When Your Child Hates Everything

			Q: My 8-year-old son "hates" everything: the particular car driving down the street, the shirt I'm wearing, the kid next door, the color of the living room, the cashier at the grocery store, etc., etc. I am having trouble understanding this and how to deal with it. Any insights? A: I'm certain that this is a maddening place to be with your son and that it feels as if nothing will make him happy. I'm certain that any positive energy you try to send his way is met with resistance and negativity.
In order to reverse your child's perception of the world as negative, it will first take a new understanding of why he "hates" everything. When children's needs are met early in their development, their blueprint for the world becomes positive and optimistic. When a baby is crying and sending out stress signals, he is in need of nurturing and comforting care. When this is given to him, his system is shifted back to a state of regulation and the world is a good place-he develops a sense of optimism. If he is not cared for and if he is left on his own to navigate through his internal stress, the world becomes a scary place. Negative repetitious conditioning breeds an outlook of pessimism. No matter how much he cries, no matter what he does, he can't seem to convince his caretakers to help him. Helplessness and overwhelm prevail. For such a child, nothing is working, so his universal blueprint of "nothing being right" is being created. A child who "hates" everything is a child in a perpetual state of fear and dysregulation. His neurophysiological system has been programmed to see the world as half empty instead of half full. He truly doesn't know that everything is going to be all right. He really doesn't know that good always overcomes evil. Essentially, he is programmed to live an operatic tragedy instead of a light-hearted drama. Think about this...isn't it great to simply go to Netflix and pick out what kind of movie you want? Maybe it is a romantic comedy; maybe it is an action movie; maybe even during this Halloween season it is a horror flick. But in our own realities, we don't have the luxury of returning one life and checking out another so quickly. What we do have are three key elements to make significant changes to our life stories: 1) understanding, 2) relationship, and 3) plasticity. The first of these, understanding, was addressed in the beginning of this article. The second, relationships, is something that is always available to initiate. Healing happens in the context of relationships, and most fervently through the context of the parent-child relationship. And third, plasticity, is what an 8-year-old has plenty of. The brain continues to make major changes until we are 25 years old. Your child needs to know that the world is safe and good. In order to do this, it will take creating a deeper relationship with him. It will take helping him to express himself at a deeper level. The next time he makes a negative statement, such as, "I hate the shirt you are wearing," sit with him and listen to him. Ask him more about what he hates. Validate his negativity instead of trying to convince him of something more positive. "You really do hate this shirt. Wow. Help me understand how much you hate it. Tell me more." As he expresses himself, help him shift into the feelings behind these words. (It's really not about the shirt.) "How does that make you feel?" Essentially, his "I hate the world" statements are indicators of his own internal reality: "The world hates me and I don't even deserve to be in this world." When a child (or adult) feels this depth of darkness from within himself, it makes sense as to why all his comments are negative towards his external environment. Think about a time when you were just in a bad mood. Nothing seemed to be right; nothing seemed to be the way you wanted it to be. Your perception of the world matched your negative framework. So, it is the same with your child, simply at a deeper level within the core of his being. When you can help him to move into this core area within himself by listening, validating, maximizing, tolerating, accepting, and staying present with him, you'll be there in relationship to guide him towards feeling safe and loved. Thus, you'll be able to guide him to see that the world is good and hope does exist. It will take positive repetitious conditioning to do this for him (see Beyond Consequences, Logic, and Control, Chapter 3). The reason this works is because our neurological systems are "plastic." We have the ability to change and be molded, especially children. Your son is growing and developing everyday. He still has years ahead of him to create new neuropathways. Every interaction with you is an opportunity to literally change his brain and lay down new neuropatterns of positive thought and positive outlook. Work to stay in a place of understanding, keep yourself regulated, and know that through loving influence, you have the ability to create exactly the environment he needs for healing, hope, and optimism. Press on,
Heather T. Forbes, LCSW Parent and Author of Beyond Consequences, Logic & Control: Volume 1 & Volume 2, Dare to Love, and Help for Billy.

