OGtruthhurts on tough love & parenting

[StrangePackage]

Being a parent is the one thing at which strive my hardest to be perfect, yet constantly feel like I’m falling way short.

I told my therapist I was terrified I was going to screw up as a parent. He told me to not worry, because I was definitely going to screw up as a parent- everyone does. He then said that screwing up gives you a chance to model for your child how to handle mistakes and admit when you've been wrong.

I think about that a lot.

 

[ZenMode]

With all due respect to both my mom and my late father, my goal is to parent pretty much the exact opposite way as them. I've got a 2 year old son and another one on the way at the end of this month so I think about this stuff often. I got my ass kicked growing up. I got beaten with a belt. I got household objects thrown at me. I got screamed at, yelled at, smacked in the head and face. Got my mouth washed out with literal soap. That cycle ends with me. I don't believe that hitting children, or yelling at them, or ranting and raving at them, or throwing things at them does anything other than yield a higher likelihood of breeding future violent, angry, insecure, hot-tempered, quick-triggered adults.

I'm going to resist going off on a tangent here but, yes, hitting your kids is never acceptable. Hitting your kids, or any physical contact out of frustration, is 100% a failure on the part of the parent. It's a failure of ideas, a failure of patience or a failure of emotional control. Think about it from the child's POV. The person who is supposed to protect, love and care for you is beating your ass with a belt, smacking you in the face or putting soap in your mouth?

My wife grew up in a nearly identical environment as you, minus having household objects thrown. She was called the "neighborhood whore" and accused of being on drugs, though. Almost all of the violence was at the hands of her dad. She also has her dad's bad temper which she knows, but struggled with for a long time and it caused some very tense moments when we had our first kid.

 

[heelinhell]

I told my therapist I was terrified I was going to screw up as a parent. He told me to not worry, because I was definitely going to screw up as a parent- everyone does. He then said that screwing up gives you a chance to model for your child how to handle mistakes and admit when you've been wrong.

I think about that a lot.

I practiced psychotherapy for 30 years, and I can tell you that your therapist was spot on ! I wasn't your therapist, was I ?

I am the parent of a 49yo and a 40yo. Growing up they were the bane of my existence and had me living a life of constant anxiety.

The questions and self reflection were endless :

Is it me ? Am I bad parent ?
Is it them ? They are just bad seeds ?
Am I too controlling ?
Am I too lenient ?

What I have learned based upon my 49 years as a parent :

I think loving your kids no matter what is #1
I think understanding the importance of how you live your life will be the model for how your kids live their lives is #2

All that said, I could be wrong

 

[CFordUNC]

I'm going to resist going off on a tangent here but, yes, hitting your kids is never acceptable. Hitting your kids, or any physical contact out of frustration, is 100% a failure on the part of the parent. It's a failure of ideas, a failure of patience or a failure of emotional Think about it from the child's POV. The person who is supposed to protect, love and care for you is beating your ass with a belt, smacking you in the face or putting soap in your mouth?

My wife grew up in a nearly identical environment as you, minus having household objects thrown. She was called the "neighborhood whore" and accused of being on drugs, though. Almost all of the violence was at the hands of her dad. She also has her dad's bad temper which she knows, but struggled with for a long time and caused some very tense moments when we had our first kid.

Ugh. I am so, so sorry to hear that for your wife. I can only imagine what that was like for her growing up. I'm glad y'all have build a much better home environment for both her and for your kids.

I hate to have put my parents on blast like I did in my post but I just thought it was a good opportunity to contrast what was said by the poster about whom this thread topic was started. I don't want to imply that or insinuate that I endured that kind of treatment 24/7/365, because I didn't. It's just that when it did happen, it left a permanent impression on me that I can still remember vividly to this day. I remember trying to hide under my bed as a kid to avoid the belt and getting dragged out from under it to be belted. That's something that you never forget because it's so formative. As I've become a parent, I try more and more to have more grace for my own parents and try to recognize that, yes, they failed in many of their parenting methods, and yes, their methods at times are indefensible, but that they were products of their own upbringings and environments.

 

[hedge]

There are infinite wrong ways to raise a kid. There is no one right way to raise a kid, except that providing unconditional love is an exceedingly strong foundation to start with.

All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way...

 

[gregh1]

IMO, hitting your child only teaches him/her one thing... when things get difficult, turn to violence to solve the problem.

Agreed. But now i'm asking myself if soap in my mouth had any negative repercussion on my relationships with friends, fam or the rest of the world.
I was spanked, instead of put into time-out of some other disciplinary approach. I'm obviously biased, but I also wonder if time-out vs spanking would've made me a different person. I'm not violent at all AND i won't be spanking my kid, but I don't have any problem with my parents using spanking as a last resort when I was misbehaving and not responding to their logic or demands.... at the time it felt fair or justified. Would time-out have left me feeling shunned or similar?
ETA: how you implement the actual discipline/consequence might be more important than the mechanism.

 

[gregh1]

Another point - Some forms of discipline need an escalation, like a lengthened time-out, or removal of fav toy for X days instead of X minutes. Thank gawd I never need the escalated version of the wooden spoon (other than the 2 or 3 beltings). This is probably another reason nobody should spank, you can't escalate without it becoming abuse.

