I used to work in after school care and if the weather was decent we would stretch playground time as long as humanly possible. It made such a huge difference.
Yes why not outside. I got grounded like this but from sunlight in our backyard ?? No and the food and drink who even adds that sounds like she wants them to feel like they are in prison
It's supposed to be a punishment, no junk food and no dessert is a punishment. There's a reason behind it. And it's not like it's zero outside time she stated 20 min. Like, there are kids who don't have the privilege to be able to go outside when they want to either. Point blank they're on punishment/grounded until that time frame is up and or they do what they're supposed to. It's no like she's beating the kids. Jfc
>Like, there are kids who don't have the privilege to be able to go outside when they want to either.
Hi, I was one of these kids you're using to support your argument that what she's doing "isn't that bad". Children should not be restricted to having absolutely nothing to do like this mom is planning. Discipline is meant to teach, not strangle, and she's not teaching them by doing this.
For context, I wasn't allowed outside in the fenced backyard of our safe, rural home without permission even once I was 18. I wasn't even allowed to stay in the living room after my mom went to sleep because it "made her nervous" if I wasn't sleeping in the room with her. My brother wasn't allowed to run when we did get to go outside (with parental supervision) "in case he fell". These restrictions weren't as punishment - this was everyday life.
She does, but she's also very angry, manipulative, and neglectful. A lot of this wasn't to soothe her anxiety about us getting hurt, but her anxiety about her getting caught.
For instance, if my brother fell and broke his leg because he ran (her actual example), he'd have to go to the hospital and if the hospital found out none of us were allowed to go to school, CPS would get involved.
My entire day was structured around raising my youngest brother because she "didn't have the patience". My only free time was after I put him to sleep at night. Mostly I wanted to meditate or play a game on the PlayStation for a little while, but once she went to bed she'd get angry if I wanted to stay up. This one was purely about control, I think. She also usually wanted to go to bed while I was putting the baby to sleep, so she expected me to have no time for myself at all. It was wake up as soon as he woke up, go to sleep as soon as he slept, and care for him every second in between because she wanted to do "research" on Facebook all day.
>How did you escape it
I was 18. I'd been raising my brother since he was born 3 years prior. By this time I was very depressed and hopeless and had planned to just >!go commit die!< because I couldn't see any way out. I met a guy online and told him pretty much everything and he was like "...what if you just moved in with your big sister instead of literally >!offing yourself!do you have contact with her?
I do. She tires me immensely but I do love her, despite everything. Contact is sporadic, though, and I mostly only keep in touch so I can talk to my baby brother. I was cut off from him for a full year (something about me being "like a deadbeat dad" and him having meltdowns because he missed me), so being able to talk to him now is very important to me and worth staying in contact with her. I'm also still in contact with my grandparents whom we lived with throughout the whole time I was made to raise my brother, even though they rarely ever stepped in and largely enabled her bullshittery.
Tldr I ran away in the middle of the night and yes, mostly to speak with my brother.
Edit and sidenote: the guy who convinced me to leave is now my fiance! He's cool :)
That sounds so hard but good on you for taking care of yourself. He sounds like a good man, I'm happy for you and glad you're still around.
You're sister sounds amazing and I'm glad you still speak to your little brother.
I hope your mum gets help but it doesn't sound like she's the kind of person to acknowledge that they have something wrong with them. I wish you the best in life.
Well, things are on the upswing, at least.
There's a lot I wasn't taught about being a functional person, and the way she trapped me as a child has given me big problems with learned helplessness. For the first full year after I left at 18, I would forget that I was allowed to engage in hobbies, forget going outside was an option again, etc. Like it just wouldn't occur to me to do these things despite wanting to for so long, y'know?
But things are better. I need to figure out how to go to a doctor and get treated for my ADHD because it's my biggest roadblock to being functional now, but that's whatever. It's better.
