Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy What would you do differently? LONG

I need some advice, or encouragement, regarding how DH and I handle our son. DS is our 2nd child, so we are not rookies. He just turned 4 2 weeks ago, but he has been angry, controlling, and independent basically since he was born. In other words he is exhausting. So, I would like to get some opinions about how DH and I are handling some common situations we have with him. Based on the following examples, What would you have done differently if you were in our shoes? I'll also note that we already try to be proactive by allowing him to have control over as much as possible everyday, in hopes that it will lesson his need for power. IE He gets to pick out his clothes, choose his computer time block, pick out the vegetable for dinner.... But that is not enough to feed his constant desire to rule the world.

EXAMPLE 1
We are at the dinner table and DS, out of the blue, says in his infamous -I know it all voice/tone- "You are not feeding me" confused I asked what he means by that. He replies "The other day you said that one of your jobs was to feed us, THIS is not called feeding me" (Let me note that this conversation was weeks+ ago, not days!) I figured out that he was implying that "feeding" means to physically spoon food into the mouth. And he was trying, like always, to make a point that someone is wrong. I gently explained to him that "feeding" has different meanings and to give an example I said that "You often help FEED the dog by putting the food into the bowl, hence you can feed someone without physically spooning the food into someone's mouth." He replies back still in his -I know it all voice/tone- "Well you are still wrong" GRRR I reply back "Son I understand that it is not fun being wrong but in this case YOU are the one who is incorrect. It is also very rude to use that tone and constantly try to prove that someone, especially an adult, is wrong."

He constantly, almost everyday, does things like this. He corrects every grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary mistake, adults or otherwise. His tone is the worst part, it is very rude, condescending, and disrespectful. It's like everyday he wakes up with a mission to prove others wrong and if he can't find something in the moment he reaches back into the past. To be honest his corrections are usually right, but when he is wrong he refuses to accept it. He speaks in this tone to many of my adult friends, as well. My BF says his mouth is just like her 13yo, and she is correct! Dh and I constantly feel embarrassed, exhausted and sometimes defeated. What could we do differently to help our preschooler quit seeking power/control by finding faults in others? And help him understand that his TONE is offending? I know that a 12yo has the capacity to know what their tone is implying, does a 3/4 year old? Does he consciously know what he doing or is it just a manifestation of a brain that is beyond one's social development?


EXAMPLE 2
DS is swinging his bat in the living room. I reply "Please don't swing that in the living room you could accidentally break something like the TV and that would not be cool" So he starts moving the bat slowly "Son I just asked you not to swing that in my living room, why are you making the choice not to listen and follow the rules" He replies back "I am not swing it, I am moving it slowly through the air" I say "I am not going to have a debate with you about the definition of swinging, you may now take your bat to your bedroom." he gets mad "you never let me do anything fun" and takes it his bedroom. NOTE: He walks as hard as he can without technically stomping, because he gets in trouble for stomping; He closes his door as hard as he can without technically slamming it, because he gets in trouble for door slamming.
2 DAYS later DS had the bat back in the living room and was doing the "slow swing" before I say anything he says "I am not swinging it I am slowly moving it through the air and the TV will not get broken because I am being careful" Did he really want to play with the bat? NO He just wanted to prove the loophole in the rule and use it to prove that he can. So I gently explain to him that playing with bat in the living room still makes me nervous, so the new rule is that the bat is not allowed to be in the living room. He replies back "That means I can't ever take the bat outside because I'd have to go through the living room first" After that remark I couldn't help but to smile because strangling him seemed to be the only other option. I'll note that he can't stand an open debate, anytime I use the "I am not having a debate with you" line, He WILL bring it back up on a different day until the conclusion is reached.


These are true stories from this week. Similar things like this happen multiple times everyday with our son and have for years. Is there any hope of change? Will it get better or worse with maturity? Am I the only one with a teenager stuck in a preschoolers body? Thank you in advance for your input, criticism, advice, and encouragement.

