Helping Our Children's Needs be Meet Through Parenting

   Have you ever for the first time meet the parent of a friend or roommate and then afterwords understood that individual a lot better? Or maybe after spending a week with your in laws you understand a lot better why your spouse is the way they are. We are greatly influenced by our parents and we are the way we are because of them. However, we are not just the way we are because of our genes that run in the family but we are also influenced greatly by the ways that our parents raise us and parent. Every parent has goals for there children. These may be things such as helping our children to have healthy relationships, make decisions on there own, and to get a good education. We can best help our children to obtain these goals by how we raise our children and teach them through our parenting. By reaching the needs of our children we can help them to obtain the goals that everyone want for there loved ones and there children. I would like to discuss what these needs our, how we can meet them through good parenting.
   Most of us have heard of Maslow's hierarchy of needs. This basically shows that some needs are more important than others. For example we can live longer without food than without water. Well there are a lot of other needs that we as humans need and needs that are especially important to a developing child. One of the important needs that a child need of belonging and contact with others. If you think about it this is why one of the hardest forms of punishment for an individual is to be isolated from others. We as humans need contact with others to develop healthily and to survive. The second need that our children have is of power. No they do not need to be a supper hero to make it ok in this world, and they do not need to be the head of the house hold. When I mean by children having power is that children need to have some autonomy and to be able to make decisions and to contribute and help others. The next need that a child needs is to be able to withdraw. This is basically being able to take a break and a step back. Another important need for a child to have meet is they need to be challenged.  Finally one another very important need for a child is protection.
  As you can see that these needs are not just for children but for all human beings. However, if we do not get them meet in a safe and healthy way then we will find some other way. This is why it is a parents responsibility to meet thees needs of there children. One thing that a parent needs to do for there children is to give them contact freely and frequently. Give your children hugs, talk to them, and let them know you are there. A little of this can often go a long ways. The second need to be meet is for power. As a parent we can help our children meet this need through the giving of choices. This can be as simple as asking them what kind of fruit do they want to have with there lunch. No body likes to feel controlled and children are no exception to this. Another need that children have is withdraw. Something that parents can do to help with this is to teach children how to take breaks at appropriate times and how to go back afterword and finish the tasks. If you think about the purpose of time outs in sports it is not to waste time or to goof off. It is often time to take a step back and evaluate before going back to the game at full speed. We to can take time outs while working at our homes. As mentioned before a child needs to be challenged. A way that a parent can do this is through helping our children develop skills and interests that will help them accept challenges and to be challenged. Some good possibilities are activities such as sports, music, and dance. One of the final things that a parent needs to do to meet the needs of there children is to teach and practice forgiveness and assertiveness. This is something that  will help children feel protected and safe.
   Meeting these needs do not always come naturally however, they are of great importance. As I mentioned before these needs most of the time will be meet, if not by us then by some other means. Often things such as drug use, rebellion, risk taking, and revenge seeking can be avoided if parents meet these basic needs for there children. By meeting these needs we will not only be helping our posterity live healthy lives but we will be setting to go on and reach the goals that we all have for our children.

The Power of Fathers

 

  When I was little my favorite flavor of the Jolly Rancher candies were the Grape ones and my favorite doughnut was the chocolate Bismarks. Is there any guess why those were my favorite flavors? Well those just happened to be my dads favorites also, and I wanted to be just like him. Even thought those  aren't my favorites any more my father still had a huge impact on my life especially over the things that matter and a are a lot more important than jolly ranchers and doughnuts. Fathers in a way can be the hero or the absent figure who drops the ball when they are needed the most. No father is perfect but everybody needs a father who strives to do his best even though he is imperfect.  I would like to expound a bit more about some of the reasons why fathers are so important.
  I'm not sure if I was the only one out there who thought that there dad was the vest at everything. In fat, I remember arguing with my cousins and friends about whose dad was the strongest and could beat up the other dads if needed. Even though my dad never had to beat up my uncles or friends dads while I was around, he did protect me from more than I knew and her gave me a sense of security while I was growing up. This is one of the very important reasons why we need fathers. In Dr. Tim Rarick's blog Family Good Things he addresses specific ways that fathers are a protection in the family for there children. For instance, there is twice as high of an infant mortality rate for infants with unmarried mothers. The families without a father in the home are also four times more likely to be in poverty. Youth growing up without fathers have a significant higher probability of being incarcerated. These are just some of the negative impacts of fatherless homes but the list does not stop there and goes on. So if you think that the only thing a father does is influence his young boys choice in doughnuts you are wrong. That same father can have an impacts on things such as the likelihood of his song going to prison and graduating high school.
  Singer song writer John Mayer has a popular song that he wrote titled Daughters. In his son he sings of the importance of a fathers relationship with his daughters. In Dr. Rarick's blog he expounds on how this song is not just a catchy poem but has a lot of truth in it and is actually backed up by empirical evidence. Fathers have a strong influence in the lives of there children especially in daughters. Dr. Rarick gives several examples in his blog. For instance daughters who do not have a father in there life are affected not just emotionally but also physically. Daughters who do not have a father are more likely to start their menstrual cycles and hit puberty earlier. They also are 7 times more likely to become sexually active at a young age and become pregnant when not married. Girls with fathers in there lives are also more likely to have healthy relationships with others and happier and healthier marriages than those who do not have a father in there lives. One of the many reasons for this is that a father acts as a protection for his daughter. He my not be fighting off villains who are attacking his teenage girls, but he shows his daughter what is appropriate in a relationship and what she should look for in a relationship. He does this by showing his daughter how a man should treat a women by the way he treats  his wife and his daughter. By this simple and basic pattern a father can have great impact on the lives of his daughters. If we seek to empower women in this day in age we should look at how we can give more value in the role of a father  and the potential he has. Saying that a father is not needed is not giving more power to women but actually taking it away from them. It is not that women are not needed because they are. I like to look at is like two different foods such as whole grain bread and oranges. One is not more important than the other in a individuals diet but they booth give special vitamins and nutrients that we need in our lives.
  I personally am very excited to be a father in the future. If there is one job that I would say is under appreciated in our society I would say that it is the teachers and the fathers. And if you think about it a father should be one of the most important teachers that we have.

