Do people physically force kids?

[Anonymouslyposting]

My 2.5 year old DD is going through the terrible twos. She is a lovely, clever, kind little girl but I am having to take a lot of deep breaths at the moment…

She won’t do anything she’s asked to - get up, get dressed, eat, drink, go out, do any activity we suggest, have her vitamins, brush her teeth or go to bed. She’s intermittently rejecting my DH who used to be a firm favourite and has started occasional hitting (she seems more to be trying to see our reaction that hurt us). Apparently she is good as good at nursery but is the same with her grandparents.

I understand that this is developmentally normal, she’s testing boundaries and asserting herself, particularly as we have a 4 month old who is taking my attention and I’m sure has been unsettling for her.

But what do we do? Do we really have to physically force her into her clothes/the buggy/to brush her teeth every time? I’ve tried explaining things to her, waiting until she gets bored and gives in (but I don’t always have time for this), mirroring her feelings but none of this works consistently. I’m sure she’ll go out of this phase but is it normal for everything to be a fight until then?

I'm perfectly capable of manhandling my child for their sake without abusing them thanks.

Or perhaps I'll ask once nicely and if they say no and the car suddenly brakes and they go through a window screen I'll shrug my shoulders and say we'll what could I DO?

But you must have physically forced your child to do things in the past - a 12 month old who doesn't enjoy having their teeth brushed for example? Or a 3 year old who didn't want their pre-school jabs? Just because they're being forced doesn't mean grabbed and yanked roughly around. My three year old didn't want her jabs (she was fine with the first one but then she knew what was coming so didn't want the second) so she was forced in the sense that if it had been up to her, it wouldn't have happened. But it didn't even come close to leaving a mark or hurting her, I sat her on my lap and held her firmly (like a tight cuddle) in a way that held her still.
There's an age where they are not babies (who obviously don't choose what they do), but they are not yet old enough to be reasoned with.

Teeth are non negotiable here, we fortunately found something that worked for us and now he's a bit older he doesn't mind doing them. We used to put the toothbrush song on and all do our teeth at the same time, he chose a toothbrush too and started to actually look forward to it which was...unexpected! Getting dressed and stuff was often frustrating, was a case of giving a bit of control to him- ie putting clothes in drawers and letting him choose. We did trousers, shorts, tee shirts, jumpers, socks, briefs etc in separate drawers and then weather dependant said which drawers to look in so he had something suitable but that he chose.

Every child is different though, he was frustrated at that age I think by starting to be more aware that he could indeed say no and wanting more freedom. For us after trial and error the above worked, didn't seem to really be 'giving in' either as the end result was the same.

What happens when the child ends up with marks on their skin when you’ve forced them to comply? I assume everyone physically manhandling their children are doing it in such a way that it won’t potentially bring SS to the door if the child says ‘mummy hurt me last night’.

Why would there be marks? My DS had to have a lot of medication from a young age, we often had to (safely) restrain him so we could administer it. Yes I felt awful about it, but his consultant showed us the best way to do it and without it he would have been very poorly. Teeth are the same vein really, having to have extensive in some cases dental work at a young age is quite brutal, they need their teeth brushing as part of maintaining their health; I wouldn't judge anyone making this happen as long as done as carefully as possible.

I remember sitting my child on my lap to have jabs. I’m sure in the past I’ve grabbed the kids out of the road as one of the examples stated. I’ve probably had to hold them still to put a car seat buckle on them. But no I’ve never had to force them to submit to teeth brushing or medicine taking. I get more creative than that.

I’m honestly amazed at so many people justifying using physical force. It’s really interesting.

I would hope most parents can make sure their children's needs are met without physically harming their DC. what did you do if your DC didn't want their nappy changing, leave them in the same dirty nappy? As that is a form of neglect and SS would be concerned.

But that never happened.

I’ve managed to raise two kids without ever fighting them in and out of nappies. Bizarre.

It's quite bizarre that you cannot comprehend children are all different, even as babies. What would you creative idea be for a 1 year old who needs medicine administering every few hours for a period of 6 months and won't open their mouth, won't stay still and thrashes about beyond safely restraining them as advised by their consultant? Not giving the meds was not an option.

I think you're making a straw man argument, but adults are much, much, bigger than toddlers. It is not difficult to make them do something if you need them to do it without actually hurting them.

My youngest sounds like your two. You're not creative, you're lucky.

I think you're making a straw man argument, but adults are much, much, bigger than toddlers. It is not difficult to make them do something if you need them to do it without actually hurting them.

