Lower the Bar for Your Tricky Kid So They Can Succeed and Feel Good About Themselves

Children with ADHD receive more than 20,000 negative messages by the time they are 12. Often they feel like a bad kid, because they're behavior is corrected constantly. And if you're a "bad kid" why even try to be "good"?

Today Stefanie discusses how to avoid the trap of constant correction and bickering by actively ignoring all of your kid's behavior that is less important. (Think ignoring clothes all over the floor and instead focus on a higher priority behavior like respect, kindness, and completing important tasks.)

 All tricky kids need grace and time to learn skills that may come naturally to other children. Listen now for some of Stefanie's "tips and tricks" for lowering your standards to improve your connection with your child and improve their self esteem. 

A Podcast for People Raising Tricky Kids

Transcript

   📍  Hey, welcome back to where the F is my village. I'm your host Stephanie Ferris, and it's just me today. Again, I have some fun content lined up and I do have some people lined up to talk to, but if you're tired of just listening to me, maybe you could join me. Here on the show, I would love, I think it's been really fun to talk to different parents and kind of see what's going on in their house, see what is working for them, what might not be working for them, and I've gotten some positive feedback on that.

So I wanted to kind of tell you some things that I wanna talk about in future episodes. I wanna talk about, um, so I was getting my, got my hair cut this week and my hairstylist is like, you talk a lot about your kids, but I wanna hear about you. Like, how are you coping? This is a big one, right? Because it's real easy to fall apart while you're taking care of everybody.

So I wanna talk about that. So if there's anybody who, I mean, listen, you can sit here and complain about how it's going. You can talk about what you have found that has worked for you, but I wanna talk about that and maybe how your marriage is coping. I wanna talk about if your, if you happen to be married, I wanna talk about, uh, strategies that you use for downtime.

Therapy. Are you using certain TV shows or books to help lighten the load? Like what's going on there? Um, I also wanna talk about the discovery of the secret sauce with your kids. Um, I'm starting to discover, ooh, this one thing is making a huge difference and we're gonna do that all the time. And it's interesting on.

What makes a difference for them? So I wanna talk about that and friendships. Um, for, for one of my kids who struggles to get along with his siblings, if he has a friend over just one friend, he is like, An angel the entire time. He's flexible, he's courteous, he's kind, they don't fight, and everyone else gets along at the same time too.

So for the rest of his life we're gonna have friends over. So that's the kind of thing I'm talking about is like, is there some magic that you have figured out with your tricky kiddos? Um, I wanna talk about the trickiness of teens. I was kind of ranting about this on TikTok this week. I. This is probably completely the algorithm, right, but most of the content that I see when I am.

On Instagram or Facebook is great content geared to great content geared to parents or people who are raising children who are like under five. I feel like, and then, and some of their advice, I'm like, Hmm, okay, that's interesting. I could probably apply it to what's going on with my kids, but these kids are gonna grow up.

They're getting older. And I tried looking for, for some older content yesterday, and it was kind of, eh. So anyway, I wanna talk about the trickiness of kids, whether they're neurodiverse or not, and kind of. What that experience is like. I have one teenager, uh, my friend has a kid who's just started driving, so kind of wanna talk about that and just be real about what it's like.

I wanna talk about inflexibility. I don't know about you, but I have kids in my house that are inflexible and if one thing changes, One thing, it can really ruin everything. It can be catastrophic. It's kind of like when a toddler's favorite plate is in the dishwasher only. It's all the time and can be anything.

What about the poor siblings of tricky kids? So if the tricky kid in your house has neurotypical, I hate that word. Um, Siblings, what are they up to? How are you giving them attention? How are you nurturing them, and how do you handle the fact that sometimes your house is crazy and they're still like hearing it all?

I wanna talk, I have somebody lined up for this, but I would love to talk to other people if anyone else wants to. I wanna talk to ADHD and girls specifically. And I wanna get Casey Ferris on this show. Someone that's the last one. Can I manage to get my husband on this show? We'll see. Okay. So what I wanna talk to you about today is, and this may be hard for people, I wanna talk about lowering the bar of expectations.

