#Parenting

To put this blog in a context it would be useful to read my opening blog on this site "Approaching the big 60" posted 19/5/2014.

I have been a parent for nearly 35 years (you never stop being a parent - ha!) I have 4 wonderful offspring all together - a daughter 34, twin boys 33 and my youngest son, 21 - plus 2 beautiful little grand daughters aged 4 and 1. Frankly they pretty much make up my life.

I thought it would purposeful to write a blog about parenting - some of my thoughts. I do so with a grave sense of humility - not because I necessarily know the right way or best way to be a parent - or that I have even been a good parent - who knows - who defines it - what is the criteria? Clearly there is no "right" way - being a parent is a very personal thing and it is a changing role of course - a role that evolves. I am very proud of my family for many reasons.

Thinking back being a parent came naturally. Obviously you can buy books about parenting - I think we had a book by Dr Spock - but to be honest I am not sure we ever read it (maybe to define the signs of chicken pox!). For most parents - it literally does come naturally - we are animals after all (although incredibly some people find this impossible to accept.) We call on learned experience - how did our parents do it? We are greatly assisted - when our children are born - we are gifted a deep and unconditional love bond towards them - everything else flows from that.

So what about the practical side of parenting. I stress again these are my personal thoughts - it doesn't make me right - every parent is different and they have every right to be - it depends on their personality and their philosophy. The other factor too is there are usually two parents - so it is a shared role.

I guess as a parent - you basically take a leadership role - maybe it is a managers role. I heard Sir Alex Ferguson talking the other day about his success at Manchester United - leading his team. He put it down to 2 things - control and particularly consistency. I agree - but my analogy - comparing parenting to running a football team might make some child psychologists despair - ha!

Perhaps the starting place is to consider the objectives of parenthood. Distilled down - for your children to grow with a healthy body and mind and to be happy.  More specifically :

• to have good self esteem and self confidence.
• to have the tools to compete in a competitive world (as in Darwin).
• to develop good lifestyle habits.
• to have a good ethos.
• to be able to lead and not just follow - objective and pragmatic.
• to nurture and develop potential.
• to emphasise and encourage the concept of family.
• to develop a positive can do attitude to life.
• to expose to a wide range of possibilities and options.
• to be happy and understand those things that lead to happiness and fulfillment.

If that is the list how do you achieve it - ha!?

Here are some of my thoughts based on a reflection of the past 35 years. They are in no particular order :

