The Adobe Flash Player is required to view this multimedia interactive. Get it here.

5 things parents do that upset children

Thanksgiving tips to make the holiday meal easy and delicious
Updated 29 min. ago
Are you willing to watch your children fail?
3:24 p.m.
Animal clinic collecting food to feed hungry family pets
12:37 p.m.
When it comes to health, Michigan tops Ohio
11/20/09
Dad goes into overdrive with daughter at the wheel
11/19/09
> More lifestyle headlines

By Greg Ramey, Ph.D., Contributing Writer 6:51 PM Friday, October 30, 2009

Our children love us, but that doesn’t stop them from being upset at some of the things we do.

Here are the five things that seem to bother children the most about how we treat them.

1. Lack of attention. Children of any age want to be noticed and generally attention from us is what they are after. This is most obvious with younger children, who will do almost anything to keep us interacting with them. Teens can be more difficult to interpret, since they still need and want our engagement but on their terms, not ours. Children get bothered when we routinely place work, our spouse, social commitments, hobbies, or anything else in front of them. They want to be our top priority, even if at times they shouldn’t.

2. Inconsistency. Children may say they don’t like or need our rules but they don’t really mean it. What bothers them is when our expectations are ambiguous and applied in an unpredictable manner. Youngsters complain that they don’t know what will get them in trouble, since their parents behave in ways that seem more impulsive than thoughtful. This results in anxious children who behave poorly. Since they cannot reliably predict their parents’ responses, toddlers yell and scream and teens text while driving.

3. Rules without reasons. Perhaps as a backlash to the perceived permissiveness of previous generations, many parents are assuming a more authoritarian role with their children. Children find that approach very aggravating. Parents shouldn’t confuse understanding with agreement. It’s not necessary for your child to concur with everything you do, but you should help them understand the rationale behind your thinking. Have them restate back to you the  reasoning behind your expectations.

4. Personal parental problems. Many kids live in homes with parents who abuse drugs or alcohol, suffer from severe depression or other mental disorders, have serious financial problems or conduct secret extramarital affairs. Children don’t understand this stuff and parents make it worse by trying to shield their children from such issues.

Youngsters in such families live in an unstable and tumultuous world. They have little understanding of why their parents are acting in hurtful and harmful ways. Children frequently try to protect parents from themselves, efforts that are inevitably unsuccessful. Internet affairs have become the latest worry for children, as teens become acutely aware of their parents’ marital infidelities.

5. Overprotectiveness. Almost all children feel they are capable of doing more things than their parents allow. Fueled by the images of 24-hour cable bad-news reports, parental anxieties have produced a generation of indoor obese children whose outdoor activities are under the constant surveillance of GPS systems and parental text reminders.

While the facts indicate the American children are growing up in the safest time in history, it just doesn’t feel that way to most parents. Children resent being oversupervised and underrespected. They want their parents to lighten up and allow them to experience life and learn how to independently deal with problems.

Gregory Ramey, Ph.D., is a child psychologist and vice president for outpatient services at The Children’s Medical Center of Dayton. For more of his columns, visit www.childrensdayton.org/ramey.

Share this article

ADD COMMENT

Comments feed

My main problem with this article is that these are not things that should "bug" kids... These 5 items that he talks about are borderline abuse and neglect. Bugging a kid would be asking them to take out the trash, or chaperone a school dance.... the things he is talking about would actually "harm" a kid. I also don't like how he does not clearly differentiate between the childrens ages. Clearly a 4 year old child may not comprehend finances, while a 17 year old would.

lindsay
6:14 PM, 11/15/2009

REPORT ABUSE

I agree with Andrea. It would be nice if our children did come with some sort of manual. You just need to do the best that you can. We as parents will make mistakes along the way. Just love your kids!

mother of 3
8:43 PM, 11/6/2009

REPORT ABUSE

While I agree with most of this article the fact is everyone in the world has issues of some kind. There are people who grew up in perfect home enviroments who have problems. So with that said as a parent you can only try & do your best at raising your children and hope that the values you instill in them shine through to adulthood. Children don't come with owner manuals so parenting is basically trial & error...you learn from your mistakes.

Andrea
5:23 PM, 11/6/2009

REPORT ABUSE

#1 Make them mind parent(s)

#2 Make them clean their room

#3 Make them do their homework

#4 Make them so respect to others

#5 Make then accountable for actions

Too bad, they will just have to be upset.

flipper
2:52 PM, 11/4/2009

REPORT ABUSE

To Hmmmm: Actually priority wise your spouse should be first. To be able to nurture and love your kids, you and your spouse need a nurturing and loving relationship, hard to do if you push your spouse aside to cater to your kids all the time. Other than that I have a much easier and truthful list of the things that parents do to irritate kids. 1. We are their parents.

That's about it! I also agree, kids are catered to way too much these days. It's sad and terrifying.

Tamia
7:44 AM, 11/2/2009

REPORT ABUSE

There are 4 additional comments

SHOW ALL

We welcome your comments. Please remember this is a public forum and behave appropriately. Your comments must conform to our visitor's agreement.