Dad tries unique punishment for vandalizing son

[Bubbler]

For all those who say "Those of you who aren't parents just don't get it," is there a magic society that you get inducted in when you have your first child? Do you get, like, a copy of some great tome of parenting wisdom? How is it that those of us who don't have kids aren't at all qualified to comment on parenting, but that one becomes qualified to do so immediately upon having one?

Good Christ.

I was eating dinner at a friend's house the other night; he and his wife are expecting their first child in about six weeks. He has an old-fashioned wood stove and is a very smart guy, but said he's not planning to put a gate up around it because if the child touched it once he would learn his lesson. My wife about shoots wine out her nose and I just start to laugh as it's the kind of **** I would have said before my son was born. Seems like a good idea, save for the fact that the toddler's skin is such that one touch of that stove is very likely to produce a hellacious scar which will serve as a permanent reminder of how much you didn't know as a parent.

As a parent you learn every day and you mostly learn not to judge because it's like Mike Tyson said: "Everybody has a plan until they get hit." The people who are most judgmental of parents are non-parents largely because they have no idea how much they don't know whereas I would like to think parents know exactly how much we don't know.

****ing A.

Some of the **** I said about being a parent before I was one were hilarious in retrospect. Parenting is about trial-and-error and without that trial-and-error, you really don't know squat.

There are things in this world you have to do to know about.

 

[shotglass]

I agree with you on most things. Not on this one. Not even close.

Turning the logic around, we wouldn't have so many **** parents out there if that were the case.

 

[outofplace]

I agree with you on most things. Not on this one. Not even close.

Turning the logic around, we wouldn't have so many **** parents out there if that were the case.

Just imagine how clueless those people were before they had children.

 

[shotglass]

You want to know the one incontrovertible thing I learned from being a parent?

It was the chilling fact that at some time, you will reach a point where you cannot affect what your children will do -- good, bad or indifferent. There will be a point, there will be an issue where they will come to the conclusion that you don't know what you're talking about on something, and they're going to be their own person.

And in the same vein, they can say, "Go screw yourself," and while you may have been able to adjust that behavior 500 times previously, the 501st time, you will not be able to.

 

[buckweaver]

Many parents refuse to admit that, Shotty, no matter how old their children get. It makes me glad that you can.

 

[shotglass]

Agreed, buck, but it's a terrible feeling upon the first realization.

 

[buckweaver]

Agreed, buck, but it's a terrible feeling upon the first realization.

I'm sure it is. Hence my first sentence in the previous post.

 

[Wenders]

I'm quite sure I've known plenty of parents who were plenty judgmental of other parents. Plenty of grandparents, too, for that matter.

Oh trust me. I am a prime example of that. My aunt spent years trying to tell my mother that she did a horrible job of raising me because I preferred jeans to frilly skirts and dresses, because I don't always comb my hair in the morning (that is what hats were created for) and because I don't leave the house every morning with makeup caked on. Once I got old enough, she started shoving that all on me, making me feel weird and stupid for not wanting to scream to the world that I was the girly-girl that I so am not.

With that being said, just like there are different parenting techniques, EVERY KID IS DIFFERENT. Some kids have gotten spanked (oh noes! Child abuse!! CHILD ABUSE!!! Someone is actually disciplining their kid!) enough before the age of 10 that they just GET IT. Some kids, no matter how many times you discipline them, ground them, take away their car, just aren't going to get it. It's unfortunate but as parents (and I am not one, thank god, but I witnessed it first-hand with all of my high school friends) sometimes just have to realize that they did the best job they could and let their kid go make the best of it. Some of them wind up pregnant, some vandalize a church and some inherited just enough common sense and an idea of right and wrong that they don't have to be watched 24/7 and their parents will just know that their kid is making good decisions.

Sometimes, it is because the parents were ultra-involved in their kids lives, called them obsessively when they weren't in the house and took a notice. But I know just as many kids who had parents like that and made some truly awful life choices.

It depends on the kid. If the parent thinks this will get through to his child, then he should go for it. The point is, he's doing something that he thinks will help his son understand.

 

[shotglass]

Sometimes, it is because the parents were ultra-involved in their kids lives, called them obsessively when they weren't in the house and took a notice. But I know just as many kids who had parents like that and made some truly awful life choices.

Really, really crucial point there. And it's one that most people don't get, parents and nonparents alike.

Keeping your nose squarely in the middle of your kid's business is a way. It is not the way. It works sometimes. It doesn't work other times.