New gadgets and fashionable clothes, the best tutors and trips to the sea, opportunities that we ourselves did not have in childhood … It seems that we, parents, take midterm exams endlessly, and strict and picky examiners — our children — are constantly dissatisfied with something. About what to do with it, psychotherapist Anastasia Rubtsova.
A friend brought her son to the sea. The son is a handsome fashionable boy of 12 years old, not quite a teenager yet, but almost. He went out to the beach, contemptuously pouted his lips, said that it was in general, there were algae on the stones on the left and there were no parachutes. There were parachutes in Dubai in winter.
“Nastya,” a friend writes, “how to console him? What if he doesn’t swim at all? What to do?»
“Try,” I write, “local fish. And wine. That’s my professional advice.»
The daughter, a charming girl who looked like Hermione, accused another friend of hers that the house was dusty and a mess. “Damn,” says a friend, almost crying, “I agree, a mess, there’s no time to vacuum the second week, then I hand over the report, then I run to the hospital to Aunt Lena, then I go to sports — well, maybe I didn’t have to go to sports, I I could have vacuumed at that time.”
To another friend, the daughter with a disdainful grimace says: “Well, oh-oh-oh, will you finally buy me xBox in July, or do you have little money again?” The friend is ashamed, because the money is really not enough. And they are needed for others. And he is not immediately a good father who provides his child with everything necessary (including warmth, support and a bicycle), but a guilty loser who has not had enough money for an xBox for the third month.
So, this is a trap.
It is interesting that the most responsible and sensitive parents usually fall into this trap. Those who really try and really care how the child feels. Who cares, they are immune to reproaches. Parents suffer, whose expenses “for a child” (study, tutors, treatment, entertainment, fashionable things) are, if not the largest, then certainly a noticeable item in the budget.
But still, they, frightened by books about childhood traumas and parental callousness, themselves endlessly doubt: am I not doing enough, oh, am I doing not enough? And why then the child is not enough? Maybe you should try harder?
The child does not have reliable criteria by which he could evaluate our parenting work as “good” or “bad”
No. We must try less.
We all (ok, not all, but many) share the illusion that if you are good caring parents, try and do everything right, then the child will “like it”. He will appreciate. He will be grateful.
In fact, a child is a very poor appraiser. He has — it seems to be obvious, but not obvious — there are no reliable criteria by which he could evaluate our parenting work as «good» or «bad». He has very little life experience, he has never been in our place, feelings still often deceive him. Especially a teenager who is generally thrown back and forth by hormones like a ball.
A child — like any person — will think that everything comes easy to us and costs nothing, even cleaning, even making money. And if we don’t do something, it is out of harmfulness and stupid stubbornness. Until he finds out it’s not.
A child — like any person — will assume that «good» is when it’s better than «normal». And if the winter sea in Dubai, gifts, fashionable gadgets, cleanliness in the house and, on top of everything, an attentive patient parent is his “normal”, then, on the one hand, you can be glad for him, seriously. On the other hand, he really has no way to know that there is some other “normal”.
And it happens.
The child cannot appreciate what this «normal» has cost and is worth to us. He does not see what we refuse and how we try. And it is not the business of a child, and especially a teenager, to give us, as parents, a well-deserved five (or, if you like, a five with a minus).
And this is certainly not the business of society — after all, it, too, like a baby, believes that we should try even harder, and more, and more, and more.
Only we ourselves can put this five. We can and even, I would say, we should.
It is we—not our children and not external spectators—who have to grope for the point at which the transformation takes place. When our children go from tender babies who need affection, warmth, security and «all the best» to teenagers who need something completely different.
They need something to overcome and something to cope with. And difficulties are needed, and restrictions. They sometimes, imagine, need to be told: “Dirty? Bunny, clean up and wash the floors. You are lazy, but believe me, laziness is much more. And I’m very tired.»
It is sometimes very sobering for them to hear: “Don’t like the sea? Well, come up with something so as not to ruin my vacation, because I like it.
And even this stupid parental phrase that infuriated us in childhood “Am I printing money?” — can sometimes be rehabilitated. We don’t actually print them.
And you know, kids really need someone to tell them about money. That they are quite difficult to earn. That most of us are not as successful as Elon Musk or even Oleg Deripaska. Why, even becoming the head of the purchasing department is sometimes a lot of work and luck. Often there is not enough money for something, and this is normal.
And if we want gratitude, then why not show what, in principle, one can be grateful to another person for?
We, parents, have nowhere hidden an endless source of wealth and strength, patience and self-sacrifice. Very sorry. But it will be better for everyone if the child guesses this before he turns 18.
It is best if we ourselves notice our merits. Then the child, if lucky, will notice not only what the parent DOES NOT buy and DOES NOT do, but also accidentally what the parent does. Not dust on the shelves, but the fact that for the previous 10 years someone periodically wiped it. That there is food in the refrigerator, and the child himself has tennis and an English tutor.
The art here is to show this to the child without attacking him. Not getting into the position of the accuser and not throwing the word «ungrateful».
Not «ungrateful». Inexperienced.
And if we want gratitude, then why not show what, in principle, one can be grateful to another person for? Yes, for everything, literally for everything: for a cooked dinner and sneakers as a gift, for consolation and the fact that our clothes are magically washed, for the fact that someone plans our vacation and tolerates our friends in their house. And after all, how to thank, the child also does not know. Show. Tell me. This skill is not formed by itself and is not taken out of thin air.
And he is priceless. It is much more useful than the skill of making others feel guilty. Or than the skill of being dissatisfied.
Someday it is for him that you will be grateful. Although this is not accurate. In the meantime, try the fish and wine.