My ds keep shaming me

[Sunshining20]

My 4 and 5 year old DS have taken to calling me the worst fattest mum in the world every time I don't give in to TV or snack demands. They also tell me to shut my mouth and hit me. But the calling me fat all the time is relentless.

They come from a loving home and me and my husband parent seemingly the same as our other parent friends. Giving boundaries, organising things like baking and days out and socialise.

Where have we gone wrong? How do we fix this? We have done time outs and explained this language and behaviour isn't acceptable.

It makes me very sad and resentful.

They are. My daughter might end up marrying one of these boys who thinks it's fine to insult his own mother, and whose mother should just slink away and say nothing while he rampages on, apparently.

Dreadful

Just a little suggestion to consider your language about this. Your DC are not shaming you. They are being rude and cheeky. It’s your role as a parent to stop this behavior. Shaming could imply a relationship of equals or maybe a superior position from your child towards you. This is on no way the case.
Children are sometimes naughty - no matter how well their parents parent.

It always stings when we’re told we’re not doing enough as parents, but it’s clear from your posts that up until now you haven’t been stern enough. You don’t have to lose your shit, just consistently do as you have now done - speak sternly and take away ALL high value treat items until behaviour improves.

It’s far easier to correct a child’s behaviour when it is a result of a parent’s weak behaviour management (as you have seen already) than when it is a result of other, serious external factors such as autism or oppositional defiance disorder. In other words, be glad that this is all seemingly just a matter of imposing firmer consequences for unacceptable behaviour!

Sorry very late to this and have only skim read but I wonder if they can tell it upsets you and are doing it to get a rise out of you?
I would try not to let them know that this particular button is a good one to push. If it gets a result in some way even a result of you being upset and shouting that is reinforcing.
There should be consequences of speaking like that yes but calmly and not with too much emotion. And they should learn that it never, ever gets them what they want whereas good behaviour gets praise and attention.

Oh yes, if the people I manage at work call me a fat bitch I just ignore them and their behaviour, so they get the message that I will reward them with attention if they work hard instead.

And if someone came up to me in the street and gave me a shove, I would ignore them and politely walk on, until they learned to get my attention by saying a polite hello

🤣🤣🤣

Yep, mine were both in school uniform for Reception at age 4 and at age 5 they were in Year 1, ‘proper school’.

They were little, yes; but they were children.

Hi this is child abuse. Can’t actually believe I’m reading this.

Oh also - this book "When Your Kids Push Your Buttons" is fantastic and only 99p. Totally recommend!! https://www.amazon.co.uk/When-Your-Kids-Push-Buttons-ebook/dp/B00JJMK3CU/

Trust me, I’ve seen many children behave in similar ways - most whose parents are doing a good job but their Dc just seem to get into a habit of using certain words that people take offence at. You have the added joy of two children very close in age and development and no doubt will egg each other on. You’re doing the right thing, but I would add, don’t take it personally. My grandchild called me a stupid old lady a while ago because I told him time was up on his tablet. I was really upset, but didn’t let him see. I asked if he would be happy to call his teacher (who is in her late 50s and whom he adores) a stupid old lady and he said no, but that was different. When I pointed out that it was just the same, he saw that he’d done something unacceptable and apologised. He understood why he lost tablet time.
Being a parent is Hard!!!

Scorched Earth ? What the dickens is this ?

My DC are in their twenties now so we thankfully didn't have YouTube etc but they did watch some children's TV and copied things that annoyed me . Not language but accents and voices . (Brick from "The Middle" was an annoying little twerp who "forgot" things . My DS copied , resulting in my stopping him watching it . "Stop copying , you aren't Brick , he's a sitcom character , you didn't 'forget' you just didn't want to/couldn't be bothered "

When they were little everything was "scary" . My shoes are scary /that dinner is scary completely random.

I did throw their toys away once but it was completely justified .

It’s not illegal in England though.
https://childlawadvice.org.uk/information-pages/the-law-on-smacking-children/

Sounds like you have got through to them. My only suggestion might be "behaviour jars" that you can add to or take things out (buttons, pennies, marbles, pieces of paper) so that they are earning or losing a treat for good or bad behaviour. Sometimes kids can get stuck with the consequences of their poor behaviour and no incentive to improve.

That, but also the idea that parents think you can treat bad behaviour with bad behaviour.

And it’s an utter disgrace that it’s not a criminal offence. It is morally reprehensible. I’m shocked this appears to be a niche opinion.

Oh that’s ok then. Disgraceful.

I doubt they think you are fat and are genuinely insulting you. Given the age I would imagine the reaction is what they want.

