The Alert Parent

2011-04-25T08:52:00.000-07:00

When I spoke to a group of teenagers on communication, one teenager wanted to talk about something else. During lunch break she visited with me privately.

What she wanted to talk about was how to hang on to what you believe to be true about yourself, your life and your passions.

Turns out she was tapped in—in a good way—to who she was, what she wanted and what she believed, though the people around her were anything but.

This teenager knew she was losing ground. She wanted to know how to hang on to what she knew to be true.

Her parents were saying that her dreams were impractical, and her friends were criticizing her attitude. “Is it weird for me to decide I want something and then investigate ways to make it happen? My friends tell me I’m compulsive and way too serious. Does this mean it’s true?”

I reassured her that her actions were not peculiar and that being strategic and pursing goals was admirable.

Before I shared with her a secret that would help her stay on track and remain true to herself, I said, “If you had to pick one thing that you enjoy doing more than anything else, what would it be?”

She said, “I love taking pictures. I love using a variety of cameras and lens. Actually, I keep telling my parents I want to be a photojournalist. They think I am nuts and could never support myself.”

She proceeded to tell me that her parents were encouraging her to pursue accounting. “They believe I’m good with numbers and that if I get an accounting degree I will be more likely to make money. I don’t like accounting!”

I asked her to think about how being a photojournalist made her feel? She lit up, almost giddy with excitement. When I asked her to think about what it would feel like to be an accountant, a dull look covered her eyes. She looked tired and drained.

Then I told her the secret: If you want to know what is right for you to do, monitor your feelings. Your feelings are the indicator. If it feels good, you are on track. If it feels bad, you are off course.

Think of your feelings as a compass. A ship captain relies on a navigational system to keep a ship on course. In the beginning of the journey, the captain enters the destination—the ultimate goal. As the journey continues, the captain continues to check his system and makes adjustments because over the course of the trip it takes adjustments to keep the ship on course.

Adjusting throughout as the trip continues means that eventually the captain will arrive at the place he intended to be.

Our feelings work the same way, and so do the guidance systems of our children. What you believe is their path is not a good indicator. What inspires and excites your child are major clues about the direction they need to take to be a fulfilled, prosperous and happy adult.

Hanging on to yourself during adolescence can be difficult to do. When your teenager tells you she or he is losing their ground, pay attention.

What’s the best way to help your teenagers hold on to themselves and what they know to be true during adolescence years? Encourage them to pay attention to their feelings. Help them recognize what brings them joy. Taking the path that follows their bliss is never a wrong path. It might not pay off as they suspected or hoped for, but it will pay off.

Allyn Evans
Email Me!
www.LiveaPowerfulLife.com

Parenting is Not about Being the BFF

2011-03-25T08:58:00.000-07:00

Your job is not to be your child’s “best-friend” or “sibling.” Parents using this style tend to view a child as a confidante, which typically means giving too much information.

Experience tells us children become easily burdened by parental financial and relationship problems. Likewise, playing the best friend means it is more difficult to correct or make decisions that are displeasing to your child.

As a parent you will say no to your child and you will make her angry. While it’s hard to say no, it’s even more difficult to say no to your best friend.

One day your relationship may develop along the lines of friendship, but during adolescence it is better to be comfortable—as comfortable as you can be—not being the friend. Your child will be better served if you are authoritative instead.

An authoritative parent is one who is warm and caring, but is also highly structured. Authoritative parents have rules and high expectations for their children.

An episode from Grey’s Anatomy helped me see the big picture. Physician Addison Montgomery has a pregnant patient who demands to have a non-surgical birthing. After practicing ‘natural’ childbirth, the patient refuses to accept anything else. She believes doctors push too early to perform C-sections, and she will not agree to the procedure Dr. Montgomery feels is necessary.

Because a past trauma has made her question her own decisions, Dr. Montgomery acts more like an indulgent parent than an experienced and authoritative physician. Under the onslaught of her patient’s tempestuous demands, Dr. Montgomery abandons the position she knows to be necessary.

Another doctor helps Montgomery to realize her responsibility is to be the competent, knowledgeable physician she is, not a woman vying for first place in a Miss Congeniality contest.

Dr. Montgomery returns to the pregnant woman’s room. She has to order the patient to shut up to get her to listen. “I have to make a decision that will save your life,” the doctor says. “It’s important and I’m the one who has to make it. Not you. Not now. Discussion closed.”

Only when the doctor is sure of her own position can the patient who is desperate for another outcome respect the doctor’s authority.

Our goal as parents is to be our powerful selves and to evaluate what’s before us. When we make a decision in the best interest of our children, we must hold our ground and say, “Not you. Not now. Discussion closed.”

One mother who listened to a stranger desperately trying to reason with a howling toddler finally remarked to a friend, “That kid and the rest of us will all feel a lot better if Daddy just says no. There’s a reason parents are made bigger than the kids.” I believe it is important to talk and explain your decisions if the child is old enough to understand, but there are also times when it’s necessary to be authoritative, to be more like Dr. Montgomery.

Author Cheryl Dellasega reminds us, “Holding fast to our standards and allowing our children to hate us, on occasion, is mature and responsible, and provides the opportunity to stay firm in our loving, despite the wrath of our progeny.

What better way for a child to learn that a human can dislike or censor another’s behavior while maintaining affection for that person? Could this be the true test of a loving parent: to love a kid—and herself—enough to be, temporarily, despised by that child?”

As children mature, they will have different best friends. Parents provide them with boundaries they need to grow and learn.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email Me!

Cell Phone and Internet Use Agreements for Caregivers

2011-02-14T07:58:00.001-08:00

RESOURCES and TOOLS for Parents (Internet Safety)

Cell phone and Internet Use Agreements:
If you'd like a copy of a parental/child agreement for cell phone or Internet use, please email me. Write "Send me parental agreements" in subject line.

For other resources you might find helpful, keep reading:

Parenting Online Guide by WiredKids.org

http://wiredkids.org/resources/documents/pdf/parentingonline.pdf

Definitions of Technology Terms Used

http://www.netsmartz.org/safety/definitions.htm

Email for kids: www.gmail.com
For instructions on signing up for gmail

Need help counteracting a cyberbully? Visit: www.wiredkids.org

If you need more than on-line help, call the hotline. For more info
about their services, visit: http://www.wiredsafety.org/911/index.html

For more Short Message Service lingo, visit: http://www.smsslang.com/

Reviews of best cell phones for children:
http://www.consumersearch.com/cell-phones/best-kids-cell-phone

Reviews of best parental control software products:

http://internet-filter-review.toptenreviews.com/

Another parental control product to check out: www.pcpandora.com

Signing up for Google Alerts:

www.google.com. For instructions on how to set up, visit:
http://thealertparent.blogspot.com/2008/03/using-google-alerts-to-track-your-child.html

Search engines for kids: www.kidsclick.org, and http://kids.yahoo.com

For Chapter on Determining Your Values from the yet-to-be-released:
(retitled) Helping Your Daughter Live a Powerful Life, visit:

http://www.allynevans.com/pdf/LivingHappilyEverAfterTodayValuesChapter.pdf

There are related articles in this blog. Refer to the listing in the right hand column for subject matter.

Exactly As I Am

2011-01-22T20:14:00.000-08:00

While writing Helping Your Daughter Live a Powerful Life (release date: 2011), I read Exactly as I Am by Shaun Robinson, a book filled with advice from well-known women.

Following are some excellent nuggets from Robinson about “what it takes to believe in yourself.”

1: You Are Who You Are

Many teenagers look in the mirror and see less than they desire. I totally get this. The mirror was not a friend of my younger self. Robinson reports that stars such as Janet Jackson, Sharon Stone and Jennifer Love Hewitt also felt the same way. Sharon Stone said, “I didn’t think I was pretty until I was thirty-three years old. Think of all the time I wasted.” It’s important to help our daughters love who they are. If you are trying to change your child, she knows it. Take the lead by loving her for who she is.

2: If You Fall, Get Back Up

Ever watched The Rookie starring Dennis Quaid? This feel-good movie, based on a true story about someone going after his dream, demonstrates the path to dreams isn’t necessarily easy. While you are heading in the direction of your dreams, there will be challenges and upsets. Meredith Vieira, Today Show co-host, shared with Robinson that she was fired from her first television job after being told she didn’t have what it takes. “My father found me crying and asked, ‘Do you believe you have what it takes?’” Veira said. “I answered, ‘Yes,’ to which he said, ‘Then why do you care what anyone else thinks?’” Helping our children learn this message is key. We can model this behavior. When things go wrong, don’t crumble. You may fall, but after sitting there awhile, dust yourself off and reevaluate. Make a new plan. Change the plan. Your child will learn from observing you.

3: Reach for the Stars

In The Rookie the character played by Dennis Quaid almost said no to his opportunity to play professional baseball. He was old. He had a decent job. Change would be risky. The only place your child will reach taking the practical or safe road is regret. How do you help your children? Get to the heart of their desire. Ask them what they are aspiring to do. Ask what they want from a goal. Being famous or rich is not a dream worth pursuing. A dream worth pursuing is the dream your child can’t shake, what she does without reward—one that features her skills and talents. Even if parents cannot see it, there are practical uses for a child’s dream. Author Caroline Myss said her family thought she was making a major mistake pursuing a theology degree. “What do you do with theology?” they asked. For Myss it turned out to be an excellent choice. Her best-selling works are laced with theology. Danica Patrick, world-famous woman race-car driver said to Robinson, “Find something that you love to do and you are good at and make a career of it.”

4: Embrace Your Uniqueness

Loving who you are can be difficult for teen-agers. Eva Mendes shared with Robinson’s readers, “The most challenging time in my life was between the ages of thirteen and eighteen. I felt physically awkward and socially inept. I was so insecure about not only how I looked but about everything I said.” Sharing your own experiences with your children will help them be kinder to themselves.

Shaun Robinson says, “What I learned from all the women I interviewed was about how to embrace yourself—warts and all.” Robinson’s book reminded me of this message. Thanks, Shaun.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email me!

Braces Off!

2011-01-16T10:09:00.000-08:00

This column first ran in the newspapers summer 2010.

Addy got the good news her braces would come off in early June.

It is such a momentous occasion, Addy’s orthodontist schedules a day every six weeks strictly for his patients who are having their hardware removed. We were both thrilled.

For me it meant fewer orthodontist trips and the end of buying soft mushy foods every six weeks. For Addy it meant lots more—including bypassing the minor pain that followed every check-up.

I never required braces and didn’t know the ‘after-braces-off’ routine. I had heard people wore retainers, but I had no idea what was required. Before Addy’s big day, we had other adults tell us about their experiences.

Our home renovations guy said he never wore his retainer. After a period of time—a short period—his teeth changed position again. All that time, money, and discomfort wasted.

We had heard more stories in the weeks leading up to her visit. Those who failed to wear the retainer had good reasons. “Didn’t like it.” Or, “I forgot.” An excuse often repeated—“I lost my retainer and never replaced it.”

In an on-line account, Rachel says: “When I got my braces off during my junior year of high school, I was ecstatic. After three long years in metal, I finally had the smile I wanted.”

Then things went downhill for Rachel: “After a while, it got to be a hassle. I was tired of digging through the garbage in the cafeteria after accidentally throwing out my retainer. I hated how icky it got if it wasn't washed frequently. It made me talk and look really weird. A couple of months after I stopped wearing my retainer, I slipped it on for curiosity's sake. My teeth felt like someone was squeezing them with pliers — it was so painful, I had to take it off right away. You would think warning bells would go off, but I didn't think any more of it.”

Rachel ignored the signs. She ended up with a smile that resembled the one she started with in the first place. A smile she now called, “Ugly.”

While I was waiting for Addy to emerge braceless, a former colleague of mine entered the waiting room. She smiled at me with a mouth full of plastics and wires. She, too, had failed to wear the retainer after the first time round, now was back to do it all again. “I have to wear these at least one more year,” she said. “I won’t neglect wearing the retainer this round.”

While waiting for the unveiling, I read a collection of stories, some comical and some exaggerated, written by patients of the doctor. Time after time, the sad tales all explained why the retainer had been lost or damaged. How much does it cost to replace one? About $100.

Addy had a chance to see and hear firsthand what would happen if she didn’t follow the orthodontist’s instructions, and the stories gave me lots of ammunition. Yes, I stooped so low as to threaten Addy. “If we ever had to do it again, you’re paying for it!” The same goes for a lost retainer.

Addy needs to wear her retainer for 10 to 12 hours in a 24-hour period for up to two years. After that, she’ll still need to wear a retainer, but the schedule is less draconian.

So far, so good. The retainer is being worn regularly and so far it hasn’t been lost. She’s only been braceless for less than a month. Time will tell us how this drama will play out.

Allyn Evans
info@allynevans.com
www.thealertparent.com

P.S. She did end up swallowing the lower wire retainer and we have since switched to the same as for the upper teeth. And, as of this posting...she's still wearing her retainers!

Roughing It

2011-01-11T12:21:00.000-08:00

Does your teen need an attitude adjustment? Have you entertained the idea of shipping him or her off to one of those host families on CMT’s “Worlds Strictest Parents?” Maybe you are looking for a more practical solution, one where you don’t have to be selected to air your drama on national TV.

I have the perfect solution, and it doesn’t have to be expensive, either.

Camp!

But not your regular summer session filled with cabins, pools and fun—something much more basic and centered around camping out and rustic living.

As teen-ager I had attended such a camp, the Episcopal Church-based camp in Canton, MS (Bratton Green) which has been offering adventures for teens for over 50 years.

What’s so great about Pioneer Camp besides the price (less than $500 covers the five-day teen vacation plus the required gear)? Both you and your teens will be glad they went.

Addy had her first go at Pioneer Camp this summer. Even though we are different in many, many ways—what I like to do for recreation, she usually doesn’t, and vice versa—I had no doubts that she would love Pioneer Camp. I was right.

Although I wanted to her to have fun, I also wanted her to gain from the experience. While at camp, you are required to be a functioning member of the team. You help with the chores, cooking and cleaning. Something else I wanted was for her to experience pushing her physical limits, which is accomplished by the activities done at camp such as going on long hikes, climbing steep rock walls, and going over the edge of a cliff (rappelling).

Having had the opportunity as a teenager, I knew the benefits. When facing challenging situations I could remember the time I climbed the wall or completed the 90-foot ropes course. I could tell myself, “If I can do that, I can do what I am facing at this moment.”

If you are the caregiver for a troubled teen, there are options for you as well, some more restrictive and demanding than others. Roughing-it programs might be a more palatable solution than appearing on reality TV. For more information, Google the subject. Find three to five options that work and then call to find out more details. Ask to speak to parents of previous campers to get more input.

I found a mix of offerings for severe situations—those who are court ordered, for example. Boot camp is another type of program for troubled teens, and typically has a military training component or disciplinary system in place.

There were also options for teens with mild to moderate issues and included trained therapists. One such place OutBack Treatment in Utah explains, “Outback, the wilderness treatment program, works with students, struggling teens or troubled teens, 13 to 17 years of age with a range of emotional and behavioral issues that may include Oppositional Defiance, Attention Deficit, Learning Differences, Low Self Esteem, Depression, Substance Abuse and Family Conflict.” They do not accept teens who are gang members, sex offenders or suicidal.

There are also plenty of options for those of you who don’t need help with a troubled teenager. Wilderness Adventures is one. The goal of Wilderness Adventures is “instilling self-confidence, self-reliance and lasting group leadership skills; and ... teaching responsible use of wild lands and concern for the continual preservation of these areas for future generations.”

Because of my own experience, I have always been a proponent of adventure camps for teens. Now that my daughter has also benefited, I want to share this good message with you.

Allyn Evans
Email Me!
www.allynevans.com

I Know More Than You Think

2010-11-12T11:28:00.000-08:00

I asked my daughter, Addy, what parents should know about teenagers today.

She immediately had a response: “Parents of teens need to understand that we know a lot about things—more than they think, probably. We get it from TV, Internet and our friends.”

Boy, did I know this to be a true statement.

Just watching TV now will let tell you that. The innuendoes and outright too-much- information peppered throughout even on a Primetime sitcom are not misunderstood by a teenager.

And then there is PG-13 which contains easily sent messages that are not always the ones we want our children to learn.

I was nine-years-old the first time I watched a scary movie on TV. The show was about the Salem witch hunt, and you and I both know that the movie couldn’t have been that scary.

It was on TV in the 1970s, for goodness’ sakes. It freaked me out for months. Addy and her dad have enjoyed watching scary movies since she was a young age. The movies now are much scarier, if you ask me, but they don’t faze her—she mostly laughs at their absurdity.

I did learn the meaning of the most used cuss word of the day when I was in the 2^nd grade. I didn’t hear it a lot until I actually arrived at college. My daughter says she hears it all the time—at school, on cable TV, on the radio (yes, have you listened to Sirus or XM radio?) and at the movies, to name just a few places.

The point is that children know more than we did when we were their age. But it’s important to keep in mind this doesn’t mean they are more mature than we were at the same age.

In an article titled “Kids Today Know Far More About Sex,” appearing in a Montreal’s “The Gazette”, Julie Beun said, “I recently interviewed Dr. Michael Popkin, the man behind the Active Parenting movement in Georgia. ‘You want to match your answers to the child's developmental level,' he said. ‘Think about it: 14-year-olds are dealing with sexual issues that we dealt with in college.’" She thinks the problem stems from our children’s exposure to the Internet, TV, movies and the big kids at the back of the bus. I agree. She reminds us, “The trick is not just to ensure they have accurate information—babies don't come from storks or Brad Pitt, no matter what Star magazine says—but to keep it all in context of the values you want them to have.”

“Parents need to understand that is the way it is,” Addy said. And that, my friends, is where Beun’s advice squares with Addy’s. We can’t stop our children from receiving the download, but we can talk to our children about our value systems and what is important to us. They do listen, even if you don’t always believe they do. Beun also reminds us that we do have to untie the apron string and, yes, “sometimes, we do have to let them work things out for themselves.”

So if nothing else today, realize that your teen knows more than you think and that even so, it will be okay. Teens have to deal with knowledge beyond their maturity whether we or they like it or not. It’s the world we live in. As parents and caregivers, we can help them process and deal with mature subject matter by listening, responding and answering tough questions.

Thanks, Addy, for helping me address a much-needed subject matter.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
info@allynevans.com

Do You Know Where You Are Going To?

2010-11-09T11:24:00.000-08:00

Recently a song has been playing repeatedly in my head.

It starts: “Do you know where you are going to?”

It continues with lyrics that ask listeners if they are pleased with “what life is showing” them.

This song reminds me how important it is to have a reason to get out of bed every morning. Not only adults need a reason.

Tweens and teens need one, too.

The other night I caught another episode of World’s Strictest Parents. The host parent wanted to know what the eighteen-year-old had in mind for his future. The young man didn’t have a clue.

He said: “In school, I just skated by. In the classes I liked, I did well. In the classes I didn’t like, I didn’t.” The mother for the week told him, “That’s life. Sometimes you have to do things that aren’t fun.”

It reminded me of the time my daughter asked me how I could be having a good time doing laundry.

Most of the teens, if not all of them, who are featured on this show don’t seem to be involved in organized sports or activities.

If you happen to have a child who is just not that in to sports or group-related activities, you have a little more work cut out for you. Don’t fret over this. Simply understand that you might have a bigger challenge to fill in that gap and help them learn the valuable lessons organized sports and activities have to offer. There are other ways to do that.

I remember years ago watching a Dr. Phil show that provided an answer. Dr. Phil was helping troubled teens. His answer: Help children find a deeper purpose for their lives—you know, meaning.

This is easier said than done in some cases, but typically children do have ideas of what they like and dislike. Maybe they love photography or art. Maybe they are the family musician. It’s just a matter of helping that child discover what that might be.

Maybe your child has always wanted to learn a new language. My daughter told me about three years ago that she wanted to learn Japanese.

“Really,” I said, not understanding why in the world she would want to do that.

Several people advised me that I should insist she learn Chinese instead because knowing Chinese would benefit her more when she grew up. I didn’t follow this guidance because I knew my daughter’s interest wasn’t about what would help her land the best future job. It was about an interest in learning the Japanese language, which she is still pursuing today. Of course, I just might have to give Pokemon and Digimon all the credit!

We also volunteer at the local Humane Society. There are many, many opportunities that provide a means to discover interests, passions and skills, which serve to give children ideas about their future—what excites them, bores them and inspires them.

To help your children find a home—a place where their skills, talents and interests can be tapped into—is the goal. Not all children fit the same mold. And you might not always like the hobby or interest being pursued. Let your child try different things. Having a goal—to learn Japanese—might seem crazy to you and maybe your child will start and decide it’s not really an interest. It’s in the pursuit that your child will find answers.

Bottom line: All children need something bigger than themselves. Whether that be a sports team, an orchestra performance or walking homeless dogs, all children need a reason to be.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email me!

I Messed Up!

2010-11-03T14:38:00.000-07:00

We’re all human.

We all make mistakes.

While sitting here writing this article, I can recall many of the mistakes I’ve made in my lifetime.

More importantly, I also remember how I felt.

