How to Keep Your Sanity When It’s Back-to-School Time
5 Tips for Mom’s Back-to-School Sanity
1. Heal self-defeating thoughts: “I stunk at math and my kids will stink too!” This was my greatest self-sabotaging thought as a Mom, and I had to heal! As Moms we allow toxic negative thoughts to run through our minds every single day. It’s time to stop it this school year! Moms can be defeated in their parenting before they get out of bed in the morning. Thoughts can’t be removed—they have to be replaced. So here is what every Mom needs to try: Face the fear. Just because you aren’t good at math, for example, doesn’t mean that’s going to be your child’s truth. It’s hard, but arrest those thoughts as soon as they enter into your mind (handcuff it literally). Then replace the negative “Jimmy isn’t going to “get” math thought with “Jimmy is smart, resourceful and able to do it!” (Plus Mom, you can hire a tutor or grab a homework coach to support him). Repeat these “healing” thoughts and strategies every time those old self-defeating ones come up.
How to Get Your Tween or Teen to Talk to You
Getting Tweens and Teens to Talk
If you are the parent of a young child, you may still have one who freely talks about her thoughts, ideas, feelings and experiences. You may also have heard that once your child becomes older, she will not share with you the way she does now. If you are the parent of a teen or tween, you may now be experiencing a relationship that seems to have little communication within it. You may feel grief over what once was, and wonder where it all went ‘wrong’.
Ten Parenting Tips Just for Dads
10 Ways Dads can be more involved in parenting their kids
by Jennifer M. Koontz
Let’s face it, sometimes fathers feel a bit left out. They may feel a little unsure of their abilities in the parenting department, and women, like many other species, can smell fear. Not only do we moms want to save a father from feeling bad, we also want to prevent as much fussing as possible, by both the father and the child. So we step in. The problem is, sometimes we don’t step out again. Having a mom is great, but children need the special perspective that a dad can offer. As a dad, here are the things that us moms want you to know to feel confident about your parenting abilities:
Are You a Hypocritical Parent?
How to Avoid Being a Hypocritical Parent
You are your child’s first teacher. You teach them to talk and walk, what to eat, how to read and how to bully other children. Wait, what? Children will do what they are taught and the most powerful parenting doesn’t come through a parent’s words, it comes through the behaviors of the parent. Children observe how the adults around them behave and they take on and repeat those behaviors, even when they have been instructed NOT to. Lead by example. If you don’t want them to hit, don’t hit. If you don’t want them to curse, don’t curse. If you don’t want them to quit, don’t quit. If you want them to be kind to others, be kind to others. Teach them to rise above adversity, animosity and to have a positive outlook when things are bleak. Don’t be a hypocrite. So, are you a hypocritical parent?