Communication in the Family

  Have you ever been to a different country or in a situation where no one spoke your language? I had a cool opportunity to serve a mission for my church in Southern Brasil and had a lot of experience struggling to learn a different language and to be understood. I said a lot of things that didn't quite make sense. Once I told someone that I like there cookies that they were wearing. Another time I told someone that a lot of people where I lived like to merry deer. Yeah when you have trouble communicating it can be very frustrating and even cause a lot of problems. In marriage it can be just as vital to learn how to communicate, and a lot of grief and pain can be avoided by using good communication.
  One unique word that I learned in Brasil that I will never forget is the word Bah. This word really is only used in Southern Brasil and it doesn't really have a specific definition. It can be used to express surprise, frustration, sympathy, sorrow, and much more.What makes the difference is how the context and the tone that you use. The same thing can be said about how we communicate with others and especially in how we communicate in our marriage. It isn't really the words that we say but how we say it. In fact we talked of how communication is made up of 3 parts. Words, tone, and other none verbal expressions. Words make up roughly 14% of communication, tone 35%, and none verbal 51 5. If this does not make sense think about these two examples. Imagine if you ask someone how they are feeling and they respond to you by yelling "I'm fine". Meanwhile there face is red and there eye brows are furrowed and they seem very agitated. Would you feel that there answer matches the message that they expressed? Or imagine if there was a person who was crying and seemed to be agitated and a person who didn't speak there language. Imagine if the one came up to the other and put there arms around them and gave them a hug. Even if they did not speak the same language they still would be able to send messages and communicate with each other. In our marriage there are a lot of messages that we can give to people without using words that we need to be mindful of.
   It is natural that in a marriage or in any other relationship that we will have miscommunications. IT is very important for people to know what to do when there is miscommunication in our marriages. There was a guy named David Burns that gave 5 secrets of good communication that are very effective especially when there is miscommunications. The first principle is to find a kernel of truth in what your spouse says. So for example if your wife says this is horrible you never listen to me and Im so mad. The kernel of truth is not that you are a horrible person or maybe not even that you never listen to your spouse but that your spouse is mad and feels that they are not listened to. The second principle is to express empathy. This is basically trying to feel what the other person is feeling and trying to understand what they are communicating to you. The third secret is to use inquiry, or basically to try to ask questions to understand what the other people are feeling. The fourth principle is to use assertiveness. A lot of time when we think of being assertive we may think that this means to be rued or even mean. However it is more being direct and expressing your feelings directly. This principle reminds me of what they taught in my elementary school when using "I messages". When you use assertiveness you tell a person how you feel and why you feel that way and what you would hope for or like others to do. For example you may say that when someone yells at you you feel sad because you feel inadequate and unloved and in the future you would prefer that a person try to not yell at you. The last secret of Burns is to express sincere gratitude and respect. Doing this is important because it helps a person to feel loved even when the couple has a misunderstanding or a miscommunication.
   It is not something easy to have good communication. In fact it can be a lot more natural to get mad and to use poor communication. However if we practice the principles that were discussed today it will help us to avoid a lot of problems and communicate our feelings in a healthy way.

Stress in the Family

   Have you ever had a moment when you were so scared you thought you might make it back home? Or maybe the feeling that you were up to your neck with homework and work? Or have you had an experience similar to when there is a minuet left in a tied soccer game and you have a penalty kick to take that could put your team ahead to win the game? If you have said yes to any of these questions than you have felt stress in your life. There are many forms of stress that take place in our lives and our families are no exception to this. I would like to talk a bit about stress in the family and how it can play out and be something that can make or break us.

