Extreme parenting is executed by moms and dads who are going to increasingly desperate lengths to give their children a head start over their peers. It's madness. Take a good, honest look at yourself? Are you guilty? Have you:
done your child's homework or project? (Misspell a word to make it look authentic?)
driven over 100 miles in one day shuffling your child from one activity to another?
called your child in sick so they could stay home and finish their project so it wouldn't be counted late?
bought your child anything/everything they need to fit in? (i.e. brand name clothes, makeup, cell phone, i-pod)
It seems we are so anxious to get it right, to have the most high-achieving children and to be seen to be doing it all effortlessly, that we have lost our perspective. We've resorted to deceit and corruption, and have come to view other parents as competitors rather than allies. I have passed off store bought food as my own so as not to admit to the other mothers that I can't do it all! Ha!
What I notice is that we are over-protecting our children when they are young and not allowing them to hang out with their peer group, fend for themselves, make mistakes and get a bit streetwise. In their teens, they expect a lot of freedom, which is so much of a contrast to their previous life that it's almost impossible for them to have formed the judgment they need. Sadly, the mistakes they make as teenagers usually have a lot bigger consequences than those mistakes made on the playground of elementary school.
Here are good parenting techniques I feel like we accomplish:
Communication, Respect, Saying I love you, lecturing/grounding, just saying no.
Here are the bad parenting techniques I feel like we accomplish:
Inconsistent punishment, over-lecturing, consistent sibling rules, creating responsibility.
Now that I have teens, I realize what I should have been striving for was influence instead of control. As kids grow, you can maintain influence, you do NOT get to maintain control. Now that some of my kids have "control" of their own lives I realize I don't have as much influence as I need to finish my job of guiding them into a happy, productive adulthood.
Anyway, here are examples of mine and Arty's extreme parenting. Let me be clear - I think these are mistakes and yet to this very minute we continue to parent using these techniques.
We will not allow a child to make a D or F on a report card. We micro-manage school work to make sure this doesn't happen rather than allowing the inevitable to happen and punishing mightily.
We make our teenage children call us constantly. When they get to work, before they leave work, when they arrive at their friend's house, if they leave to go anywhere, if they don't leave school immediately, if they are one minute late getting home, etc.
Will you post one of your extreme parenting "mistakes"?
ouch. a difficult post for a control freak to read. i'm so glad you shared this. and yes i'll share. i'm the other mother screamer. i'm the happy stay home mommy until i reach my limit, then i tend to SHOUT IT OUT! ;O
ReplyDeleteunfortunately i've yelled (and i mean YELLED!) at my kids when it really wasn't their fault. they might have done something small, but it was the straw that broke the camel's back. the real reason i lost it was cuz i was emotionally distraught over an issue i was experiencing / dealng with / living thru, and the torrent they received was certainly unfair and not deserved. at all.
so it doesn't make it all better, but i apologize to my kids, explain it the way it really was, and ask my kids to forgive me for one more psycho mommy dearest episode. and they usually do. cuz i've got TERRIFIC kids. much more terrific than i deserve, that's for sure. :)