Being the bad mom allows me to be a good parent

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . December 20, 2011 . 4:33PM

Sometimes I have to do things that make me the bad mom in the house. Well, I’m the only mom in the house, but you get what I mean. AJ and I have a lovely relationship that is secure and that most moms strive for in their relationship with their kids. He tells me his thoughts, we communicate well and there is lots of love and there are boundaries that offer security in this home. He knows where we stand at all times and I strive to decrease any uncertainty he may have about issues in his life. In other words, I’m authoritative in my parenting style. Lots of love and attention, but strict boundaries that have consequences.

Late in November, we’d gotten word that AJ had done something that indicated immaturity on his part as well as bad decision-making. We struggled with how to handle the situation and felt overwhelmed as parents. In my line of work, it can be difficult to admit that you struggle with problems too, but the main thing is that it is always easier to be more objective and to help parse through someone else’s issues than your own. After careful reflection and many discussions, it was decided that AJ needed to spend time focusing on growth and development rather than facing punishments that were already proving ineffective for him such as grounding and taking away privileges. Besides those things, we would need to add some things that he disliked doing, beyond chores, that would encourage him to focus on bettering himself as a person and, hopefully, encourage him to focus on being his best self.

As such, for the last 3 weeks, AJ has not been allowed to watch tv, play video games or play with his friends outside of school. I understand that many would oppose the last one because kids don’t get enough time to play at school and they’ve been sitting in school all day. AJ is absolutely allowed to play by himself in our front or backyard as long as he likes. What we have removed is his opportunity to socialize in the hopes that he might spend that time learning about himself or just learn that silence is ok. He has not spent time on this principle in his entire life. He is allowed 30 minutes of computer time a night for homework or to send emails to family or to decompress. If he is too busy with other things to get it, he just misses it. Period.

Beyond removing those things, AJ has added the following things to his routine: increased amounts of reading time, exercising at the gym with his daddy most every day of the week, eating healthfully almost all of the time and going to bed almost an hour earlier than he was. These were not things AJ had ever embraced and his grades were faltering, he was struggling with his focus and he was not an energetic thoughtful child as he’d been most of his life.

When AJ learned of these changes, as most kids would, we became the bad mom and dad and how could we do this to him? He was angry with us. He was angry with himself.

What has happened 3 weeks later has been a wonderful change. Because of his extra reading time, in the last 3 weeks he has increased his AR goal in reading by 300 percent and has achieved scores of 100% on every test. His teachers are floored by this. When he comes home, he does chores without complaint. He likes to go to the library to get new books because reading is really the only thing he CAN do besides spend time with the dogs. He still complains about the gym and eating, but he’s working harder at both of them and starting to see results. And the going to bed early? He’s doing it on his own. He’ll take his shower and then tell us that he’s just going to go to bed early because he’s tired. Sometimes he’ll do this 30 minutes before his new bedtime.

What I have learned from this is that AJ only thinks he misses these changes. He is a more reflective child and the little things that he used to have all of the time mean more to him when he can have them. He is allowed 30 minutes of video games tonight for his achievement in AR. He didn’t demand it immediately as he would have done a month ago. Instead, he went upstairs to read until the television is free. In fact, he may even forget about it today.

I may leave this new policy open ended. When we decided on it, that was the plan. We were going to see how long it took to see maturity taking place or some sign of reflection or better decision making. I don’t expect too much from my 10-year old. I expect proper development, manners and respect. I love him desperately, but I am raising someone who will be a solid man when it comes time for that and I refuse to coddle him when I know he can do better.

And after 3 weeks, he’s showing progress. Extreme progress. And he’s happier for it. So where do I go from here? I think we are content with how things are. Am I still the bad mom? I don’t honestly know. Am I a good parent? I think so. He’s happy. He’s healthy. And he’s growing both mentally and physically. I can’t ask for more than that.

Why sometimes it is better to give in to the small things

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . July 17, 2011 . 6:43PM

As I noted in the post prior to this one, this summer has been little fun for me and, really, for anyone living in this household. Stress and tension are overwhelming and even our mini-vacation back to Illinois was more stress and tension and what felt like a lot of pressure in what was supposed to be an easy-going week back home. AJ and I have been struggling to find our way this summer and it feels like we are navigating in a pressure cooker. I have been sensitive to this in the past week and have really been trying to get both of us out of the house and doing things to alleviate some of this build-up.

Lately, for at least two hours a day, I have studied for a test that is coming up next weekend. So, instead of letting him do other things, I asked AJ to come to the library with me and read a book that he has enjoyed in recent weeks. Generally, this would provoke whining and upset, but because of the melancholic timbre of the summer this very peculiar year, he has been delighted to sit in the cool, quiet alcove of the well-lit library on their comfortable leather couches and soak in the atmosphere of the library. When he heard we would not be going yesterday, because it was Saturday and they’d be closing early, he was disappointed that he would not finish his book in the calm demeanor he’d become accustomed.

