i feel like the worst mum in the world

[greedyguzzler]

i have always felt like i was a good mum and that both my kids are lovely and well behaved. yesteerday ds wouldnt pack his toys away when i asked and ended up throwing blocks across the room. he has NEVER done anything like this before and i was shocked and put him in the naughty place. normally he stays there, calms down and then i go and get him he says sorry we have cuddles and its all ok. yesterday he WOULDNT stay there and kept doing that cheeky giggling thing when i put him back. i was determined to 'win' and eventually after about 20 mins he stayed there and then said sorry. i was getting SO annoyed with him i wasnt being especially gentle as i was putting him back in the naughty place and i guess that is my question.......does anyone else ever get so wound up that they know they use slightly more force than they should? i like to think i would never hit him or my dd, but sometimes recently he has been really winding me up. HELP

Welcome to parenting...the real world!!!
You are not a bad mum. your child is simply learning to express himself!

how old is he?
I have this everynow and then with my son, now 4. The worse thing he can do is to giggle when I am telling him off. I just try to be firm and maintain the same discipline as normal. We are finding the threat of toy removal quite good, although we have had to "throw away" a few toys before.
It is really hard though, my husband smacked his bum the other day for being cheaky to me. He then was mortified that he got so angry. However he appologises straight after being cheaky now.

my son that is!!

If ds pushes me too far I find myself doing that. I now know when I'm getting to that point and I take him to his room and shut the door so we both have time to calm down. Our children know exactly how to wind us up and are exceptionally good at it but as the adults I think we have to stay in control and that means walking away if you feel like you are losing it. It doesn't make you a bad mum to lose it, it's recognising what you're doing and dealing with it differently that counts.

If he's pushing you too far, don't be afraid to put him in his room or somewhere where you can physically shut him in and have a few minutes to calm down. I've found my ds does calm down much more quickly that way than if i'm manhandling him or constantly putting him back on the chair, as the absolute lack of attention doesn't fuel it.

Don't worry about it any more, just promise yourself that you'll handle it differently next time.

thanks everyone! i think what you said - olihan - is right. our naughty place used to work brilliantly cos he couldnt get out ( shut the doors and stairgate and he is 'trapped' on the landing, but now he is just tall enough to open the doors and escape and that was the main battle yesterday. how do i shut him in his room? put a lock on the door or hold it shut? i definately calm down quicker,and so does he, when there is less contact and therefore less giggling

I hold it shut, take lots of deep breaths and wait until he sounds like he's calming down. He's not keen on me holding the door but realises quite quickly that no attention is coming his way and gives up!

how old is your ds olihan? mine is 3.4. do you have others running around too cos i have my dd who is only 22months trying to but in and get involved which doesnt make it easy to concentrate fully on ds discipline

He's 2.10 Greedy, and dd is 14 months so is also present most of the time too! It doesn't help at all, does it? Half the time she makes it worse because she doesn't understand that he's being naughty and wants to play with him or starts doing something that makes him laugh...nightmare. I tend to ignore her as far as possible, which is probably easier at 14 months than 22 months, or play up the 'happy' voice with her and the 'stern' voice with him to make him realise he's the one in the wrong.

2.1 is on the young side for the naughty step type stuff. You may find a very neutral reaction (a bored "no") then redirection to something fun and exciting and well behaved works better.

If he's laughing then doing something naughty it shows that he doesn't really understand that he's being naughty. It also (as you have said) can lead to an escalation of anger from the mother (believe me I've been there- my eldest son is severely autistic and loves to get a reaction, but doesn't understand at all when he's gone too far).

oh misread- it's 2.10, still probably a little on the young side.

I got so wound up by my ds 2.4 the other day I can't even remember what started it but he was having a temper tantrum of mega proportions, he was in the naughty area to calm down and he was jigging about, I said "do you need a wee?" He shouted "NO WEE WEE", I said "ok tell me when you do", "NO WEE WEE", then he said "WEE WEE" so off to the toilet we go then again "NO WEE WEE" "ok tell me when you do" "WEE WEE " "ok" so he gets himself parked up on the pan and half way through gets so mad that he has done as he was told and goes ironing board straight and wees all over me. I just went mad and yelled "for gods sake you're bloody pissing all over me". I him out the bathroom and put him back on the naughty spot. After the dust piss and tears had settled I felt awfull, I was so ashamed to of spoken and acted like that.

duke.....i am sure you feel better now. they do test us sometimes dont they? i swore at my little boy the other day, mainly cos i was really tired and he was winding me up (no excuse, i know) but i felt ashamed after too. i guess there is nothing we can do afterwards except for try not to do it again! makes you feel better to know that you are not the only one though doesnt it!

