Bringing up kids... is no easy task. So I've heard countless times before from numerous parents. Some even took to beating their kids so not to 'spoil' them, and I call them, "Chumps". I've always held a view very different from them - beating kids hurts their ego and confidence and is not good for their overall development. Instead, as they say, "showering more love" should do the trick.
Yet in the last 1 week, I slapped Advaith twice and I don't like it myself. His actions on these two occasions were just silly and committed in a playful mood, with no intention to hurt anyone. Infact, I can't even say his actions could have hurt someone unintentionally. Tell me, how harmful, could throwing a book on the floor or kicking someone on their face with his little feet, be.
But when the repetitiveness of the same actions begins to stretch beyond the boundaries of play, a growing concern inside you calls for an immediate action on your part to make them stop it. And when your "No, don't do it"s go unheeded you are left at a loss. You obviously couldn't leave the kid in a room full of books asking him to throw them all down, like the dad who wanted to make his son quit smoking. You also couldn't throw down a book yourself, and pretend to, as the idiom goes, "bring the house down", 'coz that would be like encouraging them to do it literally, bring the house down. And kids, you should know, HAVE the patience and energy to do anything they set their hearts to. Never spark such desires in them.
So what is it that you could possibly do to make them see sense. What if your "Don't make me come and hit you" (final) warnings (while holding back a smile and faking anger in your tone) is replied in the Gandhian way, "Come, hit me." A reply like that made the English resign and leave, over 60 years ago. You see, the English didn't care (and didn't need to, anymore) what shit we could possibly get outselves into, but I do. So I'm left with not even that option.
I ended up being a Chump. Not once, but twice in a week. I'm sure what I did wasn't the best thing to do, and I'm not very sure if it was even the right thing to do. But I am just ignorant of any better option (
read action). And what's worse is when, after I slapped him, he hugged me and holding back tears, asked, "Why did you hit me?". I told him, "because you threw the book down", but I know that's not the truth. The real answer was "because I was a Chump".
You tell me what other options did I have.