18. Taking Our first Parenting classes (as Senior Citizens!)

When The Old Tried and True Doesn't Always Work...

When my husband, Ned, told me Andy’s newest counselor was suggesting we take parenting classes, I was slightly taken aback…

Hadn’t we already shown experience in this area? We both had biological adult children. Ned was close to 70 years old, and I was clocking in at 61-wouldn’t we stand out? Really? Another evening commitment….? I took a breath and then I thought about the uncomfortable facts. Our adult children all had issues that may or may not have been related to their upbringing. Andy, our grandson whom we have legal custody of, was doing much better with his school behavior. His anger management at home, while improved, was lacking consistency. It was difficult to accept, but why did our grandson behave better for others, like teachers? I’m also ashamed to admit that at moments I hated the yelling replica of my mom’s unpleasant side that I had developed into in moments of sheer frustration. Ned had shown signs of wear with Andy as well, but I noticed that before class was to start, Ned had changed his parenting techniques. His new method was more peaceful, less arguing. Andy and Ned were so alike in ways neither could see, and when they clashed, it was like watching twins fight. (Note to self: Do not point out how alike they are during the heat of the moment-neither will be accepting of the info...) (and do NOT laugh at them!)

I was working but about to retire. Ned delayed our registration till after my work family gave me a great send off. He was trying to make it all easier on me. I signed us up online for Lyle’s “Love and Logic Parenting Enhancement” class. Although childcare was provided according to the brochure, we asked Ned’s former girlfriend, Karrie, to stay with our two children, now 7 and 9, since it ended close to their bedtime on a school night. (If you aren’t aware of the Karrie situation, read the chapter “It Takes a Village”.) I made macaroni and cheese, tossed applesauce packs and spoons on the counter, poured milk, and kissed our kids good-bye as the sitter arrived with her usual backpack of crafts.

We were walking into the Mentor Crossroads building in the evening, but further down than the main entrance to a separate grouping of rooms. Lyle Morris was a pleasant man with fascinating stories he added to the curriculum of his experiences counseling children from troubled families over the years. He also had another class he taught about parenting children who had trauma backgrounds, Adults Supporting Youth with Challenging Pasts. He looked at us when sharing that info, and I kicked Ned gently under the table to ensure it wasn’t even considered, though it was probably lost on him. Ned paid the nominal $60 fee for the workbook, etc. and Lyle added extra handouts on topics of interest each week for us if we were interested. (One even addressed different parenting styles and how to find common ground.)

I had noticed a change in Ned over the past couple months. It wasn’t so much a change in his outlook as a change in his behavior when dealing with Andy. It wasn’t polished at first but Ned was refusing to be drawn into arguments-and it was causing less shouting. Less shouting meant more peace. I was all about peace and loving the dance I saw unfolding as Ned actually teased Andy into behaving! I wasn’t sure how it was happening, but we were ALL getting happier with the new management.

Our class was an unusually small group. Lyle had been asked to host the class so close to the time it started that he had been given no chance to recruit students, his normal practice. We shared the sterile conference room with two others and Lyle, who sat under a white board with his laptop to show us slides as he talked at the head of a large table we positioned ourselves around. The workbook was great-easy, larger type (I’ve learned to appreciate this in my older age) and broken into six sections, one for each week of class.

The first week was an uplifting experience. As Lyle clued us into the ideas of the Love and Logic course, I felt hopeful. This was clearly working with Ned already. Surely it was doable and more importantly, it worked without yelling or chaos. This was what I dreamed parenting could look like. We were given homework. We had to choose a one-liner to use (a list was even given of possibilities) that would diffuse an argument in the heat of the confrontation. I had my sentence ready and used it several times in the following week, amazed that something so simple could work. Andy reacted so differently with its magical power! There were also a couple times that the one-liner worked, but only to a point. I needed more tools to use to keep the process working.

