The Secret to Setting Fair Parenting Boundaries

We're currently running a special limited time five week Q&A series exclusively for our Bratbusters boot camp members. Throughout April, I'm featuring selected member questions alongside the most common implementation hurdles in an exclusive episode each week for five weeks. If you're not already a member, it's not too late to be part of this series. You'll get an instant access to the episodes already released and the final episode question submission deadline is April 23 at 3pm Pacific Time. Go to bratbusters.com or check out the podcast description to learn more and join the Bratbusters boot camp today. As soon as we have friends or family over, he's wild, destructive, energetic, high-pitched, screaming and screeching, hitting, etc. When other people around, you're different. It's your leadership. Remember, your leadership is everything. How do I teach and discipline my children when all three are very strong-willed and stubborn? They're learning. Wait, if I make good choices, life is great. If I make bad choices, my parents know what they're doing. And how do you approach it if maybe you're the other way? And you can see that maybe you've leaned a little too... a little too lenient. I'll tell you what. The way to tell if you're on track with parenting is... Welcome to the Bratbusters Parenting Podcast. My name's Lisa Bunnage. I'm a parenting coach. I'm a mom. I'm also a grandmother. And I'm Amy Bunnage, Lisa's daughter, and I handle the marketing and planning here at Bratbusters. While I don't have kids, each episode will dive into parenting topics and Lisa will answer your questions. Let's get started. Okay, sweetie, what are we talking about today? Today's topic is all about how to set fair parenting boundaries. Fair... Oh, good one. I don't think we've talked about this in a podcast. I think we've mentioned boundaries, but I think where I see a lot of questions come up online, and I can understand this, is maybe you lean more on the authority style, you lean more on the pleaser parent style, and you just don't really have a great gauge of what's fair, what's not. I love this one. And I think people are going to be surprised by... Did we have a lot of rules and boundaries growing up? Not really. None. It was all... Everything was fluid. Everything was negotiable because my kids were so polite. If they said, Mom, I don't like that. I don't think that's fair. I would have said, why not? And they'd say that. And I'd say, Yeah, you're right. Let's change it. Now, because I already... I worked to get that leadership going. That's where you're headed, by the way. When you're learning how to do this, it's all rules and boundaries, and you're just sort of setting this all up. But then afterwards, I talk about this all the time in coaching. Everything's an exception. If my kids had said, Look, I think eight o'clock is too early for bedtime. I'm nine years old, never, whatever it was. I don't remember. Can I make it 8.30? I'd say, Yeah, sure. But if they'd said to me, I don't want to go to bed. I mean, that would have said, Go to bed now. Do you know what I mean? Like, it's the way they came at me. So, yeah, everything was negotiable, wasn't it? Would it be almost as if if you were learning how to cook, you're probably going to want to follow a recipe. But as you become more experienced, you can kind of go off the recipe a little bit. It doesn't sound like that's a good analogy, but it's a very good analogy. Yeah. Once you get better at it, yes, no big deal. Because my kids knew they had a voice, believe me, if they didn't like something, I heard about it. But they were polite. If they came at me in a rude way, I would have said, Well, let's talk about it when you're going to be more polite. I wouldn't have listened. But they knew because they knew I was going to listen. So they always came at me in a really polite way. But yeah, not everything was negotiable with my kids from a very young age. So, but I don't talk about that a lot because you got to work to get there. Right. So that's something you earn. You earn that. That's what I'm saying. You work. That's sort of the next level. That's when you when you are a leader, that's what you that's how you benefit from it. Is that nothing's a big deal? And I think also something that you bring up is with the Brat Busters Behavior Board is that I guess why parents are on there as well is because it maybe does feel too strict if you have all of these rules for your kids, but then you yourself don't have any. Well, who was in more trouble around the house? Was it me or your kids? Oh, definitely you. I was always in trouble. I'd always say, I promise I'll do that. Like it's usually around cooking. Got to hate cooking. I promise I'll make something I forgot. You know, so it was always me. I was always in trouble. You want to be accountable. That's part of being strong. Bossy people who are always right. The right fighters there, the weakest people in the room, guaranteed. So yeah, the strong ones are the ones who do admit when they're wrong. And you know, so my kids were very quick to point it out too. No problem with that. So because then they get a