<p>Motheroftwo, your post made me laugh! My 18 year old D has told me numerous times that she would NEVER allow her son to do the things I allow my son to do — like wear his hair in a goofy-looking afro, wear metal band tee shirts, listen to metal music. Let’s see … he is well liked by adults & students alike, he is unfailingly polite & kind, he is an excellent student (partly due to my nagging?!), he does not drink or use drugs … where am I actually going wrong in “allowing” him to do these things? Ah, youth.</p>
<p>It is funny how children feel the need to condem us for what we allow the other sibling to do, but forget when we give them a free pass. I am glad that I am not the only who has the same issues…there are days that I ask myself why did I have children, but when I go in their room every night to shut off the tv/ceiling fan/radio I look at them and all I want to do is start their life all over again so I can kiss them, hug them, hold them more…gee I am sappy!</p>
<p>I know what you mean! I have spent so many hours crying & second guessing myself … but so many MORE hours being so glad I am their mom! It is good to know we aren’t alone.</p>
<p>My daughter was condemning me for what I allowed HER to do. That’s what I think is so funny!</p>
<p>Okay so the answer is we can never ever win :P</p>
<p>New twist to the thread…we are discussing how we feel horrible for being involved and caving…my DH came home today from the grocery store amazed b/c a Mom was buying candy for her little ones, she had to take it away to pay for it, child screamed and she slapped them, child continued and she hit again, DH stepped in and said something …she glared…was he wrong? IMHO no</p>
<p>I want to scream but I am holding myself back. My son leaves early tomorrow morning to go back to school. It is 2 in the afternoon and he is not yet home from yesterday. We knew he was sleeping over at a friend. He has not packed. He has not confirmed he has a ride from the airport back to school. ( There is no bus and you have to reserve a shuttle in advance) Not returned his Christmas presents that he wanted a bigger size. He wanted to go shopping at Thanksgiving, then it was over the winter break- he still hasn’t made time. He will make do but it is annoying.</p>
<p>at the end of senior year of HS, son had to pay $12 for a missing book. He insisted it wasn’t lost. But he couldn’t produce the book so he payed.</p>
<p>A week after school ends, I get a call from the teacher, book was found as she was cleaning out her classroom. They actually sent the $12 back!</p>
<p>Son said “see I told you it wasn’t lost”</p>
<p>I guess his definition of ‘lost’ means “it hasn’t evaporated off the face of the earth, but I don’t know where it is right now”.</p>
<p>As I’ve grown up and raised a child (entirely on my own) I have realized in retrospect how cruel my parents were to me as I grew up. They would lock the refrigerator so I couldn’t help myself to food later if I hadn’t eaten something I didn’t like for dinner. I can’t imagine doing that! When they moved out of their house, my brother came across dozens of cassette tapes they had made of my phone conversations when I was a teenager (and yes they kept them for 25+ years). </p>
<p>I figure at some point down the road my son will realize that I wasn’t put on this earth to annoy him. And he will take his experiences of his upbringing and apply them to his future family as he sees fit.</p>
<p>Re: Post #45, LAST PARA: all depends on what the “something” was your DH said.</p>
<p>If he frowned, scowled at the mom and told her she shouldn’t hit the child, he might have ended up causing her to wail on the child much harder once she got the child into the car in privacy. That’s the sad part. If she’s that uncivilized in public, assume she’s many times worse behind closed doors. So you don’t want to stress her out more, if you really care about the child and not just downsizing the mom (who was wrong, that goes without saying).</p>
<p>What I’ve read and trained as an elementary school teacher on this topic is as follows: if you see someone slapping a child in public, or screaming at them hideously (obviously lost control, in other words…), what you want to do is not judge but RELIEVE THE STRESS of the parent, all the while indicating by your action (not your word) that it’s not acceptable.</p>
<p>Some ways in a grocery line might be to say, sympathetically, to the MOm, “It’s really hard in these grocery lines. I know. The kids are so cranky by this time. Can I help in any way?” meanwhile be unloading her grocery cart helpfully. </p>
<p>She’s just been through a long grocery experience, the kid is losing it, so is she. She doesn’t need a stranger telling her she’s a lousy mom on top of all that. She sort of knows that already. What might be nice is a helpful gesture, adult-to-adult, to help unload the groceries or in some way lighten her load.</p>
<p>Understand I think she’s l00 percent wrong to be slapping her kid in the face, Ever. Anywhere. </p>
<p>But you asked how to help rescue the child. That’s different than lambasting the mom. WHich did you H do?</p>
<p>I see paying3’s point, absolutely. And her training is something I would defer to, but I see it differently.</p>
<p>I have some training in the field as well having worked for social services as a caseworker, child protective services. I would always say something, but I agree with her, not in a critical voice.</p>
<p>Starting with palliative words, it’s so frustrating, etc., I would also gently tell her there ARE better ways of disciplining a child than hitting. Yes, she may know this, but she may not! I ran into scads of folks who were raised this way and honestly think hitting is appropriate. </p>
<p>Knowing strangers are looking may help the mom to control herself, and here paying3 is right, at least in public.</p>
<p>It’s a tough call. But making her feel small, berated and defensive can result in more abuse for the child, paying3 is right.</p>
<p>I actually use this example in women’s studies classes to demonstrate that women aren’t angels and that a lot of people abuse those weaker than they.</p>
