Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child (27 page)

Conversations come easier if you know about the events and people in your child’s life, including their daily activities, the names of their friends, teachers, and coaches. Spend time, if you can, in your child’s school, attending open houses and curriculum nights. Offer to work in the classroom or go on field trips. Volunteer to be a coach (or assistant coach) for your child’s athletic activities.

Learn what you can about your child’s friends and social life as well. Get to know their friends’ parents. Open your house to the slumber party. Volunteer to drive the kids to parties, the bowling alley, the skating rink. Tune in to their conversations. Listen to their concerns.

And finally, recognize that family time is full of a million opportunities either to connect with your children or to distance yourself from them. You decide in many mundane moments whether to turn toward or away from your kids. Say, for instance, that you’re trying to read when you find yourself distracted by music blaring from your teenager’s room. As you ask him to turn down the volume, you can start the conversation by saying, “I can’t believe you call that stuff music.” Or you can say, “I’ve never heard that group before. Who is it?” While the first is an affront, the second is an invitation, a chance to bridge your differences and stay involved.

STRIKE A BALANCE BETWEEN WORK LIFE AND HOME LIFE

For many men, finding enough time and energy for their children means giving over less of themselves to their jobs. That’s because it’s difficult, if not impossible, to be present for your kids physically and emotionally if you work sixty hours a week, or if you’re so distracted by work stresses that you can’t focus on your children’s concerns.

Resolving this conflict is not easy for a man whose primary identity is that of family breadwinner. He has been socialized to believe that hard work, long hours, and self-sacrifice demonstrate his commitment to his family. But now, many men fear that unless they change, they risk losing touch with their wives and children—the very people who give their work meaning in the first place.

As our society becomes more conscious of this irony, I hope we’ll
see more progress toward family-friendly working conditions. For years, working women have lobbied for flextime jobs, more part-time jobs (with substantive benefits), employer-based child care, and adequate family leave. Such changes, when they come, will benefit male employees, too, especially those who want to be more involved with their children.
A British study of scientific workers
, for example, showed that the introduction of flextime made a difference in the amount of time fathers in dual-career families spent caring for their children. Another study showed that
workers on flextime
didn’t necessarily spend more time with their kids, but they reported less conflict between home and work responsibilities, presumably leading to less stress in the family and a happier environment for children.

Still, men are often required to sacrifice financial gains and career development in order to strike a better balance between their work and family lives. As sociologist Pepper Schwartz found in her
research on egalitarian marriages
, men who play an equal and active role in household work and child care have less developed careers than men who take the more traditional role of primary breadwinner. The corporate manager who refuses to uproot his family for a cross-country job transfer is still passed over for promotions and raises. And the salesman who skips a marketing retreat in favor of a Cub Scout camp-out may miss out on a bonus or promotion.

Whether or not a man is willing to choose the “daddy track,” working fewer hours for lower pay, he may want at least to consider ways to reduce job stress. One bad day at the office after another can be a detriment to a father’s relationship with his kids. This was demonstrated in a study of
fathers working as air-traffic controllers
. Following distressing social experiences at work, the fathers in this study were more likely to express anger toward their children when they got home. High job satisfaction, on the other hand, can actually enhance parenting skills, studies show, even though it also results in dads spending less time with their kids.

Whether a dad feels some sense of autonomy in his job seems to make a big difference. One group of researchers found that
when dads have more independence
in their work, they are more likely to give their kids autonomy as well. But if they work in jobs that are
highly supervised, they seem to expect more conformity and obedience from their children, and they are more likely to use physical forms of discipline.

Making a career change, or at least finding ways to make your current job less stressful, can be a significant move.

STAY INVOLVED IN YOUR CHILD’S LIFE DESPITE YOUR MARITAL STATUS

Whether parents stay together or not, children generally do best with both a father and a mother involved in their lives. And although cooperative parenting can be tricky when couples separate, children usually benefit if their mothers and fathers view raising children as a joint venture.

As we explored in
Chapter 5
, marital separation and divorce can be harmful to children. But some problems may be avoided if children are able to maintain regular contact with both parents. And as our own studies suggest, children of troubled couples generally do better when their parents stay emotionally available to them, adopting the parenting style of the Emotion Coach. Effective Emotion Coaching requires time, intimacy, and detailed knowledge of a child’s life. That’s why I encourage fathers (
90 percent of whom live apart
from their kids following divorce) to maintain close contact with their kids despite separation from their children’s mother.

Divorced and single fathers often have difficulty staying involved with their children for a variety of reasons, including geographical distance, remarriage, issues related to child support payments, and ongoing conflict with the children’s mother. Several studies have shown that a divorced father’s contact with his kids diminishes over time, despite the quality of the father’s relationship with the child at the time of the divorce. And, as a father’s contact with his children declines, so does his influence. Without the emotional bond that forms when fathers interact daily with their children over a million matters—both trivial and significant—dads certainly can’t hope to have much influence in the big issues that typically surface around adolescence.

What can divorced dads do to prevent their children from gradually
fading away from their lives? For one thing, they can treat their relationships with their children’s mother as a partnership. Parents should not let conflicts between them get in the way of making good decisions together on behalf of their children. And, as we discussed in
Chapter 5
, parents should never use their relationships with the kids against each other. Ex-spouses should try to support each other in upholding collaborative agreements around issues like limit setting and discipline.

