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Couple of questions for your experienced parents in the group

First off, I was just told last night by the misses that we are pregnant, it's my first, I am deathly frightened of what will happen now that my life is not my own (in a way, not a way).

When it comes to punishment for a child, what are your levels?

Do you hit (for lack of a better term) your child if the offense is series enough? I know that I was in fact, spanked and smacked a few times growing up, but that was from either A) My stupidity or B) My mouth, amazing how those two can work together isn't it?

Just looking for some feedback/advice.

Congratulations!

It all depends on appropriateness and level. I think a good number of people on this board were smacked as children, and I for one know that I probably deserved it too and it probably helped me.

Unfortunately, in this world of psycho-babble and PC, hitting your child has now become an issue of great taboo and potential abuse.

Congratulations!!!!

That being said, punishment didn't come into the picture for us until after 14 months of age. Before that, "punishment" really wouldn't have done anything, as the child has no way of connecting the punishment with the act logically.

At 14 months (she is now 16 months), our daughter started pulling on this lamp we have and also would bite me now and then. We decided it was time to start implementing something. We use "redirection" for the lamp problem; telling her that she is not allowed to play with that and giving her another toy (we usually also bring her to another area of the house or to her toy area).

For the biting, we have had to be more strict. "No biting, biting hurts mommy" is said each time. If she continues, mommy picks her up and places her away from her toys or the TV or the couch. She will cry for a moment and then it's over. Her biting episodes have gone down A LOT, and now she only does it when she's overtired. We're working on that now.


We've decided to try gentle discipline (got a few books I like on the subject- the Dr Sear's Discipline book and 1-2-3 Magic). Neither of us grew up with spanking, so we aren't really inclined to it. Hopefully other techniques will work!

For older kids, I recommend reading some of the books aimed at teachers. I have an arsenal of discipline techniques that do not include corporal punishment from my teacher training. Of course, you have to be open and ready to use whatever works. We are resigned to the fact that we may need to resort to spanking; we don't want to rule anything out that may work in the end...jsut put it off until there are not other choices.

Speaking as a former child rather than as a parent...

I was spanked for only the most egregious offenses as a child. Like if I used violence on my siblings, cursed at (or around) my parents, that kind of thing. For most lesser sins I just got a stern talking to from my old man and a non-corporal punishment (like being grounded from the TV, toys taken away, etc.). If you spank a kid for everything, then you're sending the wrong message. But if you use the same light punishment for every bad thing the kid does, that's also no good.

This worked out fine for me and my siblings, eventually producing healthy young adults. Yet, at the same time, I have a cousin who never touches his kids and just uses subtler methods. He's had two (a boy and a girl) and both were absolute demons from about ages 2-4 but then settled down a lot. So you should use a method that works for you. I also tend to think that you and your wife should be agree to use the same system and to present a united front; if you two are disagreeing and your kid finds out, that can be trouble.

I think the most important thing is never to do anything to your child in anger, ever.

Darth Mortis wrote:
When it comes to punishment for a child, what are your levels?

We use a "naughty chair", one minute for every year of the childs life. Basically the kid sits in the chair with no stimulation, no toys no tv and it drives them crazy but it works really well. Rarely do they repeat the offense.

Do you hit (for lack of a better term) your child if the offense is series enough? I know that I was in fact, spanked and smacked a few times growing up, but that was from either A) My stupidity or B) My mouth, amazing how those two can work together isn't it?

Just looking for some feedback/advice.

I used to spank my son for every little thing he did wrong. Then one day I spanked him and I noticed the look of horror on his face, as if he couldn't believe that the man he adored most in the whole world was hurting him. Since then I haven't spanked him for anything, it's not worth it. I'd rather put him on the chair than damage his self esteem.

I was spanked for only the most serious of misdeeds. (Blantent lying and taking off on my own to visit grandma). Because they were so rare, the shock of being spanked was quite effective. If I were a parent, I'd reserve spankings only for situations that could endanger the kid (like chewing on extension cords, or running across busy roads).

I didn't get spanked but my mom would put a bit of cayenne pepper on the tip of my tounge instead. I learned things real fast...

Congratulations!

I was spanked for serious offenses, but every time it happened, my parents (or the spanking one) would sit down, tell me they loved me, explain what I did wrong and that this was to demonstrate to me that there were consequences for everything.

Darth Mortis wrote:Couple of questions for your experienced parents in the group

First off, I was just told last night by the misses that we are pregnant, it's my first, I am deathly frightened of what will happen now that my life is not my own (in a way, not a way).

When it comes to punishment for a child, what are your levels?

Do you hit (for lack of a better term) your child if the offense is series enough? I know that I was in fact, spanked and smacked a few times growing up, but that was from either A) My stupidity or B) My mouth, amazing how those two can work together isn't it?

Just looking for some feedback/advice.

