How did your parents discipline you?

[LunaMom]

What kind of disciplinarians were your parents? Were they effective?

My mom (didn't grow up with a dad around) was a terrible disciplinarian. She had an awful temper and frequently punished in anger, and then would later revoke the punishment because she felt guilty. I learned pretty quickly not to get too upset about, "Because of what you did, you can't go to Smantha's party this weekend!!!" because if I kept quiet for a day or two, she would back down and let me go.

However, she never seemed to feel guilty about hitting me. : She always hit in anger, and did it hard, and usually across the upper arm, where it really stings. It finally stppoed when I was in high school, when she raised her hand and I said, "Mom, if you hit me, I swear I'll hit you back, and then I don't know what will happen." She never did it again. Didn't improve our relationship any, though.

I strive to be different from her. I have a quick temper, too, and I'd be crazy to think that there's no risk of me repeating my mother's behavior, but so far so good. I treat my dd so differently from how my mother treated me, and I'm not just referring to the punishment aspect - I mean I treat her with respect and kindness rather than contempt and anger.

I haven't seen or spoken to my mother in over four years, by the way.

What was it like in your family?

[liz-hippymom]

wow. my mom was exactly like your mom! she was a single mom with alot of anger issues and was very mean about punishmeant but then later would let them fly out the window. my mom liked slapping my face. and i havent spoken to my mom in 2 years.
i think most of my parenting is about how NOT to be like my mom!

[monkeysmommy]

My parents were totally different. My mom was very gentle. Never used punishment. She would tell me not to do something, and why, and then I didn't do it anymore. I was a pretty easy kid, I guess. My mom and I had a very close relationship, and if I thought that I had disappointed her, I felt really bad. She did however lapse into some passive aggressive communication occasionally. Like *sighing* and saying "I guess" when I would ask her if I could do something she really didn't want me to do.

My dad believed in spanking, and spanked me twice. Once when I was really little, he had his records spread out all over the floor, and I peed on them. Another time I was at someone else's house and I had the other child's toy and wouldn't give it back to the child. Both instances of normal toddler behavior. He also had (has) obsessive compulsive disorder and was really strict about weird things like mouth noises, playing with food, couldn't stand anything repetitive, and would blow up if I did anything that bothered him. So I spent a lot of time tip-toeing around the house because I never knew what was going to set him off.

But because my dad was so out of it most of the time with drugs and alcohol, my mom did most of the parenting. I guess it was both a blessing and a curse, because although I didn't get spanked very often, my dad's uninvolvement caused us not to have a very close relationship

[noodle4u]

[fyrflymommy]

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[2much2luv]

At least my parents weren't yellers. :
My dad spanked. They did the "Wait till your father gets home" thing and when he got home we got the "This hurts me more than it hurts you, but I have to do it because the Bible says so" talk and spanked with a big wooden paddle.
Don't remember when they stopped spanking, but in high school they just grounded me from EVERYTHING I liked to do because I was suicidal. : They really had issues. We never talk now, BTW.

[Leonor]

I think I only got smacked a couple times in anger, that's so far as I remember. My mum mainly believed in rewards and punishment, and did some time outs. My punishment was usually just some days without TV.

Otherwise she was good, she was loving, caring, playful, cared to explain things for me. I have wonderful memories with her.

My dad was cool when I was a kid too, very playful and original, although he worked a lot, so I spent less time with him. Wonderful memories with him to.

I think in my teens both my parents became very strange, authoritarian, didn't let me go out anywhere, and didn't gave me the help I needed.

[Leonor]

Originally posted by fyrflymommy
i was spanked by my daddy. alot

Ouch, I'm so sorry for you fyrflymommy.

Hugs for you and the others who had such violent parents.



And feel proud for understanding how wrong it was and trying hard not to do the same!

[geekmom]

I've definintely had this question about what peopel thought were effective parenting techniques that were used on them.

My mother was nasty and yelled and hurt all the time. We had an awful, horrible relationship. She's terribly manipulative and when I started to remember my abuse (not all by her) she disowned me. She was trying to do it as manipulation so that I wouldn't delve into my abuse history, but it didn't work I just allowed her to disown me. Something like 10 years later, after my father and grandmother worked hard to get us to reconcile, I told her that if she would apologize then we could try to get on wiht a relationship. Up until then she wouldn't. Finally my father and grandmother convinced her to and now we deal with each other fine although we don't talk aobut my childhood.

I really, really want to find a differnet way to parent my kids. I use very little screaming or "putting down". I really just use logical consequences and talking about other people's needs, etc. and I think most importantly is just realizeing that kids are kids. the behavior they're doing now is not going to be the behavior they'll do 10 years from now even if I don't yell and scream at them. Developmentally kids will grow up even if I don't try to change every one of their curretnly undesirable behaviors.

Another thing my parents did is the whole keeping me away from sugary foods and too much "stuff" etc. It seemed to make me feel just deprived and I went crazy for all that stuff when I became an adult. With my children, I'm tryign to give them frequent and moderate access to all the things in our culture whether I approve of them or not and talk to thema bout it. I'm really careful about really letting them eat a wide variety of food and not setting anything up as "off limits" so that I don't make it more desirable. I don't know if it's my methods or just the children I have, but my children eat fabulously, tons of vegetables and fruits and junk food in moderation.

I'd love to hear more about what positive things worked for people. What made you more aware of responsibility and making good decisions? What kind of limits did you rail against as a kid, but are happy your parents put on you now?

[fyrflymommy]

leonor, thanx for the hugs. i wouldn't say that my dad was violent. i would say he took the bible too literally ("spare the rod..."). and he was always anngry when he did it.

[beachrock]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by geekmom
I think most importantly is just realizeing that kids are kids. the behavior they're doing now is not going to be the behavior they'll do 10 years from now even if I don't yell and scream at them. Developmentally kids will grow up even if I don't try to change every one of their curretnly undesirable behaviors.




Thanks for saying this, geekmom! It really sums up how to have respect for your (our) kids, in all their stages.

BTW, my parents were pretty good about not hitting us (I remember being spanked once, and seeing my sister spanked once, both by my dad). They let me go off in all kinds of wild directions because they felt I deserved privacy, but I felt that they're apparent indifference meant they didn't care what happened to me. I guess you can go too far with "respect"? Or, my parents (quite repressed and unable to talk about emotions, etc) were afraid to have a real converstaion with me. I craved their input and help, but didn't know how to ask. To get back to the topic, most of the discipline consisted of yelling, and a vague undercurrent of anger that kept us kids hopping to try to keep dad from having an outburst.