Colours of Family

BY HEATHER BAIN BEHAVIOURAL TEACHING ASSISTANT

All you need is love, right?

WELL, MAYBE NOT?!

The Beatles song “All You Need is Love” by Paul McCartney and John Lennon popped into my head and stayed there the entire time I was thinking about this article. I heard it frequently on the radio when I was a girl and the chorus played in an endless loop in my mind. “All you need is love All you need is love All you need is love, love Love is all you need.” I looked up the song and played it again! Love in its many variations is vitally important in family life. As I pondered the idea of love being all you need, I realized that in my opinion, love is NOT “all you need!” Healthy boundaries are equally as important for a happy life. Think about it. Not setting limits about how much food, alcohol or drugs you consume can have major effects on your physical and mental health. Strapping your beloved child into a car seat or insisting upon seat belt use, protects them, lessening the harm of a possible accident. Saying “no” appropriately can be empowering. Children, teenagers and adults who can confidently say “no” to peer pressure, refusing to take part in bullying, drinking, drug or sexual experimentation and dangerous or illegal activities have learned to enforce healthy boundaries. Setting and maintaining boundaries is an important life skill. So the questions are, when do we learn how to do it and how do we teach boundary setting?

CONFLICT RESOLUTION Empower your children to resolve their own challenges

My daughter posted the following conversation on Facebook between my oldest grandson, Lucas (19) and his baby brother, Leo (14 months). Lucas: “Leo, do not shut my door, I want it open.” Leo: Closes the door. Lucas: “Leo I want the door open.” (Opens the door) Leo: “Bad. Bad.” (Slams the door) Lucas: “Leo, I want the door open. Leave it alone.” (Opens the door again) Leo; “Bad! Bad!” (Slams the door) and repeat... I predict, based on his behaviour, that Leo is going to keep his parents busy! It is a funny example of one brother trying to impose his will on the other. According to my daughter, Leo’s loud and emphatic persistence won the day. Eventually Lucas decided keeping the door open wasn’t important. However, the situation changes if Leo’s safety was affected and Lucas would have followed through by keeping the door open. My advice is to pick your battles carefully. Never compromise on boundaries that involve endangering or neglecting physical or emotional health and safety. Set a limit, explain why and stick to it despite tears, yelling, aggression or meltdowns. In my example, Leo may not be able to answer yet due to his limited vocabulary but he can still understand “No Leo, danger. You could get hurt.” With older children, developing empathy and talking through possible scenarios will help develop this skill. Try these sentence starters using your child’s real life experiences to help expand your child’s point of view. For example “Remember when your brother wanted his bedroom door open? How did it make you feel when he kept closing yours today? You told him to stop but he didn’t listen. What can you do differently? What would you like him to do? How can we solve this problem?” Ask them to predict how their actions might affect others -“How do you think your brother would feel if you got hurt because you kept slamming his door?” “How would you feel if your brother got hurt when you slammed his door?” Some behaviour characteristics are innate while many behaviour patterns may be learned in childhood. There is a definite difference between being a nurturing parent with healthy boundaries, a neglectful parent who waffles or doesn’t enforce adhering to boundaries, an enmeshed parent with few or blurred parent/child boundaries and a rigid parent imposing stifling limits and expectations upon their child. The nurturing parent offers a solid base encouraging their child to explore the world. The neglectful one lets their child take control so boundaries become unimportant. An enmeshed parent has difficulty separating themselves from their child thus limiting their independence while a rigid parent imposes unrealistic expectations that are hard to meet. Good boundaries make a child feel safe. Children grow up and eventually have to learn to navigate life’s choices and challenges on their own. As much as we want to protect our children, life happens. As your child matures, seize the ongoing teachable opportunities to talk over how to handle new situations and choices. Negotiate a workable plan with your child when and where you decide it’s appropriate. Talk about potential issues with possible options for dealing with the scenario beforehand. Maybe a code word or phrase during a check in phone call with parents will help your child or teenager extricate themselves from a situation that has begun to feel questionable or unsafe. It allows them to call on parental assistance without losing face in front of friends or potentially escalating a situation. Encourage your child to trust their own judgment and think for themselves. “Oh man! I am missing out on pizza?” could alert you that your child is seeing dangerous or illegal behaviour and wants to come home. Rehearse ahead of time so it sounds like casual conversation. Another option I have heard of was informing friends that parents are insisting on the child coming home for a specific reason. “Oh I forgot that we have to do that early in the morning!” Parents get the blame for the child leaving early. Pick up your child and ask questions later. Acknowledge their wise decision and courage in asking for help. When your child does make mistakes, calmly discuss it, while encouraging them to take responsibility and do what they can to repair the relationship and harm caused. Asking what they have learned from the experience cements new learning, confidence in making good decisions, establishing boundaries and trust in their ability to problem solve independently in the heat of the moment. Here is a bit more wisdom from “All You Need is Love” “Nothing you can do, but you can learn how to be you, in time. It’s easy!” Your child does need love to learn how to be. Boundaries too!