THE MODERN PARENTING DILEMMA

Current parenting challenges

You discover that by the age of four, children have their own will. Then you discover that their will is different from yours. It is usually at this stage that parents seek help: 'How do I get my kids to listen to me and do what I say?'

They start school as cute and innocent preps in their new and oversized school uniforms. They become defiant. It feels like they won't do anything they are asked. For many, family life is chaotic and not at all fun.

You have survived pre- and primary school. Now they have started high school. Your home (that is, their home) has turned into a war zone. The only time you see your teenager is when they want something. They come and get it (usually negotiating with their mother as she is a bigger pushover), and then they leave. If in the process you ask for something then all hell breaks loose, and there is yelling, arguments or angry sulky silences. You try to help them and provide advice on how to manage their lives. They roll their eyes, look at you like you are an imbecile and storm off. How dare you be treated like this in your own home? Where is the respect you deserve? Why will these children not take good advice? Ultimately: Where has my gorgeous little girl with the pigtails gone? Where has my little boy who used to give me cuddles gone?

You have been fired as a parent! But my message is this: major pain and conflict is not necessary when children become teenagers.

Over the years, I have spoken to thousands of parents of pre- and primary school children. During these interactions, I discovered there are clear and common challenges, of which there are millions of variations on the theme:

• How do I deal with my children's meltdowns, tantrums and upsets?

• My children don't listen to me.

• My children are fighting all the time.

• How do I manage myself and stop yelling at my children?

Parents these days are acutely aware that the way they parent really matters for their children's long-term emotional and psychological health. A parent's greatest fear is that they are going to screw up their children. They know this because they are aware that how they were treated as children has impacted their adult life, or they have seen evidence of this in others.

The importance of needs for our family's survival

Both parents and children have needs, and they deserve to have their needs met. We are all driven, psychologically and biologically, to have our needs met for survival.

The Parent Effectiveness Model below shows the four types of families (based on their parenting style) and how they are going about having their needs met.

In the bottom left quadrant neither the parents nor the children are having their needs met. This family is Dysfunctional. The symptoms are frustrated parents and frustrated children. Parents are unable to help their children and are inattentive to their needs. They don't listen to their children, who tend to be highly emotional, and either upset or angry. They don't listen to their parents.

In the bottom right quadrant, we have Permissive families. Here the children are having their needs met but the parents are not. The parents are being walked all over. The children are not considerate of the parents, and could be considered spoilt. The problem with these families is that over time the parents become resentful when their needs are not being met. They begin to dislike their children. The problem for the children is they don't learn to be considerate of other people's needs. They also start to feel resentment towards their parents.

In the top right quadrant, we have Authoritarian families. In these families, the parents have their needs met but the children do not. These are families where children should be seen and not heard and where you might hear, 'You are living in my house and my rules apply'. Parents generally get what they want but the children don't. The children might be compliant and do what they are told to please their parents. Other children will become defiant. These children fight back against their parents. They become aggressive and badly behaved. They won't do what they are told despite threats and punishment.

Children in these families often grow up feeling their needs are not important or don't matter. They feel they are not listened to. Often they will grow up feeling alone with their problems.

We are programmed to behave a certain way in order to have our needs met. If we can't ask for help, we will try to have our needs met in other, less direct ways — you could call these ways manipulative. This family model will seem familiar to many of us.

Finally, we have the top right quadrant. Here parents and children are respectful of each other's needs, and recognise that having their individual needs met does not mean someone else has to miss having their needs met. It is not a 'zero-sum' game. There are ways of relating to each other where parents can have their needs met and so can their children. Some take these concepts further and cooperate to help everyone to have their needs met.

In truly successful families, all members are actively engaged in having their own needs met and helping other family members have their needs met. Can you imagine growing up in a family where everyone else was actively committed to helping you have your needs met and be successful? Can you imagine being a parent in a family where your children were actively engaged in helping you be successful at what you want in life? No longer do mothers have to sacrifice 20 years of their lives to raise children. No longer do children grow up feeling that they are not very important.

Parents don't know any better

In my parenting seminars, I begin by asking parents: 'In your many years of formal and informal education have you ever undertaken a parenting program?' The majority answer no. I then ask them how they have developed their parenting style if they have not embarked on a program. Almost unanimously, they say they must have learned their parenting style from their parents.

For most of us this rings true. How often do you hear yourself sounding exactly like your parents? Sobering, isn't it? Surely, we are more than just our parents. In addition, most of us swore that, as parents, we would never say these things to our children.

The truth is the majority of us parent as our parents parented us. It is what we know. Our parents parented as their parents did and so on, back through the generations. In reality, we are parenting using ancient methods. There might be nothing wrong with this except that over the past 60 years there has been significant research into the nature of human relationships and parenting: what works and what does not. In most areas of our society, we do not relate to others by controlling them with punishment and rewards. Physical punishment is only used against children. In the workplace, we focus on engaging our employees – not punishing them.

Many parents would adopt a No-Lose approach to parenting if they understood the impact of their Authoritarian methods and were taught the alternative.

Losing power

Many parents are fearful of losing their power...