Tag Archives: Parent

How to Be a Good In-Law

There are unnumerable amounts of publications out there that give tips for spouses on how to get along with their in-laws. Realistically, it’s the in-laws who should be taking advice. It’s no secret that all too often, in-laws play a major role in a couple’s decision to split. Perhaps the well-meaning in-laws are too intrusive; in some cases, they are downright hostile. You can help prevent your son or daughter from becoming a divorce statistic: Just follow these five simple rules.

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Rule #1: You do not get a say.

It’s going to take some time for a parent to realize that his or her baby is someone else’s baby now. It’s time to cut the cord. Many times I hear in-laws complain that their grown child’s spouse has “taken them away from their family”. Yes, that is exactly what has happened. Your son or daughter has a new family now, and that new family trumps all previous family ties. I love to hear new in-laws exclaim that they are welcoming a new son or daughter into their family. This well-intended belief pretty much defines the problem between the in-laws and the new spouse. It insinuates that they still have jurisdiction–they don’t. You’re not gaining a new son or daughter, you’re losing the one you had. Get over it. Early into my marriage, my sister-in-law bitterly announced to my husband that he must not need her and the rest of the family anymore because all he cared about was me. I kind of thought that was the idea. Now that we are divorced, his sister has her own fiance and a baby and has no room for her family in her life. I’m sure it has still not occurred to her how selfish she was being at the beginning of my marriage.

Rule #2: Unsolicited advice is poison to a marriage.

Perhaps you’ve been married for thirty years and you think you know everything about what it takes to run a marriage. You should be congratulated, of course, but you’ve all but forgotten what it’s like when you’re first starting out. Consider how it would feel to have all of your decisions questioned by a skeptical friend or family member. That’s exactly how it feels when in-laws intrude upon a new marriage with all of their “knowledge” and “wisdom”. I had a friend whose parents tried to dictate her marriage, to the point of trying to force her and her husband to sign a “contract” stipulating what chores each spouse would complete each day, how much money each would contribute to bills, and what kinds of modifications that would be made to their house and in what time frame. The end result was that their daughter’s husband (understandably) flew into a rage and the couple didn’t speak to her parents for months. Of course they have since repaired the relationship, but some of the distance between the husband and his in-laws still exists. Trust your adult child to make his or her own mistakes, and no one will be able to blame you if the marriage fails.

Rule #3: Keep the criticism to yourself.

Maybe you think your new daughter-in-law is a slob because she doesn’t wash the dishes every night, or that your new son-in-law is lazy because he waits two weeks to mow the lawn. You have a right to your opinions–that doesn’t mean you have the right to subject others to them. A good rule of thumb is if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all. You spent (hopefully no more than) 18 years teaching this concept to your child, and yet you don’t practice what you teach. If your new daughter-in-law wants to wear a tank top to church, she surely doesn’t need your input. If your new son-in-law expects your daughter to bring him his dinner every night, keep your trap shut. Therelationships that work are the relationships that follow their own guidelines. If your daughter doesn’t have a problem with her husband leaving his car parts on the living room floor, it’s not your place to step in; if your daughter comes to you for advice, tell her that she is more than capable of dealing with her own problems and you trust her to make the right decisions. It’s not “hanging your child out to dry”, it’s building their confidence–which is exactly what newlyweds need. Bad-mouthing your loved one’s spouse can do nothing but harm.

Rule #4: Give gifts unconditionally or not at all.

Sometimes in-laws will help the new couple out contributing furniture, home decor, or even vehicles. This is an excellent practice–as long as there are no conditions placed upon the couple when they accept the gifts. Some in-laws believe that if they shower gifts upon the couple, it entitles them to extra visits from the couple, more time with the grandchildren than the other set of grandparents, or even the freedom to dictate the couple’s relationships. This is not so. What happens when gifts come with stipulations is that the spouse ends up feeling like the in-laws are trying to bribe the couple into relinquishing control; and may even end up harboring resentment. If you feel you must contribute gifts to the new couple, give freely–you’ll find that gratitude is given freely as well.

Rule #5: Distance yourself from your grown child’s marital problems.

