, move on, and take care of themselves. They will not do this if we, as parents, pick up all of their mistakes and protect their actions. It is a mistake that all parents can make.

What you want to do is show your children responsible love. Teach your children that if they do something wrong that they have to pay the consequences.

Mistakes have consequences.

The best way for your child or anyone to learn from something is to make a mistake or do something wrong and feel the pain of the consequences. So this goes for small children as well as older children and teenagers too.

When your child is older, the consequences tend to be more severe. So for example, if your child is stealing, one of the worst things that you can do is to protect them from the police. Do not protect your children from their actions of stealing because they will never learn that stealing has very painful consequences.

On the other hand, if you really love your children and want what is best for them, if they do something very very wrong and you let them face the consequences themselves, they will learn that bad things have bad consequences.

By doing this, your children will learn that punishments are serious and that the world is a serious place. They will learn that if you do not behave yourself, bad things can happen to you.

Now it is counter-intuitive, because we want to protect our children. But sometimes protecting our children too much can be really detrimental for them. So it is a hard lesson that we as parents have to learn. We have to break away from protecting our children and change our whole way of thinking.

We have to let our children suffer their mistakes so that when they get older, they will learn to be much more careful and not make these mistakes, especially when the mistakes have serious consequences.

Because a child who gets into trouble at 15 years old is going to be in a different situation then a child who gets into trouble at 19 years of age. If a parent protects a child at age 15, that parent will protect their child at age 19 too. You, as the parent, do not want that to happen.

Today we are going to discuss how to get your children and teens to do chores around the house. Doing chores is a major conflict and problem in many families. First, let’s clarify why your child needs to do chores.

Your child is part of your household. Your child has to learn that as part of a group he has to contribute to that group. In your family, that means helping around the house and doing his chores.

I am going to give you one technique that will help you reduce conflict when it comes to getting chores done. It is quite simple, actually. The idea is to have a scheduled chore time for your entire family.

For example, every day from 4:00-5:00 all the children do their chores…everyone. That means that one child will wash the dishes, one child will fold the laundry, one child will take out the garbage, and so on. Have a special time where no one is doing anything but complete his or her chores.

Having a pre-scheduled chore time cuts down on a lot of conflict. It also provides structure to your home. Everyone knows that when the time comes he has to stop whatever he is doing and complete his chores.

Having a chore time eliminates a lot of the petty complaints. One child won’t say, “Why does he get to watch TV while I have to do the laundry?” Everyone is working at the same time.

If your child does not comply and keep his chore time you can then start using consequences to enforce it.

For example, if from 4:00-5:00 your child is supposed to take out the garbage and the garbage is not taken out, then he can’t play video games until the garbage is taken out. He can’t watch television. There is no dinner. In fact there is no anything else until the garbage is taken out.

We talk about using consequences effectively in a free CD that you can get here: FREE Child Discipline CD.

Getting kids to do chores is one of the conflicts parents have with their difficult defiant children.

Again, your child should do chores because he is part of your household. Your child has to learn that as part of a group he has to contribute to that group and that in your family, that means helping around the house and doing his chores.

This is only one of numerous techniques we have for helping with chores. But this technique alone will help you to get your children to do their chores more easily and with a lot less complaints.