consequence, right? We go somewhere fun. How do you handle it if parents maybe feel like they're being too strict themselves? Well, you got to look at yourself. Are you being like, is it because you're afraid of losing control? Like I don't use the word strict or anything. Usually parents are too strict because they're afraid of losing control, right? You overcompensate. So you want to analyze that. Are you really afraid of losing control? And but yeah, if you're too strict, are you expecting more from your kids than you do from yourself too? You know, do you yell? Do you, you know, do you follow through with what you say? Are you consistent? Are you reliable? Are you trustworthy? Do you play with your kids? Play and fun is their love language. You got to fill that cup up. I'll tell you, my kids cup was overflowing because I love playing with kids. So that's really important too to build the relationship, build the friendship with your kids and the trust. But if my kids had acted out or been rude in any way, boy, I would have changed. I get real quiet real fast. I go, oh, that was interesting. I'll tell you what we're going to do. That's how I disciplined. So I got real quiet. So yeah, so your, your strictness is a sign of a fear of losing control and the kids pick up on that. And how do you approach it? If maybe you're the other way and you can see that maybe you've leaned a little too, a little too lenient. I'll tell you what the way to tell if you're on track with parenting is your relationship with your kids. Are you all laughing a lot? Are your kids polite? Are you polite? Are you all getting along? It's your relationship is the tell. Do they do the right thing? They do their homework. They get ready for school. You know, it's then you know, you're on the right track either way. When the kids are being rude to you or you're yelling, you know, you got some correcting to do whether you're too lenient or too strict. Leadership has really nothing to do with either of them. So yeah, so you that's, that's the tell is your relationship with your kids. If you're ever stressed out around your kids, I was always relaxed when I was around my kids. I remember I was so excited to pick them up every day after school because that was my golden hour. I just love being around my kids. So that's when you know, you're probably on the right track. And plus the teachers and principals were always telling me, you know, how well behaved my kids were and they were happy. You know, that's that's the tell. Are you all happy and you get along? What kind of relationship do you have with your kids? Okay, should we get into the questions on this topic? Good. First one is I have a 19 month old son who is quite lively and very emotionally explosive. My sister thinks he'll become spoiled if I don't start setting boundaries more often, meaning I should forbid certain things even when in my eyes he hasn't done anything wrong. For example, when I'm sorting dirty laundry, he plays with it or pretends to help me or during meals, he plays with his food, not by throwing it, but by choosing the order in which he eats his pasta, pretending the pieces or airplanes flying into his mouth. I don't want to be permissive, but apparently I don't always realize in time that I should stop certain behaviors more preventively. Well, playing with food, I don't have a problem with it. He's not making a mess. I could care less. I think that's cute. Playing in dirty laundry, I wouldn't allow that. I think that's kind of gross, to be honest. If there, I would let my kids play with clean laundry. My son used to sit when he was a toddler. He'd sit on the bed. I lay out the laundry every day on the bed when I brought it in from outside because we had a clothesline. And I'd bring it in and he'd put all of my bras and all my panties and all his panties, all of our panties and bras and everything. He'd put them over his head. He couldn't even see his face after a while. He had so many. He was playing in all the clean laundry, but I would not let him touch my dirty underwear. So yeah, I don't like that. But pretending that the past is an airplane, I don't have a problem with that. He's just 19 months old. Let him have fun. I don't have a problem with that at all. I think that maybe this is like a bigger question is, do you find that some parents are a little quick to try and get their kids to grow up? Okay, play and fun is their love language. Okay. And you've got to teach them manners and how to fit into the world. Right? But yeah, and playing with their food, I don't have a problem with that. But I never let my kids get down from the table up and down, up and down. They knew they sat down, you eat. So I did have manners, right? Like that, but playing with their food. But yeah, I could see why you sort of want to set some boundaries, but pick your battles, you know, playing in dirty underwear. No, no go. Pretending is past as an airplane. I don't have a problem with that. What's it? What's the harm in that? I think it's cute. And but I'm wondering why your sister's saying that. I think there's more going on. I think you're probably never say no to him is the impression. I'm pretty sure about