Why #Positive #Parenting?

When I created the event #PositiveParentingDay I wasn't sure what my blogging contribution would be. I thought about it for all week, and yet here I am at almost midnight with no real solid direction to go in.

At first I thought I could site studies that might prove positive parenting is effective, but I felt that might be boring to read, and in a way talking over most parents. I don't know that a lot of us know when a new study is really true, or if it's just science persuaded to support a pre-established ideal. I find most of the people that argue for aversive punishments to discipline children find comfort in doing what they know, and distrustful of new concepts that don't match what they know. So, the idea of quoting experts, and doctors wasn't appealing to me.

Then, I thought that maybe I might find some good quality sites to share about positive parenting. I thought that maybe that might help people who are unfamiliar with positive parenting know what it is, and what it isn't. I couldn't think of a way to make this entertaining, and not just a big info dump. The whole purpose of #PositiveParentingDay is to introduce parents to a different style of parenting that they may not know about, but I didn't want to do this by simply sharing links.

In the end, I have decided to just simply write about what positive parenting means to me, and why I choose to use it with my kids.

Positive parenting isn't a fancy method that I read about somewhere, or heard about on an afternoon talk show. It isn't the way I was raised, and it isn't the same exact thing other parents who use positive parenting. To me positive parenting describes where I am at as a parent of 3 very different kids. The way I have arrived where I am on this journey going on 17 years now is unique,

Celebrate #PositiveParentingDay June 1st

Hello. I would like to invite you to celebrate positive parenting with me on Monday June 1st. To sign up please see the event listing HERE, as well as see the bottom of this page for further instructions.

What is positive parenting?

Positive parenting is not really a clearly defined technique that has certain rules to follow. It can mean different things to different people, as well as involve many different types of ideas, and values from all kinds of styles. Other styles that are more specific that use positive parenting techniques are gentle parenting and attachment parenting. I'm sure there are many others that I don't know about, but those are two examples that come to mind that I know about.

Positive parenting involves a parent, and child relationship that is open, caring, and respectful. It is usually child centered in the way it is applied. A parent using positive parenting skills will approach every situation with their child with empathy looking to to help their child grow, and learn rather than to obey, and coerce.

Positive parenting does not equal permissive parenting. It doesn't mean that parents just sit back, and let their child do what they want all the time. Instead, what positive parenting does is explore the many, many other ways to problem solve with your child that are in between harsh, aversive punishments, and neglecting to set any boundaries, or interact with your child at all.

What are some examples of Positive parenting?

Imperfectly Perfect

Yesterday was Mother's Day. Holidays always make me anxious. I tend to have ideas about how I think things will go, and they never go that way in real life. I am not good with changes in routine that are not at least somewhat predictable by having some kind of plan.

So, when a day like Mother's Day rolls around I have a plan about how I think things should go. I feel pressured, and emotional to begin with, and it doesn't take much to derail my mood, which is exactly how Mother's Day started for me yesterday.

At first, I felt bad that I felt bad. I felt like I was being ungrateful, and negative. So, I felt double awful, and this did nothing to make my mood better. Then, I decided to that maybe it was okay for me to feel whatever it is that I feel. I remembered that I had a right to feel my own feelings, and accept them as valid. As I stopped pushing against this mood it began easing up, and my day did indeed turn around to being what I would consider a pretty good day! It was only when I stopped judging my mood, and stopped trying to tell myself what feelings I should feel that things began turning around to being more positive.

That reminded me of something that happened earlier last week. Beans is very much into getting into, and taking all of my nic-nacs, and other decorations. I don't have many anymore for him to get to. The only ones left in the living room were in a closed shelf that he never bothered until last week. They were all the ones that were irreplaceable either by emotional attachment, or because they were collectible. He would wait for me to be in the bathroom, or have my back turned to climb up to the shelf, and get them out. On one occasion last week he broke one. It was a candle holder that my deceased grandmother had bought me when my daughter died. Obviously, there was no replacing this object. I wasn't heartbroken about it, really. I don't get attached to objects, but I was sad that it had been broken.

