Today holds such promise & possibility...
Today holds such hope...
Today can be anything you want to create for it...
Today can hold great power...
Today can be the start of something big...
Today can change your life...
This week I am thankful for...
Check out others thankful lists at Sting My Heart.
A friend of mine took the picture and, no, they didn't know the shark was behind them.
I've been wanting to join this meme for some time, but, unfortunately, forgetfulness and a busy life keep getting in the way. The fact that I finally remember is a toot all by itself.
The good news of the week...
Whoo hoo for the Litz family!
Eat healthy this summer
Summertime ...and the living is easy, the fun is frequent, and the food is often full of fat! Hamburgers, hot dogs, ice cream...you get the idea.
What about at your house? Have unhealthy pounds crept up on you and your kids? Before you start thinking “diet” – reframe your thoughts to “healthy lifestyle” instead.
7 Fun Facts About Me
I've been tagged by a new friend, Lisa, at The Scrap Princess.
Here are the rules...
1. List these rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 facts about yourself on your blog.
3. Tag 7 people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.
My 7 facts; some funny, some sweet, all about me...
1. I grew up in Erie, Pennsylvania. At one time, we actually lived in a house boat on the water. Not a good thing!
2. I've been scrapbooking for over 25 years. Archivally, for ten years.
3. I hate being 40 years old.
4. I have a fun, strange, sweet, dry, silly sense of humor.
5. I was a sweet, innocent girl (no laughing) until my senior of high school. Then, the bad attitude of hormones kicked in... (lots of stories here).
5. My children are the most important thing to me in the world.
6. My friends are my chosen family.
7. I love my Mt. Dew. I drink approximately 5 cans a day. Yes, my doctors know. I was told that I could reduce the amount but I could never stop drinking it all together because it would have adverse affects on my body.
Those 7 people anxiously waiting to be tagged...
1. Phyllis at Scrappy and Happy in Ohio.
2. Tracey at Grace Comes By Hearing.
3. Sheila at To Love, Honor, and Vacuum.
4. Norma Ann at The Mommy Project.
5. Carolyn at Scrapping Servant.
6. Rachel at Max's Mom.
7. Kristen at CIDP and Me.
Don't forget to link back here. I'd love to read your list.
Today is Memorial Day... let’s remember and give thanks.
Memorial Day recognizes the men and women who have died in war. With American troops stationed all around the world, it’s important to acknowledge the courage and sacrifice of those who defend our country. On this Memorial Day let us not forget those heroes who, over the years, have unselfishly sacrificed their lives to give us peace and freedom. Show your respect and gratitude to the military by helping their families.
Remember your family first.
Where the heart is willing, it will find a thousand ways.
Where it is unwilling, it will find a thousand excuses.
~~ Arlen Price ~~
We often hear this term: Freedom isn’t free.
But, what does that really mean and if Freedom isn’t free, then what is the cost and who pays it?
The cost is watching someone you love go away for a long period of time where there is little contact as they endure the rigors and hardships of training.
The cost is watching someone you love serve for pay that doesn’t always cover what it takes to live a standard of living most civilians enjoy and suffering a financial impact that can negatively alter a military family’s prosperity for a lifetime.
The cost is deployment to combat and the hardships of a soldier far from home while in a hostile place.
The cost is a loved one leaving whole but coming home less than whole, physically, mentally or both.
The cost is a a loved one who never returns from a mission and is never found.
The cost is having to take another’s life, even if they are the enemy, and living with that the rest of your life.
The cost is watching a close friend die, maybe even holding them in your arms, help less to save them and living a life of remembering that moment and feeling guilty that it wasn’t you who died instead of the close friend.
The cost is a family waiting and watching 24 / 7, hoping and praying as they watch daily newscasts about our military personnel dying.
The cost is a knock at the door no family wants but is a special privilege of sacrifice and if not borne by some, then who would bear it?
The cost is family trees altered for all time to come.
The cost is a lifetime of love.
Freedom isn’t free and the cost is high.
~~ Robert Stokely ~~
This week I am thankful...
I am thankful I am able to volunteer at the children's school.
I am thankful that the annual AR Fun Fair is over.
I am thankful for the overall good health of my children.
I am thankful for the medication to help with my bipolar, fibromyalgia, polyneuropathy, and other health issues.
I am thankful for the wonderful surprises I have received this week.
How do you know if your baking powder is still good?
You can test the freshness of baking powder by simply adding two tablespoons of baking powder to a cup of hot water. If the water foams, the baking powder is still useable.
To get more useful tips on many different topics, check out Works for Me Wednesday at Rocks in My Dryer (http://rocksinmydryer.typepad.com/).
