Change Your Brain Every Day - 20 Things Parents Should Never Do

Episode Date: November 21, 2016

Dr. Amen has more than 30 years experience as a child psychiatrist, and both he and Tana have raised children together.  In this episode, Daniel and Tana will give listeners 20 things parents should never do if they want to raise brain healthy children.

Hi, I'm Donnie Osmond, and welcome to the Brain Warrior's Way, hosted by my friends Daniel and Tana Amon. Now, in this podcast, you're going to learn that the war for your health is one between your ears. That's right. If you're ready to be sharper and have better memory, mood, energy, and focus, well then stay with us. Here are Daniel and Tana Amon.

Welcome back. So today we're going to talk about one of my favorite topics, your kids. We're talking about 21 things parents should never do. Well, and the first thing is they should not ignore their own brains because if your brain's not right you're not going to be a good parent you know as a psychiatrist i've seen this a long time i'm also a child psychiatrist if i have a mom or dad who's got an addiction who has untreated addd who's depressed bipolar and they're not taking care of themselves, their level of erratic behavior can really be stressful. We saw an example of this recently, a really good kid that we saw that came in very mature, which we see sometimes very mature kids, they have to mature quickly.

Responsible kid tends to a parent and that's never a fun situation for kids. So get your brain treated. And the second thing that parents should never do is forget what it's like to be a kid. I find this one of the most important things is remember the challenges, the pain, the anxiety, the fears and frustrations you had when they were your age. Right. And really one of the few things that has changed is technology. But the struggles with what you are introduced to, with deciding whether or not you're gonna do drugs,

deciding whether or not you are going to engage in certain sexual activities and behaviors and whatever, those are all very strong challenges that teenagers are facing at a very young age. And if I think back, even when I was 13, 14, those topics were coming up. Now, every kid doesn't approach them the same way, but the topic was there. And you never want to forget that. Three, rarely spend quality time with them. This is probably one of the most important mistakes that parents make.

They're too busy. 20 minutes a day. Just spend 20 minutes a day with them. Do something they want to do and listen. Be a good listener. Time is critical to the ultimate outcome of how kids become. The bonding time is just so critical. It's what I have found has been the key to the relationship with our 13-year-old. She's amazing. No question about it. And one of the things parents

should never do is be a poor listener. To talk over their children, you want to learn active listening. So when they finish saying something, pause, and then just repeat back the last few words. And they'll continue to tell them what's on, what to tell you what's on their mind. If you just automatically respond because you have such great wisdom, you want to pour down their heads, they'll be less likely to talk to you over time. And one of the things, you know, if you create little rituals around creating this time. So one of the rituals with Chloe and I, she likes to leave really early in the morning. I know for a lot of you, you're like, that's not going to happen. So find your time. We leave early in the morning and we go for a little drive before school. And she just like chitter chatter, like crazy.

She just opens up chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat, chat about hopes, fears, dreams. And for whatever reason, that drive time is really special to her. So it's worth getting up 15 minutes early and doing that. Create that special time. So another thing parents should never do is name calling. Don't call your kids names, bad names. Label them in a negative way. Not only is it disrespectful, it makes them mad.

And so it is critical to treat them like you wanted someone to treat you when you were growing up. Right. And being overly permissive. So I'm noticing this now. My daughter's 13. And I have to say, she is one of our favorite people. She was not always that way.

I mean, not that she wasn't one of our favorite people, but she was challenging as a young child, very challenging, very strong personality. And so we had to have really, really strong boundaries when she was young. We could not be overly permissive. And by doing that, we now have an amazing teenager. And what I'm now seeing is that my friends or some of her friends' parents who did not do that

because they just thought it was too much work for whatever reason or because their kids were cute, now they have a nightmare on their hands that their kids are teenagers. And they look at me and they're like, I just hate you. I just hate you because your kid's so easy now. Don't be overly permissive. The two words to always think about. So what are your takeaways from today? Firm and kind. So we're not calling our kids names. We're spending time with them. We're listening to them.

But we also have clear boundaries. This is okay. This is not okay. There are clear consequences when they cross the lines, but you're noticing what you like more than what you don't like. Seven, fail to supervise them. This is one of the biggest mistakes parents make because you need to be your child's frontal lobes until theirs develops. And the front part of their brain is involved in things like decision making, focus, forethought, planning, organization.

And theirs is not actually fully developed until they're 25 or so. So and it actually in a weird, makes them feel more secure. But one thing we've done with Chloe, I actually do believe that you want to motivate them intrinsically, find ways to motivate them. So we're constantly talking to her about, look, you actually have a lot of power here. You are daily, you're either earning more freedom, you're earning more respect and freedom, or you are losing it by the choices you make. You get to choose. And so every action has a consequence, either good or bad. And so little things like even her Snapchat or her social media, I want her to be intrinsically

motivated to actually share it with me, as opposed to me having to force her to show me. Not that I wouldn't if I felt like I had to, but now she actually comes home and she shares things with me. So motivate them. But supervising them does not mean doing their homework. Oh, absolutely not. Not a chance on earth I would do that. In fact, she didn't want to do her homework

and it's like, well, it's completely up to you if you want to repeat the third grade. It's about consequences. So we had homework battles like crazy when Chloe was actually second grade. We had these homework battles and I somehow thought it was my job to make sure she got her homework done. And then suddenly one day, I just realized this is way too much work. Parenting is not supposed to be this hard.

This is supposed to be her job, not my job. And so I walked up to her and I said, you know, honey, I love you so much. I am never going to ask you to do your homework again. If you don't want to do it, you never have to do it again. Of course, she got super suspicious and she goes, that doesn't make sense. And I said, no, honestly, you don't have to do your homework, but you have to be okay with the consequences that go along with not doing your homework. You're so cute. You'll make new friends next year. When all of your friends move on to third grade, you'll make new friends. You'll have new friends when you repeat second grade. And I'm sure that you'll be okay explaining to your teacher why you chose not to do your homework. And you'll get to

stay home with me another year. So when you don't graduate with all your friends and she got so upset and she marches off, she goes, I never said I'm not going to do my homework. I'm just not going to do it right this second. I've never to this day had to fight with her about homework. Number eight, do as I say, not as I do. So parents should never be a lousy role model. No, because kids don't do what you say. They do what you do. So like it or not.

Number nine is only notice what they do wrong instead of catching what they do. You have a cute story about this. Well, people may have heard the story about Fat Freddy. My older son, when he was seven, he was hard for me. And I spent a day in Hawaii, just he and I at Sea Life Park. We were living in Hawaii at the time. And we went to all the sea animal shows. And I'm like, how do they get all these animals to do all these really cool things? At the end of the day, I went to the penguin show. Penguin's name was Fat Freddy.

Amazing. And at the end of the show, I went up to the trainer and I said, how did you get Freddy to do all these cool things? And she said, unlike parents, whenever he does anything like what I want him to do, I notice him. I give him a hug and I give him a fish. Positive reinforcement. It went on in my head that whenever my son did what I want, I wasn't paying any attention to him because I was a busy guy like my own dad. And I'm like, notice what you like more than what you don't like. Right. If you want to get good

behavior, you have to notice good behavior. Number 10 is going to sound counterintuitive. Yeah, this is going to bother some of you. Yeah, never tell your kids they're smart. Yeah, no. So one thing, so Chloe struggled early on. She was younger than the rest of her class, and she struggled with her grades a lot. Like, I'd have tutors for her. She struggled mostly with math and science. So we don't think you should tell kids they're smart. We think you should focus on the effort they put in. So she had to work really hard and we always praised her effort. And interestingly, the fact that she had to work harder than the other kids when she was

younger is now paying off because she still works harder, even though now her grades are better than most of the other kids. So that work ethic is what we were praising. And that will pay off hands down every time over kids who think they're naturally smart and think they don't have to work as hard. So don't tell them they're smart. Tell them they work hard. Tell them that you're praising the effort, right? Number 11, another thing parents should never do, ignore the mental health issues of children. It is an average of 11 years from the time a child

has their first mental health symptom, anxiety, depression, eating problems, to when they get evaluated for mental health issues. Or even anger and violence. A lot of parents write it off as temper tantrums. Correct. Number 12, parents should never ignore their own mental health issues. That can devastate a child. 13, never get into tantrums or bad behavior because you then teach them it's okay. And this is what we were talking about a little bit a second ago with doing the hard work when Chloe, who was really strong-willed, I mean, two and a half years old, hands on hips,

I'm the leader, I'm the boss. And we used to call her baby Hitler, not to her face, of course, but she was so strong willed and everything had to sort of be her way. And that's a lot of work. And so a lot of parents will give in simply because the work is too hard. But when you do that, you then have a teenager who is just a nightmare. And by doing that early on, I mean, I mean, there were some hard things like taking every single thing out of her room when she was six years old, everything except her bed and her books, and making her earn it back over three months. I mean, it was not easy.

I'm not kidding about this. But now we have this amazing 13-year-old who is so incredibly responsible and fun to be with. So do the hard work when you need to do it. Also, another thing parents should never do, 14, diminish the other parent. It takes away the other parent's power and decreases a child's self-esteem. So decreases the child's self-esteem. That's really interesting. Because they are half them.

Right. And so even if you're divorced, and divorced families make this mistake all the time, of diminishing the other parent, it's just bad form. It's not a good idea to do that because it decreases their own sense of themselves. Excellent. 15, never get to know their friends. Friends often have more influence than parents in adolescence. And you're really good about having the friends over and getting to know them and doing things with them.

