Written by Nina Roesner and Debbie Hitchcock
Published at Thomas Nelson
About the book
With All Due Respect is a handbook for parents navigating the difficulties of the tween and teen years. Roesner and Hitchcock help parents identify what successful relationships look like and give easy-to-follow lessons in enforcing rules, communicating lovingly, resetting relationships, overcoming fears and exhaustion, and handling rebellion. Each day features a story every mom can relate to, down-to-earth questions to think about, and a prayer to launch an action plan. As a result, the reader gains new skills and perspective, greater strength, and an ability to live out faith daily as never before. With All Due Respect is for all parents seeking not only to connect more deeply with and positively impact their teens and tweens, but also to grow more deeply in faith through the process.
My Thoughts
When I requested this book to review, I was having issues with my tween and I knew that I needed to change. So I quickly downloaded the Kindle version because I wanted to become a better parent for all my kids when they hit the tween/teen age. I already have a teenager but somehow dealing with his transition was not as difficult as his siblings following him. I suppose I might have been less tired for him too but I knew that I lacked the skills of dealing with siblings rivalry since I was a single child. So I immediately started reading it.
Essentially this book is divided into forty dares to do but instead of focusing on your relationship with your husband, it helps you to establish a better relationship with your kids – boys or girls. Growing in the tween and teenage years can be confusing for anyone and this book will allow you to slowly develop an amazing relationship with your kids.
The forty challenges for us parents are the following ones:
- Assess Your Parenting Interactions
- Revisit Your Childhood
- Focus on God’s Vision
- Push the Reset Button
- Be Careful With Your Words
- Communicate Respect Early
- Stop Yourself
- Take Care of the Temple
- Counter the Culture
- Refrain from Casting Blame
- Parent with Perspective
- Leap Outside Your Comfort Zone
- Encourage Rather Than Nag
- Use Humor When Things Got Hot
- Stay Out of God’s Way
- Practice Thankfulness
- Be True to Your Word
- Offer Compassion Instead of Judgment
- Give Your Kids Grace
- Take Time to Listen
- Coach Your Kids On Navigating Conflict
- Parent Ahead
- Talk Your Kids Through Disappointment
- Drop the Comparisons
- Invite Their Friends In
- Separate Your Identity
- Avoid the Blame Game
- Respond With Calm
- Remove the Mask
- Deal With the Person Before the Issue
- Respectfully Consider Your Kids’ Requests
- Teach Your Kids to Self-Process
- Be Sensitive to Other Parents
- Release Yourself from Worry
- Encourage Self-Discipline
- Point Out What Is Right
- Be a Relationship Architect
Each challenge starts with scripture and you get to read a situation between a parent and his tween/teen. At the end of this reading, you will get the bottom line on how the parent helped the child to deal with the issue. Then the authors encourage you the parent to develop the skills needed to help with a similar situation. Once you have finished reading you will get to the What About You? section which contains questions that will allow you to ponder on your own growing up as a teen, how you might have responded differently, how you could develop the skills demonstrated by the parent and so on. These questions are very helpful to remember your own teenage years and realize where you can do better. For me some on these questions were like a 2x4 hitting my head. Finally at the end of the chapter, you will be able to pray on this specific skill with a quick prayer written by the authors. Often you will realize that you will add more to make it your own personalize prayer. After all what I experience with my tweens/teens would be different than what someone else experience.
Even though this book suggest to read one chapter a day for forty days, I find it hard to do this with our homeschool and other things to do. I also find that some chapters were a bit harder to “digest” than others. So I decided to go through this book at my own pace and develop the relationship I have with my kids in the same process. The book also suggest to go through it and applying the lessons with only one child at a time but I find I could apply the lessons to more than one so because of this I find that slowing down while reading this book is beneficial for our family.
If you are starting to have issues with your tweens/teens, this book could help you to build a better relationship with them. I do recommend this book in order to strengthen your interaction with your teenagers. But as any other book out there on relationship, be aware that it takes work and honesty from your part to go through it.
With All Due Respect is available at your favourite bookstore, even on amazon.ca and amazon.com.
Disclaimer: Thanks to Thomas Nelson for sending me the above mentioned product for review purposes . I was not monetarily compensated for this review. Please note that the review was not influenced by the Sponsor in any way. All opinions expressed here are only my own.
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