How to Talk so Kids Will Listen.../Unconditional Parenting/TCS thread

[flamingobingo]

Not sure if this will work! But come here and post if you want some helpful creative thinking from other parents also striving to talk in a way that will make their kids listen, parent unconditionally or to take their children seriously (more links)

No judgey-pants allowed, and only 'I want to find out more' questions, please - no debates

Firstly - please, someone, please, tell me how to get my 4yo to stop spitting! She's got into a real habit. It's not proper spitting, but raspberry blowing, but she's got into this horrid habit where she just does it so frequently.

It's driving me mad, and I am getting to the point where I am thinking the only solution is to threaten her with something - can't think what though, and don't want to do that anyway .

Please help!

another hit and miss family here. But we don't eat much in the way of tooth rotting foods (no sticky sweets, no dried fruit etc) and we DO eat a lot of hard cheese all on its own as a tasty snack. We also do natural term breastfeeding which helps. Oh, and we are lucky enough to have good genes (both my oh and I were horrified and mortified to have to have our first ever fillings about a year ago, in our (ahem) mid 30s. Well, it's still mid-30s till you're 39, isn't it?

Xylitol sugar added in small quantities to cakes and stuff kills the bacteria which causes tooth decay.

Also, as long as oral hygeine is relatively ok, your children are going to have all those teeth drop our anyway aged 7ish. I know it's a bad thing if they go rotten and the adult teeth go rotten underneath, but they don't have to be completely sparkly white since they only have to last 7 or so years, yk?

vitamin D has a massive effect on reducing tooth decay:

http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2009/03/reversing-tooth-decay.html link

In fact, vitamin D supplements plus a no-grain or low-grain diet would be a good way of pretty much eradicating cavities. Sod tooth brushing...

Great thread haven't managed to read all of it though.

I am very much inclined towards UP, but like a lot of people have mentioned on this thread, it can be difficult not to revert to age old (handed down) tactics.

I'm sure I will be back on here soon.

OK, another 'what should I have done better' question.

This morning, dd got dressed in a new favourite dress, which is longsleeved and made of thick material. Its turned out a very hot sunny day.

She, DH and M/FiL were planning to go out for the day, and basically by the time they were planning to go 1/2 an hour ago DD had gone into meltdown - she'd got too hot playing outside, but didn't want to take off favourite dress. She also wanted to go out with DH, but said (in roughly this order) she was too hot, she wasn't going to take the dress off, she didn't want to go in the hot car in her hot clothes, and she did want to go out (and not stay home with me, which would also have been fine).

I will confess at this point to have said 'look, the dress is coming off' and forcibly removing it. She ran around in her underpants for about 15 minutes shouting. After which she calmed down, we found some thinner clothes, and they went out.

So . . . can anyone suggest a more consensual approach at the point when you have massively overheated child who won't stop, have a drink, remove clothes etc.?

Did you recap the problem and then ask her whether she'd got any suggestions?

"DD you're so hot, you've got a thick dress on and you don't want to take it off. What can we do?"
Or was she beyond that kind of thinking?

Suggest you go and pick out a really special summer dress together. If you can't do it straight away, you could write down on a wall calendar when you can so she can see how long she has to wait.

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I think you're right, OTOC, perhaps trying to calm her down and get her thinking straight about the problem would have helped.

Once she cooled down, in fact what to wear wasn't an issue - and I think if everything hadn't gone pearshaped she'd have been quite happy to take the dress along and change into it if it got cooler.

I guess in retrospect there were a whole lot of flashpoints going on (she wasn't sure whether she'd like the outing but didn't want to miss out, DH was stressed because he finds his parents quite difficult, he was trying to get dd sorted out before they turned up and joined in the scene) and we really got it all wrong earlier in the morning.

typing while i've only read half as i just wanted to say to horton...... you could tell your dd about my dd if you think it would help; she picked her nose so much she ended up with severe nosebleeds; up to 2/3 heavy ones every single day and had to have her nose cauterised .

you could google nasal cauterisation with your dd, should put her right off, and tell her about the little scissors on tweezers that the ENT doc shoved up dd's nose to snip the damaged blood vessals away, with no anaesthetic

moving swiftly on thanks for this thread...it's really helping me understand these parenting techniques better, although my huge bug bear is still the lack of punishments or rewards for major things like attacking a sibling physically or achieving something worthy of recognition

Oooh, PinkTulips, you have made me go all wibbly. That sounds absolutely vile!! Your poor little girl. Hope she didn't suffer any lasting trauma!

Actually, we've had a bit of a breakthrough on the nose picking. DD was in a particularly receptive mood the other day so I seized my chance and had a really proper conversation about it with her. I said that other people don't like seeing nose picking and it upsets them and she agreed that upsetting people wasn't nice. We are planning to buy some hankies on the understanding that they are used for nose cleaning in private. In the mean time, we have bought a couple of mini packs of pretty tissues and she can have one whenever she asks. She's still picking her nose but at least she's wiping it on a tissue instead of the floor/sofa/her clothes. And she is mainly doing it in front of the television which is okay by me as she mainly watches it when we're alone and I'm cooking. So it's all looking up, thanks!