I find this fascinating. So we actually have like a bonus room where I actually set it up to be a cool room for the kids. They won't go in there. They want to be in the kitchen, in the family room with me. So I had to go get air mattresses and like let them hang out there, which I I love. But we I make sure we have all the snacks, healthy snacks, of course. And believe it or not, they will eat whatever you put out because they're just teenagers. But interestingly, I will, you know, last minute notice, we'll have a dozen kids all of a sudden crash our pool. And when the parents come over one thing I've noticed, so please take note of this. One thing we've noticed is that Daniel and I are there where you know, we got a dozen kids around and you know, is it convenient always? No, but we make it our job. We've got a dozen kids around. And is it convenient always?

No, but we make it our job. We've chosen to do this. And when the parents come over, they're like, wow, I can't believe you're willing to do this. We hear that so often. It's so great of you to do this. Can't believe you're willing to do this. I would never do this. That's what we hear a lot.

And I think to myself often, but that's why you don't know what's going on in your kid's life. And I do. So sadly enough, that's what happens. So be that parent. You want to be that parent that's in the know. So number 16 is one thing parents should never do is be reactive. You want to be goal directed in your behavior. So when I teach parent training, one of the first things I do is have parents write down, what do you want? What do you want as a parent? I want to be kind, caring, consistent, effective, loving. And what kind of children do you want to raise? I want to raise kids who are responsible, respectful, who can be effective adults, which means if I feel like lashing out, I just, I think, is this in my best interest?

Does this get me what I want for myself as a parent and for my child? So, and there's one question that's always helped me with this. And it is, you know, a lot of times parents are like, I have to be right. But my mom actually taught this to me. You can be right and you can be dead right. Does that help you meet your goals? So it's being right and being reactive and being very rigid, helping you achieve your goals of being bonded and kind and caring and creating that person. And when you get upset, just take 10 breaths. Right. Just take 10 breaths to slow it down and ask yourself, what's the goal in this situation?

Another thing parents should never do, 17, is you do not understand normal. So important. And normal development. So two-year-olds normally say no. Right. And want to be independent. They go through that again at 12 and 13 and 14. Because they're becoming their own person. And you don't, unless you want a 40-year-old living in your basement, they have to go through that. And knowing it's normal will save your sanity. So it doesn't mean you don't draw boundaries. But knowing it's normal, for me, when I wanted to rip my hair out,

I'm like, okay, she's becoming her own person. But they have to go through it. 18 is never tell kids how to think. You want to think of yourself as a good coach. I always say, be curious, not furious. In New Skills for Frazzled Parents, one of my books, there's a part on how to make your child a Republican, a Democrat, or anything you want. Your level of connectedness, if you're really bonded and connected to a child, they will pick your values. If you have a really confrontational, hostile relationship with a child, they'll pick the opposite values. So you want to think of being

a good coach rather than a dictator. And this can actually be changed fairly quickly. We saw this happen recently with a woman and her son who came to our clinics and she was suicidal and he actually was pretty close himself. They were both in a really bad place. And with some simple coaching, some of these tips, she called a week later in tears saying, it's unbelievable. I had the first, and her son was 17. And up until then, she had been dictating to him how he was going to live and put him

on restriction at 17 years old, you know, denying him like a 17 year old is going to leave if he wants to leave. And that's what was happening. And so he's huge. And so she called a week later and she said, wow, I can't believe it. I followed your tips that you guys gave me and took my son out and had the first honest conversation with him, telling him that I understood based on my past, you know, when I was his age. And he opened up to me and shared with me and now we had like this real conversation and we're bought like it's first time i understood these steps can make a radical difference in your life number 19 parents should

never do keep their kids up late you have to make sleep a priority because when you sleep your brain cleans it washes itself and for a developing brain to be sleep deprived, it's a nightmare. Kids who average an hour less sleep a night than their peers have a higher incidence of suicide. Number 20, parents should never feed kids the standard American diet, teach them the brain warrior's way because their brain health depends on the nutrients you serve them the decisions they make everything and then the last thing parents should never do is fail to protect their brains you want to protect their brains until their brain is fully developed that means contact sports for

kids it's just a bad idea your brain is soft your skull hard. Your skull has sharp bony ridges. Your brain controls everything you do. All the research, all the research coming out on concussions in children is bad news. It doesn't mean if they had a concussion, you can't help to heal it. We talked about that in another podcast, but you want to be very protectful. Dancing is good. Golf is good. Tennis is good. Table tennis is good. Track and field besides pole vaulting is good. There are a lot of things kids can do to stay active. Hitting their head repeatedly is a really bad idea. Right. And as a parent, investing in these 21 steps, investing in your child's brain is the best investment you can make. Long term. And ultimately, it's all about me, of course. I know

that my children will ultimately be changing my diapers at some point. I want their brains working right. Stay with us. Thanks for listening to today's show, The Brain Warrior's Way. Why don't you head over to brainwarriorswaypodcast.com. That's brainwarriorswaypodcast.com, where Daniel and Tana have a gift for you just for subscribing to the show. And when you post your review on iTunes, you'll be entered into a drawing where you can win a VIP visit to one of the Amen Clinics. I'm Donnie Osmond, and I invite you to step up your brain game

by joining us in the next episode.