Parenting. enough said...
Parenting is hard. What worked yesterday doesn't work today, and you've got to think quickly on your toes, ensuring you don't allow yourself to get overwhelmed or yell. We talk about overwhelm and emotional regulation in Parenting, and how children need to learn how to regulate their emotional dysregulation.
I am not a believer in punishments, or non-democratic parenting. Rather, my approach is parenting needs to be from the perspective that children aren't bad, behaviour is, and that consequences rule over punishments, because there are no pathways to build, connect, forge trust, give space for growth, mend, repair, or teach, in punishing. Often, really, punishing, getting angry, or yelling, is a means to an end for the parent, to displace their anger or frustration. There is nothing fruitful or fortifying in punishments for anyone.
The lessons you want to impart to your children when their behaviour or decisions are less that desired, is how to make better choices or decisions next time. Punishments, and I'll throw yelling into the mix here, not only grow and foster division between your child or teen and you, they offer no pathways to learning, no connectedness, and no building of a stronger relationship.
Learning effective communication and behaviour management skills and techniques will help you not only forge a healthy, trusting, and loving relationship between you and your kids, you will also be teaching them the valuable skills of how to relationship and lead by example. The behaviour you give, is the behaviour you will receive.
Right or wrong, good or bad, you, are always leading by example. If you're yelling, always on edge, or doling out punishments time after time, change is within your power, and the change in you will be a change in them. Children aren't bad. Their behaviour is. Others don't actually make you mad. They may make you feel bad, or mad, but no one actually makes you mad; we allow ourselves to become that way.
Similarly (I hear this one all the time), your children don't make you mad. Others, don't make you mad. We all have the choice to regulate our own emotions, or not. We allow ourselves (that includes our children and teens, spouses and partners, co-workers and bosses...) to get mad. we have control, and we have choice. This, is a practice, and is very doable.
l teach parents how to reclaim their parenting power, to empower your sense of self, and teach you the skills and techniques needed to be heard, and understood with the emotional balance to parent with firmness and kindness. (These same principles apply to getting along better and being heard in any situation.)