Effing Marriage...

[Spyder]

I was punished with a belt and an open hand. I eventually fought back when I got older, and the physical punishments stopped. I didn't learn a lot from the punishments, but if I were to try and gauge its effectiveness on me, I would probably say that it taught me to be sneakier and not get caught. It probably also taught me to think about physical solutions to problems with classmates, rather than using words. I got into a lot of fights when I was a kid, and withheld a lot of stuff from my parents.

I don't use physical punishment with my kids. Instead I take away the one thing that they crave, which is my attention. It teaches them that if they act like assholes, then nobody is going to want to be around them. I also use timeouts for their worst outbursts. The duration is dependent on them recognizing their behavior, and apologizing to whoever they wronged. I use that to teach them to seek atonement. That they can't be dicks and then just pretend that nothing happened. They have to fess up to it, own it, and apologize for it.

My daughter is 6 now, and is very mindful of the way that people treat each other. All of her friends are really good kids, and nice to each other. She's turning out better than I could've hoped. My son is almost 3, and he is a maniac. He is by far the biggest challenge of my parenting skills. He was a late talker, so that could have a lot to do with it. I wasn't able to use reason with him until about 6 months ago. He has made vast improvements since then, but I'd still consider him a work in progress.

I haven't read any material on parenting techniques and only use my limited behavioral psychology schooling to try and not to screw them up. My sisters use physical punishment with their kids, and their kids' behavior is not even comparable to mine. That kind of reinforces my approach when I witness all of the kids together.