Becoming Bulletproof Parents
By Dan Coulter
Ever been frustrated or embarrassed by
something one of your kids said or did in public? The stares of
strangers can feel like bullets. If your child has an Autism
Spectrum Disorder, you may sometimes feel like you’ve been
machine-gunned.
Wouldn’t it be great to have a way to
deal with these situations that made you bulletproof?
I found something that works sort of
like a protective shield –- and it’s basically a matter of
perspective.
Most of us were raised to care a lot
about what other people think. That’s generally a good thing. It
helps us be aware of social rules and interact politely with other
people. But when our kids do something embarrassing in public,
feeling those painful stares can sometimes cause us to get our
priorities mixed up.
Maybe your son throws tantrums. Maybe
your daughter makes inappropriate remarks in a loud voice. When my
son, who has Asperger Syndrome, was little, he had a tendency to pick
up and examine anything that caught his interest. This was a problem,
particularly in stores.
People react in a lot of ways to their
kids “misbehaving” in public. Too often, I’ve seen parents act
embarrassed and say things to their kids that they might regret
later. Most of us don’t completely lose it, but I know there were
times when my son was little that I was more impatient with him in
public than I should have been.
Now for the perspective part. At the
moment our kids do something in public that we wish they hadn’t, we’re
socially conditioned to react by focusing on what other people think.
But how important is that compared to what our kids need at that
moment? Do you have a picture of anyone in the mall crowd on your
dresser at home? Have you held anyone in the supermarket line in your
arms and rocked him to sleep? Is anyone in sight more important to
you than your child?
When you look at things from that
perspective, it’s easier to dismiss what other people think and focus
on your child. First off, why did he do what he did? Many kids with
ASDs are impulsive. Something in their brain triggers a behavior
that’s hard for them to control. What if your son is not defying
you? What if he’s responding to a stimulus that may take a lot of
practice to overcome? In my son’s case, it helped to remind him
before we went out that he needed to ask and get permission before he
picked things up to check them out. We’d remind him again just before
we went into a store. Even so, it took quite a while for him to gain
control of that behavior.
Knowing that our kids are prone to
certain behaviors helps us mentally prepare to stop what we’re doing
and deal calmly with the situation. There’s a saying in the retail
business, “Customers are not an interruption of our work, they are the
reason for it.” I think the same thing applies to parents and kids.
Our job of parenting doesn’t stop when we’re busy and stressed and in
a supermarket -- and kids aren’t reduced to “interruptions.” If your
daughter grabs a piece of candy from a shelf and screams when you try
and take it from her, the best thing for her may be for you to stop
shopping for a moment, kneel down and patiently but firmly explain why
she has to put it back. At that moment, being bulletproof to what
others might think of her outburst protects you both.
We don’t flip a switch to teach our
kids and then flip if off. We’re teaching them with every interaction
we have. If I think of every exchange with my son as one he may
remember the rest of his life, will I act differently?
The twist to this is that stopping to
deal compassionately and fairly with your child will probably make
people who witness his behavior appreciate your parenting skills. And
if they don’t understand, that’s their loss.
Do we care what other people think?
Sure. But never as much as we care about our kids.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Dan Coulter is the
producer of the video: ASPERGER SYNDROME DAD: How To Become An Even
Better Father To Your Child With AS. You can read more articles on
his website:
www.coultervideo.com
Copyright 2006 Dan Coulter All
Rights Reserved Used By Permission
