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Behaviour/development

Talk to others about child development and behaviour stages here. You can find more information on our development calendar.

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Original poster

AIBU in expecting a six year old to have some sense of time.

43 replies

mrsdoubtmom · 19/09/2014 20:19

Moms, please advise. I want to know how to teach the importance of being on time to my six year old. Every morning is an ordeal as try to get her ready to school and the same in the evenings for other classes. It is affecting our family as a whole. As she gets delayed, i go late to work and all of us are in a bad mood even before day starts.
Even when I tell her, with a digital clock, she has just 20 mins to leave to get ready, she just keeps talking, or lying on bed or running around the house. She loves her school. I went to the extent of not sending her to school one day to check if that would help. She cried a lot but was back to the same next day.
I am losing my patience. I end up screaming, beating her. I am sure there is a better way around. Please help. I have tried having a talk with her.. reading her moral stories on time keeping and how people lose things being not on time etc.

please please please suggest.

OP posts:

Are your children’s vaccines up to date?

Set a reminder

frownyface · 19/09/2014 20:53

Oh yes, I just remembered in the early days of reception we had issues with dawdling (we still do, we basically wake up prompt to eat breakfast prompt to stop daydreaming prompt to get dressed/find shoes/pack homework but it does always get done usually with ten mins to spare) we actually got as far as halfway down the road with his pajamas on before he begged to get dressed. That was not a fun day. I had his uniform with me in a bag, got him changed in the car and drove him to school (with seconds to spare).
Im not going to comment re. the beating as other posters have already done so-just wanted you to know your not alone it gets very frustrating! Tomorrow is a new day, all you can do is learn from today and make tomorrow a fresh start for you both.

Original poster

mrsdoubtmom · 19/09/2014 21:00

Thanks frownyface and all of you here. I will surely talk to my GP ASAP. She is an angel and I just could not imagine how badly I reacted today monring. After reading all the posts, I think I have been at fault.. not really setting standing by her and expecting her to know the routine.

OP posts:

CurlyWurlyCake · 19/09/2014 21:07

How many children do you have?

I will admit it's not easy and I have been that screaming banshee when time has been tight. I'm glad you are going to seek help, it certainly sounds like you could do with some support.

Hitting her won't make her get ready any quicker and is qua rented to make you both miserable and she will potentially hate you for it.

Artistic · 19/09/2014 21:30

Your daughter sounds similar to my DD (who woke up late this morning & decided to read a storybook!!!)

I found that until her 7th birthday she had no sense of time, urgency, sequence of events etc! Even withholding her favourite things or missing an event altogether didn't make her understand. The ONLY thing that worked was giving her a task & then counting down from ten to zero by which time she had to finish the task. If unfinished she would still have to move to the next, but the counting did create some urgency. As PP said having a fixed sequence is also vey useful. Now that she's 7.5 it's much better & she actually finishes at least a few tasks without constant reminders. But there is no way she can be trusted to get ready all on her own in 20 or even 60 minutes with no intervention or reminders. I think it all improves with age, so you need to give it time & until then - patience! Good luck!

Original poster

mrsdoubtmom · 19/09/2014 22:47

Thanks Artstic. I will try the counting and above all..tell myself repeatedly, she is six and is unreasonable to expect her to understand urgency. All here, I am so relieved. I can't tell you how thankful I am.

OP posts:

GiniCooper · 19/09/2014 22:49

Are you English?

FlossyMoo · 19/09/2014 22:53

Sorry OP but I can't get over the fact that all you seemed concerned about it getting your DD to have concept of time. You have hardly addressed the fact you have admitted to beating your child.

Go and seek professional help OP.

combust22 · 19/09/2014 23:07

I think the fact you are abusing your child is a far bigger issue than the timekeeping.

rockybalboa · 19/09/2014 23:12

Bloody hell, you actually beat her?!? Christ. And what the fuck is she doing between 7-8.45 which takes so long?!? My DS (aged 6) has to get dressed before he comes downstairs for breakfast and is allowed to watch a bit of Netflix before leaving the house after he has eaten his breakfast. He does all this in 45 mins - 1 hour. There might be some fishwife style bellowing from me at certain points but he definitely knows that he doesn't have time to piss around. If he doesn't do what he's told then he gets treated like a baby and has his shoes put on for him etc which he hates.

smokeandglitter · 19/09/2014 23:17

Where do you live? You need serious help. I am appalled you beat her.

You are the adult, some children struggle with time keeping more than others. Pp have given you good answers.

