The old ditty “sticks and stones can break my bones, but names will never hurt me” was actually quite inaccurate — name-calling can run very deep and leave lifelong scars.  But when that name-calling and labeling comes at the hands of parents, even caring parents, the psychological damage can be crippling.

“You did WHAT?  How could you be so stupid?”

               “Liar, you never tell the truth.”

Some labels are given fondly, even when they shouldn’t be.  My father-in-law loved his first granddaughter (my niece) dearly.  His affectionate name for her was “pest”.  He bestowed this on her when she was very young and addressed her by this label, instead of her name, throughout her early childhood.  While it was said in a playful manner, like a bad joke, still the subconscious repercussions of being considered a pest by your beloved grandfather has no positive attributes.  What child wants to be thought of as a pest, especially when they are too young to recognize that it was meant as an ‘endearment’?  Even an adult would have a hard time recognizing the affection in that nickname.

A label with a stigma attached – “dope,” “stupid,” “brat,” – can become a self-fulfilling prophecy to a young child who has heard it all his life.  I once worked with an associate who went by “Chub”.  Yes, he was a large man, but I’m guessing he had that nickname from childhood and it stuck.  While he stated being OK with it (in his 50s), it felt like an accommodation, an acceptance of just the way things were.

Even positive labels – “bright,” “good,” “talented,” “just like his dad” – while a point of pride, can add pressure to young child to live up to when used excessively.  My sister was always labeled “a good eater” by my mother, pretty much the only positive thing she ever heard growing up.  Guess who ended up with the weight problem throughout her high school years?

Labels prevent children from getting to know themselves for who they truly are and prevent parents from recognizing the child outside of the label they have assigned, the role for the child to play.

“Be a good girl for mommy while I’m away.” 

                                               “You’re such a smart little boy.”

Avoid labeling children; label the behavior instead of the person.  And the more descriptive and specific the comment is, the better for the child’s development.  By doing so the child knows specifically what action resulted in the label of ‘smart’.  It’s hard to continue to live up to parents expectations when you don’t really know what you did to earn the praise.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:  We think we know someone well, and so we give them a label, and in so doing we stereotype them behind a façade, without getting to the real person underneath the label, with their unique feelings and growing changing personalities. 

“Don’t even think about chaperoning the middle school dance!”

“Please, DON’T volunteer for the field trip.  I won’t go if you do.”

“You will embarrass me if you say anything to my teacher.”

What’s a parent to do?  You can’t just walk away and let the child raise himself, yet your caring support is met with a mandate to back off.   And even if the request is genuinely felt, is it really the best course to take?  Won’t your well-intentioned involvement actually be appreciated deep down, or at least later (even if it takes many years to happen)?

So what’s going on here?  It’s a young person’s job to establish their independence.  It’s a parent’s job to stay involved.  These two opposing goals often clash, especially during the middle and high school years, even though each wants what’s best, from their differing points of view, for the child.  This is especially true when both sides are strong personalities and each are determined to ‘win’.

The kind and amount of parental involvement that is best differs for each child.  Main considerations to determine whether parents should get involved or should back down include: the age of the child, the scope (qualitative and quantitative) of the parental activities, and importantly the child’s view of what’s acceptable.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution on the amount or kind of parental involvement for all families.  Much depends on the child’s specific developmental needs at the time, without concern for the parent’s needs.  Often the parents have their own agenda for participating – perhaps they want to be seen as a great parent by the other parents (like there is an unwritten contest going on); maybe they missed out with their own parents lack of involvement and are making up for it by going overboard with their own children; sometimes they really enjoy the activity and want to participate for themselves, even if the child would rather they not.   When parents recognize that they may have their own agenda and are able to put it aside to prioritize the child’s needs, conflicts can be averted.

Some ideas of parental involvement areas that absolutely are important to participate in are:

Parent-Teacher school conferences – don’t miss these, as not only are they a chance to see what is being taught but also for the strong message it sends to the child about your view on the value of education

Appropriate homework help – help yes, but appropriately, as the path for the child to achieve intellectual autonomy and to be able to take ownership for their own brilliance in the future

Discussion about school happenings – it’s important to stay informed and in the loop with chats to keep up with what’s going on in their life

Other volunteer opportunities are optional, using the yardstick described above to determine participation.  When in doubt ask – “I’d like to volunteer to help during the OctoberFest outdoor fair – would that be OK with you?”