Dads should work out an arrangement for child support payments that seems fair and stick with it. Studies show that dads who keep up their payments are more likely to spend time with their kids on a regular basis. Conversely, fathers often fail to see their children due to financial problems or conflicts over payment. Mothers often use the child support issue as a justification for blocking a father’s access to his kids. And fathers, who often feel guilty or fearful about failing to pay, avoid contacting their kids as well. Meanwhile, time slips away, with children believing that their father’s absence signals his indifference.

When fathers do spend time with their kids, whether as a visitation or as part of a joint-custody arrangement, they should make that time as normal as possible. Kids adjust better to divorce when time with the noncustodial parent is spent doing everyday activities, such as schoolwork, lessons, and chores. In other words, fathers should avoid the “Disneyland Dad” syndrome of constantly making time with their children a party. Children may benefit more from their relationship with dad by helping him cook dinner and do the dishes than by watching him pick up the tab at Burger King.

Although a father may not have as much time with his child as he’d like, it helps to keep in touch with frequent phone calls, say as many as two or three a week. Conversations will get easier with practice, especially if dads make an effort to keep up with the everyday details of their children’s lives. Getting to know a kid’s friends and teachers, and attending school functions, performances, and athletic events will help.

Staying close to kids can be even more challenging for a divorced dad if he or his ex remarries. Such a challenge is likely, given that
75 percent of all women
and 80 percent of all men marry again following a divorce. While studies show that a mother’s remarriage
can be a great help to kids economically, afterward, children typically see their biological fathers less. A parent’s remarriage can also cause kids (especially teenagers) some degree of anxiety as they struggle to adapt to a new stepparent and wonder what this person’s presence means for their relationship with their “real” dad or mom.

Psychologists have learned that it’s a big mistake to tell kids they have to choose between one dad and the other. Also, it’s usually best for stepfathers to refrain from taking over the role of disciplinarian. Children adjust much better if the stepfather simply stands by and supports the mother in her parenting decisions. Children also do best following remarriage when they can continue to have regular contact with both biological parents.

Perhaps the strongest advice to dads who live apart from the children is to be patient with their children as they adjust to changes. Parents can expect the first two years following a divorce to be the roughest. In addition to the pain and anger dads are likely to feel in their relationship with their former spouse, the children may be expressing a great deal of negativity as well. Small children, who typically have difficulty with transitions under any circumstances, may resist going with dad when he comes to pick them up. Older children may act mean or despondent, expressing lots of anger at their fathers for not working things out so the family can stay together. Because men typically withdraw from relationships when emotions get hot, many fathers may feel tempted simply to stop seeing their kids at all. For the benefit of their children over the long term, dads must not do this. It’s important to concentrate on helping kids work through their negative feelings. The techniques of Emotion Coaching discussed in
Chapter 3
may be helpful. Remember that by listening empathetically, helping children to label their feelings, and guiding them on ways to handle their anger and sadness, dads can grow closer to their kids in times of emotional crisis.

Chapter 7

E
MOTION
C
OACHING AS
Y
OUR
C
HILD
G
ROWS

H
AVE YOU EVER HEARD THIS LAMENT FROM NEW PARENTS
? “Just when I think I’ve got the baby figured out—how much to feed him, how much he’ll sleep, how to soothe his crying—everything changes!”

The comment rings true because raising children brings about steady change. As our kids grow, we continually adjust our lives to accommodate their latest needs, fears, interests, and competencies. And yet, despite all the changes, there is one constant: each child’s desire for an emotional connection with loving, caring adults.

In this chapter, I’ll explore five different periods of childhood: infancy, the toddler years, early childhood, middle childhood, and adolescence. I’ll explain some of the major developmental milestones children typically achieve during each of these periods and offer advice to help you enhance your child’s emotional intelligence during these phases. Understanding what’s “normal” and anticipating what issues are likely to be important to your child at different ages can help you understand his or her feelings better. This, in turn, can make you more effective as an Emotion Coach.

I
NFANCY

THREE MONTHS OR SO

Who can say when a baby’s emotional relationship with its parents begins? Some speculate that it starts in utero as the baby responds to its mother’s relative states of stress or serenity. Others say it begins immediately after birth as parents feed, rock, and soothe their baby. And still others point to that magic moment a few weeks after birth
when the baby beams its first genuine smile at mother or dad, making all their hard work and sleepless nights finally seem worthwhile.

Most parents would agree, however, that the real fun begins at about three months when babies typically become interested in face-to-face social interaction. Developmental psychologists speak of the infant’s eyes “brightening” at this age, meaning that babies seem for the first time really to look at their parents and hold their gaze. As little as a three-month-old baby is, she is learning an enormous amount through observation and imitation about how to read and express emotions. This means that parents, through their responsiveness and attention, can begin an active process of Emotion-Coaching their infants—even at this very early age.

Research shows that parents typically go to great lengths to get and hold their babies’ attention during early exchanges of emotional information. For example, parents often use a speech pattern described as “motherese” (although dads can be fluent in this language as well). It involves using a high-pitched voice and talking slowly and repetitively, while exaggerating facial expressions. Although such “baby talk” may seem comical and extreme, parents use it for good reason—it works! Infants usually perk up and pay closer attention when they hear and see their parents talking this way.