Spanking

[MonchichiRyan]

I have had a bad mother's day.

My 4-year-old DS was throwing tantrum and kicked a glass panel repeatedly. No matter what I said, I could not stop him. So I slapped on his right foot once, hard enough for him to feel painful. He stopped kicking right away and ran back to his room and cried. I at the same time told him that he could continue crying, and when he was done crying, come to apologize. After 15 minutes, he did calm down and apologized. Having said all that, I actually regretted spanking him in the first place. I myself have not recovered since, so I bet he has not either.

I read something randomly about spanking just lately, and revisited that article again after what happened. There is a line there I want to understand more, and hope someone here can elaborate.

"By hitting our kids we are teaching them to continue to seek love from people who hurt them, which is something no parent wants."

What does that really mean? Does it mean he will easily become target of bullies when he grows up? Did I become a bully when I spanked him?

I am worried sick that I have created trauma to my DS. I have apologized to DS that hitting him was my mistake, before I calmly explained to him that doing dangerous things like kicking glass panels or putting fingers into socket holes are never acceptable. He seemed pleased that I apologized, but I am not sure if there is anything else I should do to make sure he understands. Any advice to share?

You probably can feel I am not very organized here. My brain is cloudy and not thinking straight at the moment.

At the end of the day, it made him realize that he was in the wrong and he apologized. He won't be traumatized at all. He might be a bit more aware of your authority though. I wouldn't apologize to him either as it will downplay your authority to him. Just leave it be and next time maybe use time out instead. Don't worry about it really

Hitting a child is a poor way to discipline them. I think you know that, which is why you feel bad about it.
I actually would apologise to him, say you got really annoyed by his behaviour but hitting someone isn't right.
It is really frustrating at times dealing with children, but I think you need to chalk this one down as a mistake, find some new tactics and move on.

@Timmytoo

At the end of the day, it made him realize that he was in the wrong and he apologized. He won't be traumatized at all. He might be a bit more aware of your authority though. I wouldn't apologize to him either as it will downplay your authority to him. Just leave it be and next time maybe use time out instead. Don't worry about it really

This - it’s not ideal, but it’s certainly not going to traumatise him. I would not apologise - he’s far too young to understand the subtleties and you need to be the authority figure. Time out should work ok next time.

By hitting our kids we are teaching them to continue to seek love from people who hurt them, which is something no parent wants."

What does that really mean? Does it mean he will easily become target of bullies when he grows up? Did I become a bully when I spanked him?

Well, in answer to this question, I was smacked regularly and physically disciplined by my mother as a child. I was then very badly bullied at school, most likely because my body language screamed “victim” and then as an adult got stuck in a pattern of abusive relationships. I really really had to work hard to understand normal boundaries.

It’s a complete mindfuck to be a child and be hit by the person who is meant to love you unconditionally and upon whom your entire existence depends.

Look, as a one off, I’m sure this won’t have irrevocably damaged your son, but really it’s not ok to hit your child. Call it spanking or whatever but it makes no odds, it’s unnecessary, does more damage than good and their are better ways to parent in the long term.

NameCganged has summed up perfectly that line. You love him, you got him, it's ok for people to hit him, they do it because they love him.

In your scenario is have moved him away physically

You had no way to stop a 4 year old kicking a glass panel except by hitting him? Why didn’t you physically remove him?

And then told him he could keep crying? Before things go much further you might want to read about trying ‘time in’ as a response to tantrums rather than time outs and hitting.

I doubt one instance will cause trauma but it’s a hideous way to parent. You need some new strategies fast.

I don’t use physical punishment as discipline but my girls have never kicked a glass door. If he was putting himself in danger I think it’s acceptable to smack him. My mum slapped my hand when I was playing with the open fire. It didn’t upset me.

Although a last resort Associating danger with pain as bad as trying to promote positive behaviour with slapping.

Is there a reason you couldn’t have just picked him up and removed him from the glass? Or distracted him - (“right let’s go and make a snack/watch some tv/play a game. Count to five and race you to the kitchen/lounge? One, two...come on get ready, three, three and a quarrrrter, three and a half...” never failed with a neurotypical child yet ime!).

You hit someone much smaller and younger than you, so when you asked if that made you a bully...well, it could appear that way, Bullies target those weaker than them. As an isolated incident don’t beat yourself up, what is done is done now. But don’t do it again because all those messages like, it’s ok to hit smaller people, it’s ok for someone to hurt me and say they love me etc will take root if your persist with physical punishments. And dare I say, emotional punishments like sending a child who has been hit and is crying as a result of that away aren’t really great either.

Look, when we know better we do better. Sometimes we treat our children the way our parents treated us. But times have changed and what was once acceptable isn’t any longer.

Isn’t as bad as

Oh dear
I am sure as a one off it won’t adversely affect him but hitting a child is not acceptable
Apologise to him,say you will never do it again,then don’t

You know what you did was wrong, next time you are loosing control of your emotions, just put him in his room and leave him there, safely, until you regain your perspective and control.

