Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from a PR company in exchange for an honest review. This post contains affiliate links; thank you for your support!
Pride goeth before a fall, right? I was reading a chapter by chapter summary of No More Perfect Kids on As We Walk Along the Road when I received an email wondering if I would be willing to review it. Well, of course! As a recovering perfectionist, I was curious to see if I had made any progress.
No More Perfect Kids: Love Your Kids For Who They Are was co-written by Jill Savage and Kathy Koch, PhD and follows on the heels of Jill’s other best-seller No More Perfect Moms. NMPK is one of those books I wish I had more time to read, review and DO. Because really, I think it might be one of those game-changer books, you know? The book was written to identify and remove the need for perfection from our kids. How? By KNOWING your children, knowing what’s REALISTIC, and encouraging them to be themselves.
They cover 9 specific topics in the book from what is perfection & what happens when it collides with parenting and then goes into talking about questions your kids ask without words:
- Do you like me?
- Am I important to you?
- Is it okay that I’m unique?
- Who am I?
- Am I a failure?
- What’s my purpose?
- Will you help me change?
What’s funny about this, is that I realized I’m pretty cognizant of their differences & personalities as a personality-type junkie :). I know their learning styles and temperament and mine and how they work together. Or not. So when I started, I thought I was doing pretty well as I sped through the first 80 pages or so, having recently “conquered” the do you LIKE me question as a result of reading Say Goodbye to Survival Mode and introducing margin into my days.
And then I slowed. And I read. And I reflected. And my husband said, “You’re STILL reading that book?” Because I had been working through it for about 4 weeks which is unheard of for me. A few things which really grabbed me were discussions of childLIKE versus childISH. Ow. And the whole failure stopped me dead for about a week. I expect better from them than I can do. Ouch.
But it wasn’t all ‘bad.’ I found some real hope for inspiring them to greatness in the chapter on purpose and tools to use in the last chapter, helping them to change. I knew that it would be a great book to have and so I bought an extra to share during the book’s launch week. I’m really looking forward to reading How Am I Smart? so I can encourage them better.
Overall, No More Perfect Kids is a great book for all parents; it was written with both in mind. If you feel a disconnect or wonder why in the world God would saddle some poor child with you for a mother, this could help. If you think you are doing pretty well, do your children know all the answers of all those questions above? I mean, really know them? If so, you need to come to my house for a weekend so I can pick your brain! But if you think you could do better, No More Perfect Kids is an awesome book to help you love AND like, the kids you have, not the ones in your head.
[…] from yourself and others, you may enjoy the new book, No More Perfect Kids. You can read my review of No More Perfect Kids here. At this point, I am in want of a re-read. It was that […]