Seeking opinions on an incident involving another family member disciplining my child
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Anonymous
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We recently made a weekend visit to my sister and her DH and 2 children. My kids are 4 and 6 and hers are about the same ages. Here is what happened (I was with my back turned, helping my other child with something, so did not see all of it directly): My 4YO apparently climbed onto the arm rest of the couch and was standing on it. My BIL firmly told her "no...no...." and she did not comply. He then moved toward her with the intention of physically removing her from the couch. By the time I realized that there was something happening and turned around, she was on the seat of the couch crying and trying to crawl away, and he was standing over her grabbing at her legs. I picked her up and ran out of the room with her as she continued to cry; as I did so, I heard my BIL yell (to me, I assume) "she needs an attitude adjustment!!" After I had left the room (this next part is what my DH says), my other daughter started crying, presumably because she was scared. My DH said to her "it's okay, it's okay" and my BIL screamed at him (this I heard from the other room) "It's NOT okay!! This is my house, my rules!!" I proceeded to the room in which we were staying and my DH and other daughter soon followed. We did not know what to do but we both wanted to leave that instant. My 4YO was still sobbing and repeating "I want to go home" over and over. My older daughter was also still crying. We began packing up our stuff. We did not know what to do because my nephew's birthday party (the reason for our visit) was later that day. My BIL came up to our room shortly after and apologized. My SIL did, too. We ended up staying through the party, but left immediately after it finished instead of staying over a second night as originally planned.
My main questions are, would you have handled this differently and if so how? Also, what would you do going forward? My DH and I are in agreement that we really should not ever stay at their home again. (I should mention that although this is the worst incident that has ever happened, it is not the first...my sister and her BIL have very different parenting styles than we do. They are very strict and military-like and strongly favor punishments and corporal punishment, whereas we do not). |
Anonymous
| I think what BIL did initially was fine. Then you escalated. Then they escalated. Why did you cry?! |
Anonymous
OP here. I did not cry. My kids did. What did I do to escalate? |
Anonymous
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So... what would you have done if your child was standing on the arm of the couch and didn't respond to "get down"?
If your parenting styles are so different than stop using your in-laws house as your vacation hotel. Simple. Invite them to visit you or stay in a hotel. |
Anonymous
| BIL had no business saying "my house my rules". Such behaviour is expected from kids and if I were you I would never go there to stay the night again. Out of line. |
Anonymous
Not PP but you grabbed her and ran out of the room. That would scare my kid. You should have backed up your SIL and let the differences in your child-rearing go in that moment. You were a guest in her home. She did not deserve to be made to feel that she did something wrong. |
Anonymous
Sorry - I misread about the crying for you. You escalated by intervening and running out of the room with her when he was handling it. |
Anonymous
It sounds like BIL said it after thinks had escalated to dramatic proportions. And do you "expect" your four-year-old to stand on the arm of the couch? Seriously? Don't you have a side table or floor that would hurt him/her if she fell? |
Anonymous
I shouldn't have said I ran (I didn't; maybe it doesn't matter) but yes, I picked her up and removed her from the room. She was crying and my BIL was very angry, so it seemed best to remove her from the room. My SIL was not home at the time. |
Anonymous
But it IS his house, his rule! |
Anonymous
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1. What your BIL did initially was fine.
2. Him losing his temper clearly was not at all ok. 3. You packing up to leave, nearly crying, and planning on never coming back is also not. |
Anonymous
| I don't "expect" a 4 year old to stand on a sofa arm necessarily, merely that I "expect" them to behave in ways adults usually don't. |
Anonymous
| So what? you think your kid ought to be allowed to stand on the arm rest of people's couches and they ought to just STAND THERE AND DO NOTHING? WTF? Smh. And it sounds like you and your kid totally overreacted to him putting her down off the couch which any person with sense ought to have done. What a little hellion, I bet they hope you don't come back. |
Anonymous
Here's what you should have done: walked over while 4 yo is misbehaving. "Get down! We do not do that on other people's house!" Remove her if necessary. |
Anonymous
| OP, you're going to get a lot of responses on here in support of the BIL because frankly there are a lot of people on here like him. But in my opinion what he did was totally unacceptable. You don't get physical with someone else's kids. If she was on the couch and he didn't like it, and she didn't get down after he told her, he should have said to you or your DH (who were both right there, right??) "get your kid off the couch, i just told her to get down and she didn't listen" |