If you could start over again with your DC, what would you do differently?

[whereiscaroline]

Just mulling this over after a tricky day with DS.

I wish that I'd focused more on building his self esteem when he was small, without worrying that overpraising would make him big headed or arrogant.

I wish I'd sent him to Cubs and Scouts! He struggles with school due to ADHD and I think he would have got a lot from being part of something vocational.

I wish I’d been more patient and ignored more minor misbehaviours. Feel like I’ve spent too much time telling them what to do/to stop doing.

Focused on my own health sooner.

I kept dismissing it as normal tiredness of pregnancy/early parenting and thinking that I'd magically feel better when they were older/sleeping better/not as demanding, but really it's something I should have worked on all along with better habits, it's hard putting in those keystone habits in later with everything.

I'm hoping to be that batshit mum too @steppemum - going to hold out as long as I can on the phone and then only hand over the most basic text and calls model. Bracing myself for huge battles . . .

I wish I had read up on routines and sleep issues during pregnancy. Would have saved me from a lot of desperation and I would have been a better, more patient mum to my first born.

Chicken pox vaccine - scarring on oldest, all on his face and legs. I pray they fade, but it’s been years and three on his face are very deep. Vaccinated younger one but too late for oldest 😕

I wish I'd been less concerned about good manners and good behaviour. I have beautifully behaved very pleasant young men for sons but I do feel they've lost the spirit they had when young. DS1 particularly had a fierce temper until about 9yo, which I "controlled" through behaviour management. Now he never gets angry about anything. Even when he should.

I’m with @Hugsgalore and @minipie. I really really wish I’d been more patient. I now have three impatient teens who get annoyed easily just like I used to. I’m so much more chilled now and we are all happy but it’s such a regret of mine.

I wish I had cared less that they were well behaved /good/polite.
Obviously those things are important but I think I let that be too much of a priority.

To those with older kids and tech. What do you find are the main issues? I can guess, but it’d be handy to have some tips. Most kids get a phone aged 10 where I live when they start walking to school on their own.

Great thread! Also taking notes.

@lavenderandwisteria I understand that. I really struggled to bf and did eventually manage. It took 2 months of hell tho and such severe anxiety and despair that I cried every day. So what I wish, is that I hadn’t cared either way. Given it a go but not been bothered if it hadn’t worked out. As it was, I felt so ashamed I couldn’t get it and was even nervous to bottle feed in public in case someone judged. I wish I could have felt that it didn’t matter how my baby was fed as it would have saved me and enormous amount of stress.

@SwanShaped

To those with older kids and tech. What do you find are the main issues? I can guess, but it’d be handy to have some tips. Most kids get a phone aged 10 where I live when they start walking to school on their own.

1. it is so addictive, they just find it impossible to put down
2. whatever controls you put on, they will get round them and that means you end up with them accessing all sorts of things. It is not actually porn etc but rather just tick tock opinions on the world, which become fact to them. And the way that anything online is just a constant circle of reinforcing opinions. So they never get challenged or exposed to another way of thinking, except from mum and dad, who are obviously so old they know nothing.
3. bedtime creep, getting the phone out of their hands and downstairs is a daily battle. If I went back, it would not go bakc upstairs after dinner.

Along with that is the issue that all their music and their alarm clocks are on their phone. I have tried to get music onto MP3 players etc, so that it is not phone based, but that is hopeless, and I do understand the desire for music, but of course it comes attached to the phone.

@SwanShaped

To those with older kids and tech. What do you find are the main issues? I can guess, but it’d be handy to have some tips. Most kids get a phone aged 10 where I live when they start walking to school on their own.

I never allowed phones or any gadgets in bedrooms from day one. This is one thing i definitely got right. Very hard to change once it's been allowed.

That and forming the habit of them stripping their own beds when they were very young, which means I've never touched a teenaged boy's bedding

Vigorously note taking! 📒✏️

@ShinyGreenElephant

Pick Dads for them who aren't complete idiots.

Same

This is a great thread. My eldest DC is 8 years old and I’m a nagging mum. I spend most of the day saying things like “can you hurry up” “can you stop doing that” “don’t do this/that” “if you do this...” I really don’t want to be this person anymore and want to be more laid back. Too much time is spent on nagging children to be a certain way when they should be allowed to be just what they are...children

Any tips?

Not gone to baby groups until my son was about 6-12 months old. I was so busy popping here and there he was never allowed to just sleep. Always being moved or woken up so we could go out. It didn't really do him any favours. (It was good for me - but I looking back and having learnt with subsequent kids....not going would have been far better for him.)

That and forming the habit of them stripping their own beds when they were very young, which means I've never touched a teenaged boy's bedding

I'm the same - they strip their own beds.
On the same note, 3 laundry bins in bathroom (white, darks and coloureds) if it isn't in the bin it doesn't get washed. I did this for practical reasons, but it has meant that as teens laundry is never an issue. I just announce that I am putting wahsing in, so if you want it washed get it in the bin in the next 20 minutes, and they do, or they live without. They know I mean it.

one bit of tech we got right was no TV /x box/dvd in bedrooms.

Laptops and phones eventually did, but as teens, not when younger.

This is a very interesting thread, although it does assume that your children's behaviour is a result of parenting - sometimes I think it isn't: kids' personalities and attitudes can also be innate and nothing that you could do differently as a parent would change it.

I really want to be more patient and laid back.. Mine are 4 and 5 and I feel like I'm constantly nagging and going on at them, I get very stressed if they don't do what I've asked like straight away.. I shout sometimes and I hate it. This morning I made a snarky comment to my 5 year old because he wouldn't get dressed for school and I feel awful now. He's 5.
I recently bought "calm parents happy kids" I havnt read it yet but I'm hoping it will have some good tips to help me not stress the little stuff and enjoy my kids more.

Less tech.
Started ds on cricket as a tiny kid. He's really good at school but there's no space in teams at his age. (I get pathetically sad about this).
Put DD in a proper routine from the early days.
Spent less on group swimming lessons and saved to blitz it via private lessons.
Insisted the GP gives me HRT so I don't struggle as much.

Taught them to do more in the house they were good when they were toddlers keen to help but as I worked part time for a long time I did all the chores while they were at school I am now full time and as teenagers they still expect me to do everything and it’s a battle getting them to do stuff

DD is only 3 but I wish I’d ignored all the advice when she was a baby. And just breastfed her to sleep, cuddled her, rocked her and didn’t worry so much about co sleeping. I did all this in the end but spent ages doubting myself, buying books like Gina Ford and even left her to cry to ‘self settle’ a few times which only stressed us both out. I bought into the whole rod for your own back thing which turns out didn’t even exist because DD grew up and became very happy and independent anyway!

@Worriesome - Well, I realised I was being daft. He asked me for things as well and I had a kneeler reaction of 'God, I do everything, why is he getting everyone to run after him?!', then realised I needed to ask more of other people, rather than be annoyed at him for doing so!