You are not a licensed marriage counselor. Even if you are, you are not exactly in a position to be objective. Too many times, newlyweds will seek advice or mediation from their parents. This should be wholeheartedly discouraged. If the couple comes to you with their problems, point them to the nearest preacher or marriage counselor. Don’t attempt to solve their marital woes yourself. Chances are, your advice will only make things worse. Remind your grown children that they are grown and should be able to handle their problems on their own (or with the help of someone who has a degree and years of experience in such matters). This rule is sometimes the hardest to follow, particularly in cases where the daughter or son’s spouse is physically or emotionally abusive, withdrawn, or develops an addiction. There is no “time to step in.” In these cases, you might think you can “talk some sense” into your son or daughter, or even their spouse. In nearly all cases, the things you say or do are not going to matter. Short of dragging your son or daughter out of the relationship by his or her hair and chaining him or her to your living room floor, nothing you do is going to make a difference. The best chance you have is prayer and the hope that you raised your child to believe that he or she deserves a better life and he or she will come around on his or her own before any real harm is done. This is not to say that you should not provide a safe haven for your son or daughter if they are clearly in danger and willingly come to you for help, do what you can to protect him or her. Keep in mind, however, that if (God forbid) there comes a time when charges must be filed, your son or daughter must consent to it. If you try to go to the police by yourself, they will not be able to help you.

You might think that, as the parent, you have some kind of authority over your son or daughter and whomever might come into their life. Your son or daughter may be willing to indulge you (for selfish reasons). Anyone who is not willing to defend their spouse, even against their own parents, is dooming that marriage to failure. Additionally, whose doorstep do you think your son or daughter will end up on when the couple separates? I hear so many parents lamenting because their newly divorced son or daughter has ended up moving back in with them. If you even have a slight hand in the failed marriage then you, too, must face the consequences. Teach your grown child to be independent and encourage him or her to make the marriage work and you’ll never have to worry about relinquishing your newly decorated office/guest room to him or her. Help build confidence in your son or daughter’s own ability to manage his or her own life. And for goodness sake, leave the spouse alone! Chances are, however badly you think your son or daughter is being treated, the spouse is being treated at least equally so. Make it your goal not to exacerbate the problem.

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Parental Secrets: The Key to Parental Control Setting and How to Get Respect

Couples usually know before their child is even born the way both the man and woman, separately and together, are going to act when it comes to parental control setting and how to get respect from their son or daughter as they grow older. In fact, it is not uncommon for the couple to even joke about it , or even be proud of their respective stances on rules and punishment. Occasionally, both parents will hold the same values and standards when it comes to parental control setting and learning how to get respect, but more often than not, probably due to their individual upbringing, the mom and dad will choose to handle issues differently and from the beginning the couple and probably everyone else that is close to them in their lives can delineate clearly which one of them is going to be the stickler for the rules and which one will be a slight pushover. It is quite obvious which parent will spoil the kid rotten and which one will carefully pay attention to the future consequences before showering the kid with unending attention. Parental control setting. It can be complicated.

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This diversity between the mom and dad is only to be expected, and is okay to joke around about during pregnancy of in the very early stages of the child’s development if done lightly and somewhat in jest. But it is extremely important that as the son or daughter grows older and older, this difference in discipline standards and parental control setting becomes a less apparent dichotomy. If it does not cease to be blatantly different between mom and dad, it opens the door for the child to manipulate the parents, especially during the teenage years when getting what one wants is crucial to a good social life. Additionally, it can cause strain between the parents, which can lend to an undertone of animosity in the relationship and frequent altercations. Furthermore, these ensuing arguments more often than not occur right in front of the kid(s)- maybe even about the kids- and for obvious reasons, that is not healthy for a developing child to get used to being around.

Kids are going to go their own ways sooner or later and many times, due to influences away from home, what the parents do at home, the level of strictness they exude in their parental control setting, ends up doing little once the kid is influenced by the world outside the family. However, their home life and the parental controls they experience does at least matter a little bit and parents should do whatever they can to make that little bit count. For if that little bit of conditioning form the family assumes a strong and stable force in the child’s life and frame of thinking, the chances that a newly independent, un-chaperoned young adult will maintain good values and make proper smart decisions on their own is more likely.

Subsequently, both the mother and father need to build up credibility through efficient parental control setting so that in their son or daughter’s eyes, both parents are independent and also operating together as a unit. This is a notion that couples tend to easily forget to work on , and granted it’s quite difficult and intimidating to constantly practice- but it is a strategy that if done correctly, can subtly aid in shaping the child’s successful future the way the parents so desire in an immense way. For if the child sees his or her parents as authoritatively qualified and truly values what it is that they say to them, when they are out in the world (the child) facing their own decisions, there is less of a chance that they will feel the need to rebel, as many young adults do, and be more apt to use the lessons the parents taught them, as a natural response because it was exposed to them with such a stable force through careful parental control setting.

