If I remember correctly, Mr. Isis and I were married the Catholic way. Therefore, we are only together until death do us part...not forever.
That's good, because tonight I may smother him in his sleep.
I mean, at least in the lab those folks let me believe that I have any say in the matter before they go do what they want. So, here's the situation:
Little Isis, my once precious and sweet-tempered baby, is now three. I have decided that there is something about three years old that makes one's offspring, well, I don't know what the hell it makes them but it is nothing good.
So, Little Isis is going through a phrase where, when he is angry, he throws his things on the ground. Tonight I declared a new Isis Law that says that anything Little Isis throws in anger, Dr. Isis throws in the trash. Mr. Isis was there to witness the creation of said law.
This lasted all of about 60 minutes. At bedtime Mr. Isis perpetrated some great mortal insult against Little Isis, perhaps requiring him to brush his teeth or some other heinous act, and Little Isis threw his pillow. Witnessing this, Dr. Isis picked up the pillow and went through the motions of throwing it in the trash.
Little Isis lost his mind. Mr. Isis retrieved the pillow and appeased the beast.
Damn it.
I wasn't going to permanently throw the kid's pillow away. But, now I am completely losing control of my offspring. Damn it.
To the folks in the lab: if I am extra bossy tomorrow, it is only because I feel the need to be in control of something in my life. You feel free to go about ignoring me and doing whatever it is that you do and don't worry about me. Just let me pretend to be in charge for a little while. It'll make us all happier.
Education
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Isis, never, never, never, never, never, never make a threat you are unprepared to follow through on. Never try and bluff your children. It teaches them you are not serious.
When mommy loses her shit and does something stupid/wrong, it is daddy's obligation to correct her, even if she is going to throw a tantrum.
Just like when little Isis loses his shit and does something stupid/wrong it is mommy's obligation to correct him, even if he is going to throw a tantrum. (daddy's obligation too)
Is that clear?
You are losing control of your offspring. Your loss of control has nothing to do with Mr Isis. Taking away little Isis' pillow was appropriate. Pretending to throw it away so that little Isis would get more upset is not. Children need clear, honest, predictable, transparent limits, rules and consequences. When you make those limits, rules and consequences ambiguous or unclear by pretending they are one thing and then changing them arbitrarily, you teach children that there are no real limits.
Is that what you want?
Posted by: daedalus2u | November 9, 2009 10:19 PM
Wait, what? I made the rule and Mr. Isis was totes on board. Perhaps another pillow would have made its way back onto Little Isis's bed eventually, but who knows at this point? It is most assuredly not Mr. Isis's "job" to correct Dr. Isis in front of the offspring when she does something"wrong/stupid." If Mr. Isis has a problem, he can address Dr. Isis in private. Or, he can address her from the comfort of the couch in whuch he is sleeping. Without a pillow.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 9, 2009 10:27 PM
PS: By your rules I must now follow through with smothering Mr. Isis in his sleep. I hope you're satisfied.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 9, 2009 10:32 PM
this gives new meaning to "pillow talk" and "pillow fight"!
Posted by: jc | November 9, 2009 10:41 PM
I disagree daedalus2u.
At 3 years Little Isis is old enough to know about consequences, and it sounds as if the punishment for his actions was clear and not ambiguous at all. I doubt that Dr. Isis had ever planned not to follow through on the threat but she was undercut by Mr. Isis. Ouch.
Big Fail.
As well as following through with a threat, I think it's just as important that parents ALWAYS present a united front.
The couch is definitely the appropriate course of action here :)
Is that clear? (wtf?)
Posted by: Emily | November 9, 2009 10:55 PM
No, Dr Isis already said that she wasn't going to follow through with the permanent trashing of the pillow.
No, you haven't (at least in this blog) said that the consequence for Mr Isis of thwarting your arbitrary and capricious rules (or "Laws" as you say) is that you will smother him in his sleep. If you really feel like I am saying you should follow through on that, you have really lost your shit, as in legal insanity, as in not knowing the difference between right and wrong.
