Growing Up Again: Parenting Ourselves, Parenting Our Children

This includes implementing nurture and structure so well that the child, over time, learns to trust the adult not only to be present, but also to be competent.

When danger threatens, the impulse to fight or flee floods the body with ready energy. But survival in the urban jungle requires different skills than the ones our ancestors used in dealing with wild animals. Now the best way to survive is often not to fight or flee, but to flow. This requires thinking skills and self-discipline to overcome the imp

Competence and a feeling of well-being or self-esteem are important for both children and parents. We build our self-esteem by recognizing the positive and the negative messages and experiences life has offered us, and by making healthy decisions about those offerings. Nurture and structure help us do this. A balance of loving nurture and consisten

SRC stands for the psychological hunger for stimulation, recognition, and certainty. These three human hungers, present in all of our lives, are so powerful that sometimes they even push aside needs for sleep or food.

So, here it is. A triangle that offers options. A helpful way to look at our own behavior and that of others. A hopeful guide to help us get our needs met and improve the ways we interact with others.

In order to decide which rules are to be negotiable and which are to be nonnegotiable, parents need to be clear and straight about their own values and about what is safe and what is unsafe, what is helpful and what is not helpful.

Even though abusive attention is harsh, children will make use of this kind of attention to stay alive in the absence of any other recognition.

Ed: “I felt ashamed because I didn’t feel loved. Now I try to earn your love by anticipating your wants and needs. If you have to ask me to do something, I feel like a failure for not having noticed your need. If you tell me that you love me, I have to figure out something to do to deserve it.” New rule: I accept your love freely. I expect you to a

On the other hand, all structure and little nurture often result in stiffness. Nurture encourages us to hear and believe positive structure.