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My kids are always looking on the negative side of things. They come home from an outing and share all the bad things that have happened, and it’ll only be later that I’ll find out in some sideways way about good things. I can’t tell if they need to vent or if they’re just the kind of people to see the negative in everything, but it is driving me crazy! They have so much privilege and are so loved! They go to a good school, have activities they choose themselves (but not too many), get a reasonable amount of screen time, have friends, eat treats often enough, and want for nothing. And yet all I hear is, “Camp is boring!” “This one annoying boy is always following me!” “Suzy Q got her ears pierced, so why can’t I?” “It’s too hot.” “I hate going to the pool.” Etc. Last weekend we went to the beach (a beloved activity) and had a lovely time. No bumps or problems of any kind. When we got home, my kid told her dad the beach was “meh” and whined about the sand in her shoes. If that’s her attitude, I’m not going to take her again! I’ve tried “Rose/bud/thorn.” I’ve tried re-framing family conversations around asking the kids to share something “interesting” about their day. I’ve modeled focusing on the positive while acknowledging the challenging things. What else can I do?
—Gloomy Gus and Gustina’s Mom
Dear Gloomy,
You can say, “Oh, really? That’s too bad,” and move on to other subjects. Don’t indulge them in their complaints, don’t debate them (“But it looked like you were having fun!”), and don’t be petty and punish them (“You complained about the beach? NO MORE BEACH FOR YOU!”). My guess is that they know this gets your goat and that’s why, or one reason why, they focus on the negative and never tell you what they have enjoyed or how much they enjoyed it. But this is likely also a phase they will pass through (and pass through it faster if you don’t engage with it). In any case—and the more pressing matter, as far as I’m concerned—you need to find a way not to be so unhappy about their (professed) unhappiness. They feel what they feel, they say what they say. Don’t take it so personally. They’re kids. Kids are weird. They go through a lot of weird phases. And beyond their phases, and beyond their efforts to press their parents’ buttons (also normal), they also have their own personalities. Maybe they are both glass half-empty types (that is, maybe this is early evidence of that, and they will grow up to be pessimistic Eeyores). There are plenty of people like that in the world (Readers, I married one). So what? You do you, Mom, and let them do them. (I promise you, though, that whether this is a negative phase, a case of button-pushing, or a matter of personality, your efforts to fix it are backfiring and making them dig in harder.)
https://slate.com/human-interest/2022/07/negative-kids-bad-attitude.html
—Gloomy Gus and Gustina’s Mom
Dear Gloomy,
You can say, “Oh, really? That’s too bad,” and move on to other subjects. Don’t indulge them in their complaints, don’t debate them (“But it looked like you were having fun!”), and don’t be petty and punish them (“You complained about the beach? NO MORE BEACH FOR YOU!”). My guess is that they know this gets your goat and that’s why, or one reason why, they focus on the negative and never tell you what they have enjoyed or how much they enjoyed it. But this is likely also a phase they will pass through (and pass through it faster if you don’t engage with it). In any case—and the more pressing matter, as far as I’m concerned—you need to find a way not to be so unhappy about their (professed) unhappiness. They feel what they feel, they say what they say. Don’t take it so personally. They’re kids. Kids are weird. They go through a lot of weird phases. And beyond their phases, and beyond their efforts to press their parents’ buttons (also normal), they also have their own personalities. Maybe they are both glass half-empty types (that is, maybe this is early evidence of that, and they will grow up to be pessimistic Eeyores). There are plenty of people like that in the world (Readers, I married one). So what? You do you, Mom, and let them do them. (I promise you, though, that whether this is a negative phase, a case of button-pushing, or a matter of personality, your efforts to fix it are backfiring and making them dig in harder.)
https://slate.com/human-interest/2022/07/negative-kids-bad-attitude.html
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I deal with it from my kid because they are my kid but wow, all my sympathy dealing with it in a spouse because: DAMN
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It seems like the kids are capable of having fun and being gracious/grateful in the moment (like at the beach), but they feel the need to downplay it after the fact.
Mom took the kids to the beach without Dad — are they parenting separately? That might be part of it — not wanting Dad to feel bad, or trying to get extra privileges from him, or some other issue where over-praising time with Mom rebounds negatively.
They may be privileged, ungrateful little boogers, who knows — but giving this behavior a lot of attention is likely to backfire.
My suggestion would be to keep modeling positive language, gratitude, and polite behavior (focus any crackdowns on actual RUDENESS, not just inadequate enthusiasm), and hopefully they’ll grow out of it.
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First of all: stop demanding that they have experiences, and report their experiences, in Exactly The Right Way. Let them be their own people, and take them at their word about their own lives. Maybe it IS too hot and the sand IS annoying and they have a right to say so! And for god's sake stop threatening to withdraw good things or condemn them as ungrateful for (gasp!) having emotions you didn't authorize.
Second: take responsibility for your own emotions. It is perfectly reasonable to say "It's really a downer for me if we only talk about the unpleasant parts of the day/trip/whatever. Can we mention some positive things, for my sake?" It is NOT reasonable to present this as some Immutable Truth about their Bad Behavior. YOU are the one who is upset, LW. You're not an objective observer from on high, you're a person with a perspective. Own it.
