One of the worst mistakes you can make with your strong will child is trying to control him or her.

It can feel like trying to, I don't know, chain a bear to a chain link fence sooner or later that bear breaks free and then you've

got trouble on your hands. If you're struggling with raising a strong-willed child,

I am so glad you joined us today. I'm John Fuller joined by

Dr. Danny Werta. He's our Vice President of Parenting and Youth here at Focus on the

family and let's kick off this episode with some conversation that Jim

Daly and I enjoyed with Cynthia Tobias who has admittedly a very strong

personality about ways to work with your son or daughter.

We've talked about the positive attributes.

I mean these kids can have determination, they have grit, they really want to get it done,

they can be extremely loyal, yet at the same time there are some

downsides. Let's touch on those. We've touched on a bit of that, but let's talk

a bit about that downside, the negative aspects of strong world children.

You know when it goes sideways and it goes sideways most quickly when there's a bony

finger pointed in my face or when someone you know it sounds like an edict or an order then I tend to as a strong will child

react with rebellion with a little bit of defiance with no you can't make me and I

don't want to do it and I don't have to if I don't want to.

So then I can become a real drain on the family for one thing because it takes all your energy

just to try to get me to obey.

And what happens with parents a lot of times

when I don't obey the first time,

then they just keep drilling in and drilling and drilling and drilling.

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