The child who has the goal of avoidance seems to be saying with their actions and words, “Leave me alone.” The parent in this situation feels helpless or irritated by their behavior.
Children seeking avoidance may demonstrate one or more of the following behaviors:
Thinking everyone can do things better than him
Being afraid of new situations, meeting new people, etc.
Fearing criticism, or falling apart when criticized
Reluctance to try new things
Tendency to isolate
Wanting to numb out in front of TV
Avoiding sports or other competitive activities
Refusal to try
Feeling like she can never win
Feeling consistently over-powered by others
Acts as though she is resigned to being a loser
Giving up easily
Worrying excessively about failure
Saying negative things about self, i.e. “I’m stupid”, “No one likes me”, “I can’t do it.”
Seeking isolation from others
Parents often react to this child in non-productive ways, such as:
Coaxing
Feeling inadequate as a parent
Feeling sorry for your child
Feeling frustrated because nothing you do seems to work
Doing things for the child that you shouldn’t
Rescuing
Getting impatient
REDIRECTING THE GOAL OF AVOIDANCE
Earlier in this session we discussed the three steps to redirecting children’s behavior.
Check your emotional state.
Understand what your child is trying to communicate.
Meet the unmet need or redirect the behavior.
Now that you have an understanding of what your child is communicating and how you might typically react, it's time to do step 3.
Express confidence in the child’s ability to do well
Create situations in which the child can feel valuable and powerful
Help your child use encouraging self-talk
Arrange for small successes
Avoid doing things for the child
Avoid coaxing
Break down tasks into accomplishable steps
Ask them to do one more (explained in Session 2, Lesson 1: “22 Ways to Enhance Your Child’s Self Image”.)
Here is an ineffective response to the goal of avoidance:
The teacher notices that nine-year-old Natalie is doodling on her worksheet.
She says, “Natalie you haven’t finished your worksheet!”
“I can’t,” mutters Natalie, “I’m stupid.”
“Oh, no you are not. You can do this. Just try,” coaxes the teacher.
Natalie puts her head on the desks and starts to snivel.
“Oh, Honey, don’t cry,” says the teacher in a pitying tone of voice.
Here is an effective response to the goal of avoidance:
The teacher notices that nine-year-old Natalie is doodling on her worksheet. She says, “Natalie, you haven’t finished your worksheet!”
“I can’t,” mutters Natalie, “I’m stupid.”
“What do you think will happen if you continue to tell yourself that?”
“I’ll be stupid!” Natalie answers, perking up a bit.
“Perhaps. What do you think might be a more helpful thing to tell yourself?”
“I don’t know,” says Natalie.
“What if you say you can do one more?” suggests the teacher.
“I can do that!” Natalie brightens as she starts to do one more problem on the worksheet.
In the first example, the teacher has inadvertently taught Natalie that a good strategy is to convince someone to feel sorry for you. In the effective response, the teacher has taught her a valuable skill to help her when she gets stuck in life: to change her self-talk. It is our discouraging self-talk that often prevents us from achieving the results we want.
