Ignore It!: How Selectively Looking the Other Way Can Decrease Behavioral Problems and Increase Parenting Satisfaction

PART I  

Introduction

WHILE STANDING BY your side at the supermarket checkout line, your child begins to whine for a pack of gum.

Mooooommmmmmm! she says in her most irksome tone.

Not today, you reply.

Pleeeaaaaassse, Mommy, she says. Pleeeeaaaassssee . . .

No, you say softly, hoping that what you know is going to happen somehow won’t.

Pleaaase, Mommy. It’s just gum.

Again, you say, Not today—but with more force.

Seeing that you are distracted and getting frustrated, your child—crafty as ever—kicks it into high gear with an extra-annoying, bloodcurdling, screechy whine. Finally, at wits’ end, you either:

A. Buy the gum just to make your little darling keep quiet.

B. Stop what you are doing to devote three minutes of time to lecture and admonish your child—then immediately feel deflated and angry.

Either way, you lose.

•   •   •

AS A FAMILY COACH, I conduct parenting groups and seminars. I do in-home and phone consultations. I meet with PTAs, religious organizations, and teachers. Strangers in malls and gas stations sometimes ask me my advice after learning of my profession. Inevitably, I am hit with a variation of the very same question. Why won’t my kid behave?

Or, to be a bit more specific, parents ask:

Why does my son refuse to sit still at the table?

My daughter makes the most annoying noises for no reason. No matter how nicely I ask her to stop or even if I get mad, she still does it. What can I do to make her stop it?

When I try to give my son a time-out, he runs around the room. How can I get him to sit for the time-out?

One of my sons will do anything to get my attention. He hums, taps his pencil, and nudges his brothers. All day long. What can I do to get him to stop it?

I’ve heard them all, and the pattern is as predictable as the morning sun. The child does something undesirable or annoying and the parent tries everything—from begging to screaming to punishing—to curb the behavior. And, unsurprisingly, nothing works.

Kids are not out to get us (although it really may feel that way sometimes). They are kids. The nature of their job is to explore, learn, and develop. The nature of the parenting job is to teach, guide, love, and nurture.

Most parents feel that in order to change behavior, they have to do something. But often what they are doing is only encouraging the behavior. That’s right. What they are doing is actually making the behavior worse.

In my work as a family coach, I often see parents overdisciplining behaviors that they should ignore and underdisciplining behaviors that they should address. Parents are constantly nagging and trying to get kids to stop doing attention-seeking behaviors. That constant battle of wills is leaving parents exhausted and out of tools. To help parents discipline more effectively, I started to preach selective ignoring, a process of strategically overlooking annoying or dysfunctional behavior. Based on well-respected behavior modification research, the idea is to use ignoring deliberately. The concept is usually met with the same initial reaction from parents: There’s no way this will work. Then they try it and the magic begins. They report a decrease in annoying behavior, higher overall parenting satisfaction, and improved parent-child relationships.

I decided to write this book because I saw so many parents struggling with the same issues. And, regrettably, their actions were only making matters worse. In this book, I will teach parents how to reliably minimize or even eliminate unwanted behavior and encourage more positive behavior. What’s even more fulfilling is that you could also improve your child’s self-esteem and increase your parenting satisfaction. That means that you will actually enjoy your time with your kids more. Who wouldn’t sign up for that?

Although the concepts in this book are based on extensive research and experience working with families, I think you will find that it is not complicated or intimidating. It is completely doable—simple concepts explained well, with lots of examples for use.

Sometimes, parents are so at the end of their rope that they can’t wait to get to the tools in a parenting book. They read a little here and then a little there. The book stays at the bedside but never gets a parent’s full attention. This always makes me sad. Parents are seeking some help, and they reach out for it. But they don’t allow themselves to fully prepare for making changes in the way they are interacting with their children. Without reading all about a new technique, they do a brief attempt at implementing a new parenting strategy, only to get confused about how it works. Soon the parent feels this new strategy doesn’t work and gives up. When this happens, the parent feels demoralized and out of control. What’s worse is that the child learns that parents attempt new ways to curb negative behavior only to give up. This teaches children that parents will sometimes try to introduce new consequences for poor behavior, but if the kids work hard at it, they can get them to give it up. Sadly, this means the same negative behaviors—or even worse behaviors—will repeat again and again.

For these reasons, I recommend resisting the temptation to skip ahead in this book. Each chapter builds on the previous one to fully explain the concepts to you. I promise it is a quick and easy read. If you bought this book, it is because you really want to improve your home environment. Give yourself the gift of taking your time to absorb it all. It will be worth it.

This book is organized in three parts. In Part I, you will learn about the theoretical basis for Ignore it!. Here I will teach you about the overdisciplining cycle and the basics of ignoring. I will tell you what to ignore and what you cannot ignore.

