I'm fairly certain that the goal of discipline isn't to make your kids laugh or to make them ignore you. Since these are not ideal reactions to disciplinary measures, I know I'm doing something wrong. But what?
I think my biggest problem is that my kids are pretty well-behaved kids. They are pleasant and usually play together sweetly, so I don't get to practice discipline beyond a stern word often enough (not to mention the fact that our house is SUPER child-proofed so there's not much opportunity for them to get into trouble!!). So, now that we've established that the kids are the problem and not me, let's figure out how to fix this problem. :)
Spanking seems to work for other people and I'm sure it would work for me too, but there's a tiny problem with spanking in our house. Flora sees me spank Scout and then she feels that it is her responsibility to spank Scout when he does something that she doesn't like. And then I am caught in the conundrum of whether or not to spank Flora for spanking Scout. It could easily turn into a never-ending cycle. I spank Scout, Flora spanks Scout, I spank Flora, Scout spanks Flora, I spank Scout, etc . . . you can see how that could get confusing. "Who is spanking whom today?" is not a question I want to add to my daily list of things to worry about. I'm also in the process of teaching Scout not to hit people in the face, so spanking seems like I'm sending mixed messages. *sigh*
Time-out would be great if it worked. I have occasionally put Flora into time-out (her room with the door shut) and she doesn't want to come out of time-out! Once I said, "If you do that again, you will have to go to time-out." Her eyes lit up and she skipped to the door of her room and said, "Time-out! Time-out, Mommy!" Not exactly what I was going for . . .
Expressing displeasure works for the little things, but it doesn't help when there is blatant disobedience taking place. Of COURSE she knows I'm displeased and she doesn't really care. These are the situations where she needs to be spanked.
Maybe I should just start taking them to another room to be spanked??? I can't really think of a place for time-out that would really seem like a punishment to Flora. Are there other options besides spankings and time-outs?
And then there are the situations where Flora is disobedient but with really sweet intentions. Like today she found Scout's little red nighttime dog and wanted to take it to him while he was napping. I told her, "No, do NOT go into Scout's room. He's sleeping." But off she went down the hall with me hissing "Flora NO!" behind her. (Hissing so as not to wake Scout, not hissing because she might obey if she thought I was a snake) Flora thought Scout needed his dog and burst into tears when I pulled her out of Scout's room before she could give him his dog. I was upset (REALLY upset because she woke Scout up when he had JUST gone to sleep) but it WAS a sweet gesture on her part. Oh, what to do, what to do . . .
I don't know . . . disciplinarian is just not my strong suit. I need to get better at it because the older they get the more they are going to need to be disciplined. I also need to work on that "mom voice" that stops kids dead in their tracks and compels them to obey. Was that what they taught during that week of child-birthing class that I missed??? --because that should definitely be in the curriculum if it's not already.
Now I DO have a voice that can stop Toby in his tracks when he's being a bad dog, but he's experienced the shock collar so he KNOWS I mean business. Hmmmm . . . no, I guess that's probably not a good idea. :-)
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