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:  Research indicates that increased parent involvement is not always beneficial (yes, you can be overly involved to the detriment of your relationship with the child).  What’s important  for parents is to encourage effort over performance, to communicate expectations of high standards, and to maintain and to express an unflagging belief in the child potential.  This last should be absolutely genuine.

Parents play a very special role in not only teaching good, effective, and ultimately successful communication skills, but they also must model the same for the lessons to become internalized.  We think of communication, which we know is not formally taught, as somehow gained through osmosis.  There are no school lessons in how to communicate, other than basic instruction on the technical processes of reading and writing.  But the skill of turning words and sounds into influential interactions with other human beings can be taught, with the right teachers.

The problem most parents face is that they have never been formally taught themselves and quickly find themselves reverting to simply what they know.

“I sound just like my mother, and I never wanted to be that way.” 

“I hear my father’s words coming out of my mouth; somehow I turned into him.”

Not many people have had models of effective communication in their home environments.  Most lack the good fortune of having learned to communicate well from early childhood.  Well-intentioned parents learned inadequate ways of relating from their own parents, so we are all largely victims of victims.

Parents who want their children to have a different experience than they had with their parents need to acquire communication skills, which they can then pass on to their own children.  This is easier said than done since adult habits are deeply ingrained and hard to change.  Adult patterns of communication were created during the young impressionable years and carried forth as part of personality.  The old tapes that run through our heads become internalized as a little voice that never stops talking.  Many people mistakenly believe that, like the color of their eyes, their communicating style is a ‘given’ in their life; there’s nothing they can do about it.

Patterns that were acquired in childhood can be replaced by more effective responses.  It’s not easy to change years of habit and the new ways of doing things often feels unnatural and awkward; the temptation becomes to quickly abandon the effort as too hard to change.  But when an awareness of how dysfunctional some typical responses can be, there is good motivation to change and learn better ways to communicate effectively without damage.

The next generation of good communicators depends on their parents trying to learn these valuable skills.

COMMUNICATION TAKE AWAY:   Change is inevitable.  We change, the people we know change, the world changes around us.  Even when we think we aren’t changing and cling to the old ways, things are different because in the time since yesterday and today both we and the environment have changed.  So since you inevitably will be changing the way you relate, isn’t it better to manage the change with skills than to just let inevitable life changes happen by default?  By choosing to learn new skills to implement inevitable change you can guide the change towards desired positive results.

A mother proclaims to her child “I am so very proud of you!”  The father gushes to his child “You should be so very proud of yourself!” – Which one is better?

Which one do YOU prefer?  That depends on whether your source of authority is primarily internal or external.  (Note: this is not a discussion on introversion and extroversion, but rather of where a person looks to determine beliefs, thinking patterns and actionable behavior.)

As an adult with an external authority orientation, we look outside of ourselves for proof and validation:

“Does this look good on me?” (Others’ opinions are important to forming own judgments)

“It’s right here on the Internet, which proves my point” (written material serves as authoritative)

“What will the neighbors think?” (public reputations matter)

As an adult with an internal authority orientation, we look inside to our own standards as all the proof we need:

“I love it!  I’ll buy it.”

“How do that I know I’m right?  I just know, that’s how.”

“Who cares what the neighbors think?”

So which is better – internal or external?  Neither is better, as both have their benefits and their detractions.  The child that is raised with an internal authority source (“you should be so very proud of yourself”) may, on the extreme ends of the spectrum, turn into a charismatic leader or a quirky loner.  A child who develops an external authority source (“I am so very proud of you”) can love to please but may also be unduly influenced by peer pressure.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:    As the child, we all start out with an external authority orientation as we know nothing else except for what our parents tell us.  Parents have much power and influence in forming their children’s future character.  In the early years they are primarily responsible for most of the input that their child receives, as the child is trying to make sense of this strange new world outside of the womb, and then later their place in it.

 As a child becomes independent they experience other styles and ways of operating in the world that are different from their parents.  What they will ultimately embrace for their own is a selective matter of experience.  A parent can help to structure that experience in a certain direction with active participation in the process, if they know how.

“Why don’t you tell me about what’s going on?”  “Why? – what are you going to do about it?”

When parents try to take an interest in their kids’ lives, they may be met with resistance, cynicism, or just a general blockade, especially from their teenagers.   What a shame when kids feel that real caring on the part of their parents has an underlying agenda.  They may believe that their parents are just being nosy, trying to butt in where they don’t belong, or that they want to lecture them with something that they don’t want to hear.

