Building Trust with Your Kids

I have learned a lot since becoming a mom on January 11, 2016. One thing I never knew was how important it is to build trust with your children from day 1. When I was first figuring everything out as a first time mom, I seeked out so much advice, read so many articles and a few books. So much of the advice was contradicting. It was confusing and sometimes, overwhelming. I decided to take it all in with a grain of salt and do mom life my own way! Thats when I learned that I needed to start building trust with my son every day. I want him to grow knowing that I am going to be right there and that I am always going to support and encourage him throughout life. Seeing the relationship I have with my son now, gives me confidence that I will have a good relationship with my daughter and I will do with her what I am doing with him.

My journey of building trust with my kids consists of a lot of motherly instinct and wisdom I have gained from both of my parents and my in laws. Since Joshua was 4 months old, I started to sleep train him and I never let him cry alone for more then 10 minutes. I would go in there after about 3-5 minutes if his cry wasn't getting any calmer. I would reassure him that I was still there and that it was okay to fall asleep. Eventually he figured it out. After a few days of a lot of crying, he started sleeping in his crib just fine by himself. He would always wake up happy and excited to see me. As he grew I continued to teach him how to crawl, eat, talk and everything he does now. I would always catch him when he was learning to walk so that he knew I would be right there to help him back up. Its so amazing to look back at those moments not realizing the foundation I was creating for our relationship. 

Now, as a toddler, he looks to me for comfort, support, encourage, and to guide him through everything he is learning. {side note: Patrick is very much involved in this journey as well supporting me and doing the same things with him that I do with him but also creating his own bond with his son.} As a toddler, building trusts looks differently then when he was a baby. I am now teaching him how to act, respond, have manners, how to deal with his emotions, and so much more. When I am teaching him how to act, I reward good behavior and either discipline or ignore bad behavior depending on what it is. He trusts that when he does something good, I will always encourage and reward him. Whether it be a high five, big hug and kiss, a privlege or a treat he knows that when he does what he is supposed to I will reassure him that its good. Because he can trust me on that, he can also trust me when I tell him something is wrong, bad, dangerous or harmful. He actually responds when I tell him that something will hurt him and he stops. For example, I told him that if he plugs something in that it can shock him and hurt him really bad. I specifically use the words "no no" and "thats bad" and I show him that only mommy or daddy can plug it in. If he wants to turn something on, I tell him he needs to ask for help and only we can do it. NO JOKE, he listens to that and hesitates to plug stuff in now and always says "Help" if he wants to plug something in. It amazes me to see how much he comprehends at this age. He is a toddler and he is not perfect. Sometimes, not often, I will see him trying to plug something in. We have the plug covers, so he doesn't actually plug it in but, everytime I see him do that, I explain it to him again. He usually just needs to be reminded once a day or sometimes less. There are still other behaviors and things we are working on, he is by no means a perfect well behaved toddler who always listens. But, when I stay consistent with him he responds well and trusts what I'm saying. My biggest thing that I am very consistent about is FOLLOWING THROUGH on everything. When I say last bite, thats the last bite, when I say "if you do this you go in time out" he goes in time out, when I say "if you do this, then you can have that" I give it to him and not try to manipulate him to do it again before he gets it. I always stick to my word with him even if I think he'll forget I said it or doesn't understand me. I know that what I'm doing is working for my child because he responds well to it and we have such a beautiful relationship. 

My hope is to build this foundation with my kids so as they grow older and experience this world for themselves, they can come to me for guidance and advice. I want them to trust me when I tell them to not make certain life choices because of how it can effect them. I also want them to be able to come to me for comfort and encouragement knowing and trusting that I will always be there for them no matter what choices they make or things they go through. 

The best feeling overcame me one day when I realized that Joshua trusts me. We where at home and about to walk up the stairs with my son and he asks "help? hand?" because he is afraid of falling. I responded, "You can do it sweetie, I'm right here, I won't let you fall" and I watch him climb to the top of the stairs all on his own without my help. The look of accomplishment on his face and the size of his smile was all I needed from him to know that what I'm doing as a mom is exactly what he needs. I'm confident that when Annabelle is Joshua's age, she will have her own ways of assuring me that I am exactly what she needs.

 I never thought that building trust with your kids at this age would be so important and feel so rewarding.