Don't think time out is working anymore. How do you discipline your children?

[Pinkchampagne]

I have been using time out, but it no longer seems to be having much effect, especially with DS1 (nearly 8), who will refuse to go to the step/corner/his room & is probably getting a bit too old for this.
He also throws huge tantrums if I manage to get him in his room, where he thumps at the door etc & screams at me.
The time out seems to make the behaviour worse, but what is the alternative?

I have been trying the praising the positive etc, and I know you are meant to try to ignore the bad, but there is some bad behaviour (like scratching & marking his brother) that I cannot just ignore.

I have been on my own with them for the last 3 months, and am finding it quite hard to deal with the behaviour problems I have been having with the boys.

PC, your time alone with DS1 sounds lovely . Keep plugging away and you will get there. And in many ways I think it is not a bad thing for him to realise that you do get upset by him being mean.

It is tricky about the bedtime thing. Hopefully they will both get used to sharing and then perhaps DS2 will just sleep through DS1 coming to bed. My DS1 and DS2 have shared for years and both seem to be able to sleep through the other's noise.

yes, he was restrained for a while, but in the last few years he has really lost it. V bad long term strategy though, so I am not too worried.
It is hard to stay neutral in front of your children though, which is why I wondered if your children had also picked up on criticism of you from their father.

we had a few minutes of ultra bad behaviour from ds1 this morning when I obliquely criticised ex, by saying that women prefer to marry a man who can cook and doesnt expect a woman to wait on him hand and foot. Think I must try and be a bit more subtle in future, I walked right into that one, as ds1 knew I was thinking about his father. (ex can cook, but never does when a woman is around.)

PC - YOu have the right to confiscate anything they get given if they treat you like crap - look at it this way - their dad is giving you behavioral levers all the time. If they don't tow the line, Spiderman DVD in a locked box for set amount of time.

It works on my four year old, how about trying it for your older boys?

I have to admit, I did warn DS1 that I would be keeping hold of the DVD if he didn't change his attitude yesterday.
I don't like doing this purely because like I said, their dad would do this kind of thing a lot, and then dump the toys. However, I just said I would keep hold of it until he started behaving.
I'm sure all these treats are making things worse for me though, as they don't get bought things constantly & I am the mean one.
My MIL warned ex H not to do this because of her own experiences, but he is doing it all the time.

Dino - I think the reason I felt I needed to hide the fact he had upset me, was because I felt it was wrong for him to see that he had pretty much defeated me. I am the adult and I should be the strong one, and I was not acting very strong at that moment in time.

I am hoping we have a slightly better day today. It feels like I have had struggles with them for days & days, but they were also very very tired yesterday. I think they would have been up until some silly hour on Friday night, while their father got drunk with his friend.
They behave a lot worse when they are that tired.

Should say "They don't get bought things constantly with me"

stupid prat getting drunk with his children there

Don't worry that they will like dad more just because he buys things - all that will happen will be he gets nagged more for 'stuff' when he takes them places!

can you take them to car boot sales, and buy them toys second hand?
that is what we used to do when we were on benefits. Our children loved car boot sales, it was like being let loose in a toyshop for them.

Don't be hard on yourself Pinkchampagne, by the sounds of it you have all been through a lot. Concentrate on what has worked and don't get too down on yourself. You are doing your best and that is all we can do, the fact that you are trying to improve things means that you are being a good mum

Maybe they are just bored with each other, nearly the end of the holidays and need to get back to school and get some structure back and see their friends.

My two are definitely rubbing each up the wrong way.

just re-read that post and hope you arent offended by second hand. we were completely into car boot sales and charity shops and got loads of recycled toys.

It isn't the first time ex H has taken them around that friends house while he drinks until late.

As soon as I got home & saw how tired & crabby the boys were, I got straight onto him & said "What time did these boys get to bed last night?"
I then found out that it was pretty late.

It is not so much that I can't afford to buy them treats, Nightynight. I do buy them things occassionaly like comics etc. It is that I don't want them thinking that every time we step foot in a toy shop, that they are going to get bought something.
If I buy them something, I want it to be as a reward for good behaviour.

Todays struggles have already started.
I am beginning to feel I need outside help with DS1 because I am feeling almost out of my depth with it all.

Wasn't offended by second hand at all, NN. I have had some good second hand bargains in my time!

Are they back at school yet? If not, you may feel so much better when the are!

PC - did you read Cod's post about boys and dogs? It was excellent. Sorry don't do links .

I know where you are coming from - being the adult can be overwhelming at times. But, heh, at least you can empathise with your eight-year-old.

I do take stuff away from mine - I have the 24 hour bin, but do give in, sometimes, if I have removed the beloved cuddly toy and return it at bedtime.

It sounds like you need lazy days planned for after your ex- has the boys over night. I take it he doesn't listen to sense about putting the boys to bed at a decent time, if it doesn't suit him.

One-on-one time sounds like it might work with DS1. Have you asked him what else he would like to do? I gather your Mum and Dad aren't very supportive but would they have the boys separately on a regular basis, so you can have time with each of them? Or could you get your ex- to take one of them, give him a pretext i.e. to take them to sport or something similar?

Must go - mine have watched too much telly, so off out. Take care.

I didn't see cod's post about boys & dogs. what was it all about?

This mornings outburst was because I turned off their TV programmes after another fighting/scratching incedent over TV channels.
DS1 flew off the handle & was calling me stupid etc again.

I tried to talk to him again when he calmed down & explained that him behaving like that just ends up making both me & him sad (him because he loses out on treats), so asked him why he's saying unkind things.
He again just answered with "I don't know"

I don't know what is really going on inside him. I know he is probably all mixed up from the break up etc, but I am struggling to know how best to deal with it. Maybe he would benefit from seeing a child counsellor or something.