I have not lavishly spoiled him to make up for the loss of a summer of fun. AJ isn’t entitled to a summer of fun just for being a kid. There are parents that will disagree with me on that statement, but the truth of the matter is that no one is entitled to anything other than safety, love, a full belly and a warm/cool place to sleep. I give my child all of those things, lots of attention and affection, plenty of cool gadgets and he does get to do fun things, but he doesn’t go on lavish vacations and we don’t spend a lot of money making sure every single day overstimulates him to the point where I no longer like who he is as a person. When I meet a parent who does, I often find it difficult to be friendly with both the parent and the child because of the expectations they have as to how people will treat them; Rather, how they feel they are entitled to be treated.

Besides studying yesterday, I planned a small outing to the Nashville Farmer’s Market. I’d never been and AJ and I had gone to the adorable one near our house the other day. He’d studied a pattypan squash and liked it because it looked like a UFO. He’d picked up several other vegetables that I could not identify, to his amusement and to my dismay. I thought that, perhaps, a trip to the market where he could look to his heart’s delight and I could learn about the vegetables might be fun for both of us. They also had a flea market and AJ loves to look at trinkets. Garage sales may be his favorite events on earth.

When we got there, I handed AJ the $6 he’d earned by doing chores every day this week and told him that he could spend it, but carefully and not on junk. Immediately, he focused on a large adults watch with a disastrous amount of bling and a large money sign on it. It was a glowing green color and also came with a large $$ necklace. I bit my lip and hoped that it would be too expensive. Despite my better judgment, I told him he could not ask how much it was and pulled him away from the bling ensemble. As we continued to walk around, he found another necklace he desperately wanted. It was hematite, shiny, and looked like it had a shark’s tooth attached to it. It was gaudy and awful and I knew he wanted it more than anything. Again, against my better judgment, I told him he could not ask how much it was.

My inability to understand his want of shiny, blingy jewelry was too much. His jaw set, he marched ahead of me to the food market and the day was ruined. The shark necklace might have been $2. We continued to argue about it for the next hour. As I picked up tomatoes, peaches, cucumbers and oranges, I thought to myself and wondered if the argument was truly worth it. The money was his and while I knew he’d be happy when he’d saved enough to buy a larger toy, AJ is 10 years old. He wants immediate gratification despite the costs. Even though I’d explained that I did what I thought was best, was it worth the cost? Was the loss of that necklace worth the upset between us and the upset of our day together? The event was planned to offset some of the negativity of the summer. Surely, if he wanted a $2 necklace that he was going to buy with his own money, it wasn’t worth this.

I made a mistake. Adults do it. We decide we know what’s best and we hold firm to in the idea of good parenting practices. Usually, in this vein, we are correct in what we are doing and it is better for our children. However, “don’t sweat the small stuff” is a cliche for a reason, as are all cliches. In this case, my not giving in hurt AJ’s decision-making process and our camaraderie for the day. In the big scheme of things, was that necklace important? To me, it wasn’t. To him, it was. To us, it was. Giving in would have made the difference in how he felt about our time together. We had a large discussion about how material things should not affect our time together and how arguments do. Ultimately, I think we both learned a lot.

Next time, I’ll do better. A small thing is a small thing and day-ruining arguments are best saved for the things that really matter.

Sometimes the best thing to say is nothing

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . February 28, 2011 . 6:30PM

There are times that my son, AJ, makes comments and, instead of using it as a teachable moment, which is what I SHOULD do, I let the moment go by quietly. Let’s be real here, ok? I let the moment go by while I pretend to be as quiet as I can so it might think I’m dead and allow me to not address it.

Sometimes adults don’t want to be adults and sometimes they don’t want to teach the teachable moments simply because they can be, well, rather exhausting. There comes a moment when the sweet little baby turns into a question machine and it is “Why?” all the time. I thrive on critical thinking, but this isn’t it. This is critical asking and critical response to my answers and when I say critical response I mean it’s often answered with, “Well that’s a stupid reason for something being that way” to which I have no clever response because it often IS a stupid reason for something being that way but I’m put off enough not to agree because I just took the time to explain WHY something is the way it is.

Just typing that caused me to wrinkle my nose and for my head to throb slightly.

So, you can see why there might be times that, when something is and explaining it is going to be a drawn out process, adults might play dead or hide. Or…in some crafty cases, play dumb. You know who you are, oh cleverest of us all. You pretend you don’t know when, in reality, you do know you just keep your mouth shut because you’re smarter than the rest of us. You clever beasties, you.

This brings me to today’s geography homework. Oh woe to me with geography homework. Latitudes and longitudes and meridians, oh my! I don’t know any of this. More correctly, I learned it well enough to take a test in the 4th grade and promptly forgot it to add such things such as America’s Funniest Home Video’s and Full House to my brain.

