Are we unwittingly creating ‘resistive behaviours’ in our children?
Recently, one mother brought her son to see me.
She looked me straight in the eye and said, “My son is my worse student”.
Being a movement practitioner herself, she was complaining how her son refused to let her work with him in supporting his development.
A number of my client’s parents have also remarked, “My child cries as soon as we enter the therapy room”.
Yet another parent told me, “My daughter falls asleep every time during her therapy sessions,” and she knew that it was not just coincidence.
In my own experience as a physiotherapist, I have had my own share of similar stories.
Years ago, when I was practicing in-home physiotherapy, I took over the caseload of a colleague who was on maternity leave.
There was one particular client who did not have a medical diagnosis but who had delayed gross motor development. As soon as her mother opened the door, the child started crying.
Her Mom welcomed me in and we settled on the couch with her daughter crying in her arms. It was pretty clear to me that there wasn’t much I could do with this child.
So I started talking to her mother to get some idea of how her daughter was doing and what it had been like on previous visits. Apparently, this was her typical behaviour with my colleague.
As I continued talking to her mother, I ignored the child and didn’t even look at her.
After a few minutes, she became quiet.
That’s when I started casually glancing at her while still talking to mom. She had this perplexed look on her face as if she couldn’t understand why I wasn’t giving her any attention.
Also, she began to appear less afraid and was calmer.
While carefully observing her responses, I began to touch one of her feet lightly then quickly let it go. She was fine with this so I continued.
Gradually it turned into a game and eventually she began to smile as I did also.
Very delicately, I helped her feel how her legs could move and how they connected to the movement of her pelvis. By then she became genuinely interested!
At that point, I was very happy with the progress we had made. I provided mom with some home activity recommendations and left.
On my next visit, this child did not cry when I entered the door. After giving her some time to get used to my presence again she was happy to begin ‘playing’ with me.
After a couple more visits, her mother reported that she had started pulling herself up into standing and also was climbing onto the couch. She continued to make progress between therapy visits and eventually began walking on her own.
How this child ‘turned the corner’ from being distressed in my presence and resistive to therapy, to being happy and learning with me was etched into my memory.
Our experiences and our perception of them has the power to influence our future decisions.
An unpleasant experience can literally stop us from moving forward. But KNOWING that we do have the ability to transform that experience and be empowered, gives us hope to believe that anything is possible.
So many things can go unnoticed during our interactions with our children.
In the name of doing the right thing, we may have unintentionally subjected our children to unfair treatments, only to realize later that they might not have been in their best interest.
Being human, we all make mistakes.
However, we also have the innate ability to learn from our mistakes and more importantly, can choose to make a better decision the next time both for ourselves and for our children!
