I was listening to NPR a couple years ago. My local affiliate produced a show called “Family Forum” where parenting experts took calls, and discussed relevant topics such as these. One show in particular featured some woman who had written a book that demonstrated a connection between the parent-child relationship when the kid is about 2, to the same relationship when the kid is a teenager. Turns out, parents can observe the exact same power struggle at 2 as at 16. So whatever relationship you have with your kid when he or she is a toddler will be the same as when they are teenagers. If you allow your 2-year-old to set his own limits, or behave however she wants to, then the kid is going to act that exact same way at 16, when she can get into a whole hell of a lot more trouble. Those parents who had set limits at toddler age, and used age-appropriate levels of give-and-take communication, had virtually no teenager problems when their children reached that age. A foundation of mutual respect, effective two-way communication, and consideration had been laid years ago. IANAParent but I thought it was a rather interesting theory. I’m watching my sister’s kids to see how that theory pans out – they are about to turn 12 and 14. (Very soon, I’ll know for sure!)
My sister was not terribly permissive and never let the kids run the show. When they went out in public, before she let them get out of the car, she sat there and laid down the rules. It went something like this:
“How do we act in a restaurant?”
“We act good!”
“Good! Are we allowed to get up and roam around inside the restaurant?”
“No!”
“Good! Are we allowed to play with our water, our silverware or anything else on the table?”
“No!”
“Good! Do we decide what we want to eat and tell the waitress clearly?”
“Yes!”
“Good! And what happens if we act bad in the restaurant?”
“You’ll make us leave and go home.”
“Good! Let’s go eat!”
She did this as early as age 2. They were always angels in public. Once, my dad decided to go get them for dinner and when he gave them back, my sister asked how they acted. He didn’t want to come right out and say it, but they’d behaved horribly – probably much like the kid in the OP. My sister asked him (knowing he’d seen her go through the above exercise) if he’d laid out his expecations for their behavior before going in. Sheepishly, he admitted he hadn’t. Later, any time he took them out somewhere, he did what my sister did and never had another problem with them. Our family all realized immediately: you cannot expect a child to behave if the child does not know what you mean by “behave.”
This is why you take them to a museum where you can do things like that! (Touch everything I mean, it’s still not acceptable to be a brat).
Maybe it’s just up here but there is the Science center with lots of interactive age appropriate things to do (they have a Magic School Bus exhibit on now and recently they put in a permanent exhibit for kids called Wow-town. That one is for ages 3-7) and a couple other museums if not in the city, within an hours drive of the city. It’s fun for the kids and adults can learn a few things too (I admit I’m a magic school bus junkie)
I wouldn’t take a young child to a museum that doesn’t cater to them. They’d be bored silly within 5 minutes and that’s when you start getting them acting out.
Actually I think that’s why we have so many bratty kids running around. The parents don’t take into account what their child likes and ways of keeping them busy, they just want to do their own thing the kids can deal on their own. If you need an evening out, get a sitter. When taking the kids out plan a bit, bring toys or colouring books or something as well as laying down the line. Unfortunately some people don’t anticipate that.
Respectfully, I think this is ridiculous. If a kid doing a bit of loud talking a few aisles over is interfering with your ability to choose between cocoa puffs and raisin bran, then perhaps it is you who aren’t adequately prepared to go out in public.
Parents of feral children used to irk me. Then my husband started working for Adult Protective Services. I realized that all these idiot parents are going to be old someday, and their horrid children are going to be the ones taking care of them. Then, as my mom would say, the chickens will come home to roost.
It’s still annoying, but there’s a sense of justice.
I just got back from lunch a little bit ago and speaking of screeching demon harpy spawn from hell…
Eric and I went to Jack in the Box (yes, I know… but it is cheap) anyway, we are sitting there and in come these three women with two small children like maybe 4 and 6. They get thier food and as soon as they sit down the younger one starts screeching like a barn owl on speed and the other one is running around doing laps in the place. This continues as we try to enjoy our lunch. Then the little one gets up , I should say get down off the table, and starts doing laps as well as screeching at ear-drum shattering decible levels. :mad: What are the mothers doing?.. absolutly nothing. Just sitting there ignoring the little fuckers while they eat and converse. I did have a strong urge to stick my foot out and trip the demon spawn as they ran past… but I restrained myself from doing so. I would have said something to these women as we left, but they were speaking only in Spanish and pulled up in a car with Mexico plates (south of the border Mexico, not New Mexico) so saying anything to them in English woud have been futile**.
But on another note, this is the first time I have encountered this horrible behavior at any JIB.
**Now, I am not trying to be rude or steretypical of Spanish speaking people, but as it seems to be the norm around here see location, most don’t understand (or act like they inderstand) any English.
Whereever I was, whether it be in a grocery store, a restaurant, walking down the street, or in my front yard, if someone was acting inappropriate and disruptive, yelling and screaming, no matter if it be an adult or child, you better believe it would interfere with whatever activity I was doing. That behavior is unacceptible in public, so stop trying to make excuses for misbehaved children and permissive parents. Have some respect for your fellow human beings in public, teach your children to act appropriately, or don’t bring them in public and subject people to your kid’s misbehavior. As you can see from this thread, that kind of behavior annoys many many people, we don’t think it’s cute.