that. So yeah, I think that's the problem. You probably, there probably are things that you should say no to and you should correct, but you're not. That's my guess. I think that's tough as well though. If you're a first time parent and maybe somebody is a little bit more on, and I'm not saying this is this case, but if you have friends in your life who are more in the authority style and they think that you're being too, quote unquote, like weak and not enough rules. But then maybe you don't like the way that they're parenting. Like how do you navigate that when you aren't even sure in yourself on your parenting? Yeah, well, that's why you've got to listen to people like me or someone else that you trust online. So someone else, right? Cause you can't always trust the people around you, but go online. If you trust me and what I'm saying, then maybe sort of take my advice or someone else, you know, so look at more of someone who's out there teaching this stuff who has more experience because your sister, was it sister or sister in law? I think it was sister. Sister. If your sister, I mean, she probably doesn't like, I've worked with hundreds of kids. So maybe she doesn't have all that level of experience and maybe her kids are just different and they don't want to play with their food. Maybe she thinks that's the best way to be. Maybe she's self-righteous and maybe she's too judgmental or maybe she is truly trying to help because you never say no. And this kid doesn't, and that doesn't even know the meaning of the word. They need to know the meaning of the word. No, because there are, there's a time and a place where you're going to want to use it. So yeah. So I don't know what's going on, but I'm guessing you don't say no very often. That would be my guess. I think as well as in parenting in general, and as you said, this could be like many different situations, but there is just so much judgment. There's so much just advice coming your way. There is. And that's why I say you should really pick a lane. If you're listening to me and you like what I say, don't listen to anyone else. If you hate me, move on and listen to someone else. Don't mix up parenting styles. It's like dieting. You can't pick and choose what you like from different people. It's a system. It's a plan. It's a whole like a mode of parenting. I teach leadership. I invented this stuff. Kids taught me all this stuff. So it's what's worked with me. If you like it, don't follow anyone else. Okay. Give it a go for at least three weeks and don't follow anyone else. It would be because if you were to throw time out, cause let's say you like time out. Other people teach it. I hate it. I think it's horrible. So if you were to throw time out into my method, nothing else would work because now you're disrespecting the children. I think timeouts very disrespectful and mean. So if you were to throw that meanness into my method, it wouldn't work. So then you think, well, Lisa doesn't know what she's doing because ignoring the tantrum isn't working, but you're throwing. You're using time out. So you see, you can't make it's like dieting. You can't pick and choose what you like from different diets and expect any, anything to work. So you've got to pick a path. It's a very, my path is very specific. I invented all this stuff. I've worked with hundreds of kids. I've finished raising a couple of them. So, and if you don't like me, do not follow me because you're never going to do what I say anyway. Follow someone else that you like that makes sense. But I say there's three criteria. If I was going to take parenting advice from someone, these are the three criteria I think are absolutely necessary. Number one, they have to have finished the job. You have, there's no way you should be teaching parenting if you haven't finished raising your kids. How on earth do you know how to set up for those teen years? If you've never even been through it, doesn't make any sense at all. Number two is they have to have found parenting fun and easy. Why would you take advice from someone who struggled? Doesn't make any sense. The third one is I didn't learn a lot with my own kids. I learned it with all the hundreds of kids and teenagers I've worked with, okay, as a behavioral mentor. So, they have to have worked with hundreds of kids because how can they have, how can they teach parenting if they've only worked with their own two or five kids? It doesn't make any sense. Those are the three criteria. I'm sure there's lots of other people out there who have that. So, if you don't like me, go and find someone else who has those three experience based criteria. A lot of my clients have child development degrees. They're principals, teachers, child psychologists. They struggle with parenting too. It is all experience based. It's personal. It's not like anything else, okay? So, I couldn't do those jobs, but they also struggle with parenting. Not all of them, but a lot of them do, okay? So, anyway, I'm very, I believe this very strongly. If you're following someone that you don't like, like if you don't like the way I talk about it, you're not going to do what I say anyway. You want to follow someone that you like