February 6, 2017

How a 4 Year-Old Successfully Emo-Blackmailed His Mother

Category: Being Parents

The art of parenting comes with the ability to dish out creative punishments consequences so as to help us parents impose discipline that teaches our kids to be responsible and accountable for their actions. 

Consequences in itself is not an easy concept to grasp in the minds of the youngling. Often, the word consequences is used interchangeably with the word “punishment”; which should not be the case at all.

For a young child, the word “consequences” is also harder to pronounce as compared to the word “punishment”. 

Teaching what punishments consequences exactly means takes time, practice and consistency.  It’s about encouraging them to learn as to how they can do things differently and not make them feel bad about themselves. 

How then do we know that the child gets it?

Well, for me it happened in the form of the conversation below once upon a time:

Squirt kept calling out for my attention relentlessly when I was cooking and was in the middle of doubling up to prep as well as needing to focus on the meat that was almost burning on the pan.

After calling out for the 100th time,  he came to me, tugged at hand and spoke loudly as if I was deaf:   

Squirt: Mama, you are not listening to me!

Me: Hold on, Squirt. Give me a minute. I heard you. I’m in the middle of something right now.

Squirt: But…Mamaaaaaaa!

Me: Wait, Squirt. Just a minute. (me still furiously attending to the food on the stove and was almost done with whatever I needed to do)

Squirt: No mama, you are not listening. You will be punished.

Right. He got my attention alright. So I turned off the fire, wiped my hands on my apron, got down on my knees to his level and with an amused look said:

Me: Oh? First, we don’t use the word “punish”.  But, how will you punish me?

Squirt: No kisses and hugs.

This child has got a sense of humour. Unfortunately, I cannot live without hugs and kisses so I sucked it up and let myself be emo-blackmailed by this tiny little Squirt.

He gets it and he got me. Dammit. 

20161225_224124
Copyright: Grubbs ‘n Critters

Posted by:    |    8 Comment
Comments
  1. Kids are amazing! He is funny little fella, coming up with the worst punishment, I mean consequence, for a parent. Love that photo of you two, seems like you made up ๐Ÿ™‚

    • Kids are the weirdest creatures! He is very cuddly and a very good hugger. It would be a cruel punishment for a mother, indeed. :p
      Made up? You mean I had put on make-up? I don’t even remember! Maybe I had a lipstick on. LOL.

      • Haha, silly girl! No, it means he’s not mad at you anymore – you kissed and made up. Just an expression. ๐Ÿ™‚

  2. Bang will come jump on me and say “I”m going to bug you because I want attention.” And he’ll roll on me (if I’m sitting) until I start tickling him… He gets it ๐Ÿ™‚

    • Awww..the rolling is really sweet. At least he is being very honest about wanting attention! LOL.

  3. They so get it!! They see their consequences and dole it right back… Wow, what a cutie though! I saw something on another blog yesterday from a homeschooling mom and she said that first she gave her two sons her undivided attention, and then they gave her theirs. Pretty powerful.

    • THAT is pretty powerful. So simple and can’t be any truer about giving undivided attention. On the topic of “dole out”, there are moments when I see them emulating me then realising that it was a face palm moment for me…LOL.
      Thanks for stopping by, Katherine! Wishing you a wonderful weekend. ๐Ÿ™‚

ADD YOUR COMMENT

Privacy Preference Center

Close your account?

Your account will be closed and all data will be permanently deleted and cannot be recovered. Are you sure?