Yesterday, my son was so sweet and saw that there was trash strewn all over the lawn. He decided to go out and pick it up. When we came home from work, he was bursting to tell us about his “good deed”.
Behind him, we could see the table had been damaged sometime while we were gone. Apparently, he had taken a paper plate and stabbed it with a fork over and over and gouged the table up pretty badly.
Husband was stunned. He had just refinished that table two months ago and son has just hacked it up.
Husband says he needs to talk to me outside for a few minutes so we go talk.
We see how proud son is. We are pleased he is proud of his good deed and don’t want to steal that good feeling away from him. At the same time, son has been quite rough on this table several times now. It has marker on it that bled through some paper he was writing on. Also, he sawed up the edge of the table with a knife… I think just to see what it was like to saw something. Now we have the gouges.
So, talking through things we decide we can deal with son.
We call son out and sit him on my knee. We tell him how proud we are that he saw a chance to give service and that he gave it when he picked up the trash. We told him we wished we could we didn’t have to talk about anything else but we did need to for a minute and then we very gently reminded him that Dad had worked really hard on that table and that we need to be careful with the things we value.
We told him that we knew he didn’t mean to be destructive with the table and that we weren’t angry. We just needed him to think through his actions and to please use a clipboard when he is doing things on the table.
Then husband and I talked to daughter who was watching her brother while we were gone and reminded her of the great trust we were placing in her to watch over her brother and our home while we are gone and that she has some accountability in the choices that are made in the home until we get back.
All in all, I think we handled it VERY calmly and lovingly.
Afterwards, husband and I talked for a long time questioning our success as parents.
Are we giving our kids enough structure. We decided no.
Are we giving our kids enough discipline. We weren’t sure.
Are we giving our kids enough love. We thought we were.
Are we giving our kids enough guidance. We hoped so.
We just didn’t know for sure.
Did we handle it right? Should we have been more severe? Sigh. I wish I knew.
I wish I knew.
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