When DH can't (or won't) get it, how do you fix it? - Page 2

[Aura_Kitten]

the one thing that really stands out in this situation to me is this: i'm wondering if your husband fully understands that children learn the behaviour that they live around.

this is something i am constantly having to remind my SO of. whenever he harps at or yells at our son, i have to gently remind him, "is this the sort of behaviour you want him modeling? are these phrases that you want to hear back from him?"

then he goes and apologizes and they talk and hug, but it took quite awhile to get to that stage, because my SO honestly didn't see anything wrong w/ how he was treating our son.

one other thing is that this truly is emotional abuse, and there needs to be a stop to it. your husband is doing your son emotional and psychological damage, and it needs to see an end.

[merpk]

Yeah, in his calm moments, he knows you pick up what's modeled. This is absolutely what was modeled to him, though he got it worse. His mother beat him (even had a favorite pan she used for it) and his father was not much better ... more emotionally abusive, a real bully, but occasionally had his other moments as well ...

When I met DH, he was in the standard NYC therapy model, ie., had been in it since he can't remember how long and since it's going so well, sees no need to stop. Well, the month before we married, he stopped, and hasn't been back, and won't go back. Not sure why, after so many years of it, he is so adamant about no more therapy ... especially since it was a good experience for him.

Anyway, we had a pretty good conversation (albeit brief) while walking in the park with the kids today. He had said something to DS#1 about plans for doing something in particular, but said it in a very negative and scowly 'if you don't ... then we won't ...' so I pointed out to him (quietly) that he could have said the same thing in a 'I'm so excited to ... if you will' ... the kind of stuff I'd make him crazy with when I first found mdc & the GD forum ... anyway, he looked stunned when I said it ... kind of deer-in-the-headlights stunned.

Maybe that's a good thing.

[PM]

[arcenciel]

Klothos - did that really work for you? Just asking dh if that is the sort of behaviour...

My dh is so disrespectful of all my children in little ways (like for example if he tickles them he might hurt them - genuinely unaware of his strength - and then not stop or not say sorry). He doesn't see anything wrong with it and things like that are difficult to talk about - he generally switches off straight away, but perhaps short comments like you mentioed might be good....

[Aura_Kitten]

... well, it worked once he saw i was right. but honestly it did take a few times of my son giving back the same bad behaviour to his daddy for it to really sink in.