Because I Said So!

Why is it that every conversation in my house seems to turn into a negotiation?  I know you know what I am talking about, but in case you have blocked it out of your memory it goes something like this:

“Kids, can you please go do _______”

“But mom, we really want to do _______.”

“I’m not talking about _____, I need you to  ______.”

“Can’t we just do ____ instead?” (tears begin to swell)

“No, I asked you to do _____” (heart rate begins to swell)

“Why?”

“Because I Said So!”

The conversation ends with you uttering the words that you swore you’d never say, ever in your whole life.  Or you may choose the alternative ending where midway through the conversation you ask yourself if it is really worth continuing this “discussion”, dealing with the resulting tears, temper tantrums, etc.  You end up questioning yourself, just how important is it to do _____?  Is it worth all this back and forth or should I just do it myself?  Your mind might imagine a time in the future where they would reply with the magic words…….. “Yes, Mommy”!!  (Queue the angel chorus.)

So what’s the right thing for a parent to do?  You can’t give in, right?  After all, we are The Parents.  But then again, you don’t want to run your house like a true dictatorship, nothing good has ever come out of that ………

I set my frustration aside and tried to look at it from a different viewpoint.  I started by asking the most logical question I could think of, “What’s my goal in all of this?”  I came up with the following: 

• The kids need to learn that the world does not revolve around them.  They don’t get to call all the shots all the time.
• Life is about compromise.  Many times you are going to have to do things that you don’t want to do.  This will be true in every relationship they will ever have in life – right now as a daughter/son, sister/brother, classmate, friend or teammate and eventually as a coworker, spouse and parent. 
• On the flip side, I don’t want to raise a child who blindly follows every command that anyone ever gives them.  I want them to have a backbone.  I want to teach them to not only stand up for what they believe in, but to be able to articulate so that others can understand their position, even if they might not agree with them.

Heavy stuff for 8 and 5 years old.  How do I bring it down to their level?  The answer this week is that I don’t know, this is a tough one.  I don’t have a Pause Button or Drama Scale or a Pep Talk to solve this one yet.

Any ideas?  What’s working for you?  Share your ideas below, I’d love to hear them.  In the meantime if I figure something out, you'll be the first to know! 

Heart-FULLy yours, 

Kacey