To those with well behaved children...

[hettysfeather]

What the hell is your secret?!

My (almost) three year old DS is feral. I spend so much time with him, get him involved in everything I do and we have a sticker chart. I praise him every time he displays a positive behaviour. He also gets rewards when he has been "good".

But he does not listen, he hits, bites and pinches when he doesn't get his way or he's cross. Runs around and away from me in the shop (I try to include him in shopping but he's not interested). Bed times are terrible, he will not stay in his bed or his room. I have tried the chair method, stroking him, comforters, the list goes on.

So, those with well behaved kids, how do you do it?!

@DisappointingAvocado

Quite shocked by how much fixed mindset there is on this thread. So many seem to think it's entirely down to luck and their parenting has nothing to do with their child's behaviour. Really? Why would you bother to put any effort into your parenting if you genuinely believed that it had no influence? Is that what's actually happening? People deciding their three year olds' behaviour is already decided so they give up disciplining? I've witnessed this amongst friends but I have to say I'm flabbergasted and disheartened it seems so widespread.

I think there is some luck involved in their personality and how receptive they are. Both of mine are very well behaved but it was certainly easier with one than the other.

I don't think there's any excuse for deciding your child is one of the difficult ones and not bothering.

unsure eat together as a family because they will quickly realise they are the only one missing out and will want to be like everyone else eventually. A good dinner routine is vital. I have never in 17 years cooked a special meal to cater for a fussy eater. Now my kids have the best diets and my DS often relays in horror that his friends eat pizza every night or haven’t had a roast since Christmas. I am so so so glad I pushed through. It is a worry, but I just focused on what they ate throughout the day rather than getting caught up over one meal. Not bad considering DS used to pretend to swallow, store the chewed food in his cheeks like a hamster and then push it all out in a huge blob onto the table! Every evening we had to go to elaborate lengths to ‘aeroplane’ or Choo choo it in (It went on for a while too).

I have one that's the same age and is midway between angel and feral. He's mostly an angel and It's got nothing to do with me or my parenting (which is lax!). It's purely personality, IMO. I am "strict" though. He hears "no" and "stop" said firmly repeatedly throughout the day. Maybe that helps? Who knows. I'm just winging it until he goes off to Uni.

My DD is coming up to 9. I also need help.

Luck and circumstance...

100% single parent for 4 years and the circs surrounding this means my DC and I are knitted together in a way that seems to mean I can raise an eyebrow and that quells any brewing naughtiness immediately.

They aren't perfect by any means (neither am I!) but we are a solid unit now and apart from the occasional bit of tiredness related behaviour MOSTLY we are all good to each other... but yeah, the youngest was an absolute bugger at 3!

I have 3 dc. After dd1 I thought we had perfect parenting skills and at 13 she’s a dream. Dtds came along and yep, feral. They are mostly lovely now older but dd3 speaks to me like a piece of shit when she’s angry. I never understood how parents allow that but it’s sometimes easier to ignore for the sake of the other 2. Parenting matters but some dc are more stubborn and demanding than others!

@LlamaofDrama

Luck. Pure and simple. She's now 11 and I'm assuming the luck will run out pretty soon!

You might be OK, my easy kid was also an easy teenager. And is now an easygoing adult.

@SpaceBethSmith

3DC here, all daughters.

Eldest - very quiet, shy toddler. Never had a tantrum in her life until she hit puberty.

Middle - wild child, in an hilarious way. No tantrums.

Youngest - shat from the bowels of Satan himself from birth to 5.

This made me laugh 🤣

I'd suggest you throw away the reward charts. If your child is hitting/screaming/biting etc they have lost control and they aren't going to be thinking rationally about what they need to do to earn a sticker. You need to try and stop them losing control in the first place by figuring out what's causing it, is it frustration, hunger, tiredness etc. Figure out what the trigger points are, so if he's bored in the shop, is there a toy he can fiddle with to distract him while you go round the shop.

[quote NerdyBird]@UserNameNameNameUser what sort of improvements did you see? I was thinking of this type of therapy when DD was 5 and a half but went with something else in the end, that was scuppered by lockdown. I was thinking about it again this morning, so your post struck a chord![/quote]
@NerdyBird he mostly just calmed right down. I hadn’t realised before the therapy how close his behaviour was to extreme stress. His coordination and communication definitely improved too. But of course how much of that would have been happening anyway at age 3.

There was absolutely no downside other than cost. He loved it. He just thought it was games … being a monkey etc.

It was real hippy-dippy stuff at the time, but seems more mainstream now.

We are actually thinking of taking him back now as a teen. He’s mentioned stress recently and associated with it I have noticed he is again straying away from activities that cross the midline … so he runs, climbs, does weights etc, but struggles to kayak or surf, even though for years he was fine with judo, yoga etc.

My DD has always been pretty well behaved but when she was a toddler she had her moments. Frequent trips to the naughty step but I guess that's pretty normal. She started talking early so I think it helped she could communicate but I don't think there was a big thing that we did. She definitely had tantrums.

