The Unconditional Parent -- is this bollocks or for real?

[oregonianabroad]

I haven't read the whole thing yet, but am torn between thinking it is totally revolutionary, and then the next minute I think the guy is smoking crack and wouldn't last 2 minutes with my ds. (of course, he would have an answer for that, another of the things that turns me off about his argument).

It also seems clear that he evaluated all the books on the market and decided to write one with a radically different approach (a discipline book about how not to use rewards/ time outs??? how novel!).

SInce I bought the book on the basis of a few recommendations here, I am interested to hear what you lot think.

another tactic for the bubble in hair scenario -- try talking to him when it isn't an issue. that seems to have a greater effect with my ds.

ob

hi sorry have not read the whole thread
have asked dd to get me this book for christmas

my ds rebels against any form of reward or punishment
i sent myself for time out

off to read the thread

bye

i have just finished reading this book. it knocked me for six really, reading it was almost like therapy, it helped me work through some long running "issues" (cringe - hate that term) i have with my own upbringing and how it has shaped me.

I highly recommend this book to anybody, not everybody will like it, it does challenge the status quo, but I personally found it very valuable.

xAlice, what a lovely idea to ask your DC to buy you the book.

Oregonian, you're right, it's pointless addressing the issue when they are overexcited. Much better to leave it to a calmer time. But I feel a bit inadequate if I don't do/say something right away when they are being inconsiderate to others.

DS has obviously become a praise junkie. We decorated pictures of Christmas trees with glitter at the weekend and kept asking me 'is it good?' 'is it pretty?'. He was obviously frustrated by my not judging.

Still he's not yet 5 so hopefully I haven't ruined his creativity by past overpraising.

This book sounds like "Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves: Transforming Parent-Child Relationships from Reaction and Struggle to Freedom, Power and Joy" which I thoroughly recommend - it has helped reduce friction between my dd and me and has enriched our relationship.

It is largely based on respecting your child as a human being and not attempting to train them like an obedience dog with reward and punishment.

I think you will really like this book.

Otherside, I didn't mean that you shouldn't address the issue at the time as well (I would), but then try again later, or maybe just before the next bath. Better yet, all three! My ds1 needs lots of repitition in order to learn things, but I have noticed that eventually he does get it and we move on to the next thing! For example, the throwing things 'issue' seems resolved (more or less) now that we have compromised and he can throw the soft toys down the stairs to his heart's content. But we still have to work on him not throwing food ('But it's soft, mom!')

Agree with eeee that the book is like therapy. I keep on mulling over things from my own childhood, especially now that my dad is here!

I'm reading this at the moment and so far I am quite intrigued!

I like his way of thinking, I am finding his explanations for why time out etc doesn't work and the effects it has on our children acceptable but I can't wait to read his alternative approach to discipline.

Oregonian, I didn't express myself very well earlier. I would always say something at the time but when DS is over excited or distracted, I am pretty sure he hasn't heard so it FEELS like I am doing nothing.

But I suppose I just have to learn to accept this rather than rely on strategies that are going to cause more harm than good in the long run.

There is one bit of the book that is highly unrealisable for me. I can't imagine going into DS's school and telling them to rethink their approach! And I know that it is pretty authoritarian in French schools.

Holly-Dreamy -- I don't think he offers any alternatives to discipline, hence why I hate the book...
I too would feel like such a prat trying to instruct a trained teacher how to best manage a gang of 30+ children, all with different backgrounds, attitudes and abilities.

Oh. My. God.

This is probably a whole other thread, but the combo of my dad, my hyper-active ds1, a demanding 9 month old ds2 and all the stress of Christmas (25 people coming round on sat) and I am doing my nut.
Alfie, please come and sort my house out!!!!!

Example of non-UP style parenting no1:

'You're not being a nice boy. I don't want to be around boys like you.' (my dad)

Example 2:

'He's rude. You need to instill some discipline' (my dad again -- perhaps I should mention that he is now conked out in front og the telly, having stuffed himself and had 2 gins and 2 ish glasses of wine)

ARGH.

Sounds tough! I would never have had that many people round when my two were similar ages.

As for your Dad.....He has forgotten what toddlers are like. Can you broach the subject calmly?

(If not, can you relativise it? A few comments like this aren't going to screw up your DS for good.)