My first recollection of making mistakes involved the dinner table. I remember knocking over tea glasses or breaking plates.

As I grew, my mishaps became more expensive. The world of work set me up for many missteps. Early in my career I fried a copy machine using the wrong kind of transparency slides. Cost: $600.

Not too long ago I really outdid myself. I decided to hang a window ornament above a window. I picked a place on the frame for the nail to go and then began to hammer away. I’m sure you can see where this story is going. Yes, after about three bangs, the full length glass pane window shattered. That little mistake cost me one big mess and $350.

Not all mistakes have a monetary value tied to them, but most have some consequences. I have many memories of messing up at work—reporting inaccurate data or releasing information peppered with typos and mistakes. Mistakes can humiliate and embarrass us, if we let them.

Teaching our children how to deal with accidents and mistakes is important.

Many children are afraid of making mistakes. They tie mistake-making with being bad. I can see where this idea comes from because even in the world of work, when I made a mistake, I mostly felt ashamed and yes, like a bad child who needed to be punished.

As I blundered through my young adult life I’m not sure why I didn’t realize every other person walking on the planet had made mistakes too.

When talking to our children about this very topic maybe we should take a page from motivational speaker Zig Ziglar. "A big shot is just a little shot that kept shooting."

You have a long list of famous quotations you could pull out like: “There is no point crying over spilled milk.” Or, “Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.” Or what about a quotation attributed to Albert Einstein: “Anyone who had never made a mistake has never tried anything new.”

Something else to teach our children…after a mistake is made it is important to fess up to it. Model this behavior. It’s important to take responsibility for what we have done whether it be an accident or not. Teaching accountability will help your children better navigate their humanness.

I have mentioned before the story of Randy Pausch, the late computer science professor who wrote a book titled: The Last Lecture. If you haven’t already checked out this book, it is on my list of recommended reads.

At one point in his story, Randy told readers to: “Saddle up and ride.” That’s what we can tell our children too. After the milk is spilled, then there really is no other pertinent message. After a mistake is made, our children need to understand that we can find solutions to fix our problems. Truth: You can’t change what has already happened. But what you can do is learn from what has happened and make better choices moving forward.

As the story goes, Thomas Edison made several thousand attempts before he found success building his first light bulb. Later Edison reportedly said: “I have not failed. I’ve discovered ten thousand ways that don’t work.” Helping our children understand that making mistakes is more about learning how to improve ourselves and our lives is a valuable, valuable lesson to teach.

Allyn Evans
Email me!
www.thealertparent.com

The Get-Away Plan

2010-10-27T14:27:00.000-07:00

A friend told me about an out-of-town trip she was taking alone. If you are the primary caregiver, you know the basics of the story, something along the lines of the following:

Primary Caregiver makes all the necessary plans for her trip. “I’ve checked schedules,” she tells her family. “’I’ve arranged rides and overnight care.” She books flights and hotel and reserves the rental car. She is confident all is well in her world…until about two weeks out.

“Where are you going? When? Don’t go. We need you!”

Guilt rears its head. “How will they manage? Am I insane?”

Caregiver plods forward…beating herself up mentally along the way. She works doubly hard to get everything ready. She not only packs for herself, but also arranges for even the tiniest detail that will occur while she’s gone. In my friend’s case, she had three sports-minded and super active children to make arrangements for.

Caregiver goes to the grocery store to stock the cabinets. She makes a last minute dash to the pharmacy. Having the family run out of anything while she’s away would be disastrous. The day before the scheduled trip she frantically handles last minute details, doubting herself the entire time. Caregiver answers questions while trying not to let negative jabs derail her.

“Too late,” Caregiver says to herself, “I couldn’t back out if I wanted to.”

With every item on the list checked off, Caregiver crawls into bed (two hours later than planned).

Let’s face it. Life is simpler when everyone has assigned roles and fulfills them. But when the Family Manger needs to take a short leave (whether business or pleasure), it’s no easy task to make sure all the fronts are covered. With careful planning, a Caregiver can leave town and everyone will survive. Here are some tips to help you prepare your family for your time away.

1. Create a schedule. A friend includes Google Maps for her sitters.

2. Don’t complicate the schedule. For example, reschedule the orthodontist appointment for when you are home.

3. Explain your travel agenda and how available you’ll be. Check in regularly, but also keep boundaries.

4. Arrange the pet sitters or any other odd job that you usually handle. Leave instructions for duties that are typically covered by you. Sharing these jobs with your children when they are old enough to be helping will make future trips easier.

5. Leave your family contact information.

6. Be sure everyone has access to cash.

7. In case of medical emergencies be sure your sitter or spouse has the insurance card and/or medical consent form.

8. Having a thought-out plan with back-ups you can count on is important whether you are leaving home on an emergency, a business trip or just for fun.

It’s usually the ‘fun’ trip that causes a Primary Caregiver the most anguish. It is good to remember the occasional trip to recharge, regroup, refuel your interests and desires and, yes, to have some fun along the way, can benefit not only the Primary Caregiver, but also her family when she returns invigorated and refreshed.

As my friend talked about how hard it was to stay on course, she said, “But the most interesting thing is what happened when I finally did get in my bed the night before leaving town. As I lay my head on the pillow with the intention of going over my to-do list for the morning, I realize I was ‘hearing’ something else in my head. I heard myself say, ‘I am so very, very happy.’”

What a great example to share with your children.

Allyn Evans
Email me!
www.thealertparent.com

Fake It Till You Make It

2010-10-20T14:19:00.000-07:00

While writing last week’s article based on Charles Sykes “50 Rules Kids Won’t Learn in School: Real-World Antidotes to Feel-Good Education,” I realized I had lots more I wanted to say about this one.

“The real world doesn’t care about your self-esteem as much as your school does. It will expect you to accomplish something before you feel good about yourself.”

I often hear, “I can’t. I’m not ready. I’m not smart enough. I don’t know how.”

In some cases we do need to sit back and gather more experience or even more confidence. However, I’ve found more times than not roadblocks are the result of self-doubts and feelings of incompetence rather than whether or not someone is ready to take the next step.

I will never forget one reality-based competition TV program I watched. I share the story with audiences—particularly teenagers—on a regular basis. Although I cannot remember the name of the show or all the specifics, I do remember the message.

The final three contestants, fashion designers (and, no, it wasn’t “Project Runway”), were heading to Paris for the final leg of the competition. Two were thrilled. For one, the news seemed to be a death sentence. Something was wrong as we—the viewers—were about to find out.

Contestant number one had studied, practiced and worked hard. She had become a designer skilled enough to secure a top-three spot. On the verge of having all her dreams come true, she had one teensy problem. She was afraid to fly.

How she tried. She showed up on the departure day. She boarded the plane. She stayed on the plane for as long as she could, but she couldn’t stand it long enough to leave American soil. The two others, minus a major competitor and much closer to their own dreams, flew off without her.

I share this story with teenagers in with my talk about overcoming fears. The message is that we don’t want to be at the starting gate ready for our opportunity and not be able to take the next step.

We usually don’t do anything the first time completely prepared. We must expand beyond our comfort zone. If we really thought mastery was a prerequisite to begin our projects, we’d never attempt anything. We are never fully ready for the next step. That is the lesson we must convey to our children.

How do we share this message with our children? One way is to model it. We demonstrate how this can be done by doing it ourselves. We follow that old adage: “Fake it till you make it.” We allow our children to see our fear and we let them see us doing things we are afraid of.

There are times when it is better to step back and say, “I need more education. I need more experience. I need guidance.” You can’t practice medicine until you complete the program and earn the degree. But there is a difference between making decisions based on fear or fact. If you see your children hesitating because of fear, then they are probably coming from a place of “not being good enough,” or being afraid they will not measure up.

The way to be best prepared for any opportunity in life is to do the preliminary work. Polish your skills, hone your talents and address any fears you have along the way. Help your children do the same. If you do, you are more likely to find the joys you seek instead of watching your peers fly off to your Paris without you.

Allyn Evans
www.allynevans.com
Email me!

Coming to the Rescue

2010-10-15T14:59:00.000-07:00

While channel surfing, I happened to catch CNN’s Education Consultant Steve Perry, who helps parents with discipline and school-related challenges.

Now that our children are back in school being slammed with activities and homework, the timing couldn’t have been better. Perry offered some really great advice. He was speaking to two well-meaning parents who were having trouble getting their 12- and two 14-year-olds to complete chores and do homework. Basically, they were having trouble getting their teenage children to take care of their business.

Taking care of their own business—completing homework, taking their medicine, cleaning their room—is a vital skill for teens to learn. If they don’t learn this lesson, then when they are responsible for themselves they have difficulty leading successful and productive lives.

Where these parents were at fault, according to Perry, was that they continually rescued their children. For example, their youngest child regularly missed the bus because he wouldn’t get up in time. On the mornings that he missed the bus, his father would leave work and take him. Basically, the child had no consequences for missing the bus and so he did it habitually. The 14-year-old male twin tended to forget to take his homework to school. No worries because there was Dad to come to the rescue. He would leave work, return home and then take his son his homework. No consequences and no lesson learned.

It’s hard to not rescue our children. I know. There are many times I am tempted to save the day. Though most of the time I fight this urge, there are occasions when I do help, which means my daughter forgoes consequences for her behavior. Just yesterday she failed to pack medication she needed to take for a spend-the-night outing. In this case I decided it was more important for her to take her medicine than to suffer the consequences of not taking her medicine. I made this choice realizing I would have other opportunities to make my point. You will have the same opportunities and so, yes, there will be times when rescuing needs to occur. There can be many reasons to rescue. Maybe your child has made great strides and you are now more interested in reinforcing the idea that we all make mistakes and it’s okay. Or maybe it’s been one “bad day” moment after the next and your child simply needs your support and help. On such a day flexibility is what’s called for.

But when a pattern is created that is detrimental to your child’s overall well being, then change needs to occur. Sometimes it takes the view of an outsider to help you see what changes are required. Don’t be afraid to seek help if you are concerned about your child and the direction he or she is headed.

The good news is that it is not too late to start. If you have a teenager who is already entrenched in bad habits—and in this case we are referring to things like homework, study habits—you can start now. Perry tells us children thrive in structure, and it is our job to establish a system that includes monitoring and follow-through. You may find it challenging to change the rules, but it can be done.

Perry also said that parents tend to give their children too many choices—or wide-open choices, which means they are more likely to make bad choices. He suggests giving choices, but narrow them down to two or three while making sure that the options you are offering are all good selections to make.

Allyn Evans
Email me!
www.thealertparent.com

Resources and Tools for Parents (Internet Safety)

2010-10-08T10:06:00.000-07:00

RESOURCES and TOOLS for Parents (Internet Safety)

The Alert Parent Blog: www.thealertparent.com

Parenting Online Guide by WiredKids.org

http://wiredkids.org/resources/documents/pdf/parentingonline.pdf

Definitions of Technology Terms Used

http://www.netsmartz.org/safety/definitions.htm

Email for kids: www.gmail.com
For instructions on signing up for gmail

Need help counteracting a cyberbully? Visit: www.wiredkids.org

If you need more than on-line help, call the hotline. For more info
about their services, visit: http://www.wiredsafety.org/911/index.html

For more Short Message Service lingo, visit: http://www.smsslang.com/

Reviews of best cell phones for children:
http://www.consumersearch.com/cell-phones/best-kids-cell-phone

Reviews of best parental control software products:

http://internet-filter-review.toptenreviews.com/

Another parental control product to check out: www.pcpandora.com

Signing up for Google Alerts:

www.google.com. For instructions on how to set up, visit:
http://thealertparent.blogspot.com/2008/03/using-google-alerts-to-track-your-child.html

Search engines for kids: www.kidsclick.org, and http://kids.yahoo.com

For Chapter on Determining Your Values from the yet-to-be-released:
Living Happily Ever After with Your Daughter Today, visit:

http://www.allynevans.com/pdf/LivingHappilyEverAfterTodayValuesChapter.pdf

If you'd like a copy of a parental/child agreement for cell phone or Internet use, please email me.
Write "Send me parental agreements" in subject line.

Bigger and Better Things

2010-09-26T13:31:00.000-07:00

What does it feel like to not worry about what other people think of you? I call it the Opinion of Others, or OOO for short. I’ve been working on not worrying about OOO for years. Have I completely mastered it? NO!

Recently I had yet another opportunity to work on this skill—someone had an opinion and they felt compelled to share not-so-nice things.

I fretted. I worried.

Oh dear, that’s not how I had planned to handle the situation. Then I realized I didn’t know what it felt like to not care what other people thought. Intellectually I got it. But to live it?

I thought about the times I really didn’t care. Typically, the opinions of a complete stranger don’t induce the OOO syndrome. Neither do the opinons of those who love me best…I figure with them I am on safe ground, that they’ll keep me. But let other family members, friends, or someone who knows someone say something derogatory, I’m fretting and worrying like a champion.

Typically a remark involves my pride and targets the opinion I hold of myself. You know…Reputation. I instinctively want to play the “good girl” part. And then I can’t believe I’m really still wrestling with the Big R. Didn’t everybody else leave that behind in high school?

Finally it dawned on me that I do know what it feels like to not care about the opinions of others. It feels light, airy. It feels good. I am beginning to understand more fully my reputation is what Wayne Dyer describes in his book The Power of Intention. “Your reputation is not located in you. It resides in the minds of others.” He tells us that we have no control over the mind of someone else. What they think is what they think. Dyer explains further, “Leave your reputation for others to debate; it has nothing to do with you.” In short…what other people think of me is none of my business.

I’m ready to believe this. I am ready to feel this. I am ready to live this. While driving home from our summer vacation, my daughter and I chatted about many things. I decided to ask her thoughts on the issue and said, “How do you not worry about the opinion of others?” Although I haven’t been able to fully participate in this concept, something has worked for her. She doesn’t have this problem—at least not yet. Here’s what my wise daughter told me, “That’s easy. Find something bigger and better to think about.”

As is typically the case, once a lesson is learned the universe gives you an opportunity to test yourself. This time I passed with flying colors. As the days grew into a week, I realized I really am residing in a new place. What I thought would bother me (my tempest in a teapot for the moment) did not. Everytime I thought about that irksome situation, I could quickly divert my attention. I, without much effort, could let it go. What was happening outside myself wasn’t impacting me.

The old Allyn would have been very bothered. What will the neighbors think?—‘the neighbors’ being all those people I care about. Breathing deeply, I can say to myself: “It’s okay.” What a relief. People can have opinions and those opinions do not impact me.

I feel so much better. Free.

I’m ready to turn in my worrying about OOO for some real joy in believing in myself…some Oh Oh Oh.

I’m off to think about bigger and better things. Help your children do the same!

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
email me!

Raising Capable Children

2010-06-05T14:35:00.000-07:00

I heard a man on TV give some good advice to his wife about raising their teenage daughters. “It’s like driving a car,” he said. “When you cross the center line, you gently correct it. If there is a flat, you can’t move forward until the flat tire is removed, repaired and replaced.”

We spend their childhood years teaching our children all we know as best we can. Then we metaphorically put them behind the wheel of a car and watch as they drive off. Of course we still have work to do. When our children transition from childhood to teenager, we adjust and begin to parent differently. If we don’t change our parenting style, we hurt ourselves and our children.

If we can remember our goal is to prepare our children to get behind the wheel—to direct their own lives as they head towards adulthood—then they are much more likely to be able to drive when it’s time—and safely and smartly at that.

In college many of my peers had difficulty getting themselves out of bed in the morning. Some didn’t know the basics—like washing clothes, setting an alarm, balancing a checkbook, cooking simple meals. They had been sent off behind the wheel without operating instructions.

How do we raise capable children?

1. Spend time with them. One of the best ways to teach your children is to be with them. Many times I have used car time to teach things I think my daughter needs to know—from mundane to important, from basic driving rules to my beliefs. Often something will be said that will lead to the sharing of information.

2. Honor who your child is. It is difficult to allow your children to be themselves. For instance my daughter and I have different ideas of hurry. I’ll say, “Hurry up, we are running late to meet your friend.” She’ll say, “Okay, Mom.” To me this means, “I will get what I need so that we might still make it on time.” To her it means: “I’ll walk a little faster, but I’m still going to stop and look at this odd shaped bug.” This difference means I am critical every time one of these situations arise. The message delivered is: “Something is wrong with you.” We help our children by constantly evaluating ourselves and our reactions, doing everything we can to send the message, “You are okay.”

3. Encourage your child to take risks and to learn from their mistakes. Many children are afraid of making mistakes and it is important we give them a safe place to trip up. A good example for this is Toastmasters International, a non-profit organization that teaches public speaking. When you mess up, the audience is supportive. No one laughs, snarls or makes fun of you. Your audience wants you to do well, makes suggestions for next time and, before you leave the lectern, applauds.

4. Put them behind the wheel. As children grow and mature, they will need to try and do more things without parental supervision and assistance. This may be one of the most difficult tasks we face. Letting go. We can do it slowly and carefully—one string at a time. But to ensure that our children develop into capable adults, we must begin the process. We can start in the toddler stage by giving them simple choices. “What do you want to wear today?” Or, “would you like beans or carrots?” By the time they are teens, we need to be giving them many opportunities to do things without us.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email me!

2010-05-31T11:02:00.000-07:00

Tamara Barcinas, casting director from World’s Strictest Parents, requested I write another column about their show and include casting information. Turns out the show’s producers still need parents—parents like you—to help them make a difference in the lives of troubled teens. Casting continues through February, 2010. Contact details are at the end of this column.

Remember last week’s column when I talked about how children still need us in their lives? The World’s Strictest Parents episode that I watched to prepare for this article reminded me how important we are to our children and how much they really need us—even when they appear to be pushing us away.

In this particular show, the host parents were from Iowa. Host Dad was a police officer. Karli (17) arrived with piercings and a bad attitude, “I don’t do _ _ _ _,” she told the camera. She also explained that she didn’t respect her mom and never cared about what her mom said. When she and her mom did talk, Karli always dismissed her and questioned her authority with sarcasm and sneers. In one scene the teen said, “I don’t get to live here if I pierce my nose? Really? That’s what you said about my lip.” In another she said, “I’m only two hours late and you are totally tripping.”

The male teen, Zack (18), showed up at the McCormick’s house on a similar track. He told us, “I do whatever I want whenever I want to do it.” One scene between Zack’s Mom and him sets the stage.

Mom: “I want you to clean up the dishes.”

Zack: “You don’t always get what you want, do you?” Both teens are parented by single parents—moms who are at their wit’s end. Both moms have similar concerns about their children. They fear that their back-talking teens will turn into lazy, nonproductive citizens not living up to their full potential.

I love the opening banter between the two teens as they head to their home away from home. They insist that no adult will be able to make them do anything.

They haven’t met the McCormicks yet.

As always, the first two days are rough. The teens attempt to get their way. In this show, it works out opposite to what the kids expect. The adults establish rules and enforce consequences. The teens—even the 17 and 18 year olds—realize they are not in charge. The transformation that takes place in such a short period of time amazes me.

I wish every troubled or confused teen could have this experience. They usually walk away with genuine appreciation for their caregivers. The experience seems to help them get on track with goals and dreams, and helps them see through the eyes of others how self-indulgent they have been for most of their young lives. For most, it seems to be a legitimate turning point.

By the time Zack and Kali leave, they have turned a corner. Zack tells the camera, “I needed a good kick in the teeth.” Zack also told the McCormicks he was initially surprised at how nice they were to him despite his actions and looks. “That’s never happened to me before.” Kali told us she came into the experience thinking she was going to give the host family hell. “But now, it isn’t like that. I see that I have potential.”

To contact the World’s Strictest Parents Casting department, call their hotline: (888) 41-TEENS. Or you can send an email (teens@shedmediaus.com). For more information before contacting them, visit their website: www.theworldsstrictestparents.com.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.blogspot.com
Email me!

Be Spontaneous

2010-05-25T16:02:00.000-07:00

“Let’s go get some ice cream,” my daughter says.

“When?” I think of all the reasons I can’t get ice cream—I am too busy. I’m avoiding ice cream so how fun would that be for me? I have a long to-do list. I want to finish my list. Now?

“Now,” she says.

“Let’s schedule it for next week. How does Tuesday afternoon work for you?”

“Mmmmooooommmmmm.”

Here’s the truth. Sometimes…Addy would say all the time…I seem to lack the ability to live spontaneously. I see this as being responsible, a way to get done what needs to be done. She sees this as sad.

So I have challenged myself to view this issue through my daughter’s eyes. Let’s face it parents, grandparents and caregivers, we are not always the teachers. Our children are, if we can open ourselves to the idea, sometimes our greatest teachers.

As I think about what adding spontaneity would bring to my life, I realize my young teacher is very wise. Being more spontaneous would mean I would have more fun. Why do I fight it so mightily?

I don’t have an answer for that, but I do have a new answer for Addy now. On a recent trip I had time to think about what my teacher said. In a phone call I promised, “When I get home, I will be more spontaneous.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it.”

Home for five days, I have done at least two spontaneous things—according to my daughter. Good for me. Not sure how easy it will be to break a deeply engrained patterned, but I will continue to try. And if not for me and the fun I will have, then I want to do it for my daughter.

