I massively lost my shit with ds

[NastyOldBag]

And now I feel awful.

He’s 7yo and it’s the first time I’ve ever been absolutely furious with him. I’ve just split up from Dh and with that and the stress of trying to keep my elderly parents safe and well I’m just done in and exhausted emotionally and physically.

I was doing a little experiment thing with him and ds2 where you put pepper in water and show how soap moves it (trying to encourage hand washing). I was in the middle of chatting to dc’s about it and ds1 just decided to leave the room. I said
‘Ds can you come back?’ and he just ignored me and went and sat in the sitting room. I sat next to him and told him that he can’t just walk out, if he’s not interested in something, I don’t mind if he doesn’t want to do it but he needs to just say so before he walks out of the room. He continues to ignore me and picks up his Yugioh cards. I said ‘ds, I’m talking to you, can you at least respond to acknowledge you can hear me’. He says ‘whatever’ and points to the door signalling me to go, something Dh did and which I used to absolutely hate. I told him that was really rude and that he needed to apologise immediately or he’d be in big trouble. He rolls his eyes and says ‘whatever, just go and play with your pepper’. At this point I just lost it and grabbed his cards out of his hand and threw them out of the window.

Ds is now finally asleep having sobbed about his cards for a good 40 minutes. They immediately blew all over the garden, it’s absolutely pouring down outside and I refused to let him out to get them. He gets £4 a week pocket money which is enough to buy a pack of 5 cards. I threw about 50 out of the window, he’s been collecting them for months.

I now feel absolutely horrible. He’s due to see his dad tomorrow and I know he’s going to complain about me to him. He goes to a yugioh club after school once a week and now won’t be able to go as he has no cards. His parents are splitting up and I’ve just thrown his favourite thing in the world out of the window.

Should I go and see if any are salvageable?

@frazzledasarockI think expecting good behaviour is important but so is empathy for the child. With children, behaviour is communication. They behave like that when they feel bad, and need help. Not punishment. And he is modelling his father and needs help with that. Not punishment.

@NoProblem123 LOL, well said.

He will learn that destroying possessions is a way to control. It's a shit lesson to learn.

@frazzledasarock
But how does he know its wrong? Sounds like, in his family home, it was normal behaviour. It's just how his dad acted, so he still copy that behaviour. And now he's seeing that when your upset, it's ok to be horrible. His dad would point out the door and his mum will destroy the things he treasures. That's his home life.... but he's meant to just know not yo behave that way? And should be horribly punished if he does? Nice.

Sounds like a horribly tough time for you all. Of course you know you overreacted, we all do sometimes. I'm shocked how many people think their DC should be able to do as they pleased, do manners and rules not exist in their house??
Yes he will remember it but he will get over it. I remember when I was probably about 10 and my brother 8, he was whinging about his sandwich and had been in a horrid mood all day, DM was stressed to bits anyway, snapped and shouted and launched his sandwich across the room. We were horrified but have a giggle about it now!

You owe your child an apology and you should source replacement cards. My late husband was big on excessive punishments handed out in anger. I still have a DD in therapy. Make sure this is a one off. You should be deeply ashamed of what you did.

@notalurker2 that isn't what he would learn though. He would learn that he was upset and not coping and his mother was upset and not coping and that people get upset and don't cope and when he is upset and doesn't cope someone might damage his property and think it is ok so it is ok for him to damage property if someone treats him badly.

Getting annoyed and explaining to a child that you are annoyed and why and what is and isn't acceptable behaviour is ok. Chucking their stuff out of a window isn't.

Christ, lots of you perfect parents are being v harsh.

OP got pissed off with her DS. She’s going through a rough time and over reacted, as I’m sure we have all done at one point.

Give her a break. Kids are a nightmare sometimes

Can totally see how that happened. Buy them back and apologise, will be ok.

She was treated badly and reacted accordingly

By grabbing her 7 year old child’s most treasured possessions and throwing them out the window.

I certainly dont "have a giggle" now about the stuff my mum did in anger whenever her and my dad weren't speaking.

I got s smack across the face because my sister and I were arguing over what to watch on TV. Mum wasn't in the room. She was upstairs arguing with my dad but she came storming down the stairs and slapped us both across the face. At bedtime, my fave was swollen and I wouldn't speak to her so she said "do you want me to get the other side and even it up for you"... because I was being rude by not talking to her.