Courage!

Thanks otherside.

There was a quote from the book I wanted to point out but haven't the strength tonight. Hope you're back tomorrow, will try and fish it out.

How is it all going anyway?

Really apreciate your cross-channel support.

All is well here, thanks. I am busy cooking loads in advance for Christmas. We are off to in-laws on Sat for five days so the idea is that I bring loads of casseroles etc and do the meals running up to Christmas so MIL can concentrate on Christmas food (she makes a mean chocolate log which is the traditional dessert over here).

Since reading the book, I have stopped doing DS's pasta jar (which was only for prompt getting ready for school/bed anyway).

I find having read the book helps me be more patient and realistic in my expectations.

Having said that DD went to bed without any tea last night because she didn't want to come to the table when it was ready. She hadn't come by the time DS had finished so that was that.

AK specifically mentions not doing this in the book but in this house evenings are busy enough without having relay meals!

She has been up for over an hour and still hasn't asked for any food.

We stopped pasta jar type things too! And my ds1 keeps referring to his favourite toy, purchased as a result of a full jar, as his 'good boy' toy -- gulp. Irreperably damaged?? (haha.)

Here are Alfie's words I was pondering last night:

'Limiting our power doesn't mean that we must be silent about our preferences, but whenever possible we ought to leave the final decision in the child 's hands.' (p170)

'...I'm not suggesting that everything has to be negotiated, only that kids should know how many issues can be negotiated.' (p176).

I'm going to re-read the section 'When they have to, but don't want to' (p181).

His advice is good, and I agree that more patience and participation in decision-making means that he is more likely to agree or negotiate when we have to 'lay down the law' (and our household is running a lot more smoothly overall), but this is not always the case. Seems like this is the big deficiency: he can tell you what not to do, but has precious few suggestions (other than negotiating/ power-sharing) for what you can do.

Anyway, in terms of the dinner thing, he does say that you as a parent have to decide which things are non-negotiable.

Better go, ds1 is demanding juice.

That just isn't true, Aviatrix. Children are incredibly egocentric. They have a low ability to empathise, they live much more in the moment. They don't understand the hazards of the world, a child truly believes that he as an individual should be the most important thing to his parents-- which might be reasonable, as long as he doesn't have siblings.
Most children are much more fearful of many things than adults, because they understand so much less about things.
They insist that something is important and completely forget about it 5 minutes later (if that long). They have priorities that to us adults seem ludicrous and are extremely hard to accomodate with adult priorities quite often. They are extremely poor at managing their own needs, too. They do not respond to reason much of the time.

Agree with both of you.

There is no perscription -- which is why it is so bloody hard at times, and which makes me wonder frequently 'how do i do this? where am i going wrong?'

And it is absolutely true that my ds1 simply does not respond to reason. For example, he knows well that hitting his brother (9 months) is not OK, and he hasn't done it for a really long time. And yet, today, he decided that this was his new favourite passtime. This was while we were playing 'picnic', his other favourite passtime, so it wasn't a lack of attention. After I had explained that hitting his brother hurts him and we don't hit each other in ou house (etc) 3 or 4 times, and he carried on, he said he wanted a time-out, so off he went to sit on the stairs of his own accord. When he returned, I tried to quickly redirect, but before I even had a chance, he had whacked him on the head again. My immediate, knee-jerk response perhaps not the best one was to take him for a time-out on the stairs. We had a good chat together about why we don't hit and came back into the room. After about 3 minutes, he started tipping his brother over, so I calmly said, 'it upsets me that you are continuing to hurt your brother. If you carry on like this, I will take you to play in your own room for a while.' the words were barely out of my mouth when, THUD, baby brother was pulled over and hit his head. I comforted baby and took ds1 up to his room, and said I would be back in a minute to have a chat, still remaining calm. When I came back after a moment or 2, he had quite deliberately wet his trousers and the bed. Fair enough, he was getting even with me and trying to get a reaction, he may even have done it because he was scared (although I doubt it, I was calm the entire time this whole exchange was going on). I resisted the temptation to sigh and I just said, 'that's OK, everyone has accidents!' and tried to move on. Most of the evening was spent with me trying to disrtact him from terrorizing his little brother.
With the benefit of hindsight, I can see 1 or 2 things I might have done differently, but it seems whenever we get into one of these confrontations, we get locked into a pattern of escalation with him generally 'winning the round'. In these kind of situations, I just don't know how to be a good parent.