Part II of the book is the how-to section. You will learn exactly how to begin ignoring, and I will give you loads of scenarios to illustrate the concepts. I’ll also help you understand how to ignore in public, what to do if behavior gets worse at first, and how to manage common impediments to success.

Although Part III strays from the narrow focus of Ignore it!, it is a vital section of the book. Getting rid of unwanted behavior with Ignore it! only solves part of the problem. In Part III, you will learn how to encourage more desirable behaviors and provide consequences to any inappropriate behavior that cannot be ignored. I have listed some frequently asked questions with answers and good tips to help you get started. The very last chapter is my pep talk. In all of my sessions, this is often the most essential part of my engagement with parents. Yes, I provide practical parenting tips in these sessions, and that is clearly important. But what many parents really need is a pep talk. They need to know that they can make this change. I support parents and reassure them. With that support, they feel confident to get started making modifications, and that’s when their lives change. I will do this here for you, too.

For some parents, Ignore it! will be just one of the tools needed to address the issues of their children’s behavior. Additional counseling and support from a licensed therapist, psychologist, or psychiatrist may be warranted. A full evaluation, medication, and other interventions might be in order to improve serious or problematic behaviors. Ignore it! can be used in conjunction with most other therapies. However, do seek outside help as needed.

•   •   •

READY FOR A CHANGE? Let’s go do this thing.

CHAPTER 1

Ignore My Kids? Are You Crazy?

WHENEVER I COUNSEL parents to ignore their children, I receive one of two responses. Roughly half look at me with a tilted head and an expression similar to the one my dog, Norma, makes when she isn’t sure what I am saying. They say something like, "Um, what do you mean, ignore them?" I repeat my thoughts about ignoring all of the annoying or testing behaviors, and the parents start to wonder if I am a bad family coach. Why on earth would they ignore their children? It feels counterintuitive. Bad behavior doesn’t just go away if you ignore it.

Well, actually, it does. (I’ll show you why in the next two chapters). After learning about Ignore it!, one dad told me he was scared to ignore his son’s inappropriate behavior because he worried the child would think he was okay with it. Dad wasn’t okay with it, and he wanted to be able to express that to his son. With Ignore it!, he still can convey that message—only not with words. His behavior will speak for him.

The other half of the parents are ecstatic to have permission to ignore their kids. They are exhausted from constant parenting. Managing children, careers, house payments and taxes, elderly parents, birthday parties, and school projects has mothers and fathers on the edge of checking out. Learning what one can and should ignore is often life-changing. One dad, relieved that he could at times ignore his only child, wrote me, Thank you for this method. Now I can procreate again. I’m pretty sure he was serious.

What isn’t disputed by these parents is that they are experiencing highly undesirable behavior from their children. Their kids whine. They cry and yell and scream and tantrum. The kids agitate them, often on purpose. And they push all of Mom and Dad’s buttons just because they can. Children are exploiting their parents’ vulnerabilities in every town, in every county, in every corner of every state. In response, parents spend more time disciplining than ever before. Time-outs and consequences are in perpetual rotation. Everything is a negotiation. But none of this is working. Not only is the unacceptable behavior not disappearing, it often gets worse.

As behavior gets worse parents yell more and punish more. They are angry and frustrated a lot more. Or, worst of all, they give up and give in. As a result, moms and dads enjoy parenting on a day-to-day basis a lot less. Something has to give. Parents usually choose to have children because while they imagined the hard work, they focused on the intense joy. However, they feel deflated when the balance is off so significantly. They experience considerably more frustration than elation.

Where did they go wrong?

Watch Me, Watch Me, Watch Me

What is really at the heart of the two general parent responses to Ignore it! is that, in this age of relentless child observation, adulation, and adoration, ignoring children seems to be anathema to the predominate parenting style. Hyperparenting is an epidemic. I am not pointing fingers at helicopter parents because, quite honestly, we are all helicoptering to some degree. We never ignore our children. Ever. We take a heightened interest in everything they do, from their homework to their after-school activities to getting them into the best college.

Now, I can almost hear some of you saying, That isn’t me. Okay, maybe there are degrees to helicopter parenting. But read a few phrases most parents hear on a daily basis and ask yourself if you belong in the group:

Mom, watch me do this dive again.

Mom, did you see the amazing car I made with my LEGOs?

Dad, watch this replay of my insane touchdown on the Xbox.

Pop, watch me climb this tree.

Watch me, watch me, watch me. Kids aren’t satisfied pleasing themselves. They want to impress their parents and everyone around them, and they want to hear feedback on how (OMG!) awesome they are. Just observe any child playing any sport. A kid makes a great play in soccer and immediately looks to the parent for the thumbs-up. Parents dictate self-worth in early childhood. By middle school, self-worth is decreed by an outside influence and measured in likes, shares, and popularity. Teens vigilantly craft their online images by posting only carefully curated selfies that have been approved by their best friends.

