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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to make my ds sell some of his toys for punishment/ lesson learning.

71 replies

kinkynagbag · 06/09/2012 12:38

ds1 is 6, alomost 7. has pire for breaking my mobiles. this morning, some time before 6 and 7 he had unplugged my samsung galaxy s3 phone from its charger, and dropped it in the toilet whilst playing a game on it.

it is pin protected but must have watched and remebered the pin. he has been told numerouse times not to touch my phone, espp as it is a pricey one. i have thankfully insured it and i am able to claim on my insurance via my bank. but with a £50 access fee. i have told him after school he is going to to choose some toys to sell to make up £25 worth of the fee. ( he has no other way of getting money , his piggy bank consists of £2.4 in pennys lol)

i was so so SO angry this morning and this was the best i could come up with. along with no xbox for a month and having to phone nanny and grandad and tell them what he did (he hates them to know the naughty stuff he does)

i know it was an accideant, but he is 7 in november and has been told not to touch it. but now iv cooled down a bit im starting to think iv gone a bit ott.. i guess this is a aiubn aswell as a wwyd.

OP posts:

IsabelleRinging · 06/09/2012 13:02

I think selling something is the best punishment really, I wouldn't bother with the other ones. It might have been an accident, but if he had done as he was told it wouldn't have happened.I am very big on doing as you are told!!

imnotmymum · 06/09/2012 13:03

My DD dropped my BlackBerry in the sink, put it in rice it may help to come back to life. It was an accident but I am not sure why a child would sneak into your room, unplug your phone, access with a "stolen"pin, sit on the toilet to play a game... All before 6 0r 7 ??

wannaBe · 06/09/2012 13:04

he is seven. That is old enough to know that if you're told not to touch something without asking you don't touch it.

At seven my ds knew that he wasn't to watch tv/play on the computer/games consoles without having asked first if he could do so. This is no different. Letting a child play with a phone under your supervision is not giving a mixed message if that child has been told in no uncertain terms that they play with it only when you say so.

Taking a phone he has been told not to touch and entering a pin number he has obtained by stealth watching what the op does is sneaky and I would go belistic even before he'd dropped it in the toilet - wtf was he doing?

I would stick with all the punishments.

Startailoforangeandgold · 06/09/2012 13:04

Almost 7 is old enough to understand not to touch and not to break things.

DD2 had her own lap top at six, and a DS.
Five years later both still work, lap top has attitude, but that's Sony's design error not DDs fault.

Personally Xbox would be going the loft for a month and his bedroom had better be spotless and his behaviour perfect for at least two weeks.

Although I'm not sure he'd have still be alive to be punished.

fluffyraggies · 06/09/2012 13:05

Just thought - if he doesn't play with those particular toys, will it really make a difference to him if he has to sell them?

TroublesomeEx · 06/09/2012 13:06

I'd still be getting him to do chores to earn the money rather than selling his own toys.

If they're ones he doesn't play with, where's the punishment in that, anyway?

Original poster

kinkynagbag · 06/09/2012 13:08

i have to go out now but i shall be back to read replys :)

OP posts:

StillSquiffy · 06/09/2012 13:09

I think you possibly went a tad OTT, but it's done now and I think it is far better for you to follow through than to backtrack. Given that he knew what a bad thing he was doing in taking it, then it would be a very bad message for him to feel he has 'got off lightly'. I also think that if he himself is very strong willed, he needs to be dealt with by equally strong will from you, otherwise the balance of power will shift (in his mind)

wannaBe · 06/09/2012 13:09

"
i will talk after school and explain iw as very angry and went a bit to far. will take back the xbox ban."

I wouldn't. This is a child who you say has no concept of right or wrong - who won't be told and won't listen. And now you're going to tell him you went ott on a punishment that might actually have some impact? no no no no no no no no no one of the biggest reasons why children misbehave is IMO when parents fail to follow through on consequences. What a perfect way to learn you can do what the hell you want when nothing will happen anyway as a result. xbox ban perfectly fine. earn back money in some way (doesn't necessarily have to be selling toys, there are other ways) perfectly fine too. Children have no concept of the value of stuff these days - they are given everything on a plate.

NiniLegsInTheAir · 06/09/2012 13:16

numbertaker - you may be right about selling stuff scarring him. When you read the threads on here about people who are hoarders, many of them say they hoard stuff as they had their toys taken off them when they were younger.

Yes yes yes yes. I am one of these people. It happened to me many times as a child - my Dad used to throw my things away if he thought I'd done something wrong. That horrible feeling has never left me.

Please OP, don't sell his toys. Temporary ban from the Xbox is plenty at that age.

Clytaemnestra · 06/09/2012 13:25

I'm with seeker - it's not just he was playing on something and dropped it accidentally. He actually did quite a lot of seperate things wrong, knowing each individual one is bad behaviour. The working out the pin number would be particulary bad in my books - that shows pre-mediation that he was going to take the phone and use it, even though he knew full well he wasn't allowed - it wasn't a moment of impulsive naughtiness. He's probably done it before as well, how would you have known if he hadn't dropped it in the loo.

I think you're proportionate - the XBox is relevant because that's how he plays games. He stole the phone to play games. Now you can't play games on your phone, and he can't play games on his XBox. Toys is fair enough too, unless you want to offer him another way to earn the money (extra chores?). I wouldn't make HIM phone his grandparents, but I would tell them myself and let him be aware that I had, and that they were also disappointed in him, if that is a tool that particularly works for you.

