not to shout at or smack my children?

[FunnysInLaJardin]

My DC are 7 and 3 and i never feel the need to do the above. I see other parents shouting at their school age children and cannot understand why you would do that. They understand what you mean without any shouting. I have shouted and smacked in the past though, but as the DC get older I just do't get it

[MintyChops]

Good for you. Your medal's in the post.

[ArgyMargy]

Ok, you don't understand. Big deal.

[ImagineJL]

OP if you don't lose your temper with your kids then you've either got incredibly obedient kids or you're on sedating drugs!

I don't enjoy shouting at my kids, in fact I hate it, but I lose my rag with them sometimes and find myself yelling. Pretty natural for most parents I reckon.

[BoysAreLikeDogs]

So your AIBU is to no longer smack my children because they have developed impulse control, a volume button and have generally matured nicely as my parenting skills have been refined and honed.

Or maybe AIBU to have smacked and shouted at my kids when they were babies and toddlers because they lacked, quite naturally ofc, cognitive awareness that complying with parental orders took away the smacks and shouts til I realised I could adapt my parenting ecpectations and methods to achieve equilibrium in my.household?

[LegoAcupuncture]

Nobody enjoys shouting at their kids, but family life can get very stressful and people can only take so much.

You're being hypocritical and slightly confusing.

[LackaDAISYcal]

you obviously haven't met my children I have to shout to be heard above the constant bickering and to repeat myself several times, at increasingly higher volume to be acknowledged, and then there is pre-teen DS1 who has more front than Blackpool and an attitude as big as the fecking tower. We are locked in a constant battle of wills over everything. It is exhausting, and I shout out of frustration and then hate myself for not being the parent I always imagined that I would be.

I'm confused by your post though; if you have shouted and smacked in the past, then you obviously felt that it worked at that particular snapshot in time. Good for you that you have worked through it and have other tools in your parenting toolkit to get you through the frustrating times, but I can't help feel that you are being a wee bit smug and gloaty about it. There are other, less PA, ways of letting the interweb know about your improved methods of parenting than via an AIBU thread imvho!

[FunnysInLaJardin]

no drugs . Very spirited boys, just no shouting. Even when I get very cross I don't actually shout. But then I am not a shouty person. S'ppose that's the difference

[LackaDAISYcal]

I love your NN lego

[FunnysInLaJardin]

Lacka just wanted the traffic tbh and a proper discussion about it. No working through issues really, just a realisation that shouting was tiring, stressful and actually pointless. And I started from the POV that you had to smack children and shout at them as part of being a parent as I had been brought up to believe

[PenelopePipPop]

There are happy confident children growing up in households where they get shouted at or smacked occasionally when they cross a well-defined boundary and anxious miserable children growing up in households where they are never shouted at but are constantly fearful of being deprived of attention or affection or having their basic material needs met for unpredictable 'mis'behaviour. I am much more worried about the latter children.

I'm not pro-shouting or any one school of thought on raising children. Doing it well depends on your personality and your childs. But I don't assume that people who shout or smack are doing it badly.

[LackaDAISYcal]

But you won't get a proper discussion in AIBU; what you will get is a load of parents who do smack/shout looking for inspiration to help them not smack/shout and then feeling judged by your rather smug post and reacting accordingly

Surely much better to post in behaviour/development about how you broke the smack/shout cycle?

[ArgyMargy]

sigh You're "not a shouty person" and yet you used to shout and smack your babies/toddlers? Why?

[ArgyMargy]

Agree, Daisy.

[LegoAcupuncture]

Thanks Daisy .

So basically, you've grown into your own form of parenting and stepped away from what you thought was the way you should do it. Seems pretty normal to me. Christ if I parented the way my parents did me, my DC wouldn't be the well adjusted kids they are. Doesn't mean I don't yell every now and agin.

[FunnysInLaJardin]

Lacka I don't want to halp folk, god forbid, I just wanted a discussion. And Argy because I thought that's what parents did as my parents did to me. Now I realise I don't actually have to. Once DS2 came along I realised that I could be easy on my DC. Poor DS1!

[Amitolamummy]

I don't think many people manage to parent exactly as they want to 100% of the time. Shouting only works in this house to get myself heard over the noise. It's not a parenting choice and if I do it in anger it's because I am going stark raving mad due to being a single parent to 2 lively and sometimes completely insane boys. As I said, not always a choice

[BuntCadger]

Is this a thread about a thread? Or are you friends with my bitch of a neighbour?

[Hashtagwhatever]

Of course mine understand me without the need for me to shout, doesn't mean they do as I ask though. So on the tenth time of repeatedly asking dc to do something my voice may rise a little.

[Thesunalwayshinesontv]

YABU. It's le jardin, not la jardin.

Shouting/smacking - meh.

[hardboiledpossum]

Yabu I think smacking st any age is wrong but especially young children. I don't smack or shout at my ds

[imademarion]

I totally get what you're saying and I made the same discovery myself, pre-MN!

I do understand your surprise to discover that, after the way parenting was modelled to you, there's another, kinder gentler way to communicate.

FWIW, I thought your post was heartening not smug.

And I bet your house is a lovely peaceful place to be!

[FunnysInLaJardin]

Bunt no not a thread about a thread and Thesun really what ev's

Thanks imade a loan voice among the many. Glad you understood and yes I hope our house is peaceful. Far more so than a couple of years ago!

[freemanbatch]

I don't shout at or smack my children and I will do serious harm to anyone who does. They suffered that at the hands of their dad and, as a number of teachers have found in the last year, a raised voice will only send my children into panic and make things worse.

I never shouted at them or smacked them when he was here either though.

[internationallove985]

I don't shout at my D.D. I never have done. I don't think you have to shout and at child to get your message across, besides I believe most parents shouts through frustration and it's not the child's fault the parent is frustrated. No-one would dream about screaming at another child. I have always talked to my daughter and told her what I expect from her. xx

[hardboiledpossum]

Do you regret shouting and smacking in the past?