Major Maintenance

Today I gave Jesstyn her very first Major Maintenance consequence. (She probably should have earned about ten by now, but we were adjusting, so I was allowing a little more time for explanation and warning and pre-teaching.) Anyway, she earned an extra chore and I was waiting for her to come to the table so I could teach her how to dust. She was sitting in the recliner on the other side of the room and after a warning that she would get another extra chore if she did not come to me right now, she began inching her way out of the chair while pouting silently. Finally, she fell to the floor off the chair and said, “I'm too tired to walk!” with an oh-so-sad puppy-dog look. In my mind, I'm thinking, hmm...I probably shouldn't have said “extra chore” I should have upped it to the major maintenance. But I didn't pre-teach. So after this, I smiled (because I was getting ready to say something very scripted but that hadn't been used much yet in our language in the home. It was something we had taught her about more than a week ago, and I was a little nervous in using it myself.)

“It seems to me that you might be out of instructional control. I am going to give you an instruction. If you do not follow that instruction, you will earn a Major Maintenance, which is 30 minutes of work. Your instruction is to come here now so that I can teach you how to dust and you can do the extra chore you earned.”

We looked at each other for a moment. She was still pouting, but I think her lips curved into a small smile for a just a split second. I even said, “That was pretty good, wasn't it? I remembered what to say!” (Or at least it is something like that).

She wasn't going to go along this time. She wanted to test the waters and see if Mommy was still as floppy as I used to be. She says, “But I am too tired to walk. I really am!” (All she had to do was take about 5 steps). [Okay, Nicholeen, don't cringe too badly when you read how I still engaged in a bit of a power struggle throughout this next part].

“That is an excuse.”

“No it's not! I really am!”

“No one is too tired to walk this far.”

“Yes I am!”
“People can do hard things.”

We stare at each other for a moment.

I say, “You are doing this to see if I really will give you a Major Maintenance. Are you trying to see how long I'll wait before I give you the Major Maintenance?”

“No, I'm really too tired to walk.” (Hmph! … folded arms...furrowed eyebrows)

We go back and forth a few more times. [I know, I know! I am transitioning from being almost spineless here, give me a break!]. I think I said something about how she was not disagreeing appropriately.

“Okay, you have just earned a Major Maintenance.”

“What!?”

“I am going to give you another instruction. If you do not follow this instruction, you will also earn a SODA.” (SODAS are written problem solving exercises that teach how to choose the right.)

“But I was coming!” Now she is totally caught off guard and breaks down crying. My sweet sensitive girl feels totally wronged and I feel that I have to explain this “new Mommy” to her.

Through sobs, she says, “But I was going to come.” Her tone completely says, this isn't fair. She is a puddle.

I sit down beside her on the floor (she did come to me), and hold her in my arms. Gently, I say, “Sweetheart, I am trying to teach you how to follow instructions so you will be happy in life. It's one of the things you have to learn so you can be happy.”

She is listening, but this just feels sort of hollow. She still doesn't understand. I am straining my brain to remember the exact language that Nicholeen uses in some her teaching examples in the book about being free versus being in bondage and about the four basic skills. I come up with nothing. I think to myself, “okay, why is following instructions so important?”

Inspiration strikes.

“Let me tell you something about myself. I am 32 years old and I have not learned how to follow instructions as well as I should have yet. Because of that, it is sometimes harder for me to say no to what is wrong and yes to what is right. Like when I am so tired and Satan says, “Just eat some more of those chocolate chips and that will perk you right up and it is such a comfort, it will make you feel better.” Then in my mind, I give myself an instruction. I say, “Tiffany, don't eat those chocolate chips because you know that they will make you cranky and mean to the kids and eating them will just make you want even more sugar. They will make you even more tired after they wear off. They even have milk in them and you are lactose intolerant! Don't do that to yourself.” But because I have not learned how to follow instructions very well, what do you think I do?”

She was captivated by this. Her little wheels were turning inside that brain and I could see lights going on in her eyes as she mulled this over.

“You still eat the chocolate chips.”

“Sometimes I follow my instruction and I don't eat them and I am glad. But too many times, I don't follow the instruction and I follow Satan instead. I eat the chocolate chips and then I am unhappy because of it.”

She nods.

“So that is why I am trying to teach you to follow my instructions. Because if you can learn to follow Mommy and Daddy's instructions quickly, you will know how to follow the Savior's instructions and Heavenly Father's commandments and even the instructions that you give yourself about what to do to make yourself happy. Do you understand?”

She nods. Then, being the practical gal that she is, she pleads, (still weepy) “But I didn't understand that before. So can I just not have the Major Maintenance this time?”

Oh, she is so good.

