The Secrets to Your Strong-Willed Child Revealed

When I was little, my mother used to say “I talk to the trees but they don’t listen to me,” a reference to a song Clint Eastwood sang in Paint Your Wagon and to my choice to not listen to her. Do you ever feel like that with your kids?

I most certainly do. Some might call this karma; others say our dispositions may be genetic. One thing is for sure – your strong-willed child can be a) explained and b) taught to love and calm down.

Dr. Liane Leedom, a psychology professor at the University of Bridgeport and mother of three, was interviewed about strong-willed children this week on The Parent’s Plate, a radio show hosted by parenting expert, author and speaker Brenda Nixon. The show airs on Tuesdays on Toginet Radio or you can download past shows on iTunes for free. She offers a wide range of topics that are incredibly helpful for parents “with too much on their plates,” as she says.

According to Leedom, a strong-willed child shows these characteristics:

• His/her own agenda
• Resentful of anyone thwarting that agenda
• Laser-focused with their own goal in mind

Sound familiar? For me, this defines my youngest son perfectly.

On the show, Leedom broke down the developmental phases of children into 4 very simple stages and then offered ways for us to better understand these stages, and for parents to nurture all of these natural tendencies.

Stage 1, Year One – From birth, we are born to love. The first year of life is critical for our children to learn how to receive love and how to calm themselves when frightened. When we cuddle, nurse and hold our babies close, they feel the calming touch of a human. They coo and start making eye contact to help themselves communicate this love too. This is also the phase where they learn that parents make them feel better when the child is scared.

Stage 2, Year One – We learn caring for others also during that first year. This is a different form of love, one that projects outside of ourselves. This is when a child models caring behavior like petting an animal or mimicking parents by taking care of a baby doll. They understand what love is and begins to show that to others.

Stage 3, Year Two – The social dominance drive kicks in during the second year of life. This may be why we call them “The Terrible Twos” because it is at this stage where children start understanding what power is and their desire for that power goes into overdrive.

They are now struggling between the love they want with the power they also want. During the show, both Nixon and Leedom noted that’s why kids (mostly boys) this age make everything into a gun and why knives and fire are so fascinating. They all represent power. Leedom noted that this tendency toward guns and such is global and thus, probably innate in boys. Left unchecked, this power drive can overwhelm the love desire and that’s when things go bad.

One of the biggest indicators, beyond genetics, of the third stage – the power stage – is how a father behaves in the family. If he is domineering, overbearing or critical, this can lead to children mimicking this behavior and thus, tipping the love/power balance to power.  

That’s when the anti-social behaviors begin such as stealing, intimidating and bullying. These behaviors, left unchecked, become the ADHD, addictions and anti-social behaviors (such as criminal behavior or worse) later in life.

Stage 4, Later in childhood – The reproductive drive arrives. This drive, Leedom says, is one that our society puts in our kids’ faces WAY too early. Her example is the lingerie store in her mall with the skimpy clothing and curvy mannequins.  That is displayed in the window for her 8-year-old son to see.  This is also why sexual abuse is so damaging; it introduces feelings and actions children are not developmentally ready for and have no idea how to deal with.

Leedom makes the point on Nixon’s show that our brains become trained by the patterns it uses and the neural patterns that are not used, die.  That is why it is so very important for us to make sure we are working with our children (strong-willed or not) to nurture the right patterns in their brains.

Leedom does offer hope, though, even if your child is beyond the first stages of life. She says one of the biggest indicators to success is self-control. With her 8-year-old son, she actually has explained to him about this concept so he can understand his own impulses and the motivation behind them. He also understands his friends and classmates better too.  She said he’ll actually come home from school and tell her about being tired and thus, impulsive at school. He understands what’s going on in his own brain.

Some other tools Leedom gives to parents to help with this love/power balance:

• Get a pet, or care for a pet. For kids to understand the needs of another creature and the responsibility of caring for that animal, even if you don’t feel like it teaches children about the needs of others and how caring for those needs helps another.
• Do a community service projects as a family, such as going to an elder care facility or a soup kitchen. For your children to see others in need and then helping them, this models the caring behavior for kids.
• Try to protect your children from dangerous or damaging situations such as bullying. Leedom knew of some kids who were going to bully her son and she keeps him away from that situation.
• Encourage religious education.  Most faiths have some doctrine about fellowship, generosity and caring as well as the focus of love.

To hear the entire interview as well as Nixon’s previous shows, please visit the Parent’s Plate website on Toginet here.  Also, check out Leedom’s book “Just Like His Father” at her website www.parentingtheatriskchild.com and Nixon’s book “The Birth to Five Book” on Amazon.