A parent coach or parent counseling are two different sources of help and support for parents. Despite how diaper commercials make it appear, parenting isn’t always easy. In fact, parenting can be downright hard, grueling and frustrating. Getting some support can help you revel in the joys of parenting. It can also help you handle the not-so-joyful moments with greater ease. The information below will help you decide whether parent coaching or counseling is a better fit for and your family.

What Is a Parenting Coach?

A parenting coach is like a consultant. They assist in building good parenting skills to handle issues requested by the parents ("Common Parenting Issues and How to Deal with Them"). In many cases, parenting coaches are people who have been trained and are certified to provide assistance to one or both parents. A coach is skilled in empowering parents to successfully raise their children.

In working with a coach, moms and dads develop and solidify their parenting philosophy. They form clear and realistic parenting goals and define their values. In working with the coach to articulate what’s important to them, parents can develop their unique approach to raising their kids. The coach doesn’t dictate values and beliefs but instead guides parents as they create their own purpose and approach.

A child’s behavior issues are often what leads parents to seek a parenting coach. Coaches also:

• Help during difficult times
• Help address stress management and parental self-care
• Suggest activities to foster healthy child development at all stages
• Answer questions and provide information
• Help make plans to address practical issues such as after-school childcare
• Assist with creating a calm, peaceful atmosphere in the home
• Enhance relationships
• Teach parents to increase children’s responsibilities
• Foster a climate of respect
• Provide parents tools to reduce children’s bickering and whining

Through asking questions and listening to answers, parenting coaches can provide parents with valuable insights into how to change their child’s behaviors. These professional consultants teach problem-solving skills so parents can effectively deal with new issues in the future.

Parent coaches provide tools, ideas, and support to facilitate positive change. They don’t, however, provide treatment for deeper issues. While they can help with behavior problems, they can’t address mental health issues like ADHD or oppositional defiant disorder. If your child is facing anxiety, depression, or other mental illnesses, you might want to consider parenting counseling instead.

Parenting Counseling: Who Is it For?

Parenting counseling, sometimes called parenting therapy, is like parent coaching in that it offers parents guidance, tools, and information to help them raise healthy, high functioning kids. Also like coaching, counseling is a short-term service whose intention is to equip parents with the skills they need to go forward with confidence.

Parenting counselors work with one or both parents, parents and the child together, or the whole family, depending on the specific issue and the family’s needs and goals. During counseling sessions, therapists help parents set goals and create action plans, build communication and problem-solving skills.

Counselors work with parents on a deeper level than do parent coaches. Parenting counselors process problems, including mental illness and non-diagnosable mental health struggles. Because of this, working with a parenting counselor will include talk therapy.

You might consider parenting counseling if you are facing challenges such as:

• Ongoing family conflict
• A child with developmental, physical, or mental health problems
• Your own mental health struggles
• Postpartum depression
• Parent or child self-esteem difficulties
• Trauma
• Domestic violence
• Substance use (parent or child/teen)
• Extreme or prolonged stress (parent or child/teen)
• Major life changes
• Loss
• Anything interfering in your ability to parent your child

A parenting counselor will help you address these issues and create a treatment plan to help you build the tools you need to move past what’s blocking you.

Which is Best for You: Parenting Coach or Counseling?

Both forms of parent support can be helpful. Which one is best for you depends on your goals and purpose in working with someone. Use these summaries to help you decide which is the right fit.

Parenting Coaching

• Assists in building a practical skillset, a toolbox of tactics
• Addresses child behavior and other everyday problems
• Focuses on relationship strengthening
• Emphasis is on practical problems and solutions

Parenting Counseling

• Works on skill-building as well as a treatment plan for mental health issues
• Explores parents’ personal issues and how they impact parenting
• Focuses on overcoming difficulties that interfere in family life

Consider why you are seeking parenting help and what you’d like to gain from it. Your answers will point you to either a parenting coach or to parenting counseling. Either way, you’ll be headed in the right direction toward a healthier, happier home life for both parents and children.

See Also:

• Are Co-Parenting Classes Helpful for Divorced Parents?
• Do We Need Co-Parenting Counseling, Therapy or Mediation?

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People with bipolar disorder or depression are at increased risk for suicide. Learn how to help someone who may be suicidal.

What can I do to help someone who may be suicidal?

1. Take it seriously.

Myth: "The people who talk about it don't do it." Studies have found that more than 75% of all completed suicides did things in the few weeks or months prior to their deaths to indicate to others that they were in deep despair. Anyone expressing suicidal feelings needs immediate attention.

Myth: "Anyone who tries to kill himself has got to be crazy." Perhaps 10% of all suicidal people are psychotic or have delusional beliefs about reality. Most suicidal people suffer from the recognized mental illness of depression; but many depressed people adequately manage their daily affairs. The absence of "craziness" does not mean the absence of suicide risk.

