He Did it! No, He Did It!
I know that there are some beautiful families that have kids who love each other and respect each other and never, ever fight.
Mine isn’t one of them.
It’s a common parenting task, whether home schooling or using public schools. Pulling the kids off of each other as they slug it out over the blue hot wheels car even though there are three others just like it a few inches to the left. What? Don’t tell me your’s haven’t done that! Well I know I’m not alone here, from a comment by Suzanne:
I am the mother of a previously HS child, who I then sent to public school Kindergarten, and now he’s coming back home.
I am not nervous at all about HS’ing again. I am just trying to figure if I should keep his 7 year old sister home for 3rd grade. THAT gives me a lump in my throat, can I handle two….or will I spend my days settling the warring factions of sibling rivalry? I would love to hear your thoughts on that.
Ohhh sibling rivalry. I have more than my share of that around my house. Mostly the boys love each other, like for instance when my oldest hugged and kissed his brother last night after a painful collision with the coffee table. But there are still those moments of brutal screaming, crying, and threats. Most of that coming from me while they are wailing on each other over the littlest, mundane things.
I’m pulling out my copy of Siblings Without Rivalry: How to Help Your Children Live Together So You Can Live Too this weekend to reread and try to adjust myself. I find I have to do that every so often so I fall off the sane parenting track. This is obviously why I’m an only child.
So what’s your parenting tragedy for when the kids are fighting and fussing?
June 6th, 2008 at 9:27 am
So what’s your parenting tragedy for when the kids are fighting and fussing?
LOL. I’m guessing you meant “strategy”, right? But what a great Freudian slip!
I have a 16-year-old and an 8-year-old. You’d think that gap would be sufficient to cut down on the bickering, but you’d be wrong. My strategy (or tragedy, however you want to look at it) is to listen to my iPod. Oh, I don’t completely tune them out — I watch out of the corner of my eye to ensure there’s no bloodshed. After they realize they’re just not going to get me involved refereeing they usually resolve the issue themselves.
June 6th, 2008 at 11:31 am
Oh, that was a prefect slip! I’m not even going to edit it out, tragedy fits too well!
June 6th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
Hehe. Tragedy. Yup. I heave a big sigh, and wait for them to work it out. Sometimes I ask leading questions to help them find a solution, but mostly I think they have to learn how to resolve conflicts, and me stepping in all the time isn’t teaching them anything but to tattle. We have a rule; you know the one…if you aren’t bleeding or on fire, work it out.
June 7th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
LOL love the Tragedy mistake LOL. Fits oh so perfectly doesn’t it? LOL. My boy’s for the most part get along so when they do fight I am with the rest. If there is no broken bones or bleeding I don’t want to hear about it LOL. Either that or I ask them is this really something to be arguing about? Usually I get the well umm no and it stops LOL.