Appreciations

I have been thinking about the idea of Appreciations as reinforcement for positive things I would like to see more of. I went back through our Family Meeting book and tried to find themes in the Appreciations that Dan and I have been giving to the children. Two big ones were Maturity/Growth (doing new things, handling things better, etc.) and Being Loving (through acts or words). Others were Generosity, Courage, Problem Solving, Fun, and Responsibility. For Toby, two areas I would really like to fertilize are Thoughtfulness and Responsibility. So I can use this perspective to inform which Appreciations I give, and even how to frame them. For instance, this morning Hazel asked Toby if she could hug him goodbye when he left for school. He hugged her back. It would be easy to present it as loving, but I will frame it as consideration for her feelings - to encourage more of that!

Affection between my kids has exploded in the past week. They are each saying "I love you" to the other, hugging a lot, and kissing sometimes. I am just beside myself with joy and keep trying to remember it's probably a phase. Is this a result of so many Appreciations for being loving?

Magic!

Well, I am just blown away. We were visiting grandparents this weekend, and it was Hazel's turn to pick our Family Fun activity for the weekend. We gave her a couple of choices and she chose the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Toby was also excited for that, to see the flowers. But then it began to rain, so we needed to find an indoor idea. There is a tiny marionette theatre on the corner of my mother's block, and Hazel agreed that going to the puppet show could be our activity. Toby asked what he could do instead, and I explained that it was Haz's turn to choose something for us all to do together. He did not like that one bit. He started to cry and said it's not Family Fun if he hates puppet shows. I don't think he's ever seen one - we did try to go to this place with him years ago, and left because he was scared of the dark. I explained the system again, that each person gets a chance to choose, and everyone else has to do it even if they don't want to - in exchange for the same when it's their turn. I reminded him that he had had his turn a couple of weeks ago, and would again in two more weeks. Crying! Screaming! I could feel my mother's eyes burning into the back of me, watching how I handled it. Then he asked what we would do for him if he went to the show. What?? He said, "Either you do something special for me, or we're not going.". Oh, so fresh!! I said no, that was not the case - I managed to remain very calm and resist the urge to say Oh Really, Buster! I invited him to offer Hazel another indoor activity she might agree to instead. More crying and screaming. Then I said that it looked to me like our system of choosing a family activity was not working, did he agree? Yes. This is a problem, yes? Yes. So maybe what should happen is for him to put it on the Problem List when we get home, and at next Family Meeting we'll see if we can come up with a different way to do it. He agreed to that, and got calmer. I just waited to see what would come next. Then he said, "if, when we go out to get dessert, you get something separate for Hazel, then I'll go to the puppet show.". Deal! We shook on it, everyone was fine, they each got their own goddamn tootsie roll, we went to the puppet show and they both loved it. Hot damn. My mom was pretty impressed.

More analysis

This morning when Toby was leaving for school, Hazel said, "I kiss you, Toby? I kiss you?" Awwwwwwwww! He ignored her, but then she blew a few at him before he could escape.

Yesterday I walked in on Toby eating a candy bar in the afternoon, which he clearly knows violates family rules about sweets. We had a brief moment of eye contact, then I turned away and went about my business without comment. After dinner, he rushed to clear his dishes to get ready for dessert. He said something about what he wanted, and I neutrally said, "You had dessert already."
"What?"
"When you ate that chocolate bar this afternoon."
"Oh, yeah."
Now I am thinking about my feelings about sweets as a privilege, agreements, honesty, and trust.

First, sweets: the rules we have about sweets are to limit the amount, I don't really care when they are eaten. Ideally, I want him to be able to make his own decisions about what, how much, and when to eat - but I also want those decisions to reflect our family values about nutrition and healthy living. This is one of the most challenging areas for me in which to let go of control, to risk seeing what happens. What are the worst things that could happen (Belief)? Overweight, chronic illness, painful and expensive dental problems - and oh my - my classism glaring out about po' white trash and their pasty, greasy complexions from a steady intake of soda and junk food. And their correlated life problems. Consequence? Rules and their enforcement which send the message that I don't trust his judgement. Disputation? Both my children like lots of healthy foods, which are readily available in our home. Both are in excellent health. I eat plenty of desserts, and I am still fit and healthy. I have seen both my kids leave some treat unfinished because they felt sated - that's a key one. Encouragement: try giving some more freedom, and watch what happens. Go from there.