To help me take on this new role, I did a little research. I liked what Kristie Leong M.D. said (www.ehow.com), “Even if you're not a naturally spontaneous person, you can add spontaneity and creativity to your life by taking some simple steps to break out of your established routine. By doing so, you'll find yourself less burdened with stress, anxiety and depression as you uncover new ideas and opportunities. “

Because I was still wondering about the “how” part of the formula, I dug a little more. I found a book titled 50 Ways to Feel Great Today! written by Dr. David Biebel and Dr. James and
Bobbie Dill. The authors told readers to get your work and deadlines met first. Spontaneity can come as the reward. They reminded us that this isn’t about “shirking your responsibilities.” It’s more about “spicing” up your life, which can be done by taking an unplanned trip to the ice cream store. In addition to telling us to keep wearing our responsibility hat, they also told us to “be naughty.” Their ideas of what constitutes being naughty are doing things like splurging on a dessert or reading a novel. They encouraged readers to spend time with others and to drop agendas. Maybe more than anything, spontaneity is an invitation to include more people in our life for fun reasons.

Addy turned thirteen in March. That means, realistically, there are only five more years before she’ll not be around to encourage me to have more fun. The girl’s got big plans…plans about going off to college. I ask you…why am I allowing busy work…work I always seem to get done anyway…interfere? I am thinking that any grandparent reading this will tell me to drop everything and go and be with my child as often as I can. I’m listening…

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email me!

But Everybody Does It!

2010-05-16T09:08:00.000-07:00

Here is the Copyright Challenge I promised readers. To read the full article scroll down below the quiz. Enjoy!

The Copyright Challenge

Read each scenario and then decide if the person featured is making the “right” choice when it comes to copyright law protection. Suggest that you spend time talking about this with your child.

1. A friend gets a new CD and wants you to enjoy listening to it too. The friend makes you a copy. She keeps her copy and continues to listen to it. Is this ethical?

2. You love your new CD of your favorite band. You want to protect it and decide to make a copy of it for your own use. You make the copy and put the original in a safe place in your home. Is this ethical?

3. You made a video and you want to upload a song from your favorite band as background. Is this ethical?

4. All your friends in your tight-knit circle have seen the new movie and all love the sound track. You buy one copy of the soundtrack and decide to download it on all their MP3 players. They’ve all paid for the movie so everything is okay, right? Is this ethical?

5. You borrow a movie from the library. You decide to show it to your friends. You invite them over and you have popcorn and sodas as you watch the movie. When you are done, you return the movie to the library. Is this ethical?

Answers to Copyright Law Challenge:

1. No. Making a copy and sharing it with someone else is a copyright law violation.

2. Yes. Only the person who purchases the CD has the right to download to their MP3 player or to burn a copy for personal use.

3. No. In some cases you can be penalized, if discovered. Although some companies are now allowing this to happen in exchange for the advertising it brings them. If you take this risk, it is just that…a risk.

4. No. Paying to see the movie and paying for the sound track of the movie are two different things. Support the artists and purchase the CD! Downloading the CD to everyone’s MP3 player is a violation of copyright laws.

5. Yes. You are using the library as it is intended.

Article: But Everybody Does It!

Many people do not take copyright law seriously. Not only children think it is perfectly okay to rip a CD of the latest movie sound track or their favorite band—adults do, too.

In March, I chaired a conference for an organization known for its educational, self-development and pain management CDs. On the agenda we included a Q&A about ethical behavior concerning copyright laws. Why did we have to do this? Because we had discovered that many thought it was okay to share CDs or MP3 files without paying for the right to use them.

We asked questions like:

1. Your group borrows a CD from the library. You want everyone to have a copy. You make 10 copies and pass them out at the next gathering. Is this ethical?

2. You give a member one of your commercially purchased CDs. You did not make any copies and are giving it as a gift. Is this ethical?

The exercise helped participants have a better grasp of what is legal when it comes to sharing music or proprietary materials. It’s an exercise that you might wish to pursue with your children. So that you don’t have to create your own questions, I have a provided a list of questions at www.thealertparent.com.

Here’s the deal. Copying and sharing the music or work of others is a violation of copyright laws. It is, in fact, stealing.

Some of the confusion for our children might stem from the fact that computer programs exist on the web to help children and adults download music for free. Just because a company provides this service doesn’t make it legal.

And not all music, movie and other industries are just letting people get away with this. Although the music industry seems to have stopped targeting individuals for the time being, they did go after and sue approximately 35,000 people in 2008. One of those individuals “caught” happened to work about 10 minutes away from my home. His payout was in the six-figure range.

Although the music industry is taking a new course of action, it appears independent film makers are targeting the individual.

In March, over 20,000 people have been sued in Washington, DC federal court for copyright infringement. According to the sources of Hollywood Reporter, Eriq Gardner, there are another 30,000 downloaders who are about to be served. Gardner reports in his article (March 30, 2010): “This could be a test run that opens up the floodgates to massive litigation against the millions of individuals who use BitTorrent to download movies.”

What is the law when it comes to copyright? Math and Reading Help for Kids, endorsed by the American Library Association, explains: “The law states that no one may reuse music (or any copyrighted material) without permission from the material's owner. The exception to this is what is known as 'fair use.'”

Reporters, researchers and educators fall under this ‘fair use’ definition and can reuse copyright material as long as they give credit to the owner.

There is a way to download music legally and for little cash. Several on-line sites have offerings that are legal because of licensing agreements. Math and Reading Help for Kids provided the following lists: Apple's iTunes, Napster, eMusic.com, MP3.com, PressPlay, RealOne Music, and Listen.com.

Copyright protection for artists, writers, musicians, filmmakers and others is a big deal. We will do ourselves, our children and all those artists a favor if we take copyright infringement seriously. Caregivers, teachers and grandparents, please take the time to download and give the Copyright Quiz to the children and adults in your life.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email Me!

Sharing What We Believe

2010-04-28T14:14:00.001-07:00

Because I believe communicating our values to our children is one of our most important tasks as a parent, I devoted a chapter on values in my upcoming book: Help Your Daughter Live a Powerful Life.

If we believe in hard work, truth, honesty, realness, it’s up to us to make sure our children understand why we feel the way we do.

As they grow and mature, they will step away from some of our values, but will also hang on to others.

I made time to discuss my values with my daughter, and began the discussion with some simplistic advice from The Last Lecture by Carnegie Mellon University computer science professor Randy Pausch, who died of pancreatic cancer. This simple expression of basic truths helped me outline my value discussion with Addy.

“Whether you think you can or can’t, you are right.”

I used this quote to begin our discussion. I wanted her to understand how powerful her beliefs are, and included a conversation about the Little Engine that Could. Addy had heard the story before and didn’t like it, but the example still worked. The point was made.

Along the same lines, we talked about “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again.”

I told her stories about Rudy Ruettiger, the 5’6” and 165 pound man who dreamed of playing football at Notre Dame, and Liz Murray, the homeless girl who eventually graduated from Harvard. Both heard many no’s before reaching their goals. Both succeeded beyond their imaginations. These stories are movies and can be rented if you’d like to introduce them to your child.

I told her the story of young Ben Carson, whose mother, Sonya, turned his life around. Sonya had a third grade education and had married when she was 13. Ben’s parents divorced when he was eight years old, and Sonya had to work multiple jobs to support her two boys. When Ben was in fifth grade he had a terrible temper and ranked at the bottom of his class.

Alarmed, Sonya made a commitment to herself and promised she’d change things so that her boys could succeed in life. She allowed them to watch only three television programs weekly. She made them finish homework before they played with friends. She insisted they read two library books a week and write a report on each one. She persisted even though she couldn’t understand what they wrote.

Within two weeks of starting the new regime, Ben astonished his classmates by naming rock samples the teacher brought to class. The event changed his life. Ben understood he wasn’t stupid. He suddenly hungered for knowledge. Ben now had a chance to be something, simply because his young, uneducated mother was determined to give her children a different life—one that would be better than her own. She wouldn’t give up. She kept making changes until something worked.

Turns out that the dumbest kid in the fifth grade, Ben Carson, grew up to become the youngest Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Johns Hopkins University Hospital.

These stories can lead to discussions about “brick walls” and what to do when you run into one, about how important it is to never give up when it matters to you.

We concluded with “Life isn’t fair.” We talked about what to do when faced with an unfair situation, but more importantly, I emphasized that in our family we believe sometimes the only thing you can do is: “Saddle up and ride.”

What inspires you? Why? Use books, movies and everyday encounters to share your values with your child.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email Me!

The Power of Choice

2010-04-20T14:33:00.000-07:00

When writing my soon-to-be-released book: Helping Our Daughters Live a Powerful Life, I asked my newsletter subscribers to contribute.

One of my subscribers shared with me:

“For a long, long time I let those societal restrictions influence me to believe that what really mattered was the destination, even though I knew deep down that the quotation I used in my high school year book was what I ought to believe in: ‘Life is not a having and a getting, but a being and becoming.’ My children are also on a journey of being and becoming…change is always happening, always possible.”

What we need to help our children understand is that change comes because of choice.

There is an anonymous quotation I love that reminds us of how important the power of choice is: "It is very important you remember you have choices. It’s so important you simply can’t forget it."

When we think about making choices and then explaining this concept to our children, we need to buy in to what making choices means for them.

As author Shad Helmstetter in The Gift: The 12 Greatest Gifts of Personal Growth reminded us, “it’s usually the smallest choices we make that affect us the most.”

It’s important to remember this as a transition from making all choices for our children to allowing them to make age-appropriate ones. Making choices is a big part of defining self.

Help your children understand that as they grow they need to rely more on themselves. Explain the benefit of getting input from others but also make clear the caveat. Others give you advice based on their own experiences.

Teaching your children to trust their instincts—their gut feelings—is the best ammunition.

There’s more we need to understand and help our children understand. There are no wrong decisions. Decisions have results. Those results can bring us joy, but sometimes they bring us pain and sadness.

In an article about choices written by Jennifer Griffon she said, “Each decision that we make at any point in time is the best decision that we can make at that time and also reflects a lesson that we must learn.” She goes on to tell us, “Judging the wisdom of our choices once we learn their results, thus regretting the past, is like being able to pick the lottery numbers after we know what they will be.”

There are times we know we are not making the best decision. I can recall one as recently as yesterday. This also brings to mind something I repeatedly told my sister Jennifer before she moved to New York. Picking the right path for yourself doesn’t mean you are guaranteed the easy path. Best choices don’t necessarily mean you’ll find a gold-covered road leading to the rainbow minus pitfalls and obstacles.

In Reviving Ophelia Mary Pipher tells us, “Parents can only do so much, and they are not responsible for everything. They are neither all knowing nor all-powerful. Parents can make a difference in the lives of their daughters only if their daughters are willing to allow this. Not all daughters are. Daughters have choices and responsibilities.”

It’s our job to teach what we can and then to move out of the way. We do this by allowing our children to make their choices and accept responsibility. All we can do is the best we can and we must ask our children to do the same. And then maybe one day we and our children can be like Marianne Williamson and “come at last to live in the comfort of our own skin.”

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email Me!

Taking From Others

2010-04-10T14:41:00.000-07:00

Addy and I watched “Odd Girl Out,” a movie based on an advice book by the same title and written by Rachel Simmons.

In one scene, several girls are shopping at an expensive store. Vanessa can’t afford to buy the clothes the other girls can, and her best friend Stacy gifts her with some of the clothes. As they are walking out Stacy turns to the girls and says, “I forgot to pay for this scarf. My purse is too small.”

The girls look at one another. Some repeat the “my purse is too small” line. Then they all turn to Vanessa.

Vanessa caves in to the pressure. She sticks the scarf in her oversized bag. She walks out of the store and doesn’t get caught. She leaves the burden of paying for the scarf to someone else; in this case, the merchant who will foot the bill and pass the cost on to other customers, to you and to me.

Stealing happens frequently. Electronic devices and locked cabinets point to a problem massive enough that merchants pay big bucks to hang on to their stuff. Retail stores aren’t the only ones with “stealing” problems. The music industry is still trying to stop the bleeding.

This summer presented several opportunites for Addy and me to review this theme. The first was a few months back while we shopped at Rue 21.

Addy wanted to know why the store locked its dressing rooms and why we were limited to how many items we could have in the dressing room.

As I explained, something hit the floor with a thud. It was an electronic tag that had fallen out of a pocket of the shorts she was trying on. I knew what it meant. She didn’t. I explained that someone removed the tag, stuck it in this pocket, then strolled out the door with stolen merchandise.

But stealing isn’t only about intentionally shoplifting.

A few weeks before school started, we did our annual back-to-school shopping. At the cash register, I noticed the man didn’t charge us for one of the items. The thought drifted through my head, “Should I tell?” It was immediately followed by “Not telling is stealing.”

I spoke up and paid for all of our merchandise. Addy had the opportunity to learn knowingly taking advantage of other people’s mistakes is also stealing.

A few weeks after that experience, she showed me a CD her friend made for her. I asked what was on it. She named the song and the band. I said, “Addy, that is pirated. We can’t keep it.” When I explained that copying songs you don’t buy was stealing and illegal, she didn’t want the CD anymore. Right then we broke it.

More recently we visited another store, this time to purchase a watch for my husband. We looked at a wide-variety of sports watches and finally selected a medium-priced model. Once home, we realized that the clerk had given us the most expensive watch, but charged us for the mid-priced variety.

This time there was no second-guessing. Addy and I knew immediately our only option was to jump in the car, return to the store and correct the oversight. And that’s exactly what we did.

There is a moral to this line of stories. The moral is that taking something that isn’t ours is stealing. It’s a lesson that our children need to understand. And there are many, many ways to teach it. For starters, use this article and the examples included to teach the children in your life this most important lesson.

Allyn Evans
Email Me!
www.allynevans.com

Speaking Tic

2010-03-20T14:25:00.000-07:00

Toastmasters, an International non-profit organization designed to help individuals improve their speaking skills, teaches speakers to avoid using verbal fillers—fillers like ah, uh, you know.

Because I have been a member of Toastmasters for a very long time, I am hyper sensitive when a person relies heavily on verbal fillers when speaking.

I’m constantly amazed by the high profile TV/radio personalities who do this and aren’t told by company executives to fix it.

There’s a popular filler word used by tweens and teens, particularly girls. I hear it repeatedly when Addy and friends are loaded in my car.

Can you guess what the word is?

A couple of weeks ago, I spent three straights days working with teenage girls at Career Technology Centers in Oklahoma. I heard this word so much that I found myself overusing it.

Not good.

While waiting for a presentation to begin on one day, three girls arrived early. I told them to feel free to chat while we waited for the others to join us. Big mistake. For fifteen minutes, I had to listen to the constant repetition of the offending word.

“LIKE he told me what he said and then LIKE I said well okay and then LIKE I left. Later, LIKE I decided to go back and find him. But LIKE he was gone. And LIKE I didn’t know what to do.”

Yes, the “filler” word for this generation of children is still LIKE. The 1980’s movie Valley Girl was the world’s first introduction to the word and nothing seems to be stopping its use—not teachers, not parents.

While speaking to the students, I pointed this out. I asked them to help each other stop this bad habit. Hoping to help them improve, I would point out every use of the word throughout our time together.

My daughter and I work on this at home. In her defense it’s rare that I hear a slip unless she is hanging out with friends.

William L. Bainbridge , Professor at the University of Dayton, wrote an article about the overuse of ‘like’ for the Columbus Dispatch. He described how he and colleagues were disturbed by a teen’s presentation.

She was the president of her senior class and had exceptional scholastic qualifications—excellent grades and high national test scores. He explains: “The session was videotaped. We reviewed the tape and, to no surprise, found sixty-four instances by actual count of this bright person cluttering her sentence with the word LIKE in less than four minutes: "You know LIKE I feel LIKE students LIKE have trouble LIKE selecting LIKE career awareness LIKE experiences."

Bainbridge says popular TV personality Larry King calls this type of overuse of a word a “speaking tic,” which means it’s something a person can’t seem to stop doing no matter how hard she tries.

But there is good news. If your tween, teen or even you have this “diagnosis,” it is fixable. Ask others to help you become aware every time you say the word. Record your daughter and friends (with their permission, of course) and then play it back. You can call them out every time, too.

A favorite Toastmaster’s trick is ringing a counter bell every time you hear the offending word.

The counter bell tactic works—just ask any Toastmaster who has experienced it. I rarely, if ever, get flagged in meetings for using word fillers. When I do find myself picking up a verbal word filler habit, I immediately get to work solving the problem. Do your children a favor and help them do the same thing.

Allyn Evans
Email Me!
www.allynevans.com

I Promise Not Tell

2010-03-15T13:59:00.000-07:00

I want to take a poll.

First question: How many times have you heard, “I promise not to tell.”?

Next question: How many times has the person who promised not to tell TOLD?

For many people, keeping something private from others is impossible to do. It’s not to say that the Secret Sharer is bad a person. More times than not, the person who violates your trust is a well-meaning friend or family member who supports you in many ways.

But for whatever reason, they have a hard, hard time keeping quiet.

I’m talking about adults. Here’s something to consider…if adults have so much trouble—adults who love and support you—then wouldn’t you think a teenager might find it even more challenging?

I talk a lot to girls about this very topic. The betrayal stories I have heard and read about push me to have this conversation regularly with teens.

Now you might be wondering if I advise them to keep all their secrets bottled up inside? No, I don’t. But I do ask them to tread carefully and to be mindful of what they tell to others in their lives.

Bottom line: Friends and family members earn the right to be told your secrets. This means that as you build a relationship with someone, you share bits and pieces of your private self in increments. It’s a natural way for a friendship to unfold. It’s after you begin to share personal information with someone that you need to be an observer. I tell girls to pay attention to how the information is handled.

It reminds me of the game of tennis. Hit a ball past me and down my alley (the side of the court), I pay attention. Do it again and I start thinking about the old idiom: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

In my own life, I take careful notes about who keeps my personal information confidential. And sometimes it really isn’t about how much they love you or respect you, but their maturity level. Not everyone can keep a secret. Recall your own experiences when you wanted so badly to share some information you had, but had been asked not to. It’s challenging, is it not?

You’ll now find me repeatedly telling teenagers to be careful. Mostly this talk goes along with my Internet and Cell Phone presentation to teens. In that workshop we spend time talking about public communication. What many of them might not have thought about is that ANY private communication with someone via email and cell phone could, with a push of a button, become instantly public.

To help them avoid embarrassment or harassment, I encourage them to not write or text anything that they wouldn’t want posted on the classroom bulletin board. If they feel compelled to criticize someone, I encourage them to do it in code. Of course, in an ideal world we’d rather they not criticize anyone at all, but we know how difficult that is for us—let alone them—to do.

This is a topic that I continually talk about with my daughter and other teens. Of course, just because I’m talking about it doesn’t mean the message will be heard. Yes, many times it takes learning something the hard way before a point can be absorbed. When your child is betrayed, which WILL eventually happen (if it hasn’t already), help them process and forgive. But more importantly, remind them to be careful when sharing information or personal secrets with friends or family.

Allyn Evans
email me!
www.allynevans.com

Time to Make Summer Camp Plans

2010-03-10T14:18:00.000-08:00

As I child, I started annually attending summer camps by the time I was eight. Most summers, I attended at least two camps or sessions.

Whether I took a friend or not, didn’t matter to me. Camp was fun.

For my daughter, Addy, it was different. She had no desire to go. I decided to take a relaxed approach: “When she is ready, she’ll ask.”

Last year, at the age of 12, ready she was. And so we began searching for the ideal place. We looked in Oklahoma and surrounding states and found many good options—some expensive and some more moderately priced. Because we had started late, however, most camps were full. As my own plans started to evolve for the summer, I realized how convenient it would be for me, if we could find a camp in the state I call home. I suggested we check out one of the camps I regularly attended. We did. They had space. The price was more than reasonable. The deal was made.

Although very comfortable with the choice, I must confess I fretted some. Last year while visiting a good friend, her child wrote heart-wrenching letters about wanting and needing to come home. My friend made her stick it out, but not without tears of her own. But fear of the unknown or how it will all work out is never a good reason to not try something. My friend’s child learned an important lesson that summer. She learned how to deal with a challenging situation.

If your child has yet to experience camp, you might want to reconsider. The majority of children, mine included, have wonderful camp experiences. A study done by the American Camp Association surveyed more than 5000 families who had attended 80 ACA-Accredited camps to evaluate the experience from the perspective of parents and children. In most cases, the parents and children reported significant growth in: self-esteem, independence, leadership, friendship skills, social comfort, peer relationships, adventure and exploration, environmental awareness, values and spirituality.

After hearing all the “camp” tales from my daughter post trip, I would have to report that it was all good! She can’t wait return. Never mind that she caught the flu (not the Swine flu) and had to leave camp a day early.

There are other reasons to consider sending your child to camp. According to Dr. Bruce Muchnick, a licensed psychologist who works extensively with day and resident campers, “Camp is a learning experience.” Dr. Muchnick explains that being in a new environment and away from the familiar “provides an opportunity for your child to explore a world bigger than his/her neighborhood and a chance for you and your child to practice ‘letting go.’” He claims that “letting go” is important to develop autonomy and a strong sense of self.