No, parents need to put forth a united front, but a front that is united in doing what is best for their child, not in trying to maintain some dystopian idea that parents are always right, and what ever stupid shit one of them says or does the other one always has to agree with.
So if you said "I am going to kill you if you throw a tantrum", then Mr Isis should have killed little Isis, or stood idly by while you did?
The punishment of trashing what ever it was that little Isis was going to throw is too severe, and who's property is it? Taking it away from him for a certain period of time would have been an appropriate punishment, and from what Isis has said, is what she intended. The throwing it in the trash was a tantrum on Isis's part.
If you get too upset to deal with little Isis in a rational way, then give yourself a time-out. Mr Isis was there to deal with little Isis. It gives little Isis a realistic image of his mother as a person who can lose it if he pushes her too far, it models self-control and giving oneself a time-out before doing something stupid.
I think that his mother not being around for bedtime might be a worse punishment than losing his pillow. It is a punishment that you could have authentically inflicted on little Isis (and Mr Isis) because you were incapable of maintaining your shit at that moment. It is much better to explain that you are too angry to continue with X, and that you need to give yourself a time-out until you calm down, and to do that than to do something you will later regret, such as hitting little Isis.
Little Isis is going to push you until he reaches a limit. You do him no favors by making those limits ambiguous or flexible.
Posted by: daedalus2u | November 9, 2009 11:45 PM
Ditto what daedalus2u said... Only make threats that you are willing to carry out.
Instead of throwing the item in the trash, tell Little Isis the item will disappear for a while. Then when he throws it, put it on the top shelf of the closet.
When my kids were young and I took them to the playground I considered throwing sand to be a "going home" offense. This was prompted by the sand thrown into my oldest child's eyes before child #2 was born. I rushed that child into the restroom and flushed sand out of his eyes, and yet he shed sand filled tears for the rest of the day.
Even though I had to interrupt a very interesting conversation with another parent, and time in the outdoors... I did follow through by picking up and packing up as soon if one of the three children tossed sand. Child #1 only threw sand once, Child #3 did it twice... Child #2 did it up to about a dozen times (he is very stubborn).
But consistency does work.
The most stubborn child did graduate as an honor student in high school, and he works as a lifeguard, along with being a very well loved swimming teacher to little tykes and the summer Friday Night Theme Swims (he is the blond guy in the little drama during UFO Swim... the other young lifeguard, the "bad alien invader" is now a computer science major at Purdue, near Sciencewoman's boots!).
Well, at least you know that the three year old kids are more trouble than those in the "Terrible Two" phase. Actually Child #2 (aka "Blondy Boy" and "Vampire Boy" because he hates garlic) had a "Terrible Two" phase that lasted from when he was eighteen months until he was seven years old. But he is now a very wonderful nineteen year old young man.
You have to be consistent... and you also have to see the wonderful parts of each individual child. My younger son's stubbornness has made him reject some harmful temptations, and gave him the drive to excel in academics. When he was bored with the level of math in ninth grade, he took a class at the community college to advance a year, and then talked himself into the honors pre-Calculus class. He took the Calculus BC AP test and got a "5".
Posted by: Chris | November 9, 2009 11:53 PM
Long story short: Never lie to Little Isis.
Never make threats... only promises that you can actually fulfill!
Posted by: Chris | November 10, 2009 12:00 AM
How about if, instead of throwing it in the trash, you sort of ceremonially take it away? Perhaps putting it in the Closet of Deprival for some predetermined period. Then its restoration is hanging over Little Isis's head, dependent on his good behavior; as opposed to the finality of throwing out a perfectly good pillow.
Courage, though. He is a good kid; this, too shall pass. One day, you will actually get enough sleep. You can look back on your old blog posts, then, and marvel at how you got through it all yourself while helping other parents on the way!
Posted by: DRK | November 10, 2009 12:03 AM
Wow, daedalus. You've read a mountain into a mole hill of a post, making assumptions about my parenting that are simply not true.
This has been an issue with Little Isis we have been dealing for a few weeks. We've done time out. We've done periods of taking the toy away. Tonight when it happened again, I intervened and set a new rule. When the rule was broken, I followed through.