The road to independence can be a rocky one, as communication that may have been poor to begin with starts to shut down entirely.   After years of hearing their parents talk about them to other adults (“I can’t believe what Johnny did the other day…”) they become suspicious and can no longer hear when the parent tries to genuinely reach out with caring.

The benefit of providing a listening ear is more for the receiver then the sender.  When the child is able to tell an objective parent about how they are feeling, the correct response is to allow the child to experience the feeling with a simple, “I know how it feels… when I was young I experienced the same thing.”  No trying to fix the problem (“Here’s what you should do…”), no being judgmental (“What were you thinking doing that anyway?”; this leads to a reply/thoughts of:  “What a mistake trying to talk to you about anything…never again”).  Just a simple acknowledgement that the feelings are valid (“You must feel hurt [or angry] [or betrayed] by this situation”) helps the child to work through the feelings without feeling bad about himself.

Children who feel listened to and validated in their feelings can often think up an eventual solution themselves, if there is a problem that needs solving.  “What would you like to do next?”

If there is no problem to solve, then just talking about it can help them work through the feelings.  Perhaps you may even get a “Thanks, I feel better now after talking about.”  And all you did was listen.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:  It’s so comforting to just talk out loud with someone who just listens and doesn’t pass judgment, criticize, or give unsolicited advice.  When parents can do this with their children, they learn one way to sort through complicated feelings that need an outlet. 

I was recently reading an article about ‘office moms’ and a woman was describing how she would take advice from her office mom that she would ever take from her own mother.  Her comment was “You know how it is with your mom: Even if you know she’s right, you just can’t hear it from her.”

While this sentiment rang true – we all know what she’s talking about – no one wants to feel that it applies, or that it will apply in the future, to them.  How do we get our future adult children to not only love us, but also to love our advice, to want to seek it out, to listen to our strong voice of wisdom and experience?

Since our pool of knowledge is infinite to young children this is not a problem when we tell them about the dangers in life, the values that we hold, the proper behavior in social situations.  Their inquisitive minds may drive us crazy asking, “why?”  But when they stop asking, we miss being their authority source.

While we don’t have all the answers, we still like being asked.  It does our ego good to be regarded as smart, even if only by a child.  For them to go elsewhere for advice, especially to just another adult who is not a known expert, feels like a slap in the face.  “Why didn’t you come to me?”  we wonder, silently or aloud.  What did we miss doing or saying that created a lack of connection that caused the child to turn elsewhere with their need?

This question goes back to parenting style when the child was growing up.  The parent that is overly critical, even with the best intentions, breaks down communication, sometimes irreparably.

“You brought this whole mess on yourself”

“You aren’t going out looking like THAT are you?!”

“What makes you think that anyone would want to play with you if you won’t share?”

Some parents feel that they need to be critical or their children will never improve.  How will they ever become hard-working mannerly adults or learn anything?  Their intentions are good but their method shuts down communication.  If all you’ve ever heard from your parent as a child is criticism, you are not apt to go to them for later advice.  You know what the advice will be prefaced with…”you should have known better”, “how could you think such a thing?”, “you have only yourself to blame”, etc.

‘But that’s not me – I’m not overly critical’, you think, ‘plus, there’s a lot of good stuff in there too!’  Yet the criticism may be all the child hears or remembers – it’s louder than the rest and may drown out everything else.  One distinct memory I have of childhood is my mother being critical of my appearance – a large thumb dipped in spit coming at my face when I was little; a comment “is that a zit on your face?” when I was a pre-teen.  Hardly the stuff for future confidences.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:  While there are many barriers to communication, criticism is a biggie.  Even with the best intentions of being helpful, supportive (“let me tell you before someone else does”), and caring (“I only say this because I love you”) the criticism that follows puts up communication walls that may never come down.  There are many better ways to parent and get your message across effectively that doesn’t close communication. 

Since Easter was two days ago, it had me reflecting on when my kids were little and the expectation was that they would dress up and headed off to grandma’s house for church, an egg hunt, and ham dinner.  It felt like a rite of spring every year.  They didn’t question it when they were young – dressing up was looked forward to and fun.  Then when they got older they would ask my permission to not dress up, “Mom, do we have to dress up?”  to which I would reply, “Put on something nice, no jeans.”

So what is holiday dressing up all about anyway?  Why bother?  There are lots of reasons why young children should be encouraged to dress up for special occasions, as deemed special by their parents.  One reason is the expectation of respect that dressing up gives for the company involved (i.e. grandparents, church) and for the holiday itself (i.e. a wedding, Thanksgiving, etc.).  It’s not only about showing respect, but dressing up truly makes the occasion special.

