Managing misbehaviour – either in younger children, or adolescents – is arguably, one of the most stressful aspects of parenting. The line at the start is an old, old statement, and one that has a lot buried deep within it.

For many parents, it can come as a bit of a shock when you first notice yourself doing something (as a parent) that YOUR parents did to you, especially if that is a thing you didn’t necessarily like. And yet it makes a lot of sense – how we were parented is definitely going to impact on how we parent. And this is probably more true for managing misbehaviour than for other parenting decisions. So if you were punished using X, Y, Z, then there is a fair chance they might be some of your strategies you will draw on.

Below are some suggestions, thoughts and ideas to think a little bit more about, that might help you when you are deciding how you want to manage behaviour difficulties:

• For any behaviour, it is often helpful to consider the FUNCTION of the behaviour. For example – a child sulking is a way of drawing your attention to them, a teenager lying about their whereabouts is them trying to manage conflicting needs (to follow your instructions Vs spend time with their new boyfriend/girlfriend). If you can understand WHY the behaviour might be happening, it will help you to decide the most effective way to approach it

• Do you have a range of strategies you can use for managing misbehaviour? And do they escalate appropriately? A lot of people will have their one strategy that will be most likely to work (e.g. smacking, yelling, grounding) but at what cost? Ideally, you have a range of responses that gradually increase, rather than going from no intervention to something quite drastic

• I’ve said it in other posts – but consistency and predictability is key to parenting. If you notice that you give a lot of threats (“If you don’t do X, then I’ll do Y”) and say this multiple times before you intervene (at which point you are usually pretty fed up), then you are teaching your child that you aren’t likely to be consistent and predictable. One of the aims is to try and shorten the timeline so that the space between issue and response is much shorter, and hopefully reducing the need for escalation

• Manage your own stuff (as much as possible). We are all human, and being a parent is tough, but we need to manage our own stuff and prevent it (as much as possible) from spilling out onto our kids. If you have trouble managing your anger, or your wound too tight, or you feel like you aren’t coping, please reach out for some help. Your parents, a friend, ParentLine, Reachout Parents, us – whoever it is, make sure you have the help you need so that you can be bigger, stronger, wiser and kind for your children

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At ConnectEd Counselling and Consultancy, we believe that all families, and the communities they belong to, benefit from a little extra care and support. Whether the problems are big or small, we want to make sure everyone has the chance to feel connected – to themselves, to others and to their community. We offer counselling services to young people and families and have immediate availability. If you need some support, get in touch here: www.connectedcc.com.au

(Written by: Dr Matt O’Connor)