to have removed DD when H was shouting at her?

[HarryDan]

DD is six, and can be provocative/challenging in her behaviour - deliberately will full, if you will.

At dinner she poured (quite alot) of salt over her food, even when asked not to. Dh snapped at her then told her not to eat it, she then dipped food in it and continued eating (i.e, ignored him).

I know how frustrating it is to be ignored by children, but he began shouting at her. I asked him to leave it, but he continued, so I left the room as I didn't agree with him, but didn't want to undermine him. He wasn't continuously shouting, but his voice was raised.

I went upstairs and heard him tell her to finish her dinner - she then went behind his back (while he was loading the dishwasher) and threw most of her dinner in the bin. The entire thing wasn't covered in salt, so it was perfectly edible, and we don't really take kindly to wasting food.

DH lost the plot and began screaming at her, really loosing his temper & at this point I felt he was taking it too far, came back in the room and intervened. I took her out of the room, and told him that he was being a bully, and that he shouldn't scream at anyone like that. You wouldn't scream at your family or colleagues like that, so it's not OK to scream at a six year old like that :(

He told me to fuck off, I was very calm and took her upstairs and told her that although she must listen to him (re: food etc) its not OK for anyone to shout at her like that. She was really upset (which she can play up when getting told off, as all children do) and DD1 was also in tears. I could see they were both frightened.

DH has gone out - I assume not talking to me, and is obviously vexed that I undermined him as he feels she doesn't respect him,

My question is, did I do the right thing?

FFS....
Just tell your children NO.
YOU CANT HAVE SOMETHING.
Do as you are told.
Sit down.
Behave.
It's not that difficult.

In the long run you make life so much easier for yourselves and the rest of society.

Alicet did you read the rest of my post

I have been parenting ...that sounds proper arsey but its not meant to be ...for 21 years

I have had to deal with some proper shit behaviour from foster children for 15 yrs and I know how to deal with nasty situations ...and singling one parent out as the good one or the bad one isnt a good way of dealing with bad behaviour x

God that sounds proper up my own arse ...I really dont mean it to come across that way :)

Of course this means that whenever we ask them not to do something they repond with the inevitable 'why?' and sometimes they get the 'because mummy says so and sometimes that is enough!' as I am not perfect either!!

Can't be arsed with what reeling?

BECAUSE I SAID SO.
Get over it.

picallili yes I did. I wasn't actually meaning to single you out either, my post was more to everyone who had said that the answer was to remove the salt. Didn't mean my post to sound as though I was having a pop at you and i agree totally with your last post.

I'll be in touch when all my advice turns to shit and the boys turn into little devils!

As soon as she'd tipped salt over her food and then ignored DH, I would have taken her straight upstairs to bed, and thats it. End of story. She could scream and shout as much as she likes in her room, as long as she as safe and not in any danger there. I wouldnt have allowed situation to get so out of hand at all. Its ridiculous - now your daughter will rule the roost, playing 1 parent off against the other, and you and hubby wont be happy with each other.

She wasn't being a normal 6 year old pushing boundaries, she was being deliberately naughty. Not once but 3 times. Sod all to do with salt and everything to do with no clear consequences for bad behaviour (because it doesn't read like there were any negative effects following her initial disobedience apart from a warning - of what? - which escalated to shouts and then screams).

I've lost it with my boys on the odd occasion but on the whole they know that if they do something I've told them not to (or not done something that has been asked) then there are consequences.

I agree that you 2 need to sit down and decide how you are going to discipline / enforce boundaries within your family - it will make your relationship easier, it will make your daughter's life easier and it will make you all happier.

What works for one obviously doesn't for all but we have an escalating ladder of consequences (2 boys, 4 and 3) which seems to work for us. One warning -> naughty step for 4 mins -> naughty step 8 mins -> bedroom without comfort toy 30 mins -> bed.

So with your example above - salt on food, told not to. Warning would be "if you don't stop then I will take your dinner away" - dinner removed if naughty behaviour continues and 4 mins on naughty step. Normally that's enough to stop things in their tracks but if they carry on being naughty on the step, or won't stay, the time increases to 8 and then the ladder continues.

Good behaviour will shorten time on step, may allow for early release from bedroom or return of special toy, will not win dinner back.

This discourages being naughty in the first place but does reward subsequent good (without undermining initial punishment).

As I said, works for us - YMMV :)

I think it was a total over reaction on his part and was very badly handled. Just wait until she's a teen for wilful disobedience!!!

I think any normal human being male or female would shout if continually ignored by a child.

She was being Naughty, rude, disobedient, and tbh as the OP said this was a repeated behaviour of the previous day.

There is no need imo to think that her dad abused her by shouting, I think personally he had had enough of a tiring situation, and this was the straw that broke the camals back so to speak.

I would not say it is typical of a 6yr old to play with salt when asked not to,my 3yr old knows daddy has salt but he is not allowed it (I don't have it either)because he is too young.

Personally I would not remove the salt from the table but if she repeated this behaviour, I would remove her dinner, but I would not send her to her room I would make her sit there until everyone had eaten and ignore any whinging.

But then I am harsh at meal times as I don't see them as play time at all - I am very strict when it comes to eating.

