|
|
|
Whose Rules
By: Brette Sember
"But Dad always lets me stay up this late." "At Mom's house we don't have to take the garbage out." Sound familiar? Separation and divorce means two homes for your child, and too often that means two completely different sets of rules. It's hard enough for a kid to comply with one set of rules, but having two is a guarantee for confusion and disobedience from your kids and resentment and anger between parents.If you and the other parent are going to parent together effectively, you've got to have a set of universal rules in place for your child that is in force at both homes. But you and the other parent are individuals. And obviously there are a lot of things you don't agree on. No kidding, right? So your two homes are going to be different and you're going to have different situations, different needs, and different circumstances when your kids are at each home. There are going to be differences in the way you parent. There should be. Your kids need both perspectives and both personalities. But they also need to know that they are living under the same basic set of expectations at each home. (Article Continues Below)
Rules You Need You need to create important, big, lifestyle rules that are followed at both homes. You don't want your child going from one house to the other, feeling like he or she is migrating between different countries where everything is different. Big rules include: (Article Continues Below)
- Homework rules. It doesn't matter if one parent is the weekend parent and the other is the weekday parent. Homework should be done at both homes and should be a priority in both homes. - Bedtime and curfews. Slight variations are fine, but try to keep it within half an hour. - Levels of responsibility. Children should have chores at both homes; you don't want one house to be a free ride and the other to be boot camp. - Age criteria. Examples include crossing the street alone, curfew changes, dating. - Off-limits activities. The biggies - drinking, smoking, swearing, disrespect.
|
|
![Post to MySpace!](javascript:GetThis('Whose Rules', '<img src="http://www.self.ca/public/articles/large/whose_rules.jpg" alt="Whose Rules" style="float: right; margin: 0 0 1em 1em; border: 0;" />Parenting together after divorce is difficult. One major challenge is finding away to agree on the rules that will apply to your child...', window.location.href, 3))