Oh dear. That's not very fun for anybody, is it? I wish I could help--here are a couple of thoughts, but I hope somebody with better ideas will show up soon!

It may be that it's partly just a function of age (as I've mentioned before, 4 was not the easiest age for any of our three).

I wonder if it would help to disengage from the situations where you can? (Not in your second example, where things would get damaged if you didn't intervene, but in the first case, I wonder if it would be worth trying just saying, "mmmhmm" with a smile and then start talking to your husband about something interesting--and maybe his attention would be diverted from the argument he's trying to start?)

I wonder in general, too, if sometimes it might be helpful to let him see that his tone is hurtful? Let your eyes fill with tears, and tell him that it hurts you when he speaks to you so disrespectfully and treats you like you don't matter. With any luck, maybe he'd come and give you a hug at that point.

Possibly, too, some kind of "team-building" talk might be good? We had a corny family chant I dragged out periodically some years back when I felt as though I needed to reinforce the sense that our family was a team, and that we needed to work together in order for everyone to be happy--he needs to see that your family life is not a contest with winners and losers, but that you are all on the same side.

Can you get out his baby pictures once in a while and tell him stories about himself? (Maybe stories that emphasize what a sweet baby he was, and how happy he made you?) He clearly can't be really happy being so unpleasant, and maybe you both need to reconnect to a time when life was really joyous for both of you.

I hope that helps a little bit--

peace
minnie

OMG, how did you get my son in your house????? I'm sure someone will have ideas for you and I will listen to them also. I do the same thing you do...try to logically explain why he should or should not do something and he invariably finds a loophole and condescendingly points it out. BUT, my husband does not have the problem with him like I do or his teachers do. My son will listen to him first time without arguing much of the time.

HAHAHA! Ok, not laughing at the situation you are in, but laughing because I have one of these too! I can tell you, that mine is now 8 1/2 and we are getting better at "taming" it. She still argues like the best lawyer ever and thinks she has valid reason to justify to comments and HATES to be wrong, but... she has calmed down. She may still do it at times, then a second later catches herself and says "I'm sorry! I didn't meant to say that" without any prompting. She too, tries to not STOMP up the stairs and to not slam the door but the urge is still there, and occasionally still does but she has really gotten much better. I can say to stick with what you are doing. You aren't doing anything wrong, you just have a very headstrong, intense child but with proper direction, like you are doing to point out what is acceptable and not acceptable, it will get better as he gets older. In fact, I was on the phone with the cable company this morning and my two had a yelling match! I got off the phone after both were sent to their rooms and my DD comes down with an apology letter for her "bad behavior and the poor choices she made." SHEESH! I wanna say "Hindsights always 20/20!" Like I said, these outbursts are farther and fewer in between and MUCH more short lived then when she was your DC's age so hang in there

I have to say, my child is an angel at school though. They would think I was making it up if I told them what she did at home! At least she knows boundaries, but I wished she didn't do it at all. It does get better though.

There are time when a child needs to just listen.

Because you are willing to debate, even if just for a while, he's going to do it all the time. You have to decide before you speak, if the comment you are about to make is debatable. If the answer is no, then don't allow it. As much as we hate this line, it works.

"Because I said so!"

And then stop discussing it and expect action. It takes a while to resist answering the questions and debate but if you want to be successful you can't be baited. "i am not going to discuss it." Or "It's not a debate" are about as far as you need to go. It may take a bit of time and it's hard to know when you really want to enforce the no debate rule, but you'll get the hang of it.

I think my almost 4 year old son also snuck into your house. His older brother is 7 and we are still living with the arguements, tone and behaviors that you write about on a daily basis.

I can't offer advice but only sympathize with you. We currently using the line "I will not argue with you" and then walking away. Most of the time the issue is then temporarily dropped.

Yep. Completely agree with Crisc. "I will not argue with you", "Those are my final words" etc, and then walking away is the best way to end arguments.

