Real Life Twitter

This video came to us courtesy of GirlGetStrong

(click headline for video)

Leave your snarky attitudes at the door…

I was listening to an NPR interview in our car the other day and the woman being interviewed was an author of a best selling book on her mothering experience. I liked much of what she was saying as she had written and blogged in a very straightforward manner about her experiences, saying things that many mothers must feel but haven’t the outlet or confidence to say openly.

But then it happened and she triggered what’s become one of my worst bugaboos, she began talking about her teenagers in a very snarky, negative manner, when in fact her kids sounded pretty OK. Marcy and I write about the importance of parents understanding developmental stages in our book and common misunderstandings about how children develop, the “terrible twos” being one hugely misunderstood stage and the ages from about 12-18 being another hugely misunderstood or little understood time in your child’s life.

If you obsess about and declare that the “twos” will be terrible then they undoubtedly will be terrible and you have a successful, self made, self fulfilling prophecy on your hands. We never experienced the “terrible twos” in our family because we were both aware of our child’s developmental stage then and that knowledge allowed us to help or sons through these periods with very little stress. In fact, we greatly enjoyed our sons’ teenage years, having already established trust, communication, mutual respect, and our expectations for them. Many of their friends had a much harder time, but the point is that if you determine that your child’s teenage experience within your family is going to be awful for everyone, it most likely will be awful for everyone. If it has become awful for everyone, quite possibly because of a lack of knowledge, empathy and a snarky attitude on the parents part, it will remain toxic for a far longer time unless you proactively address the situation and try to turn it around with honest, open, and respectful communication.

Our first time at bat…

We’ve been away from blogging and tweeting for a while as we worked on our remarks on TYC for our first public speaking event. We started by underlining sections of The Yes Child that we felt were germane to an audience of parents of fifth through ninth graders. Then we worked on our remarks to proceed and follow each reading, handing the narration back and forth between us to, hopefully, keep it interesting and let the audience hear from both of us.
Then we sat down on the sofa in our living room and recorded each iteration of our remarks so we could critique them as to length and effectiveness of what was being said. We went through three separate and very different iterations before arriving at the one we delivered Thursday night, which ended up being about 20 minutes long (c’mon, the book is only 104 pages).
It seems to have worked because, of a crowd of 40 people in ever-busy Washington, DC at 7PM no one left before our talk was over and we responded to questions for another 20-25 minutes, retiring to the back of the room where a table was set up for book sales. We sold 11 books, which isn’t a whole lot but when I think what our expectations had been and how this meant that we sold books to almost 25% of the group, we felt like we hit one over the fence!!! People asked that we sign them, too, which we were only too happy to do and engaged us in further conversation for another 20 minutes. The most satisfying remark we got was one mother who told us that she “was so glad to find a book written by parents, for parents! I have neither the time nor the desire to read another book that thick (holding her fingers two inches apart) by some doctor or child specialist!”
This was a reaction that we had anticipated and counted on, but to hear someone state it out loud was music to our ears. They knew that we didn’t claim to be experts or authorities on anything other than our own family’s experience; they knew that we hadn’t raised “perfect kids perfectly” and they knew that we were speaking from our hearts about a subject that is very real and dear to us. And the response was warmth and intelligent questions that illuminated some of their own parenting concerns. One woman, Michelle, bought three copies, one for her, one for her husband and one for her son! I asked her to let us know what her son especially thought about it, as we believe that parents and their children reading TYC together can result in a new, proven, “field tested in the real world” method of communication. Special thanks to Martha C., the head of the school and Miriam G., the head of the parents association, for taking a flyer on us and for their follow up emails commending our effort!

Parenting…begin with the end in mind.

I had a call from our oldest son, Max, a week ago asking if he could “spend the night” Saturday night. Sunday was his 23rd birthday and he knew we were having his favorite meal here, but the fact that he called to ask if he could spend the night with Marcy and me just really touched something in me that is reserved for very private feelings of joy. He lives just a few miles away in College Park but he and his gf are training for the Potomac marathon and they like to start their course near our apartment and drop down into Rock Creek Park, so it was easier to stay here and start the morning run and I of course said, “Yes.”