I said, “Well, I'm not going to just take it away, but how about this? I will let you earn having some of the time taken off if you can show me that you can calmly follow instructions to complete this extra chore and for the first ten minutes of your Major Maintenance. But when this happens again, I am not going to do that, okay?”

She nods and gets up to begin learning how to dust, still weepy. I ask her if she needs a minute to calm down, but she doesn't. Then she actually has a lot of fun spraying the cool furniture polish. She did do very well with all the tasks I gave her and did earn time off of the end of her Major Maintenance.

I am so grateful for this experience. I was truly floundering about how to explain the importance of learning to follow instructions, thinking about how she might have to have a job one day and follow a boss. Ugh. When I just cut to the chase and gave her the true nitty gritty on exactly why I wished I knew how to follow instructions better, she really came to understand our new program so much better. Again, we connected while she was being disciplined for something. It felt good to just be real with her. She deserves to know the why. I don't have to hide behind trying to be the perfect Mom anymore who always has a reason and even if the child doesn't really understand it, they are still expected to obey it. Because we are learning this program together, and we are actually learning the Four Basic Skills together, I have to be vulnerable to her and this strengthens our relationship because she sees that I am trying to change so we can all be happier. I'm not just doing this for selfish reasons. She can feel that I am doing it for her happiness, too.

I also have to report that since we decided to have earning extra chores as a consequence for bad behavior, we were led straight into defining more clearly what her regular chores were. Once I talked with her about what her regular chores were going to be, she took off with them. This morning, when I told her to get in the bath tub before her cousins got here, she said, “But Mom, remember how I am supposed to empty the dishwasher and trashcans? I gotta do that first.” I was like, Wow. You go girl. And she did. Awesome.

Read more about this awesome Family Government System at www.teachingselfgovernment.com. The Four Basic Skills are: 1) Following Instructions. 2) Accepting a No Answer 3) Accepting a Consequence and 4) Disagreeing Appropriately. Staying calm while doing all of these things is essential. Once an extra chore has been earned, if the child continues to be “out of instructional control” then they earn more consequences on top of that: a Major Maintenance, a SODA, and finally, 24 hours of no privileges (which means nothing but work and SODAS for 24 hours).

An Afternoon Adjusting to the Peck Principles

We finally get home from our errands of the day. Jesstyn had earned 2 chores earlier in the day and she starts doing the first one just fine – wiping the kitchen floor. She wipes most of the floor with some spray and a sponge, focusing on big, obvious spots. Thinking she was finished, she leaves the job to go do something else. On her way, I say, “Wait a minute, remember what to do!”

She twirls on the stairs and flops down on them, (I'm still in the kitchen) and says, “What else do I do?”

“Come in here so we can talk about what we see.” (I see large sections of the floor that were overlooked).

“I am listening right here,” she says, apparently too lazy to get up and come back into the room.

“I know, but I want you to come in here so we can look at this together and talk about it.”

“Why do I have to come in there?”

“Because I want you to be able to see what I am talking about, so please come in.”

“Why can't I just stay here because - ”

“Sweetheart,” (I was doing really well at keeping calm this time. Calm leads to more calm, right?)

“I told you my answer: that I want you to see what I see. Now please come in here.”

“You interrupted me!”

“That's because -”

“I wasn't finished speaking!” (By now she had actually migrated into the kitchen).

“Okay, fine. I'm sorry I interrupted you. What did you want to say?”

“Well,” (she looks around for a second) “I would know what you were talking about even if I was still on the stairs.”

“Okay, but you are arguing. This is the type of thing that is going to earn you a major maintenance.” Still calm. Doing very well. No attitude in Mom. I continued to explain her behavior a little more clearly. “Do you understand?” (Meanwhile, the toddler's glue project is going awry and I have to pause my conversation with her to teach him how to properly use a glue stick without pushing all the glue up to the top. He resists and I tell him I will take it away unless he uses it appropriately. Mercifully, he agrees and starts gluing again).

She nods in response to my question.

“So I'm not going to give you the major maintenance this time because we're still learning about this. But I want you to understand that this type of interchange between us where I ask you several times and you do not drop the subject and accept my answer and obey, is what will earn you a major maintenance. Okay?”

“Yes! I understand! You don't have to tell me again!” (with attitude).

“You are not being calm right now. The way you just said that was disrespectful, okay? That earns you an extra chore, too.”