For your tricky kid so they can succeed. So I think every single person in the world had an idea of what it was going to be like to parent. And you envisioned your, I don't know, maybe the things that were important to you, your kids are gonna respect the, your property. So they're gonna clean their room, um, they're gonna do certain chores, they're going to.

Whatever. Okay. The thanks and then you have a tricky kid and you want to have all of those standards, but some days you're just lucky if you make it through dinner, right? So the wet swimsuit on the floor in, you know, on his carpet is just like, who cares? I can't address that too. So, and also a tricky kid, particularly one with the neurodiversity, um, on the spectrum or has adhd.

So, They get so, okay. Dr. William Dodson estimates that by the time children are 12, they A D H D children have received 20,000 negative messages. That's all of those corrections they get all of the time. Hey, you need to put this swimsuit up. You need to hang this up. Don't forget to hang up your towel. Hey, I told you to dry off the raff and floor.

Come and do that. Or in the car, you know, saying things like, Be kind to your brother. That was rude to say, we're not gonna fight right now. Everybody look out your window. Don't touch each other. Pretend like you're, you know, please stop making that sound. You're bothering this brother. And, okay, now this bro, now this brother's poking the other one, like all of the.

I feel like our drive to school is a lot of refereeing and just trying to keep the emotions in the car regulated for the entire drive kind of sucks cuz it's like a 25 minute drive. So as far as negativity goes, I'm sure everyone has heard a quote that is similar to this, that it takes seven positive comments to cancel out a negative.

There's a reason behind this. There is a scientific reason behind this. So I found this on LifeSource coaches.com. They're quoting, uh, Dr. Richard and Judith Glasser, and basically they're saying, neuroscience is now teaching us that when we face criticism, rejection, or feel fear, when we feel marginalized or minimize, our bodies produce a higher level of cortisol.

That's triggered by the hypothalamus, and it's causing a fight or flight reaction that burns the negativity into your brain, and the cortisol sticks around for a while. On the other hand, a positive comment also produces a chemical reaction. Oxytocin is released. This is a feel good hormone. It elevates our ability to get along with others to feel good about yourself.

And guess what? It gets wiped outta the brain way faster than, than, uh, the other chemical. So I have thought about a lot of why, and you just kind of have to think about like, it wasn't that long ago. You know, a couple hundred years ago that you really needed to remember all of this negative information to stay alive, so, If you wanna go all the way back to like cavemen or whatever, if you ate a berry off a bush and it made you unbelievably sick and you near nearly died, that negative thing needs to be burned in your brain forever.

Cuz you don't wanna die again from the berry. It's keeping you alive. But when you stumble across, I don't know, a delicious mango, the steaks aren't as high. It doesn't stick in your brain as long so, F fast forward to today. Negative things are teaching us different messages. They're teaching us that there's something wrong with us, that we can't do anything right.

And the more a child is corrected constantly or in in trouble constantly, the worse they feel about themselves. I'm sure you guys have heard about how uh, when you mistreat your child or you yell and scream at your child, that your child doesn't look at you and think, gosh, there's something wrong with my mom.

They think there's something wrong with me. Right. So all that to say, how can we. Limit negative feedback and constant correction and like not lose our minds. So we've employed a lot of strategies for this. We just have lowered the bar so low sometimes of our expectations. So a messy room is not a priority to me right now.

A priority to me right now is no hitting, kicking, fighting, cussing, doing your chores with a good attitude, being kind like really way more high level stuff. So, and then guess what? I actively ignore the rest. Restfully, ignore the stack of towels that your kid has used because they get a new one every time and it makes you irate.

That's a lot of laundry. You don't need to say something about it right now. Shelly pointed this out one time and she was saying that her relationship with her child was more important to her than trying to get her kid to get their homework done. And I have to say that my relationship with my children is more important, more important than how many towels they use.

