I actually saved my post before I yanked it, and after some reflection, I'll post it here again, although I underscore heavily that I'm not being argumentative--I really am just responding to the thread's topic. Here it is:
I haven't read The Explosive Child, but I have read several summaries of it, and I have to admit to some real misgivings. I just don't like the idea--at all--of letting a kid misbehave notably without punitive consequence (not corporal--I'm a big believer in the deprivation of privileges or "toys"--this would include stereo, TV, playstation, iPod, cellphone, etc for teens). I have read that TEC warns against "upping the ante" via levying punishments which will only further infuriate the difficult child , who then misbehaves some more, which forces you to levy more punishments, and before you know it you're in a game of poker with endless chips on both sides, both of you just raising and re-raising the bets into the stratosphere. I "get" that that becomes an exercise in absurdity pretty quickly.
But my older daughter (now 22) was a very willful little kid--would fly into rages when constrained from what she wanted to do in early grade school years, and then simply defy "time-out in your room" consequences and the like--she'd just come barreling out of her room in full rage, defying us and essentially daring us to do something about it. (She was 5 or 6 at the time.) My wife and I were at wit's end as to what to do, as she was truly explosive at times but we did NOT believe in corporal punishment, so we simply put a hook-and-eye on the outside of her bedroom door and thus *forced* her to remain in her room until the rage was spent. (We would even remove the lamps from her room so that she had nothing breakable to break.) The first 3 or 4 of times we did it, she roared like a lion in her room, HUGE rages, and we had to just clench our teeth and get through it. But she would eventually calm down and would ask, still crying and upset but now quiet, if she could come out. When we let her out, she was red-faced with emotional exertion (and probably suppressed fury), but she was compliant. It felt a lot like "breaking" a horse, and that was painful to do, but it worked: she eventually "got it" and would, when she was sent to her room, simply remain quietly there and cry it out, if necessary, until she was quiet long enough for us to come and let her out. It was touch-and-go at first, but it worked. She is now halfway through college, a strong and self-disciplined and kind and loving person who takes no unnecessary guff from anyone but who is civil and reasonable and kind and a productive young adult. I have sometimes wondered what might've happened with her if we hadn't settled upon the simple solution of that hook-and-eye on her bedroom door. And I'm certain that if I had followed the counsel of TEC and "picked my battles" instead of responding very firmly and consistently to *every* misbehavior in the early going, she might be a very different person today.
I really am not trying to be disputatious--just answering the thread's topic question of "How do you discipline your children?" Perhaps I'm a dinosaur who believes too much in the efficacy of (non-corporal) punishment and consequences. I was raised by a very authoritarian Southern father, and he was *much* more harshly punitive than I ever was as a father, and that had negative consequences in terms of our relationships with him, but by the same token we were never difficult children --the downside of misbehavior, in terms of consequences, was just way too steep to risk defiance. Meanwhile, my sister, whose older son is a *classic* hardcore difficult child --really scary to imagine how he'll turn out (he's 19)--raised him very leniently, with very inconsistent and sometimes non-existent consequences. She too has read TEC and believes in "picking your battles" and letting a lot of stuff just slide. It has not produced a well-behaved child, by a long shot--in fact, he is feared and disliked by all of his cousins who were raised in much sterner and more punitive parental environments.
I suppose the obvious reply is that PCs are simply not the same as difficult children , innately, and that you can't compare apples to oranges, especially wrt methods of child-raising the two. I "get" that, and am open to considering those complexities. It's an absorbing topic, no matter how you slice it...and absolutely central to our most absorbing and central activity: raising our kids.
Lastly, I am not saying--at all--that if you have a difficult child , it's because you raised him poorly. Not at all. I'm very aware that there are a great many causal and innate influences that generate a difficult child , and even luck (wrt to the peer groups they fall into) plays a large role as well. What I *am* saying is that I'm not a fan of the TEC way of child-raising, and I'm not sure it really works as well as it advertises--and I'm simply responding to this thread's topic question. I sincerely hope I haven't offended--just sharing my thoughts on this interesting topic.
