Monthly Archives: May 2010

Pillow Fighting Saves the Day

Photo (C) Joshua Tan 2007

A friend, her grandson, my daughter and I went on a ski weekend together.  My daughter is almost 9, and her grandson is 12.  He has a very hard life–this weekend was, among other things, an attempt to give him a fun time and some connection with us away from the difficulties of home.

He took some ski lessons on the first day, and learned  quickly.  He was fearless on skis.  It was a bit of a problem, actually. On the lifts, he kept wanting to lean over and spit down onto the snow. From 30 feet in the air, I didn’t think it was safe for him to lean out like that, so I kept asking him to sit back. He kept wanting to go down hills that had jumps on them, too, although he was still new at skiing.

So we all had a full first day and a really rousing card game that night, in which the kids won and we adults lost miserably in the midst of lots and lots of laughter.  It was really fun.

The next morning, he was saying that he was going to go down the runs with jumps. My friend, his grandma, said, “No, you’re going to go down slopes that you can handle, so you don’t hurt yourself.”  That was too much for him.  He hung his head, went over to the bed, and curled up silently in fetal position.

My friend and I thought for a moment, “What shall we do?”  My daughter went over to him and asked him something like, “How come you went back to bed?  Are you sick or something?” but he wouldn’t say a word.  He had dug deep into bad feelings.

Then, I said, “Let’s go pull him out!”  My friend said, “Really??”  and I said, “Sure!” and went over and grabbed one of his ankles and began to drag him across the bed. He began to kick and struggle, but I kept it on the fun side, just kept dragging him and begging him to come with us.  He got me back onto the bed, and I started throwing pillows at him, and he began to laugh and get into the pillow fight.  At one point, his grandma tried to hang onto him–that was too much, and he began to get upset.

I thought, “No, we aren’t going to be able to handle a big upset right now!” so I got her to let him go, and we kept on pillow fighting and wrestling for a long time–10 or 15 minutes. It was really fun, lots of laughter and good tussling.  When I was getting tired, finally, I yelled, “OK, who wants to go SKIING?!” and he and my daughter jumped up, put their fists in the air in a victory V, and said, “We do!” and they hopped into their jackets and boots, did everything they needed to do quickly and cooperatively, and we went off to have another great day.

- a Parenting by Connection parent

Building Support for Your Parenting

Photo (C) Julia Freeman-Woolpert 2007

When I was pregnant many people said, “Your life’s going to change once you have kids.” And while I nodded in agreement, nothing prepared me for the moment my daughter was born and my life really did change. As I held this perfect little person in my arms I realized I would do anything for her. And so, my journey as a parent had begun.

Parenting has been a path of joy and hardship for me, from sweet moments filled with snuggles and giggles to challenging moments filled with little fists and harsh words. No matter how dark my path has seemed at times, I continue to follow the light of connection toward my daughter. With the support I have found through Hand in Hand and my listening partners I see my priorities are shifting. I remind myself connection is more important than getting to school on time and playing in the rare rain of Central Oregon is worth postponing bedtime.

When parenting gets hard I now have a network of people who hold the space that I will find my way through this. My wish is to connect parents everywhere with the support they deserve. I hope you’ll join me for this months teleseminar on Building Support for Your Parenting. Please comment here with any questions you have on this topic and we’ll try to answer as many as possible during the call.

In the meantime, check out the Yahoo Group Hand in Hand Discuss. This online community is a wonderful resource for parents using the Hand in Hand tools. You can also connect with parents by searching the Yahoo Group Listening Partner Database (once you’re a group member) or check out the comments in our previous blog post Finding Parenting by Connection Parents in Your Area.

Let’s support each other in the worthy (and hard!) work of nurturing children!

~ Michelle Pate, Parenting by Connection Instructor and Consultant. Join her Building Emotional Understanding course, beginning September 13.

Healing a Separation Trauma

Photo (C) BelleMedia 2009

When my daughter Allie was about four, I took her over to my Grandma’s house for a visit. Grandma lives in a tidy, quiet neighborhood, so I let Allie play outside while Grandma and I made a pot of tea and talked.

My Grandma’s neighbor, an elderly woman, opened the door and invited Allie inside. She went. The woman, who was drunk at the time, closed the door and kept Allie there, terror stricken, for about twenty minutes. I found out later that nothing overtly harmful happened, but Allie had asked to leave again and again, and the woman wouldn’t let her out the door. The woman apparently rambled and talked nonsensically, then finally opened the door and let Allie run back to find me.

She ran to me and cried and trembled and could barely talk about what had happened at first. I felt terrible, of course. I held Allie and let her cry and tremble and cling and talk for a long time and slowly I pieced the story together. In the next several days, she cried frequently about the incident. She was adamant that she was never going there again. Never! When she seemed to be mostly over her periodic cries, I figured that we had to go back to Grandma’s. Allie needed to see that she was safe, even there, and that the incident was over. It was not going to happen again.

I didn’t want to force her to go to Grandma’s against her will. She had already been forced to stay at the neighbor’s house against her will! I figured that I needed to find a way to help Allie work on what had happened and feel powerful at the same time.