Yet again a mum comes on here saying shes hit a child and receives supported responses and flower emojis. If she was saying her husband hit a 4 year old 'hard enough to be painful' she would be told hes a violent bastard and to leave and protect her child.

Supportive not supported

Sorry op but this is awful. If a man wrote this everyone would be in uproar. Remove him from the situation. Hitting and hurting him and telling him he can keep crying? He apologised before you did to get your affection back. The article means if you continue this, he will think it's ok to be hit because you love him so it's acceptable/ he deserved it. As a one off you've not done lasting damage - but you do need to speak with him and explain you were wrong. No trying to make excuses for your behaviour, "mummy did this because I panicked" "you weren't listening" etc - no blaming him for your actions. "What mummy did was wrong and I'm very sorry, it won't happen again."

@Sandgrown1970 your children sound incredibly compliant. Distraction would never have worked for mine at that age when they were in a rage.

She probably didn’t physically remove him because she didn’t want to risk being kicked in the face.

It wasn’t ideal but I wouldn’t be in uproar about a man doing this either as a one time thing with no plans to repeat.

[quote 3WildOnes]@Sandgrown1970 your children sound incredibly compliant. Distraction would never have worked for mine at that age when they were in a rage.

She probably didn’t physically remove him because she didn’t want to risk being kicked in the face.

It wasn’t ideal but I wouldn’t be in uproar about a man doing this either as a one time thing with no plans to repeat.[/quote]
I’m an HLTA, formerly in mainstream schools but more recently SEN settings and referral units. I don’t think my suggestion would require a remarkably compliant 4 year old at all, certainly not my experience in 20
years in EYFS. I get hit and kicked in the face by much older children these days as part of my job with children who have disabilities which results in very challenging behaviour so a bit of kicking to get a four year old out of harm’s way wouldn’t bother me a jot. Rather that than lift my hands to a tiny child and hurt them.

@Sandgrown1970 I have worked with children too but my own children aren’t nearly as compliant as the children I work with. I think children save their worst behaviour for their parents.

I am not really trying to defend hitting a child just saying that distraction wouldn’t have worked with all of mine when they got in a rage.

[quote 3WildOnes]@Sandgrown1970 I have worked with children too but my own children aren’t nearly as compliant as the children I work with. I think children save their worst behaviour for their parents.

I am not really trying to defend hitting a child just saying that distraction wouldn’t have worked with all of mine when they got in a rage.[/quote]
Well, I must be exceptionally lucky with both my own children and the children I’ve encountered professionally then. Distraction and giving children alternative choices and options, when well executed, does work for me, my family members and colleagues. That’s been my experience and I can’t un-live that experience.

[quote 3WildOnes]@Sandgrown1970 your children sound incredibly compliant. Distraction would never have worked for mine at that age when they were in a rage.

She probably didn’t physically remove him because she didn’t want to risk being kicked in the face.

It wasn’t ideal but I wouldn’t be in uproar about a man doing this either as a one time thing with no plans to repeat.[/quote]
So she risked him breaking the glass instead. Hitting him could just have easily made him more angry and kick harder. What would have been the next step if the first got hadn't worked?

There's no excuse for hitting him instead of moving him unless there's a physical disability, and if that's the case she needs to consider whether she can keep him safe at present on her own

@SleepingStandingUp I dont think hitting was the right reaction but I also don’t think the answer is as simple as distraction and I was just explaining why she probably didn’t just remove him.

It’s my view that hitting a child is always wrong, in every circumstance. I don’t think one incident will make him susceptible to bullies, but I also think that if you can justify hitting a small child there are probably reasons to be concerned.

In this instance you’ve apologised and it sounds like it’s not something you’re going to do again. I don’t think you need to worry about long term trauma from one incident. But I think you need to really work on strategies to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

Hitting him was bad but telling him to just keep on crying - in response to you having intentionally hurt him because you couldn’t think of another way to stop him kicking a glass door - was absolutely awful. What were you thinking?

You hurt your child, on purpose, his reaction will have been pain, shock and fear, and you left him crying for 15 minutes instead of hugging him and trying to comfort him.

I can’t make you feel better about that because it’s really nasty and upsetting. I’m aghast people are shrugging it off.

Other people are absolutely right that if you’d posted that your child was having a tantrum and your boyfriend or husband hurt him to make him stop then left him sobbing for quarter of an hour every response would be to call the police for assault, kick him out and make sure he never saw the child unsupervised again.

When it’s a woman admitting her own failures the number of people going “awww, parenting is hard, we all do stuff like that, he’ll forget it straight away, go have a glass of wine and forgive yourself” is sickening.

I know you feel bad but I bet your little boy feels worse. Find better strategies.

[quote 3WildOnes]@SleepingStandingUp I dont think hitting was the right reaction but I also don’t think the answer is as simple as distraction and I was just explaining why she probably didn’t just remove him.[/quote]
Would nay of those reasons be ok if it had been her partner? DH said he hit his because if he'd lifted him up he might have got kicked?