Things That Shouldn’t Be Said To Children

[SunshineLollipopsAndRainbows]

I get quite upset hearing parents deal with sometimes really little children. For example, I was at work & a little girl was dawdling in the shop. Her dad said “ Ok we’ll leave you then”. Heard this so often & how awful for the child who doesn’t understand that the parent wouldn’t actually do that. When I worked as a nanny, one of the Mums used to threaten that “ Beryl” would come & get her 3 year old. I took her on the tube once & she was inconsolable when a woman near us called her friend “ Beryl”. However, it was sweet revenge when the Mum was attempting to dry the little girl’s hair & she was struggling, saying “No, I want Beryl to do it”!
I’ve also heard parents threaten their kids with the police & even that they would send them to hospital if they didn’t behave. Why don’t they think before they speak?

You are a mistake or I never wanted more than one child- my dad said this to my sister who is child number 2.

Hear hear!

Yes! Thank you. Parenting can be exhausting and it is OK for parents to be human, to be exasperated, to reach the end of their rope, to use 20 minutes of “shall we race there backwards?” then move onto the next tool in their arsenal.

“Bye, then!” doesn’t have to be in a mean tone or accompanied by trauma, and sometimes DD has followed up with “But you’re just joking aren’t you” and we’ve confirmed that yes, of course I am but we needed to hurry to get the bus and she didn’t have her listening ears on. And then she role plays “We’ve got to hurry” with all her soft toys once we’re at home. And sometimes she doesn’t care at all and goes “Whoops! Coming!” and starts skipping and chattering about how many sharks there are in the world or whatever.

Long-term damage is yet to show as she’s 4, but then again I was parented the same way and the long-term damage is yet to show, and I’m 40.

Behave or I’ll put you back.

Said to teenage son who was trying it on and was embarrassed at other people around hearing me say it and decided he better behave just in case mother came out with something even worse.

Just focus on what you say to your own family op, sometimes when you’re out and about you only see a snapshot of someone’s lives and a throwaway comment may have a backstory which you nothing about nor do you know what problems that individual or family may be suffering with.

Some of these things are true and I believe in being honest with DS. You need to put your seatbelt on or if we have a crash you will get hurt, this vaccination might hurt for a second but it will protect you from getting very ill. Don't run off in this busy public place, someone might take you, isn't a threat it's true.
To the poster who said use the options race to the car or walk there, firstly I am not running up the highstreet at the whim of a child and secondly my DS would say neither, I want to stay here. So saying to him I have to go now, I can't stay because I have to go to X, I want you to come with me and then taking a few steps, he'll come with me.

Exactly this.
I have a challenging 3 year old at the minute and I find myself sometimes automatically reverting to things my parents said to me as a child but I usually stop myself or correct myself if it slips out, because I don't want to do that to my child. It's about the long term goals, not short term gains. I try to parent with empathy and respect, and not be dismissive even if it seems like something completely ridiculous to me. It's hard at times though!

Grandparents are always saying horrible things to my child and I hate it. "don't cry it makes your face ugly", "don't be silly" when they're really upset, "I'll throw you away in the bin" when they're being annoying. How the fuck is that going to help the child learn how to deal with their emotions?!

I think people who those types of choices work for have pretty easy, complaint children.

At 2.5 mine had this sussed and would just say 'I don't want choices, I just want to stay here' and 'I don't want to race.'

I don't threaten to leave them but I've found that whole 'give them non choices and they'll magically do what you want' to be BS.

Nah I do the bye thing. I don’t have time to fuck around in a shop with a child who is misbehaving and no one else wants to see you’re wishy washy precious parenting either. You need to do what’s quick and effective, I have never seen a traumatised adult because their parent pretended to leave them in a shop.

My mother driving me to the “children’s home” instead of my friends birthday party. That was traumatising. Dumped me on the door step of the party covered in snot and literally shaking with fear.

Good grief I’d never have got anywhere if I’d never used “Bye then I’m going home I’ll see you later” with my dc. You’re not threatening them with abandonment, how
dramatic. 🙄

Agree with pps there’s nothing worse than waiting for wishy washy parenting holding up everyone else in a queue because their toddler is uncooperative, and the parent is ineffectually ‘negotiating’. I had this at an airport gate - the child sat on the ground next to the desk and refused to go down the jetty to the plane, holding up the entire queue.

Eventually a passenger just stepped over the toddler. Parents were horrified, and started to express their anger to the staff, but the rest of the queue started to follow suit and the toddler got up and moved sharpish. Stupid parents.