Whatever your system is, be consistent with it. The worst thing some parents do is adopt an inconsistent system of discipline, where the severity of the punishment has more to do with whether Daddy had a good day at the office than the severity of the offense.

First of all, congratulations!!!

I'm not a parent yet, so this is strictly from personal experience. I was never spanked as a child (besides, it's illegal to spank or otherwise physically punish children here in Sweden). I was quite well-behaved as a child, but when I did something wrong, my parents would talk to me and explain why it was wrong. When I was in the obstinate age, my parents would use different kinds of distractions etc. In my teens, it was the "allowance" card that was played (I was never grounded).

Darth Wong wrote:

Darth Mortis wrote:Couple of questions for your experienced parents in the group

First off, I was just told last night by the misses that we are pregnant, it's my first, I am deathly frightened of what will happen now that my life is not my own (in a way, not a way).

When it comes to punishment for a child, what are your levels?

Do you hit (for lack of a better term) your child if the offense is series enough? I know that I was in fact, spanked and smacked a few times growing up, but that was from either A) My stupidity or B) My mouth, amazing how those two can work together isn't it?

Just looking for some feedback/advice.

Whatever your system is, be consistent with it. The worst thing some parents do is adopt an inconsistent system of discipline, where the severity of the punishment has more to do with whether Daddy had a good day at the office than the severity of the offense.

I can't agree more fully with your statement. I grew up the son of a Navy special forces guy, and my dad, he raised me right. Everything was always consistant and there was no slinking out of punishment. If I committed the "crime" I did my time.

I think my dad's most important suggestion he has given me is that "There is nothing more valuable to give your kids than your time"

I'm going to stick by that addege.

Congrats.

As for punishment, I'll second Kendall's suggestion...looking way back when I was a kid, and seeing other kids in action, just paralyzing them for a sufficient amount of time seems to be enough, at least for minor offenses. Children want to move!! And when kept from that for a reason, they learn not to do that...at least, I did.

When I was younger, my folks spanked me for pretty much anything they caught me doing. All this did was got me pissed off at them, and I never saw any specific reason not to do things they disliked except because they might spank me, so the real lesson I learned was how to avoid getting caught. If you go with the spanking method, offer an explanation, but offer it AFTERWARD, so that they can't try and argue with you about it.

I grew up with a mix of spanking, 'time out' as they call it now, and grounding/go to your room. Those are the same systems my brothers used/uses on their kids. The girls grew up great, the boys are still all under age 10, but they are well behaved.

One trick my younger brother uses works very well. If they are doing something wrong, tell them no. If they do it again, warn them that you're going to count to 3, then it's a spanking. If mom or dad says 'three', the boy's getting paddled, no matter how much they apologise, because they were warned once.

You've never seen a kid stop doing something as fast as my nephews when they hear mom or dad start saying "ONE...."
Of course, this can lead to abuse of the system, as one tried to dodge punishment by stopping at 2. After the second count of 'one...two', he went back to whatever he was doing wrong yet again. That time Dad's count started at "TWO" and he got paddled.

But be consistant. If I had been out running the hills and hollers and ignored/didn't hear mom calling me, I was grounded to the yard the next day.

Although please don't throw something at your kid when they're reading. They may not be ignoring you, but honestly and totally absorbed by the novel. Mom never believed me when I told her I'd not heard her.. but I hadn't.

When i was real young i used to get spanked, but as i grew older my dad turned to placing me in the corner. I hated having to stand there for however long i had to. The good thing was that there was no violence involved.

I got spanked, slapped and put in the corner. Apparently I deserved it. But my dad was more of a Tarkin Doctrine kind of guy, fear of force over force itself. Reminds me of Adam Ferrara's bit about his father yelling at him and his brother. "Lemme tell you a story kids. Your mother wanted 2 kids, but we had 3 because I knew the day would come when I'd have to kill one of you."

Eventually, it got to the point where I could recognize my mom's "Go stand in the corner" tone of voice and would just act accordingly without being told. We were at a wedding once and she called out my name just to get me to come over for a picture or something, but I thought I had done something wrong. So I found the nearest corner and stood in it.

She just left me there for a while. Cruel woman.

My nephew got stuck in the corner during Thanksgiving dinner, and his mom got distracted by the other son. I walk by, heading for the bathroom, and he asks me pitifully "An'Kaffe? Could you ask mom if I can come outta the corner now please?"

I went to my sis-in-law and she got this horrified look on her face. "Ohmygod! I forgot he was there!" and she ran to get him and apologise to him

Zero132132 wrote:When I was younger, my folks spanked me for pretty much anything they caught me doing. All this did was got me pissed off at them, and I never saw any specific reason not to do things they disliked except because they might spank me, so the real lesson I learned was how to avoid getting caught. If you go with the spanking method, offer an explanation, but offer it AFTERWARD, so that they can't try and argue with you about it.