What I said in my post was that I had no intention of putting the Isis family permanently down a generic white pillow-cased pillow, which is what Mr. Isis as it turns out was worried about. Doesn't mean I was going to hand it back to him. I probably would have reallocated it to our bed or the guest room and eventually given the kid some other pillow. He'd have been none the wiser and the point would have been made. Mr. Isis undercut me not because he disagreed with my parenting choice, but because he thought it wasteful to throw away a perfectly good pillow.
But, I did not lie to him, the entire process happened calmly, but I did not get the opportunity to to calmly discuss with my husband what the next step was because he decided to have the discussion in front of our three year old. Not necessary.
You really think me telling Little Isis that if he continued to throw things that I would throw his things away was a tantrum and not rational? Perhaps you were in the room when it all happened and saw something I didn't? You really suggest that this is all akin to Mr. Isis's obligation to step in if I had threatened to kill my child? Then, let me suggest you start your own blog on child rearing.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 10, 2009 12:14 AM
I totally vote to smother Mr.Isis, mostly because I am projecting my husbands feeling onto him. Mr.SM can not handle it when the monkey starts freaking out and crying. He just feel so bad that he "fixes" it by giving in. I, on the other hand, have a heart made of stone. I have no issue with letting the child scream and cry to his hearts content. I have sat outside and read a book for 45 minutes while I waited for the monkey to calm down. Guess what he says when mommy asks "does screaming/crying get you what you want?" Monkey says no. However, crying does get him what he wants with Daddy and everyone else.
That said, Little Isis was obviously upset/angry about something. How are you asking him to express his emotions?
Posted by: ScientistMother | November 10, 2009 12:47 AM
Isis, ignore daedalus and welcome to drive by parenting.You're not a robot, you can't be 100 percent consistent. That said, I recommend toy jail. Easier to follow through, and you don't risk having to actually bin things.
Posted by: Perceval | November 10, 2009 2:37 AM
I don't throw anything away. To a little kid that is almost like killing a friend. I think at that age they almost dont't distinquish between animate and inanimate objects (that could just be my kids). Stuff goes away for 2 days which is forever to a 3 year old. It's very effective.
Posted by: Sara | November 10, 2009 2:39 AM
I love parents of 3 year olds, wait until they are 16. :)
Relax. All parents say things, set absolute rules etc., only to violate them later for a little peace and quiet.
Watch the strict tit-for-tat consequences, help little find better ways to express frustration (3 is a tough year). Look at Sara and Perceval's suggestions, toy jail is a lot better than toy captial punishment. Look you are Catholic, at some point repentance is something you respect. teaching little isis that would be a good idea. help little isis know that just the act of quitting acting bad is not enough to get toy out of jail, that little isis must do something good. reward the doing good more than punish the doing bad.
that said, you are right, mr. isis should have let you follow through, but I bet you have undermined mr. isis once or twice in little isis's 3 years.
Posted by: rb | November 10, 2009 7:16 AM
On a different (alright, extremely minor) point of the post:
Currently 50% of all new marriages end in divorce. That means the other 50% end in death. Your second comment would put you in with at least one-half of all ends of marriages.
Posted by: dean | November 10, 2009 7:53 AM
Hee hee hee hee ....
Now, for Little Isis, Daddy = good, Mommy = evil.
Such is life with three year olds. The problem is that they grow faster than parents can adapt. By the time you've figured this particular crisis out, you're about ten different calamities into the future.
Posted by: Art | November 10, 2009 8:05 AM
Oh, Dr. Isis. I LOVE that video. I have not seen it in many years. Sorry about the parenting issues...mine is about to turn 3 so I have no advice other than basic rules of Pavlovian and Operant conditioning. Good luck!
Posted by: jackie | November 10, 2009 8:06 AM
Ah, it is good to be old enough to feel wise. My holy terror has now reached the age of 17. There are still issues (and tantrums), but in general he is a good kid.