She sort of looked to the side and seemed to take a moment to register that. (I seriously don't think she always realizes the attitude in her voice as inappropriate – she was so immersed in it with her friends in public school that it's just there. [Note: Since I last wrote this sentence, I read Nicholeen's advice about making sure your tolerances are low instead of high. Now I see that my daughter speaks this way, not only because of outside influences, but because I have tolerated it for years without realizing it.] Of course, yesterday, after reprimanding her for wagging her head at me and putting her hand on her hip while speaking to me with raised eyebrows, etc, I caught myself doing the very same thing back to her later in the day. I said, “There I just did it to you, didn't I?” We just smiled, then laughed, and I said, “We're all working on this, aren't we?” She said, “Yep.”)

Anyway, back to the story.

“So are you ready to talk to me about this last job of wiping the floor?”

She nodded.

We go over checking for missed spots, redoing them, cleaning the sponge, closing the bottle sprayer and putting the bottle away. She does all of these very cooperatively, almost showing off how well she can do this “following instructions” thing.

I praise her and thank her. I tell her she did these so well that I'm going to take away the chore she just earned. But she still has the second one from earlier, so we have to do that and I'm going to have her wipe the bathroom mirror.

Instead of just setting it all up for her, I remember what I read recently about working with your children and taking the time to teach them how to do jobs correctly, etc. So I waited for her follow me in and asked her questions and helped her think through properly removing toothbrushes from the counter before spraying, etc and we go through this process. I leave to help the toddler with gluing again and she comes into the kitchen and sits down to glue with us a few minutes later.

I say, “What's the last step of following instructions?”

After a second, she says, “Report back!” proud of herself for remembering.

“Yes, so...?”

“I did it!”

“Okay, let's go check it.”

“I want to glue. You can check it.”

“No, I want you to come in here so you can see what I see and we can talk about it.” (she caught the same language from our earlier confrontation). I was in the bathroom at this point.

She says, “Coming!” and runs right down the hall to join me.

I look her in the eye and say with a big smile, “Thank you for coming in here when I asked you to. It makes me feel really connected to you right now.” She smiles proudly and I give her side arm hug and we look at the mirror. I continue to teach her about properly cleaning a mirror. There were streaks and missed spots. We talked about them and she made suggestions and I guided her along.

I was a happy teacher and she was a happy student. We were connecting, while she was being “disciplined” for something! We were connecting during the administration of a consequence.

It's not that I have never connected with her before while teaching how to do a chore. But this time, it was a result of our family system of teaching self-government and she was contributing instead of arguing or sulking. It was amazingly fulfilling as a parent. I felt so good!

I have been so inspired by Nicholeen Peck's program for Teaching Self-Government to families. I hope my readers will visit her blog at www.teachingselfgovernment.com. Ever since I learned of her, I just want to shout her message to everyone! She truly is bringing freedom to families.

Elected Governor (of Myself)

Elected Governor (Of Myself)

In May, Heath and I attended four classes by Nicholeen Peck, author of “Parenting a House United.” As I sat in her class, listening to her speak about the “Power of Calm” and the “Four Basic Skills” that everyone must have in order to properly govern themselves, I could feel that this was one of those life-changing moments. The scriptures speak of how a seed is planted in our hearts and we can know that is it a good seed by how it grows and sprouts. You know something is a good seed by how it “hath swelled your souls...that your understanding doth begin to be enlightened, and your mind doth begin to expand” (Alma 32:34).

This is what I have felt. The seeds of new perspective that Nicholeen planted in my heart have continued to grow in the weeks since then as my husband and I have stumbled our way along, trying our best to implement the principles we learned. Even with our inadequate attempts to follow our notes and change into parents who calmly hold our kids accountable when they show disrespect or disobedience the first time (instead of waiting until the third, fourth, or fifth time), our relationships with each other and our children are already stronger.

The first couple of days after we explained the new program to our daughter, we had several interchanges that went something like this:

#1:

Mom gives an instruction to daughter.

Daughter remains silent and continues her activity.

Mom realizes (later than I should have) that daughter still has not performed the instruction she gave her. Then I remember that she was also supposed to look at me and say okay. Oh, so that means I need to stand near her from the time I give her the instruction until the time I see her get up and go to do it.

Ok. Do-over.

Mom gives the same instruction to daughter and this time, says, “Okay?” and waits for an answer.

Daughter remembers that she is supposed to be saying “Okay” now. So she does.

“Okay, mom.”

Then she keeps playing. Mom comes over and looks at her with a smile and a raised eyebrow, and says, “Okaaaay.”

Daughter gets up to do the instruction. She forgets to report back. Mom forgets that she's supposed to.

#2

Dad sees daughter breaking a rule or being disrespectful.

“Go to Time Out.”

Mom says, “She doesn't go to Time Out anymore.”

“Oh, okay, well, then you get an extra chore.”

Dad looks at Mom. “What can she do?”

#3

Dad sees daughter breaking a rule and gives her an extra chore.

Daughter continues to delay obedience.

