Disciplining the Naughties

I was reading HT’s blog post about her decision to do things differently with her girls from now on – to teach them respect for other people... We sometimes have to back-track, and do things differently with regards to parenting.


I have made a decision that I want to use a different parenting technique with regards to disciplining. The natural or attachment parenting way makes just so much more sense to me now that I am older. I want to reward and focus on the positive, and not punish by hitting or by any physical means.

But the old bad habits seem to seep in if we don’t check them. Whenever Mieka got hurt, I slapped or hit the “guilty” object: “Naughty chair!” She caught on very quickly, and were hitting as well. It is a technique, and it works short term...

“Naughty floor!” Slap-slap!

“Naughty table!” Slap-slap!

Dries remarked that it is actually not very nice, especially when she started to hit us as well!

“Naughty Papa!”

I had to conquer! It does not work when we try to instil a discipline where violence is not part of it, but we are hitting at stuff when it is “Naughty!”

It was not at all difficult to change everything to “Kissing”!

She hits her head: “Poor Mieka, let me kiss the head!”

Kisses showered! And it works magically, every time!

Scary! We have to be very vigilant with regards to our way of doing things. What else do I do “wrong”, or fall back into default mode? Retorical question to self! It needs to be answered every now and again.

What have you caught yourself doing “wrong” with regards to parenting?