Show Them What They’re Worth
Would you take a million dollars for your children? How about ten million or 100 million? Of course, if given the choice between money and your child, you would choose your child. However, you may choose other things over your children without even thinking about it. Things like watching TV, sitting at your computer, or talking on the phone. When this happens often, it sends a message to the child that whatever you are doing is more important or worth more to you than they are.
Learn simple ways to demonstrate to your child how much they are worth to you.
Remember your family first.
I waited in line so I could add my name to the log so I could continue to do my advocacy work.
After asking my name and address, they asked the more personal questions that I am starting to dread.
Your marital status?
Single. I think since I have been divorced for over 10 years now that the statistical data shouldn't count as divorced but as single, especially since I am a single mother.
Your age?
40. I sigh a big sigh.
It's May and in two months, in July, I'll be 41. When does a woman become a spinster? Did I enter spinsterhood a decade ago when I hit thirty? Am I spinster now because I am forty? Or would the women's movement grant me a reprieve so I don't enter the old maid's category until I reach fifty or sixty? In some circles, I'm considered a spinster because I am single and don't date.
However, I have children... so does that change my status?
My mother isn't reticent about reminding me that my biological clock is ticking. I already have children and I have already had a hysterectomy so what exactly is ticking? And do I want my body to be ticking?
Why does the word spinster dredge up awful images and heartless thoughts?
spin-ster (spnstr)
NOUN:
1. A woman who has remained single beyond the conventional age for marrying.
2. A single woman.
3. An unmarried or single woman; used in legal proceedings as a title, or addition to the surname.
4. A woman of evil life and character.
5. An elderly unmarried woman.
6. Someone who spins (who twists fibers into threads).
At the time of this posting, I was happy to be a spinster; but after finding and reading the definitions above, I'm not so sure.
Angry Children, Worried Parents: Helping Families Manage Anger
Parents worry when their children struggle with anger. Angry feelings and behavior can be especially challenging for children who have learning and attention problems. To help parents address this problem, Sam Goldstein, Ph.D., Robert Brooks, Ph.D., and Sharon Weiss, M.Ed. have teamed up to co-author a new book, Angry Children, Worried Parents: Seven Steps to Help Families Manage Anger (Specialty Press, 2004). This practical book presents a step-by-step program to help parents understand the causes of anger in children and to design a program to help their children learn to manage angry feelings and behavior.
What is Anger?
We all become angry at times. Anger is a natural human emotion, one of many responses we can express when we are frustrated and prevented from reaching our goals. Since anger is a universal emotion, it seems logical to conclude that there is nothing wrong with feeling angry. The problem occurs when anger leads to inappropriate actions or behavior. The problem, then, is not being angry but dealing with angry feelings in an ineffective way.
Childhood experiences as well as inborn temperament powerfully influence the way parents express anger and teach their children to manage anger. How do you respond when you’re angry? Do you become cynical or overreact? Do you yell? Do you hit your children? How did your parents respond to you when you were angry as a child? Did they punish you? Did they shame or blame you? Do you have a tough time dealing with anger because your parents didn’t know how to deal with it?
We choose to view anger as a signal, an indication to the individual that a goal or outcome is being blocked and that frustration is building. How children — or adults, for that matter — learn to respond to this signal will determine ultimately whether they manage anger or anger manages them. In response to anger, some blame others as the source of their problems. They use anger as fuel to drive and justify what they view as a necessary response. Yet anger is best viewed as a signal to take action rather than a sign of being treated unfairly.
What Role Does Anger Play in Everyday Life?
Anger begins as an emotion of varying intensity. It can be experienced as a mild irritation or as unbearable frustration. At the extreme end, particularly for children who are impulsive or inflexible, anger often leads to intense fury and rage. As with other emotions, anger is accompanied by physical and biological changes in the body. Heart rate and blood pressure increase. Levels of certain hormones, such as adrenaline, increase, leading to other physical changes in the body. Some researchers have suggested that aggression in response to anger may be instinctual. They believe that anger may be a natural, adaptive response to stress, allowing people to respond to a perceived threat and defend themselves. Therefore, a certain amount of anger is likely necessary for survival, even in our complex, civilized society. But when defense occurs in the absence of true provocation, anger becomes a liability. It also becomes a liability when we react verbally or physically in an extreme way to angry feelings, when children are unable to modulate anger, or when problems occur at home, on the playground, and in the classroom.
