Are you lucky parents blessed with great kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If so...how much is family culture, nature vs nurture, community, luck, SES?

What makes your kids great IYO?

Age, gender and birth order of your kids.

Hi op !

Your thread title mentions “blessed.” Seldom mentioned thus far is: church.

Faith provided our 2 with the spiritual foundation for life. Without faith, the common tween/ teenage question of “why?” is left completely unanswered, and too often, faithless teens conclude on their own:

“why bother? What does any of this matter?”

Faith has been a consistent part of our children’s lives since birth (and we come from a multicultural/ multi faith Christian background). We opted to raise them Lutheran rather a Catholic (although we affirm our belief in one, holy, catholic church). We have embraced the family values which come along with our Christian faith traditions.

It’s been an effort. Yes, it “cost” us so many Sunday mornings. And often they were in school 7 days per week (including Saturday language school).

But now as teens, it is all paying off. They get it. They know “why.”

That's funny, because I left the Catholic Church because I believed their answer to "why" was fundamentally wrong and damaging.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Other people sometimes ask what I’m doing with my son, who is excited to learn, polite to adults, an hard worker and a great reader. I always demure and say “Oh but your kid is great because xyz!” but I will share with DCUM: He was born pretty easygoing and happy. He was always going to be a sensitive and bright kid. He had tantrums and meltdowns like any other kid, but we did not give in to them, and we helped him harness his energy (ADHD?) into appropriate channels.

Things I do think helped:

Having him to join things from a young age including team sports- has taught him how to make friends and be part of a group. He is comfortable in new situations now (which I never am myself!).

Putting him in music and enforcing daily practice. I attend every 40 minute lesson and take copious notes, even have my own copy of the music so we can practice together. - has taught him how to tackle hard things and stick with something in the long term.

Zero screens from birth until preschool, and even now at 9 yo he averages maybe a couple of hours per month. He does work on an iPad at school, nothing I can realistically do about that. Letting him be bored at home, in the waiting room, on airplanes, etc has helped so much.

Filling the house with books. We have over 1,000 books and read a lot. He knows how to sit in silence. He is never bored.

Having one meal, no “kids’ food.” He can and will eat anything. Same with cultural events and restaurants. He can sit through a fancy restaurant 10 course meal or a piano concert and enjoy both, simply because we have exposed him to those things and normalized them.

And because he's a kid who can handle that. Plenty of people have done the same as you with food and events but still ended up with a picky eater and/or a kid who doesn't enjoy concerts and long dinners out.

[Anonymous]

Lucky. Two boys - 13 and 16. It’s mostly because of who they are and only some of it is because of our parenting. They have their challenges (dyslexic/ADHD) and they aren’t perfect but they’re just really good people.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If so...how much is family culture, nature vs nurture, community, luck, SES?

What makes your kids great IYO?

Age, gender and birth order of your kids.

Define what you consider 'great' first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My three are now young adults and they are great and we are very proud of them. We took parenting very seriously starting with creating a very happy home life. We have a very loving marriage which I think creates a very good environment to grow up in. I don’t think we ever argued in front of them because we never argue. We always lived below our means and we often talked about the importance of working hard and saving money. We always made time for them in terms of their interests be it sports, dance etc. Both my husband and I grew up in very happy households so we had very good role models.

This part in bold is a central theme in the excellent parenting book, Bady-Wise.

Baby wise has actually been rejected akthough nothing wrong with having a happy marriage

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Other people sometimes ask what I’m doing with my son, who is excited to learn, polite to adults, an hard worker and a great reader. I always demure and say “Oh but your kid is great because xyz!” but I will share with DCUM: He was born pretty easygoing and happy. He was always going to be a sensitive and bright kid. He had tantrums and meltdowns like any other kid, but we did not give in to them, and we helped him harness his energy (ADHD?) into appropriate channels.

Things I do think helped:

Having him to join things from a young age including team sports- has taught him how to make friends and be part of a group. He is comfortable in new situations now (which I never am myself!).