"Those problems weren't enough to commit suicide over," is often said by people who knew someone who completed suicide. You cannot assume that because you feel something is not worth being suicidal about, that the person you are with feels the same way. It is not how bad the problem is, but how badly it's hurting the person who has it.

2. Remember: suicidal behavior is a cry for help.

Myth: "If someone is going to kill himself, nothing can stop him." The fact that a person is still alive is sufficient proof that part of him wants to remain alive. The suicidal person is ambivalent - part of him wants to live and part of him wants not so much death as he wants the pain to end. It is the part that wants to live that tells another, "I feel suicidal." If a suicidal person turns to you, it is likely that he believes that you are more caring, more informed about coping with misfortune, and more willing to protect his confidentiality. No matter how negative the manner and content of his talk, he is doing a positive thing and has a positive view of you.

3. Be willing to give and get help sooner rather than later.

Suicide prevention is not a last-minute activity. All textbooks on depression say it should be reached as soon as possible. Unfortunately, suicidal people are afraid that trying to get help may bring them more pain; being told they are stupid, foolish, sinful, or manipulative; rejection; punishment; suspension from school or job; written records of their condition; or involuntary commitment. You need to do everything you can to reduce pain, rather than increase or prolong it. Constructively involving yourself on the side of life as early as possible will reduce the risk of suicide.

4. Listen.

Give the person every opportunity to unburden his troubles and ventilate his feelings. You don't need to say much and there are no magic words. If you are concerned, your voice and manner will show it. Give him relief from being alone with his pain; let him know you are glad he turned to you. Patience, sympathy, acceptance. Avoid arguments and advice giving.

5. ASK: "Are you having thoughts of suicide?"

Myth: "Talking about it may give someone the idea." People already have the idea; suicide is constantly in the news media. If you ask a despairing person this question you are doing a good thing for them; you are showing him that you care about him, that you take him seriously, and that you are willing to let him share his pain with you. You are giving him further opportunity to discharge pent up and painful feelings. If the person is having thoughts of suicide, find out how far along his ideation has progressed.

6. If the person is acutely suicidal, do not leave him alone.

If the means are present, try to get rid of them. Detoxify the home.

7. Urge professional help.

Persistence and patience may be needed to seek, engage, and continue with as many options as possible. In any referral situation, let the person know you care and want to maintain contact.

8. No secrets.

It is the part of the person that is afraid of more pain that says, "Don't tell anyone." It is the part that wants to stay alive that tells you about it. Respond to that part of the person and persistently seek out a mature and compassionate person with whom you can review the situation. (You can get outside help and still protect the person from pain causing breaches of privacy.) Do not try to go it alone. Get help for the person and for yourself. Distributing the anxieties and responsibilities of suicide prevention makes it easier and much more effective.

9. From crisis to recovery.

Most people have suicidal thoughts or feelings at some point in their lives; yet less than 2% of all deaths are suicides. Nearly all suicidal people suffer from conditions that will pass with time or with the assistance of a recovery program. There are hundreds of modest steps we can take to improve our response to the suicidal and to make it easier for them to seek help. Taking these modest steps can save many lives and reduce a great deal of human suffering.

Good parenting qualities are characteristics that any parent can develop and use to raise happy, successful, well-adjusted kids. Parenting characteristics are learned. They don’t magically appear to only a few moms and dads who have a gift or a store of secret knowledge. Qualities of good parenting are attitudes and actions used every day in interacting with kids and helping them mature.

Parenting is a skill. The attitudes and actions that make up good parenting qualities are learned and developed over time, from birth to adulthood and all the ever-changing stages in between. As with all other areas of life, no one has every skill. We have strong skills and not-so-strong ones. This means that as a parent, you already have strong skills, and you can learn and build other skills. Developing good parenting qualities, traits, and skills will allow you to parent your children in a positive manner that fits with your values.

Every parent, every child, and every family is unique with different parenting styles and parenting goals; therefore, there isn’t one simple formula for good parenting qualities. You’ll pick and choose skills and character traits that resonate with you and let them guide you. One concept, though, is universal: good parenting focuses not on what the parent wants their kids to be like but on nurturing them to explore and grow into the person they want to be.

Nurturing and encouraging kids to develop who they involve both parenting skills and parental character traits.

Good Parenting Qualities: Skills to Learn and Use

The following attributes are behaviors and actions—things that parents do or provide that encompass good parenting:

Outwardly express love, caring, affection

Studies show that providing guidance in a loving, affectionate way is the most important quality of good parenting. Encourage, nurture, show affection with words and actions, praise kids’ actions and achievement. This will let them know that you love them no matter what.