Finally I figured out a way to use Playlistening to help. I got a long rope from the garage, and I told Allie that some day we were going back to Grandma’s but that we were going to tie ourselves together so no one could separate us! Allie laughed and the play began. I played the old neighbor, and Allie tied me up over and over with much laughter. I struggled and begged and pleaded to be released. Allie laughed and was heartless. We giggled and wrestled, tried to “get” each other with the rope, and planned how best to tie ourselves together for the trip to Grandma’s.

After awhile, I figured it was time for the real thing. I asked Allie if she was ready to go. That neighbor had moved away, so I told her that. It would certainly be safe. She agreed to go.

We brought our rope and tied ourselves together on the front lawn. We were inseparable. We hobbled over to the neighbor’s empty house, with lots of laughter. Allie wanted to peek in the windows. I said she’d have to get untied so I could lift her up. She wasn’t afraid. We untied ourselves and looked in to see the place where she had been briefly imprisoned. We talked a little, noticed everything, gathered up our ropes, and went to Grandma’s. Allie’s fears were gone.

— a mother in Menlo Park, CA.

The Morning Grumpies Turned Around

Photo (C) Klarissa 2010

My 10-year-old son woke up grumpy the Monday morning after a long weekend with his grandparents. He didn’t want to get out of bed, get dressed, or brush his teeth. Each step was a struggle. I finally moved in close, hugged him to me and told him that he was going to school that day and he needed to get ready.

The dam broke and he launched into shuddering sobs. I moved us over to the couch and pulled him onto my lap and held him while he cried away all the cluttered emotions that were getting in his way.

Little brother was concerned and I told him that his brother had some big feelings to get out and we’d be fine again soon. That cleared it up for him and he let us be. I sat with my older son for about 10 minutes of good crying until the tears subsided and we were just quiet for a time.

Then he got up, got dressed, brushed his teeth and was ready for school. Apparently he had a great day because he came home eager to dig into his owl research homework right away and even crafted his speech two days ahead of schedule.

—Karen Murphy, Certified Parenting by Connection Instructor in Oregon

Join Karen in her Building Emotional Understanding course on Monday afternoons, starting May 13.

Setting Limits with a Pre-Teen

Photo (C) Linnell Esler 2005

My wife and I have done our best to listen to our children’s feelings throughout their lives so far. We’re so pleased with them, and have used listening to help them each meet major challenges in their lives.

Just this week, my wife and I had our first upset with our almost-twelve-year-old daughter on pre-teen socializing: she and some of her classmates were planning to watch a movie in the house of one of the boys in class.  Unfortunately, the majority of those friends decided that they wanted to watch horror movies. Their choice was “1408,” which the reviews indicate is a truly distressing piece of work.

Thanks to your influence, my wife and I have been clear about resisting the worst of what Hollywood offers to young people.  Our daughter had big cries about being in conflict with us over this movie. My wife and I also had to process our feelings: it didn’t feel good to hear how painful it was for us to limit her social life in this way. She felt badly, we felt badly. But we held our ground, knowing that the movie was not healthy for her young mind. The hardest part was that her friends went ahead with their party plans without her.

However, our daughter is now glad that she did not attend that party, and told us afterwards that she would not have her children see such movies, either.  We feel close. The limit didn’t harm our relationship!  There will be lots more to deal with as our girls get older, but your approach and what we have been able to learn from you is invaluable.  Your work is so important! Thank you!

–a father in Boise, ID

The Car Seat Sessions

Photo (C) Dmytro Samsonov 2007

I am happy to share the following Success Story that is now referred to in our family as “The Car Seat Sessions.”

My son screamed whenever we put him in the car seat during the first four months of his life. Once he was old enough to sit face forward I thought that we had put it all behind us. But the issue began to surface again shortly after his second birthday.

It started when my son refused to go to the park with the babysitter. Then he only wanted to go out in mommy’s car. Finally his need to work out issues reached its peak. It would take longer and longer to get him in the car seat. When I finally got him in it was an endless deafening scream interrupted with “I’m stuck”! Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, my son turned into Houdini and escaped from his car seat. It was now taking an average of two hours just to get a few miles.

One day, he was escaping while I drove, and I had no choice but to pull into a shopping center and park in a loading zone. I took him out of the car and held him as gently as I could while he kicked and screamed. I told him I was there for him; I loved him; I knew he didn’t like to feel stuck and I heard his frustration. A man approached and told me to move but I was dedicated to listening to my son. Soon a crowd of people began to stare. They tried to offer advice, all of which I politely rejected. Forty minutes later he calmed down and said, “Thank you, Mommy.”

We had several more of these “sessions” before he could climb into his car seat and ask me to buckle him in safely. It has been about a month now and when he needs to have a cry about something he simply asks to go to mommy’s car.  Not to go bye-bye, but to express his feelings where he knows he can have uninterrupted listening time. I am quite proud of his ability to make me listen. More than ever I am grateful for having learned how to “Listen To Children”!

— a mother in Los Angeles, CA