advice for nannying kids who don't have any respect for boundaries

[?mysanity]

i care for two kids (ages 2 and 6). i also have my kids, almost 2, 3 and 4. we mostly practice consensual living at my house, though for the sake of keeping the sanity, i do have to lay down some rules sometimes. the main thing we emphasize at our house, with the kids and adults, is respect. speaking respectfully (not necessarily "good manners," but just speaking in a way that makes everyone feel like they matter), listening respectfully, and behaving respectfully.

the problem is that the kids i care for aren't used to respectful boundaries. their mom has a really hard time respecting her own boundaries, and thus has set up a situation where the kids run all over her (and try to run all over everyone else). the 6year old yells and screams at his mom if she says no, until no becomes "FINE!" he doesn't ask respectfully for things, he demands them. he treats her like he's the angry parent and she's the kid. yesterday, he hit her. the two year old goes into violent fits if she doesn't get what she wants. i've seen her head butt her mom over and over and over in the sternum, bite her in the leg, kick her, etc. and she's a -big- two year old, she can really hurt! and the mom just seems at a loss. she says, "no don't pour the coke out into that bowl" then the baby does it and the mom sighs. it's like her words mean absolutely nothing to these kids.

btw, this mom is a really good friend of mine. she's going through a lot of hard transition right now and is basically a single mom working and going to school. she's very stressed out! we live right under her, so the kids come down here extra to take some of the burden off.

both kids really seem to respond well to very rigid boundaries from me and my husband. they need us to tell them exactly how to behave and give them clear consequences for acting out. i've used time out and taking away privileges, which gets them to stop the disruptive behavior. i've even been considering making up a sticker chart for the older one (:cringe. neither of them responds to discussing our problems and finding a solution (and don't tell me a 2year old can't do that -- all 3 of mine could stop their tantrums and communicate with me by 18months). i can't even get them to calm down a lot of the time, they work themselves up into a hysterical fit, which is what gets results with their mom. if i try to comfort them, they scream louder, if i ignore them, they scream louder. and i'm talking screaming like someone is hurting them, even the 6year old.

so, my question is, what can we do to help positively affect this family? like i said, i really care about the mom and the kids. i'm pretty good at keeping the kids' behavior under control when their just with me (or my husband), in fact, they seem happier when i do keep them in line. kind of like they don't know what to do with themselves, and i help them by showing them and they don't have to worry about it anymore. but as soon as mom comes around, they go nuts. and if me and mom are in the same room, they act out even more to get her to respond -- that is, they go out of their way to get mom to say, "no" then make her say yes --, then watch my reaction. it seems like a kind of "hahah. see who's really in charge??" and they won't let up for more than 5 to 10 minutes at a time before they find something new to disrupt. i don't take this personally, but i don't like being around it. but then, if i leave, i don't really have much of a chance to hang out with my friend!

me and my husband are going to sit down with her and offer any more extra help we can, so any suggestions on how we could do that would be appreciated.

tia!

[gillibean]

I don't have a lot of advice, it seems like when you're on your own, you handle them really well. The one thing that I thought of when reading that your friend says no and then changes to yes is something Barbara Coloroso said in one of her books. She basically says that we should keep our 'no's for the big things. She gives an example that if a kid asks for cookies, instead of saying "No", you say "Yes, later." If the kid asks for cookies 30 seconds later, you can say, "Well, it's later so yes." It's not changing from a 'no' to a 'yes' so it effectively takes a lot of the power struggle away.

I guess the other thing to help your friend realize is that if she's able to get together enough energy to tackle the issues and be consistent now then in a month she will have way less stress in her life. Her children scream and complain because it works for them. I would say that if she's able to not give in to their screams for one or two weeks, they'll begin to realize that there's no point in wasting their energy on screaming. Right now she probably feels like she'll have to be enforcing things for years which would seem overwhelming. If she realizes that once the new habits are in place a lot of these issues will be resolved, she may not be so overwhelmed thinking about changing.

I think your friend is very lucky to have you in her life. Hopefully she'll be able to learn from you.

[pammysue]

Are you and the Mom together alot? I am thinking that when you are together and they are starting to act crazy with Mom, you should step in immediately. You can say "We do not behave that way in my home. You must speak respectfully to your mother." Or something along those lines. Maybe the children are looking to you hoping you will step in and show their Mom how you can respectfully get them under control.

I don't ever advise stepping on parent's toes this way, but it seems like this Mom would probably be grateful.

[BellinghamCrunchie]

Well, I guess the first thing would be to find out if she wants any help in learning how to discipline her children, and then find out if she's okay with using timeouts and consequences. You should also be aware that when children are expected to behave in a way that is unusually rigid for them, they tend to act out all the more when in a safe, familiar place. E.g. DD can hold it together really well at preschool but tends to melt down at home in a way she never would have if she wasn't going to preschool. So you may actually be making things harder for the mom.

