5 ways to parent differently than we were raised with Dr. Rahat Sayyad
Today I have a special guest joining us. Dr. Rahat Sayyad. I found her on Instagram and she's from India! She is a physician (Intensivist practicing for 6 years), a mom of two toddlers and she enjoys reading medical journals, listening with podcasts, writing, she can't dance and she hates lizards. I love those fun facts about her.
I was reading through some of her posts and I was really interested with one in particular about how we have to parent differently than the way we were raised and not to say that our parents are wrong, but times have changed and there are so many things we can do better when we know better. So we're going to cover some of those things today.
I get comments all the time from my mom, her friends, my aunts and they always say I wish I would have known this when I was raising kids. I think that's something just like with kids when they know better, they can do better and when WE know better WE can do better.
Let's talk about how we can raise emotionally stable well-adjusted humans by parenting differently than we were parented and I've selected just a few of her eight points that she made in her post to expand on with me. (The rest of this blog is information from Dr. Rahat Sayyad that was spoken on my podcast).
1. Give Them Space
Why is this important? And how do we do it?
"Giving space" - you must have heard of this concept in a relationship, but it's not very common in parenting (unless you have a teenager). Of course, they always keep on shouting "give me some space," but it's important to start giving them space from a young age.
Let me explain this with an example. Now, there's an adult who whenever he gets angry goes for a run or when he's upset, he might go for a hot bath. Now this person is someone who's been raised by parents who taught him how to deal with negative emotions in a positive, appropriate way. We need to pass the skill on our child and show him how to remain calm in stressful situations. This is a better coping mechanism.
Whenever I see my child is frustrated or he stressed I make sure he does one of these few things.
First, we practice taking deep breaths with him whenever he's angry.
Second, we sit down the child and count one to ten. It is really helpful to calm them down and get totally distracted from what they were thinking.
Another well-research method is to come up with a poem about your life. It might sound very funny. Whenever your child is having a meltdown or a burnout you can use this poem. Come up with two or three sentences with your child when he's in a normal state of mind (green arrow moments). And then bring up that poem with him whenever he's angry. This method is practiced by autistic children- they are prone to having meltdowns with sudden changes in their behaviors or their routines. So, this is another way to provide space for your child to develop a decision-making ability.
You can let your child know that you respect his choices, giving him the autonomy of making small inconsequence decisions. For example, you can allow your toddler to choose his own outfit for the day without intervening. Or, you can give him a choice between two things for breakfast, or let him choose which story he wants to listen to during bedtime. These little habits were going to be really helpful in the long run to raise well-adjusted humans and eventually it becomes second nature to them.
2. Success is NOT measured by academics.
How do we parent in a way that emphasizes this?
Different people have different definitions of success. But according to me, success is a multi-dimensional entity. A person can be successful professionally, but he might not be doing so well personally. Having said that it's also not possible to be successful in all aspects of life. We can always prioritize, right?
In parenting, being successful in academics does not mean one is successful in life. Certain subtle changes in our ways of parenting can help us ingrain this thought process in the minds of our young ones. It's imperative that you appreciate your child not only in their moments of achievements or academic excellence but also in there every good behavior. For example, you can shower them with love for an act of kindness, or for helping a friend, for being creative or for exhibiting good manners.
One of the biggest mistakes in parenting is keeping unrealistic expectations from our kids. For example, we expect our kids to do great at sports and academics, to be good at music and dance, and socialize as well. This teaches them that they need to be constantly proving themselves to you in order to receive that love and affection. It also creates pressure to perform and to make our parents happy to gain that appreciation again. The thing is their little minds aren't built to handle such pressures, so you have to be very cautious with your idea of success and how you wish to impart it in your child.
What is success to you?
How do you emphasize that in your home?
3. Raise children who are not “entitled“
How do we help our kids learn that nobody owes them anything and they just need to work hard for the big or the small?
I feel that the media and society encourage entitlement in our kids. One of the most prevalent schools of thought in parenting is the more you give your child, the better parent you are. Children are also led to believe that they're entitled to receive. One principle that can be followed to teach kids that they aren't entitled to get anything from us is giving them age-appropriate chores. This simple task helps kids understand the concept of how hard work pays off. Now the problem comes when a child is exposed to commercials, TV, movies. and friends at school. They all tell them that this is the newest latest toy or this is the latest thing - everybody's getting it and I don't have a key won't be cool. This puts undue pressure on the parents to provide. Most of the parents provide even when it's difficult for them to afford only to keep their child happy.
My way around this is being minimalistic towards parenting now. Studies have shown that kids who have fewer toys play with them better and staying engaged for a longer period of time compared to those kids who had a lot of toys.
This is why toys rotation from a young age is a good way to practice minimalism in parenting.
Our kids need to have the concept that less is more, and they can learn this only when they see us practice it in person.
4. Gauge how much a child grows into his passion
Can you explain this one and what that would look like for your child?
So first we need to decipher what our child is passionate about. A common parenting mistake many of us make is seeing when a child is good at something they provide more exposure to that thing and consequently neglect other forms. A child might be good at something but might not like it. Then might not be passionate about it.
To help our child grown into their passion. We need to first expose them to a lot of things to find out what the child likes, including, sports, arts, dance, pottery, nature exploration, coding... There are tons of things a child can like. Then depending upon his liking you can help him develop that skill set by joining summer camps or classes. We can make sure that the child pursues what he likes.
5. Let go of comparison
The very last question is being flexible and willing to adjust your parenting style if it's not working. We have to let go of the "shoulds."
How is holding onto the comparison between children or other families harmful?
This is a very calm and practice. People compare their children to their own older siblings or to their friends' kids. It's very common. What we're doing wrong here is by comparing our child to his sibling's other children we run the risk of losing sight of what makes our child special and unique. By constantly comparing our child to other children, we increase the anxiety and stress levels. Often times, children want to please their parents and not being able to do so makes them anxious. In the long run, if this is practice for an on-going period of time it will lower their self-esteem and they might even start to believe that everybody's better than them. They might even feel incapable of being good at anything.
Some ways to tell if your child is having low self-esteem.
You will notice that they start to shy away from social situations, and they get hesitant to participate in groups. They may even feel that nothing they do is good for the parent now, that's when the parents noticed a sharp fall in the child academics or otherwise. It may foster resentment towards the parents, siblings,
or the other children that they were being compared to.
What should we do as parents so that this doesn't happen with our kids?
First, we should be conscious of every time we compare our child to another kid. Think about what you're saying. Why are you saying it? What is the habit that you would like to change? Why does your child find it difficult? Does he lack a skill off to perform that particular task? By taking the time to think about it, we remain in the observational zone and we do not move into the judgmental zone because if we start judging our child, we forget the fact that we are there to help our child so that he grows into whatever task he's doing. Use the child's own previous achievements as a benchmark rather than comparing him with another child. For example, you can say that a few months ago you were barely able to read the whole sentence and now you're reading a full paragraph. That's good progress.
So to sum it up. We first need to realize how the comparison between children only hampers growth and progress. Once you've acknowledged this fact then it will be easier to remain conscious of what and how to speak to your child. It will come naturally because all parents only want the best for their children.
Find Dr. Rahat Sayyad
@doctormommyspeaks on instagram