I definitely have one of these, and it's great to know we're not alone.

I wish it was just me! but he corrects everyone. He even corrects strangers at the grocery store! Which usually earns me the "my child would never dare to correct an adult" look. It's not my fault they made the mistake of calling his TEAL shirt blue or commented on his cool "shoes" when he is wearing sandals. Mistakes like that really get under skin and he can't resist letting someone know that they are wrong.

We use the "I am not going to debate with you line" everyday and he has NO problem immediately altering his behavior. We do not allow back talk, whining, but's, or why's as a response to a direct order and he has learned not do them. He's too sneaky for direct backtalk and arguing, instead he only alters his behavior to the minimum of what the instructions imply, which makes difficult to justify why his actions are unacceptable. I do try to choose my words carefully, but it is so hard to outsmart his train of thought. Even his comment about not being able to take the bat outside, came AFTER he followed my directions and took the bat to his room.


Thanks bh14
It's nice to feel like I'm not the only one.

So, I have a question related to this: is this debating/arguing/finding loophole behavior a sometimes-characteristic of gifted kids? Because I have been attributing it to my son's autism spectrum disorder and his need for EXACT-ness, and black-and-white-ness; and the tone he uses due to his supposed decreased ability to recognize subtlety in language and communication..... I have been questioning his ASD diagnosis the more I learn about gifted behavior and could this be another example of how I am wrong about his ASD??? Nan

[quote=Floridama]It's not my fault they made the mistake of calling his TEAL shirt blue or commented on his cool "shoes" when he is wearing sandals. Mistakes like that really get under skin and he can't resist letting someone know that they are wrong.[quote]

Heaven forbid I should refer to DS5's shorts or underwear as "pants." He's another one who demands precision and lets few mistakes go unnoticed. I am also familiar with the tone.

Unfortunately, I also recognize a lot of this in myself. The same kinds of mistakes that my son will jump on also get under my skin--only I've learned to bite my tongue (most of the time). I'm guessing it's an outgrowth of perfectionism, which DS and I both struggle with.

I try to explain to DS that sometimes it's more important to be kind than to be right. I also make him admit his own mistakes. I don't point them out, but when they're obvious and he's making excuses or blaming others, I make him take ownership. I won't stand for an "I knew that" or "That's what I meant to say" when clearly, he didn't. I'll even make him say the words, "I was wrong" or "I made a mistake," and then immediately let him know that THAT'S OKAY. Everyone makes mistakes--even him--and life goes on. I'm hoping that as he becomes more accepting of his own mistakes (and keeping him challenged at school has done wonders for this in the past year), he'll eventually become more accepting of mistakes in others. That's my theory, anyway.

I'm interested in what others here have to say.

In my house, right or wrong doesn't matter anywhere near as much as respect does. I spend lots of time refusing to debate because of the tone of voice. "If you can't speak respectfully, don't speak at all." If he continues I send him to his room for not following direction. As far as the bat goes, I would have taken it away...period. I would have told him that he has shown by his actions that he is not old enough or responsible enough to use a bat for it's intended purpose. Put it in a closet somewhere and forgot about it for a month. Repeated as needed.

I allow all of my kids to have an opinion and debate anything they don't agree with but it must be done in a respectful manner and with a valid point. In the case of the little lord, I would just tell him he needs to be respectful and refuse to speak to him until he is. If this causes him to be disruptive, I'd send him to his room to get a handle on himself.

A concept I'm already introducing to my 2 year old is "pushing the limit." It's not a serious problem yet but I'm trying to nip it in the bud by pointing it out to her, so that she a) starts to develop a concept of what I mean by that and b) knows that I'm on to her, and gets a reality check about the transparency of her "sneakiness." The next step is making it clear to her that "pushing the limit" is itself a behavior that is not acceptable.

