Latest / The Family Teams Podcast / Ep. 249 | How do you Handle Having a Mean Son?

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Ep. 249 | How do you Handle Having a Mean Son? · The Family Teams Podcast

• 0:03
  What's up, guys? Welcome to another 5-Minute Fatherhood. So how do you handle having a mean son or a firstborn who's really rough on the family? We had a great question from David in our 5-Minute Fatherhood group. He said, I would like some advice on a son who is constantly mean with their siblings. How do you reach the heart to help them change and realize that they're not going to be a good person?
• 0:24
  that how they're acting is going to make them end up with no relationships when they are older. So Dave, this is a great question. This is a huge thing to address, particularly when they're the oldest and if they're mean with their younger siblings, this is something that is really important to nip in the bud. So there's a couple of things that I find really important to do when one of your kids is just sort of creating that kind of mean and rude culture. So I love what you said the first time, like reaching their heart.
• 0:52
  That is huge. And so it's really important that they respect you, that you cultivated a place in which when your voice, that's something that they really respect. We talk a lot about that in the skill of father, just different ways of elevating the weight of your voice in the ears of your children. But a big part of that process is to make sure that children,
• 1:18
  that you are keeping your word and that when you're disciplining your children, that you create this sort of large gap between being the fun dad and being the coach and sort of disciplinary dad. Sometimes you have to dial up both of those at the same time. We've talked through how that really increases the volume and the heaviness or weight of your voice critical, especially with a son who is like really aggressive with their siblings or with your wife. We have a whole talk we did about what do you do when your son tries to overthrow
• 1:46
  through your wife. Similar struggle. Another thing that I think is really critical here is that you train your son to repent from the heart. What this means is that you don't want to, with a mean child in the home, you don't want to have the quick like, say you're sorry, say you're sorry. That's not going to cut it.
• 2:06
  they have to grieve what they've created in the home. And so there's a process that involves serious and consistent consequences, uh, and then, um, really causing them to understand the implications, uh, of what they're creating in the home and repenting through that process. And so, um, so what I want to make sure is, is that is being done to a soft heart, uh,
• 2:27
  The way I do that is to make sure that the consequence really reaches their heart, that they, even if they don't, you know, some of your, some of these kids really are hard to discipline. They will resist it a lot. And so you really have to dial up those consequences so that they, they do, even if they're not empathetic towards their siblings, they're empathetic towards themselves. That actually helps. There's a, there was a big study done on, on empathy and children. And one of the things that it said was that our intuition for creating empathy and children is to say, see how badly I'm going to do that.
• 2:57
  you hurt Sally? Like she's really hurt right now. That's our, that's our intuition. Um, but with certain personalities, kids that are really aggressive, um, that doesn't give them empathy. That just continues to help them sort of figure out their power game. Yeah. If I go, I did hurt him. I can use that. Yeah.
• 3:12
  What actually creates empathy, which is counterintuitive, is when they suffer for what they did to other people. In other words, a good discipline structure that they respect. And so this was done with prisoners. There's a lot of good evidence for this. And so when you're trying to create empathy with a child, make sure they really feel the consequences. And that over time, then you direct that frustration they have with having to absorb the consequences for their behavior whatsoever.
• 3:40
  And that's the good time to say, okay, let me show you the reason why you lost that privilege or the reason why you're suffering under this consequence is because you created that for your siblings. And that takes a lot of work. When you have a kid who's struggling with this, the first thing I would tell you guys is...
• 3:58
  uh, it's going to, you cannot be passive and this is going to be a lot of work. Like do not give up, uh, do not go passive. This is, you have to win this one. Um, and it's going to take time and consistency and creativity. Um, but those are a couple of things that you have to really lean into, but yeah, how would you talk about this? No, I would agree. And the only thing I would add to is just even drilling down that more practically that we've tried to do is exactly what you said. If you have to make the consequence anytime there's, I want to show our kids that
• 4:24
  that being rude or being mean or being hurtful or kind of having that. And I even do this sometimes if the, if they're getting really intense with their like, no, that's mine, you know, don't touch. I don't want you to play with me or whatever is then is, is I want them to see that that breaks relationship, right? That like that actually you're isolating yourself like in a bad way. That's not going to like reap good benefits. Kind of like what he even says, right? And the thing where he says, and make them end up with no relationships when they're older. So one way we try to show that consequence is, I'm not going to be able to do that.
• 4:50
  You know, I tried to make it where like, you know, I'm not going to maybe it's time out or whatever, but usually I'll just have them like sit inside or just sit with me or whatever. Wow. The other kids are having fun or while the other kids are outside scootering or whatever, you know, show them that exactly. Like you're missing out on this relational communal joy that everyone's happening. Yeah.
• 5:07
  because of the way you were choosing to act, right? And then I usually always... And the language we always use in our family too is saying you're entitled or saying it's yours or being mean or whatever. It's kind of this trick. I would say it's like this trick that it's not going to do what you think it's going to do in that moment. And your heart will feel better and love will feel better if you extend yourself to that person. And so yeah, I think showing that...
• 5:28
  doing a consequence where they're kind of realizing they're missing out on like the orbit of flourishing, you know what I mean? The orbit of joy and that they're not like, cause a lot of times people are being mean or stealing or whatever kids are thinking like, cause I'm going to take that orb. I'm going to take the center of joy and party and fun and I'm going to have it for myself. When it's like, no, no, that's out here and you are kind of now outside that orbit, you know? And I think that's a helpful way to try to communicate. And if you do that over and over again, I think they start to realize like, oh yeah, this is kind of a, what's it? You're not even putting a harsh consequence. It's just like the consequences is the, the,
• 5:57
  How it starts playing out is the consequence. Yeah, it's a natural consequence. So that's what I would say. Yeah, that's good. And you guys, if you need more tools to figure out even consequences, corrections, a whole training system, this is so critical for the more challenging kids. I really encourage you guys to grab our master class, The Skill of Fatherhood. The first module, the longest module, the most details is how to train your kids. Yeah.
• 6:20
  very, very, very few fathers have a really thought out system for training their kids. And so this kind of stuff can get really overwhelming really fast. And so we get super practical. We give you lots of different ways we think about corrections, consequences, rewards, how to really shape behavior, which we believe is critical at this young stage. And so we talk about that. There's also two other modules, how to coach your kids is the second one, how to build a multi-generational family is the third one. So pick that up, go to familyteams.com and check out the skill of fatherhood.
• 6:49
  and use the code DADS, D-A-D-S, to get 10% off.