   If you think stress is something that is horrible and to be avoided at all costs you are wrong. In fact there are many instances that stress can be a help to us and necessary. For instance one of the dangers for an astronauts body is that there is a lack of stress in space. Because of this, astronauts whom leave the earth often experience a deterioration in there bones and muscles. Often I like to think of stress as pressure. Sometimes it is good to have pressure and this may be what gets us going and motivates us to do good things. However, if we have too much stress or do not deal with our stress in a healthy way it can be harmful to us and our families. There was a famous researcher after world war ll named Reuben Hill who studied families and why some seem to handle stress better than others. HE looked at many families who were impacted by the leave of fathers during the war and he noticed that there were more or less three outcomes of these families. They all had a dip down after the stressor but some of the families jumped back and were just as strong as before the stressor. Other families after having the stressor hit were not as strong and never recovered. Finally, some families after the stressor took a dip down but in the end became more stronger than they were even before the stressor. After noticing thees patterns Reuben came up with the ABC- X stress model that explains how a family deals with the stress and how it can either make or break them or cause them to be the  same as before.

   The ABC-X stress model shows the relationship between stressors, the used resources of families, and how the family perceives or defines the stressor. The A in the model is the stressor or in other words the hardship or the event in the family that can cause the stress. As we know and as Hill noticed it is not always that the hard event will cause the same results in everybody. The letter B in the model represents the resources that a family has or the use or the resources. Some possible resources that can help a family in a stressful time may be things such as money, extended family members, education, church, support groups, and any other sources of help and support. Not all families that go through stressful events have the same resources and this influences how hard it may be to overcome there challenges. The letter c in the model represents the perception or the way that the family sees there stressor. Some families see there challenge as the end of the earth. Some see them as merely obstacles to overcome. The perceived and used resources of the families handling stressful events can have an influence on how the family perceives there stress. Often these letter s make a triangle in a way with the one letter influencing and leading to the next. All of them together make up the X of the model or the level of crisis. So the findings according to Hill where that it is not just the stress that determines how big of a crisis it will be for a family but also how they use there resources and how they perceive there stress.

  So in the end it is not stress that makes or breaks the family, but several factors put together. If we use our resources and we view the stress as something that is normal or something that is not unbearable than we will be able to overcome the stress in a healthy way and actually have the potential to come out as a stronger and better family than before.  

The S word SEX!

Did I just say Sex in the title of my blog for this week? Well the answer is yes, yes I did. In fact my entire blog is going to be about the big three letter s word  sex. I would like to especially discuss why it is such an important thing and how men and women differ in there sexual tendencies.
 
 When people hear and think of sex there are a lot of different things that may pop into there heads. Some feel that sex is something evil and worldly that should not be talked about. Others may feel that it is only the means to have children. Some think it is something beautiful that is natural and a part of life. Depending on your perspective sex can be any of the three. I would like to share a quote from class this week " Sex can be a selfless act for great satisfaction, or a selfish act for great disaster". So if we want to only think of ourselves it can be something cold and worldly, or if we think of our partner it can be something beautiful and a charitable service that binds the couple together. When a couple is engaging in sexual relationships they are boot vulnerable to each other. Sex is a way to be the closest ever to your spouse physical, mentally, and spiritually. It can be a service that is like none other for couples to participate in.
   Even though sexual relations can be such a wonderful experience for couples to engage in together there can be some complications that arrive simply because men and women are different and have different sexual tendencies. Lets start off talking about men. Men tend to think more often about sex than women are. Not only is it more often on there minds but they can be in the mood a lot more often than women can. During sexual intercourse men often reach a heightened state of sexual arousal a lot quicker than women do and can reach the point of an orgasm a lot quicker. After they reach orgasm his state of arousal quickly declines .It in fact has been said related to this that men are like a toaster oven and a  women is more like a crock pot. Unlike men women often have a lot of things on there mind and do not think of sex as often as men do. Likewise it can be harder for women to be in the mood for sexual relationships to take place. For instance if a man had a hard day at work that maybe was emotionally draining he still could be in the mood for sex latter on. However, a women often will not be able to get aroused if there is too much or going on in her life and on her mind. Finally as mentioned earlier it also takes women a lot longer to get warmed up and aroused and a women reaches the point of an orgasm at a lot slower rate than a man does. When she has reached that high point of an orgasm she also tends to stay aroused and at a heightened state for a longer time compared to men.
   So you can only imagine that because of this there are a lot of potential problems or incompatibilities that can happen in a relationship. For instance imagine if a man is in the mood for sex and his wife is having a stressful week and is not in the mood at all when he is? What will he think of her? He may think things like that his wife is a selfish person who doesn't care about him, or he may think that she doesn't even love him or is sexually attracted to him. On her side she may think that her husband is selfish and only cares about sex but does not care about her emotional state and how she is stressed out. Another incompatibility that may arise comes from the differences in the patterns and speed of arousal for each gender. For men it may be no problem that they can get aroused quickly and be a go getter and have an orgasm in a relatively short amount of time. However, how does his wife feel who may just be starting to warm up and get turned on just when her husband is coming down from his orgasm and getting ready to fall asleep. You can only imagine how this can lead to potential problems and even the possibility for women to not want to engage nearly as much in sex.
  Sex is a wonderful thing but a lot more complex than some imagine. It can be an extremely vulnerable experience that can either be wonderful or terrible. This is why it is important to realize the differences between you and your spouse and there gender typical sexual tendencies and also your spouses feelings. Hopefully through today's blog post you learned something that will help you see sex as even more beautiful and important.