Why Do Children Resist Us and How To Enlist Cooperation

How easy would parenting be if children were more receptive to our instruction offered in their best interest?

“ It’s time to go to bed, you need at least ten hours of sleep.”

“Sure, Mum, let me just brush my teeth.”

“Please turn off your video game and go play in the garden.”

“Absolutely, fresh air and exercise are way better for me than a virtual shootout!”

But our angelic-looking toddler stomps their feet and yells, “No!”, a ten-year-old grumbles and a teenager slams a door in our face.

What drives children to resist us so vehemently and what can we do about it?

It is human nature to resist, but why?

Resistance is an instinct that lives in all of us. We are naturally allergic to coercion. It serves us well when it alerts us to other people’s less than benevolent agenda. In fact, programs such as Clever Never Goes (former Stranger Danger) are designed to evoke this instinct to protect our children.

But the irony is, most of the time children direct their resistance at the adults that have their best interests at heart, their parents. It makes sense too: we are the ones ladling out instruction upon instruction in our attempt to shoehorn the little people in our care into society. To carve out space to develop their own will and personhood, children are driven to fight back. I’ll decide what I am going to eat,.I’ll decide what I’m going to play with. I’ll decide if you’re allowed in my room or not. It’s a nightmare in a stressed environment when you have thirty minutes to get your child ready for school!

One of the reasons behind child's resistance is the lack of relationship manners.

Imagine you need to ask your neighbour to cut their hedge back because it’s encroaching on your garden. How are you going to do it? Typically, first your will greet them and ask how they are. You might crack a joke or talk about something that you both agree on such as the weather. Ah, there’s a smile on their face now and they are hopefully thinking you are quite a pleasant neighbour to have. Time to make that request. These are relationship manners: the unspoken rules that make relationships work. Even in a hierarchical relationship such as between a boss and an employee, these manners oil the wheels.

Without them, we run into resistance instead of cooperation, whether it’s a point-blank refusal, reluctance or sabotage.

But when it comes to our own children, we often drop the relationship manners we would never forget to offer to our neighbours and colleagues. We don’t think we have the time for them, or don’t believe they are required. This can lead relationships to a very rocky ground!

What is 'collecting' and how can it help parents to invite cooperation?

Have you ever heard the phrase “connect before you direct”? Its original form is “collect before you direct”, coined by a wonderfully intuitive developmental psychologist Gordon Neufeld, PhD. It calls on parents to bring the relationship manners back to boost their children’s cooperation. We cannot direct our children ‘cold’. A warming up of the relationship needs to take place first. Relationship manners can save us from both unnecessary harshness and desperate pleading, the last resorts of stressful school mornings. They help us invite cooperation playfully and confidently.

Collecting our children comprises of three main steps:

1. Collect the eyes - get into the child’s space in a friendly way and see if you can share a warm eye contact. If they won’t meet your eye, ‘collect the ears’ instead: lead them into a friendly chat. Many children find it easier to focus on what you are saying if they do not have to maintain eye contact.

2. Collect a smile - make sure you have shared a smile.

3. Collect a nod - look out for a nod of agreement.  What is something you can easily agree on? ‘Oh blue is my favourite colour too,’ or ‘I want Man City to win the League too.’

Once you have collected these, see what it is like to ask them to put their pyjamas on or come and sit at the table for dinner. Then notice the times when you drop the collecting ritual and see how the resistance might be more likely to show up.

What story is in your head when your child resists you?

'Collect before you direct' is only one of the many ways to enlist cooperation in a good relationship. But there is often something that stops parents from using these playful nurturing techniques. Very often, it is the story we tell ourselves about our resistant child, the story served to us by society. Parents are often held back by a sense of entitlement that dates back centuries. We feel children ought to listen to us, no matter how we speak to them and what is going on for them. Drop everything and do as you are told. I am your mother / father. Sadly, tradition has fused the concepts of obedience and respect, the kind of respect that goes only one way – from the child to the parent, and that is so fragile that it is threatened by a simple childish ‘no’.

Even today’s empathic parents who consciously choose to be respectful and gentle fall prey to the trigger of ‘disrespect’, the legacy of their own childhoods, in the heat of a moment. Being around other adults can make it worse. In the privacy of our own homes, we can find the flexibility to pick our battles, but throw the presence of a mother-in-law in the mix, and suddenly we crack down on any hint of resistance. Good parents are never disobeyed. What if they think I’m not a good parent?

To understand your child's resistance and work with it flexibly, you need a better story.

Our webinar “When Your Child Says No” looks at resistance from an attachment-based developmental perspective and helps you get in touch with your own instinct to resist, to be able to come alongside your child.

When is resistance healthy? When does it signal a problem? What is ‘counterwill’? Why is it so likely to show up around screentime? Why is it dangerous when a child is overly compliant? The webinar gives you a deep understanding of resistance and offers multiple strategies for building respectful cooperation.