Problems with discipline? Just get divorced!

When there is one parent, there is one personality and one voice telling the kids to pick up the chunks of banana pancake they threw on the floor. There just isn’t that support. That said, many married moms feel they don’t get discipline support – and I wonder if that silent or contrarian parent might contribute more to unruly behavior when compared with an absent parent, or two parents who support each other in discipline issues, but live in different homes.

So many times married moms complain to me that it’s easier to discipline their kids when their husbands are not involved: “When he’s here, he just lets the kids run wild – but he doesn’t have to deal with them all day!” Or the flip side: “My husband is so uptight, the kids feel so nervous when he’s home. I wish he’d lighten up and let them be kids.

It doesn’t really matter what everyone’s position is. The reality is that if the two power sources in the house have strong opposing views on a topic, it breeds shame in the kids. If your daughter is about to gleefully bellyflop from the back of the couch onto the cushions – which you think is hilarious – she also feels ashamed because she knows her dad doesn’t allow it. Likewise, if under his mother’s supervision your son obediently sweeps the floor after dinner, that can also breed bad feelings if his dad is adamant the task is too much work for a kindergartner.

This speaks nothing of the tension that permeates a home when parents can’t agree on discipline – or anything else, for that matter.

Ideally, a house has two parents – plus many more loving, not-crazy relatives and friends – who find ways to work together and support each other on most important issues. But the further away from that idea a family gets, the more realistic that single parenthood becomes.

After all – how many times have moms – married, single, divorced – thought, “Gah! It’s easier if I just do it myself!”?