Five ideas to keep family friction a flicker, not a blaze

One constant of life exists that all of us who are parents understand: At some moment between toddlerhood and pre, pre-pubescence, our children will cease looking at us with unconditional deference and admiration.  They will develop opinions. They will develop attitudes.  They will question every thought, action, belief, hair style, food preferences, shirt we wear, and pair of shoes we squeeze our feet into. In other words, they will act just like we did from ages 1 to 21.

Why, then, do we find this inevitable stepladder of maturity so difficult to accept when we, too, rolled our eyes, expelled exasperated sighs and countered every parental decision as we pushed, poked and fashioned ourselves into the adults we are today?

Because we don’t want to slide from the pedestals where our offspring placed us the first time they peered into our eyes and smiled.

Because we know that it is much easier to give an attitude than to receive one.

Because we now understand how vulnerable we made our parents feel, and this isn’t a welcome sensation.

Although we must join our children on their escalator to adulthood, we can alleviate the friction and frustrations so when this journey grinds to a halt, we remain friends instead of becoming foes.  We need to think about how we wished our parents might have acted and reacted to us. Here are a few concepts I picked up as I passed from pre, pre-pubescence to adulthood:

1. Defuse volatile encounters with Irony. I mean situational irony, though, not the verbal kind.  Too often, the latter comes across as sarcasm, and this will only fan the flames if it’s taken seriously. When one of our children greets an action of ours with an unpleasant response and we choose not to return a retort of our own, which they expect, an argument can’t exist.

I’m reminded of the commercial for a washer and dryer where a teenager is bemoaning the fact that her mother washed, and probably ruined, her favorite jeans. Her daughter says, “My life is over,” but the mother replies with a smile in her voice, “Okay.  Don’t forget your jeans.”  She chose not to meet her daughter’s accusations with an, “Oh, just live with it; I’m tired of not doing anything right,” flame-fanner comment, or counter with an exasperated, “The jeans are fine.” The daughter was begging for an argument but didn’t provoke one, ergo- no fight.

2. Talk with your children- not at them. While my sisters and I were growing up, our father didn’t participate in conversations as much as he produced monologues.  He was more comfortable sermonizing about how he wanted us to act and what he expected of us than he was about hearing our thoughts, or giving them any credence.  It wasn’t until we were adults that he apologized for his Right Way, Wrong Way, My Way approach to parenting.  Ironically, his actions spoke louder than his words, showing us how to be strong, confident adults. And thankfully, Mom, a role model for listening, maintained a tolerant and, “Sometimes we must agree to disagree” mindset.

3. Silence can be golden. Sometimes our children just need to vent about school, siblings, work, family expectations, and, well, about anything.  To be honest, although my childhood and adolescence are distant memories, sometimes I still need to throw a tantrum about, well about anything.  Just as my mother knew to do, my husband, adult daughter and son have learned to just let me rant and rave. They know that I don’t want advice; I don’t want them to tell me to calm down, and I don’t want to be ignored. They know that in these cases, silence is golden.  Like anyone-from 6 months to 65- I just want to know that home is a place where sometimes I can rail against life’s unfairness and absurdities and Still. Be. Loved.

4. Address the action, not the person.  I have always hated name-calling, both the mean kind and those that are meant to be endearing but are demeaning. No one I know is an idiot, a dummy, a crotchety old lady/man,  a fool, a nerd, a selfish, narcissistic twit, a pompous tyrant, an intellectual snob or, …you get the point. Any of us, though can act like an idiot, a dummy, a selfish, narcissistic twit, etc. etc.  Sticks and stones can break bones, but names can break one’s confidence, self-respect and sense of worth.

5. Listen…Listen…Listen.  To me, this is the most important factor to defuse friction. When we are listening, we aren’t judging. When we’re listening, we aren’t expounding on our beliefs, ideas, and ways to get through life. When we’re listening we are respecting others actions, reactions and thoughts, as well as their right to choose their paths through life, even if we totally disagree with their decisions. Unless their choices are life-threatening- to themselves or to others- we need to bite our tongues and just listen.  Only when people can be trusted to listen will others ask for and want their advice.

Leo Tolstoy said that, “All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way,” (http://www.brainyquote.com). Friction, too will always flicker in families be they happy or unhappy. Whether this dissention will remain a sputter or whether it will rage into a bonfire is the eternal question all parents and their children wonder as they step onto that escalator to adulthood.

Just like weight, family friction can be controlled. These five steps worked for my family.   How does yours thrive?

Until next week,

Connie

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