to have thrown water over DS (10) as he would not get dressed this morning?

[StuckForAUserName]

We are late almost every day due to DSs having no interest in getting ready for school and it is an ongoing problem where I am severely stressed out every morning.

It got to 8.25 this morning (we need to leave by 8.30) and DS1 was still in underpants jumping on his brother and fighting him. He had been repeatedly told to get dressed and I warned him I would do it.

I picked up a small jug of cold water I had been using for the iron and chucked it at him. He was soaked and had to change pants. He had some splashes of water on his clean and laid out ready school uniform but I told him to put it on.

I now feel very guilty and hate that I did it but the only other option was a hard slap on the arse IMO. So am I a child abuser?

Having read your account of what your dad did, I would say that it was fairly extreme, mainly because it caused you an injury.

You say you asked about it in the staff room today - are you saying that neither you or any of your colleagues would be worried if this was done to one of your pupils? Would you see it as normal discipline, in today's culture?

Stuck it's far from hilarious, it's kind of normal to treat humans with respect.

Why are you so insistent that people have to have more children of a greater age than your own before they are allowed an opinion?

I'd be worried about a group of teachers laughing about such an abusive occurrence. Is child protection and safegaurdiing not mandatory training? Have you done it yourself?

Or maybe, more likely, they were a bit taken aback to be asked their opinion on something that happened to a colleague as a child that they just smiled and gave a nod for fear of offending.

I have 4 Dc aged 18 to 7

I would worry too, MrsKeithRichards.

ok here are some terrible terrible abuse that happened when i was a child
dad dragged me out of bed because I took my mum to dispair day in day out - brothers still laugh about it, with me

brother threw maggots in my mouth when i said 'aahhhh'- i was 10 he was 8. tasted real bad! (was he abusing me?)

Jumped out on dad when he was getting ready for bed he screamed and did a flying kungfoo thing -- ( was i abusing him?)

dad and brothers pelted me with water bombs one summer when coming home from school on a friday( luckily mum had all ready pre filled me a empty squeezy bottle up!)

I put mayo in my dads slippers and got BOLLOCKED for that (was he abusing me then?? was i him??)

dad used to drive off every time i tried to get in car ( which actually used to really fuck me off when him and brothers were laughing there heads off.bybthe way i was 13-15 when he went through that phase.

our house was full of fun, pranks, shrieks, tears. I knew that no matter what my DP and DM would allways be there to put me up and love me from scraping my knee to my first fall out with my first boyfriend. So yes some one telling me my LOVELY dad was an abuser really pissed me off!

Im sure ox and sol can gasp at our disfunctional family but hey it worked for us!

mrskeith

Allways - from an outside point of view, the thing that would concern me about your dad dragging you out of bed, causing you to have a carpet burn, then putting you in the shower, is that it sounds as if he lost his temper - and hurting someone in a temper is abusive.

The other incidents you relate sound like pranks - pretty extreme ones, but not involving someone losing their temper in an attempt to 'discipline' someone.

Would you be happy for an adult in authority to treat a child of yours that way? Or might that give you a different perspective on it?

Buy one of those water blaster guns if your carpets will take it. My Dad got a battery operated one and that was just for summer holidays .....

the thing is that those who are most keen to say throwing things at children is ok and throwing children in the shower in temper is ok are the ones who are being aggressive and angry and insulting on this thread.

sadly that does seem to say something.

i have to agree that dragging a child across the floor and throwing them in a shower whilst turning it on sounds violent, aggressive and potentially dangerous. it just does! it's not something i would ever do to a child or ever want done to me. given your fear of your fathers footfall him coming in and shouting and telling you enough was enough would have gotten you out of bed always - so why the need to physically drag and injur you? what if your head had bashed against the bath when you were thrown in and you got concussion and were sent to hospital from school that day? would the doctors have considered it funny and normal or would they have felt obliged to inform ss?

it doesn't mean anyone is calling your dad anything or drawing general pictures - they are commenting on that one event.

can anyone honestly say that if i started a post saying today my husband dragged my daughter out of bed in her nighty, dragged her across the carpet and threw her in the shower isn't it funny that they would post and say hehe how hilarious?

allways I don't recall cracking a joke.

Are you seriously telling us that you, being a teacher and quite possibly the only adult a vulnerable child might come across, would laugh at a girl with carpet burns who had been dragged across her house and chucked, fully clothed, into the shower. Oh yes, ha ha ha, how jolly.

YANBU.
I recall my mum throwing water over me whilst I was IN bed. She had warned me and I didn't think she had the balls. She so did!

good morning and the fun continues!!
mrskeith Actually it opened up a discussion - The older the colleague, generally the 'punishment' got worse. Ranging from belt, slipper, rolled up news paper , which perferated an ear drum, - to rulers and straps used in school. The culteral difference in chastisement was an eye opener too, People seen it for what it was.

There was no nervous laughter or nodding. There was no deep -'' now x do you think you need counciling as that was abuse...' It was lighthearted, most laughs at which was more popular, a snoopy, garfield or flintstones nighty.

Of course i have done my CP and SGC so I know that abuse come in many forms, but sorry, our family just didnt have it.

Im sorry you got physically abused mrskeith...but i just didnt. Dont include me in your sorry story im afraid.