The American Camp Association (http://www.acacamps.org/) offered more advice:

1. Make Joint Decisions: Include your child in the selection process. Ask your child to pack with your help.

2. Talk Openly About Fears and Concerns: Being afraid to be away from home is common, especially if it is the first camp experience. Share your “first-time-from-home” experiences with your camper. Talk to them about what they can do when and if they feel sad or lonely.

3. Help Them Have Realistic Expectations: Explain to your child the real purpose of camp, which is to relax, have fun and enjoy. It’s not about winning the biggest trophy or prize or succeeding. Talk about a typical day of activities that will include fun activities, but also some chores like making a bed or keeping your bunk tidy.

If your child has never attended camp, you could always select camps with shorter durations. Addy’s camp last year ran for one week.

Best Hint: When trying to figure out how to pack Addy’s camp supplies and clothes, I asked a friend if she had a trunk I could borrow. She told me, “Don’t do that. Instead, purchase a plastic chest of drawers. When transporting, tape the drawers shut.” This solution was ideal and made all of Addy’s key items easy to reach. You might want to check with the camp staff before making this decision.

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
info@allynevans.com

You'd Be So Pretty, If...

2010-03-08T11:27:00.000-08:00

I’d like to remind you again of Dara Chadwick’s book, You’d Be So Pretty If: Teaching Our Daughters to Love their Bodies—Even when We Don’t Love Our Own.

Chadwick told us: “I grew up listening to my mom bemoan everything from the size of her thighs to the shape of her eyes.

So you can imagine my dismay the first time someone exclaimed, ‘You look just like your mother.’”

Chadwick’s message struck home because I am that mother who doesn’t love her body. Hard to write it, but it’s the truth. I pledged not to pass that message on to my daughter. My plan was simple. When she was in my presence I didn’t talk about my appearance or desire to lose weight. If I was going to be on a diet, which I did often when she was young, I called it a new health plan.

So far this tactic has worked. Now that she’s older when I do slip up occasionally she’s surprised by my self-deprecating words.

The best way to help our daughters love themselves as much as we wish we loved ourselves is to model self-love even when we might not actually believe it.

Chadwick’s subtitle tells it all: “Teaching our daughters to love their bodies—even when we don’t love our own.” It’s important to watch the words we direct toward our daughters.

In You’d Be So Pretty If… a fourteen year old shares, “I hate it when my mom calls me a lumberjack because I’m tall and sort of strong. It’s just a joke, but it gets old fast.”

These words, whether in jest or not, drive home the point that this child is bigger than the cultural ideal.

Mothers have a tremendous influence, but what Chadwick calls the “X factor” also comes into play. Comprising the X factor are the men in your daughter’s life: boys, brothers, dads and husbands.

I remember in graduate school meeting a beautiful girl who believed she was ugly. She had an older brother who repeatedly called her names and told her she was a “train wreck.”

As I wrote in my first book, it was the boys in my life that impacted me the most—the boys who would be, could be or had been boyfriends. I listened intently to their comments/evaluations and I absorbed them all.

Chadwick told us: “Being teased and tormented about your physical appearance in childhood and early adolescence is often how a lifetime of body image struggles begins. Like pulling weeds from the garden, it’s our job (as parents) to nip that kind of meanness in the bud.”

Chadwick offers many suggestions on building a healthy body image. One I thought particularly helpful: Help her feel good about how she looks. Take her to a professional hair stylist. Many still charge children prices until girls are 13. When she wants to start wearing make-up, show her how. Or take her to an expert. Department stores in malls and hair salons will usually do this for a minimum fee or product purchase. Find a store or stores that sell clothes within your price range that are flattering for your daughter’s body type.

Not all girls can wear skinny jeans, and although they are a popular thing to wear, there are many other stylish choices out there. Watch TLC’s What Not to Wear with your daughter. You’ll pick up tips for all types of bodies, and your daughter will see a wide variety of shapes, sizes and looks.

As Chadwick says, “Make it your goal to help her feel confident among her peers.”

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email me!

Take Time for Yourself

2010-02-20T11:20:00.000-08:00

A friend once attended an adoption counseling session for prospective parents of hard-to-place children.

The instructor emphasized the enormous stress the caregiver would face in helping these children find their place in the world.

“Every family has one caregiver,” the instructor cautioned the group, “and nobody takes care of the caregiver.”

He presented the message not as an accusation or indictment toward other family members, but as a recognition of group behavior.

At today’s hectic pace, caregivers can never get enough reminders about the importance of self-care. Child Development Expert and Parenting Coach Pam Dyson shares this timely reminder with us, and gives us some new, low-cost hints for parental self-care…a most important component for a healthy family structure.

Take Care of Yourself (by Pam Dyson)

If you’ve flown you’re familiar with the flight safety instructions. You probably don’t pay much attention to them because you’ve heard them so many times before. One of those instructions is crucial. “Secure your own mask before assisting others.”

This simple instruction can apply to parenting, especially to mothers. As mothers we are often so busy caring for those we love that we forget to take care of ourselves.

We tell ourselves that doing something for ourselves is taking something away from our family. In reality we end up with less of ourselves to give.

Not tending to our own needs can fuel frustration and exhaustion. We may feel resentful which can lead to mommy guilt. We then start doing even more for our children to alleviate our guilt.

If you don’t put yourself and your needs first who will? It’s probably not going to be those who benefit from your selfless giving. I recommend you look for ways to take care of yourself. It doesn’t have to cost a lot of money, but it does have to be something that will make you feel pampered, even if it’s only for a few minutes. Here are a few of my favorites.

Go to the makeup counter of a department store and ask for a complimentary makeover. Don’t feel obligated to buy any products except for that new shade of lipstick which makes you feel pretty.

Spray your pillow case with a scented linen spray. When you fall into bed after a stressful day place your face on your pillow and take some deep breaths. I prefer lavender. It relaxes me and helps me fall asleep.

Buy a new pair of socks. Nothing rejuvenates me more than a new pair of socks. I always keep two or three new pairs in my dresser drawer and when I’ve had a stressful day I put on a pair and snuggle up in my favorite chair with a good book. Pay it forward by sending a new pair of socks anonymously to a mom you know who could use a little pampering. Include a note detailing what the socks are for. Ask that they do one thing in return. Send a new pair of socks to another mom who is in need of a little TLC.

Society doesn’t encourage us to take care of ourselves. It often tells us we’re being selfish if we do. But being able to care for others requires that we first take care of ourselves. Step back and make a priority of taking care of you. You owe it to yourself!

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email me!

2010-02-13T12:44:00.000-08:00

Do you know a child who has chronic stomach aches?

Twenty percent of all children report stomach pains that have no identifiable cause. I was one of those children.

The pain, at times, crippled me and interfered with my ability to attend school, play sports or socialize.

During high school, my doctor believed that reducing anxiety while eating would be beneficial to me. For one year, I was allowed to eat lunch at home. The “treatment” did help reduce the frequency of attacks, but not the severity.

As defined by the American College of Gastroenterology, “Functional abdominal pain is pain that cannot be explained by any visible or detectable abnormality, after a thorough physical examination and appropriate further testing if needed.”

Although functional abdominal pain can be extremely painful and demobilizing, it isn’t life threatening. But there are consequences, causing children to miss school or limit their ability to participate in sports-related or extracurricular activities. Sometimes the condition translates into a loss of appetite and disruption of sleep.

Pain and interruptions of daily life can impact the child’s emotional health by causing depression, sadness and/or stress.

Treatment needs to be focused on helping a child have a satisfactory quality of life, which might include medication, education, stress management and coping skills. One method of helping children that has popped up in recent years is to use behavioral therapy, which has proven to be effective.

Although a solution, it can be expensive and requires time as well as access to a qualified therapist.

A study by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Duke University Medical Center published in the November 2009 issue of Pediatrics offers a different approach that can be used by parents with children at home at the time the pain is occurring.

In the study led by Dr. Miranda van Tilburg, a total of 19 out of 34 children ages 6 to 15 used a combination of standard medical treatment and audio recordings that included guided instructions. Seventy-three percent of those children self-reported that their pain had been lessened by half or greater.

In comparison, only 26 percent of the control group using only medical treatment reported similar results. Later, the control group also had the option of adding guided imagery to their treatment protocol, improving the overall rate for the control group to 58 percent.

Combining both groups, 62.5 percent of the children reported improvement for up to six months.

"Such self-administered treatment is, of course, very inexpensive and can be used in addition to other treatments, which potentially opens the door for easily enhancing treatment outcomes for a lot of children suffering from frequent stomach aches,” said Tilburg.

Tilberg’s program included listening to a set of four 20-minute guided imagery CDs biweekly in combination with 10-minute daily sessions. The children reported them pleasant and easy to use. Suggestions include things like floating on clouds or spreading warmth and light from the hand to the belly.

Although there are no clear answers about why or how the program works, other research has led to the belief that reducing anxiety is key. There are also indications that listening to guided imagery helps reduce the pain response.

The good news is that typically the onset of functional abdominal pain usually goes away on its own. Reportedly, most cases will disappear after a few weeks or a month, but some (like mine) will linger for years. Maybe the better news is that now there are more tools to help your child manage the pain.

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
Email me!

Technorati Tags:
functional abdominal pain, American College of Gastroenterology, Allyn Evans, Alert Parent, Parenting
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Reality Check

2010-02-09T15:15:00.000-08:00

Recently while exercising on my treadmill, I watched Judge Hatchet, a program I usually would not have seen.

The defendant was a 13-year-old girl who dumbfounded the judge by her disregard for her parents and authority.

“You’re telling me you tried to stab your Dad with a knife and then got expelled from school for threatening to blow the place up?” Judge Hatchet said.

“Yes,” the 13-year-old said proudly. “I don’t need anybody to tell me what to do.”

“Then you run away for six days without telling anyone where you are? Come back and then do it again for five more days?” Hatchet continued.

The teen appeared proud of her ability to take care of herself.

Her mother said her biggest fear was that her child would end up dead or in jail if she continued down this path. Judge Hatchet agreed. He sentenced the child to participate in a “jail-experience” program for teens, a program designed to give “troubled” teens a wake-up call.

And wake up the 13-year-old, it did.

She was smiling as she was escorted to jail. When they handcuffed her and put her in the police car, she believed it was all a game—a game she would win.

The game was much tougher than she realized. She was treated like an inmate, but also protected from the other inmates. I wondered if the female inmates played along while understanding the “child” had to stay safe.

Once the teenager was stripped of all her possessions and individual freedoms, she started to understand. When she demonstrated a little defiance in the beginning, she was quickly made aware of the fact that she was no longer in charge.

She also was frightened of the other women who stole her jail-issued shoes. The girl cried many times and it was clear to viewers she was afraid. By the end of her time behind bars, she understood that her actions were taking her down a bad, bad road—a road that only led to a few dark, dreary places.

Before she returned home, she had a face-to-face chat with a young woman in her twenties who was waiting out a 25-year-sentence for accidentally killing a man.

The scenario sounded similar to the teen’s. The woman had pulled a knife and jabbed at the person. The only difference between the teen and the young woman was that the young woman had hit her mark and the man died.

To talk to the prisoner, the teenager had to sit on the floor and look through the meal slot. The killer was in solitary confinement.

When the teenager, her mother and Judge Hatchet returned to court for the final sentencing, the change was evident. The child’s demeanor had completely changed.

She asked to read a note she had written to the judge. She thanked Judge Hatchet for opening her eyes. She explained that she had no idea how bad jail was. She also realized that if she stayed on the previous course, her life would not end up in a good place. “Thank you for the reality check,” she said.

Television programs sometimes do have good lessons. If you are parenting or caring for a troubled teen and/or a teen who takes drugs or consumes alcohol, consider some tough love measures to help them get back on track. Sometimes just visiting a jail and talking to inmates will do the trick.

When I was a teenager, my church group went to Parchman, a penitentiary in Mississippi. Those men’s stories and how they lived will forever be seared in my memory.

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
Email me!

Greeting Your Elders

2010-01-25T15:07:00.000-08:00

In late 2009, Addy and I took a fencing class together. It was a four-week introductory course.
Besides being fun, the instructors taught their students lessons in courtesy, such as how to greet others. This was my kind of place!

As an example, their brochure read: “Please say hi to one of the coaches when you arrive and let us know when you’re leaving by saying good bye. In classes, introduce yourself to students you don’t know. And be sure to salute your class partner and salute and shake hands after every bout.”

I wondered if courteous recognition was so lax among students the instructors felt compelled to spell it out for them?

A few days after asking this question, I got my answer. I walked into a gift store. The door opened. Out of the store walked a female tween. She neither greeted me nor offered to hold the door.

Call me crazy, but the lack of courtesy bothered me.

What about what happens on elevators? A non-trained teen or tween waiting to enter the elevator usually means that I must wait for the youngster to board the elevator—minus a greeting—before I can exit. Hello. Observing this behavior has actually turned into a source of amusement for me while providing perfect “what-not-to-do” examples for my daughter.

Something is wrong with this picture. And it’s up to us—the adults in their lives—to do something about it. I’d like to return to a world where fencing instructors didn’t feel compelled to spell out common courtesy in their brochure. Call me a dreamer.

There have been times—mainly when it’s a child I know—that I talk to them about their inappropriate greeting or poor elevator boarding skills. When I ask why they don’t look adults in the eye or speak to them, I usually hear something like…“It’s too embarrassing.” Or, “I have always been told never to speak to strangers.”

More times than not, the child simply has not learned how to properly greet others, though for some, it really is about being shy or uncertain. Plus, I’m as guilty as the next parent. Yes, I constantly reminded my daughter “Don’t speak to strangers.” I probably repeated this mantra more than I asked her to follow the Golden Rule.

Your child will reach a point in his or her life when he or she will need to possess the skill of proper greeting. By twelve-years-old your child needs to be on the way to mastering the art of greeting friends and strangers in their community. If you think your child is lagging behind, whether shy or under-instructed, there are ways you can help.

Have your child start where he or she is. If she is shy, accept it. Help her be okay with it, but explain that it is time to start building the “how-to-greet-others” muscle.

If it is too difficult to perform even the most basic greeting, like making eye contact and speaking with the idea of having a short conversation, encourage your child to make eye contact and smile. The older the child, the more difficult it will be for him or her to stop with only eye contact and a smile.

Tell him he doesn’t have to be the conversation starter. He simply can stand there and answer questions. Explain also that being nervous while speaking to another person is okay. The more a person does this and makes small talk, the easier the task becomes.

Being socially savvy will benefit your child for the rest of her life.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
Email me!

Mister Rogers Got It Right!

2010-01-08T07:23:00.000-08:00

Annie Fox (http://www.anniefox.com/) is an advice columnist for tweens, tweens and parents. One of Annie’s blog posts caught my attention.

“Good ol’ Mr. Rogers knew what he was singing about when he was putting on his sneakers: ‘I mean I might just make mistakes if I should have to hurry up and so I like to take my time.’ To Mr. Rogers’ credit, that guy could really focus on one thing at a time,” Annie wrote.

This summer, I began a project that is slowly, but surely changing the pace of my life. My life is picking up speed very quickly. This is a good thing. I am most excited about the project.

But Annie’s words hit me hard. She wrote, “Recently I’m becoming more aware of how cranky, stressed and distracted I get when I try to do a whole lot of stuff at once. So I’m trying to slow down and zero in.”

She added, “But it ain’t easy.” With this, I agree.

Like Annie, I realized that when life speeds up what seems to disappear first is our ability to stop and pay attention to those around us—like our children and significant others.

In my own world, my attention is turning more towards my project and assignments, so it is imperative that I continue to bring myself back to the present moment and what is in front of me.

Annie’s wrote about the need to pay attention to those important people in our lives. From my own observation—based on what is happening in my own life—I felt the message timely.

Annie regularly receives emails from tweens and teens who tell her, “My parents don’t listen.” I know from the feedback I get that many caregivers have much on their plate. But no matter how busy we are, it’s imperative that we keep our relationships with our family members front and foremost in our lives.

Annie advises parents, “We’d all like to improve parent-teen communication but we can’t do our part when we’re busy with six other things or even one other thing.”

I agree with Annie when she says it’s not about dropping everything to listen to your child all hours of the day. It’s more about taking moments to listen—to fully focus on your children and what they are saying.

What it’s not, as Annie says, “is a shift into an unconscious auto-listening thing, ‘Uh huh. Uh huh.’”

Annie offered tips. Click here to read her article. Here’s my personalized version of Annie’s suggestions explaining why full-focused listening can pay off:

1. It’s Respectful. Healthy communication means trust and respect flows both ways. When my daughter’s tone is disrespectful, there are consequences. When I am disrespectful to her (yes, parents do mess up too), I apologize. Sometimes, though, I don’t realize she thinks I am being disrespectful. So, I give Addy permission to tell me (in a respectful way, of course), when she feels disrespected.

2. You Are Giving Them the Message—You Have Something Valuable to Say.

3. You Are Modeling Effective Communication Techniques. Give them eye contact. Ask them to do the same. Give them 100% of your attention. If the timing is bad and you really do need to delay the conversation, explain. Set a time and then follow through with it.

The goal—improved communication with your child. The caveat: Stopping to listen more doesn’t guarantee all problems are solved and complete harmony will be found. But taking time to give full-focused attention will pay off in the long run. For you. Your child. And your long-term relationship.

Allyn Evans
email me!
http://www.thealertparent.com/

Technorati Tags:
Allyn Evans, Annie Fox, Mr. Rogers, Parenting, Teens
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

2010-01-03T14:12:00.000-08:00

A few days ago, I got a call from my friend Marg who told me she was furious with her 15-year-old daughter. “You will never believe what Shelia told me!”

“We were out shopping. Getting a winter coat and shoes, which she needed. Then she had the gall to tell me she needed more clothes. We had done the back-to-school shopping thing only a few months ago. She didn’t need more clothes.” In addition, Marg had two other children to “dress” for school.

Shelia told Marg, “Mom, I need to have a six-week-rotation.”

Marg couldn’t help wondering why her child’s concept of material goods had gone so far askew.
“What’s a six-week-rotation?” I asked.

Exasperated, Marg explained. “It means she wants to wear an outfit once every six weeks.”
Is something terribly wrong with that picture?

If you want proof this is NOT an isolated incident, all you have to do is turn on your TV set. Shows like Gossip Girl, The Hills, Housewives and My Super Sweet 16 tell the same story and give teens the same message. “More is better.”

You might recall my mention of some My Super Sweet 16 princesses and their unrealistic requests—requests that were fulfilled by their parents.

Remember Priscilla? She went to the dentist to remove her braces before the big event to the tune of $1,000, only to put them back on again the following week.

Then there was the soon-to-be 16-year-old who was allotted $300,000 to plan her party. And another who trekked cross country to purchase the perfect party dress for $8,200. What about the girl who hails from Memphis? Her parents gave her a custom $125,000+ Hummer. She wanted to add a chandelier.

Yes, something is terribly wrong with that picture.

Marg and I are not the only ones who think this. Researcher/Marketing Professor, Deborah Roedder John (University of Minnesota) believes materialism is directly tied to self-esteem.

"The level of materialism in teens is directly driven by self-esteem," said John. "When self-esteem drops as children enter adolescence, materialism peaks. Then by late adolescence, when self-esteem rebounds, their materialism drops." In a radio interview John explained materialism in teens is a coping mechanism.

An interesting study conducted by Harris Interactive (2006) in which John was involved surveyed 1,213 U.S. tweens and teens. The results showed children ages 8 to 18 really love to buy things. So much so that “buying things” is at the top of their list of things they love to do. Seventy-one percent reported they would be happier, if only they had more money to buy more things.

If we accept John’s contention—that a child’s opinion of him or her self is the driving force behind materialism—we have a means to counter. Plus, we also understand as a child grows older (and thus becomes more self assured), this over-the-top desire to shop and buy will hopefully lessen.

Quite possibly, your child’s biggest challenge is how she views and criticizes herself. Being able to re-direct this type of self-deprecating behavior is a major step in the right direction.

And it can’t hurt to keep an open dialogue going about what things costs and how much time it takes to earn, say $300. “I have to work all day to pay for that.”

We can help our children value themselves more, help them discover and use their strengths. Just like an adult, a child finds more self value when helping others and being productive.

Allyn Evans
Email me!
www.thealertparent.com

Technorati Tags:
Six Week Rotation, Allyn Evans, Alert Parent, Entitlement
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

2009-12-24T14:03:00.000-08:00

Remember Lenore Skenazy—the lady who allowed her nine-year-old child to ride the subway home alone with a quarter in his pocket?

She was recently on TV talking about overboard parents and a new safety device on the market called the Little Buddy Tracker.

The ads for the Tracker say it “keeps tabs on your child at all times, it combines GPS with cellular technology to provide parents with real-time location updates.”

Lenore said we were blowing our worries about our children way out of proportion and that keeping relentless tags on them through GPS reinforces the paranoia of both parents and children that is endemic in today’s culture.

