For the past few entries, I have been discussing the five love languages of children based on the book of the same name by authors Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell. In previous entries, we have reviewed and discussed the first four love languages including physical touch (part 1 and part 2), words of affirmation (part 1 and part 2), quality time (part 1 and part 2), and gifts.Today, we will be discussing the last of the five love languages of children, Acts of Service.

An act of service is a parent’s ability to help a child with a specific task. This ranges from changing a baby’s diaper, to making a toddler’s bed, to helping an elementary-aged child fix his bike, to quizzing an adolescent on an upcoming test.

During acts of service, it is not a parent’s job to please a child, but rather to do what is best for the child. This may not satisfy the child in the moment, however, these skills will serve to help the child become a mature and independent adult.

For example, a child may want to eat ice cream after every meal. A parent can provide the child with this request, however, this may not be the best option for the child’s overall health. As such, giving the child ice cream every now and then may not be the child’s ultimate wish but it will help the child in his or her future.

Parents can view acts of service as a means to helping a child until that child is ready to learn the behavior on his or her own.

A father may show an act of service by cleaning his 2 year old daughter’s room - this is developmentally appropriate. However, if that father continues to clean his daughter’s room until she is 16 years old, he may be hindering his daughter’s ability to know how to clean and take care of her own individual needs. This may become a problem when she is ready to live on her own. As such, it would be more appropriate for the father to begin to teach his daughter how to clean her room and continue to help her until she is ready to clean her room on her own.

In this scenario, the father first models the behavior, then helps his daughter learn the behavior, and finally, allows the daughter to do the behavior on her own. That’s what this love language is all about - it is to help children emerge as mature adults who are able to give love to others by helping one another.

Be sure to visit us again next week to learn tips and tricks to parent a child whose love language is acts of service.

As a parent, if you feel learning about the 5 love languages has been helpful, seeking individual therapy can be a great way to take these topics and learn about them in relation to you and your family. There are many different types of therapy outside of individual therapy, including couples therapy and family therapy, that can help you and your family create, maintain, and/or strengthen connections. For more information on therapy, visit FAQ at Hilber Psychological Services. If you would like to schedule an appointment, please contact us.

Welcome back! For the past two articles, I have introduced the five ways that children express love based on the book “The Five Love Languages of Children” by Gary Chapman and Ross Campbell. These love languages include physical touch, words of affirmation, quality time, gifts, and acts of service. For a general overview, please review the article “The 5 Love Languages of Children, Part 1.” In my most recent article, “The 5 Love Languages of Children, Part 2,” I reviewed the first of the five love languages for children, physical touch. Today I will be exploring the second love language for children, words of affirmation, and how parents can incorporate this language into the relationship with their children. Words are important and children hear it all. From words of encouragement, to words of love, to words of frustration, children listen. Frequent words of affirmation, love, or encouragement are important for children to hear for they provide a positive foundation to which a child may build his or her sense of self, which includes a child’s self-esteem and self-worth. When a child hears negative statements from parents a child may internalize these words which inherently casts a cloud of doubt over the child and his or her abilities. As such, children should hear and be exposed to frequent words of affirmation.

Before children can understand and interpret language, they can receive messages through multiple cues. For example, a child whose parent says “I love you” in a gentle, soothing tone while smiling at the child will create an emotional message of love and warmth, even if the child does not yet understand the construct of love. Children need these concrete concepts to learn. They cannot yet understand things that are abstract, such as love. Therefore, parents can teach children about love by how it is expressed. For example, the phrase “I love you” can be more meaningful for individuals when it is associated with affectionate feelings, demonstrated by tone and/or facial cues. As a child grows older, a parent can use words of affirmation in various ways, from stating “I love you” to saying, “You have a beautiful smile.”

I would also like to point out the difference between words of affection or love and praise. Words of love are about expressing appreciation for the child as a whole, while praise is used to refer to a child’s behavior.

Words of affirmation are an important part of expressing love in parent-child relationships. However, parents should be careful not to use praise too frequently. Parents who praise children too much run the risk of the words having little to no effect on the child. For example, a father is playing catch with his son. If the father says, “great catch” for every catch the son makes, the son will be unable to recognize when he actually does make a great catch. This can impact the son’s self-esteem and sense of worth. Furthermore, if a child grows up hearing frequent praise, this can lead to feelings of inadequacy or anxiety when the child does not receive praise for a behavior. At the end of the day, it is important for parents to praise children on wanted behaviors. In addition, a parent should believe the praise, not just say “great catch!” because he or she feels like it needs to be said.

Tune back next time as we continue to explore the love language, Words of Affirmation. More specifically, I will discuss what Chapman and Campbell refer to as “The Power of Encouragement,” as well as how to know if a child’s main love language is words of affirmation and what he or she may say about it.

If reading this article is helpful and you are interested in learning more about parenting or connecting with your child, therapy can be a great option to explore individualized cases. There are many different types of therapy available, including individual therapy, couples therapy, and/or family therapy. For more information, visit FAQ at Hilber Psychological Services or contact us to schedule an appointment.

Last week, I began to discuss the second of three principles, Chasing the Why, in the article “No Drama Discipline: The Principles, Part 3.” These three principles, based on the book “No Drama Discipline” by Dr. Daniel Siegel and Dr. Tina Payne Bryson, examine how parents can connect with their children during discipline, utilizing the moment to teach a child rather than make a child feel bad. To learn about the foundation of No Drama Discipline, please review articles “No Drama Discipline: The Foundation, Part 1,” and “No Drama Discipline: The Foundation, Part 2.” To review the first principle in No Drama Discipline, Turning Down the Shark Music, please refer to the articles “No Drama Discipline: The Principles, Part 1” and “No Drama Discipline: The Principles, Part 2.” A parent’s goal throughout discipline is to play the role of a detective. Chasing the Why asks parents to internally ask themselves, “what is my child trying to communicate through his or her behavior?” By remaining curious about a child’s behavior, a parent allows him or herself to look into a child’s internal state rather than the external behavior.