Momagain1 · 19/09/2014 23:21

With some kids, you have to set up every step, and even when they are capable, they will still resist. In high school my oldest convinced her fthe teacher in the first class of the day she was always late to school because I wasnt ready on time! (Brand new chemistry teacher, easily tricked).

I understand about the hitting. It is a shock when you find yourself there.

Try setting out her clothes, use the pictures AND timer, perhaps even try several days of dealing with her as if she was an actual infant, sitting right there and helping her change from jammies to school clothes. Practically spoon feed her breakfast. A right pain, but maybe the whole mess is her needing some attention, as well as needing to rehearse the routine at the pace expected.

ThreeQuartersEmpty · 19/09/2014 23:25

Not counting the beating, which YOU need to address, my 13 yo still needs reminding. They are children.
Given the chance he would dawdle away the time.
He knows he must be ready by x time, but underestimates it.

combust22 · 20/09/2014 07:17

momagain

"
I understand about the hitting. It is a shock when you find yourself there. "

Bet it's more of a shock to the child. I don't sympathise with people who beat their children.

EverythingCounts · 20/09/2014 07:24

You've had good answers here. They just have no idea of what 15 mins or so actually means. The one thing above all to take up is that you must commit to never, ever hitting your child again. And you need a strategy for that yourself. If you feel you are close to doing it, you need to walk away, put some space between you, count to ten, whatever it takes. Learning to control that anger is vital and some professional help with that might as people have said be the way to go.

MiscellaneousAssortment · 20/09/2014 07:49

How did you deal with her when she was 3 or 4 or 5? Has she changed or have you changed? She is still small and not developmentally capable of what you're asking of her.

To punish a child for something thats not within her abilities is not only very wrong, but it's completely pointless.

And yes, get urgent help for your violence. Telling the time is not the issue here, it's her mummy hurting her.

I think you hid that revelation in an innocuous post about timing as you are desperate for help. You are probably deeply ashamed and scared by what you are doing. And you need urgent help.

Gp first. And also a honest think about why you are doing what you are doing.

Is it because of depression or mental health issues?
Or not coping?
Bad situation at home?
Or not knowing any better?
Lack of parenting skills?

Do you need medical help? Anti-depressants? Councelling? Practical help like Homestart? Or parenting classes? This is something to talk over with your gp but having some insight into your situation is the first step to dealing with this.

MiscellaneousAssortment · 20/09/2014 08:28

Re. 'beating' your child. I want to be supportive so that you feel like you can get help. But obviously it's massively concerning and shocking what you are doing, so I feel that I have to ask...

Where are you hitting her?
How hard are you beating her?
How long does it go on for?
How often is it happening?

I'm asking not because I have any desire to hear the details, but because I'm concerned the child may need medical help.

Internal damage is not something you can see, but could be very serious. Did her stomach, chest, neck or head get 'beaten'? Liver, kidneys, back? What about broken bones?

I have no idea how hard you are hitting her, and maybe you don't either if it's done in a moment of rage... But you cannot deny her medical attention because you feel guilty or ashamed - and I cannot pretend that of course you wouldn't hit her that hard and I'm sure it's fine, because I have no idea about what's happening, and when parents get into a cycle of out of control physical abuse, combined with guilt and hiding it, or denying it happened, then that's how children die.

Original poster

mrsdoubtmom · 20/09/2014 09:55

Hello OP, thanks for your concern. I think, there is a clear misunderstanding here. Yesterday was the first time I hit her. I think I have landed myself in a very abusive mom picture which is far from true.

To answer MiscA,

I hit her in her bottom, Not hard enough to even make her cry.. It was once and only once. May be I used a wrong word there.. I should have said Spanking.. not that it is acceptable. I raised the talk to really understand timing sense in children. Yet, I will talk to GP, because I find it strange that I am succumbing to pressures on small matters. This has been happening since she started school but I was hoping for things to get better and it did not.

OP posts:

MiscellaneousAssortment · 20/09/2014 13:14

Well I had to check. Maybe you used the 'beat' because it felt so extreme for you?

Do you mean your dd is starting school now?

If so, people have been saying to me for months 'oh when Ds starts school it will be much easier for you' etc etc... And it's bloody not!!!

I think it's a weird myth. Ds has been utterly reliant on me and very emotionally strung out. I've been 'managing' his moods actively the whole time as he's always ten seconds away from complete breakdown into tears or testing the boundaries as he's such a 'big boy' now.

He's been at school two weeks and I'm knackered!

It's such a big change for them, and he is concentrating so hard at school that he's totally wiped by 3pm. I think he'll be like this for another few weeks before he finds his feet unfortuneately.

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