My mum rarely takes them out without me being there also, and hardly ever offers to have DS2 on his own.

They are back to school next Monday, EscapeFrom, which is also when I return to work as I work in the school!

PinkChamp -- Cod's post (somewhere) says that boys should be treated like Labradors, lots of exercise and firm discipline, or somesuch.

But that advice doesn't work for me (neither does timeouts). I have to manage DS very carefully or he gets too tired (so lots of exercise is out). Plus he's usually only interested in outings if they involve him getting a toy.

I have been lurking on this thread because I also have a 7yo DS who responds explosively, and we don't even have parental breakup to deal with. I read here all the advice/strategies and thought "yup, I'm pretty sure I'm doing that" -- and it doesn't entirely work. We still get some very bad moments, anyway.

The only thing I can think to add is that every time before any flashpoint activity starts (like watching TV which might be turned off for bad behaviour), it helps if I look them in the eye and say "And if there's bad behaviour from you I will have to turn the TV off. Do you understand?" I think DS takes it better (still angry, but not as likely to explode) if the consequences are spelled out for him explicitly and repeatedly.

Once he's calmed down, I also point out "Do I call you stupid?" and insist on an apology, before we can both move on.

small boy=puppy, recent post from Cod.

Actually, I'm curious what she means by an hour's exercise -- it can take us an hour to get home from school (only half a mile, but kids know how to faff about). Does that count?

No , I think you are supposed to tire them out and faffing around simply doesn't cut it. Mine are experts slowcoaches, too but I find swimming good, as long as the dinner-bed routine is then, followed to the minute.

OK, onto another MN favourite, how about the "How to talk so kids will listen" approach? Sit down with him and put a list together of ALL ideas on how to stop the outbursts, so for example NEVER TURN THE TV OFF .... get him to give you some, give some yourself, take all ideas down even the most absurd ones like the TV one, then cross off those that won't work with an explanation. My 5 year old sometimes amazes me when I try this. He comes up with great ideas. Could be the time to suggest a new activity - my SIL sent all her kids to karate as an outlet.

I think I'd be asking for help, too, start with your GP or health visitor. There must be something available. My DS2 gets help and having outside input can be invaluable. Mind you, there are times when I sit there, thinking I already do all of that.

Can you not ask your Mum directly to have one boy for a couple of hours a week rather than waiting for her to offer? You could alternate it - so DS1 one week and DS2 the next. Surely everyone, including your Mum, would benefit.

Hope you're having a good evening - bathtime here, so bye for now.

Thank you both, and thanks for the link to cod's thread. I will take a good look at it in a minute.

I did say to DS "Do I say mean things to you?" He replied "No" & I said "Well why are you being mean to mummy then?"
He just said he didn't know, but I made him think about how it would make him feel & apologise to me.

They stayed with their dad again last night (think they may actually have stayed round my parents with him though), and didn't come back tired & grouchy, so we have had a much better day today. (Well other than DS2 totally trashing his bedroom at bedtime, but I have made him tidy it!)
I have told them I was pleased with how they have behaved today, which they seemed happy about!

Have read cod's post with interest. Would never have thought of looking at my boys like dogs, but she has some good tips there!

My eldest son is very lazy, and it can be an effort to get him out of the house to go to the park etc sometimes. I do find that some time out & about often helps though.
We are going to the castle tomorrow, and meeting a friend of mine with her boys, one of which is a school friend of DS1's, so that should be good for them.

I've been trying to use natural consequences and have had some success with dd1 (dd2 is 2 and its not possible to reason with her )

So I ask her to do/ not to do something and if she doesn't then I try and give her a choice. I usually tell her I'm going to count to 5 and if she hasn't complied by the time I get to 5 then I give her a consequence. I try and make them natural ones so that they relate to the issue in hand. So, for example, if she's mucking about at bedtime and won't stop then we might not have time to read her a bedtime story because it will be too late. The key is to try and stay as calm and reasonable as possible - dd1 actually screams "don't count, don't count" but I rarely have to carry out the consequence. (Sometimes I just lose it and shout, of course )

I haven't had to use this for violent behaviour though - PC - sounds really tough -especially coping with it on your own.

How about having a few rules about the agressive behaviour and sorting out the consequences beforehand. So that he knows that if he does X then Y will happen - and make sure that it does everytime.

I sometimes use the counting thing too, and my DS comes out with the "Stop counting" line too!

The violent behaviour is a fairly recent thing, and I do struggle with that side of things. I have told them that I will have to cut their fingernails very short if they continue to scratch each other like they have been.

I am going to try hard to really praise their good behaviour, and ignore tantrums etc as much as I can.
I am also going to try to spend more quality time which each DS individually, although this can be tricky as I get little 1:1 time with either one of them really.

I am going to try to improve things, but it is proving one heck of a challange!

my boys are 13, 11 and 3 and i still use the time out in your room for older boys and time out on the step for younger boy. (although its hard not to strangle them!!!)I tell them time out is not a punishment, it is time to calm down or to have a think about their behaviour and what they could have done differently.

If they refuse to go the consequences get worse for example if you dont go to your room right now, you wont be going on ps2 today either (and stick to it).

Once you have asked them to go to their room you cant back down. my 11 year old used to scream and throw things once he was there, i would simply tell him, his time out would start once he was sittinig quietly and he would also have to clear up any toys etc he had thrown after his time out.

I always wait until they have calmed down before starting the 5 mins of time out too. I then go into the room & have a talk with them about the situation.

The last couple of days haven't been as bad, but we have been out doing things. Last week we were stuck in a lot because of the weather, which didn't help.

The struggles with the constant trashing of their rooms (although I always make them tidy) and settling at bedtime, are as bad as ever though.