Parents: help needed

Originally Posted by pektel

Thanks for all the input, guys. I had tried rationalizing with him, but that didn't work. He is 3 after all lol. Time outs only produced a giant series of F bombs screamed at teh top of his lungs (which is when he got spanked for it the first time.) The spanking has worked somewhat, but hasn't squashed the issue. Haven't tried soap yet. Maybe that will work. also, substituting sounds like a great idea. I'll give that a shot next.

The biggest underlying problem may be attention seeking. I feel that the age of smart phones has people less interactive with each other. I'm sure it takes a toll on the kids. So last night I sat down with the gf and we came to an agreement of NO PHONE STUFF (except actual calls) whenever we are around the kids. I actually think this will help. Because kids crave attention, whether positive or negative. If we aren't responding because in the middle of an email, or reading facebook, or whatever, he may actually be drawing negative attention for attention's sake.

Time out can still work, the thing with it over a butt whopping is it takes more effort on your part! I myself would do both, whopp then time out. When doing time out you do one minute per age (rule of thumb) so it would be one minute. I use a a wall to stand them against but you can use a chair or whatever, just make sure there is nothing that they can play with, attention getting etc.... When you put him in time out and he keeps saying the word then you start over, and you explain this to him, he gets up and walks away, you take him and put him back! If it talks 1, 2, 3, hours to get the 3 minutes of quite time you have to do it!!!! HE CAN NOT WIN! Not even one time! You do this and do it right and I promise it will work. May take a few times, and may only work a little while before he will test you again, but in the long run you stick with it and it will work.

If I was you my main concern will be where did he get it from? It didn't come out of the blue, so if you and the wife don't talk like that then another care taker does and if it was my child I couldn't go for that.

[MrsSledn]

Originally Posted by tx_tuff

Time out can still work, the thing with it over a butt whopping is it takes more effort on your part! I myself would do both, whopp then time out. When doing time out you do one minute per age (rule of thumb) so it would be one minute. I use a a wall to stand them against but you can use a chair or whatever, just make sure there is nothing that they can play with, attention getting etc.... When you put him in time out and he keeps saying the word then you start over, and you explain this to him, he gets up and walks away, you take him and put him back! If it talks 1, 2, 3, hours to get the 3 minutes of quite time you have to do it!!!! HE CAN NOT WIN! Not even one time! You do this and do it right and I promise it will work. May take a few times, and may only work a little while before he will test you again, but in the long run you stick with it and it will work.

If I was you my main concern will be where did he get it from? It didn't come out of the blue, so if you and the wife don't talk like that then another care taker does and if it was my child I couldn't go for that.

Yes, exactly! My son is 8 years old and is still afraid of getting time outs. When an adult does something wrong, he expects them to get them. LOL

[Starscream]

Originally Posted by awsmith4

I have a 4yr old boy who had a similar issue. I tried ignoring him, I tried calmly explaining, one day I lost it and whooped his backside. He has never said it since.

This is not the answer for a lot of parents, but it's always worked for me with my kids.

Originally Posted by MajorCaptSilly

When a 3-year-old sees a reaction of any kind from their parents to anything they have said, they keep saying it to keep getting the reaction. Ignore it when he says the f-word and make sure not to use it around him.

MCS

This works too, but with a 3yr old, it's gonna take a LOT of ignoring. 3yr olds are stubborn little brats. My oldest two were, and my youngest is now (he's 4 and going through a similar phase, not cussing, but trying to test his limits on a lot of things). Spanking my four year old doesn't seem to work lately.