and you trust, okay? And then just follow that. Forgive it three, maybe six weeks. If it doesn't work, say that person's an idiot. Move on to someone else. Do not mix up parenting styles. You'll never find anything that works if you do that. It's like, let me bring it back to the recipe analogy. It's like trying to mix two different recipes. Some people can do that. If you're really good at it, you could probably do that. But yeah, overall, I wouldn't recommend it. Okay. The next one is Emma from Australia. Two and a half year old boy is an angel when I'm home alone with him. Calm, helpful, listens beautifully. I don't often need to say no to him or do course correction. As soon as we have friends or family over, he's wild, destructive, energetic, high-pitched screening and screeching, hitting, et cetera. And none of the usual methods of saying no and removing him from the fun work. Help. Is he attention seeking, putting on a show for guests, or is he just excited? Well, he has your full attention when it's just the two of you. That's why. And then you're a different parent when there's other people around. Okay. You're not as attentive. And I would tell people, look, I'm training this kid. So if I have to keep leaving the room and dealing with him, I'm going to have to do it. Okay. So yeah, he's only two and always two and a half. Okay. He knows what he's doing. So yeah, you're a different mother and he doesn't have your foot. You probably let a lot of stuff go to. He probably knows it. So he takes advantage of it. So yeah, you're different when, when other people around you're different. It's your leadership. Remember, your leadership is everything. And when it shifts and changes according to whatever, the only time I was ever different is when we were on a plane. If I was on a plane, I'm going to give those kids whatever they want. There's no freaking way I would have kids crying or tantruming on an airplane. And put other people through that. I'm going to give them whatever they want and they knew it too. Soon as mom gets on an airplane with them, I've got a whole bag full of stuff. I'm going to give them, spoil them, rotten, give them whatever they want. Other than that, I was, and as soon as we get off the plane, right back to normal again, and they slingshot it, they understood that. But yeah, so you want to make sure you're 100% consistent. It says to me that you're different when there's other people around. Okay. The next one is Lacey from the United States. I've been listening to your podcast for quite some time now and have implemented a lot of your methods without three year old daughter, which has helped tremendously. I'm still struggling with a couple of issues. I've stopped repeating myself when it comes to tasks like putting on her shoes before we leave or picking up toys. But if we don't drop everything we're doing to do what my three year old wants to do, she will ask or say the activity she wants to do repeatedly until we repeat ourselves numerous times. So for example, she asked if we could go to the park when she first woke up. I told her that I would take her once it's warmed up outside. She repeated, I want to go to the blue park every 10 minutes or so for hours. I tried very hard to not repeat. Yes, we will go to the park as soon as it warms up, but I don't know what to do in the situation. Do I just ignore her? Yes, but you tell her you're going to ignore her. So she's three years old. She knows what she's doing. She's just trying to get under your skin. Okay. So are we going to go to the park? I said, yeah, we're going to go later. We're going to go to the park. Okay. I said we're going to go later. Now, I don't know. I'm on the fence with this one. So I would say this. I said we're going to go later. I won't be answering that question again. Okay. Then every time she asks you completely ignore her or you change the subject. Are we going to go to the park? Oh, what a beautiful day out. Yeah. Why are you ignoring me? What do not answer that? You've already told her or the other and I said, I'm kind of on the fence with this. The other thing I might do is I might say, okay, I'll tell you what, if you keep asking me, we're not going or we're going to go to the park still, but we're only going to go for half the time. Okay. So you would cut the time in half. You were never going to go for that long anyway, but she doesn't have to know that. So make it look like you're taking away some of that park time as a punishment for her continually nagging you and nagging you. You must keep answering her. That's why she does it. There's no way I'd keep responding. You just change the subject or you look away. Why aren't you talking to me? What do not answer that? She already knows because you said, I will not be answering. I've already answered that. I will not be answering that again. You've already told her that once. That's all you need to do. She's playing you like a fiddle. Okay. The next one is Maddie from Canada. My son is aged four and is struggling with keeping his hands to himself at school. At home, we implement the behavior board and have seen great success in his behaviors at home. He comes home saying that the