That paranoia also warns us that if anything happens to our children, then we are at fault.

The commentator, who must have children, shot back something like, “But I report real-life tragedies every day.”

Maria Andreu of a New Jersey publication (www.NJ.com of the The Star-Ledger) debated the use of the Little Buddy Tracker in a recent article.

Maria is a proponent of the Free Range Kids movement, founded by Lenore. Free Range parents believe our kids should experience the same freedom kids did up through the 1970s. Maria said, “So when I first heard about the Little Buddy Tracker, I thought, “Wow, where do I get one of those?”

Her debate about whether to buy or not centered around her desire to allow her children to be more “grown-up.” Her 8- and 9-year-old children had been asking if they could walk 10 blocks to school.

Maria said that at 10 she was walking to and from school several miles away. She continued, also reported only six months later she was the official babysitter for her newborn brother. My story is similar. By the time I was 11, I rode my bike all over town. All the kids I knew did, too.

Still, my attention immediately turned to the sad story of the 7-year-old Florida girl who briefly ran ahead of her siblings as they were all walking home from school. She was abducted and killed. I think Lenora would say that was an isolated case.

A few years ago, I might have immediately purchased a Little Buddy Tracker. Sorry, Lenore.

There’s still a part of me that’s thinking for only 100.00 bucks, it certainly might be worth the investment, although I wouldn’t be using it the way it is advertised.

According to the product information, you can “establish specific times and locations where your child is supposed to be — for example, in school — causing the device to alert you with a text message if your child leaves the designated area during that time.” My use of it would be more for tracking—you know, if my child came up missing.

As I found myself considering the purchase of this new device, I realized it meant that I had allowed this big scary world to dictate how I approach child safety issues. This isn’t groundbreaking or earth-shattering news. What it is…is the truth.

According to the responses on Lenore’s website (http://freerangekids.wordpress.com), many parents struggle with how to foster their children’s independence in spite of the very scary news presented by the media.

The Little Buddy Tracker might help one parent relax and give her child a bit more leeway while turning another into a stalker mom. Maria finished her article by saying she’s was not sure if she would buy this device. Since my daughter is more teenager than not, I think I’ll pass. Hope I don’t live to regret this one.

Allyn Evans
www.allynevans.com
email me!

Technorati Tags:
Buddy Tracker, Allyn Evans, Lenore Skenazy
Add to: | Technorati | Digg | del.icio.us | Yahoo | BlinkList | Spurl | reddit | Furl |

Because I Said So!

2009-12-19T14:04:00.000-08:00

I caught the end of yet another episode of World’s Strictest Parents—the good part where parents retrieved their child and the teens showed gratitude and weren’t whining.

For the most part, the parents appeared to be warm, loving and supportive. With seven episodes under my belt, I’d been wondering how things go so terribly wrong.

This time I had an answer. Permissiveness.

What is permissive parenting? Child Psychologist Kenneth Condrell explains the concept well in an article written for Fisher-Price.

He says, “Let’s start with the mom waiting for her 5-year-old son to return home after his first day of kindergarten. As he comes down the steps of the school bus, he is greeted by his mom who is so excited to see him up to the point where he kicks her.

Though the kick is painful and a shock, the mom says to her son, “Robert, why are you so angry?

You know it’s not nice to kick your mom.”Condrell explains: “This mother’s response is permissive and indulgent because it totally dismisses how her child’s behavior affected her, and she doesn’t tell him that his behavior will not be tolerated.”

I thought of Condrell’s example when the parents who arrived to pick up their children from the host families all seemed to be singing the same song to their child. The song went like this: “You hurt me. You are mean to me. You abuse me.”

The light bulb went off: They are the parents whose child kicked them when he was five.

Now that the pain has reached an intolerable point they are saying, “This hurts!”
But they aren’t sure how to fix things. Permissive patterns have been established and are difficult to change.

What’s a permissive parent to do?

Researchers continually tell us that the Authoritative Style of parenting is ideal. Authoritative parents set rules and expect their children to follow them, though the parents understand, as CMT’s website cautioned last week, that the home is not a military academy. Flexibility is required. Other key ingredients include the willingness to listen to your child and being loving, supportive and understanding.

There are actually two phases to this style. With a child fast approaching thirteen, I am already wading in the second phase. As the child grows, a shift needs to take place. More freedoms are allowed as long as trust is maintained, so that the child can become an emotionally healthy, productive adult.

My personality is far better suited to be permissive. It’s my guess that it’s parents like me—parents who love and support their child, but who have a personality not suited or ideal for setting boundaries, saying no and disappointing their child—whose kids end up on World’s Strictest Parents.

If you know this about yourself, you must work around it. I have help. I am married to someone who supports the authoritative approach. I have other tactics I use, too. I create schedules and calendars. In the middle of saying ‘no,’ I remind myself everything will be okay and I have to stick to my guns.

The parents of the teens on the World’s Strictest have given me new vigor for what I must continue to do for at least six more years.

Every time I find it hard to say no, I will remember where permissiveness leads: to teens who backtalk and cuss, who don’t respect authority, who avoid work and who think certain jobs are beneath them.

It leads to children who don’t appreciate or value you or your resources. Bottom line: Permissive parenting leads to TROUBLE.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email me!

World Strickest Parents. Casting Call!

2009-12-09T13:50:00.000-08:00

A couple of weekends ago, Addy and I watched a marathon of CMT and MTV’s World’s Strictest Parents.

The show is yet another way of “showing-by-example” unacceptable behaviors of teenagers.

Before I get to my story, I wanted to share that a few weeks after printing this articles in the newspaper, I received an email from CMT's casting director, Tamra. She said, "I came across your article in the Magnolia Gazette and hoped that you could include casting information for the show."

Casting will continue through February of 2010. And turns out that World's Strickest Parents casting team need more host families.

Tamra also said, "It is often hard to believe that a teen can change in one week, but during that week seeds are planted for a new future. Many teens and families continue to stay in contact well after the show is over." Here is the casting information: World’s Strictest Parents Casting, hotline: (888) 41-TEENS. You can email by clicking on the link or find out additional information by visiting the website.

Back to my article...

Each episode documents the time that two uncontrollable teens must abide by the rules of strict host families. Most of the host families that we watched lived on farms, which meant not only were there rules to follow, there was work to be done. I think I heard a total of twelve teenagers say, “I hate work.”

All of them resisted doing chores and any menial labor. One even announced to the cameras that when she grew up she’d have a maid and other staff to do her bidding.

In the beginning there was way too much whining. When the teenagers weren’t whining, they were breaking the rules. This pattern would continue for a few days until the kids would settle into the new routine and structure. All but one of the twelve teens stuck it out and seemed to be taking major steps in the right direction.

As they were returning to their families, most of the teens reported a renewed respect and appreciation for their parents. Many pledged that their lives would be different and that they would make strides to improve.

I was amazed by the hosts’ ability to deal with difficult people. While some did seem to be way over-the-top, most offered troubled teens a warm, loving environment heavy on chores and accountability.

When a child broke the rules, he or she was punished. In one show, although warned that a rule violation meant the worst-on-the-farm chores, two teenagers decided to go joyriding in one of the work trucks. The next morning the pair had to clean out stables packed full of manure.

On their website CMT staffers included some suggestions to parents. Although their advice is peppered with jokes and fun, what’s offered can be helpful to anyone parenting a teen. They remind parents while there is a need for rules, home is not a military academy. They also suggest offering encouragement—that the parents’ goal is help their children bloom.

As I see it we also have another goal: we are charged with the mission of helping our offspring become productive members of society.

In one of the episodes an eighteen-year-old boy said he wanted to be a chef. When asked by a host parent what plans he had to make his dream a reality, the teen shrugged his shoulders. He had no clue. No plan. Clearly no understanding of how the process of becoming a chef might work.

By the time he left the host parents’ home, he seemed to understand this valuable lesson, and pledged to make a plan toward making his dream come true.

Probably the most important advice from the CMT website is that parents must learn to say no.

I am one of those parents who would rather not upset my child, but not learning how to say ‘no’ means the door for ‘maybe’ is always open. If teenagers believe that every no is a maybe, they will continue to work on you—to wear you down—until your ‘no’ or ‘maybe’ is a ‘yes’.

This creates a no-win situation and sets them up to be adults who use this tactic on loved ones and in professional situations. Teenagers need caregivers to set limits, which will in turn help them build the self-control muscle.

Watching The World’s Strictest Parent with your teen can help begin a dialogue about work, values, accountability, and his or her hopes for the future.

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
info@allynevans.com

2009-11-30T13:35:00.000-08:00

The other night Addy and I are watching a program on HGTV. Designers were helping families in the military.

The mother of one family said to the interviewer: “We spend all our time in the den. We play games, watch TV and oh, we use it constantly for therapy sessions. I have two autistic children.”

Addy took note. “What’s autistic mean?”

I explained as best I could. “It’s a neurological disorder.”

From my own experience of observing children diagnosed with autism, I added, “They can be overly sensitive to the physical world. They’re often agitated by anything they perceive through their senses—hearing, seeing, touching, smelling. Some autistic people might make habitual body motions, rocking, for example, or have attachment to certain objects. They prefer routine and get upset when the routine is disrupted.”

That very same week, Addy and I talked to a college student who helped an autistic child. The conversation reminded me of the article I had written about Kim Hix and her 10-year-old son who was diagnosed with a neuropsychiatric disability. We dug up that article for Addy to read. Then I showed her my latest blog post featuring Chynna Laird and her daughter Jamie.

Statistics indicate many families are raising children with disabilities. According to the American Association of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry between 7 to 12 million children suffer from behavioral, mental or developmental disorders, and these numbers don’t reflect physical disabilities or other maladies. Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs), like Autism, Aspergers and ADHD, affect an estimated two to six per 1,000 children.

At the age of two, Jamie was diagnosed with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD).
Chynna said, “Honestly, I’d never heard of SPD. I’d heard of Autism, Asperger’s and ADHD but not this mysterious SPD.”

Chynna described her symptoms. “She rarely slept, fought us with every simple hygiene task tooth and nail, spent most of her awake time screaming and refused our touch.” Jamie’s mother said it was difficult to take her places, “Anywhere too busy, loud, smelly, bright, etc. made her break down or freeze.”

Chynna explained, “A lot of people call SPD an ‘invisible disorder’ because you can’t see it on a child’s face or body. The only glimmer that something is wrong is their reactions to people, situations, and events and that they often have to try just a bit harder to bounce a ball, play sports like stick hockey or ice skate or concentrate.”

Chynna Laird wrote I’m Not Weird, I have SPD to help others who are experiencing similar challenges. That was why Kim Hix wrote No One Is Perfect and You Are a Great Kid.

Besides the stories of Chynna and Kim, there are many resources available including associations and foundations that provide information and support to people and families. I found a long list simply by searching Google. One source is Children with Disabilities. Another resource is The National Dissemination Center for Children with Disabilities. Forever Families also offers information and resources for families.

Although their stories aren’t quite the same, Chynna and Kim faced their challenges in a similar matter. Both were proactive, searching for answers that made sense. The women deliver a powerful message. Chynna told me: “Jaimie is my sensational child—my miracle girl.”

Kim said something in her original article that I think bears repeating. “It is my hope that other children realize that despite any disabilities they may have that they too possess strengths and gifts. A disability does not make a person, it is simply a part of who he or she is.”

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
Email me!

Emma's Inspirations

2009-11-23T13:13:00.000-08:00

Sandie Lee, former editor for Families Matter , featured the story of Emma. “Each year, millions of children face danger and injury because of being left in vehicles unattended,” Sandie wrote.

We’ve all read the headlines and been horrified. We realize how easy this could happen—even to the best of caregivers. In our go-go, sleep deprived world, children are left in unattended cars more than we’d like to think.

According to Jan Null (San Francisco State University), there have already been 30 deaths of infants this year due to having been left in a hot vehicle.

In 2008, there were 43 deaths. Since 1998 there have been a total of 442 recorded infant fatalities due to having been left unattended in vehicles. Temperatures don’t have to be in the 90’s to be life-threatening.

Temperatures as mild as the 70’s can be fatal. It’s probably not surprising that the majority of deaths are clustered in southern and southwestern states: Florida, Arizona and Texas, as examples.

According to Sandie who is currently Blog Editor of Bumples Family First, "Barbara left her child in an SUV. Fortunately for Barbara and her daughter Emma, her story had a positive outcome and Barbara used the experience to create a helpful product for caregivers.

In the Families Matters article Barbara explained, “When our daughter Emma was an infant, we moved into our new house. As we pulled into the driveway, we all became very excited and quickly left the car to see the house. There was so much to be done that everyone went off in different directions.

“I had assumed that my husband had Emma, and he thought that it was me who had brought her inside. Making the assumption that everything was okay, we all went about moving into our new home. In a sudden moment of panic we realized that our baby girl wasn’t even in the house. Nearly forty-five minutes after we had arrived, we rushed to our car for Emma.

“The sun was high in the sky, and it was sweltering in the car. We were very lucky. I thank God that my older son had cracked open the back window on the ride up because he was carsick, or Emma may not have become the vibrant six-year-old she is today!”

After the event Barbara was created Emma’s Inspirations, a decal (a new car window static-cling sticker) that provides a visual reminder to the driver that a child could still be in the backseat. To dole out responsibility, Emma’s inspiration includes four decals designed to adhere to the inside of the window and facing out.

Suggested placements are on the driver, passenger and rear door windows. For order information visit Emma’s Inspirations, which also has decals for pet owners, too.

Jan Null posted safety recommendations on her site. She leads off her list with instructions to never leave a child unattended. Her advice is telling us something we already know. It’s highly unlikely a child is left alone purposefully.

Points worth repeating:
1. If you see a child unattended in a hot vehicle call 911. Don’t hesitate to take action.
2. Always lock your car. This prevents a child from climbing in by him or herself. Teach your children that vehicles are never to be used for play.
3. Make “look before you leave” a routine whenever you get out of your car.
4. Have a plan that your childcare provider will call you if your child does not show up for school.

Enhancing the decal idea, keep a stuffed animal in the carseat. When you place the child in the carseat, put the stuffed animal in the front with the driver.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email me!

Flying With Lap Babies

2009-11-13T14:16:00.000-08:00

Recently I flew to Virginia for a business meeting.

My trek from Oklahoma City to Charlottesville took two flights. While on the first leg of my trip and listening to the safety instructions, I started thinking about the lap child seated in front of me.

I pulled out the instruction sheet to see what they were telling parents of little ones to do incase of trouble. The picture demonstrating the recommended technique showed a mother holding on tight while hunched over her baby.

I wondered how many parents in an emergency situation would attempt to strap their child down? And how tragic either way—strapped or holding—would be for parent and child.

When I arrived home, I just happened to read an article by a former flight attendant and cyberfriend of mine on this very subject. Beth Blair (The Vacation Gals) asked readers, “Would you ever sit your child on your lap riding on a roller coaster? How about cruising at 75 mph down the highway?”

She explained the airlines policy, which is any child under the age of two can fly for “free” (in the United States) if they sit on an adult’s lap for the entire flight. Beth said, “Some parents assume that if the airline allows lap children, it must be okay. After all, the airlines are the experts, why would they put any of their passengers in danger?”

I cringed when I read this because I was one of those parents who believed, “Well, it must be okay if they allow it!”

What parents don’t realize is if a plane did crash it would be virtually impossible to hang on to your child. And the force of the impact propels a twenty pound baby into an 80 to 100 pound flying object. Strapping a child to you is also a bad idea.

Beth explains, “If the plane comes to a sudden halt or crash, your body will automatically be thrown forward and forced down, on top of your baby, possibly crushing him.”

Turbulence is also a problem. I remember how difficult it was to simply hang on to Addy when things were calm. Sometimes, the last thing she wanted to do was to sit still in my lap for an extended flight. Forgetting that, turbulence is a regular occurrence and can be rough enough to open overhead bins and throw non-seat-belted adults around.

So what’s a parent to do?

Beth has an answer for that too. “I suggest purchasing a seat for your child the next time you fly.” Parents who purchase seats can also bring a car seat to place (and then be strapped down) in the seat.

In a follow up article, Beth provided another solution to her readers. New on the market is a restraining system for children called CARES (Child Aviation Restraint System). It’s reasonable—only costs $75 and weighs only one pound and will protect a child weighing between 22 and 44 pounds.

To order, simply visit their website: http://www.kidsflysafe.com. Manufactured by an airline seat belt maker, AmSafe Aviation, it is reliable and easy to use. Beth demoed the safety straps and provided instructions:

1. Lower tray table behind child’s seat and slide the red harness over the seat.

2. Pull red loop snug about seat back.

3. Tighten red loop 1″ above child’s shoulders.

4. Insert lap belt through small black loops, buckle lap belt, fasten chest clip.

5. Tighten lap belt and torso harness. 6. Re-stow tray table.

And if you still need to take your car seat…of course you do! Simply check it with your luggage or think about renting one upon your arrival.

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
email me!

Technorati Tags:
lap babies, flying, airlines, holiday travel, allyn evans, beth blair
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Eyes Wide Open

2009-10-31T13:42:00.000-07:00

Addy was eight-years-old when she became aware that others might be critical of her. It was hard for me to watch.

“First grade is when I started to care about what others thought,” my husband said when we discussed this. As a child I had a similar realization.

I think my awareness of external judgment started in second grade when it was clear that all the other children didn’t have as much arm hair as I did. I cried about it, and even asked my mother to take me to the doctor. The doctor said something like, “You need to dye and cut it regularly.” We tried the trimming thing for a while, but my arms always looked worse—gaps of hair missing were much more obvious than leaving it be.

I had been affected by the ‘good opinion of others’ through my young adulthood. It’s the approval issue. We come out of childhood craving it. We drown out our internal voices because we worry who we are will not match up to the expectations of others and we will be proven unlovable.

Through Addy and her friends, I have an opportunity to again look at these processes. Why do we feel the need to twist ourselves to be like everyone else?

Deb Dunham (http://www.tweenyouandmebook.com/) who also writes about and for tweens and teens wrote an article, I wanted to share with you.

The remaining column is a reprinting of an article posted by Deb on her blog.

Following a discussion about preteen stress, my 11-yr old daughter looked at her 5-year old sister and said, ‘I feel so bad that she’ll have to learn about grownup stuff some day. She’s so oblivious and happy now.’ My tween was reflecting on her own recent transition to a broader awareness.

When girls enter tweenhood, it’s as if their eyes are dilated and suddenly they see much more than they can absorb.

Tweens today are part of an information age that exposes them to mature concepts at an early age. But even with careful censoring of information, tweens become shockingly aware of the bigger world – thanks to their newly emerging self-consciousness.

They begin to see that the world has opinions of them; and they start to favor the judgment of others over their own self-assessment.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, many girls suffer a crisis of confidence between the ages of 11 and 13. This crisis follows them deep into their teen years as evidenced by reports that less than 1/3 of high school girls say they are happy with who they are.

Tweens are receptive to positive input. Parents can take advantage of this receptivity to bolster a tween’s confidence level.

1. Promote a sense of belonging and value. Involve your daughter in family plans. Ask for her opinion and allow her to orchestrate the details of an event.

2. Promote self-reliance and competence. Provide ample developmentally appropriate responsibilities and choices. Promote independent problem-solving. Remember most tweens are not necessarily asking for advice, but instead need to be heard.

3. Be a positive role model. Demonstrate respect by avoiding criticism of yourself and others. Most importantly, take ownership for your own choices by apologizing when necessary.

It’s natural for adolescents to suffer a decline in self-approval as they enter tweenhood. But it’s also possible for them to build confidence and self-love with careful guidance.

Tweens are resilient beings who can do more than survive the challenges of adolescence. Parents can acknowledge the hardships of a preteen and simultaneously expect them to thrive. Every child deserves to enjoy the benefits of self-acceptance. Every child can feel lovable, capable, and valuable.

Thanks Deb for your contribution!

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/

email me!

Technorati Tags:
Deb Dunham, Tween You and Me, Allyn Evans, The Alert Parent, parental advice
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Life with Challenges

2009-10-22T12:05:00.000-07:00

The other night Addy and I are watching a program on HGTV. Designers were helping families in the military.

The mother of one family said to the interviewer: “We spend all our time in the den. We play games, watch TV and oh, we use it constantly for therapy sessions. I have two autistic children.”

Addy took note. “What’s autistic mean?”

I explained as best I could. “It’s a neurological disorder.”

From my own experience of observing children diagnosed with autism, I added, “They can be overly sensitive to the physical world. They’re often agitated by anything they perceive through their senses—hearing, seeing, touching, smelling. Some autistic people might make habitual body motions, rocking, for example, or have attachment to certain objects. They prefer routine and get upset when the routine is disrupted.”

That very same week, Addy and I talked to a college student who helped an autistic child. The conversation reminded me of the article I had written about Kim Hix and her 10-year-old son who was diagnosed with a neuropsychiatric disability.

We dug up that article for Addy to read. Then I showed her my latest blog post featuring Chynna Laird and her daughter Jamie.

