Children who are perfectionists

[GinainMD]

Hello all! Does anyone have a child who is a perfectionist? A child who is their own toughest critic? I am seeing this in dd8 in regards to her spelling. She is using list 2 from Beyond. If she makes one mistake she gets upset with herself even though I explained to her that that is the purpose of these spelling exercises. It is getting to where I feel reluctant to correct her because I don't want to upset her any more than she already is. Should I drop her down to list one? She is in a class on Wed. nights for third to fifth grade girls where she has been teased for misspellings so this could be why she is so sensitive. In general she doesn't like to try something unless she knows that she can do it well. Any ideas?

[4Hispraise]

Gina, I have been where you are. My ds has moved to the opposite end of the spectrum now So, this too shall pass is true! Anyway, I know how difficult it is to help our children learn to deal with their mistakes - even those small spelling ones seem so horrible to them. My ds was the same. I don't really have any answers. I can tell you all the things we tried. First of all, if you have to drop down a spelling list for sanity's sake...you have the freedom to make that choice. You know what will work best. Is she succeeding in the current level or is she struggling? If you think that the spelling level is right, and she just is not handling mistakes, then this may be a teaching opportunity. You could use the time to train her how to handle her trials.

(This is what we did - I am NO expert!!)We had ds memorize James 1, and then constantly reminded him that God had a reason for our struggles -even in spelling, math, whatever the challenge is at the time. Then, we taught him to pray about his trial, thanking God that He knows every detail of him and that God did not make a mistake! It worked for him, but you know dd so well, that I am confident you are the best judge of what will work for her.

May the Lord grant you wisdom in how to handle this issue with your dd.

[John'smom]

Gina,
First off, I want to say I'm praying for you and your dd. My ds is a HUGE perfectionist. I feel like I have no advice for you in the sense that will "cure" your dd. I too am a perfectionist, and have struggled with this for my whole life and still do not have victory (in the sense I am "cured" of it). There are times when I do better than others. I try and remind my ds that he is not God, so he cannot be perfect no matter what.

He recently was doing some math problems on the computer and two times he got all of them right. The third time he missed one. He began to cry. He then told me he wanted to get them all right. I explained that he did a good job. I then proceeded to tell him if his sister missed one would he think she did a bad job and he answered NO! I told him how he was being harder on himself than he would be on others. That he needs to have grace with himself. I shared with him my struggles with perfectionism (which I know stem ultimately from pride )

I try to turn his thoughts from himself to others and the blessings that God has given him. I often quote Phillippians 4:8 to him. One thing that has worked well with getting him out of his "funk" is to have him tell me what he's thankful for. He has to tell me things he's thankful for until I can see a change in him. We pray about this together. I guess I feel like I know I'm not going to cure him, but I can always lead him back to the Lord and have him seek the Lord about his "thorn in the flesh". I don't know if that makes sense.

To be honest in my perfectionism, at first I was seeking to make him better to take this away from him, and I know I can't do that, only the Lord can. The Lord may not, but this may be something the Lord uses to have my ds really seeking the Lord's strength time after time. I don't know if anything helped. Just know I'm praying for you and your dd.

[GinainMD]

Thanks ladies! I do think that list two is the correct placement for her as she doesn't make many mistakes and often does not make any. I love what you both said about God. That He didn't make any mistakes in making my dd and that He alone is perfect. I need to remind her, and be reminded, of these things. Thank you for the prayers and suggestions.

[my3sons]

I have one child in particular that tends to be a perfectionist. My other child is just in math - not sure what happened there. I remind my dc that if they got everything right all of the time, why would I need to teach them? There are going to be new things they are learning, and they are going to make mistakes. I also tell them that if they got everything perfectly right, I would probably want to move them up a grade so they began missing things, for they should not know everything they are learning already. I've also told them that about 1/3 of the skills in a guide are usually skills they have already learned and should have pretty much mastered. 1/3 of the skills they have had before, but the year will be spent learning more and strengthening those skills. 1/3 of the skills are totally new and are meant to be in the practicing mode. So, 2/3 of the skills are not meant to be things that are mastered. I have talked about how God lets us miss things, mess things up, and make some big mistakes to remind us to be humble, and to help us to have compassion for others. I gave the example that I used to be very upset if someone was late, but then I realized I am late sometimes too. Unless I can be perfectly on time all of the time, I cannot expect others to be, and even if I could be "perfect" in this regard, do I really want to be so hung up on that? It's exhausting trying to be perfect, and it's something we will fail at every time. It helps my ds for me to just to have the "big talk" about this once and a great while, but most times, if he makes a mistake, it's best to show it to him very matter-of-factly, tell him to quickly fix it, and remind him we are wasting time by talking about it. If tears come, I hug him and tell him I think he's doing great in school. If this doesn't work, I have him go to another room to collect himself, and then I do something else until he's ready to be calm. I have prayed with him too. Okay, I just asked my dc what I've said that helps them get past mistakes they've made, and they said the most helpful things I've said are...
"Put on some happy music and pick a better attitude."
Or,
"No surprise you made a mistake. Everybody does. Me included. Just get on with it."
Or,
"It's normal to miss things like that. Your brother does too."
Or,
"Buck up, or you can head to time out."

Yeah, I probably have said that last one a few times before. I just want to encourage you that this is pretty common. Wow, I thought all the deep talks we had were so helpful - but I guess they find the one-liners more helpful. I hope something here helps, but I guess the best advice I can give is not to let the child dwell on it by devoting lots of time to it. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie