The first visible success of the week:
ME: “Please don’t forget to put your lunch bag on the counter”.
My 5 year old: “I know, I know!!..... but thank you for reminding me Mommy”
Last night was our 2nd family meeting. After we put our youngest to bed, we brought our son down to the dining room and had a family talk about how our week went. We went through our “family rules” again had an active discussion with how the week went. It was a very productive conversation and I think he really appreciated that both Mike and I admitted to our faults this week as well. We also discussed our goals and set new ones for this week.
Overall, I do believe we had a very successful week. There was no yelling, we practiced time-ins rather than time-outs and everyone followed their chore chart. We also ate more meals together and spent more time together as a family. We have some kinks to work out for sure but for our first week, I am very proud of my family… and myself!
We did get to try the new Time-In method on our son twice this week. Both times I was shocked with how successful they were. We cuddled together, had a chat about the behaviour and then I left him to gather his emotions & thoughts and he was able to rejoin the family when he felt he was ready. I must admit though, it takes a lot more work. A time-out was very easy – I would just say “go to time-out” and he’d go and I’d look at the clock and then call him back 5 minutes later. With our time-ins, I had to actively stop what I was doing and go with him to his spot, sit with him and talk. At first, I was slightly annoyed that I had to stop what I was doing but then as we sat there chatting, I realized that I wouldn’t trade anything in the world for cuddling with him listening to his thoughts and feelings. You really do gain a little more understanding into what triggered the behaviour when you spend time listening to what they have to say instead of shunning them off to a corner somewhere.
I feel like my family is on track to get where we need to be. Now to concentrate on me… more to come about that next time.
that is very good insight on another way of disciplining...however i send my children to the corner. i stop what i am doing and take them to the corner, they have to stay there for the alloted time and then i go to them and have them explain to me what they have done and why they had done it and ways that they will improve their behaviour to not end up on time out again...and then i hug them and kiss them and tell them i love them and send them to play...i don't feel like i am jus shunning them in a corner...but different ways work for different families as well....i hope i am not stepping over any boundaries by commenting on your blog
ReplyDeletenot at all!! this blog is open to everyone, especially family & friends! :) I handled time-outs the exact same way as you did until last week. I also had the exact same feelings about it as you did. I think where I came to realize that they were not right for my family was when I really looked at the results of a time-out on my kid. I didn't see any reduction in the behaviour he was getting the time-outs for. For that moment (maybe even the day) it worked but the next day he would repeat the behaviour again without recalling (or caring about) the consequence. There were days where he was getting multiple time-outs for the same behaviour. I was looking for an alternative to the time-out that would help us correct the behaviour permanently. So far so good. :)
ReplyDeleteI don't think 1 parenting method will work for everyone. If you know what you are doing is the best for your family, then you are definitely doing the right thing. My problem was that I didn't feel like I was doing the best I could and that's where this entire family overhaul started.
Thanks for reading & commenting!