Okay, so now here is a redeeming incident from today’s lunch.
I went to the local Pizza Hut for my monthly ingestion of grease, carbs, salt and toxic chemical meat-like products. I expect the Hut to be busy and noisy, so it doesn’t bother me much.
I sat at a table next to a mother with two small children (boys) who looked to be about three and 1+. Both these kids were just thrilled to be there having pizza and gave me big smiles when I looked over at them. I was there for about 20 minutes and never heard much out of either of them. She looked to be Latina, which means nothing in this context, I guess, but the kids were well-behaved. When the older one made some whiney noises about something, she leaned over and said something to him and he shut up immediately.
You’d be suprised how many activities a child talking in a “loud” voice (I’m very curious as to your definition of loud voice and if it would equal what many people who aren’t around kids 24/7 consider shouting) can disrupt.
I didn’t realize before I moved into my new place that the grassy area right behind my back gate is the unofficial playground for all the kids in my apartment complex (there’s really not that many, but they’re so freaking loud it sounds like there’s 500 of them).
Now, I realize that a big grassy area is a natural playground for children. And I actually really like kids. I hope to have some. Thing is, it’s like these particular kids are trying to see how loud they can be. They give “outside voice” a whole new meaning. I’ve totally given up on trying to study in my apartment. It’s impossible. It sounds like the little brats are in my apartment. Watching TV? I’ve got to BLAST it, just so I can hear it over the little screaming banshees outside.
I hope none of them ever get into a situation where they’d need to scream for help, because no one in our complex would do a damn thing. Wanna know why? They scream like they’re being murdered regularly. THAT’S how loud they are. And I can’t say anything because, well, what would I say? It’s daylight, they’re playing on a grassy area. They’re not doing anything wrong. Except eventually leading me to run outside with a spoon and gouge out each and every one of their little voiceboxes.
I do actually have a point here in all this rambling. Children “talking in loud voices” (again, part of me thinks you may be trying to spin “shouting” into a more positive light) can be very disruptive no matter what activity you’re engaged in. Even if it’s not particularly disruptive, it’s sure as hell annoying.
Bullshit. If you really want me to believe that it would become physically impossible for you to continue your shopping because my kid is talking a level or two higher than normally–well, as I said, I think that says way more about you than it does about me. Not to mention that if you had carefully read my post, I deliberately excluded “yelling and screaming”–so I’m not sure why you threw that in there other than to try and paint my comments in the worst light possible. My boys are both well behaved, we’re often the subject of little old ladies pinch-cheeking and "oh-so-sweet"ing, but the fact remains that they are very young and sometimes they get cranky/hungry/tired. Like any good parent, I make every effort to accomadate our schedule to thier moods, but sometimes you’ve gotta buy milk even if the kiddos would rather not. They’re not perfect. I’m not perfect. And I’d bet a million fucking dollars that you’re not perfect either.
Please point out where I have once made an excuse for extreme misbehavior or other parent’s permisiveness. As a matter of fact, I seem to remember being one of the first ones in this thread agreeing with the OP that the mothers he encountered were behaving inappropriately.
lezlers–I’m really not trying to “spin” anything. I meant exactly what I said–sometimes small kid’s voices get louder when they’re excited or upset. I’m not talking about screeching, or screaming, or trying to outloud each other–which I agree with you is completely annoying and can certainly be distracting.
All I said was that a bit of loudness in a grocery store was less objectionable than the same thing in a fancy restaurant and n s came blazing in to disagree (shocking). Personally, I don’t behave the same way in a Krogers as I would in a church, and I don’t treat a trip to McDonalds the same way I would a trip to some snooty harp-playing restaurant. Why should my children be held to stricter standards than I hold myself?
And with that–I’m off. This is a kiddo-complaino thread and I’ll leave you guys to it. Lord knows there’s plenty of ammunition out there, this thing could go on for pages. Enjoy!
Yes, except this was at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, which is supposed to be kid-friendly. The kids were 6 and 8, old enough to know better. The older one then decided it would be funny to RUN AWAY – on a Saturday afternoon in July at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. And what were the consequences when, 30 minutes later, we finally FOUND the brat? “Now, don’t you do that again!” No, “You’re going to spend the rest of this vacation sitting in the motel room with the TV turned off and no Gameboy if you even DREAM of doing that again.” No “I’m going to turn you over to the security guards who will SHOW you what happens to bratty children.”* Nope, just a “Don’t do that again,” followed by a “Let’s find something else that you’ll enjoy doing!” That’s right, reward the howling monster for his misbehavior.**
*Not that they really would, but it’s always a useful threat.
**I’ve given up talking to her about her children; it’s a 20-minute list of all the medications they’re on, the special classes they require for their learning disabilities, etc. I promise you, I appreciate that many children have learning disabilities, but I suspect a lot of these kids’ would have been cured with a smack or two on the behind in their younger days!
