Blog Dare Post - Convincing children....

So @TheBlogDare followed me on twitter the other day.  It's a group/initiative put on by @BloggyMoms, and it's a "dare" to do a POST A DAY for the entire year.  Oi.  I struggle to get a post a month in!  LOL.  Don't know that I'll be able to manage EVERY DAY, but I guess I can just participate as the prompts stir a post in me.


Today's prompt was: "I convinced my children to..."


hee hee.  Convincing children?  Herding cats?  Correlation?  YES.  Absolutely. :D


But... funnily enough, this IS something that happened recently.


T and I are both "attachment-minded," natural-ish parents.  That doesn't mean that we are full on, 100% crunchy hippies, but we try to be as engaged as we can as parents, and are trying to change the parenting cycle from how our parents were.  We practice co-sleeping (until they want their own space, which for our kids was fairly early), baby-wearing, breastfeeding, all 3 of our boys are intact, 2 of our 3 kids have had no vaccines (and they're the healthiest out of the 3 too!), 2 of our 3 births were 100% natural (and one at home unassisted!), and we are doing our best to change what was modeled for us both, and spend more time with our kids in a way that is going to foster their development.


I want to interject here and say that most parents in the 70s and 80s, and even 90s did what they knew, and what they were modeled or taught, so not to say that my parents were bad, it's just that they didn't know the amount of info that parents today have at their disposal... can we say "internet?"  Our generation of parents is, in a general way, far more educated about the more effective ways to parent, and raise secure, confident children.  But that doesn't mean we don't love our parents anyway.  ;)


Anyway, right now, we're reading a parenting book called "Positive Discipline for Preschoolers" by Jane Nelson, Cheryl Erwin and Roslyn Ann Duffy.  There is an entire series of books in the Positive Discipline series, and in a nutshell, it's about raising children who are "responsible, respectful and resourceful."  Oh my dog.  What an amazing book.  And what a PARADIGM SHIFT for both of us.  My mum often says to me that she BEGAN to change the cycle of parenting with me and my bro, and it's my job to finish that change.  (She is SO supportive that way!)  One of my biggest battles is how much I yell.  I'm a yeller.  My mum was a yeller.  My grama was a yeller.  And I don't for a second doubt that before she had herself committed, that my great-grandma was a yeller too.  (Yes, that is part of my family history... but that's for another day.)  Frustration is a daily feeling for me.  But I'm working on it, and getting MUUUUUUCH better.  I'm not so much a yeller when dealing with the baby I'll add... somehow it's "easier" to attachment parent a baby than it is a difficult toddler, preschooler, or kindergartener. :P  


But ANYWAY.  Something in the book talked about how, even with babies, if you ask them to help you do something you are empowering them, and they will understand that, and will be more than likely to accommodate you.


Riley is teething right now.  First year molars.  YUCK.  Monday he had a low-grade fever, not enough for drugs, just warm.  By evening though, he was shaking from the fever, had puked up his dinner, and was burning up.  :/  (It was still a low fever though, not hospital-worth.)  I checked to see if it was a tooth, and nothing, so I just assumed tummy bug.  Out came the gravol and ibuprofen so that maybe he could be in less discomfort, poor bubba.  We had a rough night, up every 1.5-2 hours, and the next day, he had these two HUGE bumps on his bottom gums.  AWESOME.  (But at least it wasn't gastro!)


Anyway, when you have a grumpy, sick child, the LAST thing they want is medicine.  The first two days were fighting and messiness and stickiness and YUCK trying to get the medicine into him.  Then on Wednesday, I read the part in the book about asking even babies to "help" and empowering them.  So.... I thought, why not, let's give it a try.


"Riley, honey, can you please help mummy and take your medicine?  Mummy needs your help baby.  Will you help mummy?"


Well, string me up and call me Sally, holy crap it WORKED.  Not kidding.  He's 14 months old.  And he took his ibuprofen NO PROBLEM.


He hasn't had a lot of medicine since then, as I try not to give it to him too often, just when he's seeming really grumpy/in pain, but every time I have, since then, I've asked him to help me, and EVERY time, he has taken it with no fight.


Oh, bless you Jane Nelson et al.  BLESS YOU.


How have you managed to convince your children to do something lately?