Posted: November 06, 2019
A Parent’s Guide by Christopher Rappold
It’s OK to Ask for Help
Everyone needs help from time to time. Though it’s awesome to feel like you can slay the dragon on your own, often it’s much easier and quicker to ask for assistance. The game is safety and personal happiness. To get there and stay there, your child must value that over the desire to handle it on his own.
Posted: October 31, 2019
A Parent’s Guide by Christopher Rappold
Three simple steps to use when your child experiences bullying behavior at school
Without this unpleasant experience happening, you would only be able to hazard a guess at your child’s ability to handle this. Now you know where he/she stands in a situation of "push back."
Posted: October 23, 2019
A Parent’s Guide by Christopher Rappold
Why Bullying May Be the Best Thing that Could Happen to Your Child
When I look back on my years at school and think about the teachers I had, I have an adult realization: some of my toughest teachers taught me the most. Though I didn’t like the extra homework, additional assignments and hours of reading, they forced me to do something I wouldn’t have otherwise done myself ...push myself.
Posted: October 15, 2019
A Parent’s Guide by Christopher Rappold
Sometimes it’s easy to forget that the child who is causing hurt to your child is probably hurting too. Where do bullies come from? Bullies often come from broken homes and/or homes that lack solid parental supervision and support. They are children that are crying out for something to be cured within them and are acting out the hurt in unpopular ways. Many times they lack the basic social skills for creating friendships in their life; therefore, they live with the need to "get attention" the wrong way, because in their mind negative attention is better than no attention at all. While all children will go through small versions of these feelings, children who truly come from the background described are destined to live there forever, unless something changes for them.
"Sometimes it’s easy to forget that the child who is causing hurt to your child is probably hurting too."
Posted: October 10, 2019
A Parent’s Guide by Christopher Rappold
If you had a choice of ridding the world of bullies or learning the mindset and skills to minimize or eliminate their negative impact on your child, which would you choose?
Think about it very carefully because the answer to the question will reveal how you are viewing the challenge before you. At times parents can feel powerless against the never-ending siege of negative experiences that we cannot protect our children from. It can be very painful to be a spectator to your child’s struggles with a bully. Haven’t you wished that the bully would just "go away" so your son or daughter could just happily continue down life’s path? Has it ever really happened? Sure, occasionally you will have the rare treat of having the bully moving out of state, but how often does that occur? When it does, everyone breathes a sigh of relief, but unfortunately it is only a matter of time before the same challenge rears its ugly head again.