Children and Emotional Neglect

This fabulous article is one that I would recommend to every parent I know:

How to Not Emotionally Neglect Your Child

Go read it. Now.

It was informative, specific and empowering- inspiring change in your own parenting style without driving by guilt. We may indeed be practicing habits that leave our children emotionally neglected at times but that is most likely because the same was done to us and it is never too late to change and affect our children positively.

This spoke straight to my mother heart.

Allow me to highlight some important points:

The Three Goals of the Emotionally Attuned Parent:

1. Your child feels a part of something. He knows he’s not alone. You’re always on his team.

2.Your child knows that whatever she feels, it’s OK, and it matters to you. She will be held accountable for her behavior, but not for her emotions.

3. Your child learns how to tolerate, manage, and express his feelings.

Any parent who accomplishes these skills well enough is raising an emotionally healthy child and an emotionally intelligent child. You don’t have to do it perfectly. You just have to do it well enough.

 I do often times find myself reacting to my children's behavior rather than what they are feeling. Isn't it so easy to do that? Especially when we as adults act out our feelings through bad behavior. Wouldn't being a parent be so easy if you never got frustrated or angry or hurt? But I don't want to show my children through my angry responses that I don't care about their feelings- I only care about their behavior.

I feel like I have been learning these things through trial and error over the past couple of years, particularly when dealing with my son's behavioral issues and anxiety. I will give a few examples.
Please note- this lengthy bit is personal stories that you can feel free to skip. It is how I connect to this and may or may not be something of interest for you.

My son (now 6) has been going through some behavioral issues in the past few years and he and I butt heads often. When he acts out he is a real challenge for me. Once after some pretty significant tantrums and a fight between us I began to cry and told him, "I don't know what to do when you behave this way. I want to help you! How can I help you?" He began to cry and the anger left him and he simply said, "Hug me."

He seems angry and mean and out of control and I just want to send him to his room and tell him what he is doing is not ok....meanwhile he is a little boy that doesn't know how to manage his feelings of frustration and anger and needs his mother to reassure him that she still loves him and help him work through what he is feeling in an appropriate way. Validate his feelings and tell him what is ok to do and what is not ok. (His father is MUCH better at doing this with him than I am, to tell you the truth.) Instead I react in anger and send him off very often and then he slams doors and throws things. When he is acting like a little monster it is very difficult to hear what his heart is saying, "Hug Me." That has been a turning point in our relationship since he confessed what he needed and I hugged him so tightly and reassured him that I loved him.

In our quiet time together I remind him that he and I are on the same team. It is important for us to remind each other of this. I always need to remember to show him that I am on his side, even when I am not happy with his behavior. His family loves him even when he makes bad choices. Some mornings when he comes to wake me up, he will hug me and say, "I'm going to be on your team today Mom." I know that what I say is important to him when I let him know that our relationship is important to me. When he sees his sister acting out and me getting stressed he looks for ways to help me. Because I show that I want so much to be there for him, he wants to be there for me. Number 1 hit me straight in the heart because I know how much my son needs to hear that I am on his team.

At the beginning of this school year I saw first hand with my son that number 2 is very important. At the beginning of first grade he went off to school excited and came home happy and yet at the beginning of each week, or maybe even just a few days here and there he would start to say that he didn't want to go to school, or he didn't want to ride the bus. We would ask him "why? why? why? Is someone being mean to you? Did something happen on the bus? But you like school. Tell me why you don't want to go." etc. He always initially responds no, nothing happened but they would make up different excuses. One night while talking with him, alone in his room, he told me that he didn't want to go to school the next day. I asked why and he said he was scared. I asked why he was scared and he said he didn't know. That time it hit me that he really didn't know. He was telling me that he was scared but he couldn't put together why. It struck me then that he may be suffering from some sort of anxiety. I started explaining to him that when I feel anxiety I feel nervous or scared or upset about something but I don't always have a reason to feel that way. He agreed that that is what he felt and once he gets to school he does fine and feels fine but gets worried before starting a new week. I told him that it is normal to be scared and that he doesn't need a reason for feeling that way. What he feels is ok. He looked so relieved.

Things have changed since then. When he starts saying that he doesn't want to go to school or that he is afraid to ride the bus, I don't pester him with questions regarding what happened to make him feel that way. I acknowledged how he feels and let him know that his feelings are ok and that I understand and have felt similarly. Then I tell him what works for me when I feel that way. We don't ever tell him ok, don't go to school. He still needs to go and he knows that but we talk together about what may help him to feel better when he is feeling anxious. He is trying to communicate more with us now.

What's my point? When I look back at instances in which I have acknowledged and focused on my child's feelings, I have left him feeling more secure and closer to me and our relationship has improved. Some of his behavioral issues may be the result of feeling emotionally neglected.

Rambling done and ready to come back to the article.

I love the hope in the article- it isn't about shaming yourself or despairing over your imperfections:

Be assured, it is never too late to start responding differently.

It is never too late to improve your relationship with your child and affect their lives in a more positive way.

And finally the specific examples for how parents tend to respond and how an ideal parent would respond:

WHAT WE ALL SAY	WHAT THE IDEAL PARENT SAYS
Stop Crying	Why are you crying?
Let me know when you’re done with your fit	That’s OK. Get it all out. Then we’ll talk.
Alright, enough! I’m done with this.	Let’s take a break so we can both calm down.
Fix the attitude!	You sound angry or upset. Are you?
You need to think before you act!	How’d this go wrong? Let’s think it through.
Go to your room until you can behave better.	I see you’re angry. Is it because…?
OK, OK, stop crying now so we can go in the store.	Look at me. Take a deep breath. Let’s count to five.
There’s nothing to be nervous about.	Everyone gets nervous. It’s OK.
Don’t talk to me with that tone.	Try saying that again, but nicer so I can hear it.

I hope that this article has given you hope and some guidance for how to handle situations with your children in the future, as it has for me. I need to work this ideal parent talk into my vocabulary so that it becomes my go-to response, even when I am feeling stressed or tense. I naturally say a lot of things on the left column....and I want the right column to becomes things that come from my mouth naturally.

I DO care about my children's' feelings and I want that to be the message that I am sending them through my words and actions. Them knowing that will help them to have a better and happier life.