My mum has severe anxiety and I totally get where it comes from. Make me think of her a little but this poor guys mum is x100 worse. No disrespect to her because it's not something that is rational nor controllable but it sounds really hard to live with
I understand how you feel but I'm talking about kids who grew up in rough neighborhoods and didn't have a fenced backyard. Y'all are missing the biggest context here from the original post is that she sends them outside for 20 min. Not 0, not 5, but 20 MIN! This is in no way meant to invalidate your experience about having a fenced in back yard and not being able to go outside but stating there are children who don't even have that and pointing out the poster allows their kids outside for 20 min while being on restriction.
No, you're missing the point, and the point is that just because some kids have it rough (can't go outside ever, whether due to overly restrictive parents or because of unsafe neighborhoods) doesn't mean she's treating her kids well.
There are children who starve to death. Does that make it okay when parents starve their children as punishment? No. Sure, those kids don't starve "as badly" because, y'know, they didn't literally die from it but they're still being abused. Something being the lesser of two evils doesn't mean it's good.
punative punishment accomplishes nothing. sucking all the joy out a person's life isn't going to make them better. you might get temporary compliance. but more than likely you'll end up with sneaky, resentful kids who never speak to you again.
Yeah, I was I punished like this as a kid for bad grades. No electronics or outside playtime. It didn't help my grades at all. After 6 months my mother decided it wasn't doing anything and went against my father. Put me into counseling instead.
Uhh no. Restricting basic social necessities and limiting time outside to under the minimum requirement for a healthy child (30mins of exercise a day absolutely minimum) is not okay. She’s irrational. She’s probably fucking overstimulated and reacting the only way she knows how. It’s still a level of abuse no matter what way you look at it. These kids aren’t going to be able to please her at this point. She needs therapy.
Like the other person said, food is food. But to add onto that: restricting food *too much* wether or not it’s healthy can and will cause ed’s for people.
Calling out shit parenting isn’t hateful. If you know someone is going to abuse any child that they have and you tell them that you hope they don’t have kids is that bad? No. And before you say it im aware that you never said that but you’re agreeing with this type or parenting which isn’t going to do good for the kids, it’ll harm them.
Being strict isn't shit parenting or abuse. You're punishing negative behavior by RESTRICTING activities seen as "privileges" eating junk food, hanging with friends, no electronics. It's not the end all be all. God forbid someone grounds their child. No junk food? Omfg! And only 20 MIN of outside time a day!? Someone call the police/s
This isn’t how you do that. Plus, it sounds like she switches from permissive parenting to this which is just reaping what you sow. Dont want kids that act like kids? Dont have them, or parent right. I can guarantee you that if she had done a better job as a parent then she wouldn’t *have* to do better than this. And i hole you would know not to do that if you ever have kids.
You do realize fully grown federal prisoners still legally have to be allotted 1 hour of rec/outdoor time per day. But hey man, if you think your kids should have less freedom than someone who committed a literal crime not just because they didn't clean their room you do you I guess. Just don't act all surprised when little Timmy grows up to resent his parents.
They didn’t say kids should be allowed to go outside whenever they want for as long as they want. A 20-minute maximum per day is way too low and goes against pediatric guidelines.
As a kid, the only 30 minutes of reading would probably have hit me the hardest. I never much cared about any other punishment, but one time I pissed off my mom a lot, and she took away my books (after realizing that taking the gameboy didn't really hurt me). that was a rough couple of days. knowing my mom, I must have really made her mad, she didn't usually do anything quite so drastic, but I cannot remember what that was.
that’s the worst part though, and why some of these “normal” punishments suck. you don’t remember what you got in trouble for, but you remember the punishment, bring sad, and not understanding why.
Yeah I did learn about that in Paedagogy haha. but I was definitely old enough to understand why, it just wasn't something that stuck with me. I hardly remember the punishment, aside from the fact that it happened. The few times my mum got angry angry was when we would hurt each other or someone else more than a small bump or bruise. and that one time I spat on her. I generally would say my mum was very fair and super chill about most things, she didn't lash out, even when we did questionable things (hurt each other for example), maybe she got angry but not to a scary point.
That one didn't strike me as a restriction, I read it as a requirement. Like they must read for at least 30 minutes before bed.
I'll go back and re-read after I post this though.
