3 Steps To Success

If Mondays aren't hard enough, today is a Monday AND it is the day after a holiday!  Double Whammy!

Even if your holiday was wonderful and even if your weekend was wonderful and especially when your weekend wasn't wonderful, transitioning back into the pressures of the week can be hard on all of us - especially our kiddos! After a few days out of the routine, it can feel jarring and overwhelming to jump back into the regular routine. If you stay home with your kids full time, Mondays can feel easier,  or not, depending on what your days are like. 

In creating smoother transitions, there seems to be a common point among families: the importance of intentionally parenting your child. If you are aware of the fact that schedule, triggers and deficit pose a particular success challenge, and why, you can take steps to improve them. What triggers your child? How can you meet YOUR child right where he is at? Pay attention to your WHOLE child.    

1. Our children learn to trust by experiencing the fact that the same thing will happen over and over in the same way, without fail. The ins and outs of a constantly changing schedule wreaks havoc with this basic trust building our children work on for many years. As Intentional Parents, we can make choices to create a schedule that stays mostly predictable and one that is based on our child's abilities not necessarily our desires - then he will be successful.      

2. Keeping something(s) predictable on the weekends is highly effective in helping your child be successful. For example, the time you eat, your morning and/or bed time routine, or the emotional and physical boundaries you hold for your child. To battle possible triggers and increased anxiety, it is important that our children don't misinterpret the transition into or out of the weekend as us unplugging from them.

3. Just as we will be more successful in life if we know ourselves and how we deal in situations, we must also know our whole child so that we can help create moments in which they will succeed and not fail. Understand that losing your primary attachment figure has life-changing impacts on an individual and results in deficits in the areas of trust, memory, cause and effect thinking, reading your non-verbal cues, understanding nuances, abstract thinking, feeling safe, applying yesterday to today, and SO much more.  Having clarity on what is deficit vs. defiance allows you to meet your child right where he is at...there is where he can be the most successful!  

The reality is, transitions are hard for all of us and can be really challenging for our children. Intentionally meeting them right where they are at is the key to helping them be as successful as possible. When they are successful, healing happens and our entire family is better for it!