My spouse seems to think I have issues with consistency, although in my view he is the one without the follow-through gene. Everyone is going to fuck-up doing things "by the book." And yet most children turn out OK. We are a resilient species.
Remember, control is an illusion. The only thing any of us control is ourselves. Relax, and enjoy the ride.
That doesn't mean you won't ever want to smother Mr. Isis in his sleep. Just remember that if you do, you will be ALONE with your offspring without back-up or relief. That thought has helped keep me married for 25 years!
Posted by: Pascale | November 10, 2009 8:39 AM
daedalus, never, never, never, never, never, never tell someone else how to raise their child, unless they are violating the law or have asked your opinion.
Posted by: ms physics | November 10, 2009 8:43 AM
Ah yes, 3-year-olds. The tantrum phase. There is no cure, but this, too, in time, will pass.
As far as the consistency of behavioral consequences, Im totally a disciple of the goddess. If it's a rule, then so be it. (Although, to me, the you-throw-it-I-throw-it-away rule seems a tad arbitrary.) It's a lot harder with the first child - it's like parenting on eggshells. But try to relax a little and do your best. To quote the great Vulcan, Dr. Spock: "Trust yourself. You know more than you think you do."
And you might want to invest in earplugs.
Posted by: TGAP Dad | November 10, 2009 8:45 AM
Consequences are important. I think Mr. Isis has earned himself the honor of delivering the lecture about appropriate things to throw and inappropriate things to throw, as well as 10 hours of "lets play catch" with Little Isis, redeemable anytime Dr. Isis needs a break (including 3am. Especially 3am).
Toy jail (I love the "Closet of Deprival" phrase) is probably easier to follow through on than trash. I think my Dad managed to turn me around pretty neatly by saying HE wanted to play with my toy, since I rejected it. That one might work. Extra pillow for Dr. Isis?
Posted by: becca | November 10, 2009 9:36 AM
Ohgod. The parental undercut. There are few things more frustrating, even when the child's other parent is someone you love and it is a simple case of misunderstanding with good intentions.
Not that ANY of our opinions on how you handle your child are relevant, but I for one think you were on the right track. I'm a big fan of immediate and predictable consequences.
And...three. Did no one warn you that three is worse than two? Truly, I used to work in early childhood education and I would cheerfully wipe butts in the infant room or herd two-year-olds before I'd step into the three-year-old room because WOW. Three is my very least favorite age/developmental stage. Three is Of The Devil. My youngest and absolutely last child recently turned four. He thought that party I threw was for HIM. Good luck with The Year of Three.
Posted by: MFA Mama | November 10, 2009 9:59 AM
First, I want to say that I was wrong. After a tough night with a couple tantrums, and a weekend of Superdaddy-ness while Dr. Isis got her hot, hot science on, when Little Isis found the discarded pillow in the hallway (it had not been all the way "thrown in the trash" and dragged it back in to his bedroom, Mr. Isis chose the path of least resistance without considering how he was undermining the Goddess Isis. I just didn't want to deal with another tantrum at bedtime. That was poor form.
That said, a couple of observations:
1) @ Art #16 Mr. Isis never made Dr. Isis the bad guy, insisting that in order to get the pillow back, Little Isis had to go and apologize to his mommy for throwing the pillow, promise never to do it again (yeah, right), and ask if he could have it back. This allowed Dr. Isis to be the good guy who gives permission. Like I said, I did undercut Dr. Isis and her new rule (which was never really up for discussion, but whatever), but I never made her the bad guy. Mr. Isis was wrong, not a dick.
2) @ daedelus Hey Douchebag, get off my side. Seriously, if there were an award for being the most eager to lecture a stranger on how they should be parenting based on a snapshot of one incident you read about online, you would win, pal. Hands fucking down. Seriously, in what social circles do you move in which it is ever appropriate to tell another parent "is that clear?" as though they themselves are children. Are you also the dumbass who got pissed about Isis calling me an asshole (which, you know, clearly I am)? Your insulting, demeaning, and patriarchal response pisses me off, and suggests that you need a fucking time out until you calm the fuck down and can talk nicely to others. Is that clear motherfucker?
