Grandfather smacked DS bottom

[ranblungs]

DS can have meltdowns/big tantrums, usually when he's very tired. More so when he's at his grandparents' house (ex's parents). They have communicated to me that they found his behaviour very difficult at one point, but it seems to have resolved now.

ExDP did live with them but moved our two weeks ago.

DS (aged 4) told me yesterday evening that grandad had smacked his bottom because he was being naughty and that it "really hurt" he got upset as he was telling me and cried. I get the impression this wasn't necessarily recent.

DS also can play up at bed time when he is there and he told me that grandad pushes him back onto the bed for being naughty at bed time.

I'm not sure what to do next?

They are huge sources of childcare, ExDP is supposed to have him two nights per week but often works away so they will have him. They also help out during the week as/when needed.

The relationship between us was once very strained when DS was tiny.

I am furious that he has hit my child. Am I overreacting as it was just a smack on the bottom?

DS can be very challenging there.

The response was exactly the level I felt the ridiculous self serving argument deserved. Please remember these arguments are someone's personal defense of hitting small children, toddlers even. Thought out blablabla, of course they are, she's spent decades justifying her behaviour to herself.

Your childhood experiences sound awful and I'm truly sorry you had to go through that. I really am. 😔

And I wasn't beaten in the sense that I was left bleeding and crying, I was hit, open handed, as a small child by a large man when I did anything that annoyed or embarrassed him. As were my siblings.

Please think about what I discussed in my previous posts and my detailed description of my parenting methods of how smacking is sometimes useful, in some circumstances, and then compare it to what you have written about your experiences.

They are very different.

Its like comparing someone who has on occasion sent their child to their room to calm down as the same as someone who locks their child in the cupboard under the stairs for hours.

Same basic discipline tool, but the difference is in the execution. One is appalling, the other completely harmless.

How dare you?

Seriously: how dare you?

You demanded evidence that smacking is harmful. You rejected the scientific proof because you're such a independent thinker. So the poster gave you her personal account of how smacking harmed her long term. And you give her crocodile tears and finish by telling her she's wrong?

What do you mean, your way was different? You smacked just as her parents did. Like she said, she wasn't beaten or left bleeding, she was struck with an open hand by an adult. Have you been extolling the virtues of smacking for two days without even knowing what it is?

I thought your claim that keeping two year olds away from sockets was terrible parenting was arse about face, but this is weapon level.

How dare you?

Also the spanking was normal in the 80s rhetoric is nonsense, most of my friends weren't hit.

Your friends are very much in the minority according to the YouGov survey posted upthread.

yougov.co.uk/topics/society/articles-reports/2021/09/27/smacking-parents-who-were-physically-punished-chil

Many have addressed this and you seem to be ignoring it. YOU said your children are successful and have no trauma at all therefore it wasn't harmful in any way. I stopped going back and forth with you because you really can't argue with ignorance. Toodles ✌

They wouldnt be allowed near my child again- childcare or not. I would also be asking ex partner if he knew about it and what he had done about it? I’m livid for you.

From his account he'd say he hot us when we got out of hand to teach us to behave, kids nowadays are let away with murder. His account of hitting us would be the same as your account of hitting your children. I'm telling it to you from the perspective of me the child. An adult with all their authority and adultness is already a bit scary to a kid. They are earning as they go and hitting them when they get it wrong is unnecessary.
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As an adult I can tell you my dad was 5 foot 9 and a big joker, always messing around and having fun. He started life in a children's home before being adopted. He was parenting how he was parented and He'd tell you his mum and dad spanked him and it taught him right from wrong. He'd tell you spare the rod and spoil the child He'd tell you he loves us all Nd we only don't see him because we think we're better than him because we're all hoity toity professionals Nd he's a farmer.

Oh and I'd a lot of lovely childhood experiences. I could paint a beautifully rosie picture. I was hit, open handed on the backside for doing things wrong and it hurt me. Because hitting hurts children.

It's called cognitive dissonance and it's how narcissists manage to hold the view that they are against something except the way they did it which was fine. Their situation was an entirely different set up.

Very interesting psychologically. You'd like to hope she'd finally get it but it would seem not. It's not enough that statistically you can show children were hurt, nor documented proof of a child who was hurt. SHE didn't hurt HER children because she's not abusive like the people who abuse their children by doing exactly what she did to her children ....

It's interesting thought that of those in my age group almost 60% were hi once or twice, not at all or not often.

That in itself is not the picture the older generation wants to paint of it being normal to slap asses for every misdemeanor.

Yes - I think many parents probably used it as a last resort when they were at the end of their tether (although that’s no excuse). But of children growing up in the 1980s it was still 40% saying that they were smacked sometimes or often, which is a sizeable proportion.

If a work colleague, let's say a junior work colleague, annoyed you and you had to tech them a lesson so you slapped them one handed on the legs and said, no, you must meet this deadline in future' then later explained why meeting the deadline was important. Would that be ok? If not why not? D why then is it ok to hit a small child you are responsible for teaching?

Renebumswombats

forgoodnesssakenow

Again you are both saying I did things I didn't do, think thinks I don't think and have said things I didn't say. Fine. 🙄

You feel I am ideologically opposed to anything that challenges my view, when I have demonstrated several times I'm very willing to have my point of view and methods challenged. I haven't been presented with any evidence of harm other than descriptions of actual abuse which while it shares the same basic tools i.e slapping, was as different to what I have described and advocated for as the example I gave of someone treating a person who sends their child to their room as morally equivalent to a person locking their child under the stairs for days. I assume you can understand the difference?