Third: you can't tell if they need to vent, or need real problems solved? ASK THEM. Ask outright. "Do you need to generally vent some irritation/frustration, or do you need some help/advice with a problem?" You can set boundaries about how much you are willing to listen to venting! You cannot (should not) act like their venting is a terrible offense against your OMG SO PERFECT parenting.
Fourth: Depression exists. Did you know that? No, kids are not immune. Aggressively demanding positivity and punishing them for expressing unhappiness will seriously exacerbate any mental health problems they may be suffering, or even create new mental health problems. Set boundaries around how much negativity you can absorb, but within those boundaries, try to be really present. Try to remember that you do actually CARE about your kids' unhappiness. (You do, right?) Be open, be honest about your own struggles (to a reasonable degree given age and maturity - don't trauma-dump on children, but if you have had times in your life when everything felt like shit, you can share that! you don't have to be Perfectly Positive Mom!), be willing to hear it if they tell you that - despite all the good things you listed! - they feel really bad, all the time. That's not something to blame them for. That's your cue to offer support and kindness - maybe therapy if you can swing it, maybe medical checkups for the usual suspects for low energy and mood, etc. Don't just assume it's "kid moodiness" and leave it at that.
And maybe they are just inherently Eeyore-ish, and you're a Pollyanna (to mix literary references), and you're going to have to negotiate how to be kind to each other without overwriting each others' personalities. But you can't engage in good-faith negotiations, LW, while you're up on that high horse condemning the Insufficiently Grateful Children.
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I am greatly in favor of kids getting access to trustworthy adults who are trained to assess these things.
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I mean, in this world, as it is right now? There are probably a ton of kids who are depressed and dealing with emotional overload just from being surrounded by covid and rising fascism. Not that kids should need an identifiable trauma to have their problems taken seriously - but there is PLENTY of identifiable trauma for everyone, right now. LW is outright delusional if they think they can make (or have made) a perfect little family bubble that prevents any suffering. And by stomping hard on even the little complaints, they're cutting their kids off from saying anything about larger fears...
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Maybe the kids are just being difficult. That's pretty normal if they're teens/tweens, which they seem to be. But looking at the specifics, I wonder if there's more.
"Camp is boring!": Maybe it is? Are the kids too old for camp now? Would they rather do something else?
"Boy follows me around!": Yikes, that could be serious.
"Why can't I get my ears pierced?": Yeah, why can't the kid get their ears pierced? It's their body, and ear-piercing is a low-stakes, low-risk way for a kid to start feeling some autonomy. Not allowing ear-piercing seems pretty controlling, especially when combined when LW's insistence on positivity.
"It's too hot": Maybe it is? Hot weather is unfun for some people.
"I hate going to the pool": LW, have you considered asking why?
Ugh, the more I think about the family situation here, the more I hate it.
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Okay, two things occurred to me here:
One: LW, are you the "positivity police" or the "make do with whatever you get police"? Are you constantly pushing your offspring to just accept whatever it is they get and ignore problems? Because if so, they may feel that they have to, in a sense, scream loud enough for you to hear them (/Staind reference). And on the flip side, you may have given them the sense that everything is actually supposed to be hunky-dory and wonderful all the time, and instead of reinforcing "focus on the positive" for them, you have made them feel that if there is in fact anything they don't like about a thing, it's actually awful and bad and terrible.
Two: I'm allowing for the benefit of the doubt that this is not you and that you do genuinely want to hear happy things from your children, but look at the other adults in your children's lives and see if there are one or more of them who seem to think something along the lines of "anything children tell me is because they want me to Fix It or Change It" and your kids are not telling the adults in their lives the good stuff because the good stuff is fine as it is and they don't want the adults barging in there and "fixing" it when it was just fine as it is.
Alt Two: There is at least one adult in their lives, either you or someone else, who, when told about the things the kids like doing, will regularly react with shock or horror and forbid them doing it or otherwise tell them that they are enjoying the thing wrong. They have learned to protect their fun from adult eyes because there is at least one adult in their lives who will take it away from them. Or will tell them that they are Enjoying The Thing All Wrong and shouldn't enjoy the parts they did enjoy and should enjoy things they didn't.
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"Camp is boring!” - I dislike outdoorsy activities, so I would probably also say this.
"This one annoying boy is always following me!” - This is potentially alarming.
"Suzy Q got her ears pierced, so why can’t I?” - Does LW have a reason for not letting her kid get their ears pierced? Earrings are a fairly basic fashion choice.
"It’s too hot.” - Look at the heat waves. It is indeed too hot.
"I hate going to the pool.” - Body image issues, a dislike of swimming in chlorinated water, or even just a dislike of swimming in particular could be relevant.
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But if there's an activity that I'm only doing because I think the kids might enjoy it, and the kids have nothing positive to say about it? Yeah, we're not doing that thing again. I don't have enough free time or money to waste on repeating experiences that they don't like.