Please help me to stop from wanting to cause harm to my 2 dds who are driving me round the twist!

[hairymcclary]

They fight argue and cry and whinge constantly. I cant stand anymore.

Had it all out with them yesterday after another series of rows and fights, they promised they would try harder, got up this morning and have started again

They are 7 & 5.

Very mummy
very fed up/ had enough mummy

Have sent them to their rooms, seperated them and told them they wont be allowed out or to go out to cinema (which has been planned for a week, and have been threatening them with not being allowed to go all week) with a friend of mine. (however i feel i need the break from them)

Any advice on how to cope / remain sane / and avoid actually doing something i might regret like really clobbering one of them, would be greatly appreciated.

Im a mummy on the edge!

Ill stand with you on that edge. Mine are a bit older, 7 and 10. I got up this morning and told them they would be going to bed 2 hours earlier than normal from now on.
BECAUSE the reason they were initially allowed to stay up late was because they were no trouble and I was in no hurry to get them out the way....however, now world war 3 breaks out when I say its bedtime. And a 9pm I really dont want kids standing in the hall screaming about toothpaste.
So I dont know, but im removing nice things(going to bed late) and they can earn 15 min chunks back if they stop the constant, constant bickering.

Mine are younger than yours but act the same way - hopefully this will help you a bit though.

I haven't managed to reduce the fighting, whinging etc to an acceptable level all the time but what I have done has reduced it to a level where I am more sane thankfully.

Big thing I did was stick to my guns - so if you said no cinema that means no cinema. Don;t threaten them with anything you aren't willing to carry through. Sounds pretty obvious advice but I found when I was stressed with them and nothing was working I would tend to threaten things then think 'Damn, but I really wanted to do that myself and now I can't' so I tended to back down on occassion - big mistake.

Another thing I did was refuse to shout a them. I got so sick of hearing shouting all the time and it wasn't working. We have introduced a no shouting rule and things are a lot calmer. DD1 still shouts a fair bit but I can calmy tell her to stop and be quite within my rights as no one else has been shouting. In fact, now when they are naughty my voice tends to get quieter and quieter (sign of impending breakdown methinks!).

I leave them to sort things out between themselves a lot. Interfering with their arguments just seemed to encourage them to come and whinge at me about each other for every little thing. Now I don't get involved unless one of them is about to get badly hurt (then I just calmly remove one - whoever is being better behaved).

Have you reminded them of their promise yesterday? I'd say it was time for some serious ground rules for your own sanity. ]

Everyone has different parenting styles but for us, despite my DDs still being very young I have made it quite clear that mummy and daddy have rights too and living in relative order and peace is one of them.

Hope you have a good weekend.

Thanks, great advice!

I do tend to lack a bit of consistency from time to time. This time i WILL stick to my guns and say no cinema and WILL carry it through.

I have reminded them of there promise, but their apologies and promises appear to mean very little, to them they are just words with no real meaning other than to get mummy back on side.

I like the no shouting rule. Im the worst for it and therfore they copy and then we have a very shouty household.
Its difficult tho, especially if they are fighting in the car, there is not much else you can do other than shout.
I also find i am more shouty as they day goes on, tend to lose more and more patience as the day goes by.

Is good advice tho. Thankyou.

Our rules have really helped our two 6 and 8 sort out their relationship. We got the idea from a parenting book from the library called something like How to stop siblings being rivals - it was really good

1. Leave them to sort out any disputes, maybe offer guidlines such as taking turns

1. Ground rules: No violence or name calling accepted. And if they do have clear punishments.

1. Lots of praise and ignore the bad.

It really has worked miracles. I am no longer judge and jury, no longer am the bad guy and don't get stressed by them. They still argue but are learning how to negociate but know I will come down on them like a ton if they break the hitting/names rules.

sorry forgot to add - good luck it can feel like hell at times.

Also try games in the car.. 20 questions, I spy with little prizes for everyone who tried hard!

See if your friend will take them to the park or something that isn't the cinema so you still get the break

Good luck !

car is a nightmare I agree - but "Oh! Who can be the first one to spot a bycicle?/blue car?/red bus/" works really well,they stop whinging and arguing and actually do look...

I've taken up smoking, not very helpful but it does make me feel better, can't wait for the holidays

Am just kidding of course, sorry in a foul mood myself today.