My poor child I’ve been using this since July 😂😂

My mum said I should have had an abortion like your granny xxxxxx suggested. And she wonders why we are not close

‘Look up at the stars - that's how insignificant you are’ dad to me when I was about 13

As I'm eating a prawn cocktail and with each mouthful, my dad starts counting ‘thats how many women I've slept with’ age 15

‘Do you give your bf blow job?’ age 17

‘When you left the house you looked like a slut’ aged 18

The list could go on - but you get the drift. He's a spineless abusive narcissistic twat.

Why not go for a more 2 X positive choice of"Mummy needs to get to (wherever the next place is), do you want to race to the car, or shall you walk there? which would you like?

I have to go to work, DC has to go to nursery/school, and no I am not going to waste time ineffectually skipping like a unicorn. I really, really don't want him to think dicking around is an option, or that I am obliged to charm or coax him into going where we need to go when we need to go there, or that he is doing me a favour by so doing.

I disagree those things are a big deal, and IME they often work which is why it's probably been done since the dawn of parenting. I think context is key. In a generally secure, trusting and loving home life a kid won't be traumatized so easily. They could always just get a move on!

😂

I see it's not just on Facebook that people like to pop up and tell the majority of parents that they're shit parents.

I'd like to know your background OP and what puts you in such a good position to judge parents.

Taking just one example, at the point a parent says 'Are you coming? I'm going home now - bye', they've probably already cycled through all the soft cuddly things you're thinking they should be using.

@00100001
Why not go for a more 2 X positive choice of"Mummy needs to get to (wherever the next place is), do you want to race to the car, or shall you walk there? which would you like?"

Because all children are not the same. Mine has never responded well to “do you want to walk like and elephant or jump like a frog” options. She would say, I want to stay here and kick off if not allowed.

Sometimes it’s not on purpose , my daughter went through a stage of not wanting her seatbelt . Out if desperation I said to her “ if we have an accident t you can die “ . She now tells everyone “ do you want to die , no , them out your seatbelt “ .
the one thing I said I regret the most was this years , we where without power for a few days during the last big storms and on day 4 I can’t exactly remember what but something triggered me and after days of no power trying to keep myself collected I lost it and screamed really loud “ one of these days I will just leave I will just F leave and started sobbing “
Took a long few weeks to convince my 5 year old mum would never leave her . To this day she tells me “ please don’t ever cry like that because it scares me “ .
I feel really guilty about it .

Those are absolutely awful @Sparklybutold.
I'm so sorry

it'sbeen mentioned above, eg @StillMedusa but I hate pointless empty threats.

we'll leave you at home when we go on holiday
I'll throw away all your Christmas presents
I'm cancelling your birthday party

All untrue and just nasty

You can't be a perfect parent all the time. Shopping with a child can be a stressful experience. Sometimes I have all the patience in the world and will try the 'would you like to do this or that' method, other times we're in a rush, the baby's screaming and you say what you need to get your child moving.

Exactly, and after spending countless hours telling dc we don't run in car parks or around the car, I'm not about to make a game of it!
Are you a parent @SunshineLollipopsAndRainbows?

My mum did the walking off thing if my sibling and I were dawdling and messing around. Must’ve been around 3. We would then run after her. No harm done. I’m in my 20s and I think all parents did this.

There's a middle way between useless permissive parents like those at the airport and authoritarian parenting: authoritative parenting. Authoritative parenting is warm and responsive, but with ground rules and high expectations of good behaviour for good behaviour's sake.

"I can see you are upset, but I cannot let you block these people from getting on their plane. I'm going to pick you up/move you to one side". Then do it. No negotiation. No need for threats (which are just another form of negotiation really).

Ultimately they end up too big to physically or verbally restrain, so the aim is to help them learn self control and good citizenship before they get to that age. I say this as a parent of 3 children aged 12 to 19. The teen years are/have been easy as the groundwork was laid.

I'll admit it was easy for me though, as that's how I was parented. I think without an example to fall back on it would be easy to get it wrong and end up as a permissive parent.

You are most certainly not a terrible parent. Some of the comments pp have made are ridiculous, in my opinion. Of course its OK to gently persuade a reluctant eater to have just one or two more mouthfuls, if the alternative is that the don't eat. Likewise insisting on eating some of the vegetables. I will not allow my children to leave the healthiest food on their plate, no. Its nothing to do with hunger cues etc. Otherwise they may end up like a friend of mine, who was allowed to leave his veg etc, as a child. He eats no fruit or vegetables at all now. Absolutely nothing.

My children when they were small used to argue and try to fight each other in the back of the car when I was driving....I did tell them that if I couldn't concentrate when I was driving the police would stop me.