No Yelling Challenge
Sorry it has taken me longer than expected to write this, my internet cannot handle a light rain. Have had the most shoddy service since Thursday.
When I was thinking about guidelines for the three month no yell challenge one thing that has crossed my mind is tone of voice.
I know on my first day I often found myself replacing yelling with a disrespectful tone of voice. I think this is a fairly common response to frustrations.
I have always been very empathetic. As a child this was even stronger. I write from experience when I say it isn't always what you say, but, how you say it that matters.
The hubs on the other hand resorted to defensiveness. While by the end of the day he did yell, most often he talked over, interrupted, used sarcasm, or just plain out ignored what was going on to prevent himself from yelling. I think this is also a pretty common response.
Neither of those are healthy or the result I was hoping for.
I am not going to make guidelines on voice levels...yelling is yelling, you know if you are doing it.
But, I think for my family we are going to make some guidelines on tone of voice, defensiveness, inappropriate use of sarcasm, and ignoring. Would love to hear ideas if your family is going to try something different.
Some of the things we are going to try instead of and to prevent yelling are:
- Write down the negative thoughts as they come to mind. Directly underneath what is written write a positive alternative.
- Spend time once weekly alone volunteering. Use this as our quiet time while attempting to put things back into perspective.
- Eliminate what clutter stressors we can. For example my daughter loves to read, but, also dumps books all over the house to the point that you cannot see the floor in places like her bedroom and my office. So today we moved all of the books into our room and developed a checkout system (three out at a time which she can get out at anytime) until she learns how to take care of them.
- Spend one night a week as a family doing an activity the kids pick.
- Learn to say, I need a moment to myself to regain my control.
- And create an activity box that can serve a distraction when you need that moment.
So this is where we currently are. Would love to hear what your first day was like or any thoughts you may have to add to this. You can join in on the discussion on Facebook.
