Problem with DS2 and I don't agree with DH's solution

[FabBakerGirlIsBack]

DS2 is just 4 and since he was 3 he has come down in the morning and helped himself to food. Always chocolate. He isn't doing it because he is hungry, he just wants the chocolate and knows it is wrong as we have told him not to do it.

Last week he had some of my chocolate and said he was just checking it was okay.

This morning I came down to get a box of Roses I had left out to take into school today for a Mum who had helped me yesterday. They had been put in the cupboard and I assumed by DH. I got them out and DS2 had opened them and helped himself to three, and then put them back in the cupboard (hiding the evidence,)

DH wants to put a lock on the door so he can't come out. I am 100% against this and will look for something to keep the cupboard door from being opened by DS2.

Any ideas to get him to stop? I am giving him a sticker for staying in his room after he has been put to bed at night and wondering about extending that to staying upstairs until DH or I are up.

He once ate some cooking chocolate and I worry one day he will eat something he really shouldn't have and make himself ill.

I have to go to school now but thank you in advance for any advice.

Just one last thing, what do you do if you disagree with something your DH wants to do/use as discipline? Who gets the final say?

BTW I will win this one. There is no way he is locking him in.

PMSL @ not believe a 4yr old can't be stopped from going downstairs - you 'aint met my DS1 yet

FAQ, we are in our own little group. I am going to call it the realistic crap mum group.

Leave posie at al to their own little world.

Posie - any suggestions for me. I feel a little ignored.
Can't keep my DS2 with me at all times. I have three other children to deal with and I cannot physically restrain him all waking hours.
This thread shows that (1) some of us have children like these, it does not reflect on our parenting and (2) some parents don't recognise their own good fortune.

or even lunch things from the fridge - although I'm pretty sure he's had a nibble on things from the freezer than can be eaten frozen LOL.

MadameC - doesn't matter. He will eat any chocolate he finds. Thank you for your input though.

I have a very very will full nephew, very bright, incredibly active. His parents just have to work much harder at making him do as he's told. He has a point system on a blackboard.

As for saying you can't stop a four year old from going downstairs, ffs what is this world coming to?

lol - can I join the perfect mummy club and the crap one?

Only asking as DS2 has been brought up exactly the same way and despite having the appetite of an elephant doesn't take food without asking (although he DOES ask constantly for food LOL).

so how exactly do you stop a 4yr from going downstairs? Set booby traps and hope the other children don't get up for a wee in the night and fall over them? Tie them to their beds? Put an alarm on and hope that it doesn't wake everyone else up?

I'm intrigued.......

FBG - I don't think I am crap, but I would be in your group.
Some children are just pains in the bum. I put it down to high levels of determination and intelligence. Fine qualities. Just a little, er, testing.

I have four children, 7,6, 2 and 8 months. If I wanted to I could keep one of my children with me at all times.

and actually I should say that post 3yrs old I actively encouraged my DC to come downstairs in the mornings so they could watch TV quietly rather than wake me up playing in their rooms - they're very noisy boys

yes but my children don't sleep in my room - and I have no intentions of having a child that sleeps for less hours in the day than I do of being in my room either LOL.

My two aren't allowed downstairs til we get up.

Because it's always been the rule and the two times they broke the rule there was hell to pay they simply don't do it. Ever. dd is 4 1/2 and ds1 is 3 in a few weeks.

But it's a case of shutting the gate after the horse has bolted in your case if you've been allowing it so far.

The first thing that came into my mind about him going downstairs alone wasn't the concern about food though, it was 'OMG, what if he turned the cooker on and burned himself/tried to boil the kettle/fell off a counter and cracked his skull'. It's very dangerous letting him mess around like that, worst case scenario you'll come down one morning and find him dead or badly injured, best case scenario is a trip to a&e or damage to your house.

Lock the kitchen door, in fact i'd lock every door downstairs at night so if he does go down he can't get further than the hall and gets bored. I'd also teach him to come in and wake ye as soon as he gets up, i don't necessarily get up when the kids wake me but atleast i'm awake and can listen to what they're up to.

I wouldn't lock doors downstairs - it's a fire risk locking their door true - but what if access to the front door is blocked in an emergency - how would you get out?

I personally would like to be able to get out the front or back of my house in the event of a fire without worring about unlocking doors on the way!

We have an alarm that is set all night, my dcs would never go down before me or dh..

well at least they haven't worked out how to turn the alarm off yet - my DS1 has worked out numerous passwords to get onto the computer I woldn't put it past him to manage to switch an alarm off either .

OMG how stupid of me.

I ahve been allowing him to go downstairs.

I am unable to stop him.

And it is hardly allowing him to do this when the first you know of it is empty wrappers on the side.

DCs1 and 2 have never taken food.

I have tried lots of things.

It makes me wonder what you have done to your kids to make them too terrified to do something they might want to do.

I think I might have to take a break from this. I have had an okay day so far with coping with depression and attacks like this, posie et al, and can set one back more than you will ever understand.

Coming, FAQ?

your house must be laid out differantly than the standard her FAQ... over here 99% of houses have a downstairs hallway that the stairs decends into where the front door is.

that said, surely the front door is locked though so you'll have to unlock one door anyway to get out, and if a fire were to break out alll doors being closed would actually be a lifesaver as it would contain the fire.

yea fab - I'm coming - I want to play with my new shopping trolley

no I have the stairs at the end of the hallway - however, there have been numerous cases in this town of bins being set fire to - they are often kept next to front doors, hence front door being blocked, not to mention the thing that all of us hope never happen of an arson attack through the letter box - it's rare but it happens.

In the unlikely event of that happening I would prefer to get down to the bottom of the stairs and be able to turn left straight into the dining room to access the back door rather than have to unlock extra doors.

rasputin - I am not being sensitve. I am basically being called an idiot or a crap parent and some people are missing the point.

nothing works.

AND HE WILL NOT BE LOCKED IN

fab... they're not terrified, they just know life is better when everyone tries to make eah other happy.

they didn't get punished for going dowstairs, mommy being very cross was punishment enough and i told them in no uncertain terms that it was VERY DANGEROUS and made mummy very worried about them.

my kids aren't perfect kids my any stretch of the imagination, they're wilful and defiant, contrary and whingy.... but there are certain rules that have been inprinted on them as simply being beyond the realms of acceptable to break... car seats, holding hands on roads and not playing alone downstairs are the three main ones