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Why Children Say NO Even When They Feel Like Saying Yes
Hint: it’s not because they secretly want to drive us crazy.
Children are meant to cooperate with their parents. It’s because they are genetically programmed to do so — it’s a survival thing — and because they love us and we mean the world to them. We are the world to them.
Judging by all the NOs we get from them, however, the temper bursts, the meltdowns, and what appears to be an unceasing opposition that the little ones manifest, we often have the feeling that they just want to drive us crazy.
But here’s the crazy thing — “kids do well if they can.” You can tell by the quote marks that it wasn’t me who said it, but Ross Greene. He’s one of America’s most famous clinical child psychologists, so you might want to take his word for it.
If you come to accept that when children say NO, it actually has more to do with them than with you, you’re heading for a more fulfilling relationship with them.
Kids do well if they can
I hinted at the reason above, and Greene does excellent work explaining it in his “Raising Human Beings” book. Listening to their parents helps children survive. They instinctively know it. They also happen to love us. And they want to show it to us.