I was one of the calmest little kids you could imagine. I’ve also been drinking coffee since I was three years old. I think there’s a connection, ritalin is a stimulant after all.
Actually, I would prefer the “don’t do that again”, rather than offering a choice. “Don’t do that again or no ice cream.” Hmmm. Well, let’s see, at some point I KNOW I’ll get the ice cream; on the other hand, I can never have the chance to destroy a million dollar painting again. Crunch.
Woah Tentacle you might have something there. I’m of Norwegian descent and prone to allergies. In our extended family we were started on coffee as soon as we could pick up a cup. Luckily I have never had asthma, but my daughter does. We were told by her MD that if she had an attack and were without medication we should dose her with strong coffee until we could get her to an ER.
In my family (grew up in the 50’s-60’s) all the kids had several cups of coffee before school. Hmmmmm???
Maybe we should be giving kids coffee (yumm) instead of Ritalin (not yummm)?
Sometimes perfectly “normal” looking kids have physical, developmental or emotional difficulties that you might not recognize. Maybe the eight year old in the shopping cart at Target was autistic. I’d give the beneft of the doubt to something this odd.
But, for the life of me I can’t figure out when it was declared that food courts at malls were “ignore your children” zones. In fact, fast food resturants in general seem to cause people to conveniently “forget” they have a child with them. For me, the local burger joint was the learning ground for better resturants. If I couldn’t handle the 3 minutes it took to order and get our drinks, the 10 minute wait for the food, and the 10-15 minutes it took to eat, then Mom sure wasn’t going to let me go to a real sit down resturant! And when I did go to a sit down resturant, it was the equivalent of Denny’s, not the Four Seasons. I was about 8 the first time we ever went to a really fancy place, and I fidgeted and glared at the slightly unfamilar food presentation, but I wasn’t loud and I wasn’t running around. I knew if I misbehaved, Mom would be disappointed. She wouldn’t yell at me, and she never spanked me (a swat when we were in diaper, yes), but somehow she earned my respect so early and so deep that, to this day, disappointing my mother is the worst thing I can think of. Some people are geniuses at math, some at music, some at physical activities. I was graced with a mother who is a genius at parenting.
To return us to the proper mood for a rant–and for pity’s sake, stop putting apple juice in the baby bottle and just don’t buy the four year old a Big Gulp of soda bigger than him! Don’t buy him soda pop at all! Give him some milk and if he’s lactose intolerant, let him drink water. Put it in a colored cup with ice, a lemon slice and a straw and he’ll never know the difference.
my bad…=)
it seems like i spent a few days in the air there…
I can remember being told to sit still, and handed a book when flying to florida on vacation at the age of 5. I was more peeved becaue they tok my brother to the cockpit to watch the pilots, but never bothered asking if I wanted to see it=( I guess since it was the early 60s I was expected to only aspire to being a stewardess…despite the fact my MOTHER had her pilots license in addition to my dad having his <POUT>
Though I am planning on starting to take flying lessons next spring when money gets less tight=)
When I was younger, my parents never had a problem with my brother and I. First off, we didn’t go out when we were like 3, my parents knew we couldn’t handle it. From the time we were old enough to understand things, my mom made it clear that she wasn’t going to put up with screaming and running around crap. We were always well behaved, because thats how we were brought up. We were taught to be polite and have good manners, and not run around like wild hoolagin. My mom said that if we couldn’t control ourselves, we couldn’t go to resturants and such. Ever since I was little, I have never been a picky eater, never been a wild child, because I don’t want to make my mom mad. And I don’t think I should start screaming at my parents because I didn’t get the right cheese. My mom brought us up right. Mainly we are extremly good kids because we are terrified of our mother. She has threated my brother about making him volonteer at the old folks home, washing old men. He is a good boy now.
My SO’s nephew is 12 and looks like a regular kid but is a loud (and kind of disgusting, snot-encrusted open-mouth-chewer), excruciating restaurant companion. The deal is, he’s kind of… well, I don’t know the ins and outs, but he’s mentally disabled, in a functional way.
In addition, me being the girlfriend of his uncle (and hence competition for my SO’s attention) he does not listen to me when I tell him to sit still or lower his voice or that he needs to shut his mouth because food is falling out of it. He listens to my SO and behaves for about 30 seconds. I don’t know how he behaves with his guardians (I say that because it’s too complicated to get into), but from what I can tell they’re rather indulgent and have an amazing ability to tune him out.
The point of this… Well, I learned my lesson and will never, ever accompany this kid in a public place again. He has no idea how to behave and he’s TWELVE! Actually, he drives me crazy, but that’s another story. But, yeah, part of my point is that he has mental and emotional problems, and no matter what we did when we were at the restaurant he was impossible to control. The more I think about it though, that excuse seems flimsy (in regards to this kid).
Damn, I have wandered off, mentally. Gonna post it anyway.
As a retail employee, I find it interferes with my ability to do my job. For instance, yesterday a toddler was shrieking so loudly I couldn’t hear the customer on the phone. Plus, I have to be there for a whole shift, not just the amount of time it takes to make a purchase.
