Saturday, July 19, 2008

Random Thoughts!

So the big idea didn't pan out to well. I was sore for days after my big ride and decided to train up some before I start making my big ride a permanent thing. I am trying to ride every night around 8 til 9 to work myself up. This also gives me a time to reflect on the day and how things have been going. It is nice to have this time and see things from a different perspective. I know my wife wishes she could have times like this but with her being 30 weeks pregnant that doesn't seem to happen often.

My children have also started this whole not going to listen thing with her and I am not sure how to approach it. We have found this chart setup that when they listen to something mommy says then the get to move their person along the path. If they don't listen then they have to move them back a space. They try to reach certain check points on the trail and ultimately the end. We are thinking of starting off with 10 tries to get to the top with the big reward at the end of the day. If they only make it say 5 spots then they can have a small treat but anything under that they get nothing. So we are going to see how that goes and hopefully they won't walk all over mommy because she can't handle much more with the two of them and with the baby almost here. For her sake I hope it works.

My wife and I also go to talking tonight that maybe we expect to much out of our children and it got me wondering. What should we expect from a 3 1/2yr old and a 2yr old? I would like some feedback if anyone has anything they can share. I know we are still learning all of this and we are fairly young so at times we could expect to much and not know it. They say please and thank you but don't seem to respect their mother at times. When I tell them something they usually do it but not all the time. With their mother they do it like 10% of the time and the other 90% they spend pushing her buttons till she explodes. Is this just a phase they go through or did we go wrong somewhere? I guess only time will tell how we did and if anyone out there has any comments then please share them cause we are all ears.

Thanks,
JR

4 comments:

cmziall said...

Hey, JR,

Found you from the Catholic Dad's site (even though I'm a mom! LOL!).

I'm, by far, not an expert and seem to learn more and more as I go along. First, and foremost, we've found that consistency is KEY to everything. Although, this is a tough one to achieve, IMO.

We have 5 children (ds11, ds9, dd8, ds6 and dd2). I'm truly amazed at how much my 2yo daughter truly understands. It has made me realize we were "softies" on the others and are paying the price now. Believe it, or not, my 2yo puts her dishes in the dishwasher (sometimes) after she eats. This, alone, has made me realize that I think I don't expect ENOUGH from my children most of the time.

We homeschool, so I feel like I have challenges every 5 minutes. It is really hard to be consistent EVERY time with that many children and with you guys have 2 under the age of 4 AND your wife is pregnant, she will have a difficult time being consistent every time. My 2yo HATES being in the corner. When she does something wrong I hold her hands down at her side and force her to stand in the corner until she is ready to apologize and/or do what I asked her to do. I'm really trying to stay on top of her NOW so I don't pay later because when they can really run from you, it makes it much more challenging.

I'm really struggling with my 6yo son right now with temper issues. I've been really trying to stay on top of him, but by the end of the day, I'm spent. . . .time for DH to come to the rescue!

I don't know you, but one of the best things you can do for your family is be as helpful as possible with your children when you come home from work, this will keep your wife sane! :-D

Good luck. . . Sorry for the "book"!

God bless!

The Praying Dad said...

CM,
Thank you for you response. I do come home and help out but I also don't want to feel like I have undermined her authority to the children. I don't want them thinking "we can do whatever to mommy because day will be home and let us out or save us." I love to save my wife so she can go rest so it feels like I am in a catch22. I am sure we will figure this out someway and hopefully it will get better.

JR

cmziall said...

My older children know that if they don't take the punishment I give them it doubles when dad gets home. (ie., if they are to do a time out for 15 minutes and don't do it for me, it's 30 when dad gets home or if they get a chore and don't get it done, it's two chores) Dad always backs Mom up with whatever punishment she has given, but, like I said, it will be double that if Dad comes home and they haven't got it done. These charts might work for you:

http://www.doorposts.net/charts.asp

I bought these (rolled up), colored them in with markers and had them laminated. (I see they now sell them in color and laminated!) They hang on our pantry door (the IF-THEN chart and The Blessing Chart) so my kids know the consequences never change. After they were laminated we used a dry-erase marker on the last column for consequences on the IF-THEN chart and rewards on the Blessing Chart.

Also, I'm sure your children love your wife, my children know it's a punishment if they can't be around mommy because of their behavior. I don't see it as you are rescuing them from mom's punishment, but sometimes dad has to inforce mom's punishment in a little different way to encourage them to do what mom told them in the first place.

Am I making any sense? I feel like I'm rambling so I better end this before I confuse you even more! :o)

Anna said...

JR,

So this post is a month old, but I just happened across your blog and thought I would put in my two cents, in case you guys are still struggling with this.

If you guys like to read, I recommend Dr. Ray Guarendi's book, Discipline that Lasts a Lifetime. He's got some cool ideas and I found that his writing gave me more confidence in my parenting instead of making me feel like I was doing everything wrong. And he was pretty amusing, too.

Some insights that I found particularly helpful:

Trust your instincts. Two years old is old enough to be disciplining a child for pretty much anything that they do wrong. If your impression is that the children are being disrespectful or not listening as well as they should, then act on that.

Don't take it personally when they do something wrong or think that it must be a reflection on your bad parenting skills. Children are impulsive and immature; that's why they're children. Deal with the behavior, discipline them if you are going to, but try to avoid the guilt or shame for a child's choice; they have free will too.

If you are getting better results from your kids obeying you than your wife is, I would recommend that she be *quicker* to discipline, not cut them more slack for their age. Being quick to discipline for bad behavior helps avoid escalating emotions (that whole wanting to explode thing) that don't do anyone any good.

And, as someone who is 39 weeks pregnant right now, I would definitely encourage you to help out as much as possible. It's not going to be easy for her to try to stay on top of the kids. The more you can do it, the more relief she will have. If you see them not listening to their mother, take the initiative to give them whatever discipline/punishment the two of you have agreed that behavior gets. Cmziall's advice that kids that don't obey Mom during the day get double-punishment when Dad gets home is another way to support your wife's authority. Watching them to give her a break shouldn't take away from her authority unless you let them off from something she was trying to enforce.

God bless,
Anna