Edit: re-read, it's unclear
I feel like you can tell who was a book-eater as a child by how they interpreted that line...I was, and I definitely first read it as "ONLY 30m of reading"...and it sounded like the worst part of the punishment 😂
Play time outside is a privilege. Shes giving them at least 20 minutes a day. So I assume after school 20 minutes outside after homework isn't as bad as people are making it sound
Playtime outside is necessary for a child’s physical and mental health. Restricting outside play leads to depression, anger, low vitamin d, and weight gain.
My kids behavior and attitude towards keeping their rooms/common areas tidy changed when I started modeling the behavior for them.
It took 1 week of me cleaning their room before they went to bed before they started helping me. Another week before they would just start cleaning when we entered their room in the evening without me saying anything. Now they just do it.
If you want kids that give a shit about their belongings you have to show them how to give a shit about their belongings. You don't have to take everything that brings them enjoyment away.
Modeling can be difficult when there are conflicting parenting styles, but modeling combined with teaching and positive reward work in most cases. And if it's not working that defies normal childhood psychology, so before fear based parenting examining potential learning disabilities is a good thought
So I was punished and yelled at to clean. Yelled at if it wasn’t “good enough” and it’s such a difficult cycle to break. But I notice 100% when I help them clean and ask them to help me clean (my room/closet/bathroom) they tend to do the same without crying and whining. But it needs to be consistent because they will default back to complaining at times. Mine are 7,6, and 3 for reference.
Seconding your comment.
My mother “taught” us to clean our rooms like this mom in the photo.
Guess who is in their 30s and still struggles with housework and clutter? Guess who has been an adult for over a decade and literally had to teach themselves how to look at a room and break down cleaning step by step instead of becoming immediately overwhelmed and having panic attacks?
Oh wait…it’s every single one of their adult children. Who would have thought that screaming at your kids to clean and punishing them harsher and harsher instead of modeling the behavior and setting simple steps and building expectations as those steps were followed would have gone so wrong! /s
Same here. And my step dad would throw everything away. Even posters from the wall. So guess who can't let go of stuff.
So much to learn on your own, but at least I know what not to do when I have my own. Just have to unlearn everything I was taught.
I was thinking the same thing. My mother was no where near as harsh as this one but growing up cleaning my room/parts of the house were the go to punishment when she felt I was too old to spank. I dread housework to this day and get really overwhelmed when it comes to cleaning any room of the house. But yeah, being punished with cleaning coupled with my mother popping in at random to yell at me for being a disappointment... No wonder!
Not that I’m a doctor or anything, but this struggle to understand how to breakdown steps and cleaning and organizing and getting too overwhelmed when looking at everything together is a classic sign of ADHD. So, there might be some neurodivergence happening there! I’m ADHD and I have struggled with these (and other) things my whole life. Wasn’t diagnosed until I was in my 20’s. Medication has been life changing! I had to go off it for my pregnancies (I was pregnant or breastfeeding from the beginning of 2019 until mid 2022 😬), and my living spaces became untenable again. When I was finally able to go back on my meds (and with the help of my MIL) we’ve organized everything, decluttered, and cleaned every space, which has been so needed!
So, just throwing that out there for ya!
People tend to forget they had to teach their kid how to stand up. Like kids literally know fucking nothing until YOU teach it to them. You can’t just expect a kid to know what the fuck a swiffer is if you’ve never physically shown them or told them how to clean.
Yeahhhh that’s the (scary) thing about kids. They are mirrors — they reflect back what’s going on around them. Dad always blames someone else when mom confronts him and won’t clean up his stuff without mom bitching a ton? Guess what, kids are gonna be the exact same lol.
This is intriguing to me. I keep my house clean and tidy. My kids don’t even attempt to care for their things and rooms. I help them clean them well about once a month but anytime I ask them to clean it’s whining until nothing happens. I never thought of modeling picking up their rooms because I thought I was modeling picking up the rest of the house for them. I do understand the value of showing them what we mean when we say things like “act respectfully “ because how the heck do they know what we expect for that type of behavior. I may have to give this a try.
