Question to Non-spankers.

Katydid said:

OK this post is for non-spankers. I don't think I will ever be a completely non-spanker, but while reading some other posts I got curious. Why is it I feel the NEED to spank? Then I started thinking, My parents didn't spank that much. Anyway, this is really not baiting, I am truly looking for opinions from NON-SPANKERS on why I shouldn't spank, or at least not spank very often at all. Please do not debate here, there were numerous posts in the past for spankers to have their say, now I want to hear the other side.

Click to expand...

Hi there.

I kind of agree with the poster above me, overuse kind of dimishises the effectiveness of the punishment.
I've found that when I lower the tone of my voice and speak firmly and clearly, my two listen better . (they're still young though, 2 & 4). I don't want to be the kind that spanks, so I try other methods, that one seems to be working, tied with privilege denials, and time-outs.

Eye contact helps too, LOL

I've spanked my nephew twice in the almost 2.5 years I've been watching him. Both for very serious things, one was getting ahold of a bottle of tylenol and the other was running into the street.

I agree that if you use a punishment ALL the time for everything it stops working. So I try to not use any punishment too often. Right now for medium things, I'll give him a time out, five minutes the first time, ten the second, it's never gotten to a spanking because he always smartens up by then.

Now since he's almost seven I'm using the "I love you but I don't love what you did" and he doesn't like the idea of me being diappointed with him, also now were getting to the point I can explain why I don't like what he's doing like if he lies I'll say "Every time you lie people believe you less, if you lie often enough people will stop believing you etc" and he understands why he shouldn't.

Tone of voice is key, even with a seven year old, when I use my serious voice he knows I mean business.

Blue Impulse said:

oooo I like that, "I love you but I don't love what you did".. I think its a good lesson in faith as well, because God loves us, but He does not love it when we sin.. the common phrase "love the sinner, hate the sin" so to speak. Thats a good way of incorporating a lesson in God into everyday life, Linnis

~ ~

Click to expand...

Thanks, Blue. That's actually where I got it from. I didn't want him to think I loved him less because he did something I don't approve of so one day it came out "I love you but I don't love what you did," and so far it's been very effective as a way to curb a behaviour.

I think kids sometimes feel we love them less because we punish them and I did not want him feeling that way, ever.

I am planning on being a non spanker... I don't want my child to think that a reaction to something bad should be physical. I'm afraid that being physical with my kids will raise them to be physical with others or their spouse.

I am going to try to use other punishments, like time outs and grounding and taking away priviledges, but also, I am going to start young with teaching self-control. I think self-control is the key to everything, if they only learn to control themself then things don't get out of hand later. But this is largely theory and based off of talking to other parents with "good" kids and books I have read. I think this can be done by not giving them all freedom at once. Starting with a baby, when there are 15 "nono's" in the living room alone and they have reign of three rooms that would be really hard to deal with. We cut it down to three nono's in the living room and gates at the doors to the room. First I taught him NOT to touch those three things. Then when he got good about that I moved one gate and allowed him to go from the living room to his bedroom all by himself. He was very proud and discovered new nono's. He tested me a little more and discovered the nono's in his bedroom had the same consequences as the ones in the living room and it took a lot less time for him to listen. Then when he was good with that, I took moved the other gate in the living room back to allow him to go to the kitchen also. It took even less time for him to learn his boundaries. I hope this is teaching him self control.

I also plan on using positive reinforcement a lot. I already do this. When David is patiently waiting for food I compliment him and make all over him but when he fusses incessantly I tend to ignore him more and just get the food ready. He is trying throwing fits recently. He throws himself to the floor crying and then starts rolling around crying. I ignore this behavior completely. But when he comes up to me shrieking happily, I will abandon anything I am doing to give him a kiss and love on him. I think a lot of times kids misbehave because they just want attention-- ANY attention is better than no attention. I have seen parents who ignore their kids unless they are yelling "shut up!" or "don't do that!" I want to give David enough positive reinforcements that he doesn't have to misbehave to get attention, thus hopefully cutting down on the amount of misbehavior he chooses to do.

