Discipline and Your Child

Do you have children under the age of 5 that are "brats" by society's definition? Is your child that mall kid? You know, that one child that doesn't get his way and all of the sudden everyone in the mall is staring at him throwing a fit in the middle of the floor? How did your 5 year-old get that way? Is he the devil? Did you spoil him? Is he a product of your discipline, or lack thereof? Are you that parent that's constantly saying "now Jeffery, let's not cry or I'll put you in time out" while on the inside you're wishing to, as Bernie Mac says, bet their heads 'til the white meat shows?

My guess is the lack of discipline. Now, barring any obvious exceptions to the rule (an outright mental disorder, autism, what have you), most of those "mall kids" are made that way by mommy and daddy. Mommy and daddy loved the thought of having babies, just like when they played with the Jones' children down the street or her sister's children when they came to visit last summer.

The problem that mommy and daddy didn't realize is that children depend on you for EVERYTHING. I'm not talking about food and clothes and shelter here. I'm talking about behavioral cues, limits, and real attention. Here's an example. Your baby has been in daycare since he was 6 weeks old. You have him after work, and you have him on the weekends, but for the most part he's not with you. As he gets old enough to ask you for things (around age 3), he wants your attention, good or bad. When he wants your candy, he stomps and cries. Well, you haven't been with him all week and you'd hate to say no because he's your precious sweety honeypie that's going back to daycare Monday, so you give it to him.

What's he do when he turns five and he wants to stay up and not go to bed? He does the same thing: he whines, makes excuses, acts up, screams, and you take it. Why? You'd hate to disappoint, because you don't get to see him all day, he's your little precious one, and saying no is so hard. Besides, you don't have time because you've got to get sleep so you can go to Target to catch that sale and if he throws another fit you'll be stuck for 30 minutes at home again.

If you are in this boat, you've created the problem.

I'm not ragging on moms or dads that choose a two-parent income.Some people do feel the need for a two-parent income because they can't afford that new 7-passenger SUV for a 3-person family, or daddy's boat cost a lot so instead of staying at home he's gotta work. For the rest of us in the real world, times can be tough in this country and trust me, I know what it's like to have two parents needing to bring in income like my family did. But just because you don't see your children that often during the day doesn't mean you can spoil them to your heart's content. If you have children under the age of 6 and you don't want to get called to school everyday by teachers because your youngin' threw another tantrum, heed these guidelines.

Rule1: Don't be afraid to say "no" and mean it. Your child will not hate you. She may not like you at first but she will not hate you. This will suck at first. My little girl is the sweetest angel to all the teachers now. She's a social butterfly that loves getting attention by helping adults and never questions reasonable requests. So many people compliment her on her maturity for being 7.

But she was not always that way. When she was 1, she used to throw herself on the ground if she didn't get her way. When she was two, she would scream like she was on fire if she didn't get her way. She was so adorable, but we knew where this was headed. We just started telling her "no" and what was going to happen next if she kept it up. And when she tested the waters again, consequences followed. If I said yes or gave into everything she wanted, she'd probably be dead. Say no. Deal with the screaming and kicking, but stick to your guns. Eventually your child won't make those unreasonable requests and act like that because your child will learn by behavior that it doesn't work. Only if you don't give in, though.This leads to number 2:

Whatever consequences you lay out, follow through. Yes, it sucked at first. We started with "do it again, and you'll sit in that chair over there for 5 minutes." She couldn't tell time, but 5 minutes was long enough. I had a hard time watching her sit in a chair for 5 minutes, but she'd sit in the chair. She'd scream to her heart's content, but she was in that chair screaming. If she tried to move, I'd put her back in it. This was hard the first two times, but the third time she stayed in the chair and screamed. I don't remember a 4th time.

We also had grounds for spanking. If she was going to hurt herself, she was going to get a spanking. If she was going to hurt anyone else, she got a spanking. If she lied to either of us, she got a spanking.

Now, what's a spanking? For my child, it was often softer than when we roughhoused and spanked each other. But it was still a consequence. Some of them actually stung on that bottom. We decided as parents that at certain ages and certain subjects you cannot reason with children; they must learn to understand another way. My children's spanking age was between 1 and 4, with less and less spankings happening as they got older. My daughter was spanked for dropping herself on the ground in the middle of the street because she couldn't have any candy.

Some parents say "how could you do that?" I'll tell you how. Imagine that trend continuing for a toddler, just running into the middle of a street whenever she wants. Does she know what it's like to get hit by a car? Does she even have a clue? Do you? How bad does a few swats on the butt hurt compared to total body traction for months? Or in your case, having a dead toddler because you couldn't give her enough time outs to teach her how not to run in the middle of the street? How about lying whether she ate something bad for her or not?

It takes a few swats sometimes. INot a beat down with a belt or a continuous, 50-spank and scream fest, bu a few swats to the butt. It took a few to teach her not to plug and unplug night lamps, or put toys in her infant brother's mouth. But she learned. A few swats vs. electrocution. You decide. And we were fair. She always got an explaination and fair warning before she committed any act. Not one time was she ever surprised at why she got spanked.

