“Watch your tone… watch YOUR tone!”
Those words are echoing around my head a lot these days and the ‘your’ I’m referring to is not my kids…. it is me.
Our house echoes with the whinging and narking of six people. It seems we are in the middle of an epidemic of whining and saying mean things. Even the simplest questions are often answered in a way that makes me grit my teeth and often I find myself yelling at them to speak nicely.
Yep, ever the hypocrite, I yell at them, in a not nice way, to tell them to speak nice.
Yep, that’ll work…. or not.
It took me a little while to realise and remember, but unsurprisingly it all comes back to me and that scarily insightful line from Parenting Passageway…
“You must set the tone in your home”
I’ve blogged about this before. I’ve made a promise to myself to set the tone, to be ‘queen of my home‘, but lately I’ve fallen off the wagon a little and it’s become blatantly obvious by the way my children are talking to each other and to me.
I am not ok with it. I am not ok with the constant eye-rolling, and the exasperated sighs at the end of snarky remarks. I am not ok that a simple discussion about something starts off angry before it even begins. I am not ok with speaking without thinking, or using words to hurt people.
I am not ok with any of that, and it’s me that needs to stop doing it.
It’s been so easy for anger or defensiveness to creep into my words. When I stop and think about it, I often ask the big kids to do something, already assuming it will be a battle, and that shows in the way I speak. How can I expect them to do what I ask when my tone is already telling them they don’t want to? How can I expect them to reply in an appropriate manner when I have already set the tone for the conversation with the first words that came out of my mouth?
It’s hard wearing the crown, being the queen, and taking responsibility for setting the tone for my family, but that old adage that you can’t change others but you can change yourself rings in my ears.
I am the catalyst for change and if I want my family’s conversation to be kind, understanding, and pleasent then every time I open my own mouth I need to hear those words in my head…
“Watch your tone…”
Are you working on being queen of your home? What’s the hardest part for you?
{image adapted from this one from CarbonNYC via Flickr}
I’ve also been watching my tone lately. Its very hard. VERY hard. Thanks for letting us all know we’re not alone! :)
Thanks this post, it is a wonderful reminder. I find it so easy to let my tiredness affect everything and everyone in the house which is not a nice way to operate.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately too. I cringe when I hear my six year old using a nasty tone and realize it sounds WAY too familiar because I’ve been talking/yelling that way at him and his brother. Sometimes it can feel really difficult to pull out of that downward spiral, but you are so right, it is our responsibility to do so. Thankfully I know they are picking up on the good stuff too when I hear them talking sweetly to their younger sister when she cries. Now, to try for more of that sweet tone from me…
it struck me while reading your blog that my 4 year old has begun to heave and roll his eyes when asked to do something or said in an exasperated tone “That’s just great!”. Time for me to rethink my tone. Great reminder!
I have one girl who is a terrible eye roller…. drove me nuts till I was working on a video post for my blog and realised how often I roll my eyes!!!! OOpss
I had a SHOCKER of a day yesterday – and a great part of that was because of the way I was speaking to A. She was just mirroring that. Back to niceness now!
I often think that if I can just change the way I am speaking, then my mood tends to change as well.
It can be hard to see all your bad points reflected back at you by your kids, but also good for you.. right?
Kate, this is a wonderful reminder! And perfect timing too. Thank you. :)
Oh yes. It is so hard, I find it worst in the evenings when we are all tired, especially recently when both husband and I have been in pain from various injuries – after a day out and about that pain is worse, throw in tired and it all goes pear shaped.
We just keep working to improve it.
Fabulous!
You are right. We do set the tone in our homes. And sometimes it is not even what we say, but how we ourselves are feeling and dealing with daily responsibilities and stress. If we are calm and relaxed, the home is calm and relaxed.
I know the feeling, sometimes I just feel like screaming and rolling eyes myself for a day. How often we find ourselves telling kids “watch your tone” but we are sometimes not so much better in this matter. Than you for reminding me that.
I’m late to reading your post. But I wanted to say I loved it. You’re so great at hitting the nail on the head. x
Great post! I always find it “funny” when I am shouting BE QUIET EVERYONE!!! Tone is so important. I find the best way to calm down is whisper all my instructions!
This post seriously just whacked me in the head and opened my eyes to what is going on in our house at the moment. It sounds silly but I never realized I was part of the problem! Going to try to use this from now on. Thanks xx