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My cry for help. - Page 2  

post #21 of 31
4/3/04 at 10:18pm
Whoa!

From the forum guidelines posted at the top of the page:

Please appreciate that this forum is not a place to uphold or advocate physical punishment of children. Personal preferences for and encouragement of use of physical punishment are inappropriately posted here.

IMO, there is NEVER a "proper context" for hitting a child!
post #22 of 31
4/3/04 at 10:28pm
Did I miss something - I did see anyone saying it was OK to hit a child.....this thread is about finding ways to *stop* spanking......
post #23 of 31
4/3/04 at 10:35pm
Quote:
Originally posted by monkey's mom
Whoa!

From the forum guidelines posted at the top of the page:

Please appreciate that this forum is not a place to uphold or advocate physical punishment of children. Personal preferences for and encouragement of use of physical punishment are inappropriately posted here.

IMO, there is NEVER a "proper context" for hitting a child!
Where did this come from? Who is this aimed at? I hope you're not judging the OP.
post #24 of 31
4/3/04 at 10:37pm
It was aimed at the post before mine--a recommendation to only spank a certain way and with a link to a website advocating that.

Which appears to have been edited--thank you.
post #25 of 31
4/3/04 at 10:44pm
We did miss something! Oh my! (p.s. sorry for the confusion Monkey's mom)
post #26 of 31
4/3/04 at 11:22pm
Oh, MY, Emily! You must be plain ol' exhausted. I would say do anything and everything you can to get some sleep-- maybe put in a video for the 3 y.o. when the toddler takes a nap, and you sleep with the toddler and newborn? I know some people are anti-TV, but I think you need to use whatever you can so that you can be the mom you want to be-- and this is an emergency situation, for sure!

Can you identify any triggers? As you can guess from my advice, mine is sleep. If I don't have enough sleep or if DD is resistant to sleeping (which is every night), it can set me off. However, once I realized that this was the main issue, I started to see that I wasn't losing my patience constantly (so I felt better). I was also able to anticipate my lack of patience, which helped a lot . . .I could plan ahead what my reaction would be.

I would guess that with three children at such young ages, there are just no easy answers. I so agree with the other posters who advocated outside help-- we weren't meant to raise children in isolation!
post #27 of 31
4/4/04 at 7:30pm
BTW, do we know where the OP lives? What she really needs is a Postpartum Doula. I'm a doula and I'd be more than happy to do it if she lives anywhere near me. A PP Doula will help with her older kids, the house, cooking, and is a source for venting and advice. This would allow her to focus on rest and bonding with the newborn. I think any doula in her area would volunteer at least some time (for free) to help her out. Maybe we should post for help in another Forum?
post #28 of 31
4/5/04 at 11:34pm
Thread Starter 
Wow, thank you mamas for caring!

MamaAllNatural~I live in ND. I had a doula for my birth but she doesn't do the Postpartum part; that would be SUCH a help!

Well, I am used to not getting sleep, because my 1 yo started sleeping through the night two weeks ago. Not getting sleep with a newborn was not a shock, this time. Also, he is pretty good cause he only wakes up one time at night to eat, he sleeps with us so that is really easy.

I would like to know if there is any way to get my dd to listen to me. An example was today: We were at a friends' house playing outside and she starts to take her shoes off (it is nice up here but the snow is not completely thawed; we are moving and do not have washer/dryer hooked up). I asked her, "Please keep your shoes on, the ground is kinda wet and I don't want your socks to get wet." She looks up at me while I am saying this and proceeds to take her shoes off! This kind of thing happens frequently throughout the day and at 5 pm I just want to
All you mothers who have dealt with this, what worked for your sanity? How did your child overcome this?
post #29 of 31
4/8/04 at 1:58am
Thread Starter 
~Bump~
post #30 of 31
4/8/04 at 2:11am
Emily,

I hate the shoes one! As hard as it is, I just have to draw the line. If it's really not good weather or dirty or there's glass or whatever - if you've established that she can't take her shoes off and she tries to anyway, then she has to make a choice "DD, if you want to stay here and play with your friend you need to leave your shoes on because it's too cold for no shoes. If you take them off, we'll have to leave/go back inside the house ect." I know this is hard and a lot of work and *really* frustrating if you have to leave - but- you can bet next time she'll believe you when you ask her to leave them on. When they keep taking them off they're assuming they can get away with it and you won't do anything about it. I hope this helps.

p.s. Did you try "finding your tribe" in ND to locate a doula? I'm many, many states away from you unfortunately. I think any doula in your area would be crazy not to come help out at least a little bit. After all, helping mothers is what being a doula is all about!
post #31 of 31
4/8/04 at 1:20pm
Firstoff - s to you

I agree about the shoes - if they are necessary, the fun needs to stop if they're taken off. Happens all the time for us (we moved here from Hawaii just a couple weeks ago - we used to be pretty easygoing about the kids running around barefoot but can't be anymore) and they're starting to get the idea (in fact, I don't think I had to deal with this for a couple of days!).

My 2 are 22 months apart, so I don't know exactly what you're going through, but have an approximate idea. I've found that if I get a time-out (if DH takes over for even just a half-hour while I go work out or veg or read a book or something) I am a whole new person. Likewise, if my kids get some physical activity in, they are whole new people. Usually, I'll take my kids to the pool for a while (I got DS a swim vest when he was 18 months and DD can swim by herself, so I just sit next to the pool and relax for an hour while they splash around and burn energy) or to the park at a non-peak time when I can just sit back and watch them run and climb. Sometimes we do more crazy things like go for a hike (we hiked Diamond Head shortly before we left Hawaii) or go to the zoo - these things will wipe them out for the day and while I may be a little tired, it is a small fee to pay for an extra hour of sleep. They become much more manageable if they've had any chance at all to burn off steam. They're little monsters if we don't get out at least once (running around the house, hitting each other, yelling at each other and at me, throwing toys - all these behaviors dissappear or are drastically reduced if we get out once a day). I know that with your youngest this age, this is probably near impossible for you - but could you get someone else to take them for a walk or something? I started walking around the block with DD when DS was just 4 days old (I had an exceptionally fast recovery) and even that helped (she was 22 months at the time).
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