bad behaviour for 3 year old??

[pestcontrol]

Hi,

My mum looks after our 3 yr old son one day a week so I can work (he goes to nursery the other 2 days I work). She's very controlling, thinks she always knows best & is extremely sensitive.

My partner & I went on a parenting course to try to learn as much as we could about parenting. One of the things we were taught was to not call the 'Naughty Step' & to call it 'Time Out' instead. Also, to put only our son on there for around a minute at his age, rather than a minute per year. We told this to my mum, but she's decided that Super Nanny is right, so has ignored us & continues as she was.

Our son is having a few tantrums & hitting a little bit at the moment, but isn't aggressive & nothing like what I have read that other kids to be (we're lucky, or maybe it's yet to come!). Sometimes when things don't go his way or he's frustrated he makes a sort of growl/frustrated noise. Whenever he does anything physical like hitting or kicking, or makes a loud shouting or screaming noise I reprimand him, but I don't think there's anything wrong with his expressing his anger with this 'growling' noise.

He 'growled' when I collected him this afternoon & my mum responded by saying she wasn't going to accept it & that if he weren't going home she'd put him on the naughty step. I told her that parenting class said that kids should be able to express their anger to a degree & she replied saying she would deal with our son in a way she was able to deal with him - in other words, butt out.

When I was a child my mum never allowed me to be angry, I wasn't even allowed to look angry. I'm adamant my mum's not going to my son what she did to me. Am I being over the top? Do any of you tell your children off if they growl in this way?

Many thanks!

PC

I think you should look into nursery for the 3rd day if you possibly can. You don't need this stress IMO.

It's a tricky one. You need to feel that the person dealing with your child is doing it in a way you feel appropriate; you would choose this in a nursery, but you ultimately don't know how/when they are disciplining. You do know how your mum is doing it, but aren't happy, but as you are not paying, how confident do you feel in saying "My way or not at all"? How strongly do you feel about how she is dealing with him? I guess I probably would agree with 3littlefrogs about finding another place to put him day 3 as I can only see it potentially creating problems with you mum. However, she will be hurt then as she will feel you do not respect her as capable of looking after him...maybe you need to sit and talk it through. Explain what you want from her, and if she can't agree to follow your guidance, then maybe she will then understand why you have to look elsewhere.
IME, you always have to cut grandparents slack. I don't always agree with what my ds's grandparents do whilst with him, but while they're not harming him, then I have to adjust my stance slightly. After all, they raised dh and I and we turned out ok. Also, ds has learnt what is expected of him by each set of grandparents and adjusts his behaviour accordingly. You may find your child learns to know that Grandma doesn't like him growling, and stops doing it with her with no adverse consequences....for 1 day a week, would this be dreadful?

"I'm adamant that my mum's not going to do to my son what she did to me."

In that case, then i think you really need to consider sending him to nursery for all three days, and not have your mum care for him for a whole day. She is doing you a favour having him, she's not a professional, and although in an ideal world she would care for him exactly as you would want, she's human and has her own way of doing things.

Thanks all of you for responding, especially Kim Jammum, you've decided me! I'm going to leave it & see how things pan out.

I would never have anyone look after DS without paying them, that includes my mum.