Parenting and my special boys

Let’s pack happiness into our children so the baggage they take into adulthood is goodness, confidence, and kindness instead of packing bags of hurt, struggle, and loneliness that will weigh them down for life. ~L.R.Knost

I hope I can live by this goal and my beautiful boys, all four of them grow up to have happy lives, to impact the world in good and noble ways and leave a good mark. To be able to communicate with respect and show their feelings. To be around people that respect them and their voice. I feel too many times children are just shut out of the world, shut out by their parents and by their teachers, even told to shut up. Its such a horrible put down. to tell a person that your voice doesn't matter.

Parenting in a hard path to walk on, but children will grow up to become adults that are a reflection of words, the touch, the example, the behavior we have towards them, in front of them has a lasting effect. You see the most valuable things in life take time and effort to nurture.  Children of the next generation need to be looked after, not see their parents back to a computer screen or head ingraved into a phone or ipad.They need their parents faces in their hands, loving and protective. I am not saying catering to their every needs or whim. But giving quality time each day to each child  as a parent makes the decision to bring each child into this earth. May be some are not planned, but they are part of us and need to be looked after, not overlooked or neglected because we are busy!.

When I studied child development and abuses the worst form of punishment/abuse wasn't physical, or emotional, or spiritual but it was neglect. Down right neglect of a child's needs, not basic  needs for food, shelter and clothing, but neglect of their need for love, their need for warmth, their need for hugs and touch, their needs for positive affirmation of who their are, so many parents are busy, busy , busy that they don't give a simple hug and one second kiss to their child face at least once a day. That is sooo sad. I mean a generation of children with computer and mobile phone parents, cause they haven't knocked off work they have knocked out of reality to meet their needs to be affirmed, make their place in the world,  yet forgotten that small child needs them now. That small child will grow up into a teenager that will say , see ya later! Because parents need to give the most quality time when a child is most in need of them. 

If you have three children, give them equal love and time. If you have five children, give them love and equal quality time, even if it be five minters. If you have ten, do it. Because one day they will grow up in the blind of an eye and  they wont call home because you didn't call them to show love and care. This subject is so close to my heart. My mother had nine children, yes nine children and she never failed once to kiss us good night before going to bed each night when we were little. So parents if you have a lessor number, why is it so hard to show a little mercy to our children? They are the next generation, we want to leave better people for their planet, but people that have hold more pain in their heart, more hopelessness  more sadness or loneliness because their basic needs for love, care, positive touch were not meant at such a small and tender age!

They DO grow up and they DO move out quicker than one knows. Dont ever hesitate telling another human how much you love them. Yes they are hard at times, they test us at times, they leave us so tired at times, they cry, but they are valuable and need assistance and love and care. Yes I am going to emphasis this till the day I die. Treat our children with lots of love, lots of care, lots of LISTENING, lots of understanding and we may have a better world by making better little people.

A read a blog that describe how a  father couldn't understand why his daughter was fighting with him so much, He ask her to write a letter to communicate better. She wrote back " Okay, you asked, so I’ll tell you. You were always happy because you were always in control. Want to know why I don’t talk to you now? Because you never listened when I was little. When I was scared in my room at night and called you, you either ignored me or threatened to spank me if I didn’t go to sleep. I’d lay there, crying so hard I’d almost throw up, terrified of the sounds and shadows in my room, but even more terrified of you. So, sorry, but I don’t buy that you’re ‘there for me’ when it’s only ever been at your own convenience. When you were mad at something I’d done and I tried to explain myself, you’d call it backtalk and smack me in the mouth. So forgive me if I don’t really believe you when you say you want to ‘communicate’ with me now. When I’d try to show you a dance I’d made up or tell you about how someone had pushed me on the playground, you couldn’t even be bothered to look away from your stupid computer while I was talking, so if I’m wrapped up in my electronics, I learned that little trick from you, Father Dear. Oh, and reconnect? Really? That implies that we were once connected. when I was a little girl and invited you into my world and asked you to play with me, you were always too busy. So if you don’t understand me, sorry, but that invitation expired years ago. Want to know why I think you hate me? Because your actions told me so. Your ‘love’ is just words"

My question to you and myself, how 'there' are we to each of our children?

