"Love and Logic" for Tracy

I told my kids I didn’t want any eating in the living room because I’d just cleaned the room and the carpet. They apparently didn’t understand what I said and commenced to eating potato chips in that very room. What did I do? I very calmly brought the vacuum cleaner into the living room and also very calmly removed the bowls of chips from the children. Then I stated to my children, with genuine empathy, “It’s such a shame that you chose not to eat in the kitchen. Kids who eat in the living room get to clean up the mess.” Then I left the room to three stunned children. As they followed me into the kitchen to find out if I was serious about them cleaning or not, they witnessed me taking the chips bags, wrapping them, and depositing them on top of the highest cabinet in the kitchen. To their questions of, “What are you doing?” I calmly replied, again with genuine empathy, “I really am sorry you chose to eat in the living room but I only give chips to those children who choose to eat in the kitchen.” Then I left the room.

As I passed through the living room, I noticed that the vacuum still hadn’t been touched and the chip crumbs were still on the floors and sofa. I shook my head, turned off the TV and said, “Feel free to watch some TV after the mess has been cleaned up.” I took the remote and left the room to hear three kids all arguing over who would do the actual vacuuming. They really wanted their TV to watch. It took three days of them consistently eating in the kitchen before their chips were returned, too, but it worked. If I catch them walking toward the living room with a snack in hand, I simply say something like, “I would be really sad if my TV got taken away just because I chose to eat in the living room.” That usually causes an about-face in the child who eats in the kitchen before resuming TV viewing. Of course, praise follows. “Thank you so much for following the rules and eating in the kitchen. I’m really proud of you,” or something equal to that.

I try to use “Love and Logic” in my home as much as possible. Granted, I’m not an expert at it and I do slip every now and again. Lately I’ve been slipping more than not but I’m trying to get it back to the way it should be in our home. “Love and Logic” is the basic principle of allowing the children to make their own choices (within reason, of course) so they can learn from the natural consequences now rather than later when the stakes are much higher. For example, we would never allow our children to get into a life-threatening or dangerous situation. We would never tell them, “Go play in the street but when you get hit by a car, don’t blame me.” That is a BIG no-no. However, we can say, “Only children who come home on time are permitted to go out again tomorrow.” That lets the child make the decision about being on time or late, and lets the child know that his actions, not his parents, are the cause of the consequence.

I started learning about “Love and Logic” four years ago, when Dolly was only a month old. That’s when I started attending the PACT group over at CAPA. I needed some guidance since I was raising three children primarily on my own. I had grown up with a mother who was a screamer, and I had been one also, just from the way I was raised and because of the problems between my ex and me. I didn’t want to be that parent any more. I wanted to be a calm, non-yelling, non-spanking parent. That’s what I wanted to learn from this group. The first hour is an educational piece where we might watch a “Love and Logic” video or learn something else like stress management, or something equally effective to help us become better parents. While a lot of the parents there are court-ordered to attend, I’m one of the few who doesn’t have any court issues, I just chose to go, and still do, so I could be the best parent I can possibly be.

Now I know what you’re saying, “You’ve been going there for four years and you still don’t know it front to back?” That would be correct. According to research it takes ten repetitions of hearing/learning something before we actually retain it in its entirety. Since I’ve only taken the entire “Love and Logic” course twice, and have only seen bits and pieces of it during the PACT group, I don’t think I’ve actually reached my tenth time yet. Besides, just because a specific method works today, doesn’t mean it’ll work again three months from now; and just because it doesn’t work today, doesn’t mean it won’t work three months from now. “Love and Logic” is full of many different methods do fit many different scenarios. Get it? As our children grow and change, we have to change discipline methods to find one that works for the time being. Yes I said discipline, not punishment; there is a big difference between the two.

Punishment instills fear in the child and usually doesn’t fit the crime; discipline is done calmly and without the fear factor, and always fits the crime. Our children should not fear us, they should respect us; and that respect should be earned, not demanded. “No,” you say, “my children should automatically respect me because I’m the parent.” Really? So you expect your children to respect you when you don’t respect them? What was that my mother used to say? “Do as I say, not as I do.” Hmph! I don’t think so. Our children read more from what we do than what we say. Did you know that if you start yelling at a child, he or she is more focused on your yelling voice than the words that you’re saying and doesn’t really grasp anything you’ve tried to convey? It’s true. Try it as an experiment. The next time your child is acting out, start yelling, “Why don’t you listen to me? I told you not to…!!” and see what your child does. I’m willing to bet he or she will just stand and stare at you or will have a frightened look and will begin to cry. Then I want you to try whispering to that child – literally. Those same words said in a whisper will garner more attention than the yelling. I’ve done it with my kids. Yelling doesn’t work because they don’t listen to the words, just the noise. When I whisper, they have to get really close to me to listen and I can get through to them better.

Since I can’t possibly cover and entire “Love and Logic” course in one blog, I’ll have to add more another time. For now, though, I will say a few more things beyond my initial example just to get you rolling. If the child has made a bad choice (Children are never bad, they make bad choices. To tell them otherwise will make them think they’re bad people and we don’t want that.), and you don’t know what consequence will fit the crime, delay the consequence. The “Love and Logic” saying is, “If you don’t know what to say, delay the consequence.” It’s okay for you to tell the child, “I’m sorry you chose to {fill in the blank} but I’m going to have to think about the consequence so we’ll just discuss this later.” It’s okay. For very young children (“Love and Logic” can be used on children as young as two years old), though, don’t wait too long since they won’t remember what the bad choice was to begin with; for older children, wait a day or two if need be. That also gives the child time to think about the choice he or she made.

One other, real quick method that should work with just about any bad choice of the child is to let the child know that his or her actions drained your energy. For instance, say your teen-aged son decided to goof off with friends rather than mow the lawn as he was asked; then comes to you later or tomorrow and wants you to take him to the mall to hang with his friends. You can always say, “Gee, it really drains my energy when you don’t mow the lawn like I’ve asked so I’m afraid I just don’t have the energy to take you to the mall. I’m really sorry.” When he begins to argue about it you can simply throw in, with a smile, “I love you too much to argue.” Then stick to your guns. At that point he may run out and mow the lawn in an attempt to get you to take him to the mall. If you think that’s enough, fine; if not, a quick, “Gee, that was really nice of you but I still don’t really have all of my energy back yet. I’m sorry.” The child will usually try doing extra chores and whatnot to make up for the error. This is great but should not be the end of the consequence; parents set the consequence. If the child wants to do extra to help you get your energy back, that’s fine. He’s still got that consequence coming to him, though.

There is also another “Love and Logic” method that will work with neglected chores and such, but I’ll wait until another post to mention that one. If you have any questions, in the meantime, feel free to ask; and you can always check out www.loveandlogic.com for more information.

Until next time…peace to all.