 

[Icky Mettle]

Unrelated to disciplining a child, but related to parenting: my wife is an amazing parent who juggles a very demanding job with parenting and does a great job at both. But one thing about her is that she is an extreme worrier. She worries about many things, and her worries are often intense and anxiety-inducing. So naturally she worries a great deal about our kids. (And while every decent parent worries about their kids, I’m talking about many worries, some of which I feel are a bit unreasonable). Both my kids suffer from some anxiety and I I always wonder if it’s a result of my wife’s anxiety rubbing off on them.

Here’s one minor example that comes to mind: There is a restaurant/brewery near us that is very family friendly. There is a covered outdoor area there where you can sit about 30 yards from a playground. You can see the playground from where you sit, but you can’t necessarily see your kids at all times due to people and structures obstructing your view. When we go to this place, our kids like to play on the playground. I think that’s great because they have a good time while my wife and I (and anyone else we’re with) can just hang out at the table and eat and drink. But my wife can’t enjoy herself in that situation. She worries about the kids the whole time and feels the need to move to where she can see them and keep her eyes on the kids at all times. She got to point where, when I suggested the place, she would tell me it gives her too much anxiety and she couldn’t enjoy herself when the kids were out of her sight. Now, that was a year ago, so maybe she feels a little better now that the kids are a year older (they’re now 10 and 8). But I could never understand why she had any concern whatsoever. They were totally fine. Plenty of kids their age ride their bikes all around the neighborhood with no parental supervision (as I did when I was their age).

 

[dukeman92]

I don't believe that hitting children, or yelling at them, or ranting and raving at them, or throwing things at them does anything other than yield a higher likelihood of breeding future violent, angry, insecure, hot-tempered, quick-triggered adults.

Yet, you do not appear to be any of those things.

FTR, I'm not advocating child abuse, which is what you're describing. But there isn't anything wrong with discipling your children firmly. (Which, again, is not what you described)

 

[heelinhell]

Unrelated to disciplining a child, but related to parenting: my wife is an amazing parent who juggles a very demanding job with parenting and does a great job at both. But one thing about her is that she is an extreme worrier. She worries about many things, and her worries are often intense and anxiety-inducing. So naturally she worries a great deal about our kids. (And while every decent parent worries about their kids, I’m talking about many worries, some of which I feel are a bit unreasonable). Both my kids suffer from some anxiety and I I always wonder if it’s a result of my wife’s anxiety rubbing off on them.

Here’s one minor example that comes to mind: There is a restaurant/brewery near us that is very family friendly. There is a covered outdoor area there where you can sit about 30 yards from a playground. You can see the playground from where you sit, but you can’t necessarily see your kids at all times due to people and structures obstructing your view. When we go to this place, our kids like to play on the playground. I think that’s great because they have a good time while my wife and I (and anyone else we’re with) can just hang out at the table and eat and drink. But my wife can’t enjoy herself in that situation. She worries about the kids the whole time and feels the need to move to where she can see them and keep her eyes on the kids at all times. She got to point where, when I suggested the place, she would tell me it gives her too much anxiety and she couldn’t enjoy herself when the kids were out of her sight. Now, that was a year ago, so maybe she feels a little better now that the kids are a year older (they’re now 10 and 8). But I could never understand why she had any concern whatsoever. They were totally fine. Plenty of kids their age ride their bikes all around the neighborhood with no parental supervision (as I did when I was their age).

I can identify

My better half is a worrier and I see bits of her existential angst in our adult children today. Fortunately, their anxiety has been mitigated by my "don't worry, everything gonna be alright" existential position

On the downside, the kids have inherited my sarcastic, contrarian, and confrontational style which their mother has mitigated with her "go along to get along" style

So pick your poison. Your kids are going to absorb your parental gestalt for better or worse, but I'm guessing for your kids everything gonna be alright

and with your kids being 10 yo old and 8 yo ? Hang on, buddy; the next 10 years are going to be a rollercoaster ride and you will not have as much control of the switch as you would like or think you deserve

 

[NOVAHEEL13]

I think the best way to be brought up is in a loving and caring household, where rules are clearly defined and strictly enforced. I think parents should talk about feelings. I think therapy is a good thing. I don't think religion helps or hurts.

But guess what, I was brought up in a loving/caring household, with strictly defined/ enforced rules, where we were encouraged to talk about our feelings and people who needed help spoke to a therapist. From this background I went from a small town public high school to an Ivy League college, and now am a global executive in a large IT consulting company.

So clearly my upbringing must be the right way, no?

And you have a trail of 678 ex-wives clearly shows your upbringing also leads to successfully finding all the red flags!

 

[rodoheel]

Yep. The bane of parents throughout history. I don't think it's possible to be an effective parent until you realize you're parenting your own unique kids, and not the child version of you.

I struggle with this a lot with my oldest, who is so like me (for better and for worse) that it is easy to fall into the trap of assuming she's exactly like me.