So that's not to say than when it is time to wash those towels, I will not rope that kid in to helping me fold them and put 'em away. I'm not saying like life is just a party rave at my house or anything. I'm just saying we prioritize things so. I was talking to my friend whose daughter has ADHD and she has siblings, and every day when they would get picked up from school, she would have such a major emotional collapse that everyone in the car was just like white knuckling to get, get home, be nasty, physically reacting, just kind of like a toddler that has missed three naps in a row and.

I was telling her that, you know, we have always had no screens in the car unless we're on like a trip of some kind. That has been my like hill I was gonna die on. I believe it's important for kids to be bored and observe the world around them, and that's how it invention happens. Right. Okay. She pointed out to me that maybe the 30 minute car ride home being a time where everyone can chill and maybe watch a movie.

Is not a bad thing. Like maybe it's actually better than trying to have this fantasy that everyone is sitting in the cardboard and she lets her daughter put on headphones and she plays on her phone and the rest of the kids get to talk about their day and there's no disruption. And I just listened to that and I was like, what is it about me that no screens in the car is such a big deal?

And I think it's just because more and more there's become this huge dependence on screens and I, it's a battle probably all of us are fighting or have given up on, and I, I truly believe it's good for kids to be bored, but I recently realized that maybe it's better for all of our sanity for on the car ride back and forth to school to let them watch a video.

So we actually, if anyone knows me, you know, I'm a huge U2 fan and maybe you get tired of me talking about it, but I, I got a new car, a new to me car, a used car, and it came with an entertainment system. And anytime we've bought a car and the person on the car, dealer law is like, this one has an entertainment center, Woohoo.

Casey and I are always like, we don't want that. We don't want an entertainment system because the kids are gonna beg to use it and we don't want them. Watching TV when we're just driving down the street, we've always gotten weird looks cuz obviously the entertainment system is a big deal to most people.

This one has it. It even has a DVD player in it cuz it's an older car and they've just been desperate to try it out. So one of my kids grabbed a U2 concert, D V D. It was actually, he meant to grab the performance one, but he actually grabbed the documentary about the tour and he's like, can we please watch this?

And I was like, this was before I had my, uh, realization the other day that why am I fighting this one so hard? So I put it in. It is spliced together or edited together, the band performing and then them talking about the stage that they built for the, this is for the 360 tour, if anyone knows what I'm talking about.

They performed in, um, 360 degrees in the round, and so they had to overcome engineering strategies. And difficulties to make their set so nothing was blocking anybody's view anyway. So it's playing some music. Some of it's live, they're talking to the band, they're talking to the engineers and my children are not being disruptive and because it's music, they also are fine with having a conversation cuz it's not like a show.

So I'm answering a lot of questions. Um, I luckily am very knowledgeable about all of the people in the band. You too. I'm in the middle of Bono's biography. Um, but we're chatting but we're not chatting in a way, like I just have the kids we're like, if one kid says, How many, I don't know. How does the water, why does it rain?

And then another kid, of course has gotta be like, you don't know that you're dumb. Like there's just no, there's always an opportunity for my kids to fight. I got instigators and hecklers in my car, so we are now watching these concert DVDs in my car and it has been, A miracle. First of all, we're kind of chatting, but then they're also focusing on the music and watching the performance and they're not fighting.

Okay. So I think part of me has always felt like that's a crutch. Like your kids get along in the car because they're glued to a television. And I have to say, what I decided is my relationship with my child. And their self-esteem is more important than whether I get them to be bored in the car and, I don't know, come up with some creative idea and instead they're just entertained by a screen.

Cuz here's the thing, every day. For an hour, 30 minutes there, 30 minutes back. It is probably the most stressful part of our day. Our kids' behavior is getting corrected over and over and over and over, and that's horrible for me. I've even said, I don't wanna be this way. Don't make me be this way. I don't wanna correct you.

Just stop being mean. Stop touching, stop. You know, stop breathing wrong apparently, cuz now your breathing is bothering everybody. I don't wanna be this way. And I have given a gift to myself to just give up on not watching a TV during the commute. It is, it's such a small thing, but for me, that was just a really, that was a big hangup for me.

