health and wellness
november
2009
19
For Goodness Sake...
Promoting Health of the Mind, Body, Spirit and Community
By Heather Lewis, LMT, CLT, NT
I heard the other day that win-
ter allergies are on the rise. Mold, dust-
mites, evergreen tree pollen. Coupled
with it being cold and flu season, I am
predicting a significant increase in facial
tissues stock. Hurry, get those dwin-
dling 401k plans converted.
We hear a lot about new cures.
Claritin®, Allegra®, Zicam®-- I was
watching a commercial for a new aller-
gy medicine that said side-effects may
include flu-like symptoms. I’m sorry,
what was that? You’ve got to be kid-
ding. Nope, really that’s what it said.
Some medicines warn they may cause
drowsiness (I think they mean may cause
coma). The coughing, aching, sneezing,
runny nose, sleeping if you can make it
from the bathroom to the bed before you
pass out medicine.
We hear a lot about old cures. Is
it feed a cold-- starve a fever, or the other
way around?
Prevention has a wide variety of
options. There is flu vaccine for those
who are immune compromised, with
many dedicated professionals striving to
predict the flu strains that will be preva-
lent this season.
For the rest of us, what are our
options? Elmo has taught all but news
reporter Chuck Todd how to sneeze
properly. We have learned from Oprah
that your hands aren’t really washed un-
less you have been able to complete the
song “Happy Birthday” while scrubbing.
If all else fails and you find your-
self reaching for the tissue this season,
then there’s grandma’s chicken soup-
- studies show it actually helps reduce
inflammation and speeds up movement
of mucus. Sore throat? Try a salt wa-
ter gargle for temporary relief. Conges-
tion? There’s Vicks Vapo-rub®, it can’t
hurt and if it makes you feel better, great.
Over-the-counter decongestants will of-
fer relief but if used for more than a
couple of days, drying effects will cause
rebound inflammation and can actually
make symptoms worse. Try a humidi-
fier or saline nasal spray instead. Keep-
ing nasal passages clean using a Neti Pot
can be as effective if not more so than
otc medications with no side-effects. In
fact some Neti Pot enthusiasts feel it is a
great preventative. They are affordable
(compared to what we spend on other
Better Parenting: The Spoiled Child - PART I
By Sonia Spackman
What is a spoiled child? How can I tell if I spoil mine?
The sad truth is that it is easier to spoil our kids
than not spoil them. But what is a spoiled child ex-
actly? How does an adorable baby learn to manipulate
us and not get any discipline for it in just a few years?
Ask yourself the following questions about
your children:
Do they disregard rules?
Do they keep going when you say stop?
Do they seem to fight about almost anything?
Is it difficult to keep them happy?
Do they beg for unnecessary toys as though they are
necessary as food?
Do they disregard other family members’ feelings,
wants and needs?
Do they throw uncontrollable tantrums on a regular ba-
sis?
If you answered a solid yes to more than a
couple of these questions, you might have some work
ahead of you.
Spoiling our kids is not about giving too much
love. Spoiling them is providing too much care-- care
that may look and feel loving, but keeps a child from
achieving his or her full potential.
Why do we spoil our kids?
I think that spoiling kids starts with a good
heart. We want to protect our kids from feeling the
pain we had when we were growing up. Sometimes we
are reacting from our own feelings of guilt, worry and
sometimes we are just plain tired.
David J. Bredehoft, Ph.D., the coauthor of How
Much is Enough? Everything you need to know to Steer
Clear of Overindulgence and Raise Likeable, Respon-
sible, and Respectful Children, states that after reading
the facts about the harm that spoiling our kids really
does, many parents might think about doing things dif-
ferently.
What is the harm in spoiling a child? And why should
I be concerned?
Research clearly shows that the impact of
childhood overindulgences lasts well into adulthood.
They grow up facing many painful challenges as adults.
A spoiled child is not ready for the real world and will
butt heads with peers and adults for the rest of his life.
It will be easier for them to make these changes as chil-
dren than to unlearn these patterns as adults.
Giving our kids too many toys, clothes, activities,
sports, lessons, entertainment, or privileges.
As parents, we sometimes think that if we do
everything for them and give them everything they
want, our kids will feel good about themselves and be
more successful. In reality, it will be the opposite. This
thinking is deceiving in many ways. If they have ev-
erything handed to them they develop expectations that
blind them to the fact that they need to know how to
work and earn the things that they want.
Doing things for our kids that they can and should be
doing for themselves. This also involves hovering, res-
cuing and siding with the child when they are misbe-
having.
Our children’s self-worth is determined not
only by how they feel about themselves inside, but self-
worth is determined by how they compare themselves
to kids their own age. What do you think happens in-
side our children when other kids make fun of them and
hold their misbehavior against them?
Over-giving is a form of child neglect. It hin-
ders children from performing in their needed devel-
opmental areas, and from learning needed life lessons.
Over-giving and overly permissive parents hinder their
kids because the kids are not able to calm themselves
when feeling overwhelmed. They have no frustration
tolerance, self-control or anger management skills.
Not having rules, not enforcing rules, not having
chores, giving too much freedom, allowing our kids to
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remedies) and relatively easy to use by
following the directions. We pay great
detail to clean every other orifice during
our personal hygiene regimes; I think it
is high time we gave the nose its due.
Ask any auto mechanic how important
the air filter is on the efficiency of your
car’s performance. Neglect it for long
and your vehicle will be coughing and
sputtering too.
So the next time you see you kid
digging for gold, take the opportunity to
show them how to use the more socially
acceptable Neti Pot. They are just intui-
tively trying to keep their engine running
efficiently.
Here’s wishing you good
health…
dominate the family.
These kids are unable to understand the feel-
ings, needs or wants of their peers or adults around
them.
Some kids act out to be contained. They shake
things up, and get worse to force parents to finally give
them the structure they need. Many children want and
need to feel safe when they can’t control themselves.
Spoiled kids with Oppositional Defiant Disor-
der, ADHD, and bipolar disorder or other mental/emo-
tional deficits still need to have parental help or it will
be the police and the courts that intervene eventually.
Medication, when necessary, and behavior manage-
ment needs to be in place and evaluated periodically. It
doesn’t seem right or fair not to do this for them when
it’s needed. Our kids need as much help as possible to
be able to manage their behavior throughout a typical
day so they have a better chance to make progress.
Spoiled kids usually come from permissive
homes. If you give in to your child’s tantrum rather
than disciplining him or her for it, or if you do not have
rules or guidelines for your kids that you enforce, then
you are too permissive.
When you do this, you are giving your kids
power over you. And that strengthens his ego and in-
fluences selfish and manipulating behaviors. Before a
child is 6 years old, she can learn to manipulate a per-
missive parent, and then transfer this learned behavior
to the world outside the home.
Parents do not do this on purpose. They often
do not understand what they are doing, because they
mix up needs with wants. They think that a crying
child needs more from them. But this is not the case-
- all kids need to feel disappointment and frustration
in order to learn to manage it; if we do not allow this
struggle, they will get accustomed to attention and af-
fection when they feel uncomfortable, and demand it
from you and others.
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