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Find yourself locking horns with your strong willed kid? First celebrate, and then ask yourself if you can parent more sensitively.
Def: A strong willed kid– a politically correct ascertainment of what many may refer to as stubbornness, obstinate or headstrong. A child determined to conduct all their actions as per their wants, especially if advised against by the mother.
If you are raising a strong willed kid who has a fierce determination, say woo-hoo! Of course, you can’t say that, because you have no energy left in you for woo-hoo’s or even to make that cup of coffee that may supply some energy.
Being a parent of a strong willed kid is exhausting from the second the sun starts to shine. It begins with tedious explanations that may range from proving that its day time even though you can’t see the sun to why everyday school is important or how come alphabets don’t have opposites. This child constantly challenges the status quo, tests boundaries, negotiates to his benefit and is constantly on.
The strong willed kid can launch into dissertations whenever required to justify his side of the argument. I have heard phrases like “It’s my life” when asked to switch off the TV and “it’s my body – I don’t need medicine” when I wanted to give medicine for a mild fever, by a four year old. I learnt to tell my parents the phrase, it’s my life when I was 14 and Dr. Alban (google it) sang it, in 1992 (yeah, go ahead do the math).
You marvel at the parent/child when you see the child get out of the pool when told to do so. Or at least get out of the pool within 10 minutes of when told to do so. At that point you look at yours and find yourself looking for shooting stars to make a few wishes.
Parenting a strong willed kid is like fighting a force of nature and you find your spouse and yourself constantly check on which side of the family the stubborn genes came from.
Your child has forced you into ego management and made you check on your own desire to control situations. This one is deep and needs one to introspect. Every mother at some stage will wonder if she can be a better mom and freak out a little less. The only way to manage with a strong willed kid is to hear him out, empathize, give options (as opposed to instructions) and play games to achieve a simple task like tidy up. One cannot lock horns with a strong willed kid as that inevitably leads to a war-zone.
You are constantly getting invited to a court of law, where the law is at the mercy of the child’s whims. Resist the temptation to lawyer up for in this courtroom logic is play-dough.
You will very often be surprised by in-depth analysis you will receive from your child when probed to justify his standing on various subjects. The more you empathize with a strong-willed child, the more you widen your own horizons.
The one hope that can keep you going (so I am told) is that strong willed children if parented sensitively can go on to become exceptional individuals, even leaders that do not give into peer pressures. Their thought process for them defines morality and that is integral to their functioning. They normally chose the correct path if given a choice, however obedience is unnatural for them. If this is true, I will chose morality over obedience as a trait any day. Of course, no one is offering me choices!
Published here earlier.
Image source: shutterstock
I am currently a stay at home mom trying to raise a dare devil of a toddler. I have over 10 year experience in the banking and insurance sector and have worked in organisations like read more...
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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