I agree with every word of this article about the ideal of parenting

[margoandjerry]

In the times today

except that I wouldn't bother to explain why I was screaming.

Great posts fillyjonk and Sakura. I am who I am and as long as it doesn't result in hurting or scaring my children, I'm certainly not going to suppress either my personality or views in order to act out the part of some mythical perfect mother who is permanently calm and never shouts.

Good thread margoandjerry.

mcoodle, what you say about recognising your stress and anger in the early stages is really important.

The mistake I made with dd was to suppress impatience and exasperation, be unnaturally calm, then suddenly cross. Not only could she not tell I was getting angry, I couldn't myself.

'When Mum turned into a monster' by Joanna Harrison helped us - we had a good laugh about it.

have a look

Now I say 'Mummy's hands are starting to get a bit hairy...they're turning green' - she gets the message.

So what if you are naturally calm and don't shout? What if it isn't suppressing anything?

Am I destined to raise a tribe of terribly repressed ultravixens ?

I could be wrong, but I think I've seen Enid and oliveoil on the Highly Sensitive Child threads.

If their children are highly sensitive, then they probably would be very upset by some of the things described on this thread.

I'm rather over-sensitive myself, but I'm often amazed (and impressed) at the robustness of others.

I don't think Enid is smug either.

.

hurrah thats 2

thanks girls have terrible pmt and thats made me feel better

also to refute 'smugness is in the eye of the beholder' - I thought that was quite clever until I realised that, like beauty, it actually means the other person makes the judgement - I may not actually be smug after all!

[smug]

This thread neatly encapsulates my big problem with parenting atm. I am quite shouty with my kids when I reach the end of my tether (am on my own with them a lot) but I will not go to my GP or confide in anyone because I am petrified of being judged against this perfect ideal. I so want help to be able to deal with this in a better way but at the moment, I don't even feel able to post on MN about it because I don't think I could handle the disapproval

And yes, I have changed my name for this.

you won't get disapproval

there's loads of shouty mums on here

I do think you should go to your gp if its got that bad though, do you not have a RL friend you can talk to?

TBH, I don't feel it's so bad that it warrants going to the gp, but the feeling on this thread from some seems to be that you really should never shout. I want to get a referral for parenting lessons but am afraid of admitting any problems to someone in authority IYKWIM.

No-one in RL to talk to enid - all my friends are just like you!

Are they? I dont know anyone like me in RL - except my best mate, all my mum friends shout more than me. I dont judge them for it either (despite what you lot think)

We have a problem with anger in my family. We seem to see it as Bad, whereas of course it's a primal emotion (illustrated often by my twelve-week-old ).

We all lose our tempers easily, then feel dreadful.

I'd much prefer to be comfortable with anger, as I actually think I'd control my temper more successfully.

Therapy beckons, methinks...

How old aer your children?

sounds like purplepumpkin and Enid should swap mates.

lol yes

but purplepumpkin you KNOW your friends DO lose their tempers sometimes dont you?

They disapprove of shouting. Because they have relatively well behaved children and are quite calm people, they look down their noses at those who are not so fortunate.

are you sure you are not my friend in RL?

do you not have any other friends?

OK.

Why do you think they are calm? Do you think they were just born that way? They may work hard at it - knowing what makes them happy, knowing what helps them relax, remaining positive - all those things can be learned!

lol at all the smugness

it is possible to learn how to be less shouty

if you are worried, you could get an anger management book out of the library and have a read. You may find some techniques that are useful. It is hard work though.

Well, I have two very different children. dd is calm, helpful and will pretty much always do as I ask. ds is defiant, argumentative and always needs the last word. dd is a doddle to parent and I hardly need to raise my voice to her. ds is a totally different kettle of fish and we argue an awful lot.

how old is ds?

is he similar to you?

do you have to get the last word too? this is often a recipe for disaster IME. I back down over petty things.

i'm of the mind that i have two two year olds (twins) and some days all they do is fight over everything, and it drives me insane and yes i do eventually loose my temper and they stand there and watch and something in there brain says right mums had enough and like magic it changes the scene. I challenge these programmes like supernanny where they make her look so perfect and calm and make you feel like its bad to loose your temper she is a nanny, she has her evenings to herself she still has her ow life, somedays i have forgotten wht it is to just have a quiet few moments to get a job done, she can also say cut when she feels she wants to take five....leaving your kids on the motorway is ridiculous but having a shout to just regain some control...its certainly not child abuse

agree completely with fillyjonk. i also remember seeing on one of Robert Winston's programmes a psychologist parent posit that the reason teenagers are so up and down is because of their hormones, yes, but that the hormones may swing because directing their moods at their parents teach them how to deal with conflict.
she said that a 'perfect parent' might therefore seek to minimise conflict and always reason etc etc and that she did that 95% of the time. but the other 5%, when she was pushed to blow her stack, she felt was as valid a learning experience as the rest, as sometimes you just can't expect the world to shift sideways for you. i was Rather Comforted by that.

ds is 9, dd is 7. I try not to sweat the small stuff, but he really will argue about anything at all. That's the worst bit, getting drawn into endless discussions/arguments about every little thing I ask him to do.

hmm I am unconvinced shouting achieves anything tbh

yes of course it is human, yes of course we all do it but to say it like magic and works to diffuse a situation is going a bit far.