You are not responsible FOR your children.
Stay with me, here. I know this raises a few eyebrows! All that I’m about to share comes from my growth through reading and presenting what I found to be one of the most positively impactful parenting books I’ve come across– ScreamFree Parenting, by Hal Runkel. 
If you are responsible FOR your children, then you need to start right now in getting them to think, feel, and behave in the ‘right’ ways.
When they make a mistake, struggle, hurt another–if you are responsible FOR them, then you need to somehow fix their mistake, stop their struggle, make them be gentle and kind. All good, important, even necessary things for us to want for our children.
When we are responsible for our kids we are
trying to get them to think, feel, and behave a certain way usually so WE can feel better.
And yes, it may be a benefit to them to think, feel and behave as we’d like–we are the older and wiser person here. And we certainly don’t want our kids to 1) make the same mistakes we did because it really was painful for us, 2) make any mistake that might leave US in an awkward or upsetting position, and 3) do it differently from us because we do know better and are right. Right?
We care deeply for our children. We want the best for them. Hence, this really can be way more about our anxiety. Our attempt to get our child to think, feel, and behave a certain way (our way) often ends up undermining our relationship–never what any of us intend; it often ends up creating a LOUD and button-pushing household (often just what we are trying to avoid!), and certainly doesn’t help grow a child who can be responsible for themselves. Why should they, if we keep taking responsibility for them?!
What does being responsible FOR your child look like? Nagging, yelling, threatening, cajoling, avoiding, bribing…things we all do at times and I know I still catch myself doing (yep, even with adult children…:-)): “If they’d only…then I wouldn’t have to…” “Man! If I can get them to just listen to me then they wouldn’t have to (be hurt, embarrassed, fail…).”
We step into this ‘responsible for’ place because now we can or want to feel like a good parent, less embarrassed, in control, relieved…and NOT taking responsibility for them in the moment often means now dealing with our feeling like a failure, thoroughly embarrassed, totally anxious, even heartbroken. Never a whole lot of fun, and often very difficult–managing our own feelings. Hence our inclination to jump in and take responsibility for them…
It can sound like “Cut it out or I’m going to lose it!” “Ok, ok, you can have another cookie, just stop whining.” “If you’d only listened to me you wouldn’t be having this problem!” “Here, let me do it for you. It’s too hard. I don’t want you to mess up…”
It may be doing whatever it takes so they’ll get straight A’s and we can feel “I’ve done my job well; I have a smart kid; I’m a good parent; they’ll be sure to head to a good college.” Whew. Wouldn’t that make things easier? It may be doing whatever it takes to stop them from throwing a fit so you don’t feel embarrassed and instead feel in control. Ever tried making a tantruming preschooler stop? Exhausting and rarely on OUR preferred timeline :-). Or how about a tantruming teen? They are even tougher to try to make stop…
Here’s the deal.
What our kids’ ‘hear’ when we are busy taking responsibility for them is we do not have confidence in their abilities to learn and manage themselves; we cannot handle how THEY feel or behave.
Talk about rocking their world–to have the most mature person unable to handle the least mature one’s thoughts, feelings, or actions.And this often leaves US reacting in less than wonderful ways. “If they’d only get over it…cut it out…quit feeling so mad…stop all that blubbering!” Or maybe we are doing just the opposite–doing whatever we can to make them feel happy again, or doing whatever we can to make sure they don’t fall down, get hurt, lose…anything so they’ll be okay.
As a result a child may act up and push even harder to have a bit of control over their lives. Or maybe now they really don’t NEED to manage whatever the problem or struggle is, because we are so busy (and probably simultaneously complaining about) doing it for them–compliance can look this way. Or maybe they learn that treats are how to feel happy again…or perhaps never learn how to manage disappointment or an injury because we’ve always been there to rescue them, make it all “okay.”
Or maybe we are so mad because we can’t successfully get them to do what it is we want them to do or how to do it or how to feel about it that our child hides out of fear…or gives in just to (hopefully) get us to quit being so upset. Compliance can look this way, too. Crazy, isn’t it, when you think about this? And part of so many relationship struggles in our lives. Truly relationship depleting and exhausting. We do it as parents, and we do it in our marriages and friendships, too. Yes, I STILL do it, though, thankfully I’ve tipped the balance towards being responsible TO.
However…even as we are not responsible FOR our kids, we DO have tremendous responsibility as parents.
We are responsible TO our children.
We are responsible TO them for how we structure their environment–both physically and emotionally; for how we understand child development, ages and stages, their needs and how we answer those needs; and perhaps most importantly…we are responsible TO them for how WE think, feel, and behave.
When we act responsible TO our children, we are focused first on ourselves (via a PAUSE, quite often!), we are in charge of how WE think, feel, and behave rather than putting all our attention on how our children are doing the same; we take care of our own anxious feelings so those feelings are less likely to ‘lead the way’ in situations–which, with anxious feelings calmed down, leads to way more relationship building interactions. Even when that interaction is a NO.
It leads to truly being intentional with how we
decide to be, to feel, to act.
Now we have an opportunity to be in a position to positively influence our children to learn on their own and to motivate themselves to make healthier choices. To take responsibility for themselves. Key for growing well and into a healthy adulthood.
Now our children ‘hear’ our confidence in them, our respect for how they think and feel…they can now count on us to keep it together no matter what they do. This is where trust is built and respect nurtured…and this is how children can learn through the years to take responsibility for themselves.
You are responsible to your child. To be the adult they need you to be, to understand and trust in who your child is becoming, to give them real opportunity to learn about themselves, what they like and don’t like, what they can and cannot do…to grow optimally.
PAUSE. And step back today and consider first if the way you want to react is based on anxious feelings, on trying to get them to behave the ‘right’ way…or if you can instead calm your own anxiety, appreciate your deep love and concern for them, and then look at the person you are growing and intending to grow, and respond in such a way they can take a little more charge of their own selves and feel capable, respected, trusted.
This parenting deal? It is a huge, difficult, incredibly rewarding growth process for all involved. Keep your attention on what you want the most–self-directed, responsible, awesome future adults and caring relationships based on trust and respect. Easier said than done and it all begins with awareness. You can do it.
Let a PAUSE lead the way.
Alice
Author and Parent Coach
©2018 Alice Hanscam