Uh, if we can help it when we go out to eat, which we don't go very often, we pick. Our kids have slept well. It's not a Friday where they've been at school all day, like maybe it's a Saturday early dinner or lunch. So we pick the right time because I wanna set them up to succeed. I don't want the meal to be a failure.

And then we order everything when we sit down. And we usually go to a Mexican or an Italian place because they bring you food as soon as you sit down, either breadsticks or chips and salsa. And we don't linger and we don't allow devices and that is actually going okay because we don't go out to dinner that often because they get in the car and they tell me how hungry they are and we just spent a fortune on a meal.

But, so I'm not giving up completely and we are. Still limiting screen time in the house to two hours total a day. And again, I was giving them opportunities to do extra chores or works of service and be helpful around the house to earn additional minutes. And what I realized is, was I was introducing an opportunity for conflict in my house because.

There would be things like, okay, if you do a load of laundry from start to finish and you put it away, I'll give you 30 extra minutes. Well, what if the laundry was already started and you just need to get it out and fold it? How many minutes do I get for that? And I'm like, well, 15. Well, guess what? They think 15 is a pile of baloney and you're gonna have an argument over it for an hour.

So we have just decided it's two hours. I don't care what is happening in anyone's life. It's two hours and the, when the, when your device shuts off. Cuz this, we programmed them to shut off at the end of two hours. You can't, there's not any more negotiating. There isn't. Can I go water the plants? Has the dog been walked today?

Like in the beginning it was fun cuz it was like, oh my gosh, these kids are being so helpful. But now they're agitated because there's a little bit of like, I deserve more time and you should give me a ton of minutes for whatever this thing I am doing. So we've removed the opportunity to argue and it's just two hours.

It's two hours anyway. You slice it. And there's a lot of conversations about, do you really wanna use that before I take you to camp? Because after camp you're really gonna wanna use it. We do. Well, you know, we may watch a movie as a family, like that sort of thing. It's not like the TV's never on after that, but their personal device time or just sitting in front of Netflix cuts off after two hours.

And I wanna be flexible with them. And what I'm realizing is that. My Neurodiverse children don't know how to handle gray areas. And a gray area is where you're like, the mom says, yeah, you know what? Si the laundry's halfway done. If you just wanna fold it and put away, I'll give you 15 minutes. And if it doesn't make sense to the recipient of that challenge, and there's gonna be outrage.

So it's just easier. Just remove the problem black and white. This is how much time you get. Another thing that we have done to improve the opportunity for successful behavior in our house is we have locks on a lot of things. We put these in years ago, and actually not all of them are in use anymore, but um, I was at someone's house and they have a child who has to have a special diet because of some various issues.

So, And he had this lock, and it's just a Dee Dee keypad lock. It's not a deadbolt, it just works on your regular door knb. And I was like, where did you get that? And how much was it? So we installed them on our pantry. We leave it unlocked all the time. Now, unless I'm like, there's a birthday cake in there, I don't want anyone to eat.

But there's one on the pantry. There's one on the toy closet in the game room because if they have full access to the toy closet, All of the toys will be emptied everywhere, and there will be conflict, discipline, and fights. Right? We have one on our workout room because the workout equipment is dangerous and my kids don't know how to not get on the treadmill and do something stupid, and there's heavy weights and all of my husband's workout equipment, so there's a code on that.

And then my oldest son has hyper focus and. Little brothers were taking advantage of the fact that if the oldest was hyper-focused reading or doing something, they could arm me crawl into his room and steal stuff, especially Lego sets that he'd spent a few hours building. So there's a keypad lock on big brother's door.

I think that's all the doors. And then, For the backyard where we have a pool and we've only had it a few years, and when we first got it, my youngest was like three, and I was terrified of drownings because. It's just way more common than you think. So we actually have, this is on the deadbolt and it is a physical, there's buttons, it's, they call it digital, but it's digital cuz it has numbers.

