Slugs and snails and puppy dog tails

I only have 9 toenails. Ed managed to jam the lounge door shut, trapping us all inside. After 10 minutes of me panicking I managed to open it. And took off my big toe nail and a load of toe fat with it. Ed panicked at the sight of all the blood (and I assume his mother throwing herself on the floor shouting “YOU MOTHER EFFING MOTHER TWAT OF A DOOR!”) and had a massive runny poo all over the lounge carpet. I couldn’t carry him to the bathroom, all I could manage was to put a tescos carrier bag under him and hope for the best. Alex, just laughed, jumped off the sofa and like a London rioter took advantage of the situation. He ran upstairs, emptied all the toys from the toy box, ran downstairs and started eating biscuits from the biscuit tin. I was rolling around the floor in pain, and trying to avoid the poo, with Ed asking me “what is Alex doing? Is he eating the blood!?”.

*manic gleeful laughing and a sing-song posh voice* AHhahahahaha! Boys WILL be Boys!

I had 25 bruises on my legs when I counted them last night.  The other day I was playing peepo with Alex and we were having a delightful time. He gave me a loving look, lent in…and gave me a Glaswegian kiss. He was fine. I honestly thought my nose was broken. Alex didnt care. You see, my sons are destined for high powered jobs. Ed’s skills lie in repeatedly asking me the same question until I break and give him a biscuit and he will be marvellous when he is a MI5 interregator.  Alex is genius at exploiting opportunity. I try and do a keep fit video three times a week…but doing stomach exercises on the floor leave me exposed. And vulnerable. I felt like a vain perp from an old gangster movie when, laying on the floor, doing some pilates, Godzilla, sorry Alex, comes rushing over, all grins and spikey finger nails and I cry out “not the face! not the face!”. Bless him, for all his cuteness and lovliness, I am 100% certain Alex will not have a career in any kind of caring profession. Smudge was ill recently, and achey and sitting on the floor, Alex made a bee line for him, all smiley and sweet…and stamped on his leg. Repeatedly. When Ed fell off the sofa and lay on the floor crying, Alex ran over to him, showed him his little hard plastic ball he was playing with, smiled…and hit him over the head with it. Repeatedly. He means well…he just, well lets just say, check your pockets for your stuff before you leave our house if ever you visit.

I was chatting this all through with my great aunty Peggy, 83, no kids of her own, and also having a little moan that the children had yet another cold and we were not sleeping yet again. Her advice was this – “hit them round the head with a sweaty sock”. Apparently the sweat is a healer….who cares!

I suppose this leads on to the different ways of discipling a child.

With a little boy who gets so frustrated and angry and cant express it and his arms and legs flail everywhere and he hits out, i don’t feel that i can smack him across his backside and then say “DONT HIT PEOPLE!”. It just doesn’t sit well with me. I mean, i grew up in the time of getting a clip round the ear if you were bad. I remember running away from my mum and sitting on my bum thinking and feeling smug “ah ha! She cant smack me now”. She just smacked me across my legs instead. It didnt hurt me, it probably helped me. But i just don’t feel I can do it. So we lock him in cupboards instead. Poke at him with sticks. No we don’t. We take stuff away from him, which seems to work (this week). He has a little brother, so he is obsessively paranoid about having his stuff taken away from him anyway. Therefore we sensed a weakness and we are exploiting it. As every resourceful parent should.

This may be a good opportunity to discuss different grandparent views on discipling your child. I can’t really talk about my own parents but, I was discussing this with a friend the other day. My friends dad is old skool. She tells me he is frowny eyed and huffs a bit when she tries to give her child warnings before she threatens him with the cupboard and stick. (joke). Her dad is a very good grandparent and parent as he will not say a thing, not a thing, understanding that her parenting skills vary from his, although she can tell he is itching to deliver a “clip from the ear”. I love that term. Like parents rush up to their kids, fingers wagging and saying “what you need is a clip round the ear!” and tag their ears with a machine like a little farm lamb. But yes, my friends Dad feels that a smack is ok. (not that smack is ok. A Smack). She feels if she did it for her chidlren, she would be the baddy in an Enid Blyton story.

Coach Edwin of Ed’s football team seems to have the answer. When Ed tantrums he will shout in his very heavy Ghanian accent;“Edward. Shout louder! I can not hear you”.  In his heavy, delicious, Ghanian accent…

Anyway. Check this link out. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2013293/Rise-violent-Little-Emperors-Children-lashing-parents-way.html

This is a pretty extreme article and is, as it says on the tin, from the Daily Mail so what do we expect. But when i read it it did get me thinking. Amongst other things that I need to stop reading the Daily Mail. It is the sidebar of shame.

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One Response to Slugs and snails and puppy dog tails

  1. Aubrey says:

    LOVE THIS…IT’S SO HONEST AND FUNNY AND SERIOUS ALL AT THE SAME TIME. You def have to write a book…just think, you could then be famous and rich (with your slugs and snails and puppy dog tails) 🙂
    then who would care how they behave cuz you could get a nanny whenever you wanted and since they would famous Smith boys, people would just sigh and look the othyer way!!! BRILLIANT

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