Let's take a look at another option this father may have chosen when confronted with this same problem. What Plan is this?



Yup, that was Plan C! The father decided to drop his expectation of teeth brushing here. Of course, the advantage of Plan C is that it decreases challenging behavior. The disadvantage of Plan C, however, is that it won't solve the problem either, and the parent's expectations aren't met.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that this is "giving in" though. Giving in is when you try to use Plan A to solve a problem that imposition of will can't solve, challenging behavior results and so you drop your expectation! That's not the idea with Plan C. On the contrary, Plan C is you being planful. You are deciding what you are working on and what you are not working on. You are dropping the expectations that aren't worth working on just yet (i.e., you have bigger fish to fry!) or aren't realistic to pursue just yet.

Now if we just left things there, one might say that this approach is just about picking your battles, but the most important Plan is yet to come ...

Click the arrow above to keep going.