When I saw the title of this thread, I must admit that I thought "Oh here we go again, a mum who thinks her children's shit doesn't stink and undermining her OH"

But to be perfectly frank I think the OP got the balance about right.

She initially removed herself from the room as she didn't want to undermine her H. But things escalated to the point where she felt she had to intervene. His point had been made and his temper wasn't really getting him anywhere.

The only thing I think she did "wrong" was telling DD at that time that daddy was wrong to shout. What she probably heard was "Dad is wrong". But hell, I've said plenty of things to the kids that as soon as the words left my mouth, I've regretted. You live & learn and try not to let it happen the next time.

Oh and personally I'd have added a small punishment just to reinforce that mum & dad stick together (ie you can't play us off).

There's nothing wrong with giving a naughty child a good old fashioned rollocking now & again. It's done neither of my kids any harm whatsoever. You just have to make sure they also get plenty of love, cuddles & encouragement too. My principle is you praise the good, punish the bad. I think you can't have one without the other.

IMO it was prob the last straw for him (unless he is a bully that does this all the time, havent read the whole post but you dont mention that he is in your op, ) sometimes as parents we all keep going keeping cool repeating requests to our kids over and over sometimes, for weeks on end and then one day we have had enough, so maybe thats what his outburst was, although telling you to f off in front of child or indeed at all was not good, but to be honest your little girl is showing a remarkable amount of slyness and deviousness for a six year old,i would of not been impressed at all if one of mine did that,

OP, I think that you both made mistakes and that it's great that you accept that and apologized. I'm totally shocked that your h won't accept his overreaction though. The scenario you describe- parent overreacting to child's naughty behaviour happens to us all and the best we can do as parents is try to deal with it better next time since we are the adults.

When it happens in our house the calmer parent will tell the child off in a stern voice and remove the child from the room so that they can do their punishment. It gives the angry parent the chance to calm down and talk to the child when the punishment is over. In our house it's up to the parent who overreacted to talk to the child after the punishment about why they reacted like that and apologize if necessary.

I hope your h has calmed down and that you can have a calmer supper tonight.

Sounds like something that could have happened in my house!

In future I would try not to undermine him. I think I would have taken him to one side (do this often) and said that you thought he should calm down and then come up with a way to deal with it together that you both agreed on. Not easy I know! Also would have suggested that he talk to her about why he shouldn't have shouted so much himself. He could of told her that he was very angry and why (what she did what naughty and why it was) but that he shouldn't have shouted quite so much. Let him do this himself (hopefully he is the sort that would) and she will get inconsistant parenting and also not take him seriously.

Sorry if spelling mistakes, not time to reread.

Surely just leaving the room in the first place is undermining him? And at that point all he'd done was tell her off, so not quite sure why you couldn't stay, unless you didn't think she should have been told off at all?

How is leaving a room undermining him? That's just leaving him to it.

They should have had a time out since the situation was clearly getting out of control, BUT you should not have apologised for him to her, nor called him a bully etc in front of her

You've taught her a very dangerous lesson

sorry......

She should have been reinforcing to her daughter that her behaviour wasn't acceptable, walking away sends the message to her daughter that she doesn't agree with the father at all, not that she just doesn't agree with the way he's going about it.

When he started shouting, you should have removed her from the room, not walked away. Can you agree with him a 'one strike and you're out' rule at mealtimes (if those are particularly provocative times)?

I have a great degree of sympathy with you but don't think either of you handled this particularly well.

By leaving the room initially I think you undermined him, if you felt it was getting out of hand you should have intervened, introuced a consequence (eg. if you dip your food in the salt again you are going to your room) rather than abdicating responsiblity.

When it became apparent that your husband had lost it I think removing your daughter was totally appropriate and essential de-escalation but I quite frankly cannot believe you apologised for his behaviour and called him a bully........... if I was your DH I would be absolutely steaming about that (which is probably why the reapproachement didn't go very well).

As for all the posters saying 'remove the salt' that is laughable and totally missing the point. This is a child who needs to realise that when Mummy or Daddy says 'no' they mean it and that there are consequences.

Sometimes as part of joint-parenting you need to back your other half up in a battle that you would never have started in the first place.

perhaps tonight, when you are all together but before dinner, you and DH should talk to DD along the lines of 'DD we expect you to do what mummy and daddy tell you, we tell you these things because we love you and dont want you to get sick/hurt/whatever. if you ignore mummy and daddy tonight you are going to sit in the corner (or wherever) until either you apologise or we have finished our meal'

most important piece of parenting advice is never threaten anything you will not follow through.

fwiw if i were you last night i would have been cross with him too BUT if i were him i would have been at least as cross as i would have felt deserted, but we all have bad days, hope today is better

Dittany,

You are out of line describing this man as a bully when you have no idea who he is or what he is like.

Bullying is deliberately picking on someone repeatedly with the sole reason of undermining and upsetting them. Disciplining a child in order to make them behave better and ultimately be a better and happier member of society is not bullying.

OP,

It sounds like your husband went too far but it does sound like your 6 yr old needed some form of discipline which she really noticed. You have to ask yourself how you would feel were your husband to undermine you in front of your daughter when he disagreed with what you were saying to her or how you said it.

Is there an abusive category for him Dittany? A Shoutinator or something?