Being there for your kids - Starting the New School Year

Episode Date: August 9, 2021

Every year children and parents go through the ritual of starting the new school year. Got everything you need? Know where you are going? What's for lunch? Where are your classes? These are things all kids and parents need to know to start the new school year. In my first letter today, mom fears letting loose her middle school son to get his own new school year clothes. I caution that the letting go process should have started with his birth and share some thoughts about applying that principle now. In my second letter her 4th grade daughter is telling mom not to treat her like a baby anymore. Sound familiar? Here's how to cross that bridge of "tweenager" with your child and for yourself. Check them out.

I'm Dr. John Robinson, and this is Teachable Moments. I have a few more letters for you today. Here's the first one. Dear Dr. Robinson. So, my son is starting middle school this year, and he thinks he's all grown. I asked him when he wanted me to go school supply shopping for him, and he grunted, Ma, what are you doing? I can get my school supplies myself.

I know he's getting older, but when do I start letting go? Signed, confused, and left behind. Dear CNL, when I was growing up, there was a popular song on the radio called Breaking Up is hard to do. You know what else? Letting Go is hard to do. To directly answer your question, you should have started letting go of your middle schooler right after he came out of your womb. Letting go is not a time, it's a process. Now, to the issue at hand. Start by active listening his feelings about doing his back-to-school shopping himself. As a middle schooler, he might also be feeling self-conscious about being with his mom

out in public. After you've helped him identify his feelings, ask permission. to offer some options, then move into problem-solving with him to where you can be assured that he is getting the needed clothes and supplies while respecting his need to be stylish and in. If he insists on going shopping by himself or with his friends, agree on the items on the list and how all of this gets paid for. Generally, you want to reinforce his independence, responsibility, and adolescent identity while also assuring him that you have his back. Will your efforts always go perfectly? Uh, no, but they will always be a learning experience and a teachable moment for both of you. Blessings, Dr. John. Here's another letter. Dear Dr. Robinson, my fourth grade daughter wants to try

school lunches this year. I've been packing her lunch since she started school. It's no trouble. In fact, I enjoy packing her lunch. I always slip a thoughtful note into her lunchbox with love. Now she tells me that all her friends buy the school lunches now, and she doesn't want to feel left out. Also, the notes make her feel like a baby. Is my little girl growing up? What about my needs and feelings? Signed, now unimportant. Dear Now, did you know that there's a new, informal developmental stage for how your daughter is presenting?

It's called being a tweenager. The term tween age acknowledges that from ages 10 to 12, kids are not children anymore, nor are they teenagers. So they are between ages, that is a tweenager. Yes, your little girl is growing up. Your lunchbox notes are cute, and she will cherish their memory when she has children of her own, but for now, not so much. Habits at any age are hard to change.

Your loving habits toward your daughter, packed lunches and loving cute notes, are not what she needs now. Part of the parenting contract is keeping up with your child's developmental stage and helping her navigate the one that she's currently in. As a teenager, friends are becoming more important than family. belonging is key. Stretching her boundaries is her goal in life. Accept her and reinforce who she is becoming while cherishing who she was as the bundle of joy that you and her daddy created and

birthed. By doing so, you maintain your importance in her life as you help her navigate change. Now, what about your needs and feelings? They continue to be important and you are the one who satisfies them. Your daughter, nor anyone else, is not responsible for your needs and feelings. First, as family is important to you, use family meetings to secure your family nests. Individual schedules, plans, collective chores and responsibilities, family vacations, other time, together, all become a parent and part of the family collective consciousness when they are identified on a big calendar in the common area, where everybody passes them each day. If you need to give your daughter cute and loving notes and have no lunchbox to put them in,

then put a note on her bed at night. Second, fill your needs and feelings in other ways. Participate in a mom's group where all of you can commiserate together. Plan outings with friends and others with hubby. Stay active and fit. God does call us to raise our children in the ways of the Lord so that when they grow old, he will not depart from them. That's Proverbs 22.6.

However, that raising part has many forms as our children grow older. Also, while this council is about being there for your children, we also are charged to love one another as you love yourself. That's Matthew 226. Be there for your kids and also be there for yourself. Happy parenting. Blessings, Dr. John. If these letters stir questions of your own, contact me through my website at www. therefor my kids.com or email me at John Robinson Zero Zero at Bellsouth.net.

I'm Dr. Jonathan C. Robinson, licensed clinical psychologist, and Christian author of Teachable Moments, Building Blocks of Christian Parenting. And this has been Teachable Moments. Teachable Moments, Building Blocks of Christian Parenting, is available online at AmazonBooks.com and in local and national bookstores. More on Dr. Robinson at TMC-P-I-N-C.com.