4 ms·

So the teacher, grandparent, and father never bothered asking why he's licking his hands, and his mother only after a lot of drama, including spanking(!!) I ge

So the teacher, grandparent, and father never bothered asking why he's licking his hands, and his mother only after a lot of drama, including spanking(!!) I get that being a parent is hard and try to hold off my judgements on stuff like this over the internet, but ... I am not wildly impressed by this teacher or their parenting. I'm glad that at least the mother came to her senses later on and decided to treat her child like a human being.

adwn 8y ago
> So the teacher, grandparent, and father never bothered asking why he's licking his hands, and his mother only after a lot of drama, including spanking(!!) No, the mother did ask: "I tried grilling him about why he was doing this so I could find some solution." The article doesn't imply that she asked him only after spanking him, and it seems unlikely that she did. Edit: fixed the quote from the article.
- mikelyons 8y ago
  The article obviously states that she only asked years after spanking and abusing to get him to stop. Re-read it.
  - OpenBSD-empire 8y ago
    I don't get the downvotes, spanking IS physical and emotional abuse! Just because your parents abused you and you "turned out alright" doesn't mean it wasn't and isn't abuse!
- Carpetsmoker 8y ago
  Looks like something went wrong with your copy/paste there, since you copied the same twice. But I assume you meant: "I tried grilling him about why he was doing this so I could find some solution. He couldn't explain it and the terror in his eyes was disturbing." That doesn't really sound like asking to me, but more like telling him off while also asking a question somewhere in between.
  - adwn 8y ago
    > Looks like something went wrong with your copy/paste there Oops, you're right, thanks! Fixed. > That doesn't really sound like asking to me, but more like telling him off while also asking a question somewhere in between. After re-reading that part, I'm willing to concede that your interpretation is probably closer to the mark than mine.
  - xenadu02 8y ago
    That's the point of the article. She realized grilling him about the behavior wasn't productive (and neither was punishment).
crispyambulance 8y ago
I am skeptical that the child did it strictly because his hands were dry. It sounds more like an infantile behavior, like thumb-sucking, that persists in some children well into school age much to the disappointment of their parents. That said, the correct way to handle thumb-sucking is not to make it into a daily battle, just like the author discovered. It goes away by itself with little-to-no intervention required.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
clucas 8y ago
I suggest taking the same sorts of steps recommended in the article, when responding to the article. Instead of having a judging/shaming/punishing reaction toward the author, read the article generously, and try to understand what may have made the author behave in the way she behaved. She gives plenty of fodder for that. And that is exactly what you think she should have done with her child (and which she eventually did do). And based on what she wrote in the article and on her comments elsewhere in this thread, I don't think she's saying her actions with her child were justified - she is instead embarassed by her actions, and is giving people very valuable advice for things to look out for in your life that may make you behave in that judging/shaming/punishing manner, even when you don't believe you're the sort of person who might make these mistakes. Perhaps take some time for self-reflection - you said that you were trying to hold off on judgement of their parenting - so why did you ultimately feel that judgement was necessary? As you note, the author did figure things out - are you saying that writing about a mistake, and the solution to that mistake, is "not wildly impressive" in general? If that's case, would you argue that post-mortems of tech problems are not wildly impressive?

adwn 8y ago

> So the teacher, grandparent, and father never bothered asking why he's licking his hands, and his mother only after a lot of drama, including spanking(!!) No, the mother did ask: "I tried grilling him about why he was doing this so I could find some solution." The article doesn't imply that she asked him only after spanking him, and it seems unlikely that she did. Edit: fixed the quote from the article.

mikelyons 8y ago
The article obviously states that she only asked years after spanking and abusing to get him to stop. Re-read it.
- OpenBSD-empire 8y ago
  I don't get the downvotes, spanking IS physical and emotional abuse! Just because your parents abused you and you "turned out alright" doesn't mean it wasn't and isn't abuse!
Carpetsmoker 8y ago
Looks like something went wrong with your copy/paste there, since you copied the same twice. But I assume you meant: "I tried grilling him about why he was doing this so I could find some solution. He couldn't explain it and the terror in his eyes was disturbing." That doesn't really sound like asking to me, but more like telling him off while also asking a question somewhere in between.
- adwn 8y ago
  > Looks like something went wrong with your copy/paste there Oops, you're right, thanks! Fixed. > That doesn't really sound like asking to me, but more like telling him off while also asking a question somewhere in between. After re-reading that part, I'm willing to concede that your interpretation is probably closer to the mark than mine.
- xenadu02 8y ago
  That's the point of the article. She realized grilling him about the behavior wasn't productive (and neither was punishment).

crispyambulance 8y ago

I am skeptical that the child did it strictly because his hands were dry. It sounds more like an infantile behavior, like thumb-sucking, that persists in some children well into school age much to the disappointment of their parents. That said, the correct way to handle thumb-sucking is not to make it into a daily battle, just like the author discovered. It goes away by itself with little-to-no intervention required.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

clucas 8y ago

I suggest taking the same sorts of steps recommended in the article, when responding to the article. Instead of having a judging/shaming/punishing reaction toward the author, read the article generously, and try to understand what may have made the author behave in the way she behaved. She gives plenty of fodder for that. And that is exactly what you think she should have done with her child (and which she eventually did do). And based on what she wrote in the article and on her comments elsewhere in this thread, I don't think she's saying her actions with her child were justified - she is instead embarassed by her actions, and is giving people very valuable advice for things to look out for in your life that may make you behave in that judging/shaming/punishing manner, even when you don't believe you're the sort of person who might make these mistakes. Perhaps take some time for self-reflection - you said that you were trying to hold off on judgement of their parenting - so why did you ultimately feel that judgement was necessary? As you note, the author did figure things out - are you saying that writing about a mistake, and the solution to that mistake, is "not wildly impressive" in general? If that's case, would you argue that post-mortems of tech problems are not wildly impressive?