3) Mr. Isis is aware, and has been for some time, that the Goddess is completely willing to smother him in his sleep for any one of a dozen or so offenses. He sleeps with one eye open, but accepts that Dr. Isis may some night get the drop on him. He loves his wife; he'll risk it.
4) @ Percival #12, rb #14, and Pascale. Thank you for lending a little perspective to this issue. Your input is highly valued and I look forward to reading more from you in the future. Your ideas intrigue me. I'd like to sign up for your newsletter.
Posted by: Mr. Isis | November 10, 2009 10:16 AM
"Your ideas intrigue me. I'd like to sign up for your newsletter."
AAAAAAAGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!11
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
(you ever have two entirely separate spheres of your life overlap with a crash? Yeah. That was one for me. Freakout over. Carryon. Nothing to see here.)
Posted by: becca | November 10, 2009 10:26 AM
Mr Isis, you are exactly right to trash me and for you and Dr Isis to align with each other and to put together a united front against those not in the Isis family, including those who give you good advice that you (in secret) should take (even if you don’t admit it even to yourselves).
Isis, all I know about you is what you write on your blog. I have Asperger’s, so I tend to take things extremely literally. I wasn’t there, and maybe I am projecting from my own experiences more than is there. Maybe I am taking literally what you are meaning hyperbolically.
If Mr Isis thought you were headed down the path of a pillow-free household, what was little Isis supposed to think? If Mr Isis didn’t understand that your trashing of the pillow was “for effect” and not “for real”, what was little Isis supposed to think?
Would you really have thrown everything away if little Isis had thrown it? Would you really let little Isis empty your house of all objects small enough for him to throw? If little Isis started throwing books, would you trash every book that he threw? What possible good reason is there to put that kind of power in the hands of a 3 year old? Does little Isis appreciate the difference in magnitude of adverse consequences between a pillows and other objects being taken away for a day and for forever?
When people are desperate they do desperate things. That applies to children and also to adults. Putting people in desperate situations makes them less able to cope and behave rationally. Some amount of “practice” in being in desperate situations is important so that future desperate situations can be better coped with. That is one of the things that children are doing when they push their parents’ buttons; learning how to cope with desperate situations in the safest possible way (i.e. with people who are the least likely to hurt them).
Your first mistake was to make an unreasonable “Law” that you were not going to follow. I know that (traditionally) females have the “privilege” (yes, PRIVILEGE!) of changing their minds and that males simply have to learn to deal with that (as Mr Isis is amply demonstrating). I think that little Isis is too young to understand and appreciate that reality about male/female dynamics.
Your second mistake was to not admit that your “Law” was too extreme and that you needed to modify it. If you do explicitly modify your “Law”, then you get to “frame” why you modified your “Law” so that the principles behind the “Law” remain intact. i.e. you modified the “Law” because you made a mistake, not because little Isis threw a tantrum. Children are little proto-scientists and are always doing experiments to see how they can modify their environment. If experimental evidence shows that throwing a tantrum gets “Laws” to be modified, then expect there to be more tantrums.
I have no desire or need to write about child rearing except in response to when people I care about tell me of their difficulties and I have a blindingly obvious no-brainer response. Chris (7, 8) is exactly right, as a parent you should never lie to children. As a scientist you should never lie to yourself. Parents may sometimes lie to themselves, I haven’t quite figured out under what circumstances, maybe to ensure that you never lie to your children. The reason one should never lie to one's children is not because lying is intrinsically "bad", but because of what lying to one's children teaches those children about the world and how to interact with it and how if affects what kind of adults those children will grow up to be.
Posted by: daedalus2u | November 10, 2009 11:48 AM
For the record, 3 is universally recognized as um.... challenging. There is some good developmental reason for this, but I forget what it is. I dread the age, because 2.5 is already kicking my parenting butt. And getting your team parenting act together is hard when you only have 15 minutes per day in which both parents are awake and the kid is not.
My Mom used something like the toy jail described above. I'm not sure what it says about me that it was in use until an age that I can actually remember. However, I also remember it being pretty effective.
