The last point I would like to make is that kids want to be heard. A good example here is when it was time to go school shopping. Two weeks before school started my father told me to write a list of everything I needed and that upcoming weekend we would go and get everything. The weekend passed and I had not yet gone. I asked again the next day when he had returned from work and he told me, 'you never said anything about going school shopping. You have to wait till next weekend now.' Having my older brother and mother witnesses to both of these encounters, they told him how I already said I wanted to go school shopping. He changed the subject and continued another conversation. Now I'm sure I could have reminded him that weekend, rather than just writing a list and giving it to him, he's a busy man, but the fact that he couldn't even remember me telling him about it really got to me. And that is why I say kids want to be heard.…