Putting him in music and enforcing daily practice. I attend every 40 minute lesson and take copious notes, even have my own copy of the music so we can practice together. - has taught him how to tackle hard things and stick with something in the long term.

Zero screens from birth until preschool, and even now at 9 yo he averages maybe a couple of hours per month. He does work on an iPad at school, nothing I can realistically do about that. Letting him be bored at home, in the waiting room, on airplanes, etc has helped so much.

Filling the house with books. We have over 1,000 books and read a lot. He knows how to sit in silence. He is never bored.

Having one meal, no “kids’ food.” He can and will eat anything. Same with cultural events and restaurants. He can sit through a fancy restaurant 10 course meal or a piano concert and enjoy both, simply because we have exposed him to those things and normalized them.

Do you have one child?

[Anonymous]

I use to oversee a substance abuse non profit that was focused on young families and the importance of good parenting and modeling the right behaviors. Over and over again I saw children who misbehaved and caused problems in school and had parents who were in denial that their child was a problem. Many of those parents had their own problems in their marriages caused by many things. But even parents who modeled good behavior had no guarantee. Genetics play a role and sometimes they can’t be overcome. Some of it is just pure luck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Other people sometimes ask what I’m doing with my son, who is excited to learn, polite to adults, an hard worker and a great reader. I always demure and say “Oh but your kid is great because xyz!” but I will share with DCUM: He was born pretty easygoing and happy. He was always going to be a sensitive and bright kid. He had tantrums and meltdowns like any other kid, but we did not give in to them, and we helped him harness his energy (ADHD?) into appropriate channels.

Things I do think helped:

Having him to join things from a young age including team sports- has taught him how to make friends and be part of a group. He is comfortable in new situations now (which I never am myself!).

Putting him in music and enforcing daily practice. I attend every 40 minute lesson and take copious notes, even have my own copy of the music so we can practice together. - has taught him how to tackle hard things and stick with something in the long term.

Zero screens from birth until preschool, and even now at 9 yo he averages maybe a couple of hours per month. He does work on an iPad at school, nothing I can realistically do about that. Letting him be bored at home, in the waiting room, on airplanes, etc has helped so much.

Filling the house with books. We have over 1,000 books and read a lot. He knows how to sit in silence. He is never bored.

Having one meal, no “kids’ food.” He can and will eat anything. Same with cultural events and restaurants. He can sit through a fancy restaurant 10 course meal or a piano concert and enjoy both, simply because we have exposed him to those things and normalized them.

And because he's a kid who can handle that. Plenty of people have done the same as you with food and events but still ended up with a picky eater and/or a kid who doesn't enjoy concerts and long dinners out.

I think some picky eating is normal in kids, but it should be treated as a short phase. It needs to stamped out by age 4-6 IMO. I’m sure SOME will continue to be picky even with adults’ best efforts, but way too many kids are way too coddled these days by parents, restaurants, and society.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do think genetics plays a major role but I don't believe it's everything. I also think there are things people attribute to genetics that are something else, something that is still passed down from parents but is not DNA coded.

I come from a troubled family with violence and substance abuse. That's a legacy that was definitely handed down to me from both sides of my family, and that appears to go back at least several generations, to when both sides of my family immigrated to the US. The impact on me of those generations of poor parenting, domestic violence, and alchohol abuse is quite apparent. I'll probably never be completely free of it even though I've worked hard on my own and in therapy to process nd deal with it.

However, my own kid has not experienced any abuse. Never been hit or even yelled at. Two parents, intact family, zero substance abuse issues. Nurturing home, good communication, authoritative but not authoritarian parenting. Good peer group, lots of academic and enrichment opportunities. Good nutrition and healthy lifestyle.

I see myself in my kid all the time. I also see my parents. People in my family are generally very bright and academically adept -- I see that in her. She's also physically slight and not very athletic, also family traits. But I also see differences -- she is more confident in her self, not insecure. She accepts criticism more easily. She doesn't worry so much. She is emotionally steady and not prone to mood swings. She's easy to be around, well liked by classmates and teachers, intellectual curious, and funny. She's one of those great kids OP mentioned.