It happens to everyone. There's still a dent in my ds's door from the day when I was preg with dd & I really reall really needed him to take a nap & he kept coming out of his bed. So I kicked his door shut in anger & to my biggest horror it turned out to be hollow! For ages after he pointed at the door saying mama! He was about 20m at the time. Now I've become better at controling such anger. It comes with time and experience.
I must say though giggling while you're angry IS infuriating. DS looking away & ignoring me while I'm trying to explain to him why what he did was naughty has the same effect on me too.

I agree with Olihan, the naughty place just made things worse for you on this occasion, didn't it? I've said before on threads about this sort of thing that I hate the idea of naughty steps or whatever and heartily admire a child with enough spirit to keep getting up

I think using time out in his room would have been better, as it withdraws your attention completely, meaning he can't be giggling at the new 'game' he's invented that makes mummy go that nice bright red colour also he is out of view and not winding you up any further. It really is 'time out' for both of you, not a punishment.

Though I do want to say I would and have only used time out a sprinkling of times in DS' life, you need to reserve it for times when you feel like stangling him!

With the throwing, etc, you could try and lighten things up by saying "oh, throwing - let's see if we can throw all these toys in the box" or whatever the situation might be - just try and make these things a game, or a challenge to your ds and life will be more fun for you AND him. Don't expect him to always 'obey' you in things like putting toys away etc...sometimes we need to make these things a little bit fun for kids if we want them to comply.

HTH?

oh and meant to say of COURSE you are not the worst mum, you are doing a BRILLIANT job.

Yes I have found myself losing it. On Friday ds (2.3) decided that he would stand up on the changing table when I was half way through changing his nappy with poo still attached to his bum! He would not sit down and I lost my temper and shouted at him "You are a horrible boy and you should be wearing big boy pants not running around like a baby with poo on your bum like a baby". I felt so terrible that I had been nasty to him but then ds said "silly mummy getting shouty I love luu". I said sorry changed his bum and then he said to me "sorry mummy for being naughty", kissed me and then said "see mummy all better now mummy and me made up". I just wanted to cry.

thanks!
'Don't expect him to always 'obey' you in things like putting toys away etc...sometimes we need to make these things a little bit fun for kids if we want them to comply.' that really makes sense, and i do always intend to do that, but sometimes its very hard!

Jimjams, if 2 is too young for naughty step, what would you advise instead?

And why do you hate naughty step, Sunnysideup?

A couple of weeks ago I shouted at my 1.10 ds to "get off me, get off me, GET OFF ME" when he was climbing on my back when I tried to get something out from under the bed. I was very tired and stressed. Now he's telling his toys to "get off"... clearly it made a mark in his psyche, and I feel terrible. I apologied right afterwards for getting angry, but not sure he understood. I'm so sad about it.

Depends on the child tinky- especially their level of understanding, and what they like. I would tend to either turn the child away briefly, or pop them outside the room, shut the door, and hold shut for 1/2 minute top. I would only do that for very serious misdemeanours though (e.g pinching). If it's general throwing etc, normal toddler behaviour I would ignore the behaviour (by which I mean look bored), maybe say "no throwing" (although I wouldn't do that if they liked the word no and being told off- some do), and redirect redirect redirect. I would also change strategy if their response changed. DS1 in a pinching phase started pinching in order to get put out of the room because he liked the predictability of the response (would kill himself laughing) so I went for the bored approach instead- that worked.

haven't read the thread but just wanted to say that my 5 year old has a way of sticking out his tongue at me and thensay "duh!" that makes me want to slap him hard - once I was so scared that I was going to lose control that I had to lock myself in the bathroom for 10 minutes.

I hope it's normal to think like that sometimes!

Thanks jimjams. My 1.10 DS is very intense and hard to distract when he really wants something he's not supposed to have, so starts to hit when he gets fed up of hearing no. I've tried naughty step which is effective, but seems a bit harsh. Yesterday and today I tried the bored look after a good round of no-ing, and it seems to be working, so will try sticking with this.

Feel like a useless mum.

My dd is now 8 and a half months old and is very bright for her age. She has been sitting up since she was 3 months, crawling from 6, and is also very close to walking. She's always paid close attention to anyone and anything around her taking everything in.

She used to be a happy baby, smiling all the time. She rarely laughs but I think that's just her, but now she won't even smile!!

For the last two months she has been miserable!! She loves people still but whenever me or her dad have her she just whines and cries, she hates us!

She's also refusing to sleep, night and day, so we are all very tired.

We are currently living with my parents whilst we get our deposit together for a house but it's proving so hard as we feel so guilty whenever she cries so we just always pick her up straight away so she never learns.

I am really starting to feel like I've done something wrong and I'm an awful parent, I can't soothe her like I used to anymore as she just kicks and scratches me and screams even louder!!

I really feel like i just can't do it anymore and I'm not meant to be a mum, I just want to run away 😭