My daughter is waaaaay more stubborn than I am. I try very hard to pick my battles wisely. Still, I am working on ways to back down gracefully (i.e., where she doesn't realize I'm backing down). She is not, however, more stubborn than Hubby, who is the genetic source of said stubbornness, I think. I try very hard not to undermine him, but I'm sure he wants to smother me in my sleep sometimes. Luckily, I have a newborn, so I'm rarely asleep.
Posted by: Cloud | November 10, 2009 12:02 PM
Go, Dr. and Mr. Isis! I asked my 15 year old son what rules and incidents he remembers from childhood, and this is his response:
1. I remember you holding me the shower where there was cold water running because I couldn't stop crying. [He had gotten into hysterical crying and couldn't tell me why, so I kicked off my shoes, picked him up, and we stood under a cold shower. He managed to stop the hysterical crying, we dried off and changed clothes, and then we talked about what made him so upset. He never did have any sort of hysterical crying after that.]
2. I remember that you slapped me back when I hit you. [This one breaks my heart. I grew up in a hitting family with ugly sibling-sibling fights and I never wanted that in my family. When my son was 3 or so, he snuck up on me and hit me, and I hit right back, immediately, as if he were one of my brothers. When I realized I'd HIT him, I started crying. I put him in my lap, told him how sorry I was, and we both cried together for quite a while. I spent a lot of mental time erasing that violent response from my psyche immediately after that incident.]
3. I remember the rule that there was no throwing anything at anyone while we were in the car.
4. I remember the rule that I can never take off my seat belt while the car is running. [He doesn't remember, but he got 10 spanks on the butt for that one. He tested me while we were on the freeway and took his seat belt off. I took the very next offramp and he got ten swats on the butt, which was the stiffest penalty used in our house. He never did again, and he never tried any of the other offenses for which that was the penalty.]
All those rule I had for him growing up, and four rules/incidents are all he remembers.
Having rules and knowing what matters to his parents is what my son wanted and needed. So far, he's a pretty wonderful kid.
I think you and Mr. Isis are raising a fine son who will be a kind, honorable man when he grows up.
Posted by: Lauren | November 10, 2009 12:26 PM
I must have missed the "advise and consent" part of the narrative:
Having been in a somewhat analogous position more than once (as in, get some zeros stocked up) I won't swear that getting buy-in up front always works -- you are, after all, up against parental instincts -- but it does help define the rules of engagement.
Posted by: D. C. Sessions | November 10, 2009 12:39 PM
After a tough night with a couple tantrums, and a weekend of Superdaddy-ness while Dr. Isis got her hot, hot science on, ... Mr. Isis chose the path of least resistance
Mr I's behavior is totally excused on this front. I find myself in Dr. I's shoes on occasion, have the same response and in quiet reflection am totes wrong. (okay, maybe like 80% wrong...but wrong.)
Stay Strong Mr. I!
Posted by: BikeMonkey | November 10, 2009 1:03 PM
I had only a single near-hitting event. I was on some new meds for depression which had some pretty severe adrenergic side effects and I was also getting some pretty severe anxiety from PTSD flashbacks (from childhood abuse by siblings when I was my children's age). I knew the flashbacks were about my childhood, not about the present situation, and was able to articulate that in the moment, intellectually that is, the somatic feelings, the endocrine surge, the fight or flight stuff was still going on and even though I could dissociate from it to some extent, it was not easy. This was all pre-NO, which has produced a several orders of magnitude improvement in everything. I was alone with the two of them, boys, 8 and 4, and they were out of control. The details of what led up to it are kind of fuzzy (and were then), but the 8 year old was angry and yelling, he might have hit me, I grabbed him, and he spit on me. I reached back my hand to hit him, and collapsed on the floor crying instead.
The dynamic between me, their mother and our children was quite bad. No matter what I did, she would find it to be wrong and would always side with the children against me even when it wasn’t good for them. I think that was from her childhood where her parents never sided with her when she had been abused by other adults. I remember once in a couple’s therapy session at the end, after we had decided to get divorced, when I said “all we want is what is best for our children”, and she said “don’t put words into my mouth”. I remembered thinking, who is this person, who is now so different than the person that I married?
