Rosalind Wiseman

Now that we’ve finally got this fantastic new website up and running I was thinking I’d do a “parenting challenge” every now and then to encourage moms and dads to ditch one of those reactive parenting habits we’re all guilty of from time to time. So sane parenting challenge #1 is:

I challenge you to stop instantaneously sending an email when you’re mad or frustrated with someone. Instead, think about what you want to say, verify your understanding of events with a more objective third party, and then meet with the person face to face. Email should only be used to set up the when and where of this meeting. Resist the urge to get into the what!

From Creative Commons, Flikr.com

And if you can’t control yourself and you just have to send an email, at the very least don’t CAPITALIZE anything. It doesn’t get your point across. It just makes you look crazy.

Why am I saying this? Because I’ve seen these emails between parents or teachers and it’s not pretty. I swear I never get over my shock of seeing how patronizing people can be while simultaneously leaping to conclusions which can be easily refuted. Sometimes it can be absolutely ridiculous. One of my recent favorites was from a 5th grade parent who described an incident in the school hallway involving her daughter as if the parent was standing right there. Of course she wasn’t—her daughter came home after she got in trouble and told her mom her version of the facts—which of course she is entitled to. But it didn’t even occur to this parent that

1. her daughter was spinning the events because she wanted to get out of trouble and
2. there could be another side of the story

And all of this drama could be so easily avoided if you follow the same advice we give our kids! So please, when your child comes home and tells you something and your immediate reaction is, “I’m going to get to the bottom of this!” and you sit down to write a terse email: walk away from the computer! Or at the very least, write a draft and then save it until you can read it later with a calmer eye.

How do you know if you’re relaxed enough to keep a level head in this conflict? Check your pulse–if your heart rate is anywhere between “just got off the treadmill” or even “brisk walk,” you may want to wait a while. Then, when you’re ready, you call the parent/teacher/person in question and say, “My daughter just came home and told me X. Do you think that is accurate or do you have other information that I should know about?” Be prepared to listen to another perspective and accept that you might not know the whole story. Just because someone shares information you hadn’t heard doesn’t make your child a liar, but it’s easy to see why if a kid is reporting a problem to you the information that reflects on them well and conveniently leaves out their unflattering reciprocations.

In the words of a 6th grade girl I recently spoke to:

“I’m honest to my parents if I’m bullied, I’m not if I’m in the middle, and if I’ve done something wrong I don’t want to tell. So I tell my mom the minor things–the little mean things. But not everything I’ve done.”