I once read a book that said 60 percent of children are easy, however you parent them they will turn out ok, provided you don't do anything really bad. 35 per cent are more challenging and you need to work hard at parenting for them to turn out ok. 5 per cent are just a nightmare no matter how brilliant your parenting.

It doesn’t seem to be the done thing anymore but I feel I had great success with supernanny’s ‘time out’ method. I had a few “red line” behaviours which meant that they went straight into time out, for example if they hit or bit or kicked out at me. But otherwise I liked it because I could issue a warning that they needed to stop doing whatever it was or they’d go into time out and so they had an opportunity to stop and change their behaviour without immediate consequences. Then if they continued I was doggedly consistent and followed through every single time no matter how inconvenient or occasionally how long it took. I found that it became rarer and rarer that they needed to go into time out because they knew I’d follow through pretty quickly and so they soon changed their behaviour at the warning stage.
I also liked it because once their time was up, there was time to fully explain what they had done and how they hadn’t taken notice of the warning and given themselves the opportunity to stop the bad behaviour, but this was followed by a hug and no hard feelings carried on past that moment. I didn’t need to shout or plead or cause long lasting ill feeling and having set that up in their toddler years, I’ve found that I now only have to shoot them a quick look as they get older and they know to stop. We will see how it works as my oldest two head into the teen years but so far so good.
I did also praise them a lot, especially whenever I noticed them make a different choice from the last time.

thank you @UserNameNameNameUser calming down is what dd needs I'm sure. She's a ball of energy, mental and physical. Coordination and communication could be improved too. Interesting you are thinking of going back, as I was worried she might be too old now at 7 but hopefully not.

My two are hard to handle. They are often worse when they are together than when they are apart.
One of the hardest things is they run off and are really fast.
I really worry they will get badly hurt one of these days. I have talked about car parks and roads being dangerous many many times.

I have noticed my daughter often doesn't drink enough and can be worse late afternoon. I do try to get her to drink as much as possible.

They are also worse if they are bored and/or housebound.

This thread is really comforting.

Mine is 4. She was late to the terrible twos, fully embraced the threenager but oh! Oh the fucking fours she is turning into a masterclass of just how far can she push mummy before mummy seriously considers running away with the circus. She is an ANGEL at school I'm told, she lets it all hang out at home though.

Just today I had to take her out of a restaurant as she was gearing up for a full scale wobbler over orange bleeding fruit shoot. Then I had to crack out my 'mum voice' over putting her shoes back on after going on the beach.

I try not to make 'empty' threats, if I say I'm going to do something, I do it. I quite like natural consequences as well. But mostly it's repeating myself over and over hoping it goes in via osmosis or something. 😂😂

@kayakingmum a few exciting hyped up trips where you tell them if they run away they go immediately back in the car and go home, and you follow through, might do the trick.

@ididitsocanyou thank you I will implement

Children should be taught when very young,to be quite well behaved. Then you won't need all this malarkey about giving stickers or stars for good behaviour, or the so called naughty step when they misbehave.

Children who have a tendency to run amok, need to be in reins, as it is sensible, and could be dangerous if they scoot off all over the place. And giving small children sweets and chocolate to keep them quiet is a no no. as it becomes a bad habit..

I was in a supermarket a few weeks ago, and saw a Mother pushing her trolly along, and her toddler was running up and down the aisles, sometimes disappearing down another aisle, the child was grabbing things off the shelves,, and sometimes throwing them on the floor,, the Mother was just shrieking and swearing at the child, and just on her phone mostly. And made no attempt, to catch the child, and sit him in the trolly. She obviously had no idea how to control her child.

I have 4 children due number 5 anyday. The key is routine from day 1. And learn the word no and stick to it. I am very strict, but my kids will tell you, I'm a fun mum who always has then laughing but i take no nonsense. But im going to be honest I've had 4 brilliant kids all slept through from 5 months. Polite and kind. Now I know 5 is going to be the child fron hell, as im not that lucky

It's just luck at that age.

Mine are quite well behaved. DD first born, golden child. DS second born - feral if he gets half a chance.

We count to 5, then the naughty spot. I have Facebook memories of DD being on the naughty spot aged approx 18 months old. We were a bit softer on DS and I think that shows in his behaviour now
Having said that, both are always well behaved when out and about.

Luck!

Mostly luck! Happy coincidence of parenting styles and child's personality.
I think I am quite child centered but strong in boundaries and natural consequences. I don't tolerate poor behaviour but I have a child who doesn't want to push me either. I think my DD and our DSC feel listened to, secure, loved and valued.
I don't really have many strategies for bad behaviour so am a bit at a loss with other people's kids!

[quote Unsure1983]@kayakingmum a few exciting hyped up trips where you tell them if they run away they go immediately back in the car and go home, and you follow through, might do the trick.[/quote]
Thanks for the suggestion.
Its tricky because it often happens just before we are about to leave anyway (e.g a coffee shop) or in the case of today a castle (the 4 year old would have been happy to leave it but my DH and I wanted to see it). Reins might be the answer although I never see children in them when I'm out and about.