Communicate genuinely and clearly

Communication is a broad category that includes expressing interest in kids, explaining rules and their consequences, listening to them with your full attention, and more. Your body language talks to kids as much as or more than your actual words. No matter what you’re doing, including disciplining, your communication should tell kids that you value them.

Demonstrate understanding (rather than arguing with kids or lecturing them)

When kids are upset for any reason, you don’t have to fix things, and you certainly don’t have to give in if they’re upset with your consequence. Reflecting how they’re feeling or asking them to tell you about what happened won’t change the situation, but it will help kids process it in a healthy way, including accepting negative consequences for their actions.

Maintain consistency

Children need to know that they can trust that rules and routines will stay the same from day-to-day. This builds a sense of security and confidence.

Foster independence and development of passions

A newborn is entirely dependent on parents for survival. As babies reach developmental milestones (well before age one), they are already moving toward partial independence. Giving kids choices and letting them do age-appropriate activities by themselves helps them develop healthy self-confidence and a belief they can accomplish things and meet goals.

Nurturing their independence also helps them identify and develop passions. Let them choose activities to do, and give them appropriate leeway to explore on their own. Rock climbing classes? Cooking or baking? Let them decide.

Good Parenting Characteristics: Ways to Be with Your Kids

Good parenting also involves parental character traits. These traits are inner qualities such as attitudes, values, and motivations. Even though these aren’t behaviors and skills that can be practiced, they can be enhanced by acting in ways that are consistent with them.

• Patience
• Empathy
• Love
• Sense of humor
• Curiosity
• Creativity
• Flexibility

A final characteristic of good parenting is that mothers and fathers who use good parenting qualities and skills know that they are role models for their children. What you do makes an impression on your kids. When you use the above skills and demonstrate the character traits, kids notice and they emulate your actions and qualities. You can practice good parenting for your kids simply by developing the characteristics and using them.  Be the way you want your kids to be, and do what you want them to do.

See Also:

• What Does Bad Parenting Look Like?
• ‘Good Enough Parenting’ Has Its Time and Place

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Raising an emotionally healthy child is a process that takes place every day. It sounds daunting, but it is surprisingly effortless to do once you learn how to do it. Just by being interested in your child’s emotional health, you’re already on the path to learning how to raise an emotionally healthy child.

It’s easy for children’s emotional health to become lost in the shuffle of life. Of course parents pay attention to their children’s physical health, taking steps to return them to feeling and operating well. Sometimes, though, emotional health is neglected in the hectic world of family life: school, homework, scheduled activities, and more keep parents and kids on the run and emotional health inadvertently neglected.

Nurturing kids’ emotional wellbeing can happen during the hustle and bustle of life. You can do it at home and on the run. You don’t need expensive gadgets. How to raise emotionally healthy children begins with you and your relationship with your kids. The quality and nature of a parent-child relationship is the foundation on which an emotionally healthy child is built.

How to Raise Emotionally Healthy Children?

It begins with understanding what “emotionally healthy” means.

This might disappoint parents: When kids are emotionally healthy, they still experience problems and difficulties. They’ll face conflicts and let-downs, and when they do, their emotions will probably be negative. This is part of life for everyone. But while emotional wellness can’t stop the problems from happening, it does mean that kids respond in a healthy way instead of reacting rashly. When kids are emotionally healthy, they can experience the negative, deal with it, and move forward again.

Children who have healthy emotional skillsets can identify their emotions and face them rather than running from them, and they can tolerate negative emotions because they know they’re temporary. They avoid reacting to people and situations but instead respond with self-control and smart choices.

Other components of emotional health include:

• The ability to express emotions constructively
• Knowing when to pause and breathe to reset
• Walking away at the right time (neither running early in avoidance or staying and prolonging conflict)
• Having a mentally healthy attitude and perspective
• Resilience—getting back up when knocked down
• Taking action to thrive despite problems
• The skill of functioning well in society, including their childhood world
• Knowing how to self-regulate
• Developing self-awareness

Emotionally healthy kids fit these traits. In addition to these traits, all kids (and babies and adults, too) have basic needs that, when honed, help kids create success in school, activities, relationships, family life, and all other aspects of life. Understanding and meeting these needs is part of how you can raise emotionally healthy children. These requirements for emotional health are for:

• Respect (listening to them, talking nicely, treating them politely)
• Feeling valued (listen to kids’ opinions, solicit their input, give them things to do)
• Acceptance (love them for who they are, don’t laugh at them, encourage their interests)
• Inclusion (help them feel connected, let them in on decision-making, have fun together)
• Security (create a positive, safe home environment)

When you meet these basic needs all kids have, you are naturally developing their emotional health.

