copied from todays post on Parenting Passageway

1.  When you blame and accuse me –

• I hear:  I’m no good, I do everything wrong
• I feel: unloved, unlovable, incapable, worthless
• I need: for you to listen without interrupting and judging me, to set boundaries for me if I need, but most of all to love me despite my flaws and mistakes

2.  When you call me names –

• I hear:  I’m stupid, I’m lazy, I’m no good
• I feel: unloved, unlovable, incapable, worthless
• I need: encouragement

3.  When you threaten me–

• I hear:  a person I  love is going to hurt me
• I feel:  afraid, in danger, unsafe, terribly alone
• I need: boundaries set and kept  in a loving way, I need to see a way to de-escalate conflicts peacefully, I need to feel your warmth and your love

4.  When you command, order or coerce me–

• I hear:  I have no choice, I am powerless, I don’t matter
• I feel:  unloved, unlovable, incapable and worthless
• I need: to be able to make mistakes when the cost is small in order to learn, limits but with enough freedom that I can still grow into being myself, understanding  and love

5.  When you keep warning me –

• I hear:  I am careless, I am stupid, I don’t think well
• I feel:  unloved, unlovable, incapable and worthless
• I need:  a safe way to channel my wonderful ideas, my energy

6.  When you make martyrdom statements:

• I hear:  I am selfish, I am thoughtless, I am mean
• I feel:  unloved, unlovable, incapable, guilty and bad
• I need:  to see how someone asks for help when they need it, to see how someone can take care of themselves and still take care of others, how someone exercises self-control of their mouth, how someone has a positive attitude

7.  When you make comparisons:

• I hear:  I am not good enough, everyone else is better, you don’t love me
• I feel:  unloved, unlovable, incapable, worthless
• I need:  you to guide me to improvement, you to show me how to solve a problem or a challenge

8.  When you are sarcastic –

• I hear: voice words and tones that don’t match the situation
• I feel: confused
• I need:  your sincerity, your gentle voice and hands to guide me, to see how children of different ages are parented in different ways

9.  When you make negative prophesies–

• I hear:  I will never do it right, I will never be enough, my life will be ruined
• I feel:  hopeless, unloved, unlovable, incapable and worthless
• I need: your encouragement, your guidance, your ability to let me mistakes when the cost is small, your love and compassion, your demonstration that sometimes “okay” is “good enough”

10.  When you lecture and moralize –

• I hear:  I should be better than I am, I will never get this right
• I feel:  unloved, unlovable, incapable, worthless. alone and isolated
• I need:  your love, your boundaries to keep me safe, your warmth and understanding, your stories about what you were like at this age and what happened and did you ever at all feel the way I feel

One of the first things we noticed and loved about Bangor was the sidewalks shaded with trees.

We didn’t have sidewalks in Florida, and their absence made it both hot and inconvenient for our young children to play outside. Instead, they were relegated to the backyard, which was fully enclosed by the surrounding yards’ 6-foot privacy fences. We rarely saw our neighbors. When one of the boys’ baseballs disappeared behind the fence, someone would throw it back over, and we’d shout, “thank you” through the cracks in the wood. I knew only one of our neighbors well.

Last July, when I came to Bangor from Florida to search for a house, I commented again and again (until I’m sure our Realtor was sick of hearing it) about the way people here congregate on the sidewalks. My mom, who was with me, said it reminded her of neighborhoods from the 1950s, where you didn’t need a pass code to get into your friend’s gated community and calling the kids home for dinner was as easy as opening the front door and shouting their names.

Indeed, one year later, our boys enjoy the sidewalk in front of our house from morning until night. They run through multiple backyards, never meeting a blockade of privacy fences. I can think of 12 neighbors offhand whom I know well and who know my boys’ names and where to send them if they get into trouble. On most nights, after Dustin gets home from work, he and I stand in the yard and watch our boys ride their bikes up and down the sidewalk.

The only thing I haven’t loved about our neighborhood is that people drive too fast through it. We don’t live on a main street. Nor do we live on a busy street. Ours is a residential street with shade trees on either side and no lines to mark the lanes. Still, people use it as a shortcut between other, busier routes. Although the posted speed limit is 25 mph, I’m certain that many drivers are going faster. Some are probably pushing 40-50 mph.

I mistakenly believed that drivers would notice the recent influx of children on our street (there are several other new neighbors with children) and make a mental note to slow down in the future. I especially thought people would be cautious when they saw plastic toys and bikes strewn across the grass. But no, drivers fly down the road as if they are on the highway.

Then a curious and totally unexpected thing happened. People started blaming me for having my children outside and on the sidewalk. A few drivers actually stopped and got out of their car to complain.

“Children shouldn’t play so close to the road,” they said.

“On a sidewalk in a residential neighborhood?” I asked sarcastically. We don’t live on Union or Hammond streets, after all.

“Someone is going to get killed,” another person said. “We have to slam on our brakes when we see your children on the sidewalk.”

If you have to slam on your brakes, perhaps you are going too fast. A car that is cautiously driving the speed limit through a residential area doesn’t need to slam on the brakes. You brake suddenly when something unexpected — a moose or a squirrel — crosses your path. Children playing in a neighborhood shouldn’t be a surprise.

After so many scowls and secondhand complaints, I got the feeling that drivers value their need to move fast over my children’s desire to have a childhood spent playing outside in a safe neighborhood. If I would just keep my kids locked up inside, these people could travel as they please and not have to worry about killing a child.

Thirty years ago, my husband was, in fact, run over by a car, so we know the dangers. Our boys do, too. They know what happened to their dad, but we won’t shelter and coddle them. Keeping them inside all day is out of the question. They are boys who need to run and play, which is why we chose a residential road with sidewalks.

All we can do is give our boys the skills and lessons they need to stay safe. But they are still young and immature, so I can’t guarantee that they won’t chase a ball across the street or fall off their bike and land in the road. I can teach them, but until they are grown, I can’t count on them to use their head 100 percent of the time.

I had hoped to count on the adults to drive safely 100 percent of the time. Because one thing I can guarantee is that our children’s lives are worth more than whatever made you take a shortcut and speed in the first place.