The need for attention is so great that children will go to extreme lengths to attain it. At first, most aim for the spotlight by being delightful. But sometimes that doesn’t work. Parents may have other children to divide their attention. Some parents work from home or are sick or even need a minute to make a call or send an e-mail. This divided attention can lead kids to try to snag attention in less desirable ways. Enter: nudging, testing, needling, whining, yelling, and tantruming.

How and when did all of this attention-seeking and testing behavior start?

It began in infancy, and it was learned. Yup, we taught this behavior to our babies. We don’t just let kids watch a Baby Einstein video while we take a break from parenting for a half hour. No, we insist on sitting with them to teach them or support them or just keep them safe. Babies nowadays have a lot less self-directed play. In past generations, children didn’t have to be learning all the time. They just played without purpose. Those days are long gone.

Kids used to be left up to their own devices much more. They explored freely, rode their bikes around town, walked with their friends to the store for gum. When I was a kid, I’d spend long hours in the basement making art out of household products and laundry detergent. If I got bored, I’d walk myself over to the Schwartzes’ house to play Risk or Atari or hoops in the driveway. When it was time for my piano lesson, I’d ride my bike to the teacher’s house a mile away, all by myself. It was great. Times have changed.

This idea of constant parental supervision and instruction isn’t just self-imposed by parents. It is coming from all areas of society. For example, take a look at the description for a popular toy called Fisher-Price Brilliant Basics Baby’s First Blocks (notice the word brilliant in the name). The toy is a bucket containing shaped blocks and topped with a sorting grate. The online description of the toy reads, "Your baby will learn new concepts about colors and shapes (circle, star, triangle, and more) as the two of you sort the blocks through the shape-sorting lid before stacking up each group to knock them down." This toy is for a six-month-old. Why would a parent need to sort the blocks with the baby? Why can’t the baby just play on her own? Answer: because society tells parents they need to constantly engage their attention on their children.

Of course, children require attention from their parents. And parents are usually devoted to providing it. But there is a healthy amount of attention that can turn problematic. More attention doesn’t necessarily produce better-adjusted and -behaved children. Once children come to expect endless attention, that attention can turn into a drug, and your kid into an addict. And just like the junkie seeking a fix, children continue attention-seeking behaviors despite undesirable consequences such as yelling and punishment.

The Inmates Are Running the Asylum

There is a natural call-and-response system set up to ensure babies thrive. When even day-old babies need something, like milk or to be changed, they cry. Crying alerts parents that the baby requires assistance. As parents respond quickly to the baby’s needs, a secure attachment starts to develop. It is very important for a child to forge a trust that his needs will be met reliably. So what’s the downside?

Infants quickly learn that to score a parent’s attention, crying gets the job done. Long before children can speak or even use American Sign Language, they learn to communicate through crying. Baby wants milk? He cries. Baby sees a strange face or hears a loud noise? He cries. Baby’s angry, frustrated, bored, sad, gassy? Well, he might as well cry. For newborns crying is an innate ability that acts like a survival skill. It’s the universal language all parents understand.

Parents work hard to stop that crying, and that’s a good thing—at first. But at some point, children are able to tolerate more hunger, frustration, and discomfort. When parents intervene without fail to stop all types of crying, children learn to use it for their advantage. Whimpering and whining gets immediate attention from Mom and Dad, as well as a quick resolution. As children age, they learn to perfect their pitch and—Shazam!—crying becomes tantrums. It turns out parents hate tantrums even more than crying, and will do anything, especially if in public, to end the hysteria. And your kid knows it.

Children, particularly young children, control precious little in their lives. Parents control everything. This lopsided power dynamic doesn’t sit well with those on the losing end. Kids sometimes challenge parents just because they can. For example, Sam, who is two, asks for Cheerios but—as soon as they’re poured into a bowl with milk—he refuses them. No! No! No! I want eggs! No Cheerios! Eggs! Sam loves Cheerios, but he wants to see if Mom will make the eggs. Can you guess what happens?

Sam throws a fit. He shoves his bowl out of his reach. He starts crying with tears streaming down his face. When his mother moves the Cheerios bowl closer to Sam, he turns enraged. No Cheerios! No Cheerios! Red in the face, screaming, crying, and kicking, Sam is letting it all out—and he knows exactly what he is doing. And, without fail, Mom starts making the eggs. She doesn’t want Sam to be hungry at preschool, and she is in a rush to get the older kids off to school. Sam calms down immediately. Just like in infancy, Sam’s mother will do anything to stop the crying.

Now Sam knows he has more power than he thought. This is intoxicating, and Sam starts to find lots of other ways