PinkTulips, I don't think there should be no consequences for something like attacking a sibling, but that doesn't have to mean punishment. What I find helpful when DD has done something really antisocial like pushing or snatching is to take her away and calm her down. Then I ask her 'Do you like it when someone else snatches something from you?' and point out that everyone feels exactly the same about things like that and that if you snatch you are definitely making someone else sad on purpose and that's not on. In extreme cases of continual snatching or whatever, I remove her from the situation to somewhere dull and keep pointing out that she's away from the fun and bored because she snatched and it is mean to snatch. Asking her if she meant to do something mean or if it was an accident also sometimes helps. I think it helps her think about how you need to think before you act. TBH, she is mortified if she thinks she has been mean or upset someone (these are the biggest possible crimes in our house) so often just pointing out that she's upset someone (which at 2.8 she might not have already noticed properly) is enough to get her to stop. Apologies if this is all a bit basic or if you've already tried all these kinds of things.

Also, re rewards, I think the idea is that doing well is kind of its own reward but that doesn't need to stop you agreeing that the child has done something good, does it? If DD shares a treat or toy without prompting or offers a go on a swing to a waiting child, I always praise her for being thoughtful and kind, but then she mostly says 'I shared! I shared!' so I think it's important to acknowledge that she knows she's done something good. I don't know if that is wrong. I also do say good girl, which I think you're not meant to, but if the child understands that it's not for achievement but for effort and thoughtfulness it becomes a kind of shorthand, IMO. Good girl need not necessarily mean clever or compliant, that's just the way it's often used.

Wish I'd stumbled across this thread before - off to read Flamingo's links and digest.

attacking someone physically is a flashpoint for me

atm, what I have resorted to doing (after several years of trying other techniques) is telling or if need be removing the culprit to another place, until they calm down. This in practice means me saying "go to your room RIGHT NOW".

the reason for this is to stop anyone getting hurt. I have a very strong, physical, ds who loses control and hurts his smaller sisters, and a dd1 who basically ignores me in these matters. The situation is a damage limitation one. I don't think it is ideal though. They haven't come up with any helpful suggestions, I think the problem is that they have lost their temper at that point and are no longer reasonable.

Sending them away isn't a punishment, it is a way to stop the other kids getting hurt. The deal is that they come back when they have calmed down.

Any suggestions? It feels not quite right but I don't know what else to do here.

Of course we talk about it afterwards etc etc.

To me that sounds right, in the sense that it is very similar to what I think most people would do if they saw one adult attacking another - ie, step in if they were able and stop the other person being harmed, and then presumably hope that once the situation has calmed down some resolution can be reached.

Fillyjonk, the only alternative I have come up with is to move away from the situation with the angry child. Once I've comforted the injured party.

So I might say: "DS, would you like to calm down in your room?"

If he says no I'll say "Well let go somewhere else together to help you calm down" then. He usually accepts this is necessary but once I had to pick him up and restrain him which was pretty horrible.

He had been to a birthday party that day so was over excited and probably high on sugar!

my dd clearly a lot angrier than any of yours

partly I think a question of temperament, partly of some awful things that happened to her

she used to get totally out of control to the point where she was totally incapable of hearing what anyone was saying

very much wanted to hurt me because she was hurting

had to be restrained for her own safety as much as anything else

resolution afterwards rarely necessary because her tantrum was never really about the unimportant thing that triggered it; it was about her being unhappy and wanting to hurt someone

my db used to be the same (again to do with things that had happened to him): you could sense that when he had a bad day he would literally be looking for excuses to go into a tantrum (though thankfully only ever with members of his own family)

Hello

I've been away all weekend and it's DD1's birthday today so I'm only just popping on for a bit!

DD2's spitting seems to have calmed down since the quiet talk about it last week, as have her tremendous tantrums she was having, now she's back from her grandparents . Thanks for all the suggestions and support last week.

hitting siblings Ok, what is the ultimate aim of whatever approach you take? To get the child to learn not to hit, right? The 'not punishing' thing in UP is not about 'only do it if you have to' it's about the fact that it a) does not work (in teaching a child not do do whatever it is) and b) is counterproductive.

The trouble is, we are so hung up on the idea of punishing wrong-doings, that we don't actually think about what it's going to achieve. Yes, it might make life unpleasant for the person who did the wrong thing, but big deal! What's the point if they keep doing it? And especially what's the point if they just continue behaving badly because of the punishment?

What I do (although I'm never certain if I'm doing the best thing!) is separate children if any of them look in danger (which is rare - mostly it's a lash out in anger type of hitting, which stops after one hit IYSWIM).

