I like both of the two previous posts. I don’t believe in spanking nor threats of “when your father gets home”. I do understand how it can happen in a case where there are many children and the system must run smoothly or chaos results. The few times I felt like spanking my kids it was me feeling not in control.
Like @HImom I grew up in a large family where we were basically every two years almost to the date. My mom had 7 children, one who passed away before his 2nd birthday. My dad was in the military and my mom worked and had an early morning. The oldest two are girls and they took on a lot of responsibility for the care and feeding of the rest of us. My parents divorced when the three youngest were still very young and my sisters had a lot of responsibilities that should have been handled by my mother.Both of them made the choice to not have children as they felt like they already had raised kids. The oldest female child living at home was in charge of making dinner. We weren’t allowed individual wants as my mom went with what was easiest.
I also think discipline and parenting styles widely differ. My one son-in-law comes from a family where punishment was physical and his sister parents in a similar manner. My daughter has had to explain to her husband why they should not parent in a similar way.
When I reached intermediate school, my youngest brother started kindergarten and mom went back to college to get a 2nd masters—this one in special ed so she could help bring in money to help with impending college expenses.
I was given a signed blank check every day and when I came home from school, I’d go grocery shopping (we lived directly behind shopping center). I’d do my homework and prepare dinner every night. I also helped anyone who needed it with their homework and typed papers (including older sibs & my mom).
Fortunately after mom finished her degree, I was able to stop and enjoy HS. Someone else (my younger sis said it was her but I can’t recall) did grocery shopping and prepared meals.
Our kids were never given similar responsibilities at similar ages. We only had two kids and both have had chronic health issues.
All interesting stories and viewpoints. Also armchair judgments.
One swat is not a spanking.
Times are different with multiple children close in age when there are resources (and grandparents) to assist with the hands-on and child supervision care.
The 3 1/2 YO definitely behaves better to receive a ‘treat’ later if he is good. In church, the mention of ‘treat’ as he starts to act up and he settles down.
A treat (which is a very small piece of candy) is done just before brushing their teeth and going to bed. They know if they had ‘strikes’ and misbehaved they risk losing that treat. It is important to them (they are all under 7 years of age, and this involves the older 3 kids) - the 21-month-old is already in bed.
Learning at the children’s abilities - right from wrong, good and bad, with consistency and fairness. They learn that there are things we can control and things we cannot control. When they get too rambunctious there is risk of personal injury.
DD1 and I are well educated with child development and do understand develop internal rewards - which comes a bit later with child maturing. We understand emotional needs as well as boundaries for ‘drama’.
The older two children went bowling for the first time, so they had the bumper rails - this kept them from getting gutter balls. When they are older, they will not have the bumper rails and will need to ‘work’ to gain success and not have their balls be all gutter balls.
Both DDs were involved in music (piano lessons beginning at first grade, other musical instruments by 3rd grade and before 2nd grade) so we do see connection of ‘internal’ rewards with efforts of practice. GD1 is very advanced on accelerator reader and has the rewards of those achievements. Both older children like to get to any papers/brief homework from school finished right away. As they get older, they can handle more homework.
DD1/SIL are doing fine but do need extra help. Once DD1 goes back to work full-time, they are going to monitor their budget and see if they can get someone in to clean the floors and bathrooms to have that chore off of mom. I cleaned/mopped floors a few days ago. I imagine SIL could have done the job but it is better to contract that work out.
I see the children doing well. They don’t have to arrange ‘play dates’ because there are other children to play with at home. They know how to play with other children and play nicely. The children understand when they have a bad day or their sibling has a bad day, that they can recover - they see that the parents/grandparents treat each child fairly.
“When choosing a natural consequence I did try to make it commensurate with the action and pretty close on time to the offense so the connection was way to understand.” – 100% agree with this. GD1 definitely made the connection on her bad behavior that had a negative consequence.
“When kids act dysregulated as it sounded like GD1 was doing, it’s because they are being asked to do too much in the moment.” She was not asked to do anything but behave!
“..in some ways unfair to the other siblings who need to get by with less - less attention, less love in ways they are feeling most, less time with parents. This is a huge burden on them and one that they did not request.” This is an armchair judgment. I do not understand ‘less love in ways they are feeling most’. “This is a huge burden on them and one that they did not request.” - some children that are only children feel a ‘burden’ and something they have no control over; some adopted children may feel a ‘burden’. Many things in life are things we do not request!
