This meeting is called to disorder

I mentioned in my Independence post that my generally mild mannered, kind, empathetic 7-year old has suddenly asserted his independence.  His erratic behavior reminds me of myself in the 8th month of my 3rd pregnancy when I celebrated my 40th birthday in the sweltering month of July!

We have been pulling our hair out trying to decide  the best way to handle this new behavior, so I decided to have our first family meeting.  I got the idea from one of my favorite parenting books, Positive Discipline based on “social interest” principles attributed to psychiatrist Alfred Adler.  Among other things, Adler suggests that parents should “train a child to be and feel an equal part of the family” with logical (or, even better, natural) consequences for misbehavior.

Positive Discipline recommends holding family meetings in which each family member suggests and agrees on norms of how the family will interact.  So we gave it a shot — with our 2-, 4- and 7-year olds.  I’ll admit that the meeting got off to a rocky start.  There was water being poured over “magic” capsules that “turn into” animal shapes when immersed.  There was fighting over whose turn it was to soak which capsule.  There were spills and drops and ooops’es and talking over one another and ….you get the picture.

Finally, I called the meeting to its appropriate level of disorder.  I have three promising observations to report:

1. The family meeting was more productive and collegial than most business meetings I’ve attended.
2. The meeting lasted only 20 minutes, far shorter than most corporate meetings.
3. It was the most insanely disorderly 20-minute meeting I’ve experienced (excluding my tenure with Fannie Mae, that is. OOPS!! Did I say that?!?  :-0).

I am also happy to report a number of agreements reached during the meeting:

• J. the 7-year old does not like losing privileges, particularly TV.  He will stop calling his siblings stupid, knocking them on the floor and sitting on them with pillows if he can keep his DS…and watch Cartoon Network (undoubtedly where he learned the word “stupid” and how to terrorize his siblings).

• 4-year-old R. agrees not to scream, roll around on the floor and throw things at people’s heads if we don’t discipline her.  If she does misbehave, however, she recommends that we talk to her nicely and give her just a little time out.

• And A., well, he  was busy climbing on top the table, swiping toys and eating chicken nuggets throughout the meeting.  However, when I asked, “Do we bite?”, he emphatically replied, “NOOOOOO!”.  I’ll take that as his proposed behavior modification.

My favorite part of the meeting was when my husband suggested that he wanted everyone to laugh more and have more fun.  R. instantly started giggling.  J. decided to take the opportunity to run around and clown.  And A. laughed hysterically at his brother…which made us all laugh even harder.  Ahhhh, laugh therapy.  Adler would be so proud.

Next week, we’re all going to talk about how we performed against our goals.  My goal (set by the kids) is not to make “ugly, mad faces” or talk in a “mad voice”.  I think if there’s no screaming, hitting, rolling around on the floor, biting or throwing things at people’s heads, I just might be able to pull it off.

Stay tuned…