Another reason to dress up is a self-esteem boost that kids get when they are complimented on how nice they look.  We all love compliments, kids too, which helps them feel better about themselves.  When we tell little children that the expectation is that they will dress up, they take pride in their appearance and learn a lesson on how to feel good about themselves and their appearance.  We teach them that appearance is important and how to reap the benefits that society gives to attractiveness (everyone who dresses up is more attractive).

When kids are older and asserting their independence they want to push the boundaries and see if they can get away with making a stand for themselves about their appearance.  Their view of what ‘looks good’ and what their parents think looks good may be poles apart.  But at this point, the lesson has been hopefully learned, so there is no harm in letting them feel their independent on this.  As long as they know that jeans and a t-shirt are too relaxed to show their respect (in my world, but your family may have different standards regarding clean jeans) and they understand why we dress up.  It shouldn’t be a battle of wills, or about winning and losing, or trying to get your way.  This issue is not important enough to take a hard stand on.  No one is getting physically hurt; they are simply growing up and exercising their power of choice.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY: What is important is for children to know that no one can make you feel bad about yourself – only you can do that.   If your older child says that, “no one but dorks dress up the way you want me to” recognize that at this stage peer pressure is very important, and they desperately want to fit in.  It’s hard work to grow up, struggling to establish an identity but also conform to social norms.  So cutting them some slack is greatly (but silently) appreciated.  

We don’t always think about the work involved in developing good relationships, which is even more work when the other person is a child.  Who can even remember back to what it felt like to be 5 years old? … or 8 years old? … how about being a feisty 15-year old?  Parents tend to loop children into broad categories of ‘toddler’, ‘youngster’, ‘middle schooler’, or “teenager’ without really thinking about the thinking ability, communication skills, and mental processes of each year of development.  And each age has specific and definitive differences, also special to each child.  Understanding each age can greatly advance parent-child communication.

Here’s a good exercise to help you get mentally in to each age.  Take some time to sit quietly and reflect back to your own childhood, and recall a defining event of each year.  Think back to kindergarten – what do you recall?  I recall the nuns publically spanking a classmate (yup, over the knee with his pants pulled  down!) and I was scared of that happening to me.  I recall the next day throwing a fit refusing to get on the bus to go to school, and dropped out that day, never to return to kindergarten.  When I need to know how a 5-year old thinks, all I need to do is to go back to that memory and instantly all the thoughts and feelings rush back to me.

How about 1^st grade?  Keep going and lock in a memory from each year of your childhood – proud moments, sad moments, defining moments that sum up the emotions and thinking of the age that was. Once you have this resource available to you – one memory to summarize each year – be sure to pull it out and use it when you need it with your own growing children.

When we are in any relationship, the operating process is:

1)      Determine what the person’s need(s) are

2)      Determine what the person’s want(s) are

3)      Determine what the necessary ‘give(s)’ are

4)      Determine what the necessary ‘take(s)’ are

This is no different for parents, except when determining what the child perceived needs are versus what their stated wants, you must take into account their appropriate age.  And you can’t do that without mentally recalling that age in your head.  What’s logical thinking for an adult (“You don’t really need another pair of jeans; the jeans you have are perfectly fine.”) may not be logical for a 13-year old (“I’m the only loser in 8^th grade wearing last year’s style.”).

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY: Once you determine how to behave in any relationship (with love, respect, and trust), have you communicated it to the person?  Does your child know that you love, respect, and trust them?  If you don’t know – ask them!  If you do know, how do you know?  And if you do know, it still doesn’t ever hurt to tell them so, repeatedly – why wouldn’t you?  Love, respect and trust in adults are earned; in your children they should be automatic.   Young children do not break trust out of malice; they just think like children, which adults have forgotten about.  Older children may break trust intentionally because they have been taught by adult role models that the behavior is acceptable. 

Everyone likes helping others (a natural ingrained tendency, see blog post The Fight Within – I’m Really Not Selfish, But Sometimes I Am); no one likes being taken for granted.  Yet it happens all the time – people take other people for granted, usually those closest to us are the easiest and most common victims.  This is a common lament of parents with teenagers, “After ALL  I’ve done for him, he treats me like THIS?!  She owes absolutely everything to me, yet she treats me like dirt – the ungrateful little wretch takes me totally for granted!”