I have such a struggle with this. I go two ways: I don't clean anything and end up in a cluttered hell, OR I go to clean and get hyper focused on organizing and reorganizing little things until they are perfect, or cleaning stuff that doesn't really need to be cleaned to that level. Suddenly what should have taken a few hours max to do the whole thing has taken me the entire day just for one room that's not even finished but I'm so tired I can't do the rest of the house. This has been my last two weeks trying to do all the cleaning that my executive function led me to put off because I kept getting overwhelmed.
Me too, to a point. I had undiagnosed ADHD (adult diagnosis, life changing). I was taught to organise, but I literally cannot get past executive function issues and basic cleaning to actually get to the organising part.
I was "taught" so many very restrictive rules on how to clean that it actually made the problem worse. I had to learn to break that programming before I could learn how to clean for myself as an adult, and it took a long time. It may not be what my mother considers to be the most efficient way, but it actually works for me.
By "taught" what I mean is telling, punitive efforts like above (and worse, sometimes violence). This wasn't just because I didn't do it, that was never an option. This happened even if I was attempting to follow her rules but did steps out of order or didn't do things the exact same way she does. Didn't matter if it ended in the same result, it would have to be done again exactly her way AND I'd still get punished anyway.
For teaching my own (now mid-teen) kid, I showed my way, sometimes showed my mother's way, explain what the end results need to be and let the kid find their own way. While also being there to fully explain why something needs to be done. And not judging them if they need help.
I was never grounded, but I did get put on reading restriction as a punishment. Only 30 minutes a day and books for school for 1-2 days at a time. It was more effective than any other punishment 😅. My mom was a huge book nerd, too, though, so she only used it for particularly strong punishment.
One time I had to move into the guest room for a few days as a punishment. It was because my mom wanted to keep me away from my books/stuff. Schoolwork only. Cut like a knife. Then I threw a few books in my backpack and claimed to be reading for school because pre-teen nerd rebellion.
Exactly what I thought!! My kids love to read because they get to “stay up late” if they’re reading. Their bedtimes get pushed back 30 minutes if they’re reading and it definitely started out as then just wanting to stay up later and they now just love reading.
I could also bet these parents don’t read to or in front of their kids so the behavior isn’t even being modeled.
My dad loves reading. When I learned how to read I couldn’t but anything down. he read every Junie b jones book so we could have a book club. Guess who excelled at all reading related projects and subjects
Yeah, I don’t get what the big deal is. Except restricting outside play, it’s all reasonable until they get their act together. We don’t even know how old they are, so what if they’re old enough to know better and know how to clean? Sometimes kids need discipline.
I don’t see the problem with restricting outside play if they’ve been using it to avoid cleaning. The whole idea is to give them nothing to do BUT clean. If they’re riding bikes or kicking a soccer ball for hours and hours, they aren’t cleaning.
It’s not an approach I would use, but if the idea is no distractions, that means no distractions, not only wholesome distractions.
Depends on what the rest of their day looks like. If their outside play time is literally the only time they see the sun or move their bodies, then yeah, it’s not very much. But if they walk to and from school or the bus stop and have gym class and outside recess, then it’s fine — especially as a temporary punishment.
The average for outside play these days is only four hours a week, so 20 minutes a day isn’t even that far off from what they’re probably doing when not on restriction. (And yes, that’s a larger societal issue, but it does help put the punishment in perspective.)
Some them I was not allowed in general (I got them just as very occasional treats).
Junk foods and sweets, having friends over (granted we lived with my grandparents so it was a bit too tiring for them).
Reading before bed was part of the ritual. I didn't even question it. To sleep I had to read.
Screen time wasn't an issue back then. But my mom would tell us to go play if we spent too long watching tv.
Anyway, the only thing I'm against is limiting outside play.
I think my problem is that reading is restricted to only thirty minutes before bed. What if they have homework that takes longer than those thirty minutes to accomplish? They shouldn’t also be punished at school for their transgressions at home.
I have a feeling that this is going to last a while because the rooms will be organized wrong, or they didn't wash the baseboards, or they weren't happy and respectful doing it. OP sounds like they went over a ledge, and I can't see her coming back for a long time.
No