The boys frequently scrap over toys in our house, but they are appropriately reprimanded. What do you do?
Does that phrase bug you as much as it bugs me? I can still see one of my mummy friends, who I met when our kids were only a few weeks old, sitting in a play area with her little one pushing and scratching and even biting other kids, for her to sit their smiling, sipping her coffee, saying ‘ooh kids will be kids’ while her child smiled up at us with a tuft of hair from another child in her sweaty little mitt. Needless to say, most of the mothers have cut ties with her and seldom have anything to do with her anymore.
Ok, don’t get me wrong I know there is truth in the statement, kids will be kids at the end of the day, they fall out and make up faster than you can click your fingers, Reuben has been through the pushing stage, which drove me crazy as I was bullied as a child and I would be devastated to think that he was thought of in that way. I always made sure to make him apologise and to let the other parents or child know that I wasn’t going to allow him to get away with it… sometimes I think I have been a bit too hard on him. Either way, it isn’t very often he does it now, and I now take his trucks away for a period of time – bare in mind whern reading this, he is a good half foot taller than most kids and weights 3 1/2 stone… you have that push you over and you’d take trucks away too!
Reuben seems to be part of a little group of boys at preschool, who all seem to fall out and make up all of the time – they make girls look like angels, honestly, it is insane! Recently he has been coming home from preschool telling me that he isn’t getting on with a couple of the other boys and that he has smacked them, or they have smacked him. Two nights ago he woke up at about 2am very upset (which in turn made me very upset – I like my sleep!) and talking about a little cut he had on his hand that he insists one of these boys did, I’m not so sure but I know what little boys are like and toddler nails are sharp if they have tried to grab a toy from him. I think at the age of 3 the only thing I can do with Reuben is explain to him that he musn’t smack or retaliate, but must go and tell a teacher if the other children are really mean to him, but he must remember how it feels when something upsets him and be careful not to do it to others. I mentioned it to one of the other parents of this little group, and they had had the same thing, so I think it is a joint effort to stress each other’s parents out as much as possible – a successful effort in my opinion.
So at what point are kids not just being kids anymore? I’m pretty sure that won’t work if they take a baseball to someone at 15, so why should pulling hair or pushing at 2 be ignored?
It is surely important as parents to remember that we have to mould our children and help them become stable adults (ok, stable-ish) and guide them on the right path. That includes not rolling back onto the excuse of ‘kids will be kids’ every time our children fight or squabble and step out of line. Yes, kids will be kids – but grown ups should be grown ups and there is no point in just hoping our kids will grow out of the toddler aggression if we don’t teach them that it isn’t acceptable. Let’s not judge each other when it inevitably does occur, but work together to help our kids learn those boundaries.
Do you have any experiences with laid back parents or toddlers who take it too far? Have you had any bullying experiences and been told ‘kids will be kids’? I’d love to know, or even if you don’t agree and think the laid back approach is best!
Harriet x