Posted by: daedalus2u | November 10, 2009 1:51 PM
Hrmm, my parents just used the good ol' spanking method. However, this was the late 80's and I think this might be out of fashion now :)
Come to think of it, by the time by little brother was around, they had moved on to more humane methods....
Posted by: Lindsey | November 10, 2009 2:10 PM
Isis, if you figure out how to handle the 3-year-old tantrums, could you tell me, and then help me build a time machine so I can go back and solve them? Because I never figured them out, and I swore the kid was going to be kicked out of daycare for them.
He's six now, and we have new challenges. Not as bad as the 3-year-old tantrums, though.
Posted by: Kim Hannula | November 10, 2009 2:15 PM
I echo bikemonkey @29.
'After a tough night with a couple tantrums, and a weekend of Superdaddy-ness while Dr. Isis got her hot, hot science on, ... Mr. Isis chose the path of least resistance'
DrMrA has pulled me back from the brink of unreasonableness at bedtime, in particular, a difficult time for the kids. At the time it was infuriating, but, like BM I realized that I probably was going 1 step too far-especially when I had been absent from the house (working usually) ... and kids were just trying to get my attention in any possible way. Throwing things tends to get attention rather quickly.
Posted by: drdrA | November 10, 2009 3:00 PM
My spouse & I used to stand in public places and wonder why these other parents couldn't control their children. We set rules and, generally, our first-born complied.
Then we had Tim.
Suddenly we became "those parents."
When Tim was about 3 he started having tantrums in public. Like the grocery store or Target. He was/is a physical kid, and I was afraid he would hurt himself/someone else/property while I was ignoring him. Finally I came up with a strategy.
I held him by his hair.
I didn't pull; just grabbed a handful on top and let him rip. Thrashing etc quickly stopped because it hurt. You could then try to explain calmly why he wasn't getting his way. If the behavior re-escalated, it usually quickly stopped when you explained that you were quite capable of standing here all day. In general, he regained control quickly after the first couple of episodes. Strangers expressed "concern," but I do have professional credentials which generally shut them up. We finally go through this phase without major property damage, serious bodily injuries, or bald spots.
Even at his advanced age, he still likes to throw things when upset. We have tried to channel this into sports, but they aren't always in season. Now we can just take his vehicle away, a much more potent punishment.
Posted by: Pascale | November 10, 2009 3:18 PM
In my experience (N=2) the most effective method for handling 3-year-old tantrums is to wait until they turn 4.
Wait a year and I'll tell you my excellent methods for handling the problems of 4-year-olds.
Posted by: David | November 10, 2009 3:28 PM
My spouse & I used to stand in public places and wonder why these other parents couldn't control their children. We set rules and, generally, our first-born complied.
Then we had Tim.
HAHAHAAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is what cracks me up about these people (some in this thread) that just KNOW they know all about how to raise kids based on their N=1 or N=2. Some of them even write books on parenting. What a fucking joke. Those little rugrats' personalities work right back on you and there is little you can do about it except hold on and try not to throttle them.
Posted by: BikeMonkey | November 10, 2009 3:34 PM
I remember reading somewhere that a parent found that a way to control tantrums in public was for the parent to sing out loud, that the parent singing was so embarassing to the child that the child would stop tantrumming to get the parent to stop singing. Maybe that was for older children.
Posted by: daedalus2u | November 10, 2009 3:45 PM
I can't believe I am about to say this, but BM is right. There is no rhyme or reason to any of this.
Posted by: Isis the Scientist | November 10, 2009 4:10 PM
but BM is right
Of course. Was there any question?
Posted by: BikeMonkey | November 10, 2009 5:04 PM
Of course there is -- but not if you restrict yourself to looking at it from an adult social perspective. At three, despite the fact that kids have the visible and linguistic markers of what adults think of as rationality, they're not. The dissonance is part of why they're so frustrating. They're immature primates with a whole host of developmental behaviors that haven't been channeled or overridden by social adaptations.
