I am watching Dr. Phil right now and they are talking about bratty kids and how to correct their behavior. The couple that is on there now is so one sided in their discipline. They showed a video clip and the dad looked at the mom all confused and the mom said “do you want me to spank him?” They talked with Dr. Phil about how the mom is the disciplinarian in the family.
Growing up for me I only remember my mom spanking me but that is just because she was the one that was home with us, they tell me my dad spanked us a few times but I don’t remember it. My dad still disciplined us however.
It seems like in a lot of families only one parent gives the discipline and I wonder if that is an issue. It seems that if one parent gets to be the good cop in the relationship with their child they will look better to the child.
I hope that Stefan and I can agree on what we will do for discipline and both do what needs to be done instead of letting the other take care of if. Whether it is spanking, time outs, grounding, revoked privileges or whatever works for each child.
How do you discipline your kids? Is it a good cop bad cop situation in your family? Who are you in that situation? Comment below.
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I wish I knew then what I know now. I would hug and hold more than natter and scold. I would try and ask “why did you do that?” and really listen to “why you actually did do that”. I would spank less and do more “time-outs” or something that was fitting for the “offence”, like a time-out,earlier bedtime, no dessert etc. I would have a dirtier house, more fun meals (but healthy sometimes!). I am glad that we did disipline most times but I wish we did it differently. Great blog btw. I know that whatever you and Stefan choose for disiplining will be the correct way for you both.
I do all I can to avoid power struggles with my kids, to empower them to make good choices and to teach them respect. Some days I’m not so good at it, but that’s the goal. Discipline here involves a lot of talking (when you do x I feel y), role playing (if you were doing x and I did y, how would you feel? I think your brother/sister/etc feels like that now) and natural consequences (“if you can’t use it properly, you don’t get to use it/if you get cold because you won’t wear you’re gloves, you’ll have to come in” etc.). On a good day at least. On a bad day there’s a lot of “No, and whining won’t help and if you need to yell and scream go to your room and come back when you’re calmed down, I don’t want to hear it”.
One thing that encourages me is that Hana (4) is catching on. When she gets upset about something we’ve done (like telling her she can’t bang on the paint cans because her brother is sleeping) she’ll say things like “Mama, when you say no, it makes my heart feel so sad, can we find a way for you to not do that anymore?”
Ben and I pretty much do the same, but where I’m the one with them all the time they’re a bit more…cooperative with me. They try to get away with more from him because it’s less consistent. Thankfully Ben and I are on the same page with things (natural consequences, no spanking, no time outs) that there’s no conflicts there.
Geez, my mom was home with us and she either punished us by sending us to our room to think about what we did, then she would come in- or if it was close to my dad coming home we’d have to wait for him and he would come in- and sit down with us and explain to us why what we did was wrong, then we would have to pray and ask Jesus for forgiveness for being disobedient or bad, and then we would get spanked if we did something really bad. And we’d have to stay in our rooms until we were called out. I have a lot of respect for the way they disciplined, because it not only taught me to respect and honor them, but also God in everything that I do. So I do that same (age appropriate) with my daughter. Nick is hand in hand with me on this- he was raised with similar discipline, but he tends to be a bit softer than me, I think it’s because for him it’s not the 100th time she is doing something she was told not to, but only the first or second since he is only home for a fraction of what I am. Instead of her just going to her room like I had to, she is either sitting on her bed or in a corner until I go in. Works for us 🙂
Personally I find the discipline and spankings in our household to be appropriate and essential for my understanding of ‘action/reaction’ and ’cause/consequences’…
With a coddling system of time outs and no real punishment, a child develops a concept that ‘everything can slide’.
I think it all depends on the child…and what your goals are…as to what methods of discipline are best. I see my role as a parent to raise a healthy, happy, productive adult. Spankings do work, especially for younger kids, but they don’t always carry long term lessons (I’m saying this as someone who was spanked growing up). I want to teach my kids that it’s not ok for one person to hit another person, ever, and I can’t teach that if I’m spanking them.
I know a lot of very well disciplined, secure kids who have never been spanked (my own included) – it’s possible to set boundaries and have consequences without spanking. A book I go to a lot for age-appropriate tools is “Discipline Without Distress”. When punishment is needed (and discipline is about a lot more than punishment) there are ways to do it without spanking.