Well, turned out he had a fever last night, hence the bad behaviour.

Hope everyoe else is doing ok.

Well done for keeping your calm. I usually end up losing my patience and then feeling guilty when I realise they are ill.

Had an interesting experience in the doctor's waiting room this afternoon. DD was bored so started singing 'petit papa noel' in her cute 'only just three and can't pronounce certain sounds yet' voice. A couple of people waiting clapped. Cue 20 minutes of DD and DS singing the same three songs over and over again. They were having fun and no one actually complained so I left them to it, but I could see from some people's faces that they wished they hadn't encouraged it with the first applause. I bet they breathed a sigh of relief when we got called to see the doctor.

Bless, that sounds cute! Nasty mean old scrooges that didn't want to listen to songs for 1000th time.

So, you think that was the right way to handle that? I keep feeling that I am getting it wrong because he keeps on doing the same sort of things (like being violent & destructive). How much longer will this last, do you reckon???

2 of my closest friends here are off to France tomorrow. I'll bet it's lovely over there now! I've just had a third dismal, overpriced meal out this week (ugh).

Off to bed now.

It is cold and frosty over here, and we live in a rural area so the scenery is beautiful and the roads are treacherous.

You can still get dismal overpriced meals around here, particularly near the coast 'tourist traps' but there are also some fab restaurants. We don't get to go out much because of the DCs so when we go out we decide we'd better make it worthwhile and pay more for our meals than the babysitter so the food is always exquisite!

Your DS1 is probably suffering from a bit of jealousy because your DS2 is now able to join in games to a certain extent and is becoming more of a rival and no longer that tiny baby that could only eat, sleep, poo and cry. Hard work for the parents but I don't think there is much to be achieved by not keeping staying calm (although have to admit I have set my DCs a bad example on more than one occasion).

My only suggestion is that if he starts being violent with baby again, focus on how to play with baby eg rolling him a ball to roll back or building him a tower to knock down or whatever games they can do together at that age. I forget.

Okay, let me get this off my chest and I'll let it all drop.
What people are saying that they think are parenting methods consistent with Kohn's ideas, what to do instead of praise and punishment, are all parenting techniques you can do anyway, alongside praise, rewards, bribes, threats, punishment, etc.

• Explaining why you want them to do something (Reasoning with them)
• Not sweating the small stuff, giving them freedom to be individuals
• Only asserting your authority when you really have to

All of that could come straight out of How to Talk, or a dozen other books. The difference is that the other parenting texts will also suggest a lot of other things that Kohn argues against, like offering choices -- that Kohn says aren't really choices, or emphasising 'natural' consequences if child continues with unacceptable behaviour. The other parenting books give you a full toolbox, Kohn nitpicks about the common parenting tools he doesn't like and doesn't replace them with anything at all, much less something better. It's disempowering rather than helpful insight.

Maybe it depends what kind of parent you are in the first place. I don't see myself as a confident parent and there was a time when I would have had a fight with my child in order to make them wear a coat when I was cold because of the judgments other people make (she's a bad mother because she hasn't ensured her child is adequately wrapped up)
Also, I'm not used to being around kids and sometimes have unrealistic expectations.

I was beginning to 'get' these things all by myself but it helps me to read that someone who has researched it.

It really doesn't bother me that he doesn't suggest any alternatives. Seeing those traditional parenting tools in a different light means I will make much MUCH lighter use of them and they'll probably be more effective.

Fair points, PBkid (I love p-nut butter, btw).

I felt frusterated that the methods that have been presented in the media as fool-proff weren't actually having the magic effect, so the book has helped me to lower expectations and chill out generally, which has had a positive effect on the whole house.

Anyhoo, the next few days will be super busy here, so I shall wish anyone still watching this thread a Happy Christmas and New Year!

I've been reading this thread with much interest as I too have become locked in battles with my DD1 (4.5). This has opened my eyes and we've had a happier few days recently. I've dusted off my copy of How To Talk, and ordered a copy of AK's book.

Thanks to you all for sharing your stories and points of view and Happy Christmas!!