Second, agreements, honesty, and trust: I want Toby to feel an obligation to comply with family rules, to honor agreements, whatever they are about. I want members of our family to be able to trust each other, to believe that each will honor our agreements without surveillance. For the default assumption to be that we all have internal motivators towards fulfilling the same values. Hmm, now how is that possible, if we're all different people? I guess the Button here is bigger than just about the sneaking - it is that I feel threatened when faced with the possibility that my kids may not live into my values (healthy living, respecting agreements, honesty, etc). I feel like in order to make sure that they are living our family values, I have to make sure that they are - by monitoring and directing.
Belief: if I don't enforce structure in our lives that ensures our values are part of everyday living, the kids will grow up eating crap, littering, being obnoxious, dropping out of school, and unable to sustain relationships.
Consequence: we shape their lives through our words and actions. I think this is necessary at younger ages, but I guess as they get older it should gradually morph into mostly modelling. The negative consequence is maintaining too much control, for too long. And maybe sending the message that if they end up with values that differ from mine, I don't approve?
Disputation: these are my kids. I do believe in them and that they hold our core values. There are many different ways to be good people and have good lives, so different values doesn't necessarily mean opposite or no values.
Encouragement: RELAX. These kids are awesome, bright, loving, expressive, funny, and Toby already displays his internalization of a lot of what I want. Keep sending messages of love and support. Begin to consider different life outcomes for them, from what I have always imagined or dreamed of, that would also be fine.

Just to clarify, I'm not so crazy that I think all those bad things would happen because the kid snuck a candy bar. It just helped push me along to unravel all the bigger feelings and beliefs about instilling values. It really is so interesting, if I just play out the exercise of ABCDE, it can really uncover stuff I never consciously thought about before.

Respecting autonomy, promoting respect

I saw today another way PonT has altered how I handle situations with my children. Toby decided that he doesn't want to take piano lessons anymore. Previously, I would have felt disappointed and annoyed, and tried to cajole him into continuing to the end of the school year. I might have talked about how much his grandfather wants him to play, so they could enjoy doing it together. It is possible I might have tried to negotiate a deal to bribe him into continuing. I would certainly have told the teacher, apologetically and sheepishly.

But no more! This time around (we did this last year as well) I asked Toby what brought him to his decision. We figured out together that he has followed this pattern before: he gets frustrated when he advances in an activity to the point that it becomes difficult for him, and he opts to stop. I respected his choice and told him we would find out about the withdrawal policy. I asked him if he had thought about how he was going to tell his teacher. Today at the lesson, he told her himself. We gave the required 30-days' notice, and he agreed to continue to attend his lessons until that time is up. Afterwards, I asked about how it felt to talk with the teacher about his decision (a little scared), and I shared a story of a time I felt nervous about telling someone something I thought they might not like. Needless to say, a completely different experience. I am still a little sad, but didn't take it out on him. Now it occurs to me that if he doesn't want to go to the lessons we have to pay for, he can pay us back for them.

Maybe this next topic falls into the Training category - at Parent-Teacher conference yesterday, Toby's teacher expressed some concern that he is critical of other students and insensitive to their feelings about his comments. I initiated some conversation with him about different ways to communicate, and people feeling hurt or embarrassed by criticism. It wasn't clear how much he got what I was talking about. This evening he said something to Hazel like, "You're not doing it right! Do it like this." I said, "Wait! Let's look at that, what you just said." I showed him how he was telling her she was wrong and telling her what to do. I asked him how he could help her or show her, without those components. He tried saying it another way, and I gave him some observations about what he said. Then I offered a couple of ideas about how to communicate how he thought it should be done, with leading questions or sharing his experience - actually, the Art of Encouragement! Chipping away at rudeness, encouraging respect and consideration, trying to provoke thoughtfulness about the topic instead of just telling him what to do or not do. I also recommended extra carefulness when correcting an adult (the teacher was a bit offended that he had corrected her, on occasion!).

Looking at differences

After the show Monday night, I told Dan a couple of concepts that were new to me regarding Contributions. He started looking very concerned, and this led to another conversation about his feeling like this all might be too much for our kids, too much work, too many expectations. These feelings were freshly underscored because Toby left everything to do until late last evening and ended up crying on the floor, tired and frustrated. He had been plugging along, getting things done, until the piece that pushed him over the edge: he had his own clean laundry to put away, but I had already gone to put Hazel to bed in their room, so I didn't want him to turn on the light. Being confronted with either putting his clothes away in the dark, or not getting it done, was just more than he could manage. He cried for a few minutes, put them away in the dark, and came to bed. Done. It seems to me that this is more of an issue for Dan than for Toby. I explained to Dan that this experience set the stage for a conversation about other ways Toby might plan his afternoon and evening to avoid being stuck like that again. I also drew a parallel between the small stakes/supported learning of allowance over the years, and the Contributions/Training process - that they learn about time and energy allocation, and responsibility, when there's nothing major riding on the mistakes they make as they go. As opposed to finding oneself at college with no idea how to do laundry, shop for groceries, cook, or make sure they have time to study for an exam before going to a movie. He seemed to understand but still somewhat suspicious. We need to have clearer discussion about how much household work we each think is reasonable to expect of children at different ages.

A few random updates:

Hazel has been wearing underwear most of the time during the day, and often refusing a pull-up for naps. She has an accident once every two or three days. I have felt confident to take her to her gymnastics class and the grocery store in underwear, offering the bathroom but respecting her choice if she says no. Naps are dry about half the time.

