HELP!! Grandparents not disciplining 2.5 yr, lets her have what she wants, resulting in unruly behaviour

[DebsL]

Hi,

Hope anyone can help, we have 2 daughters; 8 months & 2.5 yr old(3 in Sept) The eldest is whingy and demanding when she has spent time with one set of grandparents. She is being allowed to get what she wants when she wants it (so as to avoid a scene, tantrum, tears etc) and if she puts on a show and cries she usually gets her own way. The grandparents have said that they dont want to do the time out place and it is making our daughter become unruly and naughty. My DH and I have tried to tell them how we would like things to be done but they are just too soft with her. She spends time with the other set of grandparents who are firmer with their discipline but they too wont do the time out place. We both work full time and feel like we are fighting a losing battle when we come to discipline her!

Does anybody else have this problem?

we have no grandparents around so never have the opportunity to experience this problem, but I feel for you anyway
how difficult

Are they looking after them whilst you are working or are these just social visits?

They share in the childminding whilst we are working. Its difficult to say anything to them for fear of offending.

Hoping someone can offer better advice...

But in the meantime, just sympathising, it is hard, but there will come a point (starting now perhaps?) when they will learn about different rules in different places. As long as you're consistent when she's with you she'll get the message. If they're not comfortable doing time out they'd never do it properly anyway so it would be worse than not doing it at all (from the pov of giving in after starting a battle).

dd1 is 8 now and i do have memories (not sure exactly how old though) of having to put up with a day or two of really pushing her luck after being with godparents who let her run riot. I do think grandparents are kind of there to be a bit soft though, it just takes a while for the kids to learn that its only in their house these things are ok.

I'd be inclined to say that you cant force the GPs to discipline if they feel uncomfortable doing so.
Its a GPs place to spoil the kids really.
Just for social visits it wont make a big difference in the grand scheme of things.

If they are looking after your children full time while you are at work though then I can see that it could cause problems for you.
In that case I would look elsewhere for childcare if you have already spoken to the GPs and asked them to use your methods of discipline and they ahve said no.

I think unfortunately this is often one of the problems with relying on grandparents to childmind for you. If you pay them to CM I would seriously look at paying a professional to do 3 days per week and the parents and PIL doing one day each.

what happens if you pay a cm though? do they use different discipline strategies depending on the child's parents preferences? (interested) or do you have to find a cm with a similar approach to your own?
you'll soon be getting the free child places - have you thought of a part time (at least) nursery place for your eldest? might help your daughter and the grandparents as well

Sorry, but I am with the GPs with the fact that I don't agree with time out. I don't think it teaches them anything helpful. How can they learn to be cooperative with others if they are sat on a step away from everyone else? And at 2.5, yes they are bloody uncooperative, but they will get there.

Can you discuss ways to promote cooperative behaviour that you all feel comfortable with? If my little one screams and cries over something they can't have I say. 'Sorry I can't understand what you are saying when you are screaming at me', which is immediately followed by a very polite request from him. If something can't be done, I explain the reason why and maybe come up with an alternative. Sometimes we have a talk about it and come up with a solution, sometimes things just are the way they are. And a giggle and an offer to play hide and seek is normally enough to distract him. Time out just drags the whole issue into a 'whose the boss' scenario.

morocco on Tue 17-Jun-08 23:06:19
"what happens if you pay a cm though? do they use different discipline strategies depending on the child's parents preferences? (interested) or do you have to find a cm with a similar approach to your own?"

You have to either find a CM with a similar approach to your own or just accept that different households have different rules. If you think about it, it would become impossible to use 5 different approaches to discipline at the same time in the same house- the children would all be outraged if they were not treated the same.

I don't know any CM though that would give in to a child because they were tantruming about getting their own way though.