I’ve got to stop yelling – and this is how I’m going to do it. REVIEW plus WIN: Kids Don’t Come With A Manual

Sometimes, in the middle of a frustrated, stressed-and-reached-snapping-point howl at the kids, I mentally consider the person I have become – and I don’t like myself.

I am that Mum. The one that other Mums regard with horror in the street as she screeches at a small, tear stained child that is collapsed in a resistant, grumpy heap on the pavement.

I see you judging me, and I judge myself too. I know that yelling doesn’t achieve anything. I’ve read the I-want-to-punch-you-in-your-smug-non-yelling-face parenting articles about the importance of calmness, reasoning, and taking time to understand why children are acting the way they do.

Some days, I can cope with the endless barrage of whinging, the constant questioning and the sibling squabbles.

But other times? The days where my whole body feels on fire, where I’m already so overstimulated by all the pain receptors pinging around that any additional extra bit of unwelcome noise tips me over the edge? The days where I’ve had perhaps 30 minutes of unbroken sleep? The ones where I’m so physically and mentally tired that just walking downstairs uses more energy than I can find?

Those days, I become the unwelcome Mum.

So I decided it’s time to do something about it. I’m not kidding myself, I know there will still be times where there is yelling going on, whatever we do. But getting to the point where things are harmonious enough that yelling is a blip rather than a norm would be great.

So, enter the parenting book.

‘Kids Don’t Come With A Manual – the essential guide to a happy family life’, from Best of Parenting Publishing.

It’s written by Carole and Nadim Saad, who use their experience of parenting from both a practical and theoretical highly educated viewpoint to offer a detailed plan for achieving a family that work well together.

First off, it really stresses the importance of working as a team. As in, an adult parenting team who are consistent, and don’t undermine each other. As equally tired, grumpy parents we’ve often been guilty of passing the kids off on each other and then completely contradicting what the other has decreed. But thinking about it, having read this book we have come to realise that some of the tiredness and grumpiness could actually be averted quite easily by just consistently working together. So that’s what we’ve done – and on the whole, it’s been fairly successful!

The second thing on offer is a variety of ‘tools’. Or, ways to deal with whatever irritating, instant-raise-of-the-voice inducing behaviour one, two or all three children are displaying. Tool number 6: ‘diffusing whining and arguing’ has been a bit of a godsend, as we do have an expert whingebag on our hands. Remaining consistent and refusing to give in, whilst still acknowledging the whinging has been fairly tiresome (the whinging can go on for a VERY long time) but since we’ve started using this strategy we have noticed an improvement and fingers crossed, that’ll keep on going.

The chapter on modelling has also been a bit of an uncomfortable eye opener. Children do learn from their parents, obviously, and I realised once I’d thought about it that a lot of the behaviours that I was finding irritating, well, they have in actual fact come from us!

All the information in the book is given with reference to opposing ‘strict’ and ‘all-heart’ parent views, and an explanation of WHY the tool works as well as what to do to implement it. Understanding the reasons behind behaviour, and being able to tailor responses to each child and our own specific parenting types has been incredibly useful. And, bearing in mind my somewhat limited time the fact that you can dip in and out of the book – with chapters and sections laid out in an easy to find format – is awesome. At some point, I WILL read it cover to cover. But that time does not have to be right now.

So…harmony here we come. Or at least, we seem to be coming towards quieter, more harmonious craziness, anyway.

With three small children, two tired adults and an incredibly energetic, swipey kitten there is always going to be a bit of chaos in this family. But at least now it’s headed towards the fun kind of chaos. And I am starting to like myself again.

If you’d like your own copy of Kids Don’t Come With A Manual, then you can get it here. Or alternatively, fill out the competition thingy below and you could even win one!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Good luck 😀