How To Love And Parent A Difficult Child

As parents, it is expected that we love our children, YES! but most times you find that loving your difficult child isn\’t as easy as loving the child who isn\’t difficult. If you are dealing with what I call a child that is difficult to love, you will understand better.

For different parents, having a difficult child or a strong-willed child can mean different things. It could be that this child frustrates you, disagrees with everything, constantly argues with you, challenges everything you do or say, throws tantrums, is hypersensitive and whines or cries all the time, a teenager who is suddenly moody, disrespectful, and overcritical or even a child who has health challenges. Having a difficult child can frustrate you and make you question your parenting skills.

One of the things I have learned in the past about raising a strong will child is that this child is unique and you need to understand what is making them difficult, that is the first question you want to ask. Whatever difficulties you experience with your child that have brought you to the point of being frustrated or not being able to love your child as you ought to, you must know that the best approach for you as a parent is to be committed to long-term learning.

So what do you do? How do you raise a difficult/ strong-willed child?

1 . Learn The Story Of Your Difficult Child: The first and most important thing to do is to understand who your child is. Knowing the child\’s learning style, temperament, and how the child wants to be loved and shown affection will enable you to know how to approach the issues you are having. While learning the story of your child, you also need to learn why they are who they are.

2 . Self-assessment: You need to look beyond the behavior of your child and do a self-assessment of who that child is. Self-assessment is looking beyond the behavior of that child and seeking to understand why they are who they are, is this behavior common? Is it common for this kind of person? By understanding the child\’s temperament, you\’ll get to know how it affects what they do. For instance, a sanguine cannot easily focus and put things into perspective. A choleric who does not learn how to navigate their journey ends up being bossy.

3 . Conduct Research : You need to research on the information you now know about your child, doing this research put you in a place to do better. According to Maya Angelou, an American writer, and poet,\” when you know better, you do better.”

When your child becomes a teen and becomes difficult, you have to do courses on the brain to know what goes on in the brain of a teenager. The puberty brain doesn\’t develop the same way a toddler\’s brain develops. There are lots of influences on the brain and they come majorly because of hormones. At puberty, the inducement of hormones causes laziness and they\’d want to sleep more and not do anything. However, if you don\’t comprehend this, you\’ll keep clashing with your child. For instance, when you have researched your strong-willed child, you will understand that they thrive through choices. Strong-willed children are wired for experiments and are not wired to follow.

Doing research, and learning about the area of your struggle is one of the best things that can happen to you.

4 . Make a plan: Having known your child\’s story, done a self-assessment, and researched your strong-willed child, the next step is to make a well-structured plan. The style to implement when teaching and disciplining the child. Do not concentrate on learning how to raise the child the way you are used to but how to deal with what they struggle with and not the things they don\’t struggle with.

5 . Manage your emotions : We just concluded the \’Master your Emotions’ challenge and it was mind-blowing. Emotional control helps you get your calm to analyze the situation at hand. It helps you to be proactive and not reactive.

Having known ways to parent a difficult child, how do you love your difficult child?

One of the possible reasons why the child is misbehaving or being difficult might be that he doesn\’t feel loved or lacks affection.

Sometimes, we say that we love our children but they don\’t see or feel that we do. So you need to figure out your child\’s;

1 . Love language : Understanding each child\’s love language is paramount. Some children are touchy feelers and when they don\’t get physical affection, they believe that you don\’t love them. Create a structure that entails giving and receiving affection that comes up on daily basis in your home. Also, figure out your child\’s apology language.

2 . Do not take the misbehavior personally: Learn to separate the child\’s behavior from the child\’s. Tackle the misconduct and not your child.

3 . Watch your attitude : You need to be conscious of your attitude whenever your child seems difficult. They take and demand so much from you and it\’s easy to develop resentment towards the child that\’s difficult. Guide your thoughts by getting a system that can hold you accountable.

4 . Intentionally make out extra time : Parenting a strong-willed child requires time, energy, and patience. I always love to tell parents that time is the currency of destiny. A misbehaving child needs to love the most. When a child is being difficult, he is equally going through some difficulties or struggling with some things.

5 . Endeavor to encourage and not judge: Do not say that there is nothing good about the difficult child. Look beyond the behavior because negatives are easier to see. Implement the use of a character chart to record the good things you see. It will help you put things into perspective and see that this child isn\’t an embodiment of negativity. Shower the child with words of encouragement and affirmations.

Parenting isn\’t a walk in the park. It comes with a lot of challenges. When you meet some of the challenges, what you need to do is to take courses and educate yourself on that particular challenge. Do not try to give up because it is not an option.

This is a good time to talk about the Inner circle program in the TIP Academy. In the Inner Circle, You will get to meet and interact with parents that have gone through what you are going through thereby giving you the support, structure, and accountability you need on your parenting journey. Click to book a slot for the 2023 cohort here https://selar.co/tipinnercircle

You can also chat with the team on
0812 968 7040 to join the 2023 cohort

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