Today’s homework went like this:

AJ: “What is this?” (he points to Africa)
Me: “That’s Africa.”
AJ: “No, that’s south america.”
Me: (pointing to each) “NO, There’s america, there’s south america, there’s africa.”
AJ: “Why is south america there?”
Me: … (very quietly ignoring it and almost humming and rocking)

See? I could have explained the theory about how everything was joined and the plates moved or any of the various geographical theories, right? Instead, I was vewwy, vewwy quiet. I even looked the other direction intently, as if I had something that must be accomplished right at the front door. AJ, thankfully, ignored me right back and formed his own idea of why South America is south of North America. When I saw he went back to his homework, I let out a loud sigh and went back to what I was doing.

I was clever today. I lost the teachable moment, but saved a lot in sanity. I’m going to give myself this one.

The dog stands alone…

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . November 13, 2010 . 5:19AM

Sometimes I hate being a parent.

Blaspheme, right? It’s true. Part of being a parent means that I have to do the hard work such as disciplining my child when he misbehaves or chooses to mess around in class as opposed to choosing to learn and distract those around him. This makes my job as a parent difficult and unenjoyable.

Lately, AJ has been testing his independence and his boundaries at school. This week he forgot something necessary at school and, as such, he ended up going to bed early and his dog was not allowed to sleep in his bedroom. In this house, one thing is always true: Wherever my child goes, so goes his dog. There has never been a more loyal dog than that dachshund to her boy.

What I knew was that the separation of the two was going to hurt one person: me. Why is this? Because AJ was going to go to sleep and I was going to be left with the whiny, leaky eyed dog that would look at the gaited stairs and turn eyes on me that were alternately hateful, pitiful and pleading. This is exactly what happened. She would go to the gate at the stairs and stand there for 10 minutes at a time while looking up at the darkened stairs and waiting for him to come down to get her. When it didn’t happen, she would come to me, grunt sadly and run back to the stairs. Her message was clearly “Please let me be with him.”

I had to say no. Over 100 times in the 4 hours I was awake after he went to bed did I say no. Eventually, she wore herself out and curled up on my legs. When I finally went to bed she calmly waited at the gate for me to allow her up. When I didn’t, she whined at me and watched me climb the stairs. I glanced at her sadly and went to bed.

Two hours later, I awoke and, eyes half closed, headed for the bathroom door. I happened to look down the stairs and she sat there, quietly and patiently, waiting for her boy.

In the morning, I cannot imagine what their reunion was like, but my son has been on his best behavior ever since and she has not left his side. He also has not forgotten a single bit of work since. Sometimes, a reminder of the people we let down by our failures can be the most honest motivator in our lives.

And sometimes people aren’t actually people but the vision of a dog that loves you more than anything standing alone in the dark waiting for you to come for her…

I can’t get that song out of my head!

by Jillian @ http://blueshelled.com . September 16, 2010 . 12:19AM

Yesterday, AJ and I were sitting on the couch and I heard him singing. He loves to sing, but rarely does it in front of people. I remember when he was in the womb and he’d bounce to certain songs when they’d come on the radio. He’d kill me if he knew I was telling you his favorite song was “Lucky” by Britney Spears. No joke. The kid would bounce like a fiend when it came on, as it was popular at the time, and you could see the outline of two little fists coming out of my stomach like little Alien movie wannabes. It was both frightening and exhilarating for me as a mother-to-be to recognize that my son had a personality even at that stage.

I’m really glad he has no idea where this blog is, nor does he read it, or he’d likely never speak to me again for telling you what I just told you.

Anyway, the boy loves music. He’ll sing in front of people when we play Rock Band but only because it’s “for the music.” I told you he has personality. When I tell people my kid is cool they don’t really believe me and they don’t really understand until they meet him and realize that he actually does seem to process things differently than other kids his age. There’s a 36-year-old hair band member in that 9-year-old body. At 3, his favorite song was by Bon Jovi.

I digress, I digress. I have no idea why anyone reads this blog because all I do is digress. I’ve turned into my 80-something grandmother.

So, AJ loves music. Yes, that was like 4 paragraphs ago. Get off my lawn. I heard him humming on the couch. Wait, that’s not true. It wasn’t just humming. It was full out song. “She’ll be coming round the mountain when she commmmmmmmmmmes, when she comes. She’ll be coming round the mountain when she comes.” I’m sure they learned the whole song. This was the part that was stuck in his head, though. For an hour I heard this until finally I looked at him, made sure he saw me, gave him my most charming grin and sang loudly, “She’ll be coming round the mountain, she’ll be coming round the mountain, she’ll be coming round the mountain when she comes!”

He couldn’t stop laughing. The giggles overtook him, then me. We laughed loud and long together. He gasped at me, “Ma-Ma-Mama, I couldn’t help it! It just got stuck in my head and wouldn’t go away!” We sang it a couple more times and laughed louder and longer. We often sing together in the car. Lately it’s been songs from Glee. Yesterday it was songs from elementary school.

Now if I can just get the theme song for Veronica Mars out of my own head, I’ll be set.