Do the kids a favour: look after yourself

Know thyself is an ancient dictum, but it has timeless relevance to all of us, particularly parents, teachers and other professional people who have responsibility for the care and guidance of children.

It is well established that how a parent feels about themself influences everything he or she does, particularly how the children will feel about themselves. However, it must not be forgotten that all significant adults in children's lives have an influence, especially grandparents, teachers, childminders, relatives and community leaders.

There are two ways to reflect on these two issues, one is to look at how you typically treat yourself and to examine how you interact with children, the other is to compare your daily actions with what you ideally need to do to feel good about yourself and to be an effective parent.

When you detect signs that you are bringing yourself and/or children down, it is important to see that these behaviours are opportunities, wake-up calls, to the realisation of "self" and a mature way of caring for children.

Self-esteem is revealed in all sorts of ways, but how you look after yourself in your everyday life is a major revelation of how you feel about yourself. Check the following list and see how you fare in this regard.

Checklist indicating selfneglect: rushing and racing; missing meals; eating on the run; dependent on drugs (for example Tagamet, tranquillisers, sleeping tablets, anti-depressants); working for long hours; frequently late for appointments; trying to do several things at the one time; rarely saying "no" to demands made of you; having no time for self; few or no social outings; having little or no leisure time; lacking physical exercise; suffering from sleeplessness; overtired; rarely or never asking for help; overeating; undereating; dependent on alcohol; aggressive towards others; passive in the face of unrealistic demands or neglectful behaviours; manipulative; lacking caution (for example, don't wear seatbelt, drive with drink taken, carelessly cross busy thoroughfares); having little family time; having to do everything perfectly; not taking care of your own or others' belongings; living in the future or in the past; fretful; worrying all the time.

If you engage in one or more of the above behaviours, you are showing clear signs of poor regard for self. Clearly, the frequency, intensity and endurance of these behaviours are further measures of the extent of self-neglect.

An important further question to ask is how and to what extent are these behaviours affecting how you interact with your children. The following "ineffective parenting" checklist may help you to identify how, from your place of self-neglect, you routinely interact with children.

Checklist for "ineffective parenting": shouting at children; ordering, dominating and controlling children; using sarcasm and cynicism as means of control; ridiculing, scolding, criticising; labelling children as "bold", "stubborn", "stupid", "lazy", "no good"; threatening children that the parent will leave them; threatening to send children away; physically threatening children; being physically violent; assigning punishments out of proportion to misdemeanours; pushing, pulling and shoving children; comparing one child with another; having an obvious favourite in the family; not calling children by their first names; being too strict; expecting too much of children; showing no interest in children's welfare; letting children slide out of responsibility; not showing affection to children; punishing mistakes and failures; never apologising for mistakes; not saying "please" and "thank you" to children; being inconsistent and unpredictable in response to children's irresponsible behaviours; allowing the children to control the parent; withdrawing love from children; using hostile silences to attempt to control children.

While parents are not to be judged or blamed for the above behaviours, they do have a responsibility for those actions that lessen children's presence. These signs point to parents' own neglect of themselves and their need to come into an acceptance of self, and from that solid base, to move towards positive rearing of their children.

Changing how you feel about yourself can only come through an intense, enduring, loving, accepting and affirming relationship with your "self". Indeed, the very actions towards children that will raise their self-esteem are the same as those that parents need to show to themselves.

"Love your child as yourself" is in keeping with the Christian message of "Love thy neighbour as thyself". What children need from parents - and parents from themselves are: unconditional love; acceptance; physical holding; nurturing; praise of effort; affirmation of uniqueness; listening; time; challenge; positive talk; kindness; support; humour; positive firmness; advice on request; compassion; belief in; emotional responsiveness; emotional expression; encouragement; fairness and apology when wrong.

Dr Tony Humphreys is a consultant clinical psychologist and author of A Different Kind of Discipline.