Marcy and I were talking about this later, how blessed we feel that both of our sons still want to spend time with us and that we all enjoy spending time together and it’s the direct result of our Yes Parenting style. What I would say now that I didn’t say in the book is to begin with the end in mind. The relationship that you have with your grown children is the same relationship you have with them when they’re small. Ours has been built on honest, respectful communication and shared joys we developed as we were all living together…a table set with our favorite nutritious foods, a good movie afterwords, meaningful conversation around events of the day, books read, ideas examined and discussed.

We were never parents who wanted to be our children’s best friends, but we wanted to be the best Mom and Dad we could be and support their realization of their true selves. And we enjoyed their company and intelligence and humor at every age, so I guess those things never change.

“A philosophy that nurtures the dreams of children!”

Three things occurred recently that have given me glad pause.

1st, my young friend Danny told me that he liked The Yes Child because it was a book about a child raising “philosophy” and not “child psychology.” My thought was, who in the hell reads about philosophy these days…or who reads books at all? But this was the whole point when Marcy and I set out to write The Yes Child…it’s a book written by real parents who field tested it in the real world. As we freely and readily admit, millions of people have raised and are raising great kids, but we deliberated over the conscious decisions we made and then wrote them down so they could be shared with anyone looking for this information/affirmation.

2nd, in a conversation with our great friend and creative adviser Karen Batchelor, Karen counseled us to “write in your own authentic voices when blogging.” This is exactly the approach we took when writing The Yes Child and I’ve no idea why we were struggling with it conceptually over our online writings…maybe just the awesomeness of this undertaking plus our relative newness to the online world and underdeveloped skills with all things internetery.

3rd, Carol Anderson, PhD, Professor of Psychiatry at UPMC and a highly respected leader in the child development field, said this in her review of the book; “Their philosophy of affirmation will serve as inspiration to parents committed to creating a family that nurtures the dreams of children!” How cool is that??? “…nurtures the dreams of children!” I’m blown away, and also less concerned about referring to TYC as a “philosophy.”

So thanks to Danny, Karen and Carol for your insights and inspirations…I’m floating in space!

Yeah! A “philosophy…that nurtures the dreams of children!” I’ll take that!!!

Oh, and another thing…

Relating to the previous post about a fabulous night of live music at the 930 Club last night…In a former lifetime I was the lead singer in the DC based new wave band Urban Verbs. We did two LPs for Warner Bros Records released in ’80 and ’81. The first LP had a song on it that was always my favorite, and if you care to you can see an early music video of the song, music produced by Brian Eno, on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tebluTKKTAQ Yes, that’s BE singing background vocals. We worked with Brian, Mike Thorne and Steve Lillywhite, among the greatest producers of all time. So when I talk about music being important to our family and relationship, it’s important that people know that this song was dedicated to Marcy Kayser on the first record…she didn’t become Marcy Kayser Frantz until the second record. But she was always the source of inspiration behind my best lyrics, at least the love songs.

Urban Verbs were Robert Goldstein-Guitars, Robin Rose-Synthesizers, Danny Frankel-Drums and Percussion, Linda France-Bass Guitar and Keyboards and Roddy Frantz- Vocals and Finger Pops

Marcy, music and me…our family’s beginnings

Marcy and I spent a really cool evening together last night listening to one of her favorite bands at the legendary 930 Club here in DC. We initially came together and fell in love around music and I realized how long it had been since just the two of us had done something like this. The band we heard may not be to everyone’s taste, but we both delighted in the massed guitar sound and psychedelic approach that they took to their songs…at one point they had five guitarists onstage, plus bass and drums; at other times four guitars, keyboards, bass and drums creating a mesmerizing sound unlike just about anything else out there today.
But the important thing was that it was just the two of us, the way our family started, enjoying something that was of elemental importance to both our souls.
It’s altogether too easy not to schedule times like this when we’re caught up in being a family and all the demands that entails, but I enjoyed last night more than any night I can recall in a long while and as I was watching Marcy, who looked radiant, watching the band I remembered that it was in circumstances not unlike this that I first fell in love with her. And last night I realized again that I had never stopped falling…
I am greatly blessed.

