lesliec
- 1,001
Ok, to give you a little background DH and I have pretty old fashioned family values, we are in Texas and are extremely conservative. My children say please and thank you, they appologize if they hurt someone (even if it is an accident), and they say yes ma'am (or no ma'am) when an adult asks them something. We teach them that it is ok to disagree, but they must do so respectfully. In additon we treat our children with the same respect. We love on and praise and use our manners with them, becaues 1. that's how people should treat each other and 2. we don't feel like they will learn it if they don't see it from us. We don't spank, we do believe in it, but we are adopting out children and aren't allowed to, but also don't feel like it would be beneficial to them given their past.
We are involved in a bible study group that meets on Friday nights. We meet for dinner and then have bible study. It is a family group so all of the children are there and the moms (and sometimes the dads) will take turns watching the kids and doing activites with them.
The family and child that I am having the issue with is from the noth west and are pretty new to living in our area, not that there are not plenty of people from this area whose kids act the same way, I just feel like some of it may be atributed to being from a different culture. The mother is pretty high need, and they aren't around our group that much as she doesn't go anywhere withouth her husband and he is working on his Master's and is gone two weekends a month. She also has a baby who is about 4 months old, so she misses a bit due to that. When she is there much of the conversation is monopolized by talking about all of her health problems, and how hard it is with a baby (nursing issues, no sleep.... the normal new mommy problems just multiplied by 50).
Last night I was outside with a couple of other mothers and about 14 kids (The other mother never volunteers to go out and help). There are 4 boys in the 4-6 year range, including one of mine. We'll call this other little boy Bob. We were in the back yard and all 4 boys ran around the side of the house to get toys out of the garage and then started heading out front. I walked around and called them all into the backyard to play. All of the boys except Bob came back to the back yard. Bob tells me that he doesn't want to and starts arguing (he's 4). I repeated my instructions several different ways and each time he argued with me. Then I told him that his choice was to come to the back yard or to go to time out. He came to the back yard, but was back talking and kicking things the whole way. I don't deal well with disrespectful kids, but I know that the parents allow him to talk to them this way, so I just let it go. This scenatio repeats itself 3 more times in about a 45 minute time period, only with one of the other mothers b/c I had to stay out of it. Then, as it is getting dark Bob, just takes off running all the way around the house. The second time he does it he runs in the front door. I see him go in and run to his parents, and can see that they are probably going to send him back out (as he is a huge disruption inside), so I go in and tell the father that he isn't listening to us and is running into the front yard out by the road. I tried to address it as a safety issue and that he wasn't safe b/c we weren't able to protect him from running into the street. They didn't send him out, but I could see that he was being really disruptive. When it was all over and we were all back in, they made him come appologize to me. I stated that he also needed to appologize to the mother of the house b/c he was disrespectful to her also. I then told the parents that boys will be boys, and that my oldest was in on the drama too, but my problem is when he runs off and won't listen or come back and I have no way to protect him. I could tell she was pretty upset, so I went and appologized and told her that I wasn't upset with her. She went off into this big drama about how she is a bad mother and she is responsible and it is her fault he acts this way (I totally agree), but I just tried to consol her.
Bob's mom has issues to say the least, but I don't really know how to deal with this. She is the type of person that lives on drama, and even if everything is wonderful she will find something to complain about. I have never heard her say anything positive about her 4month old, all she has done is complain. Honestly I want to tell her that since she doesn't treasure her baby I would love to raise him. We aren't able to have children, so when people do nothing but complain about theirs and not see what a blessing they truly are, it makes me so angry. Don't get me wrong, I understand having a baby and a 4 year old is hard, I just wish once I would see her acknowledge what a gift God has given her.
We are involved in a bible study group that meets on Friday nights. We meet for dinner and then have bible study. It is a family group so all of the children are there and the moms (and sometimes the dads) will take turns watching the kids and doing activites with them.
The family and child that I am having the issue with is from the noth west and are pretty new to living in our area, not that there are not plenty of people from this area whose kids act the same way, I just feel like some of it may be atributed to being from a different culture. The mother is pretty high need, and they aren't around our group that much as she doesn't go anywhere withouth her husband and he is working on his Master's and is gone two weekends a month. She also has a baby who is about 4 months old, so she misses a bit due to that. When she is there much of the conversation is monopolized by talking about all of her health problems, and how hard it is with a baby (nursing issues, no sleep.... the normal new mommy problems just multiplied by 50).
Last night I was outside with a couple of other mothers and about 14 kids (The other mother never volunteers to go out and help). There are 4 boys in the 4-6 year range, including one of mine. We'll call this other little boy Bob. We were in the back yard and all 4 boys ran around the side of the house to get toys out of the garage and then started heading out front. I walked around and called them all into the backyard to play. All of the boys except Bob came back to the back yard. Bob tells me that he doesn't want to and starts arguing (he's 4). I repeated my instructions several different ways and each time he argued with me. Then I told him that his choice was to come to the back yard or to go to time out. He came to the back yard, but was back talking and kicking things the whole way. I don't deal well with disrespectful kids, but I know that the parents allow him to talk to them this way, so I just let it go. This scenatio repeats itself 3 more times in about a 45 minute time period, only with one of the other mothers b/c I had to stay out of it. Then, as it is getting dark Bob, just takes off running all the way around the house. The second time he does it he runs in the front door. I see him go in and run to his parents, and can see that they are probably going to send him back out (as he is a huge disruption inside), so I go in and tell the father that he isn't listening to us and is running into the front yard out by the road. I tried to address it as a safety issue and that he wasn't safe b/c we weren't able to protect him from running into the street. They didn't send him out, but I could see that he was being really disruptive. When it was all over and we were all back in, they made him come appologize to me. I stated that he also needed to appologize to the mother of the house b/c he was disrespectful to her also. I then told the parents that boys will be boys, and that my oldest was in on the drama too, but my problem is when he runs off and won't listen or come back and I have no way to protect him. I could tell she was pretty upset, so I went and appologized and told her that I wasn't upset with her. She went off into this big drama about how she is a bad mother and she is responsible and it is her fault he acts this way (I totally agree), but I just tried to consol her.
Bob's mom has issues to say the least, but I don't really know how to deal with this. She is the type of person that lives on drama, and even if everything is wonderful she will find something to complain about. I have never heard her say anything positive about her 4month old, all she has done is complain. Honestly I want to tell her that since she doesn't treasure her baby I would love to raise him. We aren't able to have children, so when people do nothing but complain about theirs and not see what a blessing they truly are, it makes me so angry. Don't get me wrong, I understand having a baby and a 4 year old is hard, I just wish once I would see her acknowledge what a gift God has given her.