<p>Bullet here (the H in question),</p>
<p>Here’s what I said. “Ma’am, she just wants the candy. No need to hit her. Just ask the clerk to scan the candy now and ask for it back.” Was I wrong to intervene by admonishing her in public? Perhaps so, and perhaps this Mom was just thinking, “Wait to I get her in the car!” In hindsight, I could’ve handled it better. But I’m glad I had the courage to a least stand in as the mom was repeatedly slapping a toddler in the face. Most people I see these days would have looked away and just shaked their heads later while confiding to friends what terrible parents there are out there. I don’t envy the register folks at these places. They probably see it all the time. </p>
<p>I don’t know the whole situation (she had only a few items, so I’m guessing it wasn’t from the stress of being in that particular store for a long period of time with two small children), and I’ll only reacted to what I saw. </p>
<p>Thanks for the advice on how to handle it better. I appreciate people who are professionals in child-care providing me with advice on how to handle it next time (truly, no sarcasm in my words). That poor child might have been beaten worse because I protected them and embarrassed her mom. It won’t happen that way again on my part.</p>
<p>At least I didn’t slap the mom and ask her how that felt! (which would have only exasperated the situation and landed me in jail). But, boy, it would have felt good to show someone abusing a child what it felt like… (the Rambo, testosteron-y, neanderthal guy in me just wrote that last line, so send your arguements to him. I think he has his own TV series on ABC now, after the succesful series of GIECO commercials!: :)</p>
<p>Well, part of me is sorry that you didn’t. But you’d have the assault charge! And of course, violence doesn’t help anything, as we know.</p>
<p>I do commend you for caring about that child. I can’t think of anything worse than violence against children. And yet, when this topic comes up in the college classes I teach most of my students think I’m crazy to have not hit my kids, or they think I had exceptionally good kids “who just didn’t need it”. Corporal punishment still seems the norm in many places. Sigh, sigh.</p>
<p>And slapping a child out of frustration is not even corporal punishment, just straight abuse.</p>
<p>haha this thread is weird</p>
<p>but i noticed you said something about those 4 questions… as a senior myself, when my mom asks me ‘how was school?’ everyday when i walk through the door, my answer is always ‘fine’. There could have been a bomb threat and i would still say ‘fine’. i think we’re hardwired against parental communication right after a school day. If you really want your kids to tell you things about their lives, talk to them right before they go to sleep. My mom always gets me with that one- my defenses are down, I’m in a place where I am comfortable, and since it’s the end of the day there is less of a ‘i have so much more important stuff to do right now’ feeling. That time is when I really ahve conversations with my mom, and the sort of time that I tell her if something is going wrong, whether it be a grade or a social problem.</p>
<p>just a suggestion, but i hope it might help! :)</p>
<p>mythmom points out that slapping in frustration is abuse. She also talks about the stronger (mother) abusing the weaker (child).</p>
<p>Consider how a child feels when the person whom that child must rely on the most and whom that child cares the most about their love, affection and approval calls the child “stupid” or “lazy, good for nothing” or “slutty” etc. Verbal abuse wounds the soul and spirit.</p>
<p>There was a headline story yesterday in the Dallas Morning News. A father shot his two teenage daughters to death because he disliked that they had boyfriends. They were 17 and 18 and honor scholars and athletes at their HS. The reports from the family said he always yelled and berated them. Then, “in frustration” he killed them.</p>
<p>Another famous local child killing was by a mother who believed that the fact that her 3 kids under the age of 6 weren’t perfect angels meant she had failed in God’s eyes since in the mother’s belief system (and “church”) to the mother fell the role of raising “proper children.” Family members said she was frustrated that her efforts and prayers did not make them better, so she killed them so they wouldn’t suffer as “bad” children. She was found insane. Doesn’t make much difference to those 3 kids.</p>
<p>My ex-BIL is a policeman. My current BIL is a doctor. I do appeals. We have discussed the carnage to children done in the name of frustration. Parents are the adults. Abuse (verbal and/or physical) is not acceptable. </p>
<p>Frustrated? Go for a walk.</p>
<p>In our state (NY) the only reliable intersection between government and students on matters of civics and health is the state-required course called “Health.”</p>
<p>Does anyone know if the curriculum in such courses include alternatives to these
slappy ways of raising kids? If you’re raised that way, and those around you know no alternatives, then I feel it’s at the high school where there’s a chance to re-educate. At least teach some alternative strategies for adults to manage children while under stress.</p>
<p>Does anyone know if this is part of their state’s “Health” curriculum?</p>
<p>The worst thing I saw when a caseworker was a mother slap her eighteen month old son for crying. She was developmentally disabled, and when I explained that it wasn’t good to hit him she said, “But boys aren’t supposed to cry. I hit him so he’ll be a boy.” Truer words were never spoken, and she thought she was being a good mother.</p>
<p>I was able to require she attend child rearing courses.</p>
<p>It’s also possible, though some may think a bit gruesome, to take down a mom’s license plate number and report it to CPS. Might be extreme, but sadly, children are at risk from their parents.</p>
<p>I am not advocating this, just reminding people there are things we can do to protect children. In most cases, reports are strictly anonymous.</p>