WaitingForMe · 06/09/2012 14:26

I wouldn't sell toys but that's partly why we have pocket money. DSS1 (recently turned 7) was trying to bend back the propellers of DSS2s helicopter. I told him to stop and if he broke it he'd he replacing it out of his pocket money. He pouted and said DSS2 had bent them first and that he'd break them if they weren't "fixed" but it's DSS2s toy and if he breaks it then so be it.

DSS1 thinks I'm hugely unreasonable but he completely understands the concept.

Goldenbear · 06/09/2012 14:33

YABU and giving him in a lesson in materialism. He is 6 not 14, does he even know the value of these things? Accidents happen I did exactly the same a month ago - the phone fell out of my pocket into the loo as my DS shouted for me as DD - 17 months was about to jump off the sofa arm. Anyway, what is done is done. Can't you just explain to him that this is why you didn't want him to use it unsupervised and now it can't be used atall.

TheSmallClanger · 06/09/2012 14:46

He will not understand the toy-selling thing at all. 6/7yos do not really understand money. Do not do it. That's the sort of thing that people post on those threads we have here from time to time, like "Awful stuff from your childhood" and "Things you are still aggrieved about when you shouldn't be".

You won't get £25 for used toys anyway.

No X Box is fine if that's what works in your household.

seeker · 06/09/2012 14:50

He had been told- repeatedly- not to touch it. He went and got it from his mother's room, used a code he had secretly memorized and then dis'nt tell anyone when he broke it. The breaking was obviously an accident. The rest was not. I am amazed people are saying this is only mildly wrong behaviour.

Clytaemnestra · 06/09/2012 14:52

"Accidents happen I did exactly the same a month ago - the phone fell out of my pocket into the loo as my DS shouted for me as DD - 17 months was about to jump off the sofa arm. "

The phone falling in the loo was an accident. Taking it from the OP's bedroom after having already been punished for using it in the past and having watched the OP unlock her phone on previous occasions in order to learn the pin code were not accidents, they were deliberate bad behaviour.

Unless the phone you dropped in the loo was your DH's and you'd taken it in secret then your scenario isn't really the same.

imnotmymum · 06/09/2012 14:52

It is the sneakiness that has shocked me. The peering over shoulder to get pin !! I have a Samsung Galaxy 2 and kids love it to play on perhaps it was seen as a thrill as it was not allowed. His behaviour needs punishing not the breaking of said phone.

whois · 06/09/2012 14:57

Wow you massively soft parents! It wasn't a bloody accident, he took a phone when he had been told before not to. THAT is what needs to be punished. The fact it got dropped down tho toilet is almost irrelevant.

catwoo · 06/09/2012 14:59

Don't make him phone his GPs .Not only humiliating for him but embarassing and difficult for them too.

Ragwort · 06/09/2012 15:04

So many indulgent parents on this thread - too right I would make him sell toys or give them to charity, actually sell/get rid of the xbox (I don't even allow my 11 year old DS to have an xbox ). its not about the amount of money it will raise, but the fact he has been so badly behaved and needs to learn the consequences.

You asked him not to touch it, he sneakily copied your pin and why was he playing with it in the toilet anyway - the mind boggles.

He deserves tough punishment.

Chandon · 06/09/2012 15:12

Did he really sneakily copy your pin? Or has been allowed to use it sometimes...?

TheSmallClanger · 06/09/2012 15:17

I'm not indulgent, I would have dished out a punishment, just not a childish revenge one like making a child sell their toys.

I have no problems with computer bans or temporary toy confiscation, both of which I have used myself.

mumtomoley · 06/09/2012 15:24

What about modifying it a bit.

Give him a choice about selling his toys or doing chores to the value of £25

xbox ban is for 1 month or until he has made the £25 whichever is shorter.

Hopefully he will say £25.00 worth of chores and then if you think he is genuinely sorry and is working hard to pay it off you can give higher amounts for what he's done so it's worked of quicker.

So you could soften the punishment slightly without having to back pedal.

Plus if he works it off doing chores quicker than the month then that is another good lesson about the benefits of working hard. Plus you get some housework done for you, and it will give him something to do while not having the xbox to stop him from getting into more trouble.

mumtomoley · 06/09/2012 15:30

Also, I wouldn't be terribly in favour of getting him to call his grandparents to tell them what he's done as it's using humiliation as a tool to punish. In my experience not much positive comes from this, just huge resentment.

Original poster

kinkynagbag · 06/09/2012 15:58

i have picked ds1 up and we have had a chat.

and i have to say i am a bit proud on how he has reacted.

he of course appogised and we talked about his punishments i gave him. and why. he agreed that selling some toys would be fair, and of his own back went and chose 4 toys (3 of thouse i thought of as he doesnt really play with them, but one was one that he plays with weekly) to sell. we spoke that it was his actions of hiding and taking it that was what had angered me the most.

he is allowed to use the xbox for flims. (we dont have sky etc only xbox for netflick and bbciplayer) but not for games untill i say so, which will prob be till next monday if hes beahviour and listening and doing whats told of him. if not, it will be untill he can listen to simple instruactions.

if i had given him my phone to hold/play and he had broke it. i would not punish him at all. but like others have said. its the sneaking, the lying and doing something he knows not to after being told numerous times before. so i dont think it warrents a simple. " you musten touch mummys stuff dear"

he is a very stuborn, strong willed child and finds it very hard to follow rules if they dont suit his needs. and my biggest fear is for when he get older and is not so easy to "controll" / disapline. it needs to be nippe3d in the but now. it may be to harsh for some children but i really have tried everything i can think of with him. i feel this will be a lesson, learnt, the hard way.

that said, he has chosen his toys to be sold. they have been put away, if they dont make the 25, so be it but its the lesson behind it. and we have put a line over it. no more is to be said about it.

OP posts:

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