The second week helped, but the initial feelings I had about the class came to an abrupt halting realization. The epiphany was like a little a hammer of common sense leaving a small sting:

I was NOT the excellent parent I had always thought I’d been.

Two adult children telling me I was, wasn’t the best endorsement. I’d enabled, though always with the intention of “helping”. I’d over rewarded, causing some entitlement issues in my son (now deceased from an overdose). I’d done the typical parenting things parents did in the 90’s: swearing resulted in biting into a bar of soap (I did NOT make them swallow it) with the object of cleaning up vocabulary. Resistance was met with liquid soap that could be squirted between teeth after pinning your child down, and yes, I had spanked my children, but never in anger. In the 90’s, I was a typical parent, and in good company, as we often swapped parenting methods over glasses of wine during playdates as we sat and watched our children in one of our back yards. (I offered wine more recently to a playdate parent, significantly younger than I, who looked at me as if I’d offered arsenic. I haven’t offered since.)

I’m going to pause here. If you are over fifty, you probably aren’t judging me harshly yet, but the younger ones are. There is definitely a generational bias in parenting. The belt whipping our parents received as children, and some of us remember as well, wasn’t considered abusive in its time-but today would be seen as such. I’d like to think that we are more enlightened.

There was never a time I spanked a child that I felt good about it. Andy and even Addie to some extent, are children who have experienced trauma. Spanking is counter productive. It has an opposite effect on them and puts them into a fight or flight mode. The child might actually believe they need to fight for survival. I had been resorting to time outs that were preceded by stomping up stairs to their bedrooms. This class was my ticket to better parenting outcomes, but first I had to learn the process. Suddenly I realized how much I needed to be taught something different. Shame wasn’t a reaction Lyle wanted. He carefully worded his response to my confession about soap and swearing, seeing my angst that I realized this was not the best response. “A generation ago, that wasn’t an unusual way to parent…”

“Time waits for no one.”

We get children as kinship caregivers that are “broken”, and sometimes we are broken too but unaware. It’s obvious that help is needed outside our immediate families usually because of issues with mental health or drug addictions. We aren’t given training when we suddenly find children on our doorsteps, and the chaos that accompanies their arrival is overwhelming at first. As overnight parents we are floundering to survive, get beds, make nutritious meals, address health needs long neglected, find schools to work with our little charges, and sometimes, we have to navigate the parents’ issues that brought the children to us in the first place. There’s the challenges of child care and working to navigate for some, and financial obstacles for others. Ned and I never raised children together and our parenting styles are different. When we married later in life, the topic of children didn’t come up because we NEVER imagined we’d have some!

Last night at my second class I learned an “energy drain” technique that is a way to get around coming up with a response to your child’s behavior till you’ve had time to think of a logical consequence. Meshed into this brilliant solution, is empathy. Love and Logic works because of this emotion that allows us to show our children love first even if we are unhappy with their behavior. It demands that we role model managing our own emotions to help them manage theirs. It’s so common sense that I’m embarrassed not to have done it sooner. I can already see my weakest link too that I can overcome with this new generation. I won’t be “fixing” their little mistakes, as much as guiding them to fix their own, so that as they grow, they will be able to identify better choices all by themselves. The method was developed by Charles and Jim Fay, a father and son (The son has a PhD, which I respect because the method has been researched and subjected to peer review, a quality assurance process).

I’m older, retired, and won’t live forever. I’m giving up a few hours for six weeks to gain peace of mind that when I’m no longer here, these two children will be okay figuring out good solutions. Who knows, maybe I’ll even score a bed by a window in the nursing home, by loving adult children who come and visit, because they want to.

To all the mothers out there, biological and chosen, called “Mom”, or “Nana”, or even “Hey, You”-Happy Mother’s Day. We deserve it.

www.CrossroadsHealth.org

9220 Mentor Ave.

Mentor, OH 44060

(440) 255-1700

Due to scheduling changes, Lyle will not be teaching Enhanced Parenting skills classes at this time; however, Crossroads will have information on a new offerings.

---