Partnership, Not Power Struggle

(UPDATE: This one was published! Woo hoo!)


In his book Raising Children Compassionately: Parenting the Nonviolent Communication Way, Marshall Rosenberg, Ph.D. writes, “I’ll be forever grateful to my children for educating me…[that] I couldn’t make them do anything…That was quite a humbling lesson for me as a parent, to learn about my powerless-ness, because somewhere I had gotten it into my mind that it was the job of a parent to make a child behave.” He continues, “All I could do is make them wish they had…[then] they taught me a second lesson about parenting and power…they would make me wish I hadn’t made them wish they had. They taught me that any use of coercion on my part would invariably create resistance on their part, which could lead to an adversarial quality in the connection between us. I don’t want to have that quality of connection with any human being, but especially not with my children, those human beings that I’m closest to and taking responsibility for.”

No one wants someone else trying to control them, not even children. Punishment, criticism, judgment, blame, demands, a harsh tone of voice, the silent treatment and even bribes are controlling and manipulating behaviors. Do we really want to scare and coerce our children into doing what we want? Would you want to be treated that way? We say that we want our children to behave, but a more considerate and aware goal may be to teach our children our values. This requires explanation, which requires our time and thoughtfulness. It’s not easy in our fast-paced world, but for our children it is worth the effort.

Often parents fight to maintain their power and dominance. This teaches children bullying tactics, rather than conflict resolution and positive communication skills. What if we treated the parent-child relationship as a partnership instead? What if we saw our role as that of mentor, allowing our children to mentor us and reveal insights as well?

In another of Rosenberg’s books titled Life-Enriching Education: Nonviolent Communication Helps Schools Improve Performance, Reduce Conflict, and Enhance Relationships, Riane Eisler writes in the Introduction, “In this book, Marshall Rosenberg describes key elements of what he calls life-enriching education: an education that prepares children to learn throughout their lives, relate well to others and themselves, be creative, flexible, and venturesome, and have empathy not only for their immediate din but for all of humankind.”

This could also be a useful mission statement for parenting. I want my child’s school to teach critical thinking skills, not just how to memorize and obey rules. Similarly, I want my child to understand what I’m asking of them and why. I believe this approach and using nonviolent (or compassionate) communication will help me to build a strong connection with my child. Hopefully, that connection will allow my child to share feelings and thoughts with me openly.

When do we begin this process of explanation? Now. Whatever your child’s age is, begin talking with them. When my baby was first born, my own nonviolent communication mentors encouraged me to talk with her from the beginning. I narrated just about everything I was doing. At first, I felt silly, as if I was talking to myself. Not only is this a way to connect with your child, it also helps babies develop language skills and learn about their world.

Additionally, my favorite benefit is becoming comfortable speaking to your child. I became so comfortable narrating my actions that I found myself at the grocery store one day saying, “Now, this is an apple, and this is an orange.” The other shoppers nearby frowned and gave me strange looks. I explained that it was my first shopping trip without my baby and that in my sleep deprived state I was on autopilot acting as if she were right there with me. An older woman replied, “Oh I am so happy to hear that you talk to your baby! So often I see people ignoring their little ones and it breaks my heart. They’re people too, you know, and no one likes to be ignored.”

It may feel awkward at first, but eventually it comes naturally.

My very first a-ha moment during a Center for Nonviolent Education and Parenting (CNVEP) class occurred when my little girl was about five-months-old. She was playing with a toy outside the participants’ circle while CNVEP Executive Director Ruth Beaglehole facilitated. I wanted to return to the circle so that I could see Ruth more easily. I picked-up my daughter and she began to cry – loudly. Ruth stopped and asked if she could share some information with me.

Ruth pointed out that Marli was engaged in an activity and that I pulled her away from it with no warning. That would upset anyone, I realized. What I hadn’t realized until that moment was that children of any age can be deeply involved in an activity that’s important or meaningful to them. I put Marli back down in front of the toy and she stopped crying. It seems like common sense, but children don’t come with manuals and parenting is not instinctual – that’s why I was taking the classes.

When it was time to clean-up, Ruth suggested that I explain to Marli what was happening. It occurred to me that telling Marli when I was about to pick her up was probably a nice warning. I wouldn’t like continually being surprised by someone lifting me into the air unexpectedly.

In another class, Marli was trying to lift herself up to standing by holding onto a chair. Marli fell and she cried. Ruth approached her and explained what had just happened. She said something like, “I think you were trying to stand-up here, then you slipped and fell down. I see you’re crying. Maybe you got scared, or maybe it hurt. I’m not sure, but I can help you try again. I’ll hold the chair so that it won’t slip while you try again.” Marli stopped crying, she tried again, and she laughed as she stood-up.

