Allison's 'yes' campaign

Allison Evans was my HypnoBirthing teacher when I was pregnant with my son. She later moved to Japan but we have kept in touch over the years and I have been very grateful for a couple of guest posts she kindly wrote for this blog. A while back she started her own blog, which I enjoy reading.

A recent post of hers, 'Saying Yes' really resonated with me and I wanted to share it with you. I think many of you will find it a good read. She talks about the approach she took with her 7-year old son to deal with a stream of battles over simple day-to-day things. I'll let you read the full story in her blog post but in it she talks about how something that seems so easy to do can in fact be very hard.

There are several things Allison mentions that I can definitely relate to.....

My sweet, adorable, infuriating son resists everything these days!. I just remarked to my husband this week that our son thankfully seems to have got past the stage he was at a few weeks ago. He really is such a calm, sweet-natured, well-behaved little boy but he was going through quite a challenging phase for me, not too dissimilar to that which Allison mentions. Constant battles over the little things, being way more defiant and difficult with everything than he usually is and it was no fun to deal with. You never really know what to put these things down to, so I didn't know if it was a response to having a younger sibbling now or him getting older and more independent.....

Dropping the struggle is for me the more powerful position. Allison is right about this I think. It's not a natural response and therefore isn't the easiest to do but when you make yourself step back and respond in a different or more positive way to your child, it can be surprisingly effective.

I had been looking forward to tidying up the kitchen and starting dinner. Yes! I look forward to these mundane things too. It can be a hard balance, spending quality time with my son versus getting something done for me. As Allison states in her example, we need to get things in perspective and recognise that life isn't going to fall apart if you wait to do something a little bit later for the sake of enjoying a particular moment with your child.

Allison is definitely someone I look up to and have a lot of respect for so dare I say it, there's a certain reassurance in learning it's not always easy for her too. On the other hand, reading that she has encountered these kinds of experiences with her 7-year old makes me realise that there'll be no plain sailing for quite a few years to come! Our little ones certainly keep us on our toes and offer many an occasion for revisiting our attitudes and parenting approach!

Do let me know what you think of Allison's post and if there are any points in particular that strike a chord with you.
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