Dad looks at Mom and says, “Okay, what's after that?”

Mom says, “I don't know, I have to get my notes... Oh yeah, major maintenance.”

#4

Dad yells at two year old.

Mom looks at Dad and says with a smile, “Are you calm?”

Dad follows the crying two year old (who left the room) and apologizes. He then explains why he should not have done what he did, teaches him the right way and plays with him to reconnect.

Mom gets tears in her eyes and thanks the Lord (again) for Nicholeen Peck.

Several days and a few Family Night Lessons about our new methods later, our daughter has caught on to the “How to Disagree Appropriately” skill that we have been teaching her. She uses it almost every time we ask her to do something. We're still having trouble remembering the part where she is supposed to drop the subject.

I still seem to have the hardest time just calling her out on her inappropriate behavior! I give her the extra chore and then ten minutes later I am giving her an extra chore again and arguing about it a little and then she finally does the extra chore.

Yet I am still trying to wrap my mind around stepping up my parenting role and truly becoming a person who expects to be respected.

Being a proactive parent who expects to be respected is actually kind of hard work! I can't be lazy! I can't just do what is easy anymore! I can't just keep delaying the confrontations that have to happen because I hate confrontation. I am realizing now how my daughter was putting up the power struggles since birth and because I have had serious self-doubts and lack of confidence in my parenting skills, and because of a lack of my own self-respect, I have been letting her win too often because it is easier than calling her out on it and confronting her behavior with expectations and consequences.

This parenting program is making me realize so much about myself! There has been some weakness deep inside my heart. Perhaps it was a fear that I would do something wrong. Or a fear that I would hurt someone else or damage them somehow if I hurt their feelings or confronted them. Or maybe I was scared of hurting the relationship and losing the closeness with my daughter that I thrived on emotionally. I couldn't bear to hurt her or make her cry because then I might lose one of the sources of love in my life. One of the sources that makes me feel validated, needed, and unconditionally loved.

But what I didn't realize was that some of my behavior toward her, ever since babyhood, was feeding into an unhealthy set of manipulative behaviors, both on my part and on her part. It was also feeding a lifestyle of passivity. (I would tell her to do something, she would say, “no, I want to...” and then proceed to do what she wanted. I would try to talk her into doing what I wanted, using every form of bribery and manipulation to get her to change her desire into my desire when what I should have been doing was teaching her to obey my instruction, and giving her consequences (calmly!) every time she didn't.) The times when she just wouldn't change her desire into mine, I caved and let her do it her way first and then tried again to convince her to do what I needed her to do. That's what I mean by passive. It was easier for me to do that than to face the battle of a power struggle and have to give her consequences and watch her suffer them.

Then there were the times when I did take up the battle and faced the power struggle. (“You have to pick your battles” was something I always used to say.) I would get angry and cop attitude. My tone was threatening and annoyed. Behind my voice was “what's wrong with you that you won't give in to me?” I was reacting. I was not calm. I did not think loving thoughts about my child in those moments. I was insecure.

Now I realize that a tendency to just react to something is actually a lack of self-government. Governing myself wisely means that I calmly accept that something inappropriate just happened. Then I calmly and lovingly describe what just happened to that child (ie call them out on it) and teach them what would have been the appropriate way to handle it. I give consequences (which I proactively set up before this incident happened).

As we have taken the time to discuss these principles with our daughter, who is almost 7, she has responded very well. I tell her that we are learning how to be better parents. She is grateful for our efforts to do so. Deep inside her spirit somewhere, she senses that things haven't been quite right and that she isn't quite learning what she needs to learn in order to govern herself. As we've implemented these principles, even though at times she is doing things she doesn't want to do, she glows when she reports back and says that she's completed a task. She chooses to behave well at times because she is motivated to avoid the consequences, but she doesn't behave well with resentment in her heart toward us for “forcing” her. She behaves well because she can see the right choice more clearly now. It's like her little spirit is just soaking up the responsibility and saying “Thank you for trusting me that I can do these hard things. Thank you for helping me grow and learn how to choose them. Look what I can do!”

I think she used to have this sense of being controlled. Now that she is realizing that she is in fact in control of her own life, and the choices she makes really do have meaningful consequences, both good and bad, (and they actually match the behavior – meaning she doesn't get a good consequence for doing something bad) – she is relieved. She says we are better parents already, even though we are still getting the hang of everything. We are able to stay connected and she still feels loved when she is disciplined! This is truly the clearest, most sensible and Christ-centered parenting program I have ever seen. Thank you, Nicholeen Peck!

You can visit Nicholeen's blog at www.teachingselfgovernment.com and buy her book “Parenting a House United.” She also has several video interviews and audio clips available on her blog.