What Kids Need Most
“Selective ignorance [is] a cornerstone of child rearing.
You don’t put kids under surveillance: it might frighten you.
Parents should sit tall in the saddle and look upon their
troops with a noble and benevolent and extremely nearsighted gaze.”
-Garrison Keillor
In a couple of weeks I’m participating in a panel discussion at a local high school. There, in front of a very large crowd, I will join four other experts discussing the dangers, the patterns (and the strategies to combat) teenage drug use. The panel discussion is titled “Drug Awareness and Prevention Seminar,” and the PTA is marketing it through a number of channels. Hundreds of anxious parents can be expected.
I’m excited about this opportunity for a number of reasons. Obviously, drugs are a serious concern in every community. And I love working with PTA groups, parents who are connected to and involved in positively shaping the school environment. I’m most excited, though, because here’s a chance to address an audience that isn’t there just to see me. Most of them won’t have even heard of me or the ScreamFree way.
And many of them won’t like what I have to say.
This is because after hearing from the other experts about the very real dangers and danger signs and consequences of drug use, this crowd will have plenty to be anxious about. And if they let that anxiety get the best of them, then they are likely to run home and start to drug-proof their kids. You know—rummage through their rooms, scour through their book bags, and even start the interrogation process.
So I applaud the Brookwood High School PTSA (Lawrenceville, Georgia) and the drug-prevention organization, ParentCorps, for specifically bringing ScreamFree in to offer a calm (and calming) alternative. I plan to have one single, and simple, message. Now that these eager and well-intentioned parents have plenty to be anxious about, here’s what I believe they need to hear:
What kids need most are parents who do not need them.
What kids need most, particularly today in this incredibly dangerous and anxious world, are parents who do not need them for anything. Parents who do not need them to get good grades. Parents who do not need them to be respectful. Parents who do not need them to be appreciative. Parents who do not need them stay away from drugs and alcohol.
Now, I can imagine the confused face you may have after reading those words, because I see that face every time I speak about it in public.
Whenever we as parents need our kids to behave, whether it’s their behavior toward others or toward us, then we issue them an anxiety-crafted invitation. An invitation to do exactly the opposite of what we need them to do.
You are already aware of this at some level. You can remember your children as two-year-olds doing exactly what you told them not to do, while devilishly looking at you the whole time, wondering about your response. Or you can remember the countless battles over the messy room, wondering aloud if they’re withstanding the smell just to spite you.
You know this dynamic is true whenever it seems that your child pushes the exact button you need them to avoid.
They are not pushing that button because deep down they’re burgeoning Dr. Evils. They are not pushing that button because they absolutely do not care about you, or do not care about the damage they are doing to your relationship, or even themselves. They are pushing that button, that exact button you hate and cannot handle, for one reason only: because you need them not to.
Needing our kids to behave, or needing our kids not to misbehave, sends out three unmistakable messages: 1) I cannot emotionally handle it when you act as a free individual; 2) I am not in control of my own reactions, you are; and 3) In this scary world, you cannot trust me for leadership. The person you need most is not available because that person actually needs you.
And what happens when we send out these messages? Our kids usually find ways to do exactly what we need them to avoid, even as it makes life worse for them. Self-destructive behavior, especially from children, is never intended that way. Self-destructive behavior (like drugs, bad grades, breaking the rules of the house) is always intended to send a counter message to the messages above—“I’m the one that needs you, Mom/Dad, not the other way around.” Kids are asserting their individuality. When we don’t give them the space to do this (because of our anxiety), then they choose destructive behavior in order to get that independence they so strongly desire. Of course, this only heightens our anxiety, our need, and the cycle worsens.
So how do our kids know that we need them? How do we communicate this damaging message? Sometimes, we say it very explicitly, very early in the process. “Honey, Daddy really needs you to get dressed so we won’t be late this morning.” But it continues in more subtle ways. Like caring more about their homework than they do. Or telling them what to do over and over again, even after we promised ourselves we wouldn’t. Or silently resenting them when they don’t seem to appreciate all the sacrifices we’re making on their behalf.
