to want to disipline my nephew?

[TotorosOcarina]

I don't, well I do ocasionally but I want to go in super nanny style and sort the mess out!

My sister does nothing to disipline him, she has no confidence in herself at all :(

For example at a party recently we were at soft play first, they had go karts.

Her DS (who is 4) drove past on his and in front of the whoe party shouted 'OI fatty' to his mum!!

she just laughed it off and confessed he does it all the time.

Nothin came of it.

If that were me I would have took him from the kart, sat him down, told him he does NOT call mummy or anyone names like that. Made him sit for 4 mins and apologise.

When we got to the party after at the birthday boys home my nephew followed the birthday round screaming it was 'his turn' for the new toy he had gotten.

my sis kept saying feebly 'its xxs birthday and its his toy'

but my nephew just continued this moaning, screaming behaviour the whole party and it was embaressing.

You could see everyone was thinking 'FFS tell him he is not having it!'

I feel sorry for her, shes in an on/off reltionship with DNs dad, who i know has been abusive in the past ( fatty comments come from somehwere!! ) and she just doesn't seem to have the energy to control him :(

I try to help but she doesn't follow through with any of the disipline advice then says to me 'why are your 3 kids less work and more well behaved than my 1'?¬!

It sounds like she is really insecure in her own decisions and could use some guidance.

You don't really need to ask anyone's permission to pull him up short, especially if it's your nephew. Treat him as you would your own children & step in if he's misbehaving. "That is not a very nice thing to say to your mummy and I want you to apologise" etc. I doubt your sister would take offence and her 'why are your 3 kids less work?' comment sounds like she's looking for some back-up.

if she would be happy for you to help her with it then you could, but obviously you cant just go in there and undermine her by disaplining yourself as it seems her confidence with him could be low already. if she says those kind of comments like why are your 3 less work maybe you can find a way to put an offer in there of helping her out with him a bit? does she see the kind of techniques u do with yours at all, like to observe and copy ideas?
if she does want help and as your her sister and if you are close to her and can present it so she doesnt feel attacked or judged or anything then i think you would be in quite a good position to help her out with this so she could get it sorted before he gets too much older, but of course really needs the commitment from herself otherwise nothing will be able to change

I'ts not U to want to, but whether you should or not, depends totally on whether your sister wants you to. You can only really intervene if she asks for your help, as anything else is just interfering.

However, maybe her wondering why yours are so much better behaved, is in fact her trying to ask for help. Perhaps there is a way you can chat about this and clarify? She might seem exasperated but be happy with things on the whole, but equally, she might be desparate for advice and support and not know how to ask.

D

If they are at my house and I see an 'incident' I do always tell him its not aceeptable.

But its a big step going from saying 'oi don't do that its rude' to going through the whole 'naughty step' thing we do and apology afterwards.

And it ONLY works if its consistant and she would keep it up at home which I don't think she would,

All you can control is what happens when you're there. You can't parent someone else's child however much you'd like to. He'll quickly get the message that Auntie TotorosOscarina is not a person to be messed with and that's never a bad thing.

I know what you mean. I feel the same about my SIL's 3 year old son. At family get togethers I sit with a 'tolerant smile' plastered on my face while he runs amok, swears, hits, kicks, bites, when really I want to pick him up, tell him his behaviour is unacceptable, and hold him on my knee until he is ready to apologise/pick something up, etc. But, I am always aware that 1. His mother is not actually my sister and will view me as being 'an interfering outsider' if I try to help and 2. My advice has not been asked for so I don't want to give it for fear of being 'an interefering outsider' and 3. I don't have any kids of my own, despite working with them for the last 10 years, so don't want to come off as smug and know it all when, in her eyes, I probably don't know what I'm talking about. The only time I ever do anything is when his mum's not there - such as when his grandma is babysitting him and my husband and I have popped round. There have been a couple of times recently when he has really hurt his grandma that I haven't been able to resist going into 'teacher dealing with naughty child' mode! I think his grandma has been thankful, my husband has told me I did the right thing, but I wouldn't have done it if his mum had been there! Interestingly, I'm the only one in the family who he doesn't hit/kick/bite, because I think he knows that I just will not tolerate it!
If your sister actually says to you 'why is he more hard work than your children?' then that is an invite in my opinion to anwer with a bit of advice about how she could sort his behaviour out. Maybe you could offer to deal with him, and so give her a chance to accept the help or decline. Such as the time he was moaning throughout the party. Maybe you could have said something like 'I bet he's hard work for you when he has days like today. Why don't you watch my kids here and I'll take him outside to calm down for a few minutes?' That way she can either accept and you'll know she does want help and may be keen to hear some more advice later, or she can decline and you'll know not to try to ever discipline him yourself or she will be cross! It is difficult though, as you don't want to start a family rift over a naughty 4 year old!

Oh I feel your pain! A friend's child (with friend) was visiting recently. She was sulky, badly behaved and whined on and off the whole time she was here. My friend (who is otherwise fab) did nothing! I did invoke a few house rules but otherwise had to bite my tongue. Not only is she making it hard for herself but by letting her child misbehave - for example by jumping down from the table and running around during a meal it's a crap example (and seems very unfair) for my dc who aren't allowed to do that. My friend is confident as a parent so I really can't understand why she doesn't step in.
We have another friend with an indulged child like this and much as we love the friends we sometimes avoid spending time with them because we know their spoilt child will ruin trips out etc.
ARGH! It is so hard not to say anything when a few boundaries and punishments (like the step) would ultimately make the child happier and the parents.

Its incredibly hard to find a balance.

When we went for dinner he messed around the whole time and my sister ended up leaving her dinner to FEED him hes 4!!