Try as I might, the father of my children makes me want to yank my hair out by my follicles at least 80 percent of the time, all on his own. If you add the kids to that equation, I feel like I should be sporting a Sinead O’Conner hair do in the interest of feeling like yanking my hair out 23 hours per day. However, when it comes to parenting, my spouse and I have somehow been able to maintain uniformity in the microcosm that is our relationship, sans hair loss. Even with this blissful alliance, there are times that we simply do not see eye to eye. During these times, pliability and planning lead us to success.
Kids Sense Weakness and Fear
Being a mother for 17 or so years now, I have learned an indisputable universal truth: kids are like dogs. They can smell fear, sense weakness and exploit dissension in the ranks. Masters of their own domain, children are also expert manipulators in situations where mom and dad don’t agree.
When faced with this reality in my own home, I realized that my spouse and I had to discuss disciplinary actions and repercussions for unruly behavior in private first. This gave us time to iron out our differences and present a unified front to the troops, giving them fewer opportunities to break rank.
Ironing Out Differences
For the first ten years of our parental co-existence, I was “the good cop” and my spouse was “the bad cop.” I admit, I used the, “Wait until your dad gets home,” phrase many times during this decade. As our twins grew into preteen and then full-blown teen, the child-rearing dynamic switched. As a parent, I had to learn to be pliable and let my teens be “daddy’s girls” as I morphed into, “The Warden.”
My husband and I had to strategize often on how we would deal with a myriad of situations, discussing how I would discipline without being too rigid and how he would support me without being too lenient. Like it or not, you have to do this in advance if you want to be adequately prepared for the maelstrom that is parenting teenagers.
Ground Rules
In my home, we had to set ground rules with our daughters on a wide variety of topics. Looking back, implementing these ground rules probably saved our lives and our hairlines during the teenage years. The expectations set in place helped us avoid many frown-line causing, hair yanking scenarios that other parents I know wade in daily. In short, expectations saved my life, and my vanity.
It took countless private chats, text messages, emails and more back and forth than a Williams sisters tennis match, but eventually my husband and I found serenity on just about every parenting issue we didn’t see eye to eye on. The magic in our technique is that the kids never knew that we didn’t agree. There were under the impression we had some freaky Vulcan mind meld going on. No matter what your style or your parenting preference, uniformity is crucial to live long and prosper. Discuss discipline strategies in advance, set expectations with your kids and never let them see you sweat. Your hairline will thank me, and your Botox bill will be a lot cheaper.
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