Depending on the age and comprehension level of the child, my inclination is to deal with the arguing (e.g. about not being able to take the bat through the livingroom) by getting quiet and serious, and asking, "Do you really not understand the difference? Because I can explain it to you. Or are you just wanting to argue?"

This is actually a technique I picked up from teaching undergraduates! If you have something to say that they don't want to hear, don't just start saying it. First you have to get their buy-in to listen to you, or else they have to admit that they aren't interested in listening to you.

I agree completely. We've had this problem, too. It gets better after a while when the child finally realizes that there's no point in arguing. It doesn't go away, but it gets better.

I think that a willingness to challenge authority is a wonderful trait to have, provided a person learns when to challenge something and when to leave it alone. But for a four year old in the situations you've described, "Because I said so" seems appropriate.

I'm still learning, but I'm getting better.


Val

Hi Floridama! I'm so glad you've gotten such great advice and sympathy. My son was this way, and it sent me into a tizzy trying to figure out what could be so very wrong that he would act like this. Sure, having him spend many hours a day with agemates in daycare wasn't helping, but I've come to the realization that 'that just how some of our kids are.'

Sure, they need to learn like other kids need food. Sure they are 'shamed' by the various indignities of being a young child, but in the end, I wish I had 'woken up' to the reality of my son's personality a lot sooner.

I can tell you that if he keeps up that behavior in school, you will catch a lot of blame, and you do not deserve that. You are being completely reasonable in your parenting - you just happen to have an intense child who needs 'extra-super' parenting.

I think the book Transforming the Difficult Child, has helped me tremendously. http://difficultchild.com/

It starts with the parents getting really intense about verbally praising what the child is doing well. Anytime the child uses a non-obnoxious tone of voice - praise his respectful tone. Anytime the child shows any drop of flexibility - specifically praise that moment of flexibility. Challenge yourself to see how often you can notice him being kind, respectful, or obedient. Verbalize those feelings if it doesn't cause too much of an uproar, or just beam at him.

The idea is that at this moment your son is addicted to the negative energy that he gets from pushing your buttons. This means that the first step is to provide lots of opportunities for him to get nourishing positive energy from the good behavior he is already doing. Then keep the rules 'clean and simple.' No more 'Please don't swing' - just 'BAT, MINE, NOW' in a calm but firm voice. No more asking what he means by 'you aren't feeding me,' - Just ignore any words he says that use a bossy tone and move on. Look around for something, anything positive in the room that you can praise. It's ok not to share how he makes you feel when he uses that tone - do the worlds best acting job to project 'Yes - children make mistakes - looking to start a squabble by using disrespectful tones is just another mistake that children make.' No more explaining the reasons for your rules. You are the adult here, and for some kids, sadly, giving explanations communicates that your authority alone isn't enough. Practice looking shocked when he says 'But WHY!?!' and 'That's not fair!?!' Practice saying: I am older and I know better. and 'of course you don't understand - you are a child, and children don't understand lots of adult things.'

It seems so unfair that parents who are ready to parent in a cool 'power-sharing' way sometimes get kids who just can not handle that kind of openess. I wish someone had explained this to me when my son was 4. I thought the answer was to just do more power-sharing and be every more scrupulous. Sadly, there just are some very concrete gifted kids in this world who need charismatic leaders and ultraclear boundries.

If he wakes up every day with a mission to prove every day that other are wrong accept that, for today, that is just who he is. How would you react if you weren't worried about what that might mean is wrong in his world, or how he will be when he grows up, or enters school. Just wake up determined every day to prove to him that he gets more juicy interaction and rich relationship from good behavior than bad behavior.

At a moment when things are going well, you might have a little family meeting about how weak people like to focus on what is wrong, but strong people like to focus on what is right, so from now on there will be a rule about 'no children correcting people ever' from now on, and when you trust your son to handle his strong feelings about other people's mistakes, he will eventually do just that.