kids at school call him mean names and he responds by hitting at them and yelling. Not sure how to help him navigate when his friends are being unkind to him, but not choosing to cross a line with his own aggressive behavior. Please help. Okay. You don't know what's going on there. Like I would talk to the teacher. Now is he daycare or school? Would she say preschool? It says school. School. Okay. So he's probably in preschool. Anyway, I would ask the teacher see what's going on. Is he starting it? Oftentimes the kid who is the, like you might not be getting the full stories when I'm saying, so then say to him, I'll tell you what. They're mean to you or well, then don't play with them. Go somewhere else. Like, you know, oftentimes the kid who complains about other kids being mean is the one who starts it. That's, that's what I'm guessing here. Okay. Pretty sure about that. So yeah, I'm assuming he starts it and then he also finishes it because they, they get, they get annoyed by him, but I would ask the teacher. So I had a clear picture. Then if he hits, I would say every time you hit, you come home, there's going to be a consequence and then just follow up with that, but quit playing into it. And maybe I don't think he's as innocent as he's saying. I know he's retaliating, but is he also starting the whole thing? I'm guessing he is, but I would find out from the teacher, teachers know what's going on. I'd say, look, he's saying that the kids are being mean to him. She might say, well, he starts it and then he get, then he complains when they, when they retaliate. I'm guessing you might get that answer. So then just deal with the hitting. Can't hit other kids. They're being mean to me. Oh, well, that's what happens. Play with someone else then play with someone else. And then you can do role playing at home too. Once you know what's going on, you can be, and you can pretend you're him and he's the other kids. You can find out a lot of, I don't want to go on about this too much, but you can find out a lot of information by role playing. So you, you play him and he'll play the other kids and then you'll see what happens and see, you know, if the truth, the truth will kind of come out through role playing too. How does that look with role playing? Okay. Role playing you say, okay, I'll tell you what. So I'm going to pretend, let's pretend, let's play it like it's supposed to be fun, right? So let's play. So I'm going to be you and you're going to be the other kid. You show me what the other kids, how they remain to you and I will be you and I'll show you how to handle that. So he says, kid comes up to him and says, you're stupid. And he says, oh, well, and then you pretend to walk away and go play with someone else. See what comes out and then you go back to the teacher and you say, he said, the other kids are saying you're stupid. She might say, he's the one who starts it and says they're stupid. He, they often will say what they've already done to the other kids. I don't know that for a fact though. I'm just guessing, but more often than not, that's what ends up happening. When kids are complaining that they attack other kids, he's hitting, right? Victims don't usually hit. If a kid, if kids are being mean to a little kid, that kid doesn't usually hit back. That's where I'm going with this. So if he's hitting, I'm guessing he's not as innocent as you think he is. You find out from the teacher role play. You might get more information that way. He start, he might start confessing, but he doesn't realize he's doing it. But I'm sure that these situations are so nuanced. I'm sure there's so many different ways. There's a lot of different. I can, I can, in coaching, I usually get to the bottom of it, but it's, it is. Yeah. I ask, yeah, I just need to go back and forth with questions. What's he like at home? What's he like around other kids? When you, when you see him, when you're around, what's he like with other kids? Do other kids push him away or play with him happily? Does he poke and prod kids? Does he chair? You know, I'd have a whole bunch of questions. And, you know, figure it out. But yeah, I just think you don't have enough information to really move forward that effectively, but role playing might give you more information and the teacher. Are your kids driving you nuts? They don't have to check out bratbusters.com for my bootcamp courses. If you want to learn how to become a leader. Okay. The next one is Patricia from Ireland. I have three kids, three girls under four, and I feel outnumbered. How do I teach and discipline my children when all three are very strong-willed and stubborn? Plus all three of them cry a lot for any minor discomfort. My oldest, who's three and a half keeps copying me and tries to discipline my other two girls and even her father and aunts. She's very bossy. And although she helps and listens to me, she does have moments when she's very defiant and she ignores me or tells me she won't do what I said. Now my two year old is slowly starting to do the same thing. How do I discipline them if they can't really clean as a punishment? And I'm not sure what I would even do. And as a second punishment, I can't really