When my husband arrived home from work, and saw it sitting there in pieces he went straight to gluing it back together. I didn't think it could be repaired. It was too damaged, I said.

Missing a Place In Time That Never Was

I sit in a quiet room listening to the faint clock tick by the seconds, as I try to determine what it is that I'd like to do. My mind is full of images that are too far away, and abstract to quite differentiate. My body urges to move, yet to where, or to do what I don't know.

Oh, this mood is here again.

It's a familiar state of mind. One that has hints of melancholy, mixed in a with a dash of loneliness, and maybe even boredom. I find it a confusing feeling. Da ja vue like, and without context I am without direction. It's a little bit uncomfortable, but not jarring.

This feeling, this mood, it reminds me of something. It feels like something is missing, and incomplete. It almost feels like hunger, but not quite. Hunger of the emotional variety, maybe. I can't put my finger on what I am lacking. What I am missing.

It's like my body, mind, and spirit is missing something I never had. It's a longing for a place in time I've never been, but needed to have been, I feel a faint pull to a home I've never had, filled with people I've never known, and this missing part of me is left dangling over a time that never was.

I don't know how to remedy the situation, because the feeling is so abstract. I attempt to fill the gap of neediness with what I can to pass the time. I think about chatting with others, but then my listless brain has nothing to really say. I want a connection, but feel as if one cannot be made where I am at mentally, so instead I spend my day on autopilot looking for something to distract me from this odd tugging of my heart. All of my OCD checking behaviors magnify as I check, and recheck the same things hoping to find some reprieve from this feeling.

I know that this mood will pass. Likely, it will be different tomorrow. I wish I knew what was missing. Why I miss a home I've never known, and people I've never met. How can I feel this low level of desperate need of something  have never had?

Finding Happiness

I have different writing styles, as well as differing reasons that I blog. I have always been a writer, and there is still something so magnetic, and alluring about an empty notepad of paper that I can't hardly resist filling it with words. Words of a poem, of my thoughts, of lyrics to something that makes sense to me in that moment. Just words flowing onto an outside object from inside my head is a desire that I can't ignore. It's my way of communicating to the world, and to myself. I process the world by writing, and have ever since I learned to spell.  No matter my special interest at any given time writing is how I am going to best explore it, and share it with the world, whether anyone is on the receiving end or not.

So, this is one of those posts where I talk to myself, and share my thoughts raw. They're about as mysterious to me as unknown to you. I finally have the confidence to not worry so much about whether or not anyone is going to read it, or if this post is going to be shared, or receive comments. It likely won't, but I don't write to please others. I write because I have to express myself, and this is how I do it. How others interpret this expression is up to them, and while I love to get feedback it is not necessary for me to get in order to enjoy the process of writing.

As I have written about recently (HERE) I have begun a new round of antidepressants after a particularly trying bout of depression. It was not your typical gray depression, but rather it was a life changing kind that required action. Not just action from an outside source, such as an antidepressant, but also action in changing my life, and the way I think to be able to sustain a more positive lifestyle conducive to me needs. I'm not going to repeat everything here that I have said in so many other posts, but to paraphrase; depression is often a signal from our subconscious that something in our lifestyle, and way of being is not congruent with our needs. This is not the whole of depression, but it is often at the root.

Almost immediately after beginning my new medication I could feel a difference. It's a med that I have been on before, and have found it to be really effective for me, even though it seems to not agree with a lot of other people. It was as if it were made just for me. Suddenly, I felt a surge of energy, and a renewed sense of purpose. There were so many things I wanted to do, and experience. It was like waking up from a long sleep where I could finally do the things I could only dream of before. Suddenly, my dreams could be a reality. Life became clear again, and not this long drawn out painful, confusing fog that I had to fight to just survive through each day.

Aspects of my personality began coming back that I hadn't seen in years. Things like