But you actually push in the code and you are pushing in the unlock mechanism to be able to unlock the door. And let me tell you what, when my friend comes and babysits and she brings her 18 month old with her, it gives me such peace of mind to know that no one can open that door but her. So we have that as well.

So what this does is it eliminates an opportunity for conflict with my kids. As a matter of fact, one time the toy closet upstairs got left open somehow. Probably cuz my oldest knows the code. He's just more responsible. He probably didn't get it closed all the way. It is stuffed full with things. And one of my kids, Got into it and I was downstairs doing something and I could hear just a lot of vocalizing and I'm like, is he crying?

He's just up in the game room and I, you know, would look on the camera that we have in there and he's sitting there like with a bunch of stuff. So finally I walked up the stairs and was kind of listening outside the door and he just was going, I. I am so stupid. I am the biggest idiot. I'm gonna get in so much trouble.

My parents are going to yell at me because he decided I'm gonna organize this closet. It desperately needed it, but a child with d ADHD is instantly overwhelmed with a chaotic closet. They need a job like you are in charge of Nerf darts. Find every Nerf dart and put it in a bin. Instead of like, here's Legos and Nerf charts and Hot Wheels and whatever else.

All mixed together is overwhelming. And it broke my heart because I went up there and I'm like, buddy, what's going on? He's like, I'm so stupid. I was gonna clean out the toy closet and I started doing it. I made the mess worse. And I'm such an idiot and I, I know I'm gonna get in so much trouble you guys.

First of all, that felt like a super big failure on our part, the parent part. And I also hated that the closet was accessible to him because he entered into a situation that he couldn't handle. It wasn't that big a deal. I gave him big hugs. I talked to him about his intentions. I talked to him about how appreciative I was, that he was honest with me and we picked up and we closed the door and moved on.

Something to think about. I am noticing with my kids, if they really understand the reason for a rule, they are more likely to follow it. If a rule doesn't make any sense to them, it's not gonna go great. And it's so fascinating. We got a new table a few years ago. It's really pretty. It's real modern, so I think it's like white lacquer and it's just, um, It's like a cent.

A cent, what am I trying to say? It's like a centered pole in the middle and then a big white lacquered rectangular top on it. It's real modern looking. And I got these, uh, place mats to try to protect it from heat. And our first meal, I noticed that they weren't enough, and the lacquer under my hot plate had like bubbled up and I was like, oh my God, we just got this.

Uh, table. So I bought thicker, I researched the place mats and I found some thicker place mats that would look nice on the table, and I. Basically just showed the kids, Hey, I wanna show you this. I actually did this. No one is in trouble, but I thought the place mats that I bought were gonna protect the table and look, it did it.

It's got this big weird spot on it that I made with my hot plate. So I got these other thicker place mats, and I just really need you guys. Anytime you sit down, you need to use one. Would you believe three years later? Every time they sit down at that table, they use a place mat. Every time they will go looking for one.

If somehow they have gone missing, if anyone dares to sit down without a place mat, someone else in the room is gonna be like, Hey, you need a place mat? Oh yeah, I need a place mat. What, and Casey and I look at each other and I'm like, what? This is the rule you choose to obey. And they're the same way way with knives.

So, We had the same block of knives for 20 years cuz we got it when we got married. And recently Casey had the genius idea of replacing it with some knives that actually cut. So we got these knives and again, I just mentioned to the kids, Hey guys, I wanna show these new knives. They're gonna be so much better than what we had.

I just wanna let you know that water actually is what Doles knives. So these really can't spend. Half an hour in the dishwasher, they need to be hand washed. So everybody just do me a favor and let's not put these in the dishwasher. Would you believe that if anyone sees a knife in the dishwasher, they immediately are like, ah, mommy, there is a knife in the dishwasher.

Somebody put this knife in the dishwasher. And they are so anal about the knives not going in the dishwasher because I explained to them what happens to the knives and that we want the knives to work. So I'm trying, like we've really struggled with the kids eating on the couch. And I'm wondering if the issue is that I eat on the couch after they go in bed.

