momblogger

The other day thumbing through an issue of Woman’s Day and I came across an article I had to read. A parenting article, of course. It was called ‘When Did No Become a No-No?‘ by Paula Spencer. Now I never made a decision that I wasn’t going to tell my daughter no, but after reading about other forms of ‘discipline’ I thought I would try and avoid it. HA! That went fine until she was crawling and walking lol Then that no no nonsense went right out the window! Now it’s probably the word I use most every single day. Don’t know where I’d been without that one little tiny word.

I don’t know how anyone can effectively teach their child what’s ok and what isn’t without telling them no once in awhile. It’s nice to think you can just redirect them and explain to them why they can’t do what they were doing….uh yeah, have you ever tried reasoning with a 1 year old? Doesn’t go over too well.I’ve just kinda had it with all this new-agey parenting crap. Your job as a parent is to do your best at raising a functioning member of society. What’s going to happen when a child who has never heard the word no goes to school and gets reprimanded by a teacher? I would assume that’s gonna cause some problems. Same as if you overly praise your child then they get told they’re not good enough for a sports team. Kids need to know no and understand not everything is going to go their way. The article sites a few reasons parents don’t want to say no:

‘I don’t want to break his spirit.’ See what I mean with this? If hearing the word no breaks your child’s spirit then the kid is gonna have a very rough go at life!

‘I don’t want to be negative.’ I personally don’t really see no as a negative, it’s just a word that makes boundaries clear, which you have to do! Your kid is getting ready to stick their finger in an electrical outlet which do you think is more effective, a nice stern ‘NO!’ or pulling them aside and trying to explain why that’s a bad choice?

‘I want her to see me as a friend, not a dictator.’ That is just a set up for problems down the road. You cannot be your child’s friend…well you can, but that role needs to come 2nd to parent! If there’s one thing I do know about parenting it’s that being just the the friend or just the dictator does not work!(I know cause I had one of each for parents!) You’ve got to find a balance and be a little bit of both. Yes, even a little bit of the mean ol’ dictator.

 ‘I’ve heard that overusing the word will make her tune it out.’ Well this I do kind of agree with. I tell my daughter no at the very least at least 20 times a day. Does it get old? Yes! And I’m sure she gets tired of it too. That’s why I try to redirect her and distract her with other things or just remove whatever is causing the problem. However, all of those are accompanied by a ‘NO!’ so that she understands she was doing something that she wasn’t supposed to. How else is she going to understand that?

‘I’m just uncomfortable saying it.’ Um WTF? If you’re a grown person who can’t say no you’ve got some issues to deal with!

It’s never fun to discipline your kids, to ‘be the bad guy’, but it has to be done. It’s no wonder you see crazy, unruly kids running all over stores and what not, their parents won’t tell them no!

Trackback URI | Comments RSS