How to Raise an Emotionally Healthy Child: Some Helpful Tips

You’ve already begun to gather information on helping your kids develop emotional wellness. Love and your relationship are of utmost importance, and meeting their fundamental needs for emotional health is vital as well. There are other things you can do for your children every day that will naturally build emotional skills.

• Build emotional regulation by helping them to identify, monitor, and adjust responses.
• Help them identify their strengths and interests and be proud of who they are.
• Tell them when they do something well, show gratitude when they do something for you.
• Help them develop and use outlets for strong emotions (sports, art, music, etc.).
• Model your own emotional health by handling stress positively and telling them what you do.
• Work with them to compile a go-to list of things to do when they’re upset (active things, creative activities, calm activities).
• Pay attention to how they talk about themselves and others. If it’s predominantly negative, help them reframe their thoughts and see positives rather than dwelling on negatives.
• Create a safe space for them to be when they have strong emotions (their own bedroom is a great place).
• Spend quality time with your kids, connecting with them and having positive experiences.

Parents who are present, available, and engaged in their children’s lives naturally foster emotionally healthy development. The earlier you start, the sooner your kids will begin to develop their skillset for emotional wellness. The process can begin with a newborn and continue to be honed through adulthood. It just takes a strong relationship, love, listening, and gentle guidance.

See Also:

• What Is a Parenting Plan and How Do I Make One?
• Parenting Is Hard! How to Conquer Burnout and Exhaustion

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Parenting gifted children is about much more than helping them pursue academic and intellectual excellence. You’ll nurture them for overall success in life. You’ll encourage their unique gifts and talents while cultivating social and emotional development that are common difficulties for gifted kids. Parenting gifted children to succeed is uniquely challenging because of their exceptional nature.

Giftedness is having a unique ability that is substantially above the average for the child’s age. Someone can be gifted in different ways, such as:

• General intellect
• Specific academic areas (often science, math, or language arts)
• Creativity (Art, Music, Writing, Theatre)
• Leadership

With these aptitudes and abilities come challenges. Gifted children frequently face social deficits and emotional struggles. Gifted kids often have asynchronous development, a pattern of development that is uneven. While they excel in their area of talent, they often lag in other areas. A child might be gifted in language, for example, but not in math. Or they might have advanced intellectual skills but are developmentally behind physically or socially.

Parenting gifted children is indeed taxing. You can develop the parental skills you need to parent your own gifted child for success in life.

Parenting Gifted Children for Success

Parenting gifted children for success means knowing the characteristics of gifted children. To be gifted looks different for each child; however, there are certain traits and characteristics that a gifted child tends to possess. Recognizing these traits can help you meet your child’s unique needs:

• Perfectionism
• High energy
• Sophisticated sense of humor
• Accelerated reading skills
• Extensive vocabulary
• Curiosity
• Excellent memory
• Long attention span
• Ability to make connections and see relationships
• Flexible thinking
• A tendency to question almost everything
• Fast learners
• Enjoy discussions about topics they find interesting
• Preoccupation with fairness and justice
• Emotional and physical sensitivity
• Asynchronistic development
• Intense sensitivity

By knowing the characteristics of your gifted child, you can parent in a way that meets their needs and thus helps them thrive.

Parenting Gifted Children for Success in Life

Raising a gifted child is often about balance. Balancing their unique needs related to their giftedness with their developmental needs is a challenge. Because you know your own child and their personalities, interests, and how they’re developing, with patience and practice you can determine the best balance for your child and your family.

Balance in multiple areas will help your child embrace and pursue their gifts while feeling valued for reasons that have nothing to do with gifts and talents.

• Create balance between intellectual nurturing and nurturing whole-body health. Provide plenty of opportunities for stimulation, exploration, and development of gifts and talents. Also, support your child’s social, emotional, and physical growth. Connect and interact with your kids in these areas and more. Nourish your child’s mind and body with stimulation, nutrition, and mental health activities to reduce stress, anxiety, and depression—conditions that gifted kids can develop.
• Find a balance between pushing and protecting. Often, parents are excited by what their gifted child can do. Proud, they want to help their child be the best they can be, so they push their child to do more, be more, excel faster. Other times, parents want to let their kids be kids and not put undue pressure on them, so they protect them from outside burdens and stress. Finding a balance between these extremes is essential to your child’s life success. Foster interests. Encourage exploration. Help the child cultivate their gifts and talents, but also let them develop other parts of themselves, too. Instead of pushing or protecting, think in terms of nurturing. When you nurture your gifted child, you listen, ask questions, take them to libraries, museums, and other areas of interests. Encourage without pushing.
• When disciplining, balance your expectations created by your child’s intellectual capacity with your knowledge about their age and emotional level. It can be tempting to try to reason with a gifted child. Sometimes, this works and is welcomed by your child. Other times, because a gifted kid is still a kid, rationalizing and laying down consequences is met with confusion, anger, crying, resistance, and more. Try using discipline that motivates positive action rather than stops negative actions. Use praise, natural consequences, and positive reinforcement for effort (not just results). How to discipline a gifted child involves remembering that discipline means teaching your kids the skill sets they need for success, and it’s also about building and maintaining positive parent-child relationships.
• Encourage your child to be themselves while helping them learn to fit in with peers. This is a delicate balancing act. Remember that all kids, including gifted ones, need to develop a strong sense of self that involves knowing and embracing who they are independent of others. Kids need to balance this while forming meaningful connections with peers to feel acceptance and belonging. Cultivate your child’s independence by letting them explore, create, debate with you, and generally develop their talents and interests while arranging opportunities for your child to play with kids their age.

