The other day I was observing a conversation between a father and an eight year daughter. The girl got excited to see the rains after a harsh summer and wished to get wet in the rain.

Girl: Papa, I want to get wet in the rain!

Father: No dear. If you get get, you will get cold

Girl: So what? I will drink hot milk once I reach home

Father: You might get cold until then. You will also end up missing school

Girl: Papa, please. Only 5 minutes

Father (a little annoyed now): I already said NO

Girl: My friends are getting wet; their fathers are allowing

Father (shouting): It doesn’t matter what your friends are doing. I already told said – You will not get wet. Else …… you know how angry I will become

The poor girl had no choice, but to dejectedly go with her father without being able to get wet.

This is not just about this father and the girl. It is the case with most parents, irrespective of the age of the child. If the child wants to do something, which the parents don’t approve of, they will immediately say NO to their requests. If the child insists, they will try to explain (depending on how much patience they have). Even after that it doesn’t go as per the parents wish, SHOUTING is the last resort.

The SHOUTING tells the child a few things (said and unsaid) –

• This is it … No further conversations
• Shut up right now
• You have to listen to my decisions
• As a parent, I am more powerful than you are
• I have a right to decide on your behalf because you are not good enough to make decision
• You are not mature enough to decide for yourself
• I don’t care about what you feel, but this is the decision for you
• If anyone raises their voice (even in the outside world), you are supposed to become meek and do as per their wish to not make them more angry

When you shout at your child, for that moment, the child might hold back and stop the conversations. But they are still boiling from within. There are thousand questions at that moment. Depending on the past experiences with you, they will choose a course of action – go into a shell, lose their self-confidence, bang doors, throw things around, cry, shout back, walk-out, call a buddy, create a dent in the relationship with you, and many others.

As a parent, I know none of us enjoy shouting. Given a choice, we will never want to shout. But we end up shouting when we want to control the situation. We also shout for our ego satisfaction. Another lovely reason for shouting is that we have run out of words – we don’t know what more to say.

Shouting should never be a part of your vocabulary as a parent. It only harms the children in various ways and never helps them.

HOW TO HANDLE SHOUTING?

As parents, we need to build on our patience. The new generation are different than what we were as children. They demand answers until they are satisfied. They have their own thinking and trust themselves more than we did. If we have patience to explain and make them understand, we will help them satiate their curiosity and inquisitiveness. There is no doubt that we are thinking for their good. But this set of kids needs to feel that you are thinking for them

As children, we need to understand that our parents are our biggest well-wishers. Yes, their ways might not always appeal to us. They might look too harsh and unreasonable. But their entire life, you have been their world. Everything about them revolved around you. Even something that might cause a little harm to you, they want to secure you. So, don’t take their words, actions or tone verbatim. Just that they are not able to communicate their love to you. But love is to be felt and not communicated!

In today’s world, a co-existence is required between parents and children! Parents need to understand where the children are coming from and the children need to understand where the parents are coming from. When this is understood, the purest relationship on this planet of PARENTS and CHILDREN will bloom!

#shouting #parenting #mistakesinparenting