Nighttime sleep is still erratic but so much better. We have had several nights where Hazel slept through to 5 or 6 a.m., and some nights where she woke up but went back to sleep quickly. There are still occasional crying fits but much less reliably. I think the duck lamp made a big difference, but it could be just the phase of the moon.

Bedtime: um, well, uh... we have sort of given up on this for the time being, and one of us stays with her until she is asleep. When we were trying to move her beyond that, there was so much yelling and crying, and it was impacting Toby so much, that everyone was just miserable. For now, for peaceful evenings and energy leftover for other progress, we are sticking with our bedtime status quo.

Your money is where?

Hazel and I had an exchange in a store today that sounded a lot like some scenarios Vicki has played out, but with a little twist. Hazel saw a set of Elmo song books that looked quite appealing to her, and she picked it up and said, "we get this." Right on cue I asked if she had her money. "Yes." Oh, really? I asked her where, and she said it was in her pocket. She was not wearing any clothing with pockets. I asked her to show me, and she searched around on herself for pockets for a minute. Then she said, "I no have pocket." "So then you do not have your money?" "No." I told her that she could not buy the books if she did not have her money to use, and she could try again next time. Then she asked if I had money (ooh, she's quick), and I told her my money was for what I needed to buy, and hers is for what she wants to buy. "That is why we gave you money in Family Meeting." We went back and forth about this for a minute and then I started to walk away. She found another toy she wanted and told me we were going to buy it. I repeated that she would not be able to pay for it since she hadn't brought her money, and kept walking. She carried it with us through the store until she got tired of that and asked me to carry it. I offered to put it up on a shelf for her, which she accepted, and we peacefully left the store. So a bit of debate but no tears or yelling, and Hazel got her first lessons about keeping track of money and remembering to bring it.

On the lying note...

She has also said her bedtime checklist is done when it clearly is not - we have not brushed her teeth yet, and she is not wearing a diaper, but when asked directly she says that yes, both those things are done. My question about Agreements is do we address it with our children when they don't fulfill them, or do we let them live the P without the R, and grow into feeling responsible to it? Of course a two-year-old needs some guidance here, but a six-year-old knows whether he's done his jobs or not. Do I check up on whether the Agreement has been fulfilled, or do I trust them when they say it has? More specifically, do I just make the observation that something hasn't been done yet, or do I actually say, "You can X as soon as Y..." I think the answer is: 1) you trust them when they say they did it, 2) let them do the P as though the R has been met, 3) make the observation that it wasn't, and 4) point out that they now need to earn back the P by fulfilling the R for some number of days, again.

Toby is back to zero for clean clothes. This is turning out to be harder for him than I thought.

Money news

It's been a big money weekend here. First off, Hazel said yesterday, "I want money." Alrighty then, it's been brewing anyway! She said she wanted coins, not bills, so at the end of Family Meeting today she recieved two quarters (since she's two). She was grabbing at the quarters during the meeting and she got to hear that allowance is at the end, she will get her allowance then. Everybody applauded her first time receiving allowance, what a big girl! Afterwards, I asked her where she would like to keep her money, and she said in her hand. Later I found it on the floor, so I put it away to give back to her at next week's meeting. This evening she asked, "where's my money?" I asked her where her money was, and she said she didn't know. A perfect start!

There have been a couple of things recently that Toby said he wanted, and I told him I could take him shopping to buy those things for himself any time. We went this afternoon - he chose Target. He wanted bubble solution and Kids' Crest toothpaste (we have tons of toothpaste in the house so I'm not buying any anytime soon). We walked around the store and I showed him the big signs for each section, and the small signs for each aisle. I asked him what sections he thought those things might be in, and encouraged him to ask a store clerk for help finding them, which he did, reluctantly. When he found the bubbles, there were a lot of choices and different prices. Toby chose what he wanted and sat on the floor, counting out dollar bills into his shopping basket. We talked about tax and how to figure out how much money he would need. Then he got the toothpaste and counted out more money into the basket. Although he was looking at everything, the only other thing he decided to buy was a $1 bag of cotton candy. He picked a checkout lane and handed over his little wad of cash. Then he came home, left his money bag in the car, and spent 45 minutes playing with bubbles. This was a totally successful shopping adventure.

Another note on Family Meeting: Hazel gave separate Appreciations for each person, things we had each actually done with her this week! Toby was all prepared with the Appreciations Board. And Hazel chose three contributions for this week - taking out the compost, vacuuming after meals, and putting away books. No Problems. Quick, sweet, celebratory.

As for Toby's P&R of wearing clean clothes, the second day he wore the same pants (and underwear), so I chose on Wednesday. Thursday and Friday he carefully picked clean clothing, so now he's up to Day 3 out of 5 tomorrow.