Another child fell and hit his head on the corner of a wood stage as he practiced standing. He howled loudly, but he actually stopped as Ruth showed him what had happened. He seemed focused, his eyes following her movements. He was taking in what Ruth was saying. I was surprised at the time, even though now it seems like a no-brainer that toddlers are soaking up what we say and do. Just because someone cannot communicate the same way we do that does not mean they cannot understand us!

Explaining what is happening helps children of any age to understand the world around them rather than perceiving it as a mysterious and unsafe place where strange, unpredictable things happen.

Now, whenever Marli falls down or gets hurt, my partner and I help her process it by replaying what happened as much as she wants to. By one-and-a-half she was replaying falls for family members and talking about her ouchies for over a month. These incidents were very big for her at the time. Her father and I also attempt to help Marli achieve her initial goal. We’ve found that several times her big tears weren’t about the fall, but about the fact that we scooped her up and took her away from her activity. Now, when Marli falls her father and I wait to see how she reacts, then we follow her lead. If she wants us to scoop her up we do, and if she wants to reengage in her activity we help her.

Following our child’s lead is a big part of our parenting philosophy. We don’t try to direct or control her play. We observe, we explain what we’re observing and we try to reserve judgment. For example, if we see Marli ‘pull’ someone’s hair we don’t assume that she is doing something negative. She is not intentionally trying to hurt someone, she’s merely trying to explore someone’s hair and she doesn’t know how to be gentle yet because she can’t regulate her movements. We try to use neutral language, so we might say, “I think you’re trying to explore her hair, but when you do that it’s called a pull and that hurts. Try to be gentle, like this.” We model the behavior for her and we understand that we’ll need to model in this way for a long time before she’ll be able to do it on her own.

For a while, one of Marli’s friends pulled hair when she needed space. She would gently give Marli a little push to communicate that she wanted to Marli to move away. After a while she learned to ask for, “space please.” If neither of these strategies worked, though, the only tool she had left to work with at the time was to pull hair. And the truth is that pulling hair worked! But the little girl’s mother helped her to understand that pulling hair hurts our friends and I helped Marli to understand that sometimes our friends need space to feel comfortable.

When Marli began climbing all the furniture in the house, we’d say, “I see you’re enjoying climbing. I’m concerned about you climbing on the table because you may fall, so I’m going to help you get down.” Then, we try to find the yes behind the no. We don’t want her to climb on the table, but she can climb on the couch. At that point, I began taking Marli to the park every day where I could help her climb and explore all she wanted. Marli’s older now and she still gets the urge to climb the table because she loves climbing.
So, providing her with the chance to climb each day is still important. When she climbs the table she is not being bad and doing something she knows she’s not supposed to, she is simply feeling the need to explore! That’s hard to resist and it takes time to develop impulse control.

Another strategy my partner and I use to address the table climbing is making books. We draw stick figures and tell the story of how Marli really wants to climb tables, be up high and explore. Then, we explain that mommy and daddy are concerned that she could fall and get hurt. So, mommy and daddy help Marli down and she feels frustrated and angry. Then we draw a couch and a playground and explain that these are things Marli can climb on. Whenever she tries to climb the table, we read the book and we try to have patience, remembering that eventually she will learn. And, again, I want to stress finding the yes behind the no. Sometimes I say, “We don’t climb the table, but we can go outside and climb the stairs.”

Another struggle I’ve often observed in my own child and others is not wanting to leave a fun place like the park or a party. I struggled with this as a babysitter many years ago. I used to threaten, “You have until five to get over here.” What happens after five? I don’t know, but it’s something bad and scary and you don’t want to find out! Now, I’ve learned to start giving Marli warnings about ten minutes before we need to leave. I give multiple updates: “Eight more minutes, five, two, one, five more pushes in the swing, now let’s say good-bye to the swings, slides, sand and other children. It’s hard to say good-bye. Wouldn’t it be great if we could stay here all night! But what would we eat and where would we sleep. Time to go.”

One of my nonviolent parenting mentors once spent twenty minutes building a bridge of leaves to the car with her two boys. Her boys didn’t want to leave the party they were attending, so she turned leaving into a game where they could only step on leaves as they went to the car. It may have taken twenty minutes, but fighting with the boys and dragging them out of the party would have taken just as long. Plus, fighting would have caused tension and anger, leading to a rift in the relationship that would have to be repaired later.

I was surprised to learn just how much Marli could understand by age two. As she grows, I’ll continue to explain what I’m observing while reserving judgment. I will say, “I see that you’re crying because you really wanted ice cream. You must be really disappointed,” rather than, “You’re being bad and it’s not that big of a deal.” I’ll help Marli identify her feelings and search for healthy ways to deal with those feelings. This goal requires her input, though, and that’s why I want to approach parenting as a partnership and not a power struggle.

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