Far from rejecting empirical evidence as you describe, I have actually sought out the studies on this subject, at least the ones available without subscription and read them in detail. I have presented you with the obvious flaws they contain and why it would be very unwise to draw the conclusions you seem to be drawing from them. Again that is the opposite of being cognitively dissonant.

It feels to me that you are both equally ideologically intransigent as you portray me to be so I don't think this is going to get us anywhere.

As I stated last night, I know my parenting method works, because it has done so, three times, and my lovely children have no issues telling me that. Believe me they are happy to criticise me on all sorts of issues, so they wouldn't hold back on this one, nor would I want them to!* *

Forgoodnesssakenow your experiences with your abusive father sound awful but bear no relation to the love and support my children received, nor the majority of other people whose parents occasionally used corporal punishment appropriately to teach them important lessons and protect them. I'm truly sorry you went through that but it had coloured your perception of this issue I feel.

We have all had the chance to have our say. No doubt the OP is long gone but FWIW my advice to them remains the same, if you don't want your GP to smack your children then of course, just tell him. If he then goes on to do it again anyway then of course you should be livid, I would be!

Yep, as well as my dad smacking my mum gave us the odd slap on the legs too, their were 5 of us, it got too much occasionally. The difference is she knew it was wrong, she'd apologise, we'd talk about it etc. She never went around saying hitting kids was fine and necessary.

I actually, while thinking smacking is obviously wrong, can also see how someone can lose their patience especially with other social and socioeconomic factors in their lives, parenting is hard.

It's not the odd smack when pushed then immediately contrite parents that you've to worry about. It's the colonel dax's who can't accept fault and that there's a better way. It's the 'it hurts me more than it hurts you' crowd.

Do you know, I actually can't bear to read anything the Colonel says now.

You failed repeatedly to keep your toddler away from sockets and think anyone who did was a worse parent than you. The worst kind of helicopter parent, even. You let him get up close then hit him for it, and that was superior parenting.

You also raised a daughter who either finds hitting children acceptable, or hasn't got an honest enough relationship with you to admit she wouldn't do it.

Why on earth should any of us take parenting advice from you? Or, indeed, subject ourselves to any more of this?
It was offensive enough when defending hitting children in the abstract, but after that hatchet job on an assaulted child's account of their assault ...it's been two days but I think I'm finally done.

@ReneBumsWombats @Forgooodnesssakenow Can you both not even try to understand that just because SOME parents who smack ARE abusive (as both of yours seem to have been and I am genuinely very sorry for that) there ARE those of us who had parents who were good parents and also smacked occasionally?

Explain the difference please of you hitting your child open handed on the bum to my dad hitting me open handed on the bum?

Also you seem to think this was every day? Maybe 10 occasions in my whole childhood I remember being hit. And I've been harmed.

I've detailed above the difference between my mum and dad. However despite understanding it, it still doesn't make it right. Parents hitting children is wrong. Even when my mum did it, and she knew it was wrong, she apologised, we talked about it then and later.

Don't worry on my account, I knew the reaction it would get for that quarter, I recognise the personality type. Isn't it interesting though that the obvious trauma I suffered from being hit negates my opinion on hitting children? Is that not the most convenient thing you ever heard?

You can not do either you know, not hit, not shame, not ground. You can treat children like human beings who are learning how to behave and work from there.

@Forgooodnesssakenow yes, I know. And that was exactly how I was brought up. As I have said many times, a very occasional smack was reserved for an unusually naughty or dangerous occasion.
I read many threads about children having tech removed for weeks, being grounded for whole summers, pocket money removed, sent to rooms, I don't hear anyone screaming abuse about any of that.

Oh, definitely. It's why I haven't shared my experiences and admire you for doing it. Because I know from experience that for these people, nothing invalidates your views and experiences on being hit more than being hit.

It's also why I'm ignoring the increasingly angry poster whose modus operandi is just to keep telling me I'm insane and stupid for feeling as I do. If I wanted to listen to that kind of response to my childhood experiences, I'd just talk to my family. It's a shame MN doesn't have a "hide poster" function, but luckily it's pretty easy to scroll.

I guess they're right on one thing, though...I definitely can't understand putting your own ego above the matter of child assault. Can't say I care to.

I agree, even the old suoernannh naughty step, watching toddlers being dragged back to a stair over and over screaming in anguish until they get the idea they need to sit there for 2 minutes quietly then apologise to appease their parents feelings for something they've probably already forgotten.

It isn’t surprising that there are posters who defend their parents against accusations of abuse for smacking them a few times. Because they have a good relationship with them and they’ve become very loving grandparents.

That is true of my DM. However, as I said in a previous post, her parenting of us wasn’t the best, and she was wrong to smack us. It was abusive, even if that wasn’t her intention. It also meant that she wasn't in a position to find out what else was going on in our home. (I don’t blame her for that, as I keep the blame where it belongs, with my F, but things might have been different if she hadn't regularly smacked us.)

She herself acknowledges all this, and blames herself far more than she should.

It's possible to still have a good relationship with your parents whilst acknowledging that they made mistakes in the past.