Anytime we work with a family in my line of work, there are a few givens that are pretty universal. Almost by definition one or more of the family’s children must be struggling with “maladaptive” behaviors that have lasted at least a month or two and either the family or the school (or both) are struggling to support the child in managing those behaviors. For our purposes today specific struggles are not really important as far as whether it is related to anxiety or depression or some relatively common disorder.
One of the early basic interventions that is almost invariably suggested is some sort of collaborative intervention. Probably the best known treatment of collaborative interventions is seen in the book The Explosive Child, written by Ross Greene. In a nutshell, the book lays out the case that when children struggle, it is almost always because they are in a situation where the skills necessary for success are either not fully developed or, in the case of many children (and adults), are lagging or far behind where a person of their age would be expected to function. Greene would subsequently partner with Stuart Ablon to more fully flesh out their ideas of what they would term “Collaborative Problem Solving” (CPS). Later, Greene and Ablon would have a falling out and now Greene calls his CPS “Collaborative and Proactive Solutions” so do not be confused if you research CPS and see different names. Both are substantially the same.
In some ways this seems very basic. If we start a new job or are learning a new skill of any type, we typically are given training or are able to seek out books or guidance of some sort to help us along the way. However, children are born “as is”, we all have strengths and weaknesses and hopefully we are able to accentuate our strengths and cover up our weaknesses in such a way that we are able to present ourselves as “fitting in” with the rest of the world.
The problem often comes due to a disconnect in one or more areas at home. Sometimes the child’s lagging skills are reflective of the parent’s own lagging skills, which can make for a difficult situation. In other situations, the parent is often busy or immersed in problems of their own and feel they don’t have enough time to work with their child, which can be true in some cases. The problem that often seems to be the most intractable seems to be the parent who feels that the child should simply do what they are told, when they are told and see a struggling child as simply being willful or purposely challenging their authority as a parent or making them look like they aren’t a good parent.
Many times when working with families you will hear things like “I don’t need to have a debate, I just need them to do what i say,” or “they just do this to get under my skin.” At other points, parents will feel shamed by their friends or family members who say “you let them get away with murder” or “they just need smacked.” Basically all of these statements could look true in given circumstances. The one that is obviously wrong is the idea that hitting will solve behavior problems. As someone who worked in residential care with kids who had almost invariably been physically abused, often to the extreme, my response is to say if this were true those kids should be the best behaved of all.
As in many relationships control often seems to be a large factor in the parent not wanting to be collaborative with their child. As humans, we wish to have control over as many factors in our lives as possible. As adults, many times our lives become hectic and we can both struggle to have patience and to step back and see the difficulties that children often go through trying to negotiate the world. It can often become a double-edged sword where we are working hard for our children but don’t have the time or patience to help them ourselves. As a child when we feel distress or anxiety we want it to go away and often avoidance is the easiest means of returning to our comfort zone.
Situations like this where a parent who is overwhelmed comes together with a child who is overwhelmed can often be a combustible one, especially if the child struggles to express their emotions. This can often lead to the situation often termed the power struggle. A power struggle is typically a situation where a parent attempts to force the child to do something, clean their room for example, where the child is unwilling or unable to comply.
In these situations, parents often take one of two basic tacks. They either raise the stakes and begin to make threats to ground the child or takeaway favored activities or they completely drop the expectation and don’t make the child do anything. Both of these strategies are inefficient and typically make the problem worse. If you make too many threats and are not able to follow through, the child will often learn that resistance gives them control. Similarly, the parent who completely drops expectations allows the child to implicitly learn that resistance pays off and will often make them more likely to engage in avoidance behaviors next time.
In this light, it should be fairly easy to see why this approach is to be preferable. If done consistently, it can help your child begin to gain insight into social situations and learn to understand what other people may be thinking more accurately. It can also help them grow in their ability to think proactively and consider the consequences of their actions beforehand.
Of course, there will be objections to this line of thinking, as mentioned above, but the alternative is to allow these behaviors and ways of thinking to become more ingrained every day until there is little recourse but to consider these interventions.
Before we describe the interventions let me address another concern that often comes up: “You are just telling me to let them do what they feel like.” My automatic response to that line of thinking is to say that if you are letting your child do what they feel like, you still are not being collaborative, you have just handed them whatever authority you had. The basic premise of being collaborative is to get things done in a way that works for you and works for them. You still have the authority to decide what the things are that need done, it just seems to be a senseless hill to die on to say your room needs to be cleaned at 5 rather than at 6 or 7. If the time things get done is this important to you, you may want to check to see if you have some control issues that need to be addressed.
Collaborative interventions in a nutshell are simply interventions where you are able to calmly get together with your child and hammer out a means of getting things done in a way that solve concerns for both you and them. For example, say you have asked your child to clean their room every day for the past week. They begin to scream and refuse. You may just want peace and let them go back to playing their video game. You, in many ways, have just made them refusing to clean their room more likely the next time they do not feel like doing it. Once a person realizes a behaviors can help them avoid a scenario they dislike they will often use it when they necessary. Does this mean they will refuse every time? No, but the odds have gone up.
On the other hand, maybe you feel the need to exercise your authority and force them to clean their room. They scream but you are determined that they clean their room NOW. Where do you go if they refuse? Do you slowly begin to take things from them (video games, phone, etc.)? What do you do when they still don’t clean their room? At some point this is bound to happen. They will not be eight forever.
The way that assures you can keep your authority and gets the room clean is collaboration. “Hey son, we need to figure out a plan to get your room clean. It seems like it has been really hard for you. Do you have any ideas?” The room still needs cleaned and you still have authority. Please do not misunderstand. I am in agreement up to a point with the thinking that this type of behavior in the “real world” will not fly. All choices we make have outcomes built into them, both good and bad. If we choose to make poor decisions and get no negative consequences, how do we learn?
If they accept your offer to come up with an idea, you have the ability to let them know why their idea may or may not work and find a solution that works for you and them. They can begin to learn to see from your point of view a bit better now, and down the road. They also may learn how to be more flexible in their interactions by watching you in action. These are invaluable skills to have when one needs to interact with people as an adult.
Are you considering using collaborative interventions at home but feel like they will take away from your position as a parent? Drop us a line at psychdomain. com and we will be happy to help you formulate a plan for working with your child.