to wonder why some intelligent educated people just don't discipline their dcs?

[mayonaise]

Me, DH and our 3 dcs have just had an exhausting week with old friends of ours who came to stay with their 3 dcs. It was a nightmare.

We were friends with this other couple before any of us had children. Me and DH are quite strict I guess, we take the view that the parents are ultimately in charge, there are consequences for undesirable behaviour and the dcs have to pull their weight around the house.

Our friends dcs were rude to us and their parents, never picked anything up and either me or their mum did it, whined and demanded everything with no manners, refused to eat the food I cooked, and one of them was quite mean to my dd.

These are lovely old friends of ours, intelligent, succesful, civilised adults, so what are they thinking letting their dcs behave like this? Can't they see they are going to have such a huge problem on their hands, tbh they do already....

arses she sounds fab

OP YABU and I hope you are not a rl friend of mine

Some children do behave erratically and differently in different settings, some are more highly strung, some have SEN that you, and in some cases the parents, may be still unaware of. My dd1 can be a pita in social situations, I found out recently she has dyspraxia which explains why all my attempts to persuade her to use cutlery etc have largely failed. Most parents try to discipline their children, some are having none of it.

I read ... er, somewhere ... that discipline methods administered in childhood make little difference to adult behaviour i.e. children will turn out pretty much as they were always going to. I have no idea of the provenance of this idea or upon what evidence it's based, but it cheers me up a great deal

Actually spending time with over strict parents is worse believe it or not. My friend's DH is a terrifying father. Every other sentence he utters to his adorable 3 year old is a shout/telling off/threatening the "naughty step". The poor child was so bewildered. I spent 3 hours with them and cried in the car on the way home. Poor boy was yelled at for among other "crimes" not putting one toy away before getting out another .

I know my friend feels the same but doesnt want to say anything. Her father (also present) was also visibly upset. Give me laissez faire any day.

I intended to be a really laiez-faire laid back parent - no rules, please yourself kind of household - funny how when you have kids you find out what is important.
Manners are really important - please and thank-you - I actually got dd signing this before she could talk . If they behave then life is so much easier. It is really important that she listens to me, that she holds my hand, that she doesn't hit or kick or bite me. That she actually does go to bed when I say bedtime. I guess I learnt that we have to learn how to get on with people don't we, it isn't always natural. I have friends who are stricter, and friends who are more lax, relaxed friends are more fun to visit.

What does one do when there are lots more rules in the house you are visiting? Is tricky.

I used to be judgey like this when my dcs were younger and they were very well behaved - now they are not - they eat and sleep well but are able to completely ignore me at times. and my 6 yo ds will occasionally have massive temper tantrums - much more so than when he was 2.

Sometimes I can see my friends with younger dcs thinking 'mine will never do that, omni is obv a completely useless parent' and I think 'just you wait'...

some people of course are doing it for a specific ideological reason as well - as long as it doesnt affect you then what does it matter and I would agree dont holiday with people with different parenting styles - its always a disaster.

druzoc - it may not effect the child how they trun out to what dicepline was administered or not but the parents end up as jibbering idiots though

I wonder sometimes as well if theres any space for some children to actually express themselves at all so locked down are they...and for this reason theres no right or wrong - just do what you do and ignore other people.

Parental smugness in any form is vile.

ivykaty - it's like you know me personally

I hear what you're saying!

All parenting styles are different because we are all different people with different ways of enjoying our children.

However, we holidayed with friends one summer and their oldest dd (the same as my oldest) acted up to her mother all week.

I could let it go over my head (sat reading the paper while mine played happily!) but not when she used my dd to get at her mum.

Anyway, the mistake - I believe - is to spend too much time with friends! (or to meet in neutral territory).

However, biting is not acceptable.

Wonderstuff: re "What does one do when there are lots more rules in the house you are visiting? Is tricky."

We have that issue with my sister in law's children/household. Her children have a great time at our house (and generally wreck the playroom/garden), but our children have a terrible time over there and are afraid to move.

To be fair to her, she has a very demanding job AND 3 young children close in age. She already had a 14 month old DD when she gave birth to twin boys, so she has to run a tight ship. Her DH is laissez-faire to the point of absenteeism wherever possible, so I do understand why she has kept her children focused on keeping things tidy: basically, she couldn't cope with the clean up operation if she was as relaxed as us. She is also far more cautious than us generally, and her children are subsequently very physically restrained. Once again, I can see that she can't let all 3 run amok, especially as her DH has refused to child-proof their house. He's a bit of a selfish cock, tbh.

Still, I hate to see my lovely DS made to feel like a criminal every time he fails to follow the Random Rule du Jour: things like not spilling water from the paddling pool on the grass. Strict demarcations between Inside and Outside Toys (wtf??). All Food to be Consumed Whilst Sat Down or You Will Choke to Death. He's a year older than his oldest cousin and has been brought up in a pretty relaxed household, so he just doesn't have a clue how to respond to these bylaws. He gets the big stuff right - he knows how to behave and is polite - but the endless minor rules and potential for infringements ... it is exhausting.

So generally, we all socialise here and then DH and I spend the next 2 days clearing up .

