Recently I saw my brother and his daughters; always a pleasure for us, I only see them occasionally because we live far apart. We're close in age, but we have very different temperaments: I'm an introvert and used to be a people-pleaser, he's very loud and thrives on drama; nothing there has changed since we were children. For full disclosure I am not a parent (so I expect his methods are none of my business), also he had the children on his own that day as their mum was at work, so he was probably a bit stressed. Also, although we have a good relationship as adults, we squabbled a lot as children; each of us would always want to be "right".
I know, the usual MN spiel, I only saw a snapshot, maybe things were more fraught than usual because it was half term. But here it is, and I've seen similar on other visits: while I was there, it sounded as if he was constantly nagging them, putting them in their place every few minutes, always using a special "telling off" voice. He'd interrupt a conversation with "Come on, eat up, letsgomaths has almost finished." When one of the children (aged 4) moaned about being cold, his reply was "Are you whining? Do you live in Whinesville? Is your name Princess Whine of the kingdom of Whinedom??", his voice rising to a crescendo. I suppose it's meant to be good-natured, but it's very "dramatic" in my view, far more than the original whine from the child. I couldn't help wondering if the children play up to it, because his replies are so dramatic. A few times during the day, I was thinking "I'm glad he's not my dad", because as a child I hated sarcastic replies. The children seem to forget each telling-off after a few minutes, but I remember being silent and upset for a long time if I was told off, especially if I thought it was unfair.
At one point, when one of the children was about to go outside, I said "no, daddy told you not do". My brother said (grandly and dramatically) "thank you for backing me up, I wish our parents would!". Fair enough.
When one of the children spilt some bubble mix in the living room, he really lost his temper, shouted at her and made her cry, then stormed upstairs to fetch clothes for her, slamming doors as he went. He did apologise to her a few minutes later; I kept very quiet but I was reminded of our dad doing exactly the same thing, and how much I feared scenes like this at home.
And near the end of my visit, he and I were chatting about old films, and one of us said "that one's awful". One of the children (aged 6)chipped in with "What's awful?" My brother then snapped "Can't I just have a conversation for once, without you butting in????" He sounded so angry about this, and I was so stunned and shocked that I couldn't continue the conversation. I didn't say anything because I didn't want to undermine him, but I thought that was deeply unfair to the child; and again, I remembered being unexpectedly told off like that at the same age. I ended up staying longer than planned because I didn't want to leave on that note.
Again, all this may be none of my business; maybe it says more about me than about him, he might just be "louder" than I am, it's their way of doing things, and as a non-parent I'm probably in no position to criticise his methods. However, I found this really painful to watch. I have a vivid memory of my own childhood, and I remember really hating being told off, fearing being shouted at, especially unexpectedly, as with his daughter asking "what's awful?". Yes, perhaps I just felt differently about it from him; perhaps he thrives on "conflict" while I really don't like it at all. Although I think our parents got most things right, I remember some really heated shouting matches, which would always put the fear of God into me because they sometimes ended in me being smacked.
Maybe I'm reading too much into it, but the reason I care so much about this is because I feel that history might repeat itself, before my very eyes (apart from the smacking, as far as I know he draws the line at that). I don't want to interfere, but right now I'm really wanting to tell him a cautionary tale about me: as a child, teenager, and even a young adult, I often did not ask for help when I really needed it, because I was afraid of our parents' reaction, and I remember encouraging him to keep his mouth shut if we were in on something together. If I broke something while their backs were turned, I would never own up to it; I would lie, hide the evidence, try to blame my brother, etc. As a teenager, if I got into trouble at school over homework, I'd lie to cover it up, to the extent of forging my mum's signature on detention paperwork, because I didn't want to tell her about it. (Result: I got into far more trouble later.) As a young adult, I never told my parents what I was doing until my projects were well-established, in case they had a bad reaction. It's only later that I realised that owning up to mistakes straight away is valued by many people.
Seeing him really losing it with his daughter about the bubble mix incident made me wonder: in a few years' time, will she dare to ask for help if she needs it? If one of the children accidentally lets the puppy out of the front door, will they own up to it, or will they pretend nothing happened, as I used to? My parents never did have the conversation "always tell us if something goes wrong: we might be cross at first, but we'd much rather you told us", or "lying is far worse than the original crime". My dad said that he grew up in a family full of conflict; he only learned to be calmer long after my brother and I grew up.