The Discipline Miracle

By Dr. Linda Pearson

Kids and Problem Behaviors

It’s likely that the reason you picked up this book is because things don’t always go perfectly with your child. In fact, sometimes they go horribly wrong. You’re wondering if these difficulties are huge or just bumps in the road. But, in either case, your child’s problem behaviors are making things a lot tougher than you think they should be, and you need to find an effective way to deal with them.

Do you sometimes feel as if you are on a “wheel of emotions” with your child? He does something that angers or frustrates you. Then you become angry at yourself for being angry at him, and now you feel even angrier at him because he was able to make you so angry with yourself. And, when he does the same thing just after you yelled at him to stop, you feel even angrier than you did a few minutes before. Does your child have an incredible ability to trigger emotions you didn’t even know you had until he was born?

I feel confident that after reading this book you will have a new perspective on how to approach your parenting challenges.

Parenting is a tough job. Raising toddlers and preschoolers is filled with ever-changing problem behaviors that you can expect to experience. Trust me when I say that whatever you’re going through, you are not alone. And this is a good thing. Because you can benefit from my experience and the experience of all of the people I’ve worked with over the years.

Do any of these situations sound familiar?

Eighteen-month-old Linda whines, clings to her mom Yvette’s legs, and always wants to be held. Yvette tries to give her all the love she has, but sometimes she tries to detach herself to get other things done. Then, she feels guilty and wonders if she is doing the right thing.

Two-and-a-half-year-old Thomas is a strong-willed child who constantly demands his own way and seems to draw a great deal of power from saying NO to any request from his mother and father. His parents often feel helpless and tired from the stress of dealing with their first born. Sometimes they even feel a _secret desire to escape from the responsibilities of raising him.

Three-and-a-half-year-old Lenny whines all the time. His mom Carolyn tells him repeatedly to stop, each time becoming more and more frustrated. By the third time, she raises her voice in an attempt to get his attention. Still, Lenny continues whining and pleading. She ends up screaming at him, and this stops him temporarily. But now Carolyn feels guilty and resents that becoming angry seems to be the only approach that works.

Four-and-a-half-year-old Chris has an activity level that won’t quit. He never seems to listen, and he won’t sit still for anything other than action shows on television. Chris also has trouble changing what he is doing. If he is playing in the house, he doesn’t want to leave for the playground. And once there, he creates a scene when his dad John needs to take him home again. Sometimes John just leaves him in front of the television for hours, even though he feels guilty doing this. He often just lacks the energy to “fight with him” and feels exhausted as a parent.

Five-and-a-half-year-old Amy hates the feeling of tags or rough clothing—and she positively won’t eat anything that is the least bit cold or hot or “looks funny.” Amy’s mom Donna feels as if she is raising a princess who demands that everything be done her way even though this still doesn’t make Amy happy. In Donna’s mind, everything she has tried so far has failed. She has no idea what to do next.

If any of these scenarios ring a bell—and this is just the tip of the iceberg—the suggestions in this book should help you.

Whether your child’s problem behaviors are big or small, whether they indicate a stage he is going through or something far more serious, you can take steps that will make a lifelong difference for you both. And throughout the course of this book, you will learn those steps, as well as how to use them and customize them to your particular situation.

But before we begin, let’s come to an understanding about what problem behaviors are and where they come from.

What are Problem Behaviors?

Problem behaviors can be defined in many ways. A child’s behavior is a problem if it causes a parent to feel unpleasant emotions (such as anger, bewilderment, disappointment, or guilt). It’s a problem if it causes the child to act in a way that regularly upsets others. It’s a problem if a child seems to be unhappy, anxious, or angry a lot of the time. And it’s a problem if it gets in the way of his getting along with others.

If your child regularly exhibits any of these behaviors, does that mean that she is “sick”? Not at all! A certain amount of mis­behavior in your tot and preschooler is perfectly normal. There is no such thing as continuous peace with our youngsters. Parents who think that their lives should be calm when their children are this age are often terribly disappointed and are setting themselves up for a fall.