It's not ok to get so angry that you cant control yourself and resort to violent acts. Chucking stuff around is a violent act and is frightening. I cant believe the number of people saying it's ok. It isn't. It needs to be the last time you let anger take over.

It was a massive over reaction. He was rude and it would have been completely appropriate to remove his cards until he apologised but to destroy his treasured possessions in anger because he reminded you of his dads abuse of you is abusive itself.

He is learning how to behave from you two. Your ex has showed him some terrible ways to communicate. Now you’ve showed him that if someone pisses you off enough you can destroy their property.

It’s not too late to rescue this though. Explain why what he did wasn’t ok but also that what you did wasn’t ok either. Talk a bit about how each of you could have done better. Cuddle him, love him and repair/replace as many of the cards as you can. And mentally prepare some better responses and sanctions for the next time he acts out.

No it's not funny. I don't giggle over the shit I had to go through either.

Sorry OP but that was really low of you.
He is 7, very small in the grand scheme of things.
His Dad has taught him it's ok to be rude to people and
You have now taught him that it's ok to lose control and destroy another person's property.
I'm glad you have recognised that this is not ok but you dound more worried about your ex finding out rather than your son being distressed.

@alfier It was more than being upset and not coping. He's learning that when he's upset and not coping, he gets to treat his mother like crap, possibly stepping into his father's shoes in that way. That's not acceptable. I'm also a single mom and have to be firm with my kids in my own defense because there's no one else there to tell them not to treat me badly. Teaching them to be respectful to me is part of my job. FWIW, they're certainly not perfect but I'm often told that my kids are so kind and polite etc. so I think it's sticking. I'm shocked at how some kids talk to their mothers without any correction.

You should be deeply ashamed of what you did.

Oh stop it now. OP is upset about her reaction without the perfect parents wagging their fingers at her. Give her a break.

Shockingly rude for a 7 year old, and then to point'to the door for you to go?!? Wow.

I wouldn't be rushing to replace his cards either. There's a reason your marriage to his father ended, and you don't want him to turn into a mini version. Time to install manners.

His 7.
His attitude is disgusting

Attitude and bad behaviour has consequences

So if a woman posted here that she was rude to her husband and that he got really angry at her and threw her favourite thing out the window, would people really be telling her that she deserved it, that she needed to be taught manners, that he was absolutely right to do what he did ???

I think people are being really harsh. Everyone is having a really hard time and OP is having the worst time of all trying to hang in there. These things happen in the heat of the moment and there is no point beating yourself up about it. And this is another reason not to live with an abuser as boys will copy the behaviour.

'Give me the boy until he is 7 and I will show you the man'.

Some kids that appear kind and polite and seethe do so through silent compliance not because they respect their parents and seethe in private and then act out in other ways.

OP may have had a bad day and hopefully has learned she was wrong but her not a behaviour to be encouraged as the ideal. Correcting behaviour is fine through explaining but not punishment or abuse and particularly not from the one labour of love someone has painstakenly devoted their time to because it gave them respite from their parents breakup.

That’s why I said to sit and talk to him when both are calmer and replace the cards faster as and when he behaves well is good.

Letting him get away with rude behaviour is not going to help him. And he does know it’s rude and he does know it’s not right to point to the door and dismiss his mother. He’s seven that’s old enough to understand what he is doing is rude.

It's not shocking at all. He's a child who's grown up in a home were his parents seem volatile and rude to one another. So he's learned to behave the same way. Hardly shocking when he stars being rude; look at his role models.

OP is clear that her son is aping his father in at least some of behaviour. He’s 7. He’s fucking 7. He’s copying what he’s been shown, repeatedly, and he’s in the middle of his family falling apart with an extremely stressed mum.

I’m the last person to make excuses for poor behaviour from children just because they have divorced parents but ffs, it’s going on in his short life right now. He didn’t ask for any of this. It’s not his fault his dad was rude to his mum. Its not his fault his parents are splitting up. It’s not his fault his mum is stressed. It’s not his fault there’s a global pandemic. Cut him some fucking slack.

To me it sounds like the parents trying too hard and children find that boring. We have all been there. I would buy the cards back for him.
I think I would be angry for him being rude too, but also throwing away something very precious to him out of anger is not right as an adult.