‘Always’ and ‘never’ can be difficult to follow.
I am fine for people saying they do not ever swat their child or grandchild – in this thread it said they do not ‘hit’ which again has a totally different meaning - to me hitting a child is a ‘higher’ level of parent or adult not having control, reacting impulsively, being mean, and a physical level and emotional level as at an abusive level.
D1 told me that they do not like to say No to GD1, instead they would say “maybe that’s not the best choice and you should try to do this…instead.” I just LOL in my head. When they weren’t around I said “no, no, no” to GD1 and also wiggled my finger at her. Well, GD1 repeated it to her Mom while wiggling her finger. D1 wasn’t pleased with me.
Different families have different rules.
Moreover, when you’ve been around a number of years, you know that the methods of disciplining a child come in and out of fashion. Moreover, IMO, the truth is that different methods work better with different children.
I try hard not to correct any parenting tactics I disagree with. Once in a while I can’t stop myself and say something critical and it inevitably ends badly for me. I think back and remember that my parents felt I spend MUCH too much time explaining why I wanted a child to do something. They belonged to the “because I said so” school of parenting.
Part of the differences in parenting styles is that we all have different ideas of how children “should” behave. We even have different ideas of the “ideal adult,” so to speak.
With all due respect, when you use language like this for a child - whether they are 2 or 12 or whatever…this is when I/we here on CC might be inclined to react negatively to the action.
We aren’t going to change the child rearing methods you mention …we only know what we read (but mentioned more than once) - it is a natural empathetic human reaction to want to pause and address it as something that makes us uncomfortable.
I hope the baptism is a celebratory event for your new little one and the whole family.
Do you really not see a “swat” as a form of corporal punishment, just as a slap, spanking, etc? - I believe they are all use of physical force to punish a child - Am I missing something? I’m not going to argue whether it’s right or wrong, just that they are both inflicting pain or discomfort on children.
Pain and discomfort, for sure, but IMO it’s also humiliation.
Right, it sends the message “I am the godly parent who has the right to harm you at will”. I think that all children, even very young children, deserve bodily integrity. When you have to do something like trim a baby’s nails or hold a toddler for a shot, you have to surround that with explanations and love and explain that this is a limited exception to that consent.
ETA: my children are extremely obedient and I absolutely had and have high standards for their behavior. But I knew that the kind of conversational attachment parenting that I felt was appropriate, would not work with more than one baby (age 0-3) at a time.
I spent two days watching my son’s family (kids 5,4 and 2) while he and his wife worked. The kindergartener was on spring break. Both days we dropped the littles off at preschool and picked them up. And I spent the day with the kindergartener. She is the hardest one because she demands your full attention all the time which is exhausting (very similar to how my oldest daughter was).The absolute hardest part is getting everybody up, fed, dressed, teeth brushed, shoes on, in the car, in the car seats, out of the car seats, out of car, etc….
Last week I did drop off with all 4 kids (2 to daycare, 2 to school), leaving the house ideally at 6:15 am. If one leaves after 6:30 am significantly heavier traffic and waits. This included making breakfast, making pack lunch for older two. 21-month-old GD2 was often the easiest and got her in the car seat first. This week she has teething pain so dosing of Tylenol liquid before and after school - as soon as the Tylenol takes effect she is her bubbly personality. The first grader GD1 often the last to be ready and wanting the most attention, but she has been better the last two days. GS1 is the next easiest. GS2, at 3 1/2 is fairly easy to direct and assist, and once he is talking he is also usually pleasant.
Since dad is on paternity leave, he has done most of the drop offs this week, the errands, and usually the pick-ups. He has been very attentive to GD3 - DD1 has asked him to do various things, and he willingly pitches in.
DH arrives tonight, but later than expected as his initial flight was canceled because the equipment did not come in and he was bumped to later flights on both legs (same airline), so instead of arriving at 10 pm he arrives at midnight. Baptism on Sunday. DH is excited to ‘catch up’ with the grandkids, DD1, SIL, and see GD3. I think he has been a bit lonely w/o me around for the past weeks.
GD1 gets dropped off at 8:15 for pre school. The school is one block from the house. The nanny shows up at 8. D1 leaves the house at 7, so it’s up to Dad to get both kids in the morning. He likes to GD1 up first to get her going on breakfast before he gets GD2 for her bottle.