Let’s review an example of what discipline may look like utilizing the connection principle, Chasing the Why.

Dave is a single parent raising 12yo Alice. Alice has always been a good student and Dave hopes that Alice will follow in his footsteps to become a lawyer. One day, Dave receives a phone call from the school stating that Alice has been disruptive in class by frequently talking to classmates. Embarrassed about the call, Dave begins to become anxious. He imagines Alice's grades dropping and her future jeopardized. For Dave, his shark music regarding his own fears for his daughter’s future become louder. Instead of letting the shark music grow, Dave takes a deep breath to clear his head. He allows himself to become curious as he asks Alice questions about her behaviors rather than make assumptions about the motivation behind them. He may begin by asking Alice, “Alice, tell me about your day,” to first connect with Alice. Dave may then ask Alice specific questions about the conversation with Alice’s teacher. “Alice, I heard from your teacher today. She seems to think that you have been more talkative in class than usual. Tell me a little about that.”

By taking the time to explore the reasons behind the child’s behavior, a parent may be surprised from what the child’s motivation is rather than the parent’s own perceived motivation. In the above scenario, Alice may reply that she has been more talkative because she recently made a new friend, or that her friend had a bad day and she wanted to make her feel better. The parent will still have to help the child learn strategies to handle these situations in an appropriate manner, however, by chasing the why the parent is creating a way to connect with the child rather than dismissing the child and missing the opportunity to understand the child’s motivation for the behavior.

Tips and Tricks: It is important for parents not to directly ask, “Why did you do this?” For many children (and even adults) asking “why” can cause defensiveness in those being asked. Furthermore, depending on the age of the child, the child may not be at a developmental level where he or she could tell you the motivation for the behavior. It is not uncommon for parents to hear “I don’t know” when asking a child about an event. Try asking open-ended questions (i.e. “What did you do in school today?”) instead of closed-ended questions (i.e. “Did you get into trouble today?"). Closed-ended questions will limit the interaction between parent and child.

Chasing the why is asking parents to ask “why” in their own heads in order to create that curiosity and let that open mindset guide the conversation. In this way parents can begin to not only address the external concerns, or behaviors, but look into the child’s internal concerns, or the root cause underneath the behavior, to prevent future problematic behaviors.

If you would like more support in parenting your child, whether in couples therapy or individual therapy, please do not hesitate to contact us at Hilber Psychological Services to explore options. Therapy can be a great way for parents to discuss personal concerns that may get in the way of parenting. If you have any general questions, please visit our FAQ.

Tune back next time as we examine the third and final principle, Think About the How based on the book “No Drama Discipline” by Dr. Daniel Siegel and Dr. Tina Payne Bryson.

In my previous article “No Drama Discipline: The Principles, Part 1,” I began to discuss the three principles of parenting as created by Dr. Daniel Siegel and Dr. Tina Payne Bryson in their book “No Drama Discipline.” This week, I will continue to discuss the first principle, Turning Down the Shark Music. Please refer to the previous article for an introduction of the concept. Last article, we looked at a family scenario and discussed what parenting with shark music may look like based on the children’s previous behaviors. Now, let’s look at this same situation from the perspective of a mindful parent, absent of shark music clouding one’s judgment.

A parent has two children: Jessica, 17, and Daniel, 15. The parent checks the children’s grades at the end of the quarter to find both are not doing well. For Jessica, this is typical. However, for Daniel, the once straight-A student has mostly B’s and a D. The parent takes a second to stop and think about how he or she will react to each child. The parent approaches Daniel first, and states the following, “Hi Daniel. I was looking at your report card today. It sounds like this was not a good semester for you. I understand that as you get older, your grades may not be what they used to be. Unfortunately, based on our house rules, I am going to ground you for three days. How do you think we could increase that D to a C-?”

The major part of being a present, or mindful, parent is the ability to be flexible (response flexibility) and the ability to empathize and connect during discipline. In the above situation, the parent addressed the specific needs of Daniel, an individual child, without comparing him to his sister (as seen in our previous article). Furthermore, the parent looked at this specific situation with the current facts (i.e. acknowledged the D in chemistry instead of yelling at Daniel for being irresponsible) instead of clouding the situation with past expectations for Daniel (i.e. knowing he was previously a straight-A student) or the parent’s own future fears (i.e. the parent fearing Daniel will not go to college).

Being a mindful parent can be challenging, and some days will be better than others. It’s important for a parent to become aware of the shark music blaring in his or her ear before interacting with the child. Furthermore, a parent needs to remember to adjust expectations and understand that a child may need more time to develop. Part of parenting is teaching and guiding children to be successful in the adult world. Sometimes, especially when there are multiple children in the home, a parent may get stuck in assumptions around comparing siblings and/or comparing the child to the parents’ own successes or failures. It is not uncommon for a parent to project his or her own life path and/or choices unto the child. But remember - the child is an individual. It is vital to view the child with a blank state in each and every situation so the parent can act in the present and not base discipline on an emotional trigger of the past and/or worry of the future.

If you feel that you could use more information about parenting, or would like to create a space to discuss your own upbringing, therapy can be a great place to start. If you are hesitant to start therapy or have any questions about it, please contact us at Hilber Psychological Services. You can also visit our FAQ for any general questions you may have.

Tune back next time as we begin to examine the second of three principles, Chasing the Why, based on the book “No Drama Discipline” by Dr. Daniel Siegel and Dr. Tina Payne Bryson.