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“I don’t get it,” my friend fumed to me on the phone this morning, “Why do kids even like you?”
Yesterday, she had introduced me to her nephew. My friend is […]
Original post: Picture Perfect Parenting
To V:
Children “like” to be ignored. It’s something I discovered with my little cousin a while ago when she was a little girl. I’m a teenager and I really didn’t like how she behaved, as I noticed she tried to get everyone’s attention and when she got it she decided it was boring and moved to the next person. But I never really paid attention to her because I never felt like it. Even her mother noticed but didn’t really make a big fuzz about it.
Pretty odd if you ask me, I should try with grown girls or something.
I guess kids are like women. My average with women was under 300 when I treated them nicely. Ever since I began treating them like shit and ignoring them, I’ve at least doubled my average. It’s a lot cheaper too.
300? Is that a completely arbitrary number or am I missing out on something?
Kids are smarter than people give them credit for.
They work out the relatives who give them everything they want pretty fast, and while they like the stuff they get from them, there isn’t a lot else they like about them. YOU try buying friends and see how much they really like you. Kids are the same.
When you are 2, best thing in the world is falling over. They love it, and try to do it often. Try poking them over and over, they seem to like that too.
I was about to respond lamenting how fucked up V is.
Then again, considering her own childhood, it’s really no surprise she would act this way to her own (step)children.
When my nephew was younger I would sit on the floor and push him a round a little to get him to start running. The instance he would start going away, I’d grab is angle and bring him crashing onto the carpeting.
“Way to fall over!” *Laugh* “Now, get outta here.” *Laugh*
He starts moving away, I would grab his ankle.
Repeat.
Or I’d even let him get a few steps.
He loved it. And I’d just be watching a movie or something.
*Shrugs*
Child psychology is… fun. They like you, V, because you give them legitimate attention, as opposed to using gifts in lieu of actual playtime or relationship building. Physical contact is huge to kids, as is playtime, and by pushing them down, you’re actually playing with them, even if you don’t perceive it as such. End result? They love you. Plus, kids are kinda like middle school girls, only without all the backstabbing and general bitchiness. They love attention, and if you ignore them, they’ll do almost anything to get it.
I think kids like falling over for the same reason that tiger cubs like fighting with each other. It’s part of learning how gravity and their bodies work.
I honestly can’t say I think you did anything wrong in the situation with your stepson. You showed him that you meant it and once he figured out that it wasn’t a game he stopped misbehaving.
A lot of misbehavior in kids stems from a misunderstanding about parenting. You can’t give a kid attention when they misbehave and expect them to stop misbehaving. Much like animals, they have a hard time differentiating between good and bad attention and will take what they can get.
I can’t find the link right now, but I read an interesting article about a woman who started having horrible trouble with her dog when she’d go to work. The dog would literally go on a rampage every day. She kept thinking that he needed to burn off steam so would play with him before and after work and give him more toys to play with during the day, but he kept getting worse. Eventually a trainer told her to crate the dog for the day, which she had thought would lead to him hurting himself and destroying the crate. The dog behaved well and never caused any trouble with the crate. The reason theorized in the article was that he acted out because he didn’t know what to do. Given a clear boundary he knew what to do.
Kids are testing boundaries. That’s their job. That’s how they grow up. If they never find the boundaries, they will keep searching and end up fucked up. Even if the boundaries are arbitrary and weird, giving kids a solid boundary trespassing beyond which results in real consequences that the child can understand works. Stepson didn’t understand the scream try to get up get dragged back game, but it was a game. Being cold and outside and having nobody to play with… that was a real consequence.
Oh and 300 would be a batting average 30%.
I’ve always promised my parents I’d help take care of them well into their “golden years,” but I don’t think that’ll involve knocking them down.
…but if you want your kids to knock you down when you’re old and fragile, whatever!
Jack Handy quotes that reminded me of this article:
If a kid asks where rain comes from, I think a cute thing to tell him is “God is crying.” And if he asks why God is crying, another cute thing to tell him is “Probably because of something you did.”
One thing kids like is to be tricked. For instance, I was going to take my little nephew to Disneyland, but instead I drove him to an old burned-out warehouse. “Oh, no,” I said, “Disneyland burned down.” He cried and cried, but I think that deep down he thought it was a pretty good joke. I started to drive over to the real Disneyland, but it was getting pretty late.
Just made me think of you, V. ;)
I have a three year old niece that I play the “push on your as” game with too. She loves it. Eventually she gets to the point where falling down isn’t enough of a rush for her and she’ll run full speed at me from 10 feet away so she can get pushed down harder. It’s odd. I’ve tried it with other kids and they all love it too.
Wow. I’ve got a 2 year old and I’m impressed at V’s self-control. Not once did she hit her stepson, and frankly, my son’s had quite a few “spanking of his life”s. I guess maybe that’s what the kids like about her, not only does she pay them real attention, but she respects them as people. Could be that they see she won’t hurt them. As it was said; kids are smart (except when they’re 2).
I told my four year old daughter if she wouldnt stop acting up and go to sleep in her bed that I would put her out in the grass. And that there are blood thirsty vampire bats waiting in the dark. It worked …
A friend of mine had some disciplinary problems with her eigt year old son - he had serious problems getting ready for school in the morning.
So she promised him that if he wasn’t ready on time she’d just put him in the car when it was time to go and whatever he had on was what he’d wear for the day.
The third day he went to school in just his pajama bottoms he figured out that she was serious and the problem disappeared.
Kids don’t like people who won’t tell them “no”. Reason: a kid’s entire job at life is to push at the boundaries to figure out how much they can get away with. If you don’t *give* them boundaries to push, they have no fucking idea whether they’re inside them or outside them, and no idea how to find out, and it scares the living hell out of them.
Don’t ask a four-year old to *articulate* all of that for you, because they can’t (and don’t understand it themselves). But that’s where that comes from.
Yeah, kids are smart and understanding. Hadn’t occurred to me to give them bogus explanations for things not allowed, but I think explanations are necessary.
Even though I don’t tink spilling water over a kids head is ok, I must admit, I’s probably much better than hitting him. I agree that it seems great patience on V’s part.
In a world where everybody’s parent’s want to be their kid’s “friend” maybe kids naturally seek V because she’s one of the few legitimate parents left. Friends are pretty easy come easy go. A good parent is hard to find.