Demands, demands and demands.

“Do something about it! That man scolded me,” she shouted angrily at the son.
“But mon, you did dirty his floor,” the son tried to put some sense into his mom.
“What! Are you saying that he can scold me and get away with it?”
“Mom, I told……….”
“Don’t you talk back at your mom! How can you take the side of that man? I’m your mother, you know?”
The poor exasperated son , realizing nothing could get his mother to see reason, quickly walked away from the scene to escape further embarrassment.

That mother demanded for action, right or wrong, to be taken. Her demands had to be attended to or she would throw her usual tantrums. Why are some mothers or fathers, or anybody for that matter, be like that?

It all started when this mother was young. She learned then the art of getting things her way. She found the method one day and through years of practice have built it into her life to have things her way.

Young children, not just the present day ones, are clever and know how to wrap their unwary parents or grandparents around their little fingers. Throwing tantrums is quite a successful and popular technique and too-loving guardians and parents just are no match for some of these tiny little tots.

As a parent, I remember taking my wife, my two children, my mother-in-law and her granddaughter to an outing. There was this procession with a lion dance in it. It was something I felt I would like to have my children enjoy. It was after lunch and all of us ought not to be thinking of food.

Just then, as we were watching and enjoying the sight of a lion prancing around near us, the ringing bell of the ice-cream man attracted the attention of the little girl, my mother-in-law’s granddaughter. She demanded for ice-cream. When none of us paid her any heed, she stamped her feet and cried. My wife and I paid her no attention as we did not want our children to learn such behavior. If we were to buy ice-cream for her, then my two boys would come to understand that that was the way to get attention and whatever they wanted.

With the grandma there, of course, the girl succeeded with her technique. She knew it would get results. She got her ice-cream.

I did buy ice-cream for my two children when they were young but not when they shouted, screamed and demanded. From young, I have taught them love. I have always taught them what is good for them, what is the right thing to do and the way to doing it. When I see something tasty like the ice-cream in the supermarket, I would buy it for them to try the taste. At other times, I would not buy the ice-cream but get them some tasty fruits instead and teach them that fruits are better than ice-cream. Sometimes or as they grow up to understand better, I would explain to them the advantages of eating certain food over other food.

There is a lot of advantages in communicating with your children. Communication leads to a kind of closer relationship. Today, there are certain things my sons are better at or are more knowledgeable than me and because we easily communicate, they would tell me the things I do not know. Isn’t that wonderful?

Thus, we ought to talk to our children rather than just succumb to their demands and tantrum. Should a child throw a tantrum, parents must love them enough to stand firm and teach them why a thing ought not to be done then and teach them to communicate properly.

Of course, I have noticed that sometimes a tantrum is brought on by parents. A child may be hungry and needs food badly but uncaring(?) parents refuse to respond to complains of hunger; perhaps too engrossed in something such as an interesting conversation with a friend. To attract attention to his/her problem a child may be forced to complain even louder, gradually shouting and screaming for attention to a real problem. Only when a tantrum occurs do such parents stop whatever they could have been doing to attend to the child, indirectly teaching the child to throw tantrums or make demands.

How then can we fault such a child? That was what she had been taught or trained through a natural necessity to behave thus. If that child remained unaware of her problematic behavior, it can lead to an inability to understand that no one in society would pamper her with attention whenever she demands it. Success in being easily accepted by society, and even family members, can be crippled by such parenting.

Thus, it is important that children should never be allowed to continue or taught to throw tantrums.