I will admit that I struggle to get both kids to bed when I am there by myself. I really don’t see how some of you can take care of 3+ kids. When I am there by myself in the morning, D1 gets another sitter to come in at 7am to help out.
Hats off to you all.
Our standards are lower!
I had one kid who took to sleeping in her school uniform because it saved time in the morning and she got to sleep an extra 10 minutes. They also often ate breakfast in the car on the way to school, or brought it to day care if it was an early drop off (it was open an hour before school).
But I’m impressed with getting 4 in a car before 6:15 in the morning. The hardest to get going that early would be ME.
I am usually up at 5:30, but I like to have some time to myself before I get going. My grandchildren are still alive because they wake up after 7am.
I could not and would not want to get kids into the car by 6:15. I like to start my day with a leisurely coffee.
My son is still struggling to work things out while his nanny is out. He asked me for today but I had appointments I couldn’t change. We will help out on Friday and hope the nanny is back next week. We suggested they consider getting a live in. They have the space and it would be helpful when my son travels. He has an upcoming trip to Europe that is 13 days. That’s a long time away from your family and a big deal for my daughter-in-law to not have him. They are thinking of all going as my son has several free days mid trip.
My daughter has two and they have a nanny for one and the other goes to preschool and is dropped off by dad. I think they leave around 8.
My other daughter is lucky that the preschool her kid attends two days a week is on her husband route to work. They aim to leave by 7:45. It’s a long day for GD as she isn’t picked up till 5:30.
3 of the 4 of my grandchildren aren’t easy to put to bed. There won’t be any overnight visits without parents until they are better sleepers.
I got home from my son’s last night and today I am at my daughters watching her 8 month old son and 8 month old puppy. Usually they come to our house. But the 8 (almost 9month old) puppy is in heat. So now they are both in diapers!!
Wow—I’ve never gotten my kids anywhere by 6:30 or earlier. That’s amazingly impressive. It sure is a long day for kids and everyone.
Having 2 kids I could handle. More is much tougher.
DD1 was upset when DH was on a business trip and missed Valentine’s Day one year. She was maybe in 3rd grade.
Nephew/wife/kids live about 1 1/2 hours from DD1/family - he is in Mexico for work for 6 days and the two boys are in busy/young years, so his wife (who works remote) does miss his help with the kids. For a while they had a situation where there was pre-school and PT nanny support, but now both boys go to a local all-day school which they complain is ‘expensive’. I think that with their high incomes, it is nonsense to complain. It is convenient to them and they live in a more affluent area. Their kids are well cared for and it is quite educational.
It turns out our DDs were in a daycare that was close to our home and very convenient for drop off and pick up by either of us - and when they were 2 1/2 they went to a Montessori (so the older one left daycare after we got the second one there). The older DD was in an ‘adequate’ daycare until a spot opened up for the one we used longer term.
DD1/SIL are blessed with excellent daycare and school situation. Their jobs have enough leave time to work around kid’s illnesses and their own. The daycare schedule is quite good with the meals and nap time, so the kids do not feel like it is a long day.
Hey that’s not lower standards to sleep in tomorrow’s clothes! 
I think it’s pretty standard for kids who bathe at night.
Fortunately for us, SIL has insomnia and often gets up at 4am. He packs lunches, snacks and water bottles, empties the dishwasher, then tries to get some work done before the kiddos wake up at 6am.
Clothing is laid out the night before
I get up at 6:15-6:30 to make breakfast. (French Toast and sliced strawberries this morning.)
D gets home around 6:45 unless there’s an issue with sign out. So she kisses the kiddos good morning and wishes them a good day at school before going to shower and go to bed.
Kids are dressed and have shoes on before breakfast. After breakfast, teeth get brushed, jackets are put on and SIL and I load up the car. They’re gone by 7:15 for the 30 minute drive to the twin’s preschool, then GS get dropped off at his preschool that’s 15 minutes away for the twins’ preschool.
SIL gets back by 8:30am.
Next year will be easier logistically. GS will attend the same school as his older sisters AND they will all ride the school’s bus. Not sure if the bus will pick up the kids at the door (What a delightful thought!) or if they’ll need to be driven to local pick up point about 10 minutes away.