Teaching Anger Management
The goal of teaching children anger management is to reduce excessive reactions when angry and to develop skills to use anger as a signal to redirect their behavior. As with learning to swim or ride a bicycle, as you begin to work with your child it is important to be patient. Not all children learn to swim in the first lesson or master riding a bicycle that first day. Some children require much longer periods of practice to develop proficiency.
Keep in mind also that some children are born more likely to be irritable and easily angered. These symptoms usually appear at an early age. Yet, it is also important to remember that some children behave this way because they live in households in which they are exposed to models of poor anger management. Some children experience both risks, leading to a significant probability that they will struggle to learn to manage anger effectively. Some of these children may require professional help.
The primary goal is to help children and adolescents express anger in an assertive rather than aggressive manner. This means they are neither pushy nor demanding, but learn to be respectful advocates for themselves. This also means that they learn to cope with, not simply suppress, their anger. Suppression is only a partially effective strategy. When angry feelings are suppressed they often emerge later on, usually in an excessive way in response to a minor event related to an earlier anger-provoking experience. Suppressed anger is also thought to contribute to passive-aggressive behavior such as getting back at people indirectly without telling them why or confronting them directly. It also fuels cynical or hostile behavior, leading children to be excessively critical and fault-finding.
Anger Management Strategies
There are steps parents can take to help their children deal more comfortably, effectively, and adaptively with anger. These interrelated steps include:
1. Serve as appropriate models for your children. Remember that children don’t always do what we say. They are more often likely to do what we do. Thus, a key component of teaching anger management is for you, the adult, to manage anger and model effective anger coping strategies for your children.
2. Be empathic. As you teach your children to express anger constructively, place yourself in their shoes. Ask yourself such questions as:
“Am I speaking to my children so they will learn from me rather than resent me?”
“Would I want anyone to speak with me the way I am speaking with my children?”
If we do not consider our children’s perspective, we are likely to say or do things that may actually work against helping our children learn to deal constructively with anger.
3. Involve your child as much as possible in the process of dealing effectively with anger. Even young children can be engaged in a discussion that includes consideration of:
a. what makes us angry.
b. what are different options for dealing with anger.
c. what might be the consequence of each option, and
d. what option might be most effective.
When we enter into such a dialogue, we reinforce the belief in children that they can learn to control anger rather than have anger control them. This provides a sense of ownership, self-discipline, and resilience.
4. Remember the adage, “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” Engage in prevention and “planned parenting.” Notice when certain situations are especially difficult or frustrating for your child and prepare a “plan of action” in advance. For example, if your child gets frustrated when going into a store, wishing to have every item in sight, you can say before going in, “You can select one item. You let me know which one you would like to have.” If even this kind of preparation does not work, it may be a signal that your child is not yet ready to accompany you in the store. Or, if your child “fights” about going to bed and you find yourself trying to cajole him for an hour, it might be helpful to provide your child a sense of ownership and avoid a struggle by saying, “Do you want me to remind you 10 minutes or 15 minutes before bedtime that it’s time to get ready?” Prevention also involves providing clear and realistic expectations, following a flexible but predictable structure, and being consistent.
5. Discipline in a way that lessens frustration and anger and reinforces self-discipline. All parents can become frustrated, at times, with their children, but when parents respond to their children’s anger by screaming, yelling, or spanking, they are unintentionally reinforcing the very behaviors they wish to stop. A parent who screams or spanks is communicating such messages as: “We handle frustration through anger,” or “As long as I am bigger than you are, it’s okay for me to shout and hit.” Parents who remain calm while disciplining, who have clear expectations, who use realistic, natural, and logical consequences, and who remember that discipline is a teaching process, will lessen outbursts of anger in their children, while reinforcing self-control.
6. Show your children unconditional love and spend “special times” with them. While these behaviors can be placed under the heading of “prevention” (step Four), we believe that they are so important they deserve their own section. When parents accept their children and show them unconditional love, children are less likely to become very frustrated or intensely angry. When parents spend time alone with each of their children in such activities as playing with them, reading to them at bedtime, going out for snack or to a game, they have opportunities to develop a positive relationship. Such a relationship will provide the foundation for teaching children self-discipline and assisting them in managing frustration and anger constructively.
Even in the best functioning families, children may be angry at times with parents. Parents may be angry with children and children may experience anger regarding other issues or people outside of the home. The key issue is how we choose to deal with our angry feelings as parents, and how effective we are at helping our children develop strategies to learn to manage anger. We believe that one of the most important tasks of parenting is to help children become skilled at anger management.
Adapted from Angry Children, Worried Parents by Sam Goldstein, Ph.D., Robert Brooks, Ph.D., and Sharon K. Weiss, M.Ed.
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