Statistics indicate many families are raising children with disabilities. According to the American Association of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry between 7 to 12 million children suffer from behavioral, mental or developmental disorders, and these numbers don’t reflect physical disabilities or other maladies. Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs), like Autism, Aspergers and ADHD, affect an estimated two to six per 1,000 children.

At the age of two, Jamie was diagnosed with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD).
Chynna said, “Honestly, I’d never heard of SPD. I’d heard of Autism, Asperger’s and ADHD but not this mysterious SPD.”

Chynna described her symptoms. “She rarely slept, fought us with every simple hygiene task tooth and nail, spent most of her awake time screaming and refused our touch.” Jamie’s mother said it was difficult to take her places, “Anywhere too busy, loud, smelly, bright, etc. made her break down or freeze.”

Chynna explained, “A lot of people call SPD an ‘invisible disorder’ because you can’t see it on a child’s face or body. The only glimmer that something is wrong is their reactions to people, situations, and events and that they often have to try just a bit harder to bounce a ball, play sports like stick hockey or ice skate or concentrate.”

Chynna Laird wrote I’m Not Weird to help others who are experiencing similar challenges. That was why Kim Hix wrote No One Is Perfect and You Are a Great Kid.

Besides the stories of Chynna and Kim, there are many resources available including associations and foundations that provide information and support to people and families. I found a long list simply by searching Google.

One source is http://www.childrenswithdisabilities.info/. Another resource is The National Dissemination Center for Children with Disabilities (http://www.nichcy.org/). Forever Families (http://www.foreverfamilies.net/) also offers information and resources for families.

Although their stories aren’t quite the same, Chynna and Kim faced their challenges in a similar matter. Both were proactive, searching for answers that made sense. The women deliver a powerful message. Chynna told me: “Jaimie is my sensational child—my miracle girl.”

Kim said something in her original article that I think bears repeating. “It is my hope that other children realize that despite any disabilities they may have that they too possess strengths and gifts. A disability does not make a person, it is simply a part of who he or she is.”

Allyn Evans
www.allynevans.com
email me!

Technorati Tags:
Kids with Disabilities, Kim Hix, You Are a Great Kid, Allyn Evans, The Alert Parent, Chynna Laird, I'm Not Weird
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Secretary Mom

2009-10-18T14:56:00.000-07:00

Robin Lewis was recently featured on 20/20’s Helicopter Moms: Hurting or Helping Kids as a very serious Helicopter Mom—a mom who by definition hovers over her children from beginning to end.

Lewis is more along the lines with the Black Hawk version of parenting.

At the controls, she knows all the passwords for her college-age children’s bank accounts and school portals.

She monitors their student email accounts to help them keep up with assignments and communicate with teachers.

She spends hours daily creating individual to-do lists, which she delivers to each son via email. She calls them throughout the day to check on their progress or remind them of tasks. Twice weekly she makes the two hour drive to wash their clothes.

The boys see their mother as being supportive and helpful. One son said: “It's nice to have someone who kind of serves as ... a secretary mom."

The boys are appreciative, but are they learning how to handle their own lives?

According to Helen Johnson, parenting expert and author of the book Don't Tell Me What to Do, Just Send Money, they are not. She believes that Lewis and parents like her are sending a message to their kids that screams, “You are not capable.”

This new parenting trend is building its own industry. Many four-year colleges hire Parent Coordinators to handle the “hovercrafters”.

A Parent Coordinator is charged with manning an information hotline and organizing parenting events.

Colleges even offer seminars for students to help them learn to separate from so much control, although many of the millennium generation report they prefer having their top advisors in the middle of their business—handling the tough issues and minor hassles they face. Something is terribly wrong with this picture.

The College Board, a New York-based nonprofit organization that oversees the SAT and Advanced Placement programs, provides information for the parents of entering Freshman. It offers a quiz so parents can see where they fall on the Helicopter scale.

Questions include how many times caregivers contact their college-enrolled child a day, if they have ever contacted a professor on the child’s behalf and if they have written a paper for their child.

Parents who answer too many questions with the wrong answer are told, “We know you mean well, but you've just learned that hovering can be detrimental to your student. Take a deep breath, and check out the books listed below.”

To take the quiz, click here. This site provides a wealth of information, including recommended books.

On the flipside, new research tells us hovering parents can actually be helping their students.

The main message of these new findings is that involved parenting can be a good thing. Checking in, asking about grades and encouraging our college students to stay on top of their work and commitments certainly isn’t overstepping any boundaries.

For a clear delineation of where hovering becomes toxic, heed Johnson’s advice, “You do not take on your children's problems,” Johnson says, “but you talk to them about their problems.”

Learning how to manage one’s own problems and challenges builds a required muscle. If the child never does anything for him or her self, no lesson is learned.

Many times in my young adult life, I wished my parents would handle my problems—talk to my professor about a missed class or call my boss to explain what happened. Thankfully for me, having my parents handle those challenges wasn’t even an option. Unfortunately, for our latest generation of college students and young professionals, it is.

Allyn Evans
email me!
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
Secretary Mom, Helicopter Parents, parental advice, Allyn Evans, The Alert Parent
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

A Child Who Sleeps Wins!

2009-10-10T11:26:00.000-07:00

A few weeks back a video clip for CNN featured author of NutureShock, Po Bronson.

The clip prompted last week’s sleep column, but by the time I had completed my 600-word maximum, I had completely left out any mention of what Po Bronson had to say. And he had lots to say…

In the clip, the CNN anchor took the lead. “Parents, what's the difference between raising an A student and a B student?

Fifteen minutes.

And we're not talking about study time, we're talking about sleep.”

During the interview Po Bronson said, “One school district started an hour later. The SAT scores of the best and brightest went up 200 points.”

You know my stance on the importance of sleep. If only I could go door-to-door every night and collect all cell phones, computers, gaming systems and MP3 players from all the teens in the world. I can’t. What I can do is share information with you that might lead to different choices.

During the interview, Mr. Bronson shared some of the research reported in his book.

Bronson featured a Rhode Island researcher, Dr. Avi Sadeh, a leading expert in the field.

In one study Sadeh asked 77 fourth- and sixth-graders to change their sleep patterns for three nights. Some were asked to stay up longer and some were told to go to bed earlier.

To measure sleep time, each child used a wrist device called an actigraph, which measures sleep activity. After evaluating the results, it was determined that one group did actually sleep thirty minutes more, while the second group slept 31 minutes less.

To see if this made a difference in the child’s ability to perform, neurobiological functioning was tested on the third day. The results were surprising. Sadeh’s conclusions were that a sleepy sixth-grader will be at the same performance level as a rested fourth grader.

Sadeh’s not the only researcher who is reporting the consequences of small sleep differences.

In reference to the “15 minute” remark, two important studies give plenty of ammunition for the importance of sleeping and amounts.

Dr. Kyla Wahlstrom, University of Minnesota, evaluated the sleep habits of more than 7,000 high school students.

Turns out that the A students averaged approximately fifteen more minutes of sleep than the B teens. And the students who made mostly B’s slept about eleven more minutes than the students who made mostly C’s. The C’s slept on average ten more minutes than the D students. What might be even more surprising is that this study replicated the results of a similar study done in Rhode Island of more than 3,000 teens.

A small number of schools are taking sleep researchers seriously by backing up school start times. According to Po Bronson, one of the best known is a school located in Edina, Minnesota. The time changed from 7:25 a.m. to 8:30 a.m.

“In the year preceding the time change, math and verbal SAT scores for the top 10 percent of Edina’s students averaged 1288. A year later, the top 10 percent averaged 1500, an increase that couldn’t be attributed to any other variable.

“Truly flabbergasting,” said Brian O’Reilly, the College Board’s executive director for SAT Program Relations on hearing the results.

Maybe Po Bronson said it best in a 2007 article he wrote for the New York Times. “Parents and educators might remain skeptical about the importance of the lost hour, but the sleep-research community considers the evidence irrefutable. Their convictions hardened as scientists began to understand sleep’s vital role in synthesizing and storing memories.”

Allyn Evans
www.thealertparent.com
email me!

Technorati Tags:
Po Bronson, The Alert Parent, Sleep, Teens, Performance, Nutureshock
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

A Good's Night Sleep

2009-09-29T07:08:00.000-07:00

“I stay up until 2:00 a.m. every night,” one girl told me. Another student piped in, saying she never made it past midnight. These students have to be checked in at school before 8:00 a.m. every weekday.

“What do you do when you stay up?” I asked. They mentioned TV, video games, and Internet. A junior standing nearby added, “Cell phones. I text. My phone sounds at all hours of the night. Lots of my friends are night owls.”

It doesn’t take a brain scientist to figure out that these girls aren’t getting much quality sleep. And according to researchers, that is a serious problem.

Sleep is something we take very seriously at my house. We work hard to have all our activities wrapped up with time to unwind before the bedtime hour arrives. For my 12-year-old daughter, we target nine hours of sleep. More nights than not, that’s exactly what she gets.

In a report written in Science Daily (2009), researchers surveyed 100 middle and high school students to evaluate their sleep patterns. The majority of the students sampled reported having at least a computer (30%), TV (66%), cell phone (90%) or MP3 player (79%) in their room. Results indicated that only 20 percent slept eight or more hours, with eight to nine being the recommended allotment. Thirty percent of the students surveyed reported falling asleep during school.

Lead researcher Calamaro said, “Parents need to discourage teenagers from drinking caffeine past noon time and keep TVs, computers and especially cell phones out of kids’ bedrooms.”

Some interesting information came from a study out of Northwestern University (BioMedicine/Andrea Browning).

The study evaluated 2,281 children ages 3 to 12 with follow-up study on the children when they were 8 to 17. Researchers determined how much sleep a child got by using bedtime and wake-up times.

Turns out children who slept longer had lower BMI (body mass index measures) than the children who did not. Berger explained, “Specifically, the researchers found that sleeping an additional hour reduced young children’s chance of being overweight from 36 percent to 30 percent, while it reduced older children's risk from 34 percent to 30 percent.”

What I gather from this is that sleep issues have important consequences other than just whether or not a person can stay awake or concentrate the next day. There’s much more to it and I will talk about these issues again next week.

How do you know if your teen is getting enough sleep? The National Sleep Foundation says to address the following questions:

1. Does your child have trouble waking up in the morning?
2. Is your child irritable in the afternoon?
3. Does your child fall asleep during the day?
4. Does your child oversleep on the weekend?
5. Does your child have difficulties concentrating or remembering?
6. Does your child report having an interrupted sleep cycle?

Use common sense when making this determination. Look at the facts. How many hours is your child actually sleeping? Then do the math.

Personally, I can answer yes to the first and fourth questions without concern because I know Addy goes to sleep and stays asleep. We talk about how she slept every weekday morning. I also know that there is no TV or computer in her room and the cell phone is tucked away with mine in the kitchen drawer.

Because of the ramifications of not getting enough sleep, the http://www.sleepforkids.org/ website (a service of the National Sleep Foundation) advises: “We need to focus as much on the sleeping half of children’s lives as we do on the waking half.”

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
email me!

Technorati Tags:
sleep, children, allyn evans, the alert parent
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Taking From Others

2009-09-23T16:48:00.000-07:00

Addy and I watched “Odd Girl Out,” a movie based on an advice book by the same title and written by Rachel Simmons.

In one scene, several girls are shopping at an expensive store. Vanessa can’t afford to buy the clothes the other girls can, and her best friend Stacy gifts her with some of the clothes. As they are walking out Stacy turns to the girls and says, “I forgot to pay for this scarf. My purse is too small.”

The girls look at one another. Some repeat the “my purse is too small” line. Then they all turn to Vanessa.

Vanessa caves in to the pressure. She sticks the scarf in her oversized bag. She walks out of the store and doesn’t get caught. She leaves the burden of paying for the scarf to someone else; in this case, the merchant who will foot the bill and pass the cost on to other customers, to you and to me.

Stealing happens frequently. Electronic devices and locked cabinets point to a problem massive enough that merchants pay big bucks to hang on to their stuff. Retail stores aren’t the only ones with “stealing” problems. The music industry is still trying to stop the bleeding.

This summer presented several opportunites for Addy and me to review this theme. The first was a few months back while we shopped at Rue 21. Addy wanted to know why the store locked its dressing rooms and why we were limited to how many items we could have in the dressing room.

As I explained, something hit the floor with a thud. It was an electronic tag that had fallen out of a pocket of the shorts she was trying on. I knew what it meant. She didn’t. I explained that someone removed the tag, stuck it in this pocket, then strolled out the door with stolen merchandise.

But stealing isn’t only about intentionally shoplifting. A few weeks before school started, we did our annual back-to-school shopping. At the cash register, I noticed the man didn’t charge us for one of the items.

The thought drifted through my head, “Should I tell?” It was immediately followed by “Not telling is stealing.” I spoke up and paid for all of our merchandise. Addy had the opportunity to learn knowingly taking advantage of other people’s mistakes is also stealing.

A few weeks after that experience, she showed me a CD her friend Mark made for her. I asked what was on it. She named the song and the band. I said, “Addy, that is pirated. We can’t keep it.” When I explained that copying songs you don’t buy was stealing and illegal, she didn’t want the CD anymore. Right then we broke it.

More recently we visited another store, this time to purchase a watch for my husband. We looked at a wide-variety of sports watches and finally selected a medium-priced model. Once home, we realized that the clerk had given us the most expensive watch, but charged us for the mid-priced variety.

This time there was no second-guessing. Addy and I knew immediately our only option was to jump in the car, return to the store and correct the oversight. And that’s exactly what we did.

There is a moral to this line of stories. The moral is that taking something that isn’t ours is stealing. It’s a lesson that our children need to understand. And there are many, many ways to teach it. For starters, use this article and the examples included to teach the children in your life this most important lesson.

Allyn Evans
http://www.thealertparent.com/
Email me!

Technorati Tags:
Rue 21, stealing, Odd Girl Out, Allyn Evans, Alert Parent
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

But I'm Too Fat!

2009-09-16T16:19:00.000-07:00

To continue last's week theme...

A study conducted by the Harvard Eating Disorders Center reported fifty percent of girls of ages eight to ten were already unhappy with their size and wanted to be thinner. Why do girls as young as eight yearn for thinner bodies?

Carla Fine in Strong, Bold and Smart says, “Girls as young as eight years old express concern about their weight, according to a recent study conducted at Stanford University Medical School.

More than one half of the girls in the survey, who ranged in age from eight to eleven, said they were dissatisfied with their weight. More than a third wanted a thinner body, and 16 percent had attempted weight loss.”

The study asked girls why they wanted to lose weight. “The reasons they gave included teasing by peers, pressure from family, feeling uncomfortable or embarrassed, and wanting to feel better or look better.” Researchers also asked how the children learned about the concept of dieting. “Three-quarters of the study’s participants said they heard about dieting from a parent, while more than half had also heard about weight loss from television and other media sources.”

Runway models and actresses aren’t helping matters. Remember the reference to actress Jennifer Love Hewitt last week (in the Entertainment Network storyline about Hollywood and thinness). She said, “I go to these parties and I am the fattest girl in the room. I wear a size 2.” Another actress talked about wardrobe sample sizes. She had to wear a size 0 to fit the sample sizes delivered by designers. “If the clothes don’t fit. I don’t get the job.” These are the images our children are comparing themselves to.

Although media images are a problem, we must also look at ourselves. If every time we walk by a mirror and talk about how fat we are, or that our skin is wrinkling, we are sharing our focus on appearance with our daughter.

If we don’t believe we play an important role, Nancy Snyderman (Girl in the Mirror) asks us to rethink our stance. “If you need convincing about how important this is, keep in mind a study published in October 2000 in The Journal of the American Dietetic Association.

The report discovered that girls as young as the age of five form ideas about dieting—and the need for it—from their mothers’ behavior! Forcing ourselves to become aware of the messages we send our daughters—about our womanhood, our looks, our bodies, and what we find meaningful and important in life—is the first step toward helping our daughters become healthy adolescents who will grow into fulfilled and secure women.”

Mary Pipher in Reviving Ophelia told us, “Girls are terrified of being fat.” So are mothers, and a mother’s attitude about her own body has a significant impact. Fathers, brothers and other significant males in your daughter’s life do too. Always focusing on how your daughter looks will direct your daughter’s attention to her appearance.

A recently published book Would Be So Pretty If… by Dara Chadwick, provides parents tips she calls body image builders. She tells us to “cultivate kindness,” with yourself and others. She also says to “skip the mirror,” cutting back on the frequency of mirror glimpses one takes. She asks us to “appreciate our strengths” and “revisit history together,” spending time looking at photographs of the women in your family, complimenting the people in the pictures, helping your daughter understand the family she comes from.

If your daughter has body image issues, Chadwick’s book is a good starting point to begin helping refocus your child in healthier ways.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
email me!

2009-09-09T16:12:00.000-07:00

Not too long ago Hollywood actress Jennifer Love Hewitt claimed to be a size 2. The night after seeing her discuss “being the fattest one at the party”

I talked to my husband. I started naming women he knew who comfortably wore a size 8. “Can you imagine Bridget wearing a two or zero?” I asked him.

“Not good,” he said.

“If Bridget started wearing a size two, I’d accuse her of being ill. Do you think if I saw Jennifer Love Hewitt in person, I’d think she was ill?”

But we and our children are bombarded by media images that make size-2 women feel fat. I hear of third grade-girls obsessing about their weight, and I have to think, “Are you kidding me?”

Eating disorder expert, Dr. Anne Becker, and medical doctor and author, Dr. Nancy Synderman, have each discussed the influence of media on our daughters’ perception of themselves.

Dr. Becker suggests “young American adolescents are…vulnerable to mistaking television characters as role models for real life.” Snyderman asked her readers, “Is your daughter culturally sophisticated enough to realize that the images she’s looking at—in magazines, on CD covers, on television—have been altered and enhanced, digitally and otherwise? Does she realize that the bodies (not to mention the skin, hair and nails) presented as ‘ideal’ may also have been specially lit, ‘altered’ or ‘enhanced’? Are her mathematical skills sophisticated enough for her to recognize what a teeny percentage of the female population on this planet actually is born looking this way?”

Even I have taken advantage of the wonders of photo enhancement. When taking photos to use for my website, the photographer pointed out my imperfections.

“Would you like to remove this extra flesh under your chin?”

“Extra flesh,” I thought. “I have extra flesh under my chin?”

He used a pointer to show me the offending skin.

That extra flesh had to go.

He worked other magic, too. With a click of a button many of my wrinkles vanished. Every now and then you’ll catch actresses or models unprepared for the cameras or the victim of an unbrushed shot. Sometimes it’s surprising the difference in how they look and how you think they look.

The website http://www.mypopstudio.com/ can help us deal with what’s coming at our daughters at warp speed. My Pop Studio, for younger girls and tweens, uses creative play to strengthen critical thinking skills about television, music, magazines and online media directed at girls.

The information on the website tells parents, “Developing media literacy skills is increasingly important in a world where girls spend much of their everyday life consuming and creating media.

Parents and educators can highlight the learning outcomes of My Pop Studio by encouraging girls to share and discuss activities on the site, and by extending into offline activities from the curriculum guide.”

The site has three suggestions to help our daughters use the information provided. Ask your daughter to share what she has done on the site. With many interactive games and activities, she’ll have much to show.

Secondly, ask your child questions about the activities themselves. Talking to your child about her experience and interpretations means that you too are playing a vital role in helping her digest what she sees in the media. And finally, help your daughter reflect on the purpose of doing the activities and then help her make connections to the role of media in both your lives.
Concerned about how media is impacting your daughter? I highly recommend My Pop Studio as a starting point.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email me!

Technorati Tags:
Jennifer Love Hewitt, Too Thin, Runway Sizes, Size 0, parental advice, The Alert Parent, Allyn Evans
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

The Tug of a Lotus Flower

2009-09-03T14:38:00.000-07:00

“It’s just so scary,” a mother of a tween said to me. “I am trying to allow Annie more freedom, but it’s hard. Every time she rides her bike to our local quick mart, I’m petrified until she gets home.”

I knew exactly what she meant. I constantly remind myself the objective of my current job: to get my daughter from tween to adult in one piece—physically and emotionally. I also understand my daughter needs space as she develops self-resilience, self-confidence, and the ability to make connections on her own. She needs to be allowed to make mistakes. She needs to ride her bike alone.

Remember Lenore Skenazy who put her nine-year-old son on the subway train in New York City with only quarters and a map? Lenore’s genuinely worried that our safety concerns are limiting our children.

While theoretically I agree with her, I am also concerned about what might happen to my daughter if I am not hovering nearby. Let’s face it. There is no Leave It to Beaver life right now. The streets and Internet are not safe places for our children to roam free.

But our children grow up. There comes a time when parents must begin to allow and let go. My daughter and I have reached this place. It is time to begin saying “yes” more. She needs to test her wings. She needs to be able to make mistakes. She needs room.

While talking to Annie’s mom, I thought of Marianne Williamson’s story of elephants in A Return to Love. When Williamson traveled to Bangkok she witnessed how elephants are trained. “The trainers capture the elephant and tether one of its legs to a giant tree,” she wrote. The elephant puts up a mighty fight. In an attempt to be free, it will fight for days, sometimes weeks. Typically by the time a month has passed the elephant gives up—stops fighting.

