Families are unpredictable and stressful things. Such a diverse group of people with such a broad set of interests and ideals is always going to be an unstable thing. In family groups it’s love which brings them together, love and some sense of commitment or even devotion.
Just because you love your family doesn’t mean you understand them. If you’re working full time and you come home and immediately get bombarded by teenage angst, toddler tantrums and sulking children it can be overwhelming. You’ve just worked all day, you’re tired and then that happens. It can feel like the world is falling down and that being tired has become your neutral setting.
The fact is that kids will always have a reason for acting out, even if it isn’t an immediately obvious one. While discipline is certainly important in dealing with this, it’s not always a solution. It’s important that your kids know that they can’t simply act out and get their own way but it’s also important that you pay attention to whatever may have caused the issue in the first place.
Change is one of the biggest causes of upset in a family structure. Children experience things slower than we do. Weeks can quickly become months in our minds and we can forget that they always drag a bit longer for kids. This means they’re more sensitive to change. It’s common for families themselves to reform today due to new jobs or new partners. This can leave kids unsupervised or feeling unloved, in these cases it’s attention which they’ll want. Technological advancement is another great cause of change, it’s also widening the generational gaps. This means your kids are going to feel much more different from you than they once would have. Again this could cause acting out.
The best way to deal with all of these things is by openly communicating with your children. If you explain and then answer their questions on whatever the issue may be they’ll feel like they can come to you with other issues and feel more comfortable with the changes. As long as they feel like they have you as a constant in their lives everything should be much easier to handle.
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