take anything away that they would care for for more than 10 minutes because they're not attached to any particular thing. And they don't have screen time at all. How else do I punish them? Okay. Focus on the oldest, uh, cause the other ones are just following along. So I would, I would focus on all three, but if you're learning, you know, if you're new to this, just focus on the three and a half year old. Use the behavior board and start there. And you said, it doesn't care about anything. You can't take anything away. So cleaning, she can clean. She can do a chore. Remember that on the behavior board, it's completely free on my website, bratbusters.com. You might also want to look into the bootcamp courses cause you got three kids. So it might be, it's a lot more information obviously in there. But anyway, so what you do is you just start with the rule and a consequence for her and the others will follow suit. But you said that, oh, what was, I lost my train of thought here. Sugar. What was it? You said, um, yeah. Oh, she's very bossy and everything. Okay. So you might want to put the rule down. Um, no, that's too much for her. She's three and a half. Okay. Just put any rule down that, that you think is appropriate. So you said that she doesn't care about, you can't take anything away. Oh, yes, you can. We're going to invent leverage here. So what you're going to do is you're going to say, okay, so there's two consequences. The first one is do a good deed or a chore. Okay. If she refuses to do that, then you resort to the taking something away. What you're going to do is you're going to take something away that she, she sees her younger sisters doing with the, with the dad, maybe. Okay. So look, because you didn't do that first consequence. Now you can't play hide and seek with daddy, um, for the first 10 minutes. So let's say he's going to play for 20 minutes. She has to sit and watch dad play hide and seek with the other two for 10 whole minutes or five whole minutes. You're going to delay the fun for her. She has to watch her little sisters playing with dad, doing something she would love for the first five minutes. She'll have a fit. But once that five minutes is up, let her join in. Even if she's having a fit. You say five minutes is up. Okay. Now you can play. It's called inventing leverage. You make something up that was never going to happen anyway. And you just either delay it or take it away completely. I'm not, she, they're awfully young, but if they were all older, I would say, well, then you take the other kids out for donuts or something. And she has to stay home with the other parent. So she can completely miss out on something, but they're little to just be like hide and seek for five minutes or 10 minutes that she misses out on. You often talk about though, with inventing leverage, like he don't recommend starting there. I don't start with it. But, but that one's not a bad one though. Like you're just delaying the fun for her. You never take it away at the end because then you're going to have one hell of a night. Okay. You only take it away at the start. So it's not, it's not a real tough one. It's just like, let's say he's going to play for 15 minutes. Okay. Start the timer. The first five minutes she misses out on. That's not horrible. But it was her choice. She chose to break the rule in the first place. She chose not to do the first consequence. She chose this. You didn't. It's all her choice. You want to give kids control and autonomy, autonomy over their own lives. That's what this is. They're learning. Wait, if I make good choices, life is great. If I make bad choices, my parents know what they're doing. They're going to make sure I learn a lesson. All she has to do is not break a rule or do the first easy consequence. Her choice. She'll learn the first few times is going to be difficult. She'll learn. Okay. The next one is Hannah from the United States. My six year old is very mouthy and always has been. I'm struggling with how to get control of this. His four year old sister tests the waters in the same way on occasion by speaking disrespectfully to us and often mimicking his behavior. But she obeys easier without as much effort on our part. I'm not sure how to gain my son's respect. We do notice that when he's given a task such as chores or anything that makes him a part of the household, he acts more pleasant. We're tired of the constant correction and fall into the trap of talking about the issue too much with him. We're not sure how to provide consequences for the disrespectful back talk. Thanks for any insight. Well, I don't know what you mean by mouthy. Disrespectful back talk just means you have to change yourself. That's leadership lack of leadership. So I don't know what you mean by mouthy. Is he swearing or name calling? Is he or is he just being rude? If you're just being rude, you completely ignore that follow up through with the behavior board. You'll start with one behavior board in week one, then two and week two. And then by week three, you have three behavior boards. You might want to look into the bootcamp course. It's got a lot more information obviously, but the three behavior boards on