• An uncle told me light years ago - if you love them son and they know you love them - then they will turn out alright.
• On reflection - the Manchester United analogy might not be a bad one after all. The family is the team. Within the team ethos the individual needs the freedom and opportunity to develop and express themselves with confidence and support. It is about balance - no favouritism but an understanding each child is different and will need different things at different times.
• I have always believed in making boundaries - consistently applied - as wide as reasonably possible - but the boundaries must be clear - unacceptable behaviour understood - and a certain level of consequences if the boundaries are exceeded. (The football pitch is the boundary not just the centre circle!)
• In terms of consequences I would say this - I do not really believe in punishment. Things like grounding , or stopping pocket money etc. I certainly think any sort of corporal punishment should be truly exceptional and if it is ever used - more for shock (a wake up call) than pain. My approach has  always been to reaffirm the boundary - say it like you mean it and mean it. Rather than punishment (I think understanding is key) I have preferred strong eye contact - look at me. I would quite often start by asking "why did I  ask you to stop that" or "why were we annoyed with you". The answer is not I broke the rules - but there follows a discussion about why - there was danger in it - or it was selfish because we were watching something else on the TV - ha! Other phrases - the emotional/conscience bit - you have let yourself down - you can do better than that - you have not been fair to your family, how would you like it etc. It certainly helps if discipline can be applied at the time - with a couple of provisos. The first - the talking to is best and most effectively done in private - a one to one.(take your child out of the room). Embarrassing a youngster is not a great idea. The other proviso is the effect of tiredness. If either parent or child or both are tired I would avoid the eye to eye talking to. That is better done the next day i.e. "I want to talk to you about what happened last night" - I have found tiredness so often means emotion and inconsistency.
• Carrot or stick? Your youngster produces something. Do you praise for the job done - or do you express a negative if you are not really impressed. Do you encourage by praise. Do you encourage by being critical of the effort made. This is a matter of judgement. How do you get your youngsters to put the effort in. " look I have got to say I think you could have done better than that"  and possibly upset the child in the short term. Every child is different - every circumstance different - but I think tough love has its place - not everything should be praised - parents have to raise the bar at times too. Certainly there are some parents who put far too much pressure on their children. Children must not be scared of failure otherwise they will find ways of not participating. Have a go attitude - do your best - is all that can reasonably be expected or wanted.
• On the subject of setting the bar and pushing - I knew a lady many years back who reached number 8 ranking in UK tennis. She represented England against the USA. Her parents pushed her like mad - moved house from Birmingham to London to get the best coaching - huge family and personal sacrifices made. She told me she was glad her parents did it but that she would never do it to her children. Make of that what you will - ha! One thing I have learned is the learning process is often not very enjoyable and children will resist it - learning to swim for instance - but once you have helped them over the hump to reasonable proficiency then the game or past time becomes enjoyable, there is a sense of achievement and the youngster then gains their own momentum. I think parents have to push a bit to get over that initial hump. This applies to academic learning too I think.
• Choice. It is an act of love and affection to give your youngster choice. It is an important way to learn and to give responsibility. But actually in my thinking choice is often a problem too and there is just as much a place for direction - particularly with younger children. To try and mollify a tired youngster at meal time with "what would you like for tea" is not a good idea. In fact I would suggest meal "choice" is a bad idea. My approach has been - this is what the family are having for dinner tonight. I would not accept "I don't like it" if the child has not tried it. Parents get into a tangle with food. My little darlings will pretty much eat anything now and enjoy it - ha!
• Learning by mistakes. That is the prime way of learning - particularly as children get older. On the other hand it is probably better for all of us if we learn from other peoples mistakes. We want to protect our children from danger of course and probably from any sort of negative. I think the best way is to talk about some of these issues well in advance and hope the penny drops. A difficult balancing act. Certainly in todays world there are too many children mollycoddled and stifled and probably resentful. 
• Exercise. Children are naturally energetic - with energy to burn. They need to get out of doors - probably daily. Sport is a great thing for children (and adults) to be into. I am going to be controversial now. I have great scepticism about ADHD. Diet and exercise is the cure together with a healthy dose of real and decent parental authority/control. We want to protect our children but we must find ways of giving them massive amounts of fresh air and exercise. Absolutely vital and a key to happiness in my view.
• Camping. Increasingly we live in a sanitised and ordered world. Proper camping in a tent poses all sorts of challenges. Learning to cope with the wind rattling your tent, creepy crawlies, or the dark, or a bit of grass in your food is a great thing. Kids have to learn to rough it a bit too. Who knows what life is going to throw at them?
• Social media - Facebook etc. I am far from an expert on this. What I would say is there has always been peer pressure to conform. I remember talking to my children about making their own minds up - at times better to lead rather than be led etc. Facebook seems to be a massive pressure in modern lives. Parents have a challenge in helping their offspring remain as individuals rather than social clones dependent on mass validation.
• Finally I come to PMA - our family motto if we have one. It stands for Positive Mental Attitude. If any of us get a bit negative or wimpy we use the retort PMA. It reminds us to take responsibility and not make excuses and get on with it. On the issue of responsibility - we live in a world of blame - it is always somebody else's fault - there is always a ready excuse. I have always tried to counter that view. We take responsibility for our own lives. My youngest son went to a pretty badly performing state secondary school - with teaching problems. We agreed that the absence of a teacher was not an excuse not to learn. That would not get him the exam passes he needed. He pestered staff for the learning material, found out for himself what he needed to know if a lesson was missed. (and the school responded well). He is now a medical student.

Just a couple of other things 1) those teenage years - and then they are adults! Don't expect teenagers to necessarily agree with you - but the seed planted - they will reflect on it - and when they need to make a decision hopefully what you have advised some time before will have some impact. As adults the parental role inevitably changes (although I can remember my dad reminding me to be careful crossing the busy road when I decided to walk over to the local shop - I had just driven 150 miles with our then three kids in the car!) I suppose now I am more the chair of the board of formidable directors - or maybe a cooperative. Whatever it is hopefully my offspring know I mean well even if I forget they are now full blown very capable and competent adults! 

The other thing 2) is parental divorce. A split in the leadership or management team. Obviously this will have some negative effect on the family unit and the individuals that make it up. Divorce is not desirable. However it can and should settle down and a divorce has got to be better than living in a unhappy household which at worse becomes dysfunctional. Both parents still love their children and want the best for them and it is possible for the children to eventually get the best of both world's and be the better for it. Hopefully the parents can be mature enough to keep a similar ethos but it is also true that children can be confronted by one set of boundaries in one home and a different set of rules in the other. A problem - but children are resilient. More significant problems can relate to the introduction of new partners and possibly their offspring. This can be extremely difficult for all concerned. No one loves the children like their own parents and no one has the same insight or forgiveness. We see on Jeremy Kyle type programmes that kids can feel or be marginalised. This is a horrible thought and not good.

Anyway these are some of my thoughts. There will no doubt be many more - but that is enough for now. Happy parenting - the easiest and the hardest job of all. The most gut wrenching and rewarding too!