Bonk bonk on the head, bad kid

[marydell]

I have become my grandpa. Yesterday Charlie was playing with his choo-choos, and they were not behaving the way he wanted, and so he did his usual thing of smacking them off the track and being generally pissed at them. When I put a couple on the floor so he could use them without the track, he picked one up and threw it at the bookcase. It bounced off the bookcase and hit him in the forehead, causing him to make a startled face and causing me to say "see what happens when you throw things?" Then he started crying so I switched into nice-mommy mode and cuddled him while I tried very hard not to crack up laughing. I feel bad that I wasn't instinctively nicer but at the same time, that IS what happens when you throw things, and further in my defense, it was funny.

Consequence-based learning is something my Dad has always been fond of--he was never a dick about it, but when I would get hurt or have a bad result because of something I did, he would point out the sequence of events and make sure I understood the causality. I think this is a good thing. Dad's dad, however, took this philosophy a bit far. Dad told me, with great amusement, that when he was a toddler he started throwing his cup when he was sitting in his high chair. Grandpa tied a string to the cup and tacked the other end of the string to the ceiling, so when Dad would throw the cup it would swing off into the air and then come back and thwap him. Ingenious, but wow, too mean.

ETA: Grandpa was awesome in many ways, and was a nice Grandpa to me, but was sterner than Dad, and believed in old-school discipline. Once I was crying and Dad was comforting me and Grandpa accused him of coddling me, to which Dad said "Look, did I tell you how to raise your kids?" Grandpa thought that was hilarious and the greatest thing ever.

Comments

[sanguinity]

That sounds more like your dad than your grandpa. Pointing out consequences, but not setting up traps.


Are you a regular crossposter now? I'll take your LJ off my read filter (you'll still get friends permission) if you are.

[marydell]

I believe I am a regular crossposter, but I haven't tested friends-lock yet - I will within a couple of days. Go ahead and take me off and if flock doesn't work properly I'll let you know (it seems to work for everyone else, so I'm pretty certain it will be fine)

[sanguinity]

Sure, let me know. But it looks like we have mutual access here, so it should be fine.

For whatever "should" is worth. ;-)

[torachan]

Hee! I don't blame you.

And I was going to ask the same as sanguinity. If you're going to be crossposting regularly, I'm going to go ahead and defriend you on LJ and friend you here. (This is kyuuketsukirui from LJ, btw.)

[marydell]

I added you to my DW circle, so defriend away :)

[torachan]

Thanks! :)

[trinker]

Aaah! My invisible pantheon of cool people just shrank by one. (I didn't know those were alteregos.)

[torachan]

Ahaha! XD

(Also, woohoo! Someone thinks I'm cool!)

[marydell]

You are cool!

[torachan]

Aww, thank you! You are cool, too! :D

[marydell]

Thanks!

[browngirl.livejournal.com]

*giggles*

That was a bit much of your grandfather, yeah.

[maevele.livejournal.com]

One of my primary parenting strategies is the classic "yup. that's why we don't (jump off the freezer/shove leaves in our nose/throw hard things up in the air to watch them fall on our head"

[marydell.livejournal.com]

I think it's a good strategy--it's just always a bit startling the first time I hear myself saying something my parents or parentlike siblings said to me. But yeah, that IS why we don't throw our trains...

[marydell.livejournal.com]

BTW, "shove leaves in our nose" made me LOL. So much truth to this.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

Been there. "Yeah, that hurt, huh. That's why we don't do that." But then of course I always offer to kiss and make it better.

Smothering the laughter is sometimes harder.

[ma-ee-uh.livejournal.com]

As a teacher, I have said that MANY, many times.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

You make me glad I teach university.

The closest I've ever gotten was "This is why I told you to start your essay early."

[kouredios.livejournal.com]

Heh. Yup.

Of course, Cassie's getting to the age (and has the personality) where I can go too far in the, "I told you so" direction. If I overdo it and get didactic, she gets pretty pissed at me. I try to limit it to, "Yup, that's what happens," if I possibly can.

[little-octagon.livejournal.com]

You could have turned into my late grandmother and said, "See? That's G-d punishing you!"

[unhappytriad.livejournal.com]

"Look, did I tell you how to raise your kids?"

ROFLMAO. Why couldn't I have heard that before it was too late to use it on my mother?

I myself had the pleasure of pointing out to my kids "see, that's why we don't eat pancakes in the tub", but then I was indulgent enough to let them try eating pancakes in the tub in the first place.