Of course I don't really know exactly what my parents did with me anyway, lol

 

[StrangePackage]

Yep. The bane of parents throughout history. I don't think it's possible to be an effective parent until you realize you're parenting your own unique kids, and not the child version of you.

I had an epiphany about this a few weeks ago, over sausage biscuits of all things. Growing up my dad and I would bond over sausage biscuits on the weekend and I was low-key upset that my picky eater isn't a fan. Then I realized he has his own version of that- we get breakfast tacos every Saturday morning, which he loves. It's a reminder to not try to recreate my childhood better, but to give him his best childhood.

 

[rodoheel]

I will largely agree with those who say there's no one right way to be a parent, but there are two things from my experience (which is limited considering my oldest isn't 10 yet, so take it for what it's worth) that I think are essential:

1. Your children have to trust you and be able to talk honestly with you. They don't always have to like you, you may not always be their friend, but they need to trust that you love them, that you care for them and protect them, and that you will be honest with them.

2. Patience is absolutely critical, maybe the most important thing. Kids' brains don't work like adult brains. They can't focus as much; they get overloaded and result in meltdowns/tantrums more often; they aren't as developed in terms of logic/reasoning/empathy, among other things. You have to teach the same lessons dozens and hundreds of times, and it doesn't help anybody to get mad or frustrated when they don't stick or take so long to stick. We all will routinely have our patience fail - maybe even daily. No one is perfect. But yelling at my kids because they won't listen to me or won't do something right (which has certainly happened) has pretty much never advanced the situation at all.

 

[UNCatTech]

Yep. While every family and every child is completely different, to me, it all comes down to helping your kids answer three questions:

1. Am I safe?
2. Do I matter?
3. Do I belong?

That's not a license for discipline-less or consequence-less parenting, but if you stay focused on helping your kids be able to answer all three of those questions with a "yes," you'll be 90% of the way there.

Exactly, punishment without explanation leads a child to question their self worth.

Someone mentioned religion, religion as with any outside influence is a variable.

My childhood and early adult years were greatly impacted by my parents and how they made it so clear that I was a mistake and ruined their lives. I swore to raise my kids differently and I did. But we still had our obstacles. BUT, my kids have always known that they are loved and actions that have consequences can be addresses, but those actions don't define them or make them bad people.

 

[UNCatTech]

I'm going to resist going off on a tangent here but, yes, hitting your kids is never acceptable. Hitting your kids, or any physical contact out of frustration, is 100% a failure on the part of the parent. It's a failure of ideas, a failure of patience or a failure of emotional control. Think about it from the child's POV. The person who is supposed to protect, love and care for you is beating your ass with a belt, smacking you in the face or putting soap in your mouth?

My wife grew up in a nearly identical environment as you, minus having household objects thrown. She was called the "neighborhood whore" and accused of being on drugs, though. Almost all of the violence was at the hands of her dad. She also has her dad's bad temper which she knows, but struggled with for a long time and it caused some very tense moments when we had our first kid.

My dad beat the shit out of me with a belt, then told me to stop crying and be quiet. Several times I really didn't know what I had done wrong.

Looking back i have more understanding of why but that doesn't change how it impacted my life. I know that my idiots faster came from a similar family structure. He also didn't get an opportunity to grow into adulthood at a normal pace since his dad died when he was 16. He had to quit school and support the family.

 

[SnoopRob]

I think a lot of great things have been said here, so I won't repeat my experiences that have largely already been covered.

One thing that I think my ex-wife and I have done/did well was that we took the long view on a lot of things for our kids. The way I describe it is, "I parent to help develop an awesome 20 year old adult that is confident, capable, and ready to thrive in an adult world, not to create the best 4 or 6 or 8 or 10 year old."

Taking the long view helped us to keep a focus on where we hoped our kids would go as people and helped us not stress the every day events where our kids and we fell short of expectations. It also helped us to remember that no matter how frustrating one situation or evening or week or even season of life might be, that if our kids were progressing to being good 20 year olds, then we were doing ok as parents.

Now that my oldest is 20 years old and is the kind of adult I'd hoped they'd be, I feel good about this perspective. And my 15 year old is well on her way to being that kind of adult, as well, as far as I can tell.

 

[TarSpiel]

OGTruthHurts: life is fucking hard

Mine isn't, and never has been.

Probably because my parents didn't shove negative shit in my face every time I turned around.

 

[ZenMode]

My dad beat the shit out of me with a belt, then told me to stop crying and be quiet. Several times I really didn't know what I had done wrong.

Looking back i have more understanding of why but that doesn't change how it impacted my life. I know that my idiots faster came from a similar family structure. He also didn't get an opportunity to grow into adulthood at a normal pace since his dad died when he was 16. He had to quit school and support the family.

That's the unfortunate part of things - the impact. It's something that I can't relate to because my parents weren't physically abusive but I do remember, in extreme detail, the ONE time I got smacked on the butt by my dad. It wasn't even that hard, but it sticks in my mind 40 years later.

I can't imagine being on the side of what you and others went through.

 

[TarSpiel]

My dad beat the shit out of me with a belt, then told me to stop crying and be quiet. Several times I really didn't know what I had done wrong.

Damn. That just breaks my heart.