Had to laugh at elvislives' description of these lax parents whose children make public places a nightmare for everyone else: 'well-heeled and a bit special'

Sums up exactly the couple I saw in Waitrose yesterday with two nightmare from hell toddlers of about 2 and 3, bizarrely wearing jumpsuits even though they looked far too old for that (probably what they insisted on wearing) and screaming the place down. No matter where you went in the supermarket (quite a large one) they could be heard shrieking in unison. The parents? Didn't blink an eye. Never admonished them once but just floated around dreamily piling lots of very expensive 'special' (lactose-free, organic etc**) food into the trolley while their kids drove everyone insane. I'm sure they're terribly talented darlings whose natural creativity can't be suppressed for something as mundane as a shopping trip... It really was a picture while they were waiting at the check-out, the toddlers were ripping stuff off the shelves and throwing them on the floor while the trustafarian parents just calmly packed the shopping, oblivious. They never even looked in the direction of the mayhem once. Amazing! I thought they were either Zen Buddhists who were too detached from reality to notice noise (they looked hippy-ish) or were just exceptionally bad parents...

** not digging at people who genuinely need this food - I'm coeliac myself and so need to buy gluten-free food but it's bloody expensive and I do wonder sometimes if half of the people buying it really have an illness or just think 'it's more expensive and therefore better'. Believe me, most gluten-free food is not worth the extra money unless you have to buy it, as I do!

InMyPrime: ah, maybe they were just dealiing with such close scrutiny! If you know what they bought, you must have been having a good old gawp

What can you do, though? If your toddlers are going beserk in a supermarket? I usually give a mild running commentary for the benefit of anyone horrible enough to be judging me ("Yes, darling, that's it, you kick me in the face, I feel so fulfilled right now, so glad I have 2 children screaming at me") and get out as soon as I can. I won't be rushed out by starers, though ... let them judge my trolley!

If the trolley had been piled up with Haribo and Irn Bru, you'd have had a different comment to make, eh?

It isn't so much about having perfectly turned-out, perfectly behaved kids though. Most children tend to act up, be rude or whine sometimes and mine are no different. I just think parents should be willing to step in, say no hitting, remove child from situation etc or just generally not let their DC make all the decisions and push them around, destroy people's property etc without batting an eyelid.

All a bit simplistic here IMO. You can be rubbish at enforcing discipline if you are "middle class and educated" and you can be rubbish at enforcing discipline if you are less advantaged.

Agree with the difference between discipline and punishment. There is a big difference between teaching a toddler that running arund screaming in a supermarket is not acceptable and scaring the shit out of them by shouting at them and threatening worse.

I do my best and I'm sure I don't always get the balance right. I think they pretty much always turn out ok in the end provided they are loved and cared for.

I think as well that you sometimes change as a parent with ds I was very disciplinarian because I was scared and new at it and needed to be in control.

I enjoy the parenting with dd much more and so am more indulgent because as well I care less about what other people are thinking. I wont let her break anything or harm other people but I will let her run about a bit in places where before I would have had ds strapped into the buggy.

I have a massive chip on my shoulder about the strictness of my childhood, so am rather biased here, but ...

... the problems I have had in my adult life (inappropriate behaviour of one kind and another) have been far more to do with lack of self esteem from being shouted down and forced to endlessly conform, than any kind of lack of structured discipline.

I think, if you are strict, you must also pay your children lots of positive attention. That is probably the best kind of parenting, I reckon, although it sounds exhausting.

What really did it for me were the wild extremes: being afraid to move in case I was shouted at for messing something up, then being entirely ignored. I suppose I have interpreted that to mean that if I am generally quite nice to my children, I can pop them in front of Tom&Jerry, and read the paper every now and then

you do need to adapt with each child i think
i have a friend who lets her 5 yr old son hit her whilst tantrumming as she doesn't want to stop him expressing himself

Inmyprime

What an incredibly bitchy post

Sounds to me like the parents were taking the view of totally ignoring children hoping to take wind out of their sails, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn't.

Inmyprime you really sound like you have major class issues

Yikes! I intended my post as being funny and observational much like elvislives' post about visiting a castle rather than bitchy so obivously didn't write it very well

We were right behind them at the checkout so pretty much impossible to ignore what they were buying as I was standing right next to it. The children were not just badly behaved toddlers but far louder and worse-behaved than any I've ever seen before and the parents were doing absolutely nothing to intervene or even noticing the behaviour. As this thread is about whether 'educated' (parents who are 'successful' and ambitious for their children as it's been interpreted by other posters) parents are the worst at disciplining their children on day-to-day behaviour. I thought what I saw yesterday was a relevant example of this and tried to give a funny account of it - oh well!! I'm now being judged on what 'class issue' hang-ups I have despite not even mentioning the class of the parents...

Think I'll stick to the health threads on here from now on and just use MN for advice re pregnancy which is what I originally came here for

Don't take offence immyprime.
You've obviously hit a nerve with some posters who feel you are describing them
Don't go anywhere
stand your ground woman

Is commenting on other parenting styles a national hobby?

We complain about working class parents about their 'chav' issues and then complain that rich parents have nightmare kids.

Which type of parent is then the ideal parent and what is the ideal child?

omnishambles Your post reminded me of last week - I was in Mothercare - I am very pregnant and dd knows that if she runs really fast mummy finds it difficult to catch her I could see all the pregnant women and mothers of babies looking on in horror as dd tore round the store, finally caught her trying to have a go on the display trampoline - they (the other mothers with raised eyebrows) were all thinking 'thank god she's not mine' (or worse) and I thought 'just you wait'

God, people, lighten up!!

OF COURSE all children play up sometimes, OF COURSE they all go through stages of being lovely/horrible but equally OF COURSE we should intervene when they are doing something obviously physically destructive!

People can have whatever parenting styles they choose - I have friends who are strictly Attachment Parents, Waldorf Parents, Motessori Parents, let-them-watch-loads-of-TV parents... it's pretty much standard across the board that you can't let them hit/shove/grab/bite/kick self or others.

For the rest of it, go hog wild

If this is me being all judgy-pants, then I judge away!