Strategic Parenting

I am working with a mother and father dealing with an oppositional child. One of the issues the parents are dealing with now is discipline, obviously. Specifically they complain that the 13 yr old does not respect them and blatantly disregards their rules. Yet they also feel somewhat guilty given her abuse history when they try and maintain firm expectations. They are becoming more fatigued and fighting a sense of helplessness.

This situation is not that unusual and not just with adolescents who have gone through the abuse this girl did. Parents in addiction recovery, parents who are dealing with their own mental health issues, or parents of typical teens who are flummoxed by the whole puberty thing frequently have difficulty with a similar pattern of behavior in their children.

One concept that is worth learning is 'Strategic Parenting.' The assumption is that you know your child well and can generally predict that certain behaviors will occur in the future. The Strategic piece is this; Do not engage is wishful thinking such as 'that will never happen again', but instead accept that the troubling behavior will occur again and have a plan for it. Planning for an event in the future is called a Strategy. When your child disregards a particular rule, is disrespectful, or what ever the case may be, have a plan for how you will respond.

Too often we come up with a response in the crisis moment. In crises we tend to make haste decisions, over react and then regret what we did and said. Punishments decided in these moments are often overreaching. Later when we realize this and let our child off the hook we are sending the message that our rules really don't need to be respected and our authority is diminished. And the problem only grows.

Part of Strategic Parenting is the development of Consistency and Constancy. These concepts are important in raising children but are also very useful when trying to be more parentally strategic.

Consistency means that the rules and expectations in the household are generally the same day to day and are equally held by all caregivers (parents, grand parents, foster parents etc) dealing with the children. What is expected on Monday is expected on Tuesday and so forth. It helps to have rules, chores, rewards and consequences written down. The idea is simple but takes energy for parents to truly adhere to. Consistency is well known as an important parenting skill. Less so, is Constancy.

Constancy in the sense that I am using it refers to the mood and affect of the caregivers. In the family mentioned above both parents acknowledged that their moods had become more unstable along with the teenager's. They were mirroring her moods or were responding with their own temper tantrums when she was oppositional or arrogant. This only made the situation worse, led them to feeling more angry and powerless and did nothing to address the situation.
Constancy means that regardless of how disappointed, angry or frustrated they may feel the caregivers are expressing these feelings calmly and appropriately. Constancy is hard to immediately achieve and needs to to be practiced. It is connected to acceptance. As parents it is hard for us to accept that we are not 'in control' of our child's mood and behaviors. Ironically by accepting this and demonstrating more Constancy in parenting we are more likely to see our teenager begin to demonstrate more emotional regulation and respect for us on their own.

Constancy plus Consistency is the key to Strategic Parenting.

No one solution will work all the time with discipline and that is where patience and acceptance comes in. (But that is a posting for another day.)