At this point the trainers will tie the elephant with a rope. The elephant will fight some more, but not as hard. Eventually, just like before, the elephant will stop trying. By the time the training is complete, the elephant will remain tied to a tree or a stake tethered with only a lotus flower—the constant tug on the ankle indicates they are anything but free.

If we tether our children long enough, even if it’s out of a great love for them and a desire to keep them safe, they can lose the ability to branch out on their own. And isn’t that what life is all about? Exploring and learning for as long as we live? I think Lenora would be proud of me for making this analogy. We caregivers walk a thin line as we do everything in our power to keep our children safe while helping them be strong, powerful people who will prosper and soar as adults.

How do we do this? If you are like Annie’s mom and me, you take baby steps. You say yes as often as possible. You give your children choices, and dole out consequences when the boundaries are overstepped.

What did it feel like the first time you were allowed to ride your bike alone? Didn’t you feel free and powerful? Didn’t you feel all grown up? We need to set up opportunities for our children to feel “all grown up”, free and powerful so that when they do leave our nests, they will not be held down by fears, insecurities, an inability to test the waters or, for that matter, a lotus flower.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
Email me!

Technorati Tags:
Lenore Skenazy, Marianne Williamson, tethered elephants, parental advice
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

2009-08-28T10:54:00.000-07:00

Recently Addy had a mild bout with the flu. Over a long weekend, we cuddled on the couch and watched movies.

One in particular, The Ultimate Gift, caught my attention, and not because it boasted big name actors from my youth like James Gardner, Lee Meriweather and Brian Dennehy.

It was a movie about Jason Stevens, a trust fund brat who receives twelve tasks—or gifts—instead of the big inheritance he is expecting from his grandfather.

If Jason is going to receive any money, he must accept the gifts and complete the tasks within one year’s time. As he works through the tasks, he is transformed from a spoiled rotten and indifferent person to an exceptional adult.

Addy wasn’t crazy about the movie, but that’s not the key point here. The clincher is that the movie she really didn’t like delivered a powerful lesson with visuals. As an example, one of the gifts was the “Gift of Work.”

Jason is sent to Texas to work on a ranch. His job is to build a fence. Accustomed to his extravagant lifestyle, Jason’s first reaction is to think it’s not worth it—no matter what the pay-off.

For the first few days, he doesn’t do much of anything. He waits for the crew to bring his food and he naps. Later he begins building what he believes is a fence. The posts are poorly grounded and most are crooked, as well as being sloppily wired together. Although he is proud of his accomplishment, his boss, Gus the Rancher, is not. Gus unceremoniously ties a rope attached to his truck to what Jason is calling a fence and drives off. Yes, the contraption is torn down.

After Addy recovered from her illness, I decided to pay her to clean an outside refrigerator. In less than ten minutes she was outside, then inside again, passing me in the hall.

“Where are you going,” I asked.

“I’m done.”

I knew it was time for a chore check. Let’s just say my idea of clean was very different than hers. “Remember Jason and the fence?” I said. After a brief discussion she got it. She finished the job—a job well done.

In the movie, Jason has to address issues including problems, friends, family, giving, and gratitude, as well as others that he had missed due to his affluent and insulated life.

At one point Jason is stripped of all his financial resources. His mother can’t help him or she will lose what she got in the deal. Jason has to figure out how to function without an endless supply of funds. Our children can benefit from this lesson as well.

Of course we’re not going to cut them off and put them out on the street, as happened to Jason, but we can teach them lessons about money and work. Providing allowances and paying them to do odd jobs is a good starting place. When your children want something like a new CD or Xbox game, help them figure out ways to earn the money instead of footing the bill.

Step-by-painful-and-entertaining-step Jason is led to develop the resources so that he can develop the ability to give and receive the gift that we all seek: the gift of love. On the film’s website (http://www.theultimategift.com/) James Gardner who played Jason’s grandfather is quoted as saying "If you want to take your family to see a movie that will teach them about life lessons and the importance of character, this is the film to see."

I agree James. I agree.

Allyn Evans
www.allynevans.com
email me

What Size Are You?

2009-08-07T09:36:00.001-07:00

Not too long ago Hollywood actress Jennifer Love Hewitt claimed to be a size 2. The night after seeing her discuss “being the fattest one at the party” I talked to my husband. I started naming women he knew who comfortably wore a size 8. “Can you imagine Bridget wearing a two or zero?” I asked him.

“Not good,” he said.

“If Bridget started wearing a size two, I’d accuse her of being ill. Do you think if I saw Jennifer Love Hewitt in person, I’d think she was ill?”

But we and our children are bombarded by media images that make size-2 women feel fat. I hear of third grade-girls obsessing about their weight, and I have to think, “Are you kidding me?”

Eating disorder expert, Dr. Anne Becker, and medical doctor and author, Dr. Nancy Synderman, have each discussed the influence of media on our daughters’ perception of themselves.

Dr. Becker suggests “young American adolescents are…vulnerable to mistaking television characters as role models for real life.”

Snyderman asked her readers, “Is your daughter culturally sophisticated enough to realize that the images she’s looking at—in magazines, on CD covers, on television—have been altered and enhanced, digitally and otherwise? Does she realize that the bodies (not to mention the skin, hair and nails) presented as ‘ideal’ may also have been specially lit, ‘altered’ or ‘enhanced’? Are her mathematical skills sophisticated enough for her to recognize what a teeny percentage of the female population on this planet actually is born looking this way?”

Even I have taken advantage of the wonders of photo enhancement. When taking photos to use for my website, the photographer pointed out my imperfections.

“Would you like to remove this extra flesh under your chin?”

“Extra flesh,” I thought. “I have extra flesh under my chin?”

He used a pointer to show me the offending skin.

That extra flesh had to go.

He worked other magic, too. With a click of a button many of my wrinkles vanished. Every now and then you’ll catch actresses or models unprepared for the cameras or the victim of an unbrushed shot. Sometimes it’s surprising the difference in how they look and how you think they look.

The website http://www.mypopstudio.com/ can help us deal with what’s coming at our daughters at warp speed.

My Pop Studio, for younger girls and tweens, uses creative play to strengthen critical thinking skills about television, music, magazines and online media directed at girls.

The information on the website tells parents, “Developing media literacy skills is increasingly important in a world where girls spend much of their everyday life consuming and creating media.

Parents and educators can highlight the learning outcomes of My Pop Studio by encouraging girls to share and discuss activities on the site, and by extending into offline activities from the curriculum guide.”

The site has three suggestions to help our daughters use the information provided. Ask your daughter to share what she has done on the site. With many interactive games and activities, she’ll have much to show. Secondly, ask your child questions about the activities themselves.

Talking to your child about her experience and interpretations means that you too are playing a vital role in helping her digest what she sees in the media. And finally, help your daughter reflect on the purpose of doing the activities and then help her make connections to the role of media in both your lives.

Concerned about how media is impacting your daughter? I highly recommend My Pop Studio as a starting point.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
email me

Technorati Tags:
Teens, Image Conscious, Parental Advice, Alert Parent
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Because I Said So

2009-07-12T11:51:00.000-07:00

“I overheard some girls talking about how much they hated their parents,” my daughter told me.

I knew a few of the targets were really good parents, and suspected the ones I didn’t know were too.

What makes children claim they hate their parents? While there can be serious issues hidden behind closed doors, for many the “hate” comes from the caregivers’ role—restricting activities and constantly telling children what and what not to do and when to do it.

Not long ago several girls at my daughter’s school got in trouble for cutting themselves—one child was mad at her parents for grounding her and not allowing her to see her boyfriend.

Another child also blamed her parents: “They expect too much from me,” she told friends.
All parents and children have a similar dynamic going on—parents restrict, nag and sometimes yell, children try to break free. But it’s been my observation some parents and children seem to still have solid relationships while others are continually at odds.

How do we balance being the disciplinarian and a loved and respected caregiver?

How do we balance our job of restricting and allowing freedom while keeping our child safe and emotionally healthy?

And isn’t part of restricting and making rules enough to make a child declare “I hate you” at times?

An expression of intense hatred or self-mutilation demands we evaluate what we are doing. If I found myself in this situation, I would seek expert counsel for me and my child.

For the rest of us—who are dealing with every day issues and the normal vicissitudes of life—what is the best way to restrict, discipline and nurture our children?

Over the years research demonstrates the best parenting style is an authoritative style. Using this style means directing our children’s activities in a rational manner. It involves communication and requires a caregiver to give reasons for decisions as well as listen to the child’s objections or concerns.

It may be the toughest style to use—it requires establishing rules and controls while not hemming in the child with restrictions and no choices. This style combines warmth, nurturing and love with controls and rules—but rules that can be flexible when reason or a situation demands a different scenario.

Truth be told, I tend to be authoritative with tendencies toward permissiveness. My problems arise because I dislike schedules and rules, and get tired of playing nag. This means I have to fight a tendency to not demand enough.

Because I recognize this about myself, I create follow up systems or reminders for myself.

Thankfully, my husband is a walking model of authoritative parenting, which also helps.

To be more authoritative, practice being demanding. Create and enforce rules and have expectations about what will and will not be done—like chores or curfew. Be responsive to your children.

When they need your attention and/or help, be available. As your children grow, you’ll need to give them more freedom. Establish consequences, if the child violates the ground rules, but do allow a re-testing of the waters again when appropriate.

Parents really do have so many lessons to teach and behaviors to correct, while keeping their children safe. Being in control while not being overly restrictive requires discipline and attention from the parent not just for the child, but for herself.

And the reward for balancing our job of restricting and allowing freedom? Keeping our children safe and emotionally healthy, while enjoying them as they grow and develop into adults.

© Allyn Evans 2009

If you wish to use this article on your web site or in your E-magazine, you are welcome to, as long as you include my bio with it: Allyn Evans is author of Live a Powerful Life (originally titled, Grab the Queen Power: Live Your Best Life), as well as the upcoming How to Help Your Daughter Live a Powerful Life. Allyn is a professional speaker on teens/tweens, a paid consultant, presenter and advisor. She has been published in numerous print and on-line venues, including inclusion in Be the Star You Are! For Teens. Currently, her column runs in Metro Family, the Bolivar Commercial, the Magnolia Gazette and Today's Mississippi Woman.

Contact Information
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Allyn Evans
email me
http://www.allynevans.com/
http://www.allynevans.blogspot.com/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Technorati Tags:
Parental Advice, Teens Who Hate Parents, Allyn Evans, The Alert Parent
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

I Wannabe Famous

2009-07-05T10:09:00.000-07:00

There’s a song with a repeating chorus line: “I wannabe famous.” This song talks about being a “hot topic”. The song’s gist is that others are always watching you, with the idea that it’s not a good thing to be nameless or unknown.

In a previous column, I talked about a disturbing trend investigated by author Jake Halpern. In his book Fame Junkies: The Hidden Truths Behind America's Favorite Addiction he reported the results of a survey given to 653 middle school children.

He asked, “Given the choice of becoming the CEO of a major corporation, the president of Yale or Harvard, a Navy Seal, a US Senator or the personal assistant to a very famous singer or movie star, what would you want to be?” Almost half of the girls (43.4 percent) selected the assistant role. Why? Halpern theorizes, “If they can't be famous themselves, they can at least ‘smell the red carpet.’”

Reality TV shows on networks like MTV and VH1 don’t help reign in the dreams of our little ones. Flip channels and you can find show after show demonstrating to our children that one can be famous without having any talent or skill to offer audiences.

Viewers also witness that self-indulgent people gain more fame by being obnoxious, insensitive and self-absorbed. And Halpern’s research tells us that teens who regularly watched celebrity-oriented TV shows tended to be more likely than their peers to believe they would be famous

CNN journalist Todd Leopold says, “Put these wildly popular shows in the context of an individualistic youth culture with an increasing sense of personal entitlement, and fame almost becomes a birthright.”

Twenty-nine percent of children on a recent survey wanted to be famous. Nothing shocking there. This is the “American Idol Generation.” Certainly we can agree that childhood is in some ways narcissitic by it’s very nature. Children typically do feel entitled. Think Santa here. Our challenge is to help our children outgrow the entitlement phase.

Research tells us that the best way to do this is to put our children to work!

Doling out chores (yes, some without pay) is a good way to help a child be grounded. Doing volunteer work is another.

Author and Consultant Janet Nusbaum (AKA the Organizing Genie) tells us “By proactively reminding children that their contributions (such as in chores) are necessary, expected and appreciated, children will develop a sense of belonging to something larger than themselves, become confident and secure in themselves, their environment, their place in the home and in society.”

Isn’t that what it really is all about?

But here’s where parents must be careful. It’s also important to nurture your children’s dreams and aspirations. What if they believe they are the next American Idol?

Some children do grow up to become movie stars, famous singers and professional tennis players. Dreams are fun, but even more fun is developing talents and skills through real-time activities. Talk to your child about their strengths, weaknesses, talents and gifts. Don’t be judge and jury. Help them understand their motivation.

Why do they want to be a personal assistant?

Why do they want to be Miss America?

Don’t discount their ability to succeed. If their desires are backed by interests, talents and gifts, help them seek out opportunities to flourish.

On the other hand, if they tend to be going down the road outlined by Jake Halpern, yearning for fame as identification, help them look at the world around them and find activities that will make them feel good about themselves now. There are countless ways to live interesting, productive lives while using talents and gifts, with or without that spotlight.

Allyn Evans
email me!
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
Fame Junkies, Children Seeking Fame, Parental Advice, I Wannabe Famous
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Texting Mania

2009-06-18T15:47:00.000-07:00

One night I heard a mother say to a friend, “My child’s phone is never out of her sight. She’s constantly texting—while she eats, reads and visits with friends. The only time she’s not texting is on the softball field.”

“Maybe you need to set more ground rules,” her friend said.

You think?

Later I read about Crystal Wiski—a Scaramento teenager who is an extreme texter, though she’s not the only teen gone texting wild. One Ohio teen sent an average of 15,000 text messages a month (500 messages daily), while balancing texting with good grades and competitive play.

In late 2008, 13-year-old Reina sent 14,528 text messages in one month (484 messages daily). Her texting bill was 440 pages long. Luckily for Reina’s dad, they had the “right” type of plan and weren’t charged 10 cents per minute or they would have paid up $3,000 for the excess. Reina’s excuse: “I am friends with four obsessive texters.”

Back to Crystal—the teen who sent more than 303,000 texts in 30 days. Crystal averaged 10,000 text messages a day, 421 messages an hour and seven texts a minute. The high school student who earns A’s while holding a 40-hour-a-week job said in her defense, “I can’t help it if I’m popular.” The Wiski family had an “unlimited” texting plan in place, thus avoiding a $30,000 tab.

Research reports a majority of teens and almost half the tween population (2008 Neilson Survey) own a phone. Most parents give their children phones for safety reasons. That’s why Addy got her first cell phone before making the leap from elementary to middle school. This same Neilson survey says that the monthly texting average for most kids ages 13 to 17 is a mere 1,742!

What is a safety issue for parents is obviously much more to our children. A 2008 survey of 2000 teens by the wireless trade association, CTIA, and Harris Interactive revealed many teens believe cell phones are as important as clothes. Many teens gauge a peer’s popularity or status simply by the cell phone he or she uses.

More troubling to caregivers is the unhealthy attachment some children have to their cell phones. For them the world revolves around receiving and/or sending a text. At a recent pool party we hosted for tweens, one teenager was so tied to her phone that the minute she heard her “signal,” she would stop the game, jump out of the pool and respond.

To help your children have a healthy relationship with their cell phones, begin with two guidelines for kids:

1. Require all cell phones be turned off before bedtime. Reina’s Dad uses dinnertime as the cut-off. During the school year our off time is 9:00 p.m.

2. After the deadline, detach the child from the cell phone. Addy’s phone goes in a kitchen drawer until the next day.

When I spoke to moms at a Girl Scout event in 2008, many of them confessed they allowed their children to take their cell phones to bed with them. Maybe the zealot texting teenagers mentioned above also had this flexibility and ended up texting half the night away rather than getting a good night’s sleep?

Adults can model detachment. Don’t answer the phone every time it rings. Don’t keep it always in your back pocket. At the end of the day, my phone joins Addy’s in the kitchen drawer where it remains for the night—meaning we all get a good night’s sleep.

It’s a parent’s job to teach technology is a tool as well as a toy—not a lifestyle.

Allyn Evans
email me!
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
Cell phones, parental supervision, texting too much, teens texting
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Girl Pushed, Mom Approved

2009-06-10T11:51:00.000-07:00

After Googling gift ideas for my favorite pre-teen this spring, I didn’t want to wait until Christmas to tell you about a list of “Girl Pushed, Mom Approved” products and brands recommended by 108 members of AllyKatzz.com.

(AllyKatzz just happens to be the country’s largest and only Children’s On-line Protection Agency’s compliant safe social networking site for tweenage girls.)

Gift Cards to favorite retailers topped the “Girl Pushed” list, followed by music/CDs. Moms, of course, loved Disney CDs the best. Many of the tweens did, too. If you have questions about music choices, specifically whether lyrics are appropriate for your tween or not, you can easily find them on-line. You know, Google it! Some retailers, including on-line stores, will also allow you to test before you buy.

Not surprisingly Ipod or MP3 players also topped the list. The big winner was Ipod Touch ($229) and Nano ($149). The first Ipod we gave Addy was the Shuffle. Although it has no screen or way to track songs you are playing, it’s more affordable for a first-time gift ($49).

Another favorite gift item was clothing, followed closely by books. Of course, seeing books make the top five made my day. For tweens in late 2008 Twilight, The Clique Series, Dear Dumb Diary, Beacon Street Girls, Petty Little Liars, Nancy Drew and Wicked seemed to be the most popular. Another popular gift request, and it was first on Addy’s list for this year birthday wishes, was a mobile phone. Neither girls nor moms seem to care about the brand. For mom, it was more of practical nature…“what plan are we currently on?” For daughter, it was more about features and color. Pink topped the list and girls listed keyboards and texting capabilities as a must have.

Another favorite listed by girls is a laptop computer. Although many moms reported they approved a laptop purchase, they simply were making other less expensive choices. And hopefully, for those girls who do receive a laptop for their next birthday gift, a conscious parent will be aware of wireless network capabilities and require the computer stay in common areas of the house.

Finishing off the list were cosmetics and hair accessories, video games and systems, digital cameras and DVDs such as Camp Rock and High School Musical.

And although it’s not a birthday gift recommendation, I do have a great tween product recommendation to include.

I had been searching for “bladeless” shaving alternatives for my daughter (chemical hair remover products were too strong and caused rashes. Laser and waxing, which I really like to use, were not “my-child-friendly” options) when my friend and hairstylist asked me, “Have you seen those commercials on TV about the Smooth Away pads that remove hair?”

“Yes, but I don’t believe them.”

“They actually work,” she said. “I will never use a razor again.”

I discovered my local Walgreen’s and Sally’s carried them, and I could also order them on-line. The next day I purchased the pad and the sheets (all under $15) and we tried it out.

The product worked!

No mess, no rashes, no cuts. Smooth Away is an excellent product for pre-teens. It’s safe and gets the job done effectively. The one drawback is time, but can be done while watching TV, talking to friends or reading a book. How does it work? The pad is covered with a sheet of superfine crystals that buffs away unwanted hair while exfoliating skin.

Although we have since switched to a more traditional way to remove hair, I will always be grateful for Smooth Away and I highly recommend it for pre-teens.

Allyn Evans

www.allynevans.blogspot.com

Oh No Facebook Again!

2009-06-01T15:41:00.000-07:00

“Can I please have a Facebook account now, Mom?”

I raised my hand. I didn’t even have to add, “Talk to the hand,” for her to get the message.

She kept talking anyway. “Listen to me. It’s important.”

I listened.

I had known this day was coming, and it had arrived.

Let’s face it. Social networking is one way kids keep connected. Cell phones are typically the first experience and social networking is not far behind. I knew it would be an important social connection for her. I knew that by insisting she not be “connected” with her friends that it could impede her friend-making and networking abilities.

I had already decided that I needed to “allow” her to join the FB ranks the next time she asked. Didn’t and doesn’t take away my concern for her safety, but measures existed to make it work for both of us. I just had to figure them out.

“Okay,” I told her, “…if we can figure out how I can monitor everything.”

She was giddy.

For a full seven days I heard, “Have you figured it out? Have you signed up yet, Mom?” Of course, I was doing everything in my power to put it off. Eventually, I set aside a block of time and got to work on solving the FB challenge.

Here’s how we set up what I consider to be a safe environment for Addy to have her own Facebook account.

I receive a copy of every email notification she receives which includes any external communication from friends or strangers. If you think this is a violation of privacy, get over that idea right now. It’s public information that many others can read, including her teachers and parents of friends/boyfriends and later, her prospective employers.

I also have in my possession her username and password and explained up front that I will use them. If she ever changes them without giving me the keys, we will have a violation of our FB contract. Another condition is that I have to be an “accepted” friend of her network. This doesn’t mean I go posting things on her wall (that’s FB talk for public broadcast). It simply means that she is fully aware that I am looking and evaluating information that is posted on her pages, including words, messages and photographs.