I will then cuddle them both and describe what is going on e.g. "Oh no! DD1 that looks like it really hurts! No wonder you're crying! DD2 - you've really hurt DD1, and now she's crying! You ought to think about saying sorry to her when you've calmed down." Then I'll focus on cheering up the injured party, and, more often than not, the perpetrator will apologise really nicely and join in the calming down.

I don't bother with any 'talks' about hitting at that point, and wait until the perpetrator has calmed down enough to listen, and then we talk about how hitting is not an appropriate way of discharging anger, and about other ways of doing it.

important note! the above is how I would ideally deal with hitting. How I often deal with it is to shout and get really cross, but I'm also trying to cope with depression at the moment so am cutting myself more slack than I would normally! When I do deal with it how I think it's best dealt with, then the children respond. They're not resentful, and they don't stay angry.

For me the other thing that is relevant (except in some particular cases, like Cory's example) is that generally IME when one child has just hit another, there is a whole situation going on and that child A is not blameless while child B is totally in the wrong.

So for example, in the community where we live dd spends a lot of time with the child nearest her in age (who is 2 years older). These days it doesn't happen so much as they're both older (7 & 9), but up to a couple of years ago said older child would reasonably often thump dd - but generally only because dd had been following her around relentlessly hassling her when she wanted to play on her own, or taking something away from her, or whatever.

Clearly we could have supervised the children more to stop things getting to that stage, but I feel that they benefitted from having the freedom to play away from adults, and that they've now (mostly) learnt to resolve things more effectively if only by separating when it is all going pearshaped.

The thing for me is that actually, I think they will grow out of hitting each other. They get on well, unless they lose control and lash out. They know not to hit. They understand also that hitting completely distracts from solving the problem at hand. 9/10 round here the hitter has been thoroughly wound up by the "victim", however I can't be letting them whack each other, especially as they are just not evenly matched. So we have to have another conversation about hitting, pointless really as they know they mustn't hit, they just aren't as good at keeping their tempers as they would like to be (ds will say "mummy, it makes me sad when I end up hitting dd1 but sometimes I get to angry not to".)

So the ultimate aim for me is simply to stop anyone from getting hurt here and now. I don't actually worry that they will still be lashing out in a few years, I expect they will have their tempers under better control by then.

Takver you have hit the other nail on the head for me. I don't really agree with managing my kids relationship. I don't want to be following them around, I don't want to be even telling them to be nice to each other-beyond everyone's basic rights not to be thumped or be called wee wee head , whether they actually get on, whether they enjoy each other's company, is their business, IMO. I mean I weight the odds in their favour in various ways-and so far the three of them seem to get on brilliantly-but I would never micromanage them, or their relationships with each other. I don't feel I have that right to direct them, they are their own people. I can tell them what annoys me and help their siblings explain what annoys them but its not up to me to change them for their own good, iyswim.

The paying attention to the victim thing would really not work round here, I think it would be percieved as quite manipulative and I tend to feel it almost blows the hitting out of proportion, given that there is usually wrong on both sides. I feel I am very much sending the hitter away to give me space and so everyone can calm down and then deal with what is usually a very complex tangled situation. But I still have this sense that I must not send kids out of the room (incidentally at this point I am often ranting "Alfie Kohn's kids were 5 years apart and at school")

Useful analogy with a fight. In an adult fight, the first thing you'd do is separate them so no one got hurt. When no one was worried about getting thumped then you sit down and talk. Am wondering if there is a better way to do this, maybe there isn't, but it is irksome, I hate sending them to their rooms, or away.

(too angry not to)

otherside walking away with angry child is a good one, sorry meant to say that.

I always think i should do that and somehow it doesn't work, not sure why, will think on it. I think tbh I am really annoyed by hitting and I need to calm down.

Cory raises another good point I think about kids who just seem to need to discharge anger somewhere . I wonder if dd1 might be like this (alternatively she might just be not great at vocalising anger-she is only 3)

Yes, I can see comforting the victim is difficult when the victim has been winding up the other one.

DS usually hits because the other one won't do what they are told. He likes to be the boss and sometimes he gets frustrated when DD doesn't want to things his way. So she hasn't actually done anything wrong.

Filly, I totally agree with all you write about not trying to make your children behave in a certain way with eachother. In fact, so long as on one is in serious danger, I try and let them sort out their own disagreements.

If they come running to me, I often say 'look, I can't sort this out for you - why don't you two sit down and talk out a way to come to an agreement?' and often they do.

But still, whatever the reason if a child has been hit and is hurt, surely that is the first thing to attend to?

What do you do when your child hits you though? My DD has a tendency to lash out when she is frustrated and/or tired.

Do i just ignore the hitting and focus on the cause totally. I feel like hitting is a non-negotiable tbh but not really found a good way of dealing with it.

How old is she fifitot?