Anyway I am still learning as I go, but these are my thoughts so far...

YES I totally have that somedays! DD will do something wrong and simply get told not to and then of course DS does the EXACT SAME THING!! I hate that! (he gets treated as if he JUST got told not to, cause telling her should be close enough)

All the positive reinforcement in the world IMO, isn't enough alone. but I still try my best.

Katydid said:

OK this post is for non-spankers. I don't think I will ever be a completely non-spanker, but while reading some other posts I got curious. Why is it I feel the NEED to spank? (Emphasis mine)

Click to expand...

Hi Katydid, yeah, it's me.

Let me offer a different perspective to hopefully shed some light to your question above.

As a child, I was raised in church that if we changed how we behave, we'll change what we believe. So we dressed up, carried big Bibles, behaved well on Sundays, and doing all the things that good Christians are supposed to be doing, and expecting that, to change what we believe - about God, about Church, about a personal relationship with Jesus. But it doesn’t work that way. All it really did was create an environment based on legalism.

I've sinced learned that belief is not a result of change behavior, but changed behaviour is a result of what we believe.

Because if we change what we believe, we’ll change how we behave.

Belief is not a result of changed behaviour. But changed behaviour is a result of what we believe. We need to change what we believe. And that can be in anything - we do what we believe.

So what we believe about raising our kids, is what we will do. Now this is not to suggest you are somehow less of a parent because you do the occasional spanking - you know I don't think of you like that at all. (By all indications from what you've posted about your kids, you're a great mom.)

So if we believe that spanking is requisite to raising our kids, then obviously we'll feel the need to spank as necessary and as appopriate.

Again, as you've asked, I'm not debating about the rightness or wrongness about spanking or not spanking, but only giving you my thoughts as to why you might feel the need to spank.

Katydid said:

OK this post is for non-spankers. I don't think I will ever be a completely non-spanker, but while reading some other posts I got curious. Why is it I feel the NEED to spank? Then I started thinking, My parents didn't spank that much. Anyway, this is really not baiting, I am truly looking for opinions from NON-SPANKERS on why I shouldn't spank, or at least not spank very often at all. Please do not debate here, there were numerous posts in the past for spankers to have their say, now I want to hear the other side.

Click to expand...

Because in most cases it is not the most fruitful way to develop character. Spanking develops fear of punishment. Right correction develops character.

Dark Matter

I don't know if I can give you reasons not to spank but I am not opposed to spanking (clarifying what 'spanking' means to me - a swat on the tush with your hand) but we choose not to spank.

I say that and yet, our two year old, when she gets upset in the car (which really is quite frequently) will take off her seatbelt. Our solution is to stop the car, swat her hand and put the seatbelt back on. It's really slowed down the behavior and til we added the swat, nothing seemed to work...so maybe I am in the 'spanking' category.

Anyhow, that is the only time I swat and that's only because she has me at a disadvantage. We're on the road and I don't have a good place to give her a time out. Believe me, I even tried pulling over for a time out but she seemed to think that was funny. At home, time outs work because she is removed from the rest of the family and she really hates that. Afterwards we discuss why she was in time out and that just seems to be a good solution.

My son is almost seven and I've only spanked him once and everybody always compliments us on how sweet and well behaved he is. Of course he has his moments but he's not being willfully disobedient...often, he just has too much energy and drives me nuts Time outs still work wonders on him and, I'd say, on average, he gets one, maybe two time outs a week, if that.

Okay, just my ramblings. I just believe that unless you're abusing your child, how you discipline is your business and everybody else should keep their opinions to themselves.

When I babysat anywhere from 2-6 children, spanking of any kind wasn't an option. When a child misbehaved Id give them time out in a room away from the rest of us. I knew the kids would start the "Oh you spent extra time with him because he was bad," so if one of the kids misbehaved or spoke rudely I ignored them, or at least pretended on was. Then they weren't getting the attention and usually it kept it from happening again because nobody likes to be ignored. After the time out was over I'd say what they did wasn't acceptable and that's why they were in time out and it was over.