my MIL slapped my child + told me

[hermykne]

they were spoilt.
not in material goods but in how i treat them.

its one day later and i am still quite hurt about her saying this to me and for slapping ds. DD got very upset when she did it to ds.
i was out food shopping.

basically she said a good sla p would stop the antics of a nearly 5 and 3 yr old.

i feel i can withdraw or send her a note, as a friend suggested. not good face to face.

littlelapin - I agree absolutely that if you're the full-time parent, it is the sort of thing that you can let pass. But I also know it's the sort of thing that my parents would see as evidence that my children were cheeky. I just think we need to be realistic about our expectations of people from older generations looking after our kids and accept that they are unlikely to parent as we do.

Anyway, i'm not getting into a smacking thread, I shall fall asleep (yawn)

Been thinking about this away from the computer and thought exactly the same as Kittywits! Oops. But I have to say, I agree with you Kittywits. Parents should be in control, not children. That was my point earlier.

Littlelapin

are we talking about dogs or children? You know, human beings.

the inevitable consequence of not twatting your kids

He He DG you and I can be terrifying parents together!!
Anyways what I think is not so shocking. I've a sneaky feeling that if more parents thought along the same lines society wouldn't be quite so ill disciplined

Kitty for Prime minister I'll sort 'em out

LOL LL, my ds refuses to wear underpants. Presumaby i should be giving him a light whack every morning in his own best interests lest he chafes.

No ruty, just make him put them on

Kittywits, you are so wrong. It is because children are subjected to and witnessing so much violence that society has so many problems.

Well, if this was me, I am afraid I would say to my child: "I have told you to put your socks on, now will you please do it?" (Actually, me being me, I would put them on for them if they were 3 but that is another issue - help! 4 yo ds3 is starting school in a week and still can't dress himself! )

I am afraid I couldn't do the "OK go without socks and get blisters and learn from your mistakes" route because I know darn well that if my child got blisters and was in pain, they would make a lot more fuss than would be made in the battle over whether to put the socks on or not. So it might appear that I am being draconian (and I am a strict parent, I freely admit it and am not ashamed of it) but it would actually be me taking what I would see as the easiest way out.

If I was then feeling in a middle-class, liberal frame of mind, I would then explain nicely that wearing socks prevents nasty painful things called blisters, but if I was hassled and cross (and hey I am human!) then I would leave it at that and I suppose you could argue that the child has not learnt the lesson of Why Socks Are A Good Thing.

But at least I will have partly taught my children to do as they are told which I see as one of my parenting duties.

make him how kittywits? Of course he will be a threat to society because i don't force him to wear underpants. That is hilarious. He is a rather kind considerate child actually and I intend to keep him that way thanks.

Dear me. Could some posters please understand that there are more than 2 ways to parent? Some people seem to think we either let Johnny learn from his own mistakes or we thrash the living daylights out of him. I am draconian enough to expect my children to do as they are told, but I do not smack them.

Please could we have some acknowledgement of the middle ground here?

Quite right DG. I don't ever have to smack my kids in order to get them to do what they are told.
If on a good day, I will be calm and patient if on a bad they will get told to just 'do it'.
Of course my kids are no angels, but they do know who is boss, I am their mother and what i say goes.

There are many occassions when I turn a blind eye, when I chose not to pick up on stuff and my kids will try it on , all the time.

I can put up with naughtiness when with me, but disobedience with another adult, especially a grandparent is completely unacceptable.

I find it embarassing when my kids are disrespectful to other adults ( and they are sometimes,of course) but, it reflects on me as a parent.

haven't read the whole thread but i do think that there is a generation gap here. smacking was not viewed in the same way it is now, years ago. we come from a 'supernanny' background, where parents are encouraged to use tactics when dealing with childrens bad behaviour, ie, warnings, naughty step etc. i was smacked as a child, i don't smack my own children although there have been a few occasions where i could have been driven to it.

yesterday, i was in the supermarket and a girl, about 6, was having a major tantrum at the checkout. i heard the woman on the till who was serving me (who was about 45ish i guess) say 'that child needs a good slapping' i was quite shocked, more shocked by her saying that than i was at the tantrum itself.

Does a 3YO understand enough about cause and effect to get that no socks = blisters?

And yes, there is a middle ground and I'm in it (although clearly on the more disciplinarian end of the scale it seems )

I generally don't support smacking, but my parents smacked me through my childhood years, and I am glad they did.
I know for sure I would have gotten too smarty-arsy for my own good if I had been let away with some of my antics. Looking back, some antics of mine as a child simply deserved a smack (although not wanting to put on socks is not one of them, IMO).

I haven't succumbed to smacking my DD, but there have been times when no amount of reasoning will do, and I have threatened her with a smack, and unfortunately, had to carry out the threat. But they're few and far in between and always a light smack, enough for her to get the point that I mean business.

IMO, the OP's MIL went too far. However, if my MIL smacked my DD, I would trust that it was done for a VERY good reason. Personally, I would get more upset to be told that my children are spoilt than for them to be smacked by their gran.

Am I missing something ,Ithought that it was now illegal to slap a child under five and leave a mark.In which case the original pooster should just point out that MIL has committed an offence