Parenting gifted children to succeed in life means considering the characteristics of these gifted children, creating opportunities to spend quality time together—sometimes exploring interests relating to gifts and talents but other times just playing. These kids are highly intelligent and talented, but they are not small adults. Stimulate them, accept all aspects of them, and help them explore how they want to use their gifts as they grow up.

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Disrespectful children are frustrating and even hurtful, and many parents need help knowing how to discipline a child who is disrespectful. It often seems that nothing you do works, that kids become worse each time you try to end their disrespectful behavior. Dealing with such kids is usually heated and emotional for both kids and parent; therefore, beginning the correction process by intentionally choosing your mindset is an important first step in learning how to discipline a disrespectful child.

How parents view their child’s behavior is the foundation of discipline. Adina Soclof, author of Parenting Simply (“Disciplining Your Kids: Can Laughter be a Sign of Defiance?”, n.d.), explains,

    “It is how we perceive their behavior that sets the tone for how we discipline
    children. If we view their behavior as disrespectful and defiant, we will
    discipline in an angry manner. If we view their behavior with compassion and
    understanding, our discipline will be kinder and more effective.”

It might seem counterintuitive, but kindness and compassion are essential in approaching a disrespectful child. That does not mean, however, that you should excuse their behavior or give in to them when they’re being rude.

Once you’ve adopted the healthy parenting perspective that acting out of compassion for our kids is better than reacting to them in anger, it’s time to start the teaching process. Keep this crucial principle in mind: address kids’ disrespectfulness every time it happens. Rudeness can become an ingrained habit if it’s not extinguished. Further, it’s imperative to deal with rude behavior immediately in the moment, before it escalates.

Guiding Principles for Disciplining a Child Who is Disrespectful

Kids are versatile; they can be rude in a lot of ways. They can ignore parents, either not listening or pretending not to listen. They might be master eye-rollers. Sometimes they laugh at you. They talk back. Their tone can be scathing, and they often make rude comments or even put-downs.

Understandably, this behavior provokes parental anger, and it’s tempting to want to yell, threaten, name-call, and punish. These reactions, however, promote more disrespect from kids. Instead of negative, emotional reactions, there are much more effective ways to disciplining a child who talks back or laughs at you or is otherwise insolent.

See: How to Discipline a Child Without Hitting or Yelling

The most effective way to teach your child that you won’t tolerate disrespectful behavior is to keep it simple. These general principles—the five Cs— will help you approach your child when they’re ill-mannered:

• Communicate respectfully, in a way that models the treatment you want from them.
• Be clear. Make your rules and expectations transparent and well-known. Require certain responsibilities, and make sure your child knows what they are.
• Consequences replace harsh and arbitrary punishment. They should be straightforward and related to the behavior. Sarcasm and eye-rolling when you ask your child to put their phone away for dinner might lead to the loss of the phone for the remainder of the night.
• Consistency is important. Decide on your plan, including the consequences for rude behavior, and use it every time. Be consistent even when kids try to talk you out of a consequence. Remain calm, and stick with your discipline plan.
• Be calm. Calm and steady is the most valuable way to discipline a kid who is disrespectful. You might need to step away to cool off. Tell your child that’s what you’re doing. It teaches them a valuable coping skill.

What Kind of Discipline Techniques Should You Use with Disrespectful Kids?

Let the above principles guide you in your specific interactions with your child when they act out offensively. How to discipline a disrespectful child involves planning ahead of time what your rules, expectations, and limits for behavior are and then teaching them to your kids. Also, develop examples of consequences they’ll face for insolence and, again, make sure your kids know what they are. Having this in place will help you remain calm and straightforward when you need to enforce them.