That's our job -- and if it were easy, it wouldn't be fun.
If you think they're frustrating to us, consider that their lack of ability to do what Mommy and Daddy want is enormously more frustrating to them. Which is where a lot of loss-of-control tantrums come from.
On more than one occasion you've described losing control when you're tired. You've had decades more practice (and developmental neurophysiology) than Little Isis has. Hmmm.
Posted by: D. C. Sessions | November 10, 2009 5:10 PM
Wait. So BM is a three year old?
Everything makes so much sense now.
Posted by: becca | November 10, 2009 5:58 PM
Thanks for pointing out that I'd edited out the part about "immature primates with a plethora of inherited nonrational behaviors which haven't been either channeled or overwritten by social adaptation."
Whether BM is three or not, I think I'm covered.
Posted by: D. C. Sessions | November 10, 2009 6:17 PM
The problem is that you devised a punishment that turned out to be harsher than you (or Mr. Isis) really realized. When you're standing there with the pillow, you suddenly think "what am I doing here?"
Suggestion: Negotiate with Mr. Isis and lower the punishment -- put the offending object on "timeout" rather than throwing it away.
Yes, three is worse than two.
Posted by: ArtK | November 10, 2009 7:41 PM
Yes, 3 is worse than 2, but 4 brings its own rewards. While a bit more rational and controlled, 4-year-olds are WHINY. I mean major, big-time whining.
For me, 17 doesn't present a lot of bad stuff. We have 3 rules:
1) Don't burn the house down
2) No illegal substance use (IE anything that is illegal for you to ingest or otherwise use)
3) No hookers.
We figure if these 3 rules are adhered to, what harm has really been done?
Of course, this is our final child.
Posted by: Pascale | November 10, 2009 7:57 PM
hahahahaha!!! to all.
Grandma here. And she says you're paying for your raising and for your spouse's raising.
As for my own children (n=3) none of them were alike and what worked with one didn't work with the others. I think the youngest was 8 when I finally realized the value of never threatening or promising anything I wasn't absolutely 100% sure I could accomplish.
My children would probably tell me that the thing they dreaded hearing the most was "if you want me to decide right now, the answer is no." Of course they were much older than 3 when that happened.
At age 3, if the tantrum happened in public, I put them under my arm like a football where their legs and arms would do the least damage to me and took them home and put them in time out.
One of the worst tantrums my youngest threw was when she was 3 and we'd returned "Annie" to the video rental store after three days of her watching it constantly. She never got out of her "time-out" chair, but she screamed and cried for near 45 minutes.
When she finally stopped, and I told her she could get down, she asked me for a bandaid for her forehead. Ah yeah, I had to suppress a laugh, but maybe a bit of my explanation that she only hurt herself when she threw a tantrum got through.
A few days later, the little one was singing "Tomorrow" in the car. She was in her car seat between her older brother and sister (because they couldn't easily reach each other with her there) when I overheard the oldest tell her that if she wanted to see tomorrow, she'd best shut up. Since the only lyric the child knew was "tomorrow", I couldn't help but agree with the oldest child.
I honestly believe that the most important thing parents can have is a sense of humor.
The older Little Isis gets, the more unified the parental units need to be. I well remember as a teenager asking my mother for permission for things I was sure my father wouldn't agree to... and vice versa. Since they weren't stupid, I only got away with it once... maybe twice.
I hope you are still writing this blog 13 years from now, so I can tell you about the first time the youngest got drunk.
Posted by: Donna B. | November 10, 2009 8:57 PM
Donna B., I hope for your sake the song "Tomorrow" was not involved. If it was, I don't know if I want to wait 13 years to hear this story...
Posted by: Pascale | November 10, 2009 9:36 PM
No hookers? Srsly Pascale?
...I don't even know what to think. Actually, considering Littlest perhaps I best withhold any thoughts at all.
Posted by: BikeMonkey | November 10, 2009 9:46 PM
"So, Little Isis is going through a phrase "
At least he's verbal!
Posted by: Alex | November 11, 2009 4:25 PM