Politicians and Their Negative Ads...Talk about Bullying

During every TV show our children are watching during campaign season there are negative ads from every candidate.  We are busy trying to teach our children not to bully other children and that is exactly the model that they are being exposed to each time they watch one of those negative campaign ads.  If you don't have a device on your TV that lets you skip those pesky commercials, the bad news is they will be around for another nine months and as the election gets closer they are going to become more vicious.  How do we limit the affect of these ads on our children?   Turn off the TV, read a book together, watch videos, use them as a jump off point for a discussion about bullying and talk to them about what you think about negative campaigning.  We can't make those ads go away but we can certainly do something about there affect on our children

Be Ready for a Discussion about Marijuana

Be prepared to discuss your feelings about marijuana with your children because more than likely they will ask. The debate about legalizing marijuana has been going for as long as I can remember and it is still going strong today. Make sure that you have decided where you stand on this issue and that you feel comfortable telling your children where you stand. Is it a gateway drug or less harmful than cigarette smoking? I don't know, but you should also consider that no matter how you feel it is still illegal to use marijuana.

Your Child Has an Addiction Problem...Now What?

The signs are there, your child has an addiction to drugs or alcohol.
Now what? The first thing to do is to leave the guilt on the door step. Ultimately, even if you have an addiction yourself, your child is responsible for their addiction. It is VITAL to their recovery for them to accept responsibility for their addiction, and not push it off on you. Get them professional help ASAP; this is not a problem that you can handle on your own. The sooner that you get them help, the better chance they have of recovery. Your role in your child’s recovery is to get them help, and to make sure that you are not playing the role of enabler. Help for addictive behaviors takes on many forms: residential facilities, support groups, individual counseling to name a few. Decide on the program that is best suited to helping your child and then commit to it. Give it some time to start working. If you see no improvement, try a different program. Don’t just give up; this is the life or should I say death of your child that you are talking about. It is also important to get some support for you and your family as well. AA has some wonderful groups for family members that have a high success rate