Whoever shouts loud enough wins? - Why parents should not be pressured

Young children try to test limits and enforce their will. Her remedy is deafening screaming, which blanks the nerves of the parents. Even if it were often easier to give in, parents should stay consistent. For what does a child learn so that he can impose his will?

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The club of the powerless

Once a child is old enough to discover their own will, it will soon be ready to do everything in their little power to enforce that will. On the other hand - is the power of the child really so small? About 90cm tall, compared to - say - 1.85m of the father? Or do you, like almost every parent, know those moments when your child's power is 3.50 meters tall and your own would fit on a pinhead? Welcome to the club.

Who yells, gets his will?

It is in the nature of the child to demand. It is also in the nature of the child to test limits. It wants to know how far it can go and above all, what it can achieve, if it only puts enough vehemence on the day. In the case of a toddler, vehemence means above all: volume. A small child does not yet master complicated psychotricks, but it does feel exactly how screaming puts his parents under stress. Shouting is uncomfortable for the parents. They want that noise to stop immediately. And in weak moments ("Alright, so this one more lollipop, but only this one, do you hear?") Then children learn very crucial lessons: who screams, gets in the end what he wants. Shouting causes pressure and adults only sustain this pressure for a limited time. So the kid just screams a little longer than the parents can tolerate, and so comes to his will.

Of course this is not a very happy lesson. Not for the children or for the future. Or can you imagine your son as a young adult throwing himself screaming at the office floor while talking to his boss because he does not get his hoped-for salary increase? The later life works in such a way that one may make demands, but first of all the sound makes the music and secondly that patience and restraint sometimes pay off. Few people like quenching, crying and annoying. But how do I now meet possible impulses of my child when it develops into this hope?

A child learns from his role models

Recently, in a large German women's magazine an interview with a currently very popular family therapist (yes, here it seems to be already alternating fashion trends ...) to read. In this interview it was said that education in the narrower sense of reward and punishment was actually not that important. Much more important would be how the family environment is experienced by the child. Because children lend themselves to things by imitation. They assume that what is shown to them in the family is correct and therefore worth imitating.

Applied to our questioning, this would mean that it does not help much to explain to a little screamer that roaring is not nice. Furthermore, it will do little to banish the Screamer in his room. Although this helps the parents to reduce the noise level in the acute situation, the child will not derive a life lesson from it. Anyway, no positive. At the most it learns that anger can not be, but that's not the way it is. Each of us may be angry. Rather, the right behavior is critical to a roaring whiner. This means that you must act as an adult and have to prove by your behavior that SCREAM does not lead to the goal. That there is nothing in your house to sound out because it's not the sounds that are heard. Once in conflict with your child, deliberately lower your voice. Only speak as loudly as is necessary for communication. You will notice that this is immediately de-escalating. Tell your child that although you understand that it is angry because it does not get its will, but you have your reasons and therefore will not change your mind. It is important that you - you guessed it already - remain consistent. While this may be difficult in many situations, it is the method that gets you - you and your child.