Hear ye, Hear ye all children- young, old, teens, toddlers, smart mouth 10 year olds, college kids who suddenly know everything about everything..... I want you to listen closely. I want to impart on you some wisdom that can thoroughly change your life. At first you will fight me on it. You will want to give me 1,000,000 reasons why I am wrong. <------- this is the problem. You talk too much. I am going to teach you two very familiar words and one action that will make life so much easier. It is something I am desperately trying to impart on my own child. Sometimes it works, most of the time it doesn't, but I wanted to share this wealth of knowledge with you today.
Most arguments with your mom are never over critical matters. Most involve an argument after she has had to repeatedly tell you to do something 10 times and once she starts yelling like a mad person with smoke coming out of her ears you are suddenly encouraged to actually do said thing. Know how this could have been solved in the very first place?
A simple "Yes Mam" and walk away. Try it out. Play it out in your head. Let it roll off your tongue. Watch your mothers horrid expression as she tries to figure out what has possessed you to actually listen. Don't say: in a minute, or do I have to , or why not..... simply say "Yes Mam" and walk away. Simple right. Think of all the yelling, screaming, grounding, spankings, crying, breakdowns and arguments that could be saved if you only said those two words. Do you always get your way, well .....no.... but the simple truth is you weren't getting your way in the first place. All that your bantering back and forth trying to justify your expert reasoning has done is make the situation worse and possibly ...... no probably put you in an even worse position than when you opened your mouth to begin with.
Most children think they are as smart as Rudy looks right here
With smaller kids most parental squabbles are over chores or lets get real here...anything! "Can you please pick up that pop tart wrapper you just casually dropped on the floor and put it in the trashcan or is that asking entirely too much of you?" Said kid finally picks up the wrapper and lays it on the coffee table and goes about his business. "Is that the trashcan? I said go put that in the trashcan!" At this point said kid will generally do one of three things: Completely ignore you, suddenly have to poop, or give you the "I will in just a minute" line that simply boils my blood. You also have to love the complete mental breakdown over the shoes you laid out for them to wear that they just had to have in the store but suddenly is not the shoe they wanted to wear that day. As a matter of fact, they now hate those shoes and can't believe you ever bought them.
With your middle aged kids most of your arguments are going to stem from them not getting their way. Case in point:
"Mom can ______ come and spend the night tonight?"
"No not tonight sweetie, we have plans in the morning."
"Well that is in the morning, not tonight."
"I realize that as I am a fully functional adult and am quite familiar with the concept of time but we do not have time to take ______ home in the morning."
"What if we wake up extra early and go the 20 minutes out of the way to take ____ home?"
"I do believe you asked me a question and I answered not tonight dear."
"Why do you hate me? You don't love me. If you loved me you would let _____ come over. You NEVER let me do anything I want to do."
"For that reaction you are now grounded and will spend the evening cleaning your room or polishing my shoes.... whichever punishment I decide"
The original face palm
See how a Simple yes mam would have worked right there?!?
Now your Pre-teens and Teenagers is where it gets interesting. This is the age in which money grows on trees. This is the age where suddenly they are SOOOOOOO much smarter than you. You are now officially a walking embarrassment to them and the complete definition of lame. They will try to out-smart,
out-wit, out-speak, out-rationalize (ok I made that one up but you get what I am saying) everything you say "NO" too that you suddenly visualize smacking them upside the head. No I am not condoning child abuse, but a love tap never hurt me as a kid when I was being completely irrational. At this point they love to turn an argument around on you and suddenly your the bad guy. So kids at this age group can I be your yoda for a minute? I will pause while you go google that reference. You need this phrase worse than anyone whether you realize it or not.
"Take that picture you posted today off Instagram."
"Why?!? It had a Bible verse under it mom"
"Yes it did darling but you are also in a bikini top and your showing entirely too much cleavage. I don't think God appreciates you associating that with a Bible verse."
"OMG mom you just don't get it. Your what....like..... 40 or something? You have no idea what you are talking about. Things are different now from when you were my age. You just need to let me be myself and love me for who I am!" Kid suddenly feels just like she just delivered the best speech of her life and deserves a medal.
"For starters I am 39 and holding. Second of all I know exactly what I am talking about. You are 14 years old. You are not auditioning for Girls Gone Wild. I do love you for who you are, but I also have enough sense as a parent that your picture is inappropriate and as your mother it is my job to make sure you make wise choices. Now for the love of all that is Holy, take the picture down now before I make you stand on the side of the road holding a sign that says My mom is punishing me for posting slutty pictures of myself on social media!"
"I hate you!"
"I will take your phone now, thank you."
Now I am not saying your parents will ALWAYS be right, but regardless they do have your best intentions at heart so just insert the Yes Mam and simply walk away. You generally sound dumb in your arguments anyways.
That was a totally logical explanation don't you think
Older kids have usually done something really stupid. Don't try to make us understand why you did what you did. Just sit there, take it, and keep saying yes mam. At this point in time it is also okay to insert an I'm sorry or you're totally right mom or I am a complete idiot, but don't talk too much because whatever you have done has probably got us completely wigging out. Whether you missed curfew, lied to us about where you were going to be, blew what was supposed to be your gas money on a new shirt from the mall and suddenly are out of gas on the side of the road, or any other stunt that involved you not thinking it all the way through, we aren't looking for your excuses. We already realize that your excuse was that you did not use your brain.
Remember when Vanessa went and had "BIG FUN" with the Wretched
Using my theory of saying yes ma'am will rarely ever be a fun experience for you because in turn it will mean that you're not getting your way. How you react in these circumstances heavily weighs on how we make decisions as parents in the future though so "no" today my quite possibly mean "yes" tomorrow. After every argument that Colby and I have, I will look at him and remind him by saying "what two words would have saved you all of this drama?" He simply drops his head and says "yes mam". In that moment he is reminded of how he could easily be doing something else at the present moment instead of whatever punishment he now has in store. So knock your moms socks off by trying this little trick out. I promise it will work in your favor.