People, get real. You can't watch your child every minute of the day. But with the thought process of "this will hurt either by mommy's hand or certain death" going on before they make a bad decision because you gave them a few swats, you'll be ok. I don't have to do them much now. She's old enough that discipline can take other forms, such as no time with her friends, no tv, no computer, toys get moved out the room, whatever it takes. And no, my daughter doesn't hate me because of rule 3:

Never punish/ spank under anger. It's the worse thing you can do besides spoil. You won't have a clue as to what you are doing. You have enough stress in your life that your children shouldn't fall victim to it. When it comes to physical discipline, it should be used as a tool and not a stress reliever. You can quickly find yourself investigated by the department of social services if you punish while you are angry because you left marks or spanked too hard.
For grounding and "time out" type punishments, doling them out while you're angry can lead to promises you can't keep. "Your grounded for a month!" because your child went left instead of right means that, for that small infraction, you have 30 days to watch a 5 year-old do nothing. Now, is that worth your time or his time? Probably not. But it sounded extreme and you wanted to let him have it because you were in an extreme moment.

Rule 4: Spend actual time with your children. You'd be surprised what it takes. I've been guilty many times over of giving my kids just the basics: I made dinner, I made them brush their teeth, and I put them to bed. On the weekends they went to every store with me to get all the honey-do. For dinner, whatever I could whip up quick , I did it and didn't even eat it with them because I had to surf the net.

The "actual" time you spend with children that young, however, doesn't have to be much. It has to be concentrated on them as a human and not an accessory. We made sure that sure, this weekend was a shopping weekend and they were tagalongs. But when we got home we had movie night of 1 movie on pay per view that THEY wanted to watch, a bowl of popcorn, and they stayed up a little later than normal. And we sat on the couches next to them and watched Lava Boy and Shark Girl. That was actual time. Yes, this week we had heat 'em ups, but Sunday night, we made real Mac n' cheese together, or made our own pizza. If you had all those hours during the week to be with people at work that you don't like, why not spend a couple of hours with people you chose to have or chose to raise? If you're at the ballet recital, put the damn cell phone down and actually watch. It isn't an after-hours office meeting, it's your children.

Rule 5: If your child pisses you off, it's probably because he's just like you or your spouse. My daughter is smart beyond her age. Some things come so easy to her. But things that are challenges can really get to her. My daughter can get frustrated with things and then just act like she doesn't know anything. One minute she can add in the 100's, but then 20 minutes later if she can't add past 101, she forgets 1+1. It makes me more upset than anything.

Why? Because that's how I was. I was a smart kid, but if there was pressure, I dropped the ball easy on stupid little things. She does it. I used to get very frustrated. I'm a patient person but that got to me more than anything. But then I thought, "What do I wish my dad did or said back in the day?" And I did it. I stopped her when I saw it happening and asked about what was really bothering her. I boosted her confidence by reassuring her that yes, she's done it before and it was good and she can do it again. Soon we were back on track and the situations were over.

If your son has a temper, maybe he got it from you. What are you gonna do? Find out your weaknesses and see if your child has the same habits. Before you can begin to have any discipline as a parent, you have to show discipline for yourself. You will never be perfect or a perfect parent. But the trick is doing everything you can in the book to never let your child see those imperfections while they are that young.

Rule 6: If you have a spouse, be a team. Lay all the rules out from the start. I wasn't about spanking. I could never dream of "harming" my child. Then my wife explained to me what she went through with spanking, why she got them, and how she feels about her dad now. And for the most part, I could understand it. Talk to your spouse. What's an acceptable bed time? Are there going to be levels of discipline? Will both have you do the same discipline (as it should be) or will one do one form and the other do another? If you enforce a form of discpline, immediately let your spouse know. If you disagree with your spouse, never, EVER make a stink about it in front of the child. The child can feel total blame for your argument and misunderstand the situation for what it is. Take it behind closed doors or talk about it later, but never disagree about discipline in front of the child. I've learned that the hard way.

Rule 7: Make time for your spouse and for yourself. This is the benefit of discipline at a young age. Right now it's 9:30pm. I have a 4 and 7 year-old. They've been asleep for an hour without fight, without hassle. I can be up for the next 4 hours doing what I want for myself and my spouse, while I hear my neighbor's one and two year-olds still up and them shouting "get to bed!" Now that I have this time, it gives me a chance to do my own thing and spend some quality time with my wife. Children should be part of your life, but not ALL of your life.

My children are by no means perfect because neither my wife nor I are. But they know how to act in public because we never gave them an excuse to act out. They clam for our attention, yes, but they want that positive attention. "Daddy look what I can do!" and "daddy I can spell museum!" is what we hear, and not curse words. It isn't so bad that they act bad just to hear us call their names. They have a healthy fear of God (and us) in them because we started young and stayed with it. The trick to disciplining your children is that you have to have your own discipline for it to work.

When they have kids of their own, they'll never look back and say "we never got to do anything with mommy and daddy". I'm in the military. My wife works in child care. If we can find time for our own kids, anyone can. If you're excuse is "I just don't have time," then why have kids in the first place?