PARENTING : CHILD'S BEHAVIOR SIGNALS SOMETHING'S AMISS IN FAMILY.

Byline: Greg Steckler and Gerald Deskin 

A child refuses to do what the parent asks. There are fights and/or a rebellion. A child gets sick or hurt. The child just gives up or becomes depressed. Is there something wrong with the child? Usually the answer is yes. However, sometimes the child is reacting to too much activity and not enough connection. He just can't keep up. In this way, the child is saying, ``Let's slow down and smell the flowers.''

Children live in the present. Parents, on the other hand, are constantly trying to meet deadlines, accomplish tasks and take care of things. Their mind, body or emotions are rarely in the moment, as they rush from appointment to appointment or from chore to chore. Parents lose their awareness of the relationship with their child. Sometimes, the child will have a problem when he or she unconsciously wants to stop the train, have some fun and reconnect with the parent.

This is especially true for younger children because they more frequently live in the moment and are so intimately in touch with their feelings. They sense and respond to everything in their environment, judging it as pleasurable or not pleasurable. Older children and teen-agers learn to separate their needs from what needs to be done, but even they will force a timeout when they are overloaded and undersupported. Teen-agers will create an argument out of thin air, get sick or get themselves into trouble, in part for the attention, but also, to bring the family back together. It is important that parents keep this in mind when addressing what appears to be ``the child's problem.''

Children will also have a problem as a way to rescue or call attention to another family member who may be in trouble. In one such dramatic situation, a 9-year-old boy started an argument with his father every time the father started to drink. In counseling, it was revealed that he had once witnessed his father hitting his mother after he had several drinks. The boy himself wasn't even conscious of what he was doing. In another example, a child kept his overworked and stressed mother from sinking into a depression, by starting an argument. He would rather have her anger than lose her altogether. Interestingly enough, it is quite usual for a strong child to become the ``identified patient,'' in the family, as a way to protect weaker siblings or as a way to hold the family together.

If a child is having a problem, the first thing parents need to do is to stop. They then need to think, to feel, to ask questions and to listen. All of this takes time. It interrupts schedules and it slows everything down. It forces you to reconnect with the child. But maybe this is the point of a child's problem. In any event, you have brought more of who you are to solving the problem, which gives everyone a better chance to not repeat the problem. When the problem is only half-fixed, it will likely be seen again.

Recommendations: 1. When a child has a problem, consider the possibility that the problem is bigger than you think. 2. Allow the problem to interrupt your schedule and take some real time to solve it. 3. Allow the problem to reconnect you to the child.