Choose

Remember when I wrote the post about the word, “okay” and how by adding that single word to the end of a sentence such as, “you need to get your shoes on now, okay?” it confused things for my son?   I was using the word to mean, “can you confirm you heard me?” but he interpreted it as “do you agree?”   My son likes to have control of his environment and that simple “okay” at the end of the sentence was causing problems.   He would decide that no, he didn’t want to put on his shoes.   When I would tell him that he actually had to put on his shoes and he didn’t get to choose, it frustrated him and made him feel out of control.

Frustration would then ensue on both the adult and child side.   But if I had said, “it’s time to put on your shoes now” he was fine.   It’s important to give children choices (which we do) but my phrasing was giving him too many choices and when he made a choice and then had it immediately taken away from him it was causing him to want to control his environment even more.

So that’s fixed, I don’t use “okay” as a sentence terminator any more.    Yesterday I found out I was doing another thing related to control and decision making opposite of what I should be doing with him.   Let me take a quick aside here and say all of this doesn’t apply to my daughter.   She is a different little human being and she doesn’t have the same rigidity he does so phrasing isn’t an issue with her.   She likes to please, help and do the right thing.   She appreciates advice and gladly comply without complaint.

Let me give an example of what I did wrong this morning and you’ll see what I mean:  my son came downstairs dressed in jeans this morning.   It’s going to be over ninety degrees today and he’ll be spending time outside at camp.   I said, “let me give you some advice: it’s going to be very hot today, I would suggest you put on shorts instead of jeans so you won’t be as hot today.”   This advice was wholly rejected by my son who got angry even at the suggestion.

I did the proverbial slap on the forehead, forgetting what our play therapist had said just the day before.   I waited until he’d finished eating breakfast and tried again using these words:  “I see you’ve chosen to wear jeans.   It is going to be very hot today; if you’d like to be cooler you can choose to wear shorts to camp.”   Without any objection he told me he would go change as soon as he finished with what he was doing.

What’s the difference between the two?  In the first case I made the decision for him and told him what he had to do but in the second on he was given a choice and told the how his choice would affect him.  Because he wants to have control, the second gave him a choice and control.

Have I mentioned children are complicated little creatures?   In the two situations above, for some things I need to not let my son make a choice while in other situations I need to make sure he gets to make the choice himself.   What Dhruti said was that my son wants to be in control and letting him make choices and decisions where we can will help center him and make him feel in control as opposed to out of control.

The “choose” word extends even further though into behavioral modification.   For instance, “I see you’re stirring the paint so that it out on the table.   When you spill the paint you’re choosing to be finished with the painting work.  If you stir slowly then you’re choosing to keep painting.”

I’m a work in progress.   What is amazing is how just with a few changes in words how he reacts so differently.   Most of the work to help my son reduce his anxiety is going to be in how we, as parents, communicate with him.  

The Big Boy Update:  My son was very hot the other day and wanted something to drink while we were out.   I told him we’d get him something to drink as soon as we could.   He registered his complaint by saying, “soon I’m gonna be dehydrated!”

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  My daughter said the other day, “when I grow up I want to be a tooth fairy.”