Originally Posted by Countrygal:
That is an interesting take on the article. I guess he does talk about help, but he also is talking about even teenagers. In fact, I don't think much of this can be diagnosed or figured out until they are older than most of our kids - which means they end up in the school system. The school system is neither the place nor has the time to deal with individuals who have not learned appropriate behavior skills.
I guess, overall, I mostly agree with the article. Having raised a child who has serious issues, I know now that I did things wrong when raising him. As the article said, I did the best I knew how and what I had been taught and what I had read at the time, but sometimes we just need to come back to the basics. Right and wrong. Acceptable and unacceptable. I use those words a lot now.
I don't think the lines are as black and white as the article would have us believe, and I don't think that it is always easy to distinguish the lines. But I HAVE seen kids like this, my son being one of them. He did not respond to my training like his sisters did. And I do feel that I should have done things differently with him.
That said, the article makes it look so easy when it's not. If a person is raising two or five or seven children at a time, sometimes it's hard to single out one child and deal with him in a whole different way than the rest of the children. Life doesn't really happen that way.
But I do agree that the main and key ingredient is to not allow inappropriate behavior. Period. Ever. And I agree that that element is missing in the way parents raise children these days.
I agree with some of his points. He is exactly right that kids are as "out of control" as some people would have you believe, but are just the opposite - in control of the situation. I thought that was right on the money.
But his overall tone of "if your kid throws toys or yells sometimes, they're in need mental help" and "get a backbone" was a little offputting. And I disagree that the answer to a screaming, red-faced episode is a "fight". I feel that with an angry child (not teenager) the first priority is to de-escalate the situation. Then deal with the cause and mete out the consequences. You don't investigate the fire while its still burning, you put it out first.
JMO.