It is common for parents, especially those on their firstborn, to stand up for their child in every little situation, even when they are wrong.
These days, a child will throw a stone into your windscreen, shatter it then rush to his parent for protection. If the aggrieved party makes the mistake of giving a much-needed admonishing for being a brat, the mother appears at the door, arms akimbo, threatening to sue the individual.
The situation is usually more pronounced when a child who has been raised in the city goes to visit his nieces and nephews in the village like many did over the Christmas holidays. Superiority and inferiority complexes come into play, and before you know it the two are fighting over everything.
All I wanted was a victory
Normally, the differences would quickly be solved and they become inseparable again, but then the parent factor comes into play. Most parents will request one of the children to ‘just let the other have’ whatever it is they are brawling over. It quells the situation, yes, but the long-term effects could be worse.
The child who is constantly asked to hand over toys grows up feeling inferior, while the one that keeps receiving them grows a mammoth-sized superiority complex.
I was that parent for years, so much that I joined in myopic situations like pity parties and offering comfort whenever my son lost an argument in the playing field.
Sometimes it was as clear as day that he had lost fairly, but the father in me did not want him to come alive to the fact that in every competition, there is winning and losing. All I wanted was a victory.
Something happened recently that opened my eyes to just how much I was crippling his problem-solving skills. Twice, he went out to play and came back with a tear on his lower lip. When I inquired, he told me that a friend called Chloe did that to him.
It is normal for a child to come back with an injury from the playground, but twice? At the same spot? From the same culprit? That sounded like bullying to me, so I made up my mind that I was going to investigate what Chloe does to my son.
It did not take long before we went out to bask and Chloe showed up. The moment my son saw her, he started running away with the young girl in tow. At some point, he ran out of breath and she caught up with.
What followed put into context the tears on his lip. Chloe hugged him so tightly that his mouth crashed into her torso, and when she released the grip my boy had his third tear. It was an innocent game by all standards, but the aftermath was unacceptable and it had to stop.
My teary son came to sit beside me, blood trickling from his lower lip. As he sat there looking dejected, I inquired what game he and Chloe have.
“She likes chasing me around to hug me, but I don’t like it,” he muttered.
The proclamation was evidence that although the young girl enjoyed the game, the other party did not.
Taught him to have a voice
The lack of an answer pointed to a child who did not know how to stand up for himself or say no, and it was a problem I had created by always doing it for him.
At that point, I started a new program of teaching him to refuse what he is not comfortable with, even if it looks like a game to the other party.
The outcome has been amazing, and it has given him a voice that I had not seen before.
That he stands up against that which is contrary to his belief gives me some confidence that he will not lay low and be bullied out there.
As for me, I learned that even though being the knight in shining armour whenever he was in distress looked cool, it created dependency. Essentially, I had been bringing up a child who, although able to stand up and make decisions for himself, would run to me for help.
I have also been applying those lessons in many other aspects of life and the results are tremendous. These days, whenever he comes to me for something I tell him, ‘big boys figure things out on their own,’ and he ends up finding the answers himself.