The Power of Negative Beliefs

				Q: My son had a terrible early childhood history and constantly tells me he is a bad boy and that nobody loves him. Yet, no matter how much we tell him what a good boy he is or how much we love him, nothing seems to help. How can he continually reject these positive messages? A: From the moment a child is born, the child is dependent on others to care for him, nurture him, and teach him about the world. The child has no other option but to trust that the
information being given to him is the truth. He has no filters...he accepts everything as fact. For a child who goes through early childhood trauma, he lives in a world of false messages that are absorbed as truth. Everything that is said to him becomes his reality. Everything that is done to him becomes a reflection of who he is. For example, if a child is emotionally abused and told he is worthless, that he won't amount to anything, or that the parent wishes he was never born, this child's internal belief system develops from these messages. This child believes he is worthless. His belief is that he is not lovable and that he should not be on the planet earth. Neurologically, we know that neurons that fire together wire together. So this belief system becomes ingrained and accepted at a deep subconscious and neurological level. These beliefs lay down the neural circuitry that then governs how this child behaves and responds to life events. We then place this child in a different, more loving family. He is told that he is wonderful, that he is good, and that he is loved. The external messages are now in conflict with the internal messages. Which one do you think is stronger and louder? Of course, it is the internal voice of negativity that will dominate. There is a profound gap between what others say and what the child's internal framework is saying, preventing this child from easily accepting any new messages beyond that which he already knows. The human brain is programmed to reject any belief that is not congruent (not the same) as one's own view. Think about this from your own perspective. When someone comes up with a different belief than you have, what is your first reaction? You reject it. You dismiss this person as being on the fringe and you move on, maintaining your own reality in your mind. You might even argue with this person, defending your position in order to "save face" and to protect your own belief system. Now back to the child in this example, the parent then tries to lovingly parent this child and to give this child positive messages of self-esteem and self-worth. Yet, what the parent doesn't realize is that the parent is up against the power of belief—up against the child's neurological mapping. No matter how many times this parent tells his new son, "I love you." or "You are a wonderful child." or similar positive messages, the old belief system of not being worthy and not being good enough continues to prevail. It is as if these messages are impervious to this child. These positive messages simply slide off the child as if there is a Teflon coating. The reason is that these new messages are being given to the child at a cognitive level and are simply cognitive experiences. Yet, emotions play a powerful role in neural processing, much greater than language and cognition. In order to break through the old negative beliefs of this child, the parent has to dig deep within himself to interact with this child at a deeply profound emotional level. Love has the power to do this. While the emotion of fear keeps this child locked in this negative belief system, it is also true that the emotion of love will release this child from this negative belief system. It takes parenting this child in a loving, safe, and emotionally available manner. And it won't be just one experience, but several experiences, over and over again, with this child being met at an emotional level, in order for new neural pathways to be created. A new belief system is possible. It takes time, patience, understanding, tolerance, perseverance, and most importantly, emotional impact. For more information on a child's negative belief system and more concrete and practical ways to help him "re-write" them, see Chapter 5 of my latest book, "Help for Billy". Love never fails…it simply takes learning how to love our children from their perspective and going beyond routine cognitive experiences. Press on,
Heather T. Forbes, LCSW Parent and Author of Beyond Consequences, Logic & Control: Volume 1 & Volume 2, Dare to Love, and Help for Billy.

Celebrate and Stop the Crazy Loop

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 Q: I have a 15-year-old son who has established a pattern of running away. I've been advised to call the police when this occurs. What do you suggest?

 A:  Running away is indicative of a child who has entered a fear state. When we, and all animals in the animals become threatened, we go into a primitive response called the "Fight or Flight" response. It is an inborn genetic response, which helps to protect us; it is a survival response.

With this understanding, it perplexes me to think that calling the police on a child in this survival response pattern would ever be recommended. Why would you call out the police to address a child who is simply acting from his body's primitive, automatic, inborn response? Your child is acting from an unconscious level. It isn't a conscious response. It is an unconscious reaction. Addressing it from an authoritarian and fear based approach will only keep your child in this pattern; hence, you described it as an "established pattern."

We have somehow come to believe that we can force change by provoking fear and threat. This is completely unnatural. Have you ever seen nature force a seedling to grow? This is a choice that has to come from an internal place from within that person.

To give such advice about sending the police is an example of doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result (this of course, is the definition of insanity). Statistics reveal that more than one in 100 adults in the United States have been in jail or prison. This is an all time high. When are we going to realize that this isn't working?

Our own fear keeps us in a constricted place, locked in from seeing other alternatives. Fear keeps us in a loop of trying harder, "upping the ante," and driving more consequences in order to get our children to behave and to be compliant.

Here is the traditional parenting crazy loop: 

-       For young children, we start by picking them up and putting them in the time-out chair.

-       When they get too old to sit in time out, we began removing privileges in order to get them to comply.

-       When this becomes ineffective with a "whatever" response from them, we increase the stakes and ground them for a week.

-       Finally, as teenagers, they realized they had the ability to just leave and run away.

-       Then we call in the big guns and call the police.

None of the craziness above is effective in the long-term, and only limited in the short-term.

This problem is, love has not been a part of the solution…that is why the cycle has continued. If you want to end the cyclical turmoil in a family, put love into action. Unfortunately, many of us have no blueprint for what this looks like, so it challenges us at a deep level to consider that it would actually work.

The next time your son runs away (and I also suggest looking closely at the circumstances that led up to this event and determine how much fear from both you and him contributed to the situation), I want you to plan a celebration for his return. Instead of calling the police, call the caterer! Seriously, bake a cake or some cookies. Make a banner that says, "Welcome home, son. We missed you."

When a child returns, what we typically do is dump our fear onto the child. Instead of saying, "I was scared for you," we say, "How dare you leave this house and not tell us where you were going!" We need to realize that it took a tremendous amount of courage for the child to walk back into that door, knowing the parent was going to lecture him about everything he had done wrong.

Put love into action when he walks in the next time. "Son, I'm so glad you're home. We missed you." It takes putting your fear aside and getting down to your core feelings. You did miss him. You are glad he is home. Let him know how special he is in your life. If you've lost these loving feelings towards your child due to the intense dysregulation going on, revisit pictures of when he was younger and when times were calmer and more pleasant. Get yourself back into a loving place with him.

Later in the day, take the time to be with your child and listen to him. Talk about what it is that drives him to leave. Really listen to him. Give him space to voice himself. Stay out of being defensive. Know that when he feels heard, he will be able to hear you. When you give him the gift of being understood, you then can take the opportunity to express your fear. "I just get so scared when you leave. When I don't know where you are, I can't do anything to help you at that point.  I also can’t do my ultimate job for you as a parent, and that is to keep you safe."

Be courageous enough to try something different. You have the capacity to interrupt the negative loop and to change this established pattern with your child. It takes trusting that love never fails.

More parenting solutions can be found at:
http://www.beyondconsequences.com/archive.html