Ha. I wound up getting spanked quite a bit myself, and it pretty much had the exact same effect on me. I basically learned how to get around getting caught rather than correcting whatever perceived offense I'd managed to cause.

We have a 3 year old and use a combination of 'time out', counting-then-punishment, and just spanking... all depending on the offense. We usually use time out for when she's being overly fussy (i.e. throwing a tantrum), because we find that gets her to cool her jets and gives us a chance to walk away for a second and cool our jets, which is also a good thing.

We tend to use counting (1...2...3) when we don't want her to do something (or want her to do something but she's refusing), but it isn't urgent. A good example might be that she's taken a toy away from her friend and we want her to give it back (sharing is one of her "need improvement" areas). She's learned quickly that if we get to 3 she's going to get either a swat on the butt or a time-out. So far she hasn't tried the starting over thing that LadyTevar mentioned... but now I know the trick for that already! Ah-ha!

We generally try to reserve the immediate spanking for the Big No-No's, like talking back or doing something dangerous. As a result, it does a good job of getting her attention.

When she gets older, I expect we'll need to adapt to new ways of discipline. Keep the communication going between you and your partner with respect to discipline, because as your child gets older certain punishments won't be as effective and/or appropriate (giving a 16 year old a "time out" isn't going to do squat).

I can't emphasize enough Mr. Wong's statement that you need to be both consistent with the punishment and consistent with your partner in parenting if you want discipline to work. If your kid learns that one parent will "go easy" on him or her, you're through!

LadyTevar wrote:My nephew got stuck in the corner during Thanksgiving dinner, and his mom got distracted by the other son. I walk by, heading for the bathroom, and he asks me pitifully "An'Kaffe? Could you ask mom if I can come outta the corner now please?"

I went to my sis-in-law and she got this horrified look on her face. "Ohmygod! I forgot he was there!" and she ran to get him and apologise to him

That happened to me when I was young as well. I was in the corner for over an hour when my grandma reminded my mom that I was still sitting there.

My aunt and mom still pull my ears and pinch me under my arm when I get out of line too.

One other thing you can do is connect the reason for the punishment to general principles. Some friends of mine punish their children for "dangerous, disobedient, and destructive behavior," and each time they explain what it was. Of course, their kids are 4 and 6 and are thus theoretically capable of understanding abstract terms, but it seems like a reasonable system to me.

I can only give my views with hindsight since I am not a parent myself. I have no business being a parent with my financial and other difficulties.

My mother was extremely fair and used nothing but non corporal punishment. She made sure that I understood the reasons why she came to a conclusion. With disagreements with other siblings: she would listen to both sides and nearly always come to the fair conclusion. I can remember to this day a time when she took me back into a store when she discovered I had stole a tiny little plastic bear. You would be surprised how much of an impact that makes on a very young kid. I cannot remember ever stealing anything (soda, from work, aside ) since.
My father, on the other hand, came from the complete other school of thought. If left by himself to deal with problems, he would immediately resort to an ass whooping. My dad is a very large man. Very muscular with a beard and 6'4 frame. I can assure you that is very intimidating to a kid. That was his role in raising me too, sadly. He simply enforced rules if moms stuff failed (and they did when I was a teenager). Corporal punishment was rare, but I cannot say I was too affectionate to my father until I was nearly an adult.

Edit:
I must list other alternative punishment besides the asswhooping my dad used. When I was older a "spanking" was obsolete and could even be interpreted as assault.

Instead of load a truck up with wood for the fire place (it's cheaper than gas or electricity, and we have 10 acres of wood to harvest). You manually carry each handful an eighth mile back and forth to his satisfaction. This was very persuasive technique. You do not want to repeat that ever again in you entire life.

If a fight occurred, both parties would have to sit down in opposing corners of a fenced field; Ideally in sight of the other. This was the extreme "time out". It could take hours.

I'm not a parent and won't be for a while, but I can't see myself spanking a kid, just because I can't get past the hypocritical aspect of it. "You hit Bobby, so Daddy has to hit you now." Huh? Also, it scared the shit out of me when my mom raised her voice when I was little; I would have been horrified and upset for days if she'd hit me.

Besides, there are other ways which are just as effective.

Durandal wrote: She just left me there for a while. Cruel woman.

well she did give birth to Damien, spawn of Satan.

My parents used the mix of grounding, no tv/toys and the smack when i got out of line. My Father tried to knock some sense into me when i was 16. By that point i was a 185 lb 6 foot soccer player. I knocked him flat on his ass. That was the last time he tried that.

Col. Crackpot wrote: I knocked him [dad] flat on his ass. That was the last time he tried that.

Wow, you really needed some manual labor punishment. A smack on the cheek doesn't accomplish anything for teenagers. How old are you now? You can't be that mature to STILL hold that opinion.