Category: Parenting
The Good Therapy Blog
August 4th, 2010 |
Caveat: Because court jurisdictions vary, the information included here is based on Alameda and Contra Costa counties in the San Francisco Bay Area. You can find out about the rules in your jurisdiction by contacting an attorney or asking the public information office available through the courts.
When divorcing, you have a number of options to choose from: You may decide to work with individual attorneys, choose the Collaborative Divorce model, or meet with a mediator. You may also choose to meet with a mediator or an attorney/MHP mediation team. You also have the option to sit down together... Read More
August 1st, 2010 |
A GoodTherapy.org News Summary
For adults who were physically or verbally abused as children, psychotherapy is an important step in working through the difficult emotions these experiences have created. But what about children currently living with an abusive parent? Providing one-on-one therapy, parenting coaching, and emotional support to abusive mothers drastically improves their parenting skills and treatment of their children, a new Texas study has shown. Many programs like Project Support exist in states around the country,... Read More
© Copyright 2010 by http://www.GoodTherapy.org Therapist Oakland Bureau - All Rights Reserved.
July 19th, 2010 |
Social scientists love to study trends. These trends, whether short or long term, get written up into articles or lectures, and add to the general knowledge base of human beings and the world. Families, marriage, children and parenting are among those things most frequently written about and studied. That’s a very good thing. The problem comes when writers translate those carefully crafted statistics, trends or curves into newspaper, magazine, radio stories or full-length books. Trends become truth; small differences become the latest evidence of irreversible change.
I’ve been interested... Read More
July 15th, 2010 |
At what point did you make the decision to become a parent? Did you grow up with the intention that you wanted children? Was it something that you always knew and took for granted? Did you first consider it during an important romantic relationship? Or did you know for a fact that you didn’t want to be a parent with all of the joys and struggles that the job entails?
As a Guidance Counselor, I was often surprised to hear elementary school students reveal that they not only wanted children, but knew how many children they planned to have. Read More
July 1st, 2010 |
Parent #1: It’s already December. We need to decide about Christmas and you had Johnny last year. Why do you think you should have him again this year?
Parent #2: You know how important Christmas is to me. I’ll take him to my parents and he’ll have all his cousins around. Why should he miss out on the big Christmas celebration my parents always have.
Parent #1: Because I want to spend Christmas with him too. Why should I lose out on time with him because it’s not a BIG celebration. Johnny needs to learn about all different ways of celebrating Christmas.
Dividing up the holidays... Read More
June 26th, 2010 |
Perceived favoritism on the part of a mother can cause long-term psychological effects on all her children well into adulthood, according to new research. Gerontologist Karl Pillemer from Cornell University looked at 275 mothers and their 671 adult children and found that in families with a perceived sense of favoritism, children were more likely to exhibit depressive symptoms as adults. Interesting, this applied to both the favored children and non-favored children. The... Read More
© Copyright 2010 by http://www.GoodTherapy.org Therapist Hollywood Bureau - All Rights Reserved.
June 22nd, 2010 |
Previously, I defined discipline as meaning “to teach” or “to train,” the root being “to disciple.” I would like to expand on that because so often parents equate discipline with corporal punishment and automatically think they have to start spanking children when they are very young in order to “make them mind.” Frequently, parents will say that their parents spanked them and they turned out okay, so what’s wrong with it? Just because something works doesn’t mean it is desired.
I firmly believe that it is not only unnecessary to spank children, but that it is detrimental... Read More
June 15th, 2010 |
Often the parent of a teenager or young adult in recovery will tell me that their son or daughter is “like an extension of myself”. They might describe their offspring as being “like one of my own limbs” or “so close, it’s like we’re one person”. Inwardly, when I hear this, I often cringe.
On the one hand, it’s wonderful when a parent feels close to his or her child, has become deeply invested in the child’s well-being, intimately attuned to their joys and pains. How could a conscientious parent not be? On the other hand, it’s possible that this kind of intensity constitutes... Read More
June 14th, 2010 |
This is a continuation of last month's article, "Are You Your Own Worst Enemy?" Here are seven reasons why people attack themselves:
1. Imitating Parents
We all learn how to take care of ourselves from imitating how our parents (or other caretakers) take care of us. So when parents or caretakers attack children emotionally, verbally, or physically, children learn to attack themselves like their parents do. Practicing over and over, people become good at self-attack and carry the skill into adulthood. It becomes an integral... Read More
June 11th, 2010 |
School’s out and some of our kids are already at home with us. Oh sure, some will go to sleep-away camp for a month, some will go to day camp returning every night, and then there’s summer school – oh joy! – and then there are some kids who will be home the entire summer with no particular plans.
Whatever our summer plans, we know the pace is slower. Many times the reality of the summer break from school feels like there are even more demands on parents. Our kids are bored. They believe it’s our duty to fill their every waking moment with fun.
During the summer, frustration begins... Read More
June 8th, 2010 |
Parents are faced with many dilemmas as they struggle with allowing their children to individuate. These dilemmas are part of the everyday conflicts and behaviors that are intrinsic to parenting. In psychotherapy, parents can become aware of how some of their everyday choices impact on their child’s ability to individuate. Parents can increase the likelihood that they will be providing, as best they can, the kinds of responses to their children that facilitate individuation.
The wide range of feelings that parents experience provide clues for their behavior towards their children. But feelings... Read More
June 4th, 2010 |
When is Johnny’s baseball game? I need to know the schedule. Does it conflict with some of the other activities he is telling me he wants to sign up for? Susie is consistently late for her piano lesson because we don’t know when Bobby’s soccer game is over. These are common complaints parents have when they are co-parenting and trying to manage the busy schedules of their children. It is made all the worse when communication between the parents is strained and coordinating schedules is not as easy as a phone call could or should be. Some parents manage it through email, however that can also... Read More
May 21st, 2010 |
A GoodTherapy.org News Summary
In ongoing quests to improve academic performance and opportunities among schoolchildren, those involved in education as well as child counseling and related fields have been placing a strong emphasis on parental involvement in scholastic life. A highlighted issue for many years, the involvement of parents in the fostering of positive academic habits and the establishment of a consistent presence in school life through frequent visits and other actions has been promoted as a crucial component of early academic success. Hoping to gauge the precise effect of parental... Read More
© Copyright 2010 by http://www.GoodTherapy.org Therapist Chicago Bureau - All Rights Reserved.
May 17th, 2010 |
Recently, an elementary school principal discussed with me an important issue in parenting. The context was her concern with parents who ask their children each year who they would like to have for a teacher the next year and then, not only request that teacher, but also put pressure on the administration to see that it happens, rather than letting things take their natural course. We parents have to watch that we don’t let our children take the lead in the relationship. Children get the idea that all they have to do is ask and mom and dad will take care of it for them. It isn’t good for them... Read More
