Do you yell at your children?
PaganMom
I totally agree. it also depends on the kids. Gentle natured kids that mind the first time do not lead to you raising your voice. My kids that are ready at any given moment to rule the world live in a louder place.
Last edited by Hyacynth on 06 Dec 2009, 12:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
leejosepho
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Joined: 14 Sep 2009
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Location: 200 miles south of Little Rock
Yes, I believe there is a necessary distinction of temper there. While my five grandchildren were still here in my home, one "Hey!" from me could immediately stop *all* activity, and I never hesitated about saying it loudly enough to be heard well by all the first time. There were also times when anger came into the mix and a lecture came out, but I made sure those were only just long enough to make the point unavoidable.
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lol..amazing how the HEY!! ! word with enough volume will not only stop kids but also pets in thier tracks..my son has always been one of the aspies that always made sure all rules are being obeyed...i cannot drive over speed limit without a glare and a speech...which is why ive never had to yell at him..i am truely lucky
Yes, I do...although not much...but when I'm stressed, I snap...everyday I work harder to stop...since I know it is possible to NOT do it...my husband NEVER yells...NEVER...I have never heard him say a curse word...and no, he's not a religious kind of guy, he's just a very level-headed and peaceful guy...
CockneyRebel
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Age: 50
Gender: Male
Posts: 116,810
Location: In my little Olympic World of peace and love
There are two things that the yelling and spankings that I got, have done to me.
1. I beat up my bullies in elementary school and won those fights.
2. I became a die-hard hippie at the age of 16 and stayed that way, until the summer that I was 19.
Getting yelled at and spanked affected me in a very negative way.
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The Family Enigma
I really try not to raise my voice but sometimes I can't help it . My daughter talks all the time, repeats same sentence or question over and over again and she is very loud. When I talk to my husband she comes and starts talking about something completly ignoring the fact that we were talking to each other. We try to have patience but sometimes I get frustrated because of the noise and all the repetition, I forget what I was talking about with my husband. I try to tell her that we were talking and it's not nice to interfere, but she just gets louder. Most of the times I can walk away and wait until she goes to bed so I can talk to my hubby. Sometimes I yell at her: STOP!! ! PLEASE STOP TALKING!! ! It works because she stops and goes to her room, but makes me fell like a very bad person. After I calm down I always appologise and she is so sweet and forgives me .
I know this is old but i just wanted to say my dad still gets carried away with anger to the point it scares me It's now gotten to the point where our relationship is estranged. He doesn't understand that whatever he says really hurts me sometimes and he acts so unapologetic.
I've seen how angry he gets! he even said I betrayed him. I don't know why he would use such strong words (is it not a crime to love both sides of your family but at the same time disagree with the decisions that were made) He even made me choose between him or my mom's family. I don't want to choose! It hurts too much! If I choose one I might lose the other!
On one phone call, he used several profanities at me and even almost used the "r' word (but used the word "whatever" in substitute) Now I'm starting to question what he really thinks about me when we don't speak to each other or see each other.
It's situations like this that explain why I'm in therapy.
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"A freak of Nature stuck in reality...I don't fit the picture I'm not what you want me to be...sorry"-Line from "Strange" by Tokio Hotel ft. Kerli
It's a yes from me. It's not that my wife and I are aggressive people (we are not) it's just that nobody (unless they are on drugs) can have infinite compassion when their child is smart enough to know how to press their buttons.
I agree that what the original poster is describing is definitely emotional/verbal abuse.
Do I yell, sometimes out of frustration? Yes, I have. It has zero impact, so it is not something intentional, and it is usually after I have told him something a number of times in a row, and he isn't complying. It is never abusive---there are no insults---It is more like "Child's name I just told you not to (Whatever it is) five times, now. I really need you to stop doing that." Am I proud of this? No, I am not and it does not work.
It is much better to have calm consequences when something is not complied with than having yelling be the consequences or part of the consequences. It usually happens when I am in the middle of something, and I have a bunch of sensory stuff going on at once and can't attend to whatever he is doing like I need to. I am not perfect, though I wish I were.
Afterwards, I always apologize and I explain to my son that sometimes Mommies have problems with too much stuff going on, too, just like he does, and I tell him that I should not have yelled. I try to turn it into a teaching moment because my son has trouble managing his emotions and maybe seeing that mommy has these issues sometimes, too, might help him not feel so badly when he has meltdowns and such.
What you have going on does not sound like one-offs or instructive in any way. I am sorry. I had a dad who yelled all the time, but he was never that bad, and even that was harmful.
My son pushes my buttons so I yell at him. I hate it. I don't want to be one of those mothers who always yells and screams at their kids. I could never stand parents who yelled too much at their kids. My mother yelled but she didn't yell as much like those other parents who yelled a lot. Plus I also thought as a kid that if their kids would stop doing bad things and just listen to their mothers, they wouldn't be yelled at as much. But I was always glad mine didn't yell a lot because I would hate to be yelled at for every single thing my mother didn't like and she never told me the first time to stop in her normal voice because I didn't know it was a bad thing.
Plus parents who always yelled at their kids, I always stayed out of their hair and anything my friend got yelled at about, I would remember to never do that or else I would be yelled at. Plus I always sat still and never did anything so I wouldn't do anything bad to get yelled at. It would make me so glad I didn't have a mother who yelled a lot or else I never do anything in my home fearing I'd get yelled at because what if mommy doesn't like it, then she would yell at me. But honestly I realize that those kids are so used to it, it doesn't bother them because to them it's normal and their mother's normal tone of voice. So yelling is pointless for them because it's so normal. Plus they probably don't ever respect their parents because why should they if they don't respect them? I don't want my son to end up not respecting me because I have a hard time respecting people when they don't respect me so we would both be going around in circles and it be a cycle.