While you do want to deal with disrespect immediately, it’s recommended that you give kids a warning when they begin to get cheeky. This gives them a chance to reset. Give only one warning. More than that teaches kids that you don’t mean what you say and that they don’t have to listen. Leave the room briefly to allow kids to switch gears and save face. If kids continue to break the limits after you’ve returned, calmly give them their consequence.

How to discipline a child who is disrespectful involves, again, your perspective. Choose to be positive in your approach. Yelling and threats don’t work, but statements that tell kids what they can do once they talk to you nicely do work, and well. Positivity helps move everyone forward to the ultimate goal: teaching respectful behavior and maintaining a loving relationship.

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Being a parent means facing a host of common parenting issues. Children have their own exclusive personalities, challenges, and behaviors; therefore, there isn’t a single rulebook for dealing with challenging parenting issues. Let this information guide you with general knowledge that you can tailor to your own children and the difficulties and concerns they present to you along your parenting journey.

List of Common Parenting Issues

Kids have a way of presenting their parents with a lot of challenges. An exhaustive list that covers all problems is impossible to compile, but there are several parenting issues that are common to many families. Some common issues that span age groups include:

• Tantrums or meltdowns
• Hitting, biting, hair pulling, etc.("How to Discipline a Child for Hitting Others")
• Lying
• Facing fears that affect a child’s daily (or nightly) life
• School refusal
• Time spent gaming, on a tablet or smartphone, in front of the TV ("Top 5 Parenting Skills You Will Need in the Digital Age")
• Behavior problems (acting out, refusing to listen, defiance, stealing, etc.)
• Anger at not getting their way (“I hate you!”)
• Substance use

The list can be daunting, and it’s just a sampling of common problems. Be encouraged, for there are ways to deal with these and all other issues.

Two Guiding Principles Help You Deal with Parenting Issues

Two important tips can guide the way parents deal with any parenting issue:

• When interacting with your upset child of any age, respond rather than react.
• Remember that addressing problems is about shaping your child rather than punishing to stop a behavior in a moment.

In the face of frustration and emotional upset, kids react. Emotions take over and determine what they say and do—and how loudly and obtrusively they do it. Contrary to how it may seem, they’re not being a bad child (their behavior is undesirable, but the kids themselves aren’t bad). Kids react emotionally in a situation that they don’t like because they haven’t learned how to self-regulate. They haven’t learned how to respond.

Adults do have the capacity to respond. A reaction is a knee-jerk action or speech that comes from strong emotions. A response, in contrast, comes from rational thinking.

Even if you’ve been reacting to negative parenting situations by becoming quickly angry, yelling, threatening, or punishing, you can learn to respond to your kids and reduce parenting issues. Parenting without yelling encourages kids to listen to you and helps show them how to respond rather than react.

It’s also helpful to remember the other important principle: think beyond punishing. In handling problems, a parent is more successful and creates long-term harmony not by punishing but by shaping behavior and helping kids react rather than respond. Punishing teaches kids that it’s undesirable to be caught doing something wrong. Instead, think in terms of parenting discipline. To discipline is to teach, which involves shaping and using natural consequences. These teach right from wrong and good choice-making.

Responding and shaping through discipline helps your kids’ healthy development. It’s a process that occurs from birth until they leave the nest and even beyond that. You can also respond in the immediate moment, during an issue, to help stop it now while you still parent your kids for the big picture.

Ways to Deal with Common Parenting Issues

While this may seem surprising, there are general principles to help you through most challenges your child of any age presents. To be sure, you wouldn’t handle a toddler’s tantrum the same way as a teenager’s coming home drunk; however, the underlying approaches and attitudes are the same.

Practice applying these principles when dealing with parenting issues to raise your children to have the character and behavior you want them to have:

• Make sure your rules are clear and simple.
• Be consistent in rules and consequences; inconsistency is confusing to kids, so they behave erratically.
• When your child is upset or has done something wrong, remain calm. Breathing deeply and slowly helps.
• Be objective, keeping your focus on the single issue at hand.
• Don’t ignore behavior you don’t want. Ignoring a tantrum or the teen who sneaked in drunk tells them that you’ll look the other way and allow the behavior. Be gently present, give them a safe, quiet place to reset, and then have a talk with them (adjust the length and complexity according to age).
• Help kids find and use words rather than acting on emotions with negative behaviors.
• Listen and support your kids and the problems they’re facing. Do you have a little one who’s afraid of monsters? Problem-solve with him and work with him as he develops a plan.

Using these approaches leads to parenting without power struggles. You will face many parenting issues. Your attitude and demeanor will help them go in your favor and keep them to a minimum.