May we be better parents to our children and to others children. I love you my 14 year old Nabil, my 9 year old Ayyub Yahya, my six year old Ebraahim and my eigth month old Shuaib Yunus. May my words be always in action ameen.

    

Toddlers tantrums-understanding and advice

Babies and toddlers primary and secondary  experiences within the family context,especially in the first two years will have a huge bearing on how they learns about the social and emotional world of self, others and objects.  Satisfactory attachment is essential to emotional development in this development time.

 Parental patterns of reacting and interaction with baby and toddler shapes their behavior and perception of the world. I do know its very normal for toddlers to have an intense feelings such as  dislike, frustration, jealousy that cause tantrums. Toddlers do not have the ability to control their emotions and inhibitions. Emotions are being experiences that are new and can actually frightening a young child as to how to handle frustration, sadness, anger, hurt etc.They're a normal part of development and don't have to be seen as something negative. That is their way to deal with the stress in there life. 

Toddlers are generally unable to verbalize their feelings, often not having the words to describe their fears and worries, nor are they able to take positive action towards managing stress when it arises.As language skills improve, tantrums tend to decrease. She can understand alot of what is going on but cant yet grasp how to handle it.

Parents may have feelings of frustration, annoyances, and confusion as to what is going wrong and why, which  is very normal when entering a different stage of child development stage, namely the toddler years. Toddlers will be doing simple experiments in cause and effect in their real life encounters   with others, including in their relationships with others.Items that are taken from them can cause them great emotional pain, as they associate a toy or something they have as an extension to themselves.

 Temperament plays into it also, whereby some characters find it haredr to get along with others as much as other toddlers there age.Some cultural background do not  understand expectations of children and toddlers behavior so a high amount of negative discipline may occur. Toddlers  are at a age where  wants more autonomy and attention and needs active, positive encouragement of the boundaries to be set. They don't have the memory recall to remember that she/he shouldn't do an action or touch something etc. Thats why we end up saying the  same thing over and over till about the age of 4 years :) :)

 Negative behavior or negative discipline, such as shouting or a smacking, will only increase her/his frustration and sense of insecurity. What is needed is compassion, calmness from parents,  to     teach them the all-important life skills of learning to reduce their negative responses to stress.

 Relaxation skills form an important part of self-coping skills for toddlers and children and, when learned effectively, can stay with them throughout their lives. I find what helps is trying to give toddlers some control over little things. This may fulfill the need for independence and ward off tantrums.

Khadija

In the course of researching an article about crawling (of all
things), I can across some absolutely beautiful words by Dr. Alan
Green, pediatrician:

"This is our goal:  to provide a nurturing environment where a child
can develop at his optimum pace.  We don't want to hurry him; we do 
want to encourage him.  We also want to identify anything that may be
an obstacle in his path."

He then advises a concerned grandmother to "observe your grandson's
spontaneous play.  This will give you the best clues to the 
developmental tasks that are important for him to learn next.
Children tend to be most excited about skills they are on the brink of
mastering.  If you try to engage him in an activity that is beneath
his developmental level, he will quickly get bored.  If you try to 
interest him in something that he is not yet ready for, he will become
upset.  (Note:  babies don't tend to cry when they fail, but rather
when the activity isn't at the right developmental level)...Provide 
situations where he can teach himself through playful exploration.
Forced teaching hinders development."

(source:  www.drgreene.org/body.cfm?id=21&action=detail&ref=354 )

Totally Agree

I get some great emails, and I agree with the qualities this sister was writing about have a read. Enjoy! and put into practice!