So why does this happen?  And how did things get to this state?

The answer to the first question is that we train people on how to treat us (see blog post You Train Me).  And with children, since they are learning from their parents, as their first and most influential role model, this is critically important.  Not only is it that ‘this is how I treat Mom’ but also, ‘this is how mothers are treated in general’, which will greatly affect their own future parenting style (positively or negatively).

The answer to the second question is a quirk in the brain around processing favors over time.  Initially when a favor is done or given to someone, they are extremely grateful, relative to the degree of effort or cost expended in doing the favor.  But as time passes, the gratitude for the favor decreases in degree to the point that, when much time has passed, the roles actually flip, and the grateful person feels that the other person should be grateful to them!

Initially it is, “Thank you SO much – I will never forget what you’ve done for me.  I will be forever in your debt!”  This becomes, “He was happy to do me that favor, in fact he owed me as much.”  We work to rationalize away the debt because we hate to owe anyone anything, especially when we can’t repay.   Without the rationalization, we would be living forever as a ‘weasel’ (one who takes and doesn’t give), a feeling that is intolerable for a lifetime.  So the brain protects our ego with this little self-preservation trick.

With children, who can never pay their parents back for all the years of support, for the very gift of life itself, this rationalization takes the form of a sense of entitlement.  “Because you’re my mother – you HAVE to do this.”; “You owe me a college education.” – “I don’t owe you a thing.”  Sometimes this sense of entitlement takes the form of, “Just take this loan it out of my future inheritance” like an inheritance is their due.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:  All people just want their kind efforts to be appreciated –  a little gratitude goes a long way.  Especially parents with their children, who want their children to succeed and want those children to take their help in achieving success.  They don’t realize that they are setting their children up for a lifetime of debt feelings that they can never repay, and then wonder why their children, who are striving for independence, act so ungrateful.  

My daughter loves her job – it’s just her boss that makes her work life miserable.  She is miserable to the point of frequent tears, lost productivity, and all around general upset.  So what earns a boss/parent/teacher – an authority figure – the dishonorable ‘nasty’ label?

In the case of this boss, it is many things – stealing credit for the work of those she supervises, gossip mongering, holding herself to a different (lower) standard – in other words, she doesn’t have a rule structure for herself, but holds her direct reports responsible to pre-determined set of unwritten rules. [For more on rule structure, see post from 3/25/13.]

When the authority figure doesn’t fight fair, plus is holding all the cards, it’s a tough position for the underling to be in.  The boss holds the trump card of “I’m the boss” – not fair!  And if the employee needs or wants to keep the job in spite of the boss situation, it’s a hard struggle to face every day.  Many reach a mental point of no return and start looking for another job, figuring the boss isn’t going anywhere.  This is unfortunate as a lack of communication doesn’t solve anything, and the situation perpetuates with the next hire, repeating the cycle indefinitely.

A recent survey by Office Team found that nearly half of all employees report having worked for an “unreasonable” boss, and 59% of those boss-unhappy employees stay in the job anyway!  Dislike of the boss is the #1 reason people give for work complaints – higher than low pay concerns.  And when there is no boss’ boss to turn to, or that person is ineffective, the quandary of really being boxed in deepens.

To understand why an authority figure is nasty is to largely understand low self-esteem.  While you may think that the bombastic, pompous, son-of-a-gun has too much ego, in fact often the loud ones deep down are lacking in self-esteem; they are just covering up their feeling of inadequacy with a loud show of arrogance.   They feel really diminished when the bright young upstart comes into their sandbox.  How dare she have talent, youth, and looks to boot – jealousy is a green eyed monster, grrr!

So what are the choices?  If you leave, you lose a job you liked and were good at.  If you stay, you grow to hate the job.  But if you stay and communicate, there is hope of problem solving the situation, especially if you start early enough in the relationship.

Unfortunately what most people do, since most are non-confrontational and lack good communication skills, is to be passive aggressive – play hard ball quietly – with a detailed letter into HR file, all the while smiling and agreeing to anything.  While this approach may be defensively necessary in some cases, ultimately it is unsatisfying to be disingenuous.

COMMUNICATION TAKEAWAY:  Clear communication is hard enough with ‘normal’ people, but it is made even harder dealing with nasty personalities.  While several factors go into creating less than pleasant interactions, the question to consider when dealing with such a person is, “What must be true in the belief system of this person for him to act this way towards me?”   When you know that, you can decide your next behavior move.