Even at age 4, during happy moments, you might try explaining about the inside face and the outside face, so that he knows that it's ok, normal, important, to spend some time figuring out what the situation requires and putting on an 'outside face' to show the world when he is away from home. We used to practice social lying - when Grandma asks 'how do you like my new hairstyle' then it might be time to put on the outside face and squeeze out a smile and a social lie.

What about how he reacts to your discipline interventions? He will probably not like being told that he doesn't understand everything, or that life isn't fair, or that you've changed your mind, and he will express those feelings if your family norm is that it's ok for him to show his inside face to you. You can praise him for expressing how he feels about it, and then let it go. You may have to 'fake it until you make it' for quite a while, but there are some places he will go emotionally where you just can not follow him. Putting attention on it just gives him hope that he can get more of your attention by hyping his inner face. You have to figure out a way to reassure yourself that you are the boss, and that you are doing him a tremendous favor by acting like it.

I hope this helps and doesn't make you feel worse. It isn't your fault in any way that your son is like this. Fairness is giving each child what they need, not what you needed, not what their sibling needs, not what you want them to need. Getting DH involved in this way will go miles and miles toward improvement. At age 13, my DH has finally come around to seeing that he must play a role with DS that if very counter to everything he would like to believe about the world, and DH has taken over all the routines and much of the discipline. Do I sexistly believe that a female can't provide this level of athority? No, my mom was pack leader, no questions asked. But me, the female that I happen to be, would much rather be soft and loving and interested in every little thing sort of parent. Having 2 parents who are willing to 'umpire' our DS has really helped. I've really grown a lot!

Love and More Love,
Grinity

Oh, big hugs to you! And kudos at being as patient as you have been thus far!! I struggle with my patience on a daily basis, and my kids are not helping.

I do not have any advice to offer. Just lots of sympathy.

What a lot of great advice you all have... some excellent ideas to help me with my own mouthy, argumentative 6 y.o. At first I tried explaining my reasons thinking that was what he wanted, but it made things worse. I think it did convey to him that my authority wasn't enough (thanks, Grinity). Now I've started to say, "I've made my decision - end of conversation" and then just stop talking. He doesn't like it, but I do think it may be working.

Also, we've started enforcing a time-out for yelling or using a rude tone -- not put in a corner with nothing to do, but in his room with a book or pen & paper or something else to redirect his thoughts. This helps him calm down pretty fast and he is ready to be nice again after a few minutes alone. My theory is that rather than punishment, he needs strategies to help himself deal with frustration. And if nothing else, it allows *me* some space to calm down myself... the constant challenging and arguing can be exhausting and maddening!

We're with you too. DD7 was so obnoxious at age 3/4 that I didn't think she'd live to see age 7 (heeheehee) However, a phrase that is my mantra is "it is just a phase and this too will pass"

We also had the issue that she was worse with me than with DH, but would correct any and everyone. When we would give her an example of how she sounded to other people (in otherwords, spoke to her in a tone of voice like she was using to us or others) she would get extremely upset and at how rude it really was, then she would back off being argumentative for a while.

I do think it is an age thing, we have very few times where it is a problem any more. However, DD2 is rapidly approaching that stage.....

I'm sorry if this is repetative as I haven't had a chance to go through all the posts. Your child acts and sounds very much like... a hypothetical person who looks and acts just like me. I'm, er, I mean 'she' is much better now, but this simple approach was very effective, along with one or two sharp consequences for not following the spirit of the rule. No claims that I, er, she didn't know were accepted because it should be obvious.

The other thing that jumps to mind is specifically talking about how certain scenarios are not about who is right and who is wrong. It is about moving forward in a functional, useful way and spending time looking backward to examine who is at fault is a waste of time. We spend very very little time at my house looking at who is at fault or wrong, except jokingly when we blame an imaginary friend we have kept around for that precise purpose.