Problem behaviors commonly seen in toddlers and preschoolers include:

• Crying, irritability, and temper problems.
  
• Consistent evidence of anxieties and fears.
  
• Toilet problems.
  
• Eating problems.
  
• Bedtime and sleeping problems.
  
• Sexual curiosity problems.
  
• Clinging and other signs of insecurity.
  
• Endless chatter, excessive running around, and other instances of hyperactivity.
  
• Hitting and other acts of aggression.
  
• Disrespect and rudeness.
  
• Unwillingness to share.
  
• A high incidence of trouble with siblings.
  
• Begging, whining, and being demanding and/or bossy.

Different children often show different intensities of each of these behaviors, and most experiment with almost all of them at least once in their first six years. These behaviors usually begin as an aspect of your child’s normal development, but they can become severe as a result of environmental stressors, social pressures, or biological problems.

Why Do Kids Have These Problem Behaviors?

To understand why kids act in ways that are often difficult for their parents, it’s helpful to look at life from the perspective of your child. Tots and preschoolers believe that they should rule the world and have every right to be self-centered, demanding, and annoying if it suits them. Preschoolers do not believe that there are any consequences to their demands. They often test the limits of their parents’ authority by misbehaving, not because they necessarily set out to defy them, but because they believe they have a right to do this and in some ways are supposed to do it.

Young toddlers have a developmental need to say “NO,” and this can be tough on parents. Much of your child’s original self-discovery has been exciting for you to watch (“I want to watch this. I want to go here. I want to wear this. I want to eat this. I want you mommy.”). What a pleasure it is for a parent to watch their sweet little baby exert his wishes while expressing a pure joy in living! The problem is (and parents often forget this part), that the natural flip side of wanting something is not wanting something (“I don’t want this. I don’t want to go there. I won’t wear it. I won’t eat that. GO AWAY!”). Being capable of saying “NO” is really about saying “I am.”

When your child first says “NO” to you, you should sit down and congratulate yourself that your child is developing into an independent human being. After all, aren’t we raising our kids so that they can become autonomous, mature adults who are capable of making their own decisions? Remember, no one can succeed in school, refuse drugs, or make meaningful choices in friends or a marriage partner unless she is capable of saying NO.

This first exertion of control can make a toddler drunk with the power of it all. Imagine the feeling of evolving from having had all the decisions made for you to being able to turn your household on its ear and Mommy and Daddy red with one little word. From your toddler’s perspective, it almost seems like saying “NO” is all it takes to be king or queen of the world.

This is where the correct parental reaction makes all the difference. If you engage your toddler in a battle of wills, your toddler will decide that his identity is dependent on winning this battle. Parents who react to each “NO” with an insistence that they make every decision for their child are often the same parents who cannot believe how many problem behaviors their child has. If on the other hand, a parent reacts to “NO” with choices (either decision of which would be fine with the parent), nonchalance (“Whatever”), or even a little humor (“No matter what you say I will never allow you to wear that pretty dress to Grandma’s”), then their toddler is left with the understanding that it’ll take more than one word to master the world.

For some children, their normal problem behaviors resolve relatively quickly as they mature to their next stage of development. For other children, however, what begins as a normal problem behavior erupts into something more serious. Whether this happens depends on a variety of factors, including the child’s inborn biological tendencies, her mental and physical health, and the social environment in which she is growing up.

It’s the parent’s reaction to predictable developmental misbehavior that most often defines whether these behaviors continue, increase, or decrease. The way a parent reacts to a child determines to a high degree how the child turns out. Parents who react to their child with a great deal of anger or with inconsistent or unwise responses run a high risk of creating terribly unhappy kids—and a terribly unhappy home for everyone.