Do you want to improve your life? Do you want to be more awesome, but just don’t know how to go about peeling off the unnecessary layers?
> I’ve put together a list of 79 ways you can improve your life which I will be sharing with you for the next few months.
>
> So share these gems with your family and friends and join my facebook page
> http://www.facebook.com/zakiaaftabusmani for more interesting articles and posts.
>
> Here we go!!!!!!
>
> 1. Care
> If you want to be awesome, you have to care. Care about the people around you and even people you’ve never met.
>
> 2. Give Value
> We all have something to share. Always focus on what you can do for others. What do you love and what are you good at (or want to become good at)?
>
> 3. Be honest
> Honesty feels good and is the right thing to do. But why do many choose to lie instead? Most often it’s because it makes their life easier, or does it? It usually might seem like it in the short-term, but in the long-term, honesty always wins.
>
> 4. Be honorable
> Be honorable and respectable. This means doing the right things, keeping promises and in general, being someone who does the right thing.
>
> 5. Integrity
> Having integrity for me means being ethical and following a moral code that is both practical and benefits all of humanity. It’s idealistic, but it is certainly worth striving for, isn’t it?
>
> 6. Follow your passion
> Find your passion and follow it. Never give up. There is always a way to make a living doing what you love. It may not come in the form you think, so be open-minded.
>
> 7. Take responsibility
> You are responsible for your life. There is no one to blame. If you’re not happy with your life or with your circumstances, you are the only one that can take responsibility and start changing it. What are you waiting for?
>
> 8. Be positive
> Being just a little bit more positive can mean a lot of things. Reading a good book, checking out positive quotations or even learning new skills that you enjoy. The possibilities are endless. Even though being positive is cliché and kind of irritating, it is still useful.
>
> 9. Take action
> You can dream and you can wonder, but nothing happens without taking action consistently. You don’t have to be perfect. Learn as much as you need to know the next step and take action!
>
> 10. Focus on your strengths
> Stop trying to fix your weaknesses. You can’t be perfect. Focus on your strength and let other people do what you’re bad at.
>
> Wishing you the very best.
>
> Wassalam
> Zakia Usmani
> http://www.facebook.com/zakiaaftabusmani

Power of acknowledgement

I have been thinking why do we have such a need to have people acknowledge our existence? I know people that need others to constantly give attention to, and others that are very famously happy to be by themselves, in their own world. I think we all go thru stages when we can be bits of both, but the personality of a person I believe is kind of "set" in a certain matter, changing ever soo slowly as the years go by. You can see when a person wants to change their inner character when one sees modification in the way they speck, act and interact with others, when experiences, inner thinking, meeting goals and people all help that modification to a better or thats face it, worst human bean.

I have seen primary school children do this, write out a list of the "good' people and "bad" people in their lives.Since I was a child, I have done that over the years...write out a list of friends and cross out the ones I no longer click with, broken my trust or devalue who i am in some way. Of course excuse are made and modificates to find something "good' in that friendship to allow it the float the sea of time. Its funny to see that who is left, in many ways, are the ones that, like you, have weakness and faulths and some great qualities, but are trying....making effort to be a better person, or a person very much intune to themselves. What i mean, these friends, eventhou very different in character, care about others. They show you, as a friend that I do care about you in some way. One may not talk to them or see them offen...but you know in your heart this person values you

So that takes me to my original question of why is it people need to be acknowledge of there existence. I believe the answer is everyone to some degree needs to be valued, if not they will not exist for long. It goes back to Erickson and others belief that if a child is given physical need, such as food, shelter, etc but no attention, no love, no touch, they well not thrive. This has been proven many times. So we must not understimate the power of a smile, the power of a hug, the power of a touch and the power of listening. Try it, listening and aknowledging a person is not a ease as it seems, but when done in a matter of care and warm, it can be one the most powerful and life changing experience for some. With that the Prophet Muhammed SAW always had a smile on his face, and I hope that you and I can find something to smile about everyday of our lives ameen ;)

The characteristics of the seeker of happiness

The Characteristics of the Seeker of Happiness“…The seeker of Allah and the Hereafter – rather, the one who seeks to obtain all knowledge, productiveness, and leadership, such that he is a leader who is taken as an example in all of this – should be brave, bold, in control of his whims, and not under the control of his imagination. He should be abstinent from everything except that which he is after, passionate about what he has turned his face towards, knowing the path to it, as well as the paths which lead away from it.He should be bold in his aspiration, firm in his resolve, and not swayed from his goal by the blame of the blamers or the discouragement of the discouragers.He should generally be tranquil, constantly in thought, and not be moved by the sweetness of a compliment or the pain of criticism.He should be forthcoming in providing himself with what he needs to help him obtain his goal, and should not be incited by those who oppose him.His slogan should be patience, and his rest should be his fatigue, and he should love to have the best manners.He should make the best of his time, not mixing with the people except in a most cautious state, just like a bird that quickly comes down to snatch a morsel from between two people.He should stand over himself, encouraging himself by way of hope and fear, and should seek to be outstanding amongst his group…” My mother pass me this advice and I loved it, hope you enjoy. author Ibn al Qayyim