If mom is interested in learning new ways to discipline her children, then you could begin sharing ideas, trying to keep your ideas in line with mom's values and not imposing your own values on her and her children. I also wonder if your idea of boundaries might differ from hers - different people have different ideas about what is acceptable behavior. For example, if DD had been head-butting me in a tantrum at the age of 2, I would have placed more focus on trying to problem-solve the cause of the behavior than punish the head-butting. Everyone has their own ideas about what is important, and what is acceptable.

Its great that you want to help out this mom, but you also sound like a strong personality that might overrun this other mom. If you're careful to learn from her what she wants help with and not tell her what she needs help with, I think you could be a very positive influence in this family's life.

[?mysanity]

Originally Posted by BellinghamCrunchie

...You should also be aware that when children are expected to behave in a way that is unusually rigid for them, they tend to act out all the more when in a safe, familiar place. E.g. DD can hold it together really well at preschool but tends to melt down at home in a way she never would have if she wasn't going to preschool. So you may actually be making things harder for the mom.

...

I also wonder if your idea of boundaries might differ from hers - different people have different ideas about what is acceptable behavior. For example, if DD had been head-butting me in a tantrum at the age of 2, I would have placed more focus on trying to problem-solve the cause of the behavior than punish the head-butting. Everyone has their own ideas about what is important, and what is acceptable.

Its great that you want to help out this mom, but you also sound like a strong personality that might overrun this other mom. If you're careful to learn from her what she wants help with and not tell her what she needs help with, I think you could be a very positive influence in this family's life.

this is great advice. i definitely can see how having more structure down here can make them act out more up there. my dd is the same -- prim and proper around other people, but sometimes falls into a mess of tears with me b/c the pressure's off. also, i get really REALLY mad when anyone tells me how to parent (and it's usually other people telling me that i should "discipline" my kids by spanking them or something like that), so that's why I haven't said anything in the past year that i've been watching these kids. it really isn't my business. still, as a friend, i see her suffering and she seems really lost and unable to figure out what to do. i don't think she likes being screamed at or hit. i just think she wants to make sure her kids are happy.

i'm having such a hard time with this because i actually have to be a lot more rigid with these kids than i am with my own because if i'm not, they act down right abusive. i, like you, focus on problem solving. i don't ever punish "bad" behavior with my kids, i talk to them and we work things out. like i said, i mostly practice consensual living at my house, so doing things like using time outs is really really hard for me. i just haven't been able to figure out a more creative solution (any suggestions for that would help a lot!) i'm not comfortable with any kind of punishment/reward system, but i'm also not comfortable having my communication ignored and my emotional and physical space invaded. i won't let myself be kicked or hit or bitten, and i won't let myself be screamed at, and i won't let the other kids in my house be bullied, either.

as for the mom's boundaries and whether or not she thinks her kids are acting appropriately, all i know is that she is on the breaking point. and what i've seen happen is her getting to the point where she's screaming back at them, they're crying, and everyone is miserable. she is constantly exhausted and has zero time for herself. she actually did look at me, yesterday, and say, "what should i do?!" but i didn't know what to say.

i love your suggestion to just outright ask her if she'd like some help rearranging her interactions with the kids, and what she is and isn't happy with. that's the way i normally communicate .... this issue is just so hard for me for so many reasons that it's been hard to figure out how to bring it up. i don't want to step on any toes or give the wrong message that i might be judging her because that really isn't how i feel.

alright. thank you all so much for your help. i'm going to ask her tomorrow if she'd like to transform some of the patterns between her and her kids, and what i can do to help and support her.

[?mysanity]

if DD had been head-butting me in a tantrum at the age of 2, I would have placed more focus on trying to problem-solve the cause of the behavior than punish the head-butting.

... i just wanted to re-emphasize that i am not suggesting punishment. but this mom's way of dealing with the headbutting is giving the baby a chocolate treat to get her to stop. she's not dealing with the core issue, she's just sugar coating it, so to speak. i can't help but know that this is ultimately really bad for this child, regardless of respecting different parenting styles.

[BellinghamCrunchie]

Originally Posted by ?mysanity

... i just wanted to re-emphasize that i am not suggesting punishment. but this mom's way of dealing with the headbutting is giving the baby a chocolate treat to get her to stop. she's not dealing with the core issue, she's just sugar coating it, so to speak. i can't help but know that this is ultimately really bad for this child, regardless of respecting different parenting styles.

Its sounding more like the mom doesn't know how to deal with emotions, including her own. Before she can "emotion coach" a child she'll probably need to do a lot of work around dealing with emotions herself.

I realize this doesn't give you any advice on how to help mom. But I wonder if most of the issues here aren't about her parenting but are more about her own coping skills and mental health. Maybe the issues aren't so much about a lack of knowledge about parenting - you can give her more knowledge - but you can't give her insight, the ability to reflect, the ability to be comfortable with a range of emotions, the ability to be thoughtful... She may not be willing to leave her comfort zone to do the work around herself that needs to be done.

Ultimately whatever help this mom is going to be able to accept from you involves whatever her comfort level is. That's going to be hard because you will see issues that she is probably going to have difficulty being willing to deal with, and I'm sure that'll be frustrating.