Parenting terror alert level – red
Sarah is failing math and social studies because she hasn’t been turning in her assignments. Tommy is tormenting his biology teacher and bus driver daily (m-team tomorrow). Amy is so jealous of the attention Evan gets that she has become a screaming terror. Evan quit sleeping through the night and now wants to play from about 3 until 5 a.m. He will sleep only at the breast, day or night. Noah is still away at camp and I can’t check on him, argh!
Oh – my parents have been taken over by pod people and think I’m being too hard on Sarah for grounding her because she is failing (because she’s too lazy to do her school work).
I’m sure the “no grounding” is the same approach your parents took with you…
Funny how the stuff that your parents thought were capital offenses when YOU were a child are no biggie when it’s their grandchild. LOL
You are one of the best parents I know. somedays just suck ass.
I’ve had many similar problems lately with my 4 kids. Our oldest (8) stopped turning in his homework and got bad grades. He’s got some developmental issues, but is very bright – he was doing the work correctly, but didn’t feel the need to actually turn it in. We solved the problems through threats to life and limb (not really – we took away his electronics: TV, Gameboy, Playstation) and persuaded his teachers to email us when he was acting up. It took a while, but he snapped back to good behavior fairly quickly.
Our 6 yr old girl became jealous of the attention our 1 yr old girl was receiving and told her teachers the reason she was not participating in class was because noone at home loved her as much as the baby. Mind you, this is the daughter who has the princess room, ballet lessons, a trip with just her and I to the Houston Opera to see the Nutcracker every year, etc. But she’s jealous of the baby who considers full-throated screams to be the basic mode of communication. You’d think someone was sawing her foot off the way she yells.
Finally, our 2 yr old (and slightly autistic) son is having nightmares and climbs into bed with us anywhere from 3 to 4:30 every night, whereupon he proceeds to chat, lay on, kick and otherwise discomfit my wife and I until the alarm goes off.
Kids are sometimes a pain. Mine are lucky they’re so cute or I’d get rid of them. 😉
Oh, I came to your site through Says Uncle. I hope you can come to a conclusion on how you feel, but I’d really appreciate you coming down on the side that believes in preserving freedoms for those who choose to exercise them.
CR