Here - Health Promotion Agency

Habits and behaviour
• Sometimes your child may be
reacting in a particular way
because of the way you’ve
handled a problem in the past.
For example, you may have given
your child sweets to keep him or
her quiet at the shops, so now
your child screams for sweets
every time you go there.
•
Could you accidentally be
encouraging the behaviour you
most dislike? If a tantrum brings
attention (even angry attention)
or night-time waking means
company and a cuddle, then
maybe your child has a good
reason for behaving that way. You
may need to try to give more
attention at other times, and less
attention to the problem.
• Think about the times when the
bad behaviour happens. Is it, for
example, when your child is tired,
hungry, over-excited, frustrated
or bored?
CHANGING YOUR
CHILD’S BEHAVIOUR
Do what feels right
For your child, for you and for the
family. If you do anything you don’t
believe in or anything you feel isn’t
right, it’s far less likely to work.
Children usually know when you
don’t really mean something.
Don’t give up too quickly
Once you’ve decided to do something,
give it a fair trial. Very few solutions
work overnight. It’s easier to stick at
something if you’ve someone to
support you. Get help from your
partner, a friend, another parent,
your health visitor or GP. At the
very least, it’s good to have someone
to talk to about progress or lack of it.
Try to be consistent
Children need to know where they
stand. If you react to your child’s
behaviour in one way one day
and a different way the next, it’s
confusing. It’s also important that
everyone close to your child deals
with the problem in the same way.
Try not to over-react
This is very hard. When your child
does something annoying, not just
once, but time after time, your own
feelings of anger or frustration are
bound to build up. But if you
become very tense and wound up
over a problem, you can end up
taking out your feelings on your
child. The whole situation can get
out of control. You don’t have to
hide the way you feel. It would be
inhuman not to show irritation and
anger sometimes, but, hard as it is,
try to keep a sense of proportion.
Once you’ve said what needs to be
said and let your feelings out, try to
leave it at that. Move on to other
things that you can both enjoy or
feel good about. And look for other
ways of coping with your feelings
(see pages 60–1).
Talk
Children don’t have to be able to
talk back to understand. And
understanding might help. So
explain why, for example, you want
your child to hold your hand while
crossing the road, or get into the
buggy when it’s time to go home.
‘Your children’s behaviour takes
over your life. I just felt that I
changed totally when I had a
second child. I felt my patience
had gone completely. If I saw
parents shouting in the street,
I used to think that was a
terrible thing. When I had one,
I could reason with her and
we’d sort it out. When I had
two, one only had to do
something the slightest bit
wrong and I would fly off
the handle.’
‘You think, if I handle this
right, they’ll learn, it’ll
get better. But you know
sometimes it’s just that you
have to let time go by.
Everything I wanted to
happen happened in the
end. Sometimes you can
try too hard with them.’
If you can think about your
child’s behaviour a bit and
begin to understand it, you’re
more likely to find a right
answer. And even if you
can’t find an answer, you’ll
probably cope better.
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