'Parentelligence' posts

As parents, we want to do everything we can to help our children be happy, healthy, smart, and successful to give them the best chance at being happy, healthy, smart, successful adults. Especially with a first baby, we tend to listen to all sorts of sources, family, friends, and even marketing to find out what we should do and buy.

Retail stores will try to sell you tons of stuff and we often times will buy it because we don’t want to look like we don’t know what we’re doing. So, we buy the toys that have flashing lights with buttons that play Mozart, and the ones that teach infants higher math because we think we should. After you spend all the money and get the present back home, all your child wants to do is play with the box. How frustrating is that? The parents end up spending more time with the toy trying to entice the child to come play. Why do babies love playing in boxes?

This is what I call Baby Physics. They’re ‘real world’ items. They can crawl in and out. Toys can disappear only to reappear again. The sides and corners are planes and angles. Just like playing with ...

Our children face all sorts of challenges. Challenges at school, at home, with friends and with siblings. Challenges that are self-imposed (questions about worth, and self-doubt) and challenges of just sorting out this big world.

As parents, we’re there when they take their first breath. We help them thrive and exist as an individual being. We help them take their first steps. We cheer when they are happy and we experience physical pain when they are hurt, sad or heartbroken.

We know our child’s personality better than anyone else in the world. We know what scares them and what makes them happy. We know their likes and dislikes. We can see when they’re getting tired or hungry. We know them better than we know ourselves.

If a child then develops a problem ...

What does it mean when you say, “You’re so smart!”? Are you telling someone they’re intelligent, clever, cunning, observant, ‘book’ smart, ‘street’ smart, adept, sharply painful?

What does your child hear if you say it to them? “Mom loves me be because I’m smart.”

How about if you tell your child, “You’re so cute!” or “You’re funny!”?

When we offer praise to a child we’re putting emphasis on a trait that we appreciate. Of course, we think our children are smart, cute, and funny, but what we really need to say are things like, “Wow! I really like how you worked on that puzzle to figure it out.” Being specific teaches them about what it is that we like and value.

Do we really want our child to grow up thinking that we value them for being ‘cute’?

We moms have all sorts of things we feel guilty about but shouldn’t.

We feel guilty because...

• We go to work (we feel like we should be home)
• We stay home (we feel like we should go to work)
• We play with our kids (we should get the chores done)
• We work on the chores (we should be playing with the kids)
• We want some ‘me’ time (we should be spending time with our partner)
• We want to work out and get back in shape (we should be working, playing with the kids, getting the chores done, and spending time with our partners)

That’s it! We work at work and work at home (and only write our blog at 11pm the night before it’s due after partner and the kids have all gone to bed.)

Mom guilt is a real problem. If you search “Mom Guilt” in Google, you’ll get 12,700,000 results in .2 seconds. This topic is well versed, but they all say the same things:

What if I were to tell you that a new study was out about something that could make your child smarter, happier and healthier. There are no negative side effects. It’s painless. It’s not injected, ingested, or inhaled.
The benefits:

• Problem-solving skills are honed
• Cognitive ability is increased
• Physical health is improved
• Social skills are developed
• If you participate, bonding is improved

This new wonder drug is not a drug at all. It’s something that humans and non-humans have been doing since forever...

It’s no secret that we’re all just a little stressed these days. Between the economy and information overload on the internet, we have all sorts of things to worry about nowadays. Stress and anxiety can cause physical pain, emotional strain, and strain in your relationships. When you’re stressed, your body is secreting hormones that put you into that ‘fight or flight’ state. Long term, this state will wear on your body.

Our children pick up on our heightened state and become stressed and anxious, too.This is not a good state for children to thrive in. We learn best when we’re comfortable and relaxed, not if we’re nervous and anxious.

Parents need to learn how to regulate their own stress so that we may help our children learn the same coping techniques.

Tips to regulate stress in the immediate moment:

 The 10th Anniversary of 9/11 happens on Sunday. There will be much coverage in the news and online. As parents, we need to be prepared for questions and we might need to censor how much exposure our children receive about the events on 9/11/01.