Yeah, I'm gonna eat a snack, I'm gonna watch tv. Maybe that's confusing to them cuz they see me doing it, so why can't, we had a big thing last week over eating strawberries in the living room and I was like, strawberries are not a living room food. We have a rug, we have fabric furniture and strawberries and that don't go together.

That is a kitchen food. And guess what? You can sit at a stool in the kitchen and still see our gigantic television. You're like five more feet away. But it was, it's an issue. So I need to solve that one. That is annoying. Uh, I guess we haven't convinced them on the reasoning behind not eating on the couch yet.

And then, let's see what else I was gonna say. Remaining calm. Changing my reaction to my kids' screw ups has been huge for me. I dunno if you remember on a past episode I was talking about how I think I accidentally taught my kids to lie to me, because when I found something clearly misused or broken, I would erupt, and then ain't nobody gonna tell me what happened.

I am not going to get an answer. I realize, and Casey did this too, I was not alone and immediately getting frustrated because a lot of stuff in my house is broken with these three children running around, three boys running around. So it used to be like a big trigger for us. It's gotten better, but I remember one time I was out in the garage, I was getting something outta my trunk and one of my kids had a broom.

I think he might've been like sweeping, honestly. And I was like, Hey buddy, what are you doing? And he started spinning a tail. Instantly. His first instinct was not to say, oh, I don't know. I thought the garage looked dirty and I thought I would sweep it, or I wanted to pretend like this broom was a sword, or I wanted to, sometimes they like to knock, uh, the helicopter seeds out of our tree and then they try to sell them.

So maybe that's what he was doing. But instead he's like, well, um, this person down the street was asking me if I could do this. And I just looked at him and I was like, not a word that is coming outta your mouth. It's true. And also nothing you're doing is wrong. So he had learned, he better have a story to my satisfaction every time he's asked what he's up to.

I had taught him that just telling me the truth was going to result in major consequences and it wasn't gonna be safe with me. So we had a big talk with everybody and we encouraged them. If you're in the house somewhere and you're doing something and maybe you're jumping off of your dresser and you break your bed, which has happened, If you all just come to me and be like, I don't, I, mom, I, I'm so sorry.

I, we weren't thinking and I was on my dresser and I did a front flip onto my bed and I think I broke it. We can have a conversation about, Why it's not a good idea to jump off of your dresser onto a bed and how are we gonna fix it? That particular instance, that kid slept in a caved in bed cuz he broke the box spring a caved in bed for like a year.

And it was kind of annoying cuz he didn't mind. I was like, I don't know when we're gonna replace that bed. But I, we actually went under the bed so I could show him like the crummy wood that his cheap mattress was made of. Box spring was made of, and I could show him like, you know, this is what happens when you jump on.

It is you're not on a trampoline. Anyway, we worked through it. He acknowledged what he did. We discussed safety, blah blah, blah. No one has jumped off any furniture lately and broken something. You know, they'll come up with some other unique thing to do. But in the moment, I was just delighted that I. I was told the truth and he had a consequence.

His bed was broken for a while. I didn't rush out to fix it. Just like when my kids had a light saber fight upstairs and they got a little close to the game room TV and broke it, and I'm sure they were very terrified for a minute.

But the two of them came downstairs eventually and were like, I have something to tell you. I'm afraid you're gonna be mad. Okay. What happened? We were having a lightsaber fight and we broke the television, so we had to talk about that and about what it means to have a TV in the game room and why or why not they should have one.

And I. They were very apologetic and I don't think we replaced that TV for about a year. And in the end they paid for half of the new television and I actually ended up replacing it cause I was so tired of children shows being on my downstairs TV that I really wanted the upstairs TV fixed. So I'm not saying that all is perfect at my house.

It's not like it's super, super, super not. But I have learned some lessons and. I have to say, I mean, my mom was at my house recently and she was like, you need to lay down the law on how messy they are in their bathrooms. And I was like, I would love to. But since every day after school this week, we've had multiple meltdowns that have lasted a really long time.

The priority of dirty underwear on the floor in the bathroom has fallen so far off my list that I can't even describe it to you. And she looked at me and guess what? She didn't raise easy kids. She raised tricky kids. And she's like, okay, yeah, I get it. I mean, it's real easy to walk into my house and be like, how can she allow them to do this?

How can she allow her kids to have rooms that look like this? And how I can allow it is that I cannot get onto my kid for one more thing in their day. It's not good for them and it isn't a skill they have yet. Have you ever stopped to think about what skills your kids have? Stop and think about, does my kid have the skill yet to stay organized?

Does my kid have the skill yet to do a good job loading the dishwasher or sweeping the floor, or did I just hand him a broom one day and expect that a broom was self-explanatory? What skills do your kids have? Do they have the ability to reflect on the mistake they've made yet and have a discussion with you?

Or are they still stuck in that? I am in the moment. I have no, there's no past, there's no future. I don't know why I did that. And we're all learning together and you know, your kid has an impulse and they take a Sharpie and they ride all over your brand new couch. Right? And you wanna freak out. I read an article about a lady and she's like, I bought brand new white furniture, and my kids were like under seven, and that's on me.

I chose to get a white couch and then try to enforce rules to keep the white couch perfect, and not a week later did her child who was neurodiverse and a lack of impulse control have a Sharpie in his hand and he wrote his name on the back of her couch. There was a lesson learned in a couple of ways.

He, first of all, felt horrible that he had done that. A lot of times kids are doing something and there isn't. None of it is about you. None of it is about disrespecting you, disrespecting the house. They just have a sharpie in their hand and wanna write their name down. Like literally we attach so much to our kids' behavior when really it's just, does my kid have the skill, first of all for me to have white furniture and maintain it?

And second of all, for me to leave Sharpies out cuz when my kids were little, if. I saw a sharpie just sitting out on the counter. I would gasp as if it was like a loaded weapon. I would be like, Casey, did you leave this Sharpie out? You're just, I mean, I have walked through the house before I'm going to bed, and I just see a pair of scissors sitting on our coffee table and I'm like, better grab those.

Better grab those because someone tomorrow is gonna be having their screen time and they're gonna want something to fiddle with, and they're gonna see the scissors and they're gonna pick 'em up and they're gonna start fiddling with them. And they're gonna start, they're gonna start poking my couch and before you know, I'm have a hole in my couch and I can eliminate that huge issue by noticing the scissors and taking them with me and putting them in the bathroom so they're out of sight.

If I just put them in the drawer in the kitchen, the hole in my couch isn't going to happen. It's leaving it in the sight of someone who doesn't have impulse control. I hope that makes sense. So just some stuff to think about. Have you taught your kids the skills of the things you're trying to enforce?

Have you right sized your reactions to your tricky kids' mistakes and. Is your relationship with your child worth certain standards in your house? So I leave you with that. Anyone who has got children that they manage to keep everything running smoothly with like clean rooms and everything, I. Applaud you.

I think it's so amazing. We're not there yet. I hope to get there in some months. We have months in a row where the standard goes up and then guess what? Uhoh, something happens. Maybe somebody had a growth spurt and their medication stopped working and we gotta adjust it. So all the rules come crashing down and we back way up and suddenly we're gonna lower the bar for a little while and then we're gonna work that skill back up.

So flexibility's key guys, that's where we are now. And it's a lesson I'm continuing to learn on a regular basis.  I appreciate everyone listening. Thanks for coming today and if you liked any of those show ideas and you even just have a comment or like an antidote that you want to submit, Shoot me an email at where the F is My  📍 village gmail.com.

I'd love to hear from you. I get about one email a week from people, and it's so gratifying for me. And also sometimes people are asking for tips, and I love, I love helping people love, love, love, love it. I guess that's why I have a podcast. All right. Take care everybody. I will see you next week.