This foster parenting thing comes with its challenges and eye
openers. As I mentioned before, I feel
very green with these little guys. I
think a lot of it can be credited to the fact they have come into our home with
habits that our children didn’t have at their ages, and we have to discipline
differently than we did with our children.
I didn’t realize that certain behaviors could be developed or so
engrained by such a young age. I realize
a lot of it has to do with culture and parenting or the lack of parenting, but
I am still shocked at times.
Jay and I are firm believers of stern, consistent, and loving
discipline. We were active parents from
the moment each of our children were born.
If one of our children misbehaved, they were warned, but if they tested a
boundary they got spanked/smacked on the bottom. Let me stress – NOT whipped or beat, just
smacked on a padded bottom and a stern “NO”. After they were disciplined, we would discuss
why they got in trouble and we assured them we loved them and it was important
for them to listen because we were only trying to keep them safe.
These little guys have come into our home set in their ways, and
our only option of discipline is redirection, time-out, or logical consequences. Which are the biggest jokes. Some days, one
little guy will end up in time-out to only have to stay in time-out because of
his behavior while in time-out. Then we
talk about why he was put in time-out and he apologizes (with coaching) to only
end up right back in time-out for the same behavior because really, having to
sit for a few minutes isn’t that big of a deal.
We are even trying the sticker reward chart to encourage positive
choices; however, Jay nor I believe in bribing kids to behave. Has anyone thought about the fact we have a
generation known as the “Me Me Me Generation” and they’re coined to have a
narcissistic personality. Hmmm. I wonder
why?!
It is very frustrating because it feels like we have spent more
time the last two weeks using an ineffective method of discipline than we ever
had to spank our kids. I understand and
don’t agree with corpor0al punishment, but seriously when did spanking – I don’t
approve of whipping/beating – become considered corporal punishment? All I have to say is, look at the problems
teachers have in the classroom because schools are no longer allowed to ‘paddle’
or discipline. When I went to school,
the nuns smacked your hands with a ruler, if you got sent to the principal’s
office you were more than likely getting paddled, oh, and the teachers could hug
their students. I don’t ever remember having the issues in the classroom that
teachers deal with today on a daily basis.
I also understand why spanking is not an option – who knows if
these kids were hit/beat/whipped, but I truly believe these methods of “use
your words”, time-out, and logical consequences are very difficult for a
toddler and a just turned 4 year old to grasp, especially when redirection or discipline
was never used in their early informative years.
Zack has asked why the boys continue to do things over and over
even after they’ve been told numerous times not to. He doesn’t understand why they seem to
challenge us (our authority) as much as they do. So, I explained to him that in training we
were told that most of these kids come from environments where they have no
structure, no discipline, no productive supervision, and no consequences to
their actions. They basically are the
boss of their house. Then they come into
our home that has structure, consequences, discipline, and adult supervision
and they meet it with resistance. I
explained to Zack that all infants/toddlers, including him and his sisters,
test boundaries, but the main difference was we guided them to make better or
good choices and they never developed any of the bad habits these little ones
have.
Okay. Seriously, the time with these boys has not been all
horrible, but just frustrating because it feels like our efforts fall on deaf
ears. But on a side note, we have seen
small strides. The older boy is
realizing he has to ask permission to leave the table and to ask politely while
saying “please” and “thank you”. We
understand it will take time for them to adjust to our home, our rules, and our
limitations. We’ll just continue to be
firm, consistent, and loving and hope they come around sooner than later.