Or lecturing them again and again on the dangers of drugs. And then violating their privacy again and again by rifling through their things at the slightest sign of change in their behavior.
Teenagers do drugs. Teenagers abuse alcohol. And it is usually a horrible experience for the whole family. And it can ruin so many chances at having a successful launching experience into adulthood. All of that is absolutely true and worthy of our attention, awareness, and response. That’s why I’m glad the PTSA is putting on this seminar, and ParentCorps is working so hard all across the country.
But we as parents have to absolutely commit to a principle more powerful than drugs. First, Do No Harm. Emotional reactivity has the amazing ability of creating the very outcomes we were hoping to avoid in the first place. Whenever we give in to our anxiety we begin to violate our own principles. Like respecting our children as individuals with a mind (and life) of their own. Like invading their privacy because we cannot handle the anxiety of not knowing what they may be involved in. And then we pore through their things, start to interrogate, and it motivates them to work even harder to hide from us. I’ve seen it happen over and over again in my practice, and I hear about it time and again at my conferences.
We, however, are not responsible for our kids and their choices—they are. We can do everything “right” as parents, and do it all very calmly, and they can still choose to wreck their life. That is their birthright as individuals. As ScreamFree as I’m trying to be, my kids can still choose their own self-destructive path.
That does not give me an excuse for retreating to some laid-back, aloof position, hoping that everything turns out alright. What it does is help me to be responsive, not reactive. What it helps me realize is that if I need them to behave a certain way in order to validate me as a parent, then I’m actually inviting them to do just the opposite. They need me to validate them as individuals with a certain freedom, and responsibility, in my home. I cannot do that as long as I need them to validate me.
And neither can you.
(3 votes, average: 3.67 out of 5)
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September 11th, 2007 at 11:05 am
Wow - what a bunch of liberal psycho-babble! Yea - I believe in “reverse phychology” and giving kids a “choice” but to an extent. Texas law is your child is your financial responsibility until he/she is age 18. Until they are 18 - if they break a law you as the parent have to pay for the damages. I am not going to give my kid the free rein to choose his own destruction. It’s just that simple! He or she will do as I ask of them and show me the respect I deserve as their parent. That is what I am teaching my children. No, they don’t always like it but they know if they want ANYTHING from me they will do as I ask of them or tell them to do. I don’t mean this is my right to abuse my “right” to be their parent - but I certainly won’t allow them to do as they wish. I’m not going to let them ruin their futures as becoming productive adults because they want to dabble at drugs and alcohol. They have to work for their freedom with me!
October 10th, 2007 at 7:09 am
Hal,
That was wonderful and I want to add something to your message that you may not have pointed out directly. Let’s consider the revelance of dependence in parent/child or any relationships. I agree that a dependence exists. Obviously it exists from the moment we’re born (actually before that) and is maintained in varying degrees until the natural need for autonomy and good, loving parenting skills (whether birth parents, foster parents, or what have you) diminish the need for it. Let me clarify here by saying that I realize that in certain ways we human beings do continue to need each other in many wasy throughout our entire lives. Okay, so on the question of dependence my perspective is that while it may be nearly impossible to prevent my children from trying drugs, and I do consider alcohol a drug, it is entirely possible that through my own experience, strength, and hope that can be conveyed to them, they will know down deep who to turn to and trust when/if the day comes that they encounter their first, second, and maybe last problem(s) that is caused by use and abuse. Of course that comment does not take into consideration the fact that for some the irony of drug abuse is that a diseased and/or addictive state can exist and in such cases the very nature of the disease is such that it’s makes the sufferer actually believe that drinking and using are the answer to problems not the cause. In those instances the truly best thing to do is take care of yourself and turn your loved one(s) over to the care of others. And I think most parents know others that can and will help in thoughtful, knowledgeable, and skillful ways. The question is can they ask for and accept help and step out of the way to give life a chance.
