Why am I beginning to feel that communication with growing up kids is getting tougher? These days feel that I need to wear “bullet proof” vest before I get injured by “word” ammunitions. 

When our kids were babies and toddlers…..

 We used to think that communication was tough. Those were the days when our babies could only communicate through their cries and as first time parent, we had to struggle with interpreting the different meanings of the cries.

As they progress…..

We pride ourselves over every new word they learn even if it means communicating with popular “parent-child codes” like “mumm mumm” (eat), “shee shee” (pass urine), “orh orh” (sleep).

When our young children get disobedient and when lecturing or even reminders fall on deaf ears, we wish our children could be old enough to understand the kind meanings behind our words soon and longing for that one day when they could communicate at our level of maturity.

Then, when that day comes, we are suddenly awakened by the fact that communicating with older children is by no means easier…..

With a pre-teen at home, I have a social circle of mothers who have children also going through the same stage.

(A friend shared her concern that her 13-year-old boy has become reserved and quiet but surprisingly become chatty when with friends. Some other parents  are bothered that their children have become challenging to speak to and often challenge, talk back or even prefer that their parents do not probe too much.)

Myself? My pre-teen is often challenging me with “Why cannot?”, “My friends are doing this and that and I do not see why I can’t”, “BUT…xxxyyy”.

Do I see a similarity in pre-teens or teens? Yes. Of course. Eg. getting impatient or even adopting “care less attitude” at the slightest advices or taking ages to follow-up with parental instructions or preferring to spend hours on FB communicating with friends.  To be honest, I fret when our boy started to argue.  Had heart-to-heart talk with our boy. When whatever reasonings I give does not seem to penetrate into that defensive wall, I learn that it could be more effective to cool down and then revisit the topic a day or two later.  It is by no means easy for parents as we have to master our tolerance and maintain our cool as our kids start to defy and talk back.

That day, Papa Ed was commenting that Brendan does not seem to share with him as much personal life information as he does with me. Our boy talks to his dad alot about movies, news update, general developments but hardly about his personal matters.

Despite the fact that our kids are challenging us more in conversations these days, I find it generally comforting that both boys still fill their mother in with their everyday happenings enthusiastically and share with me their unhappiness/happiness and problems encountered in their daily lives. 

At least, it makes me feel that a pair of  listening ears matters much to them and I would love to play this role for a long time to come. I am a strong believer that it is more genuine to communicate in person instead of via emails, smses, watsapp.

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As parents, communications with our children does not have to be mainly “instructions”, “reprimands” and “questions”.    Constantly communicate, be open and honest, be enthusiastic, listen and show empathy…..

Through my personal interactions with our boys, it occurs that these approaches might help when communicating with our growing up children:

Listen - listen to their thoughts, their opinions, show empathy and enthusiasm as appropriate (our children will find it welcoming that we respect their thoughts, share their joy instead of us putting our thoughts on them all the time).

Communicate regularly and don’t make it a habit to use “busy as an excuse to shut off communications - Do not shut our children up when they want to talk. A friend was sharing that day whether generally many parents would shoo their children off by reciprocating their children’s conversations with “I am busy, do not disturb”, “later”, “please do not ask so much”, “how old are you now? please talk like an adult.” Whatever busy schedules we have, it’s important to communicate within a family.

Do not discriminate talk-back - our growing up children often like to be respected that they have a mind of their own and as long as it is reasonable, parents do not have to always adopt the “I am right” and “How dare you” attitude. What is communication if it is not a two-way traffic? Frankly, it’s not unusual for me to encounter talk-backs which ended up as “argumentative debates” with Brendan. At least, we get to hear each other’s views and our boy needs to learn how to make decisions. To be honest, I get upset along the way but on second thought, I would be more concerned if he agrees to everything I say and hide that secret resentment.

Embrace any topic of conversations - when our children are enthusiastic to talk and regardless the topic of conversation, BE ALL EARS.  I try not to turn our boys down whenever they have the enthusiasm to fill me in with topics. Keep to our promise to listen later if we are really busy at that moment.

Open up our hearts - share casual conversations, jokes, feelings or even make efforts to talk about topics that our children enjoy.

Trust - Be consistent in what we say and maintain privacy if that’s what our children want.

I am not endowed with a natural flair to communicate effectively with every age group but just like our kids, I am learning all the time to adjust to our kids- to be a better listener, to be more accepting when our kids start speaking with a mind of their own, not to be offended when our kids argue with the most nonsensical theories and to take deep breath when our kids turn deaf ears to our advices.  I have my fair share of disappointments when our boys misinterpret our advices as unreasonable and challenge us with hurting words. 

It’s not easy but I guess I am starting right by - FIILTERING the unpleasant words, putting down that EGO and being more ATTENTIVE each day at a time.

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