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Why Isn’t NO Good Enough?

January 23, 2011 by

In our house the word NO for some reason doesn’t mean NO and I am not totally sure why that is.  My kids hear the word No but insist on asking the same question again minutes later thinking the answer is going to be different.

Example: Last night Shaun asked to play Xbox 360 and Melinda told him No because he played Wii for about an hour earlier in the evening.  It couldn’t have been a minute later and he asked the same thing again.  Then maybe five minutes passed before asking again.  At this point I was pissed and I told him if he kept it up he wasn’t going to get dessert.  Melinda and I ran to Wawa for coffee and I needed gas in my car.  When we got back from Wawa can you believe Shaun asked to play Xbox 360 again and this time I flew off the deep end and sent him to bed.

Maybe I was a bit extreme in sending him to bed an hour early but in a 30 minute period he asked to play Xbox 360 four times when he already knew the answer was No.  I hate when we tell the kids No to something and they disregard our answer and ask again.  I feel like it is total disrepect for us as parents.

I don’t tell my kids No for no reason or just to be mean. Believe it or not we usually have a good reason for telling them No.  Also, this post focused on something Shaun did but believe me Shae does the same crap often as well. I am only pointing out Shaun because it just happened and is fresh in my mind.

My hope is some day my kids understand No really means No and not to ask the same thing minutes later.  I am sure I am dreaming but I need something to look forward to don’t I?




Why Is Shaun A Block Head?

April 26, 2010 by

I love my son very very much but he is a block head. Shaun’s biggest problem is asking the same question multiple times. I think he feels if he keeps asking the answer will change in his favor but it doesn’t. It actually works quite the opposite and it actually gets Shaun into trouble.

A few weeks ago we told Shaun that we were no longer going to tolerate him asking the same questions over and over. We told Shaun that if we say No that the answer is No and there is no need for him to ask again. Last night he broke that rule by asking Melinda if he could eat his ice cream in the basement and she told him no so about thirty seconds later he asked me the same question. I told him to go to his room and he began to cry and I don’t mean a little cry I am talking a full blown wailing cry as if we told him he wasn’t able to have dessert for the rest of his life.

A few minutes later Shaun came downstairs and we told him he lost dessert for asking if he could eat it downstairs twice. That opened the flood gates again but this time we had the joy of the wailing cry but this time he added foot stomping and that pushed me over the edge so I sent him to bed for the night. It was only 7pm when I sent him to bed and trust me I felt soooooooo bad for sending him to bed but I need him to learn when we give him an answer that is it and there is no more need for a discussion.

Do you have similar situations with your children or are we the only ones?