Agreed. If you're leaving a mark on a child, then you're using a lot of force. DD2 once had to be held down by two nurses while another tried to get a cannula into her hand (she was far too young to do any kind of reasoning with, but she needed IV antibiotics). They tried one hand, then the other, then back to the first. It took forever and she was hysterical by the end and really trying to thrash about, but there wasn't a mark on her. No one reasonable is leaving a mark because they've made a child get dressed.

A couple of days after this incident we were in the day surgery unit at the hospital and there was a boy about 7/8 having 8 teeth removed. He was far more distressed than my DD has ever been on the rare occasions she's been made to have her teeth brushed. It was awful.

No one is on about hurting them though? Are people conflating something having to physically intervene to get something essential done to being abusive and/or inflicting physical harm? They're not the same thing.

Oh sorry think I misread your post @BertieBotts !

Can you give examples of this “creativeness”, @RudsyFarmer ?
I’ll lay odds it really isn’t anything untried by the masses, you just have unusually compliant kids.

Absolutely!

Rudsyfarmer is going on about leaving marks and SS being interested :)

I'm pretty sure no social worker is going to look at a parent forcing a tantruming, overheated, tired child into a car seat, or antibiotics into a miserable unwell child and say "What terrible abuse!" they would say "Glad you're using an appropriate child restraint, administering medical care and having boundaries" 🤷‍♀️

Sometimes they get past the point of no return and it's much easier (and kinder) to make sure whatever it is gets done (and then comfort them and praise them for being brave) than spend hours being creative and trying to persuade them, while everyone gets even more tired, grumpy, overwhelmed etc.

If you aren't at that point yet, the persuasion, creativity, play, positive methods etc work very well. If anyone wants more ideas for this in between phase I'd highly recommend the How To Talk series of books. There is also a good course on Coursera called The ABCs of Everyday Parenting.

The very big difference between you and a lot of people on this thread is that you have been shown how to restrain your child SAFELY.
And that’s a really big thing because there is a way to it and I doubt many people know how to do this. I certainly don’t.

I also believe that trying to restrain a child (eg to take medicine) who is 12 months old isn’t the same than a 2.5 yo let alone a 5 yo. (Plus of course you have the difference between size, strength etc…).

Teeth brushing for me has always been something that has made uncomfortable.
1- because if you restrain your child with one hand and try to brush their teeth with the other, it’s impossible to do a good job. So the question is - is it worth it?
2- giving medicine is a quick put in mouth action. Brushing teeth is several minutes long
3- brushing someone else teeth Wo it being uncomfortable is difficult when they don’t trash . It will be near impossible if the child isn’t still.

For me, brushing teeth has always been one I refused to make it a battle of will. I used different techniques instead. I let them not brush their teeth. I made sure they ate well, avoided sweets and co.

The result is two children who are now adults and have no issue with teeth brushing, or cavities etc…
One of them is also on the spectrum and had major sensory issues with the brushing (understood years later but god was I happy not to have restrained him then!).

unless, it’s a life and death situation (like grabbing a child that is going to run onto the road etc…), physical force should be a last resort really.

You can try sticker charts and being fun, but if it doesn’t work, for their well-being you sometimes have to use force. Not brushing their teeth because they didn’t want you to would be neglect.

My youngest sounds like your two. You're not creative, you're lucky.

Agree with this. You can't have two children and declare that all children can be "creatively" made to do anything you want.

Are you drunk?

That’s very out of date. People don’t think it’s ok to hit a toddler for not brushing their teeth these days.

For me, brushing teeth has always been one I refused to make it a battle of will. I used different techniques instead. I let them not brush their teeth. I made sure they ate well, avoided sweets and co.
Yeah, that’s called avoiding the situation, not managing it.
Not for me.

If I had to hold them to brush their teeth, I just did a quick sweep around less than 20 seconds probably. I wouldn't hold them there for a full 2 minutes! It's more about communicating no, this really has to be done (even if minimally) than about getting a thorough brush in.

I found the most effective tactic for tooth brushing at 2.5 is to look for the colours in their mouth and guess what they have eaten. You start out with normal, plausible foods and graduate to ever more silly suggestions like alligator and roof tile and socks, which keeps it fun after the initial novelty has worn off. (If you do the silly suggestions first they don't get it and won't cooperate).

I don’t agree with that, at all

Yes, but I agree with another poster who said to pick your battles. Decide what are the basic standards that your child needs to comply with and enforce these. We found that our children started complying fairly quickly when they realised that we were serious every day.

If I had to hold them to brush their teeth, I just did a quick sweep around less than 20 seconds probably. I wouldn't hold them there for a full 2 minutes!

See my point 1
What is the point of insisting fir 20 seconds when it should be 2 mins? Is the 20 seconds quick sweep actually making any difference to teeth health?