by Sara McGinnis posted in Parenting

"We're all human, we lose our cool, but as parents, it's our job to reroute and be examples to our children!"
These all-too true words are just some of what has led to one mom's recent Facebook post being shared over 11,000 times.
Along with a photo of five hairbands worn on her wrists like bracelets, Shauna Harvey wrote explained, "Today, I tried something new. Something that required me to exercise patience with my oh so testy 4-year-old. I wore 5 rubber bands on my wrist from the time I got up, to the time I tucked him in just now."
She continued:
"The 5 rubber bands represent every time you lose your cool or say something unkind to your child. Every time that happens, you move one band to the other wrist. To 'gain the band back,' you must do 5 kind/positive things with your child (dance party, singing a song together, reading together, etc). "I read that science shows for every bad reaction, it takes 5 POSITIVE reactions to regain a positive relationship. I'm going to be using this method until it becomes a habit and basically turns into an auto pilot ritual."
Shauna went on to say she finds herself "so incredibly stressed out" because she doesn't understand why her 4-year-old "insists on being disrespectful and a non-listener. I was to the point of crying at least every other day."

Shauna saw the idea for the hairbands trick on a blog called The (Reformed) Idealist Mom wr...