I’m just fortunate to be able to relate to my children any so many of the difficulties they face because of the difficulties I have faced and worked through. The terms from the seventies were “rap” for rapport and “tight” as in are you tight with. And for me today those terms still signify in my mind the condition of my my childrens relationships with their friends (peers) as well as their relationship with me. Anyone might say it’s absurd to tell them that they can’t do what I have done, but I live a do as I do not as I say life today. I can tell them, in a calm and understanding way what it was like for me, what happened to me when I did what they are contemplating or doing, and how much better off I am today for stopping. The rest is up to them. This in only my opinion though it works for me. Thank you.
November 7th, 2007 at 8:49 am
Is this article written for promotional shock-value or to give parenting advice? I’ve been counseling parents and teaching child development for over 30 years. The primary problems I see in adults (”grown children”) are related to lack of boundaries from their parents. If you follow the above “wisdom” you are creating for serious problems for your kids when they grow up.
February 1st, 2008 at 12:49 am
Just a few comments from my own experience, maybe to open the other eye. The war on teenagers and drugs in schools, God forbid the possibility it might be your teen, a parents worst fear. As much as we try to stop it in schools, I don’t think it will ever happen for it is too powerful of an industry.
Education, awareness, tax dollars, trained drug dogs even coming into the schools are wonderful in my book. However, no matter how hard we try there will never be an end. You can try to empower and pump up every parent in a room and try to change them and you will empower half, anger the controlling parent and not even move the parent who is not willing to step up to the plate for they might not be all that worried because at that very moment they might be half baked.
In my brief synopse, it all went down fast. My daughter in 7th grade started cutting, then the drugs at school and found out later, she drank her dad’s alcohol. I did not accept this behavior at all, but did not punish her I helped her. I checked her into a local short term treatment (less than 72 hours), and stood beside her with love, support and I mainly listened. In that short time, I discovered that since the age of 5, she was being abused by her father. He was booted immediately, for my other 2 children came out in months to follow. Surgeon, high profile, not even a slap on the hand.
I became pro-active for a bit to help the schools against drugs. My daughter would not narc for she was afraid for her sister. This school even got an award for a drug- free environment. I don’t mean to sound disrespectful, but what a joke. I would pull up in my car to pick up my kid, (jr. high) and I would see a group of boys form a circle and deliver a deal. I even witnessed one boy stick a Coke packet in his cheek. Trust me, when you are M.A.D.D. you do research on drugs.
The funny thing was, I would talk to kids and they would tell me that while the officers would perform their locker searches with the trained dogs, for drugs; these kids would be in the classrooms with the drugs on them. They also hid the drugs across the street in clever places like, uh, a flower pot. If those homeowners only knew how much money they had hidden on their property.
My daughter cleaned up after a school dance and found a Visine shaped bottle minus the label. There were some drops left. She knew what it was. So we marched back inside and gave it to one of the five police officers at the dance. He said that he would have it investigated. Nothing.
I sort of gave up after my daughter was threatened by a girl from a drug related gang for I finally became worried for her safety. A few years later, it was interesting to talk to some of these teens who were safely away from the school. The art teacher would dissappear in a back room only to find a pro-active student who tried to bust her for smoking pot. The vice principal that I would touch base with, that I actually wondered about, would never bust the pot-heads for that is where he got his supply. Off the subject, but the counselor who never reported my daughters suicidal ideations, not only creeped my daughter out but promoted 73 jr. high girls to sign a petition/complaint about him looking down their shirts and weird behaviors. Nothing gets done. My favorite counselor ended up quitting years later for what goes on behind closed doors.
Twisted people in every profession, I was married to one. I ended up telling my daughter who had attempted suicide and survived 2 treatment centers, that if my dad did all of that to me I may have done exactly what she had chosen. For feeling like the bad girl all of those years, she then felt ok. She so far is doing well, and is loving college. She takes one day at a time. My other two are doing great. Drug free.
I just feel that their is no sure fire answer here. I just listen to these kids, give them the facts, and all I have learned to rely on is my personal preference; my silent prayers. Good Luck!