I scanned the replies rather quickly, so sorry if I am repeating what someone else said, but... My dd3 is not "one of those", but she certainly has her moments. And we (DH and I) want to walk close to the edge of what's socially acceptable, because we think it's great that she's analytical and detail-oriented, that she can articulate her reasoning, and that she is willing to question authority. But, of course, there are limits. And like you mentioned, TONE is a big one. And dd3 has got that concept down. Most of the time, if she's rude -- but right -- all I have to say is "Tone" or "Try again" or just give her "the look" and she'll say "Sorry," and then make her point in a polite way.

What I did was repeat what she would say -- HOW she would say it -- and then model the correct way to say thing. And explain to her about mutual respect, being kind, etc, etc. (And, of course, we do a bunch of stuff with tone when we read books; she got the concept that there are different types of tone down long before we did this -- but then she got the concept of rude vs. polite)

Like I said, dd isn't like your ds, so I don't know how helpful my experience is, but -- to reply to one aspect of your original post -- yup, a li'l one can get the point of tone. HTH...

Wanted to elaborate on what I said earlier.

DS7 has been argumentative for as long as I remember. Nothing pushes my buttons faster than "the tone", so I've had to learn to handle it calmly. In recent years, the behaviour has morphed into sarcasm and biting humour wrapped in a cheeky grin, which I take as his way of moulding it into something more acceptable. 'Tis good! (A lot of you must have seen this condition, no?)

Last weekend we went to a cafe that, from the outside, seemed unlikely that they would serve a full scale breakfast. In an effort to be polite (and I agree what I said was redundant!), I asked the greeting staff, "Do you serve breakfast?" From below me, a voice said in a nasally twang, "Whaddya think they're eating? Dinner?"

I hate to admit it, but I was "that kid" as a child. For me, I really only learned when I got to my teens and was trying to figure out how to fit in socially more and why people didn't seem to like me. It finally dawned on me that I didn't HAVE to correct everything I saw or heard that was incorrect. And that arguing was not always a good idea. I am not sure I had the self control, or enough desire to please other people prior to that age to fix this... It isn't that my parents didn't tell me, I just didn't give their comments any notice. Also, as I'm sure many other adults on the site can attest to, it is sooo frustrating to be small/young and be treated like you are dumb or furniture. I think that gave me an attitude problem that didn't really get resolve until I was a teenager.

That said, my youngest (gifted) D has some of that characteristic, but is MUCH better now that she is a teenager. One phrase we used a lot was, "Just because you CAN do something doesn't mean that you SHOULD do it." Also, for a while we did not respond AT ALL (completely ignored) any comment made in "that tone". I might say, "I am not going to talk with you until you repeat that in an appropriate tone". Just to make sure she knew why I was not responding. Then NO REACTION unless she cleaned up her tone.

She is Aspie, so she often didn't see how annoyed her comments were making people. So when other people were involved, I would sometimes comment to her afterwards about how her tone/comments might have made the other person feel. She was sometimes surprised, and even embarrassed. I didn't do it in front of the other people, though.

It would me take hours to reply back to everyone so I'll just sum it up with THANKS! I think getting some outside opinions and points will help DH and I revamp our system.

I look forward to testing some of your ideas and reading the book suggestions.

Oh... and encourage him to try debate when he gets to high school D loves it. It gives them a chance to learn to channel that argumentative streak more productively. It also forces them to learn to discern a broader, successful argument from a nit picky, irrelevant one.

Is it the age? My DD is turning 4 in August and almost over night, about 2 weeks ago we have a child filled with attitude. She has always been one to argue and that doesn't bug me so much as long as she does so without the 'tone'. I believe in allowing for their view point. I don't pretend to know it all and sometimes my logic of why something shouldn't be is flawed. If she argues her case; I have no problem admitting it, but here lately it has been over the top confrontational and down right rude AND that is NOT acceptable.

IE. yesterday morning my mother was trying to get DD up and dressed but DD wasn't having it. She finally gave in to getting up but let her dislike for it all be known when she turned around and stated "Yes MAID." to my mother. She clearly understood the negative implications of it all because she continued her statement over and over while getting dressed.