the website, they both are. But anyway, so yeah, just start there. That mouthy behavior, I'm assuming is just disrespectful chatter. Like I hate you. You're rotten, whatever. You can only blame yourself for that. You can't blame them for that. That is the very their attitude. The bad attitude is the very last thing to go away and it goes away organically once you're a leader, but it happens over time. It could be three to six months by especially with a six year old boy or a six year old, any age, any sex like boy or girl. So yeah, it's the very last thing to go away. You've got to earn that respect. So you, you haven't earned it. So he's just walking all over you. He doesn't respect you. Set yourself up as a leader and don't blame him for that. It just means that he doesn't have a leader. That's all that is parents are very quick to blame the kids. Like you said, he's mouthy. He's this. He's disrespectful. But all I heard was you're not a leader. Okay. You're disrespecting him by not giving him leadership. Once you do hit that attitude will go away. You can't blame him for the bad attitude. We never address it. It just means you're not a leader means you haven't earned the respect. You got to earn it before you expect to get it. Pete parents often just expect to get it. I don't understand that. I work for it. I earned it. Okay. When I was working with kids, if they were rude to me initially and teenagers, I always thought, ooh, I got to work harder here. I never blame them because a leader always looks in the mirror and says, I'm going to fix myself that you lead. They will follow. Yeah. He just, you're not a leader. That's all that's all that it's a tell for the brat busters behavior board. Can you put no back talk? Never, never, never. What you're saying is what you're saying is I demand that you respect me. It's ridiculous. You can't, you can't, you can't demand to respect. You have to command it and earn it and work for it. Okay. You can put your attitude on there. You can put down no angry tone or no yelling because you're an adult. You should be able to control yourself. Right. You're the leader here. Right. It's a different role. You lead, they will follow. But yeah, you can't put attitude on the board. That's just because it's your fault that he's got a bad attitude, not his. You can't blame them for their bad attitude. You can only blame yourself. Okay. Well, that was it for the parenting questions. Okay. I think that's it. So set fair boundaries. Like I said, once you're a leader and I don't talk about this a lot and I often say, I don't talk about how I parent it a lot. I tell funny stories here and there, but really I didn't have many rules or boundaries. My kids knew right from wrong and they just followed it because they knew if they didn't, mom would come in with a consequence. Also, I was very accountable. They told me everything they didn't like if I was doing something and I listen to them and I usually they were right. If they came at me and said, I don't think you were being fair with that. They were always right because they didn't come at me unless unless they knew they were right. So that's what you want. That's where you want to go. That's the payoff with all this, but you got to work to get there. I earned that. I worked for that. Okay. I can I commanded it. I earned it and that's what you have to do. Don't expect it. You've got to work for it. When I worked with kids and especially the troubled teenagers, boy, I paid my dues. I earned that respect. I never expected to get it. And as soon as they were rude to me, I enjoyed that actually because I thought, Oh, I love a challenge because I had experience with this stuff. Right. So I like that. I like the challenge and you want to look at it. That way think, you know, this kid's really pushing me to be a better leader and I'm going to rise up to that. So if they've got a bad attitude, it just means you're not a leader and you've got work to do on yourself. That's all that means. Okay. But you can do this. You can only control yourself anyway, but when you lead, they will follow. They love a leader. They don't know how to ask for it. They act out. That's how they ask for it. They act out. Come on, lead me. Lead me. Come on. That's what they're saying basically. Okay. I think that's a great place to end. Okay. Thanks so much for joining us. We'll be back again soon talking about another parenting topic. Happy parenting. Thanks for tuning in. If you're ready to dive deeper, check out bratbusters.com to learn more about the behavior board, parenting courses and private one-on-one coaching with Lisa. If you've enjoyed the show so far, we'd love it if you could take a moment to follow, rate and review us on your favorite podcast platform. Your feedback helps us reach more parents just like you. The information provided in this podcast is for general informational purposes only and is not intended as a substitute for professional advice. Lisa is a parenting coach, mom and grandmother. She is not a licensed psychologist or counselor. Her services do not replace the care of psychologists or other healthcare professionals. 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