Because I’ve spent a lot of my time child-rearing and what-not these days, I thought from time to time I would pass along to you, lucky reader, some of the hard-earned wisdom I’ve gleaned since having my wonderful, wonderful children. Through these tips, I hope you too will be able to avoid incarceration, insanity and the unfortunate personal hygiene neglect that are all too often the hallmarks of unprepared parents.
Parenting Tip #1
Being an effective parent has less to do with how loving, nurturing and compassionate you are and more to do with how adept you are at psychological warfare.
No amount of parental reasoning, patience and love will ever convince a 4-year-old that he should once, JUST THIS ONE TIME FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, wear jeans to pre-school instead of wearing the sweatpants that make him look like the homeless version of Justin Timberlake.
On the other hand, a calm thinly-veiled threat to throw no less than two, but no more than three, Backyardigan’s DVDs in the trashcan because he’s the one being unreasonable is a surprisingly effective motivator.