So how do parents earn credibility in their child’s eyes and establish ideal parental control settings? What are the parental secrets out there? When it comes to the issue of how to get respect and develop a strong parental control setting, there are many different methods, each unique to every family out there. Surely there are plenty of parental secrets about how to get respect that we can’t even fathom at the time being. But whether you decide to implement other parental control settings you discover through your friends’ parental secrets, this one is the root of all stable family relationships and should be used first and foremost, at least as a trial run to see if it works, whether other methods are used alongside of it or not.

The solution to the question of how to get respect as mom and dad and how to develop a constructive parental control setting is simple: The parental secret is simply that the mom and dad must operate as a like minded team while in front of the child or children. This is tough, and easy to neglect, but is a real great way to strengthen a family bond and develop trust among all family members. Many couples, as mentioned previously, allow it to be way too clear to the child that , say one is lenient and one is strict, and that when it comes to setting rules for the kid they often struggle to come to a mutual decision. While it’s hard to avoid, couples really should try to display themselves as more on the same level because kids will see their parents weaknesses and they eat it up. They know who to go to for what and they certainly use the knowledge liberally. Furthermore, whether it’s something stored in their subconscious mind or not, it is very likely impressed upon them that their parent or parents both are passive or passive-aggressive in their communication techniques and the reaction that most people have when constantly experiencing this (passive) behavior in someone they care about is that they often pity the needy, weak person and lose a little respect for them that they can’t stick up for themselves. Again, at a young age the child might not realize that this impression is imprinting in his brain, but psychological experiments and real life stories from current mental patients pretty much have proven that the information still sinks in and carries itself into the future in the child’s subconscious mind.

This important parental secret is not suggesting that the mother or father change their outlooks on life and on discipline and on the entire parental control setting, but it simply requires the disagreements to be discussed and worked out behind the scenes rather than right in front of the child. It may be a really difficult task for you and your child’s other parent to come to conclusions on important parental matters involving the discipline or lack of in regards to the son or daughter, but just like any disagreement you’ve had as a couple along the way, you find a way to work it out through some sort of discussion most likely. If that were not the case, you wouldn’t still be together and in the rare case that you are not together, but simply operate as friends, once lovers, who happened to share a child, you wouldn’t have been able to make it through the pregnancy stages and the early childhood without one of you becoming frustrated and doing something drastic like taking off. So the parental secret has proven to be possible. You’ve shown each other that despite your differing views on things, you can and will always come to some sort of compromise. Therefore when it comes to making decisions, specifically related to what the young adult can do and not do (i.e. date) the parents would be best off discussing their individual views in a separate room and coming to a mutual agreement before telling the child their answer. It cannot be stressed how important this is when it comes to how to gain respect from your children and develop a high level of credibility. Sticking to this technique is beneficial in many ways. One, the child grows up with consistency. With every tough decision, it is routine and expected for the parents to talk it over and then present him or her with an answer as a team. This consistency shows stability and good family bond and values, not to mention respect toward mom and dad together and also toward the child, as they are actually taking the time to discuss the matter rather than blurting out a no you cant go to the movies with brian or whatever the situation might call for. Ultimately, the child gets conditioned to see parents working together in a cordial manner as a standard for the basic family practices and will hopefully take those values along with them as they grow up and even further down the road when they get married and/or have kids of their own.

And a consequence of greater importance when it comes to using this method when learning how to get respect from a child through parental control settings, is that the child will rarely, if ever, experience the parents fighting with one another. So many parents today find it simply too much of an effort (and granted, it must be terribly difficult) to postpone a fight until the two of them are out of kids earshot especially when it begins with underhanded, subtle comments of hostility or facial expressions and sighs that reek of annoyance and condescending haughtiness. But aside from the public fighting to be a bad environment for the kid to be in for the obvious reasons, it also weakens the entire family unit and likely results in an involuntary lack of trust and respect from the child toward one or both parents. And when that respect is gone, this is when the child might be more likely to go astray and rebel. For if mom and dad show weakness and a lack of credibility from the beginning, the child, when approaching young adulthood is not going to take very seriously their warnings, casual lectures and attempts to portray genuine concern over their well being because, well, they’ve lost some respect for the parents over the years and it may take a long time and a lot of roller coaster experiences to repair this deficit.

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