Parents: Raising Your Child in a Troubling World
My two daughters are grown and have families of their own now. When my youngest daughter went to college she wrote me a letter that to this day I hold dear to my heart. She validated my parenting...
View ArticleYell or Scream at Your Kids?
Not everyone has lost their cool with their kids like me but there are many that have yelled on occasion. I believe yelling became the go-to discipline method when child abuse was put on the books and...
View ArticleWho Is your Hero?
The definition of the word hero means: a person who, in the opinion of others, has heroic qualities or has performed a heroic act and is regarded as a model or ideal: A hero is someone who is brave and...
View ArticleChildren Swearing and Cursing
While rebuilding our deck one summer, I felt a sudden, sharp pain in my foot after stepping onto a discarded board, “Son of a ———!” Looking up I saw both of my young daughters wide-eyed with surprise....
View ArticleYour Children and the Choice to Remain Childless
When I was a little girl the first toy a girl received was a baby doll that may or may not wet. We learned to fold diapers, how to ‘cook’ on a pretend stove in a pretend pot. My brother was given cool...
View ArticleWhat Goes In Does Come Out: How Babies and Toddlers Pick Up More Than You...
I have raised two children and have babysat more than my share of nieces and nephews and I know for a fact that things you say and do come back to bite you. Even things you think are innocent and even...
View ArticleYour Child Wants to Get a Tattoo
Teenagers are curious creatures. When kids turn twelve many are already into adolescence, a time of great change in their brains, bodies and lives. Adolescence can be a trying time for parents as well;...
View ArticleCheating and Kids: Use Teaching Moments
Last week found a dark cloud hanging over the educational establishment in Atlanta, Georgia. Caught up in the conspiracy to cheat were the former superintendent, executive administrators, principals,...
View ArticleWeather Changes Affect Children’s Behavior
When my girls were school-age the topic of weather and our children’s behavior came up in my Parents Anonymous group. The facilitator said, “Any time there is a weather change you can expect the kids’...
View ArticleWhat Will Your Epitaph Say?
My family and I went to Emley’s Cemetery in Imlaystown, New Jersey to pursue our hobby of ‘graving.’ While we were there taking photos of the different stones I remembered a question from many years...
View ArticleA Child’s Mistake: Holding a Grudge
Attending my Parents Anonymous group was the best thing I could have done for my daughters Chelsey and Katie. All the parenting I learned from my own parents about was either wrong or illegal. I just...
View ArticleWhen Your Co-Parent Doesn’t Show Up
A Parents Anonymous group is a great place to unload frustration, anger and heartbreak. At one meeting Tracy* was very upset and asked to speak first; she was going through a difficult divorce and the...
View ArticleWhat We Learned from a Missing Frying Pan
Many years ago my favorite non-stick frying pan disappeared from its usual place in the kitchen and I could not find it for the life of me. For more than a week I looked everywhere: in the oven, in the...
View ArticleSocial Skills of My Eight Year Old Daughter in MMORPGs
Technological entertainment is a way of life for much of today’s societies. As I am a gamer myself, how am I to restrict social interaction from my eight-year-old who is coming into her own gaming?...
View ArticleChildren Being Bad: Caught On Tape!
My daughter Chelsey was nine-years-old and driving me nuts over the simplest things. I wished my Parents Anonymous group members could see what I was dealing with every morning. That gave me an idea, I...
View ArticleStop Children’s Fighting Over Toys
When parents buy a toy for their children, we have visions of happy, smiling children enjoying the toy. Ideally, all the children in one family will share toys, especially if it would be too expensive...
View ArticleSocial Media – Top Venue for Cyberbullying
From Facebook, to Twitter, to Foursquare, social media sites are everywhere and full of virtual land mines for our teens. They can quickly become a victim of cyber bullying. Anything they say can and...
View ArticleGet-Out-Of-Jail-Free Cards and Peer Pressure
Peer pressure or pack mentality can stir up a lot of trouble for a child who would never think of breaking the law, hurting another person’s feelings or destroying property. A child who obeys parents...
View ArticleHow I Decided to Start Using Cloth Diapers
Probably, two of the best possible ways to do the right things in life is by learning from one’s own experience and learning from others’ experience (often mistakes) too. The latter perhaps is what...
View ArticleKnow-It-All Moms Get Little Help
We moms think we know how to do everything, right? There is an old expression that says, “mothers are the very heart of our homes,” so it must be true. We know how laundry should be done, how to cook a...
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