So it's like an experiment on nature versus nurture. She's only 10. Will she really escape the legacy of violence and abuse that I was born into? Are my choices and efforts enough to save her from that, or is it actually genetically coded. I believe, obviously, that in our case, the troubles are nurture, not nature. That several generations removed from whatever the original source of the violence and abuse was (poverty? war? oppression? I truly don't know), I can break a chain of generational violence through effort.

My experiment isn't over yet, but I do think it's nature AND nurture, and that the parenting choices you make are of central importance to the kind of kid you raise and how you send them out into the world. And a lot of what some might chalk up to genetics might be a different kind of legacy, one you actually have the power to change if you are so motivated.

I'd love to see you change autism.

PP here and this comment is really ironic because both my DD and I are on the spectrum. And no, you can't change autism -- I didn't say there aren't fixed genetic traits that people must find a way to live with. I said, genetics do matter. But I can tell you that my child is having a really different childhood experience with ASD than I did, because where I was constantly punished and ridiculed by my own family for my neurodivergence and provided with no treatment whatsoever (and treated always like my ND behavior was willful misbehavior on my part instead of just the way my brain works), my DD is loved and embraced by her parents and provided with therapy and other supports, and has been taught to love herself and not to apologize for the ways in which her brain doesn't work the way other brains do. So it's always nature and nurture.

The fact that you're able to write in complete sentences tells me your experience with ASD is nothing like mine.

I know many people with ASD and they can all write in complete sentences. It sounds like your situation is a more extreme case, and for that you have my sympathy, but many autistic people live good, productive lives.

“many autistic people live, good productive lives”. I urge you to understand that 1. many people who talk about their Autism don’t actually have it. 2. You should spend some time in schools that have dedicated Autism classes and see if you come out with the same conclusion.

Lots of people have autism. And lots of people have a level of autism that prevents them from living good, productive lives. Many others have a level that does allow that.

Don't have kids with a person with ASD unless you're prepared to deal with the former. But really, that wouldn't be fair for the kids, either.

It's ok for people with autism to be parents. But they should adopt. The genetic risks are too great.

Do you have any evidence for your suggestion that a person with, say, level 1 ASD, is more likely to have a child with, say, level 3 ASD?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Other people sometimes ask what I’m doing with my son, who is excited to learn, polite to adults, an hard worker and a great reader. I always demure and say “Oh but your kid is great because xyz!” but I will share with DCUM: He was born pretty easygoing and happy. He was always going to be a sensitive and bright kid. He had tantrums and meltdowns like any other kid, but we did not give in to them, and we helped him harness his energy (ADHD?) into appropriate channels.

Things I do think helped:

Having him to join things from a young age including team sports- has taught him how to make friends and be part of a group. He is comfortable in new situations now (which I never am myself!).

Putting him in music and enforcing daily practice. I attend every 40 minute lesson and take copious notes, even have my own copy of the music so we can practice together. - has taught him how to tackle hard things and stick with something in the long term.

Zero screens from birth until preschool, and even now at 9 yo he averages maybe a couple of hours per month. He does work on an iPad at school, nothing I can realistically do about that. Letting him be bored at home, in the waiting room, on airplanes, etc has helped so much.

Filling the house with books. We have over 1,000 books and read a lot. He knows how to sit in silence. He is never bored.

Having one meal, no “kids’ food.” He can and will eat anything. Same with cultural events and restaurants. He can sit through a fancy restaurant 10 course meal or a piano concert and enjoy both, simply because we have exposed him to those things and normalized them.

And because he's a kid who can handle that. Plenty of people have done the same as you with food and events but still ended up with a picky eater and/or a kid who doesn't enjoy concerts and long dinners out.

I think some picky eating is normal in kids, but it should be treated as a short phase. It needs to stamped out by age 4-6 IMO. I’m sure SOME will continue to be picky even with adults’ best efforts, but way too many kids are way too coddled these days by parents, restaurants, and society.

I have a child that is just above the line for being dangerously underweight, yet continues to refuse most food. It's a constant struggle to get enough calories in him, even using things like Pediasure. And this is with food therapy working with an OT.