How to deal with passive agressive behavior

Tell me if this sounds familiar: you ask your child to do his homework, go to bed, turn off the TV, etc. and he resists or ignores you? This behavior can often be labeled as passive aggressive. When it gets pretty bad, the child is so successful at resisting you, you just do whatever it is you asked him to do. For example - "John, will you empty the dishwasher?" (Repeated 5 times over the course of a half an hour). John dawdles, watches TV, tells you to wait, etc. Rather than get in a fight, or keep repeating yourself, you just empty the dishwasher yourself.

ARGH. Who's in control in this situation? John is. If you get mad, and lose your cool, John still thinks he won. He's not upset, you are. How did we get here? Kids develop passive aggressive tendencies as a way to avoid feelings, chores or conflicts. Rather than expressing himself, and dealing with the conflict of him not wanting to do what you asked, he just resists. If it gets him out of the chore, the pattern could continue causing a lot of arguments in the house.

Another way this can be played out would be, "Carrie, if you clean your room and do your laundry, I'll give you $20 to go to the mall." She doesn't clean her room or do her laundry, but she's running off to the mall and you give her the $20 anyway. This is a slippery slope to no good.

The ugly truth of it is this, by resisting you, your child is often training you to give up and leave him alone. You start to lower your expectations of your child and expect less and less from him. It works for a lot of kids, so they use it.

Dr. James Lehman, creator of the Total Transformation Program says, "Instead of building bridges, passive-aggressive behavior tears down communication quietly, closing window after window."

Some ways Dr. Lehman says you can combat this behavior are:
* If you get angry in front of your child, show him that you can handle your anger and use it to resolve the conflict.

* Sit down and discuss why the child is not doing what is expected of her. If she is slow to start her homework, perhaps it is because she doesn't think she knows how to do the assignment. In this case, you can encourage her to start and help her break it down into smaller, more manageable tasks.

* Build in times when the chore has to be finished by. In the examples above, you could say to John, "Please empty the dishwasher by 8 pm. If you choose not to, you won't be able to watch TV tomorrow." And then let it go. Now it's back on him to take responsibility for his actions. For Carrie, "I need you to clean your room and do your laundry by Friday or you won't get any spending money for the mall."

* Reward good behavior. When he does empty the dishwasher by 8 and gets to bed on time, give him an extra half hour to play on the computer. Or if Carrie gets her chores done by Thursday, let her bring a couple of friends with her to the mall. This way, they are motivated to do what's expected of them and it feels good.

* Keep the lines of communication open with your son or daughter. Tell her, I understand your angry, but holding it in, or acting out is not going to get us any closer to a solution. Let's try to figure it out together.

* Stress the importance of working together as a family. Everyone lives here, and everyone pitches in to keep it clean. Thanks for helping by emptying the dishwasher.

Remember, passive-aggressive behavior is an ineffective coping skill. In order for a child to stop using it, they have to learn an effective coping skill with which to replace it. Coping skills will not be abandoned because they’re ineffective unless a more healthy coping skill is learned to replace it.