The Yes Dad, Part 1 (or in SEO speak: Advice for Dads)

My own father had an expression he used at times to let me know that he thought I was “alright.” He’d pronounce it in the car when it was just the two of us, or occasionally out of the blue for no reason that I could determine. He’d say, “Handsome boy, intelligent boy!” and it made me feel great until I eventually realized that this was the only compliment in his vocabulary, at which point it began to sound a bit stale. And I’m certain that someone, probably his mother, said the same thing to him often and it had great meaning for him. But his eyes and his mannerisms towards me so often conveyed love and approval that I never felt he was at all deficient in that regard (or really, in any meaningful regard).

So when I wanted to put Mr. Roger’s “I like you just the way you are” mantra into effect with my own children, I didn’t want to trot out some stale compliment from another era, I wanted something that was uniquely our own…and I made a little game out of it. I’d go into each boys room in the morning and say something like, “Have a told you today what a great kid you are?” or “Have I told you today how proud I am to be your father?” And you can play this game at night before bed, too. “Hey, did I forget to tell you today what a great kid you are?” This could be overdone and you want to watch that the phrasing doesn’t become rote, but my kids loved it and I think it contributed to giving them both confidence and positive self esteem.

New “HERO” Status

A few days ago I got a message on one of my social networking sites that really made my day! It read, “Rod Frantz is my HERO!” (no kidding).

The message was posted by one of my younger son’s friends, Daniel, someone that we had lost touch with in recent years and it just came out of the blue. I’ve no idea why Daniel posted that particular message, but it was a great boost to my day and got me thinking about the time I had spent with Daniel and Charlie when they were in middle school and both of them were mastering their skateboards.

We’ve always tried to enable our son’s interests and skateboarding was no exception, despite the misguided perception that existed at that time that all skateboarders were punks and juvenile delinquents. I viewed them as exquisite athletes who were trying to master an extremely demanding, almost Ballet-like discipline and who were able to make the streets and their built environment the playing fields for demonstrations of their athleticism and grace. On weekends I would volunteer to take these guys into downtown Pittsburgh where they loved to skate in a more urban setting and would always advise them, before they got out of the car, not to smart mouth the police should they be questioned, to answer questions politely and to remember three simple phrases; “Yes, Sir, No, Sir and May I go now, please?” I told them that if they were hassled by authorities they should call me on my cell phone immediately so that I, as an adult, could intercede on their behalf.

We lost touch with Daniel at some point during those years and I had always liked him…he was smart and witty and athletic in a non-traditional way, a charming, hugely likeable young guy and I am deeply honored to be considered his “HERO.”

Created versus Inherited Family Cultures

Marcy and I have been talking a lot about our recent realization that the Second Essential in our book The Yes Child, “Create Your Own Family Culture” is so prominent. Marcy observed that people have an “inherited family culture”, but can create a “unique family culture.” This is a subject we look forward to discussing and developing with our readers during our June book tour.

An inherited family culture would be a near total adoption of one of the family cultures that were found in the parents’ childhood homes, same political and social affiliations, same church membership etc or possibly a blending of the two cultures. Most of us create our unique family culture by blending inherited rituals and beliefs from our families of origin with new rituals and beliefs adapted while we create our lives with our mates and/or children. While some people adopt a culture in their adulthood that mimics the culture of their family of origin, we believe that the more conscientious route is to examine habits and beliefs and rituals and deliberately adopt or discard them in light of the affirmative culture one is creating within a Yes Family.