We also have the strictest of privacy settings established. We talk constantly about notifications she’s received and other activities she does on FB.

So how do you get email notifications every time a transaction takes place? You sign your child up to have a gmail.com account and then you set the gmail.com settings to send all the FB generated emails to your e-mail address. If you need specific help doing this, you can visit http://www.thealertparent.com/ and look for “Gmail” articles. There are two—one about Gmail and the other a step-by-step how-to-set-up article.

Interestingly, getting on Facebook—something I have resisted for a long time, by the way—has been fun for me, too. I am catching up with old friends, especially friends from high school. I now know that Pat W. lives in Conway, Keith K. lives in Cleveland and Darryl D.’s kids are talented singers. Several of us have reminisced about our elementary school experience. Yes, it’s an excellent vehicle for connecting. I can see now that if I had continued to forbid Addy from being on FB, I would have denied her an important social experience. No, I wouldn’t have started her any earlier, but I’m glad that we are on FB now. More to follow soon…

Allyn Evans
email me!
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
Facebook, Gmail, The Alert Parent, Parental Advice, Kids Internet Safety
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Double Digits

2009-05-20T09:12:00.000-07:00

I recently read something a good cyber friend of mine wrote about her daughter turning double digits. I liked it so much I wanted to share with you.

Author Christine Hohlbaum grew up in the States, but now lives in Germany. She’s been writing about family issues for at least a decade and has an informative newsletter, Powerful Families, Powerful Lives. She’s also written a few books and has an upcoming release with St. Martin Press called The Power of Slow.

Double Digits by Christine Hohlbaum

There is nothing like remembering your daughter's tenth birthday to hurl you out of bed at the crack of dawn.

"I forgot to make her cake for school!" I chastised myself as I padded down the stairs. My husband, whose eyes hadn't quite thought of opening yet, mumbled something about time and the power of slow and all the things I'd been telling him about how life can be beautiful when you slow down to smell the roses.

That's all fine and dandy, I thought, except when you've got a cake to make for your daughter's first double-digit birthday.

Within three minutes, I had the thing baking in the oven. My daughter groggily entered the kitchen. Wiping the counter, I acted as if I had the whole thing planned.

"I'll bring the cake during recess, okay Baby?" I smiled with a dash of uncertainty whether my perceptive daughter had noticed I nearly forgot about my promise. She protested about her nickname, something I simply couldn't stop calling her despite her repeated warnings.

She silently ate her breakfast, then got ready for school. After saying good-bye to our early riser son, Jackson, I turned my attention back to my daughter who had managed to get dressed without her customary tween drama.

"I have something to show you..." I said mysteriously. Her eyes lit up in anticipation of an early birthday gift. I rummaged around a box in the basement, then came back up the stairs.
"Close your eyes," I whispered. She held them tightly, then giggled with anticipation. I pressed the photo frame into her hands.

"This is who you were shortly after you came to me," I said. Fighting back a tear, I bravely showed her a picture of her seven-month-old self hugging my head tightly during a day at the park in Boston. Her eyes widened. She had never seen the picture before.
She squeezed me more tightly than usual, then pranced out the door with an affectionate grin.

You will always be my Baby, I thought as I tearfully waved her adieu. She's a double digit girl now, and I cannot help but feel the painful ebb of her essence's departure from me as she flows into the self she will become.

If you’d like to find out more about Christine’s work or sign up for her online newsletter, visit: http://diaryofamother.blogs.com/.

Allyn Evans
info at allynevans.com
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
Christine Hohlbaum, Powerful Families, Powerful Lives, parenting advice
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

BFF No More

2009-05-18T08:34:00.000-07:00

“My daughter’s best friend is shunning her,” a reader wrote. “What is she to do?”

This hard, painful loss of a friend is also painful for the caregiver trying to help the child through a bad situation.

“My daughter sort of put all her eggs in one basket with this friend. She really doesn’t have other friends separate from this child. She’s having a hard time.”

Another person told me she had two daughters who experienced a “shunning” within about two months of each other. Her youngest called her long-time best friend a name in anger. The long-time best friend punished her by alienating the child from all their friends. The mother said, “I don’t know what to do. That child is her life. My child’s world evolves around that child.”

Thinking back to my own childhood experiences, I can look from both perspectives—I remember being shunned and being the shunner. Being shunned is, of course, the painful side. A friend told me recently, “I remember eating lots of lunches by myself in middle school.”

How can parents help a child move past a dying friendship so she can meet new people?

I encouraged the lady who emailed me to talk to her child. “Remind her about all the people who do love and care for her.”

I also suggested that she help her daughter build a wider net of possibilities…like adding an extracurricular activity or finding a club of children with similar interests who might also attend different schools.

For example, my daughter enjoys anima (Japanese cartoons). Because of its growing popularity our local library hosts a biweekly Manga Club, which means she has recently met a new group of children who have a similar interest.

If there is not a group for the child’s interest, the parent might work with the library to start one.

Maybe one of the lessons here is introduce your child to many people in many different environments so he is not completely alone if a friend suddenly decides to change the rules.

Something else I talked to this mom about was coaching her daughter through it. Give your child information that will help him or her deal with the loss. First of all, don’t minimize it. It’s painful to lose a close friend. Next, help your child develop solutions and/or options.

A coaching dialogue might run along these lines: “What do you normally do at lunch?”

Your child might respond, “Sit with Joanie. But that’s not going to work anymore.”

Then help her think about what she can do instead. “You like Rachel, right? Where does she sit?”
The mother I coached worked with her daughter on every situation from arriving to school, to lunch and breaks. “What do you do between classes? What can you do instead?” She also talked to her daughter about looking for new people to befriend.

Probably the hardest lesson for a child (and an adult to learn) is the need to let go of the person who is attempting to pull away. The more you grab, the more the other person will resist. Eventually, the person will get away from you. The best way to keep someone, and there are no guarantees, is to let them go.

After a month, I followed up with the mom. Turns out there was a happy ending to this story—well, at least for now.

We all know that as one lives life, people will come and go. Though it sometimes hurts a lot, it’s true that losing one close relationship opens up opportunities for many more enriching experiences.

http://www.allynevans.com/
info at allynevans.com

Technorati Tags:
BFF, best friends forever, parental advice
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

From the Mouths of Teens

2009-05-07T07:34:00.000-07:00

I received my first newsletter from LetMeKnow.com, the team effort of Girl Scouts and Microsoft Office to make the internet a safer place.

This monthly publication is loaded with excellent articles, from basic text lingo every parent should know to tips by online-safety expert Parry Aftab.
For starters, there’s a short “how-to” essay about texting and instant messaging, giving novice users (usually the grown-ups) the bare essentials in easy-to-read language.

The young experts tell us, “While text messaging for all users is mostly more popular than making or receiving phone calls, it’s much, much more popular with us teens. As of the end of June 2008, a typical mobile subscriber in the United States sent or received 357 text messages per month, compared to placing or receiving 204 phone calls according to Nielsen, the media research company.

Nielsen’s research also shows that the typical teen mobile subscriber in the United States (ages 13 to 17) now sends or receives 1,742 text messages per month, compared to making or receiving 231 mobile phone calls.”

If you can’t read a text shorthand message, maybe it’s time to pick up some language.

Common lingo according to the teen advisors is: jk—just playing; k—okay; cu—see you; brb—be right back; ttyl—talk to you later; bff—best friend forever; g2g—got to go; 18r—later. As a parent you might also find these good to know: prw—parents are watching; kpc—keeping parents clueless; 9—parents are watching and p911—parents coming in room alert.

What I love about the advice shared by the teen advisors is they also tell us how to help our children.

In this particular issue, the advisory board teens explain: “Adults give teens a lot of grief for texting ALL the time, but what adults and parents need to understand is that texting has become a huge part of our culture. Most parents don’t realize that texting is a big part of how we communicate, and that it doesn't mean we don't know how to communicate in the real world. Give texting a try with your teen and you’ll start to see the benefits.”

They also counsel that if inappropriate communications are taking place, we have things we can do: “Parents can help by being aware and supportive, not surprised or angry, that sticky situations can happen. Remind us to ‘stop, block and tell’ a trusted adult if harmful or mean messages are received.”

The ‘stop, block and tell’ message comes from Parry Aftab. It’s her way of reminding teens to stop—to not react before thinking or allowing a ‘cool down’ period, to block any additional communications with the offending party, and to tell a trusted adult.

The teens asked us to be sure and include our children in the cell phone plan making decisions. “This will give us a sense of responsibility for our actions by making us part of the process from the start.”

They did ask that no matter what plan or decisions you make about their online and texting use, adults should be honest. “Here’s a prime example of what not to do: telling us our plan has only 400 minutes or texts per month when it’s actually an unlimited plan. When we find out stuff like this later, maybe from our older siblings, it will just make us upset!”

Girl Scout/Microsoft project is an excellent resource for you whether you parent boys or girls. To sign up, visit: http://letmeknow.girlscouts.org/Home.aspx.

Allyn Evans
info at allynevans.com
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
Girl Scouts, LMK, Let Me Know, Parry Aftab, internet safety, texting lingo, texting lanugage, parental advice
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

How Can You Possibly Go?

2009-05-03T16:25:00.000-07:00

Whether you’re going on a business trip or a get-away with friends, unraveling yourself is hard if you are a caregiver.

You must make arrangements for everything from who’s picking up Johnny or who’s dropping off Suzie, to planning what Johnny and Suzie are going to eat.

When I was trying to pull the pieces together for a March trip, I almost threw in the towel. I almost cancelled.

I went, but separation drama continued even after I reached my destination. Adding to my stress, my dogs had become escape artists soon after I left. My husband was out of town and I had to resolve the “dog break” incident from afar, all the time wondering, “What was I thinking?”

I am lucky. I have lots of support. My long-time friend with three kids under 13, a pressure-filled job and not-so-supportive husband emailed me a week before our scheduled departure, saying, “It’s not going to work. Too much to sort out. Better go without me.”

I understood. I questioned my own ability to go.

At just the right time, I read something written by a young mother. “Picture a white horse, mane in the breeze, splashing through rivers. Now imagine that same horse curled up in a ball in the corner of a shadowy stall. That horse is me,” she said.

She wrote she loved her current life and understood the role she was playing, but still she pined for the woman she had been: “I used to be the girl who spent midnights dancing around my car at red lights. I can’t remember the last time I was in a car without kids. I used to be outgoing and fun. Now I'm just settled and quiet. I used to help autistic kids. Now I barely see my own sister.” Her essay reminded me of myself only a decade ago. There were moments when it felt like I would be a mother of an infant forever.

Horse Lady said more: “I've been tamed, like a wild horse stuck in a muddy stall. Tamed by life. Routine. I'm not a routine person. I like change and messy spontaneity. I like the freedom to run when I want to, and not be held back by so many to-do's. I miss writing poetry and stories every day with enough passion to cover the globe. Too much to do. Work. Cleaning. Cooking. Babies. Maintaining our business.”

I had been there, slap dab in the middle of life as a caregiver. Though I still am, I’m no longer so deeply entrenched. I wanted to tell her that she could find herself again.

I wanted to tell her with each passing birthday it does get easier and less labor intensive. I also wanted to encourage her to put “life” and “dreams” back into the formula—even if on a very small scale.

The mistake caregivers make is giving up all desires and dreams while giving everything to duty, routine. It doesn’t have to be all or nothing, though it might be less of “own life” and “dreams” than at other times.

Reading this article helped me stick to my guns. I went on the trip despite the headaches and mixed feelings. Though it took some effort, it was time for me to step out on my own.

And it was well worth the effort.

We must remember our children aren’t just looking to us for transportation and meals. They are learning life is more than a to-do list, that there are times even for grown-ups to leave the stable and run on their own.

Allyn Evans
info at allynevans.com
http://www.allynevans.com/

Technorati Tags:
parenting, mom traveling
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Bully, Bully, Bully

2009-04-21T14:24:00.000-07:00

“You wouldn’t believe what happened last night at Allison’s basketball game,” my tennis league friend said. “When the referee wasn’t looking this girl punched my daughter in the stomach. I wasn’t there. She told me when she got home.”

In recent years, society and especially schools have experienced an increase in bullying incidents. Although schools require “no tolerance” policies to discourage bullying, they are difficult to enforce. It takes more than words on paper to stop bullying. The challenge is to figure out how to stop bullying incidents before they escalate or cause long-term problems for the targeted students.

Recently I heard about bad things happening in my daughter’s small-town American middle school, but most of the girls I interviewed for Living Happily Ever with your Daughter Today reported a safe environment. When I asked my daughter about the increase in “incidents of violence” at her school, she didn’t know what I was talking about, though she did report school officials had closed the restrooms located near the lunchroom because of the fights.

“There are no bullies in my school,” one girl told me, but proceeded to describe how she had been verbally attacked by a girl at school. Another told me there are girls who do make threats, but her school administrators don’t tolerate it. “Most of the time it’s just girls being mean,”
she said.

“There are rude and cruel girls, mostly saying mean things,” another girl told me. She felt her school administrators don’t punish appropriately. One sixth-grader reported, “There are girls at my school who have been mean to me. They called my house and were mean.”

While many children are not affected by bullying, if your child is the victim of bullying—fights, beatings and “mean girl” behavior, including verbal and emotional attacks—you know the effects can be life-impacting.

Bullying does not respect age, color, education or experience. A bully’s targets are usually unsuspecting and undeserving. Timidity, passivity, and submissiveness encourage bullies because their goals of intimidating, overpowering, and frightening their target are easy to achieve.

My business partner and former high school teacher Linda Allen told me recently, “Taller, prettier, smarter, better, sexier, cooler—all those comparative and competitive words that end in “er”—motivate the bully to prove his/her perceived superiority over his/her target.”

“From a teacher’s perspective, bullying often mirrors the student’s home life and family experiences. When intimidation, insults, and physical abuse are the family communication strategies, the student learns to use such behavior with his peers and teachers to get what he or she wants—from attention and influence to a tangible object,” Linda said.

Linda believes there are no quick, simple solutions to eliminate bullying. “Responsible adults must take the lead in modeling appropriate behavior and educating both the bully on correcting his behavior and the target in developing skills to deal with bullies.”

If your child is grappling with the bully issue, here are some helpful tips offered by bullying expert Stan Davis, a school counselor and author of Schools Where Everyone Belongs and Empowering Bystanders: Don’t blame the targeted child. Find out what your child has already tried.

If a necessary, talk to teachers, counselors and administrators at the school and ask them to ensure your child is protected. Ask them to give consequences to students who bully and to supervise the situation more closely. Encourage your child to keep talking to adults and asking for help. Finally, if your child is isolated and needs more peer support, help them find other ways to meet and befriend others.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
info at allynevans.com

Technorati Tags:
Bullies, Parental Advice, Alert Parent
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Facebook Permission

2009-04-21T13:00:00.000-07:00

Yes...I am finally on Facebook. And so is my daughter. Confessions and more will follow soon. This most definitely is an article in the making!

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/

No One Is Perfect: And You Are a Great Kid!

2009-04-03T14:52:00.000-07:00

Excerpted from Living Happily Ever After with your Daughter Today:

“When a mother finds out she’s pregnant she dreams about the life of her child. Although she might have fears and concerns about the baby’s health, she has no room in her dreams about imperfection. She has no thought, especially a first-time mom, that she might not like the child or that the child might be difficult. She thinks she is dreaming of her child, but most of all she is creating a drama in her head.”

In my forthcoming book I speak of a mother’s expectations. In the real world, children come to us with their own set of interests, strengths and weaknesses. It’s the weaknesses and differences that challenge us. It’s the challenges we’d like to wish away, especially if they are a mental, emotional or physical disability.

Kim Hix experiences this reality first hand. This is the second time I mention Kim and her son on my blog, but I feel the message is important. Kim’s 10-year-old son suffers from neuropsychiatric disabilities. Kim didn’t talk to me about the frustrations of dealing with constant and uncontrollable outbursts from her son, but I am betting if asked, she’d say this was not how her dream was supposed to play out.

According to the American Association of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry between 7 to 12 million children suffer from behavioral, mental or developmental disorders, and these numbers don’t reflect physical disabilities or other maladies.

Kim wrote No One Is Perfect and You Are a Great Kid with hopes of helping other families facing similar challenges. With her son Zack’s permission, she tells about “a very special young boy who struggles with emotional difficulties.”

“From an early age Zack has experienced an array of moods including rages, depression, anxiety and drastic mood shifts. When I began putting pen to paper to tell this story I simply needed to remember conversations and situations that involved my son and his desire to understand why he felt the way he did.”

This mom’s main concern was making sure her son understood that she loved him. She also wanted him to understand his worth was not tied to what he said or did.

“My child deals daily with overwhelming emotions and behavior that at times are uncontrollable and confusing. I feel quite certain millions of other children feel isolated, rejected and different due to a multitude of reasons, yet quietly suffer alone as they wonder ‘am I the only one?’”

If there are millions of children, then there are many more parents and grandparents asking similar questions.

Kim reminds us that our children should not feel shame if they have emotional, neurological or physical disabilities. “Our children should not feel ‘less than’ if they are not great athletes or scholars, if they are not perfect in every way.” Kim is right. No one is perfect, and no one should feel less because of it.

“It is up to the adults to teach tolerance and acceptance, to embrace the broad range of personalities and idiosyncrasies of others. I feel we must teach that our differences are what make us each unique and interesting. My son is not a perfectly well-mannered, high-achieving child, which does not lessen our love for him or his gifts to this world. He was born with complicated neuropsychiatric disabilities that manifest in behavior that is very difficult to understand.”

Kim’s willingness to share her story is heartening. “It is my hope that other children realize that despite any disabilities they may have that they too possess strengths and gifts,” she says. “A disability does not make a person, it is simply a part of who he or she is.”

To order Kim's book, visit Amazon. If you have a need for a bulk order, Kim says her publisher will offer 40% off (Booksurge). To read more about Kim, visit a previous post.

Allyn Evans
http://www.allynevans.com/
info at allynevans.com

Technorati Tags:
Childhood disabilities, mental disabilities, neurological, No One Is Perfect, Kim Hix, neuropsychiatric disabilities
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl

Nag, Nag, Go Away...

2009-03-25T09:17:00.000-07:00

“Do this.” “Do that.” “Hurry.” “Go.” As a mom, I had plenty of stuff to boss about. Borrowing from Larry the Cable Guy, I even threw in a few “Git-R-done now.”

I don’t know about you, but I was ready to stick a fork in it. I was done. Finished. No longer willing to be The Nag.

Untangling the nagging web, though, is easier to write about than do, but I’m offering you my example.

Addy and I sat down together. I told her I thought it was time for her to take on more responsibility, and explained that I would no longer repeatedly remind her of her “things-to-do” list. Let’s say Addy took it well if giddy can be construed as taking it well. This nagging thing hadn’t been working for her either.

I outlined the new plan.

“Each day after school we will discuss your schedule and the tasks (like homework, chores) that need to be finished by bedtime,” I said.

Then I explained that she’d have to map out the plan, which included estimating time of completion and targeting times to begin activities. “It will be your responsibility to finish all tasks before bedtime.”

To help her track time, I gave her a timer. “You can use your cell phone clock, if you’d prefer. I will give you only one reminder for each task.”

“What happens if I don’t finish everything by bedtime or forget something?”

“You will have a consequence.”

The consequence took me a little time to figure out. I had to pick something that mattered to her and didn’t put much of a burden on me.

I was fortunate to have recently listened to girls talk on this subject. One of them had been grounded for a week. She said, “Yep, I can’t get on the computer. Like I care. I don’t even like it very much.”

Thank you, girls, for the insight. Determined to find a consequence that packed a punch, I considered my options.

I immediately ruled out money. Addy doesn’t really care (at least at this stage in the game) if I take away her money or not. She once told me, “You buy me all the important stuff—like clothes and food—the rest is not a big deal to me.” Unfortunately for Addy, I was listening. Okay. Money was off the table. There was no punch.

Taking away her phone was not an option because it’s a safety issue for us.

I considered sending her to her room, but quickly crossed this off the list. She enjoys her room and loves to read and write.

The best consequence I could dole out was taking away computer time after school and on weekends. I could also take away the cell phone when she’s at home. I explained, “For each violation, you’ll have to stay off the computer for one day. Whenever you have a consequence, your cell phone will also be off limits when you are at home.”

“So we understand each other?”

“Yes, mom.”

Now that we’ve put our little plan in motion, I am surprised I didn’t think of this sooner. Besides taking me out of the nag business, it hands over more self-responsibility to Addy. The former felt more like begging and pleading (on my part) and opened the door wide open to back talk from a frustrated child.

It’s been a month since the Nag was put to rest. I’m happy. Addy’s happy. And so far I haven’t had to take away one day of computer or home cell phone time.

Allyn Evans
info at allynevans.com
http://www.thealertparent.blogspot.com/
Technorati Tags:
Supervising children, nagging, letting go, stop nagging
Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us Yahoo BlinkList Spurl reddit Furl