by Denise Wallace

Created on: May 21, 2009   Last Updated: May 22, 2009

Steps to improving a relationship with your child

Children are a gift. I think this is the first thing we all need to realize and appreciate. God gives us this amazing little person to love, nurture, and raise to be the best they can be. We get to give this tiny person a name, sometimes even a birth date. We get to choose whether we raise them the way we were raised, or the way we wish we had been.

I was raised in an abusive, dysfunctional household. I didn't understand why I was treated this way as a child, young adult, or even as an adult. Then when I had my own children I understood it even less. How could you treat your child with anything other than loving kindness? I don't know the answer to this question. All I know is that I would never let my children feel the way I did as a child. I love them too much to treat them with anything other than love, patience, understanding, and kindness.

I believe the answer to having a good relationship with your children is to respect them. I was in a Bible Study the other day when I heard one of the moms say if I talked to my friends the way I talk to my children I wouldn't have any friends. She then laughed, and the woman next to her agreed with her. How can you say this, and think this is funny, and not know that this is wrong? If we want to get respect from our children, if we want to raise loving respectful people we need to treat them with the utmost respect. Children aren't less worthy than our friends or even strangers.

As parents we need to be polite, patient, loving and kind to our children. When they are treated this way they respond with all of these wonderful traits right back at us. Children learn by example; if this is what they see and hear, it's what they will do.

I treat my children respectfully. This is not because I'm the greatest parent or the smartest person in the world. It's because this is the way I would have wanted to be treated as a child. I would have wanted to feel like I matter, like I was important, like I was loved and valued. This is how I want my children to feel.

I have a wonderful relationship with all four of my children; even my teenager. We love and respect each other; we talk and share our thoughts and feelings. Because they know how I feel about them they know that they can tell me anything. We discuss things; we don't scream at each other. I have never screamed at my children because you don't scream at people you respect.

So I believe that the way to improve your relationship with your child is to respect them. Treat them the way you would want to be treated.

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