If this is where you stand right now, and if you feel as if you have tried everything you can think of to solve your child’s behavioral problems, then you may need a whole new approach to addressing these issues. For example, if you have been screaming or lecturing your child for a while now, it is probably time to admit that this isn’t working. Finding a solution to your parenting frustrations will more likely happen if you step back a little. Without a conscious attempt to parent differently, we tend to parent the way we were parented ourselves, including nurturing the way we were nurtured and disciplining the way we were disciplined. Indeed, perhaps the greatest cause of parental mistakes in handling kids stems from an oftentimes unconscious conflict within your own heart and mind over how you were parented.

Being a good parent requires a great deal of time, planning, and energy, but you will not need to become an expert in child development. What you will need is a set of principles that you can apply to the difficult behaviors that most children display as they grow up.

My Three Parenting Principles

The three parenting principles described in the following chapters are literally essential if you want to raise happy, well-adjusted kids. Think of these Three Parenting Principles as the three legs of a stool. If you use only two of the legs, you will fall over. If you don’t use any of the legs, you will not be supported and will find yourself on the floor. The Three Principles have evolved from my decades of clinical work, as well as extensive review of hundreds of books and articles about kids and parenting. And they do work. Will these Principles make it so that your child will always behave? Of course not. But you can rest assured that the consistent application of these Principles will help you be the best parent you can be and help your child become the best kid your child can be.

‑ PRINCIPLE #1: BE A SAFE HARBOR — Create a secure base for your child and ensure that you and your child have a healthy attachment.

‑ PRINCIPLE #2: BE A GOOD BOSS — Set firm limits and demand in a loving way that your child accept your rules and his or her responsibilities.

‑ PRINCIPLE #3: PREPARE THEM FOR THE REAL WORLD — Give your child what he needs rather than what he wants and teach him the importance of being part of a larger community.

The urgency in learning and applying the Three Parenting Principles depends upon your circumstances. For example, if you and your family are essentially stress free, if you have no mental or physical conditions that run in your family, if you and your child are completely healthy and happy, and if your family has never experienced any traumas or life tragedies, then your child is much less likely to progress from normal developmental problems to severe behavioral problems. However, even if you are this fortunate, you can still enhance your chances of raising a happy child if you follow the Three Principles. On the other hand, if your home or family has experienced a high degree of stress or adversity or if your child has significant temperamental, biological, or genetic problems, then you run a significant risk of having a child who displays severe problem behaviors. For you, the Three Parenting Principles are a must.

Once you learn about the Three Parenting Principles you may discover that you need to modify or even radically alter your parenting style. This requires changing habits, and habits by definition are hard to break. But using the Three Parenting Principles will give you a peace you may have never experienced before. And, as you adopt these parenting techniques, you will see your child change in wonderful ways. Because each person in your family is an individual and the combination of personalities in your family is unique, you will find that solving problems takes flexibility and imagination. But my Three Parenting Principles are basic to human development, and I will show you how to adapt them to a variety of family characteristics, culture, religion, and beliefs.

I am not suggesting that the Three Principles are going to lead to a utopian existence for you and your family where conflict never arises. Building your family into a cohesive, functioning unit takes work and, at times, involves the honest display of intense emotions. In other words, even the happiest families are going to have their share of thorny moments. But you can rest assured that if you master and adhere to the Three Principles, life with your toddler or preschooler will go much more smoothly and your child will be as well equipped as possible to deal with whatever life sets in her way. Could there be anything more rewarding than that?

The tools and techniques you need are described in the pages that follow. The thing to remember as you move forward is that problem behaviors are very much a natural part of growing up for your child. The key to surviving them and helping your child emerge from them stronger is remembering that these tools are at your disposal. And as you master the use of these tools, you will go a long way toward making life better for everyone in your family.

THE DISCIPLINE MIRACLE: The Clinically-Proven System for Raising Happy, Healthy, and Well-Behaved Kids.  © 2006 Linda Pearson, www.amacombooks.org, Division of American Management Association, 1601 Broadway, New York, NY 10019.  All rights reserved.