Sticky-fingered difficult child driving us MAD!

[gcvmom]

In typical impulsive difficult child fashion, difficult child 1 unplugged husband's cell phone last night and apparently took it to his room to play with. (I need to check to see just what he did while he had it).

Well, husband has a meeting about a job today and NEEDS that phone because that's the only number his contact has to reach him.

We didn't know where the phone was, so I frantically called the school to contact difficult child 1 about the phone. Turns out it was still in his room. But that didn't prevent the panic and husband's blood pressure from rising and ruining his mood this morning.

Now to come up with an appropriate consequence...

 

[DammitJanet]

Oh geez. That would tick me off too. I had so many problems with Cory and phones. Heck I still do. When he is here I am constantly checking for my phone. He is known to walk out of the house with it in his pocket and I have to drive over to his house to retrieve it!

What would be a good consequence? Hmmm...go to walmart and get one of those little kids princess cell phones, you know the ones that beep and talk? Then make a sandwich board that says I WILL NOT TAKE MY PARENTS CELL PHONE and make him stand out in front of the house for two hours.

 

[gcvmom]

Oh, that's CLASSIC! I'll talk to husband about this... we don't get much traffic on our street, so maybe standing on the main boulevard would be better!

 

[rlsnights]

Just curious - did you try calling the cell phone to see if you could locate it inside the house?

Not excusing difficult child 1 (and I suggest you charge the cell phones in your bedroom from now on) but just wondered about that. It's the first thing I do when I can't locate mine. I swear I have a colander for a brain since my kids turned 13.

While I find the idea of making a teen stand on the corner with a sandwich board as Janet suggests hilarious and quite tempting, with my difficult child 2 it would lead to a full-blown rage as humiliation is definitely one of his triggers. Don't know about your difficult child 1 - might work for you.

Is there something of his that he considers essential to his life and is electronic that you could take away? MP3 player? Electronic dictionary? Alarm clock? Watch? I like the last two ideas especially. They are things most of us really take for granted that truly are essential in my humble opinion.

 

[gcvmom]

Yes, we did call the phone, but it was turned off and went straight to voicemail.

As for revoking something of his, well, he's already lost the use of all video games and handheld electronics because of his last report card. So short of banning him from lacrosse, which he LOVES, and which would also affect his PE grade, there's not much else we could take away that would have the kind of impact he seems to need to remember a lesson!

Maybe just assigning a staggering list of chores for the 4-day break will be suffcient.

 

[rlsnights]

Ooh - messenger boy? Potentially combines a mild form of humiliation with reinforcement of why his dad might be upset with him?

Have any family or friends who live within walking/bike riding distance? Maybe he could serve as messenger boy between their homes and yours for a weekend or two? Instead of phone calls and e-mails he must drop what he's doing and hand carry a message? Or memorize one?

Maybe he goes to the store for stuff or goes and orders take-out?

Instead of you yelling from one end of the house to the other for someone you ring a little bell and he has to drop everything, find you and then convey your message?

Oooh I like this more and more. If it won't trigger outright rebellion in your difficult child 1 it might be fun (but something of a hassle I admit).

Maybe instead of making him stand on the street corner with a sandwich board, he could just make a BIG sign to put up in the front yard that says "I, difficult child 1, will never take my father's cell phone again." Provides the humiliation but softens it just a bit.

 

[gcvmom]

Someone else suggested to me that we make him ask permission to do EVERYTHING (eat, go outside, use the toilet, etc.) for two days. The tedium of that would likely do the trick of driving the lesson home in his brain.

 

[rlsnights]

Now that would be hard for me to implement because I would forget to make him ask. Colander head disease is more debilitating that you might think.

 

[TerryJ2]

get one of those little kids princess cell phones, you know the ones that beep and talk? Then make a sandwich board that says I WILL NOT TAKE MY PARENTS CELL PHONE and make him stand out in front of the house for two hours.


OMG! ROFL!!!

 

[DammitJanet]

Hey...I have a lot of time on my hands to think up annoying punishments since I dont have any fulltime kids anymore! Right now, all I have to do is push my lip into a full blown pout and fake cry and Keyana does want I want...lol. She will do anything not to see someone cry!

 

[gcvmom]

Janet, you are too funny!

 

[DammitJanet]

Im tellin ya...grandparenting is so worth surviving parenting!

 

[Marguerite]

Seriously - any punishment should fit the crime. He needs to understand the problems that this caused.

You've already taken away a lot of his electronic stuff, I'm wondering if he took the phone so he could play games on it since a lot of the mobile phones have various hand-held games on them. If he's not got access to his own games then he did this out of boredom and thoughtlessness.

In which case - you need to deal with both the boredom and the thoughtlessness. I do like the idea of using him as a messenger boy, take him back to how we had to cope in the days before we had mobile phones. Maybe get him to write an essay on the many uses of mobile phones and especially how important it is for someone who uses their mobile phone for business, to always have it available? Maybe he could write about the possible consequences of dad not having his mobile phone when it's the only contact for business colleagues...

Just a thought.

Marg

 

[gcvmom]

Yes, Marg he was using it to play a game that's on the phone. And he got read the riot act for that as well. We're trying the permission-for-everything approach for now. He's being cooperative about it and understands what a big deal this was for his dad this morning. Not to mention the embarassment of his teacher having him call home to deal with the incident this morning. I also told him his dad wanted to make him miss lacrosse today (but I played the good cop part and told him I opted for the permission deal since I didn't want this to affect his PE grade).

What were we saying about these kids needing to learn the hard way?