Yes of course my dad lost his temper- he wasnt perfect, no one is. He never raised his hand to me- or my brothers- or his wife. Never played mind games. If you were in the wrong you got told. None of this passive agressive shite - or sitting on the end of beds begging your child to do something. At no point did i cry out in pain or shout stop. My dad would never hurt me..yes i did have a small carpet burn but i wasnt bothered about it.

It wasnt a ranging bull father dragging a screaming child nearly bashing in her head on every thing- My mum had obviously talked to him previously about it, hense why she only asked me once!He was tired after doing a 7-6 (11 hour shift) He wipped me out of bed and straight in to shower. We had a cubicle, so sorry, no head smashing, no doctors, no concussion....Id given my brothers worse chinese burns!

sdt it wasnt a random adult it was my dad.... stop procrastinating. And yes people were calling my dad an abuser.

Alas im all talked out-- time to get ready for work. Sorry to all that want to stick an 'am a victim' label on me but its just not so, sorry to disappoint you.
Time to go looking for your next victim...mwhahahaha

mrskeith i wasnt a vunerable child, i was 10/11 and a very boistrous one too, sorry wall flowers in our house! I did the smiley as i was laughing at your comment. The carpet burn was very small and didnt break the skin --sorry STILL no abuse. ??????? Your obsessed woman! Go get a job or something...

You're still no answering the question.

No one is trying to label your family as abusive, but that act wasn't normal and quite alarming really and, viewed in isolation, abusive.

I have a job, it involves leading training courses about child protection and giving young people a voice. That's kind of why I care about this type of thing.

Actually a huge part of what I do is this really, challenging people's views based on their own experiences of what they regard as normal. It's amazing what some people put up with as a child, and it stands to reason that they assume that's normal. That in itself isn't an issue until that person is put into a position where a young person might rely on them to spot the signs and speak out for and with them.

I work in school and if I child told me that their dad had dragged them out of bed causing a carpet burn and chucked them in the shower, I would record what the child said in the Welfare Book and report it to the headteacher as a matter of child protection. It's routine. It's not making a judgement, it's just recording the facts.

If the child told me that their dad had thrown a water balloon at them on a summers day, I would not record that, or report it.

I would be concerned that a teacher, trained in child protection, cannot see the difference between the two scenarios.

shutthebloodydoor

No, I don't think anyone would conclude that was abusive.

You seem quite angry, are you ok?

I didn't need to share my line of work to give my post credit, it stands up to scrutiny on it's own. I thought that background information would be useful, as no one comes to you from a vacuum. We all have experiences and influences that shape who we are and the opinions we form.

Im not angry at all, a little bemused perhaps, mrsKeithRichards . Just because you feel it is abuse it dosnt mean that it is. I can see why Allwaysthebaddie
got somewhat annoyed. Maybe your work makes you look for something that isnt there, I dont know? Although there was some inflammatory things about another thread, six of one half a dozen of another.

More and more on MN there is a fight to the death on people hammering home their veiws on things, its sensless.

That makes me sad. I thought this site was for support not to go around accusing people of bad parenting,abuse, which happens a lot.

No one called allwaysthebaddie dad abusive. Many have said that could be construed as an abusive incident. It would certainly set alarm bells ringing for me, and I hope for many people in positions where it matters.

Abuse isn't defined by one act. Nothing in this area is black or white. If this incident sat amongst a long list of others in a similar vein then it could well be indicitive of something much more worrying going on at home. It could also be nothing.

If you were a teacher and learnt of such an incident occouring would you take the chance that it was nothing, and keep it to yourself?

It certainly isn't normal or productive parenting. It's all by the by now as it was an incident that happened a long time ago however if a child I was in contact with came to me detailing this happening it would trigger of a train of though and action that I am duty bound to see through.

It could turn out dad was just at the end of his tether, acted in rashness and acknowledges it was daft. We might look at better techniques for getting the young person out the door in the mornings. It might be that there is miriad of abuse going on at home. No single person can make that call.

To define abuse and protect young people, adults and others in their lives need to share information, report incidents and ask questions.

Children get hurt by people doing nothing.

Or we could ignore, and hope that nothing else is going on and that the young person will grow into an adult who laughs at the time dad dragged her through the house, causing carpet burns, and threw her in the shower, and now seeks reassurance from colleuges that this was normal.

In fact, allwaysthebaddie I'm concerned about the attitude of you and your workmates. You all think extended BF is gross? They all laughed at your tale of woe?

That you think you have a right to judge anybody and keep harping on about treating children as you would adults is hilarious. But this very argument is one of the main arguments against smacking on MN - that you wouldn't smack an adult so why would you do this to a child. In turn, if you wouldn't chuck a jug of water at you DH for example, why is it ok to do it to your child? I personally think what you did was wrong and was a loss of control. Was it child abuse - no, but neither is a light tap on the bum or the hand yet anyone who admits doing this gets flammed. I'm quite surprised you have so many people on here advocating what you did, not because it was terrible (because it wasn't - it wasn't great but I think you know that or you wouldn't have posted), but because they are probably the very people up in arms on the smacking thread. A loss of control is a loss of control whatever way you look at it.