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Good parenting is a broad concept, encompassing multiple aspects of your and your child’s lives together. Good parenting is an accumulation of actions and interactions that you have with your child. It is driven with purpose and end goals in mind. Good parenting aims to develop in children character traits like independence, self-direction, honesty, self-control, kindness, and cooperation. To that end, good parenting creates a foundation for a child’s healthy, positive development.

Good parenting also involves parents living their lives as role models. Kids listen to and watch what their parents do, taking everything in. As they absorb their parents’ actions and words, they begin to emulate them. Good parenting means being aware that your children are watching, learning, and copying you. Now that you’ve seen a description of good parenting, we’ll go a bit deeper into a good parenting definition.

What Does Good Parenting Mean?

Good parenting focuses on the overall health and wellbeing of kids. Good parenting focuses both on the here-and-now of a child’s life and on raising kids who are successful in their lives as they mature and become adults. To that end, good parenting approaches kids with love, warmth and acceptance. Healthy parenting means nurturing the whole child, attending to physical, mental, social, emotional, and intellectual needs.

A definition of good parenting acknowledges that parenting is both an art and a skill. While good parenting doesn’t mean perfect parenting (that’s impossible), it does mean that parents do their best to interact positively and respond to their kids’ needs every day. Every parent’s best varies from day to day or even hour to hour within the same day. What’s important is that a parent has a child’s best interests at heart no matter what ("‘Good Enough Parenting’ Has Its Time and Place").

Having a child’s needs and interests at heart isn’t so difficult when you know the elements that comprise good parenting.

What is Good Parenting? Elements of Good Parenting

The following elements are present in good parenting.

Support.

Parents are supportive of their children, assisting them with school and activities when needed, attending their events, and asking about their lives.

Discipline.

Parents set guidelines and rules that align with their values and purpose. Rules are consistent, clear, and explained. Consequences are gentle and logical.

Routine.

Routine, as well as structure and consistency, provides stability and a sense that the world is logical and predictable. It fosters healthy, positive development.

Trust.

Parents trust their kids. If kids break that trust, parents talk openly, discipline, and explain why they are disciplining. Also, parents act in ways that their kids can trust them and what they say and do.

Involvement.

Good parenting means being actively involved in kids’ lives. Setting aside time to do things together, attending school events and other activities, and staying current with what’s happening in kids’ lives are some aspects of involvement.

Positive focus.

Parents help children have a positive perspective rather than a negative outlook. While processing negative events and situations is important, good parenting involves helping kids find positivity and forward direction.

Guidance. Good parenting involves guiding their children to be successful, but it does not involve controlling, micromanaging, or hovering over kids.

Responsibility. Parents give children age-appropriate tasks and chores. As kids grow, so do their responsibilities in order to foster success and a healthy work ethic.  

Love.

Above all else, good parenting is driven by love. This helps kids feel valued and facilitates healthy self-esteem and a belief in themselves and their abilities. When parents openly show love and affection, children learn to be caring and kind to others.

Good Parenting: Parents Matter

As a parent, know that you are important. You are an asset in your children’s lives, helping them develop character. Good parenting is a skillset that can be nurtured and honed; it isn’t something some parents can do while other parents can’t. Driven by love and purpose, all parents can practice good parenting.

Developing parenting skills involves patience and practice. And it’s well worth it. Good parenting nurtures kids academically, socially, and emotionally. The above elements of good parenting are protective, helping kids be mentally healthy; indeed, good parenting practices can prevent anxiety, depression, eating disorders, and alcohol and drug use and abuse throughout childhood, adolescence, and into adulthood.

It’s important to note that we’ve been talking about good parenting. It’s something parents do. It’s not about judging parents and labeling them as good (or bad) parents. Good parenting has less to do with the parents and more to do with the raising of kids.

See Also:

• Top 5 Parenting Skills You Will Need in the Digital Age
• Good Parenting Qualities and Characteristics You Can Develop

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Discover how a bully becomes a bully and what can a child do to stop a bully.

by Kathy Noll- author of the book: "Taking The Bully By The Horns"

BULLIES CAN MAKE YOU FEEL:

How A Bully Becomes A Bully

• He (or she) is angry. Someone might have bullied him in the past.
• He has a low self-esteem. He thinks controlling you will help him feel better about himself.
• He might have been exposed to a lot of violence in the media. (TV, books...) A lot of movies make violence look cool. But if you look closer, the "good guy" is always cooler!
• His (or her) friends, or peers, could be a "bad" influence, talking him into doing things he may, or may not, understand are wrong.
• His caretakers might have lacked in supervision. They might have been too busy to teach him how wrong it is to hurt others. Or maybe they spoiled him, making him think he can do anything he wants, including bullying!

What To Do About Bullies

• Inform your teachers & parents. If his bullying is physical or violent, tell them not to give your name. That could make the bully Knight in Shining Armormore angry, and then he'll come after you harder.
• Travel to school or social events in groups. Don't walk alone.
• Avoid the bully at all costs.
• Ignore him. That will take away his power he "thinks" he has over you. He'll get bored, and go look for someone else to pick on.
• Confront him with the problem. Do this only if the bullying is mental, not physical. Maybe you can explain how it makes you feel. If he doesn't care, and continues to bully you, report him, and avoid him.
• Take a safety training workshop. This should only be used as a last resort (in self-defense). Using this to show off for your friends, or simply because someone made you angry, could lead to lawsuits, and YOU becoming a bully!

Take care of yourselves & stay safe. : )

Kathy Noll has written a series of articles on bullies and how to deal with bullies.

• Child on Child Violence
• Help For Parents and Teachers On Dealing With Bullies and School Violence
• Empowering Kids to Deal with Bullies and Low Self-esteem
• Bully Advice For Kids

If you'd like to learn more about bully and self-esteem issues, purchase Kathy Knoll's book: Taking The Bully By The Horns.

Raising a strong-willed child can be exhausting. Your headstrong child might have you uttering to yourself something to the effect of, “I love you, but right now I don’t like you.” Forgive yourself if you have similar sentiments because they’re a natural response when a child seems to turn everything into a battle. The following five tips for raising a strong-willed child will help you feel less exasperated and more able to parent your bullheaded kid.

5 Tips for Raising Your Strong-Willed Child

1. See the flip side of your child’s annoying behavior.
Parenting a strong-willed child is hard. These children are prone to power struggles, difficult, full of unrelenting energy, always need to be right, and have meltdowns when they don’t get their way.

While accurate, these traits aren’t the only ones that fit. Your child has the potential to grow into a leader with a host of positive strengths. You might even see glimmers of these already:

• autonomous and independent
• a free thinker
• curious (always asks “why”)
• intelligent
• determined
• outspoken
• willing to stand up for what they believe in
• self-motivated
• resistant to peer pressure
• perseverant in pursuing goals

These traits will serve your child well in life. Shifting your perspective and seeing your child’s strengths and potential underlying the obstinate behavior can help you develop these traits.

2. Parent to Your Strong-Willed Child’s Specific Needs
Like all children, strong-willed kids have needs that must be met in order to thrive. Part of thriving is fitting in with the family and behaving in an acceptable manner. Willful kids’ needs include:

• Control over themselves and their actions: Give your child choices whenever possible.
• Power: Let your child be part of family decision-making when age-appropriate.
• Connection: Perhaps surprisingly, these kids want and need quality time with their family.
• Respect: Communicating by talking calmly and listening fully increases cooperation.
• Being heard: Again, listen to your strong-willed child and seek to understand them, even when you won’t give in to their wishes.
• Trust: They need to know they can trust you to keep your word, and they need you to trust them to make choices and have some autonomy.

In general, working with your child rather than approaching them as if they’re too young to have a say goes a long way toward empowering them and respecting them. Unwanted behaviors will gradually decline as these needs are met, and you’ll begin to feel respected as a parent.

3. Parenting Without Power Struggles Requires Structure and Predictability.
Kids need stability. They need to know that life is orderly in order to feel secure. Strong-willed kids need routines to help them feel in control. Without daily routines, these kids can feel manipulated, uncertain of what will happen, and powerless to make choices. When strong-willed children feel at the mercy of adults who aren’t, in their minds, behaving rationally, they have meltdowns.

Creating predictable routines that the whole family follows helps soothe a strong-willed child. Involve your child in establishing routines, giving them personal choices when practical. This way, when your family operates within the structure, power struggles will be minimized.

 4. Stand Your Ground When Facing a Meltdown
Even a strong-willed child who is vocalizing (inappropriately) their need for power and control needs parental comfort during a meltdown, perhaps more than other kids because these autonomous kids don’t like feeling out of control.

Stay nearby, and as the tantrum loses intensity, validate their feelings and empathize. Listen attentively as they tell you why they’re angry and upset. Respect them by acknowledging their feelings. Then calmly stand your ground. State what you need them to do but provide a choice. Letting them decide what order to do things or how to complete a task gives your child some control and allows you a positive parenting moment.  

5. Remember Your Parenting Goals.
It can be easy to lose sight of the big picture when dealing with daily issues, so remember your parenting goals. As you try to get through heated moments, ask yourself:

• Do I want my child to be obedient or cooperative?
• Do I want my child to give in and give up or to learn negotiation skills?
• How can I act in ways that will foster development of the positive aspects of being strong-willed?

These five tips for raising a strong-willed child can positively change your relationship with your child. You could find that parenting a strong-willed child, while still challenging, just might become less tiring and maybe even more fun.

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