The Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically I

Learning Curves 157

I’ve been taught that it’s important for parents to be

consistent with each other in front of the child so the

child can’t do any “splitting.” So what advice do you

give parents if one is using Plan A on an issue and the

other disagrees?

Explosions are far more destructive to families than
parents disagreeing in front of their children. What’s inter-
esting is that if two parents share the same concern, they
already agree on the main point (that they have a concern
to put on the table). Your concern is entered into consider-
ation with both Plan A and Plan B. So if one has begun
heading toward the point of no return (Plan A), good
teamwork means that the other parent should jump in
(quickly) and get the child’s concern on the table (to initi-
ate Plan B), head off an explosion, and get the problem
solved. Then the parents need to talk privately about how
they can get their concerns addressed without causing ex-
plosions.
Life is a bit more interesting if one parent is using Plan
A and the other is doing Plan C, for this suggests that the
parents are not yet in agreement about whether they
should be putting a concern on the table. Before the issue
is raised with the child, the parents need to discuss
and agree upon whether the concern is actually worth
pursuing.