Dd (sen) calls me a bitch sometimes. And shouts at me sometimes. I act like I have a filter on my ears and these sounds just don't go through.

Ignoring or going "sorry. What.. I can't hear you... It's too loud/ too rude... I can't hear you. " usually quickly gets her back down.

She was most put out once... Mummmyyyy I'm calling you a bitch, can't you hear me??? Mummmyyyy...

But they are adults who someone else has presumably parented badly.

Dealing with small children who are often trying out certain behaviours to see what works is different.

It’s your responsibility as a parent to teach them what is OK and what is not. It’s psychology 101 that behaviour that is rewarded is reinforced and behaviour that gets no reward will extinguish.

A lot of people go wrong by ignoring their kids when they behave well and then giving lots of negative attention when they misbehave which is in fact reinforcing that behaviour.

Yes, you need a "I mean it" voice and look that accompany carrying out whatever you said - no TV, treats cancelled, toys taken away etc.

They soon learn that the "I mean it" voice and look are enough.

But the posters advocating smacking should be ashamed of themselves.

They will grow out of it hopefully. My 2 brothers were like this at that age, only it was an obsession with 'bosoms'! They used to shout it out at every female they saw. We mostly ignored it and they stopped when they stopped getting attention. for doing it. Maybe you could try that?

A bit?

I think though at that age sometimes children know something is NAUGHTY (ie; that it gets a reaction) but they don't always know why.

The fact this little guy calls the remote control fat suggests to me he just thinks it is a reaction-getting word, not that he understands it aims to make the object feel bad about themselves.

That’s your opinion though. A very occasional short sharp smack to shock them out of horrendous behaviour does them a favour IMO - the behaviour that you see these days from children and teens can be absolutely awful. The OP is the one on the receiving end of abusive behaviour here, not the little boys. The abusive behaviour needs to be stamped out. Otherwise the kids will have no boundaries.

I would definitely use smacking to correct this behaviour. Because the behaviour is so bad it warrants it. Would you like these boys to get a little older and continue these comments to a tween female and push her into anorexia, self loathing and a lifetime of ED/death? It’s that serious. Smacking is warranted.

And don’t stress about me smacking anyone. My dc are grown up. And got smacked once or twice in their lives when it was totally warranted. They know and are totally fine. It was so, so far from any type of abuse.

I would link the consequences to the behaviour, and wouldn’t frame them as punishments. Discipline means to teach - I hate arbitrary displays of parental control. I am a gentle-ish parent. These are all things I said over and over with my son that might help.

“You are clearly picking up seriously unkind behaviour from somewhere - no TV or YouTube today. I know, it sucks - but so does your language today dude and I am tired of listening to you be vile. It’s not how we speak to people. We can try again tomorrow.”

”Ah, you’ve woken up with a truly rotten attitude again today I see. That’s ok. We can all be grumpy when we’re tired but it’s not cool if it makes everyone else miserable. I’m not the enemy. Let’s get to bed half an hour earlier tonight and see if we can do better tomorrow.”

”No, I’m sorry I don’t want to play cars with you. I really don’t like playing with people that are mean to me. Give me half an hour and then we can have a reset.”

Always hold the boundary, always give them a chance to reset and start again with a clean slate.

Some bonus things my kid will say to his therapist/kids because I said them so much when he was little:

”Am I the enemy?” (sullen ‘no’) “Then quit your attitude - we are on the same team.”

”How many times does mummy ask?” (sullen ‘once’) “That’s right - shift your butt.”

”Asked and answered dude - I’m just going to ignore you now. Let me know when you’re ready to talk about something else.” (To stop badgering)

”Do you want to start again?” (Reset question if he’d worked himself into a full on state about anything) “We can carry on like this and have a bad day or start again and have some fun together today. Let me know when you’re ready.”

I wish MN would consider deleting posts encouraging smacking.

It is illegal in three out of four nations in the UK, for one thing, and we’ve no idea where the OP is. Everyone does assume England here but not all posters are.

Then there’s the fact the site doesn’t always have genuine posters and we have no idea who is pushing smacking as a sensible disciplinary method.

The issue I have with it is that it isn’t just the fact that it’s not a good idea, it sort of changes the feel of the site for everybody. Look at this post - fairly standard small child naughtiness has been blown up into akin to calling an adult a ‘fat bitch’ at work and people are almost falling over themselves to be the angriest, scariest and most violent. Great, well done.

Threads like this which attack an OP are the opposite of helpful.

This reminds me of the stinky granny thread, is there a family member who has used unkind terms to describe you which got a laugh and then the children think it's funny and ok to repeat?

I think people are being harsh on you as it sounds like this has been ongoing.