But my mood has been good lately so not much yelling at him thank goodness. He does pretty good listening when I stop him. But he gets moments where he gets defiant and doesn't want to listen so I end up yelling at him.
Daddy yelled a lot. Between having the AS temper and being a coal miner (and thus half deaf), I don't even think he always knew he was yelling. DH says I'm yelling when I don't think I am.
Daddy also spanked. Rarely, and not after I was old enough to reason with, but he did spank.
Daddy said kids were a lot like dogs-- They needed consistent, simple rules; a loud, firm voice; an occasional whack when they got too far out of line; and a lot of playing with and petting or else they'd turn mean. His peers didn't care for him much. Kids, dogs, and old people flocked to him like metal filings to a magnet.
He also praised, and hugged, and made sure we sat in the rocker and made up after every fight we ever had. He would tell you that actions or behaviors were stupid, but he said it was very important to distinguish between the action/behavior and the person. He always said, "That was stupid." Never, "You are stupid."
I think Daddy did a good job. He certainly cleaned up the mess that my overpraising, hardly-ever-yelling, mostly-parenting-book-friendly Grandma made out of me. I felt more secure with his method of parenting than any other I experienced.
I know I turned out a lot more secure than my mother or her half-sister (both of whom my grandma raised-- she blames Grandpa's yelling and high anxiety and seldom-to-never praising-- and certainly NONE of his siblings and few of their kids turned out very well in my opinion-- but I'm not so sure it wasn't the combination of both).
My aunt and uncle on my dad's side yelled a lot, but they weren't so big on the hugs and making up, and frequently mocked their kids (and everyone else, too-- in fact, everyone else more; they're very mocking people, which is something I really hate about them). They're more confident than any of the kids on my mom's side, but definitely self-serving and lacking in compassion and human decency (for all they're very socially skillful, they use it in manipulative and destructive ways and are not very pro-social at all).
I've done both ways. I have yelled at my kids and spanked them (up to the point they get old enough to reason with). I have also done the no-yelling, no-corporal-punishment, redirect undesired behaviors, honey-sweet voice at all times schtick our current society seems to approve of.
I don't like it. Maybe I'm misunderstanding the parenting books, or all those honey-sweet mothers do something behind the scenes that I don't see or something. My kids don't like it. I don't know if they're AS or if they just weren't raised with it and therefore don't respond to it, but it gets no results (other than whiny, spoiled kids that don't mind and have to be nagged all day in a honey-sweet voice) and actually just seems to confuse them.
Lately I've gone back to yelling and swearing (in front of them, but not exactly at them-- I think there is a difference, but I don't know how to quantify it). I find I get less frustrated this way, have to spend less time nagging them this way, see more to praise them for, have more energy to joke and play, and end up enjoying my kids a lot more (and they seem to enjoy me, too).
I think I'm going to continue in this manner. I might try to cut out the swearing-- it doesn't seem to bother the kids (they just take it for granted and occasionally imitate me, which makes me cringe and feel guilty) but it does really bother regular people. Nobody's perfect, but I think this works best in our case. Because, the other morning, my 10-year-old daughter looked at me and said, out of the blue, "I'm glad you're back, Mom. I like you better this way." Both my little ones listen to me (most of the time, anyway, which isn't bad considering they're almost-5 and almost-3) now, and they don't seem to be afraid that I'm going to actually lose control of my temper (probably because, even though cuss words are just part of my f*****g vocabulary and I controlled-yell almost daily, it's been months now since I've really blown my top and screamed or said or done something I had to apologize for later).
I don't think it would work for everyone. All the NT chicks I know are horrified by my parenting. They don't understand why we seem get along so well when we're "obviously doing it all wrong." They say they don't think I like raising kids, or like my kids. That bothers me, because I enjoy it very much and I think they're wonderful (even though I don't carry on about it, because that behavior makes me want to barf). But I'm not raising THEM. I don't live with THEM. I am not THEIR mother, and THEY are not my kids.
I might just not get it because of AS, but it really seems to work for us. My kids say they're happy. They look happy. They act happy. Not all sunny-cheerful, what a lot of people think of as happy-- but content, secure, it's-OK-to-act-like-myself, I-feel-safe, relaxed, really truly actually happy. People who actually see up day in and day out, day after day, say we seem happy, that we fit together well and everything works. There's definitely a lot less reticence and screaming and fighting and hitting and biting and tears and lying and hiding and avoiding than there was when I was doing the honey-sweet thing.
Everything I'm told and everything I read says it's wrong, but everything I see says it's right for us.
For the OP-- Yeah, it sounds like the stuff your folks are doing is patently f****d up. I don't know how to quantify the difference, but it sounds f****d up to me. You can generally tell by looking at the mental state of the parents and that of the kids, and watching whether they seem to connect with each other or not. I really don't think there are any objective criteria you can use, but you can tell.
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"Alas, our dried voices when we whisper together are quiet and meaningless, as wind in dry grass, or rats' feet over broken glass in our dry cellar." --TS Eliot, "The Hollow Men"
If you see the advice in most parenting books as a " honey sweet " thing, I'd say you do misunderstand it, but it actually sounds like you've worked things out in you own way. The not yelling AT the kids and showing frustration with the behavior instead of the person are very important distinctions.
I wonder if one reason trying someone else's way doesn't work for you is that it can be hard to follow the golden rule of parenting when you are uncomfortable with a method: be consistent; say what you mean and do what you say.
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Mom to an amazing young adult AS son, plus an also amazing non-AS daughter. Most likely part of the "Broader Autism Phenotype" (some traits).
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