When my boys were little I was having a frustrating day. I had two little guys under the age of three. I was trying to reason with my older son about his behavior.
My sister offered me some parenting advice.
“You need to stop talking,” she says. “I get it. He’s your oldest and he seems like a little man. He’s a smart little guy. But he’s 3 years old. You need to stop talking and use consequences.”
“I thought I was using consequences,” I say. “I put him in a time out.”
“Yes,” she says. “But you’re talking to him like he understands everything you’re saying. Focus more on the consequences and I promise you parenting will get easier.”
I listened to my sister.
Her wisdom proved correct.
One day I was taking my boys for ice cream. They were now 4 and 2 years old. They were making a lot of commotion in the back seat. They wouldn’t stop carrying on.
“You need to settle down,” I say. “Or we won’t go for ice cream.”
They continued to misbehave, I gave them one more chance to no avail.
When I turned the car around their little selves were shocked and devastated. To this day, it’s one of my hardest parenting memories. I didn’t typically have the heart to do this kind of thing.
It wasn’t easy.
It hurt me not to take them for ice cream.
I didn’t want to see their sweet little faces covered in disappointment. I didn’t want their tears. That’s the thing about utilizing consequences. It can hurt us to inflict a penalty on someone we love.
It never happened again.
When I issued a warning they believed me.
Consequences made the need to talk unnecessary.
Consequences alleviated a huge degree of parenting frustration. I didn’t need to over-explain myself. I didn’t feel the desire to get upset because their response was nearly instantaneous.
It made our relationship calmer.
It took out the back and forth. It took out the need to repeat myself. It took out a dynamic that could be frustrating. Parenting isn’t easy but some fundamental basics make it easier.
Looking back, consequences would have been better for my marriage.
But I didn’t utilize them.
Instead, I used words and tears.
It didn’t work.
My husband could have cared less what I said. He would appear to be listening but nothing could have been further from the truth. He was compartmentalizing. He was shutting me out.
My tears didn’t phase him either.
They were child’s play to him.
I would have used consequences if he had mistreated me while we were dating. I would have broken up with him. I would never have tolerated a man who treated me badly.
He waited until I married him to show me the other side of him.
It took me eight years to use a consequence.
I left him.
But it was less a consequence, because I was seriously done with him. It was closure to a very unhealthy cycle that developed once we were married. I wanted out. I wasn’t utilizing that consequence to get his attention.
I should have used consequences the first time he made me cry.
When my smile was wiped away by a man, who had once sworn to protect it.
I should have shown him the door.
Or walked out of it myself.
But there’s something about relationships that makes us talk. It makes us seek the attention of the one we love. We need them to hear us. We need them to understand us.
Even when they act as if they don’t care.
Consequences don’t necessarily enter our minds.
Instead, we make veiled threats.
“That’s the last time you make me cry.”
“I’ll never let you treat me that way again.”
“I’m not staying if you do that one more time.”
It’s not unlike the parent, who keeps threatening not to take their child for ice cream. The parent who says they absolutely can’t have two scoops if they misbehave.
But they repeatedly take them for the cones anyway.
I’ve spent more than a decade in the counseling, research, and writing of love and relationships. As a journalist, I no longer write about other topics.
I’m dedicated to the complexities amid the simplicity of love.
This may be one of the most uncomplicated concepts.
Relationships versus words versus consequences.
I know why I didn’t initially use consequences. It’s simple. A vow made me remain married. I have way too much self-respect and moxie to have stayed otherwise.
I’m the daughter of a strong, independent, outspoken New Yorker.
A vow, a church, and a marriage license.
That’s why I allowed a man to make me cry.
When my husband talked me into taking him back, we went to marriage counseling and had six good years. I felt as if I had my best friend back. The guy I dated, not the man I married.
It didn’t last.
I no longer cared about the vow.
My moxie and self-respect had overrode it.
That’s when my ex-husband began behaving differently. Once he knew I might leave him, he began uncharacteristically drinking. It wasn’t constant but it was disturbing.
I know why I didn’t use consequences this time around too.
I was afraid to use them.
I thought something bad would happen to him.
I should have let him self-destruct. He was doing so anyway. Instead, I ran interference to make sure he was safe. I didn’t want anything bad to happen to him while he was drinking.
It also kept me from the ultimate consequence.
It kept me from leaving him.
I thought his drinking meant he was in a bad place. I thought he was experiencing a mid-life crisis. I thought if I left him, it would put him over the edge.
I did eventually use the ultimate consequence.
It took a few years, but I walked out of that door, cycle, and relationship.
My husband was an extreme. He was diagnosed as lacking empathy and having narcissistic personality on the severe end of the spectrum. Utilizing consequences would never have saved my marriage.
But it may have done several things.
It might have lessened what a narcissist knew he could get away with. It might have let a narcissist know I had something, I seemingly lacked…boundaries.
It might have made me leave earlier, if imposing boundaries didn’t work.
It might have diminished or decreased the length of some of my heartache.
But I married an extreme.
There’s far more hope for the average couple. Utilizing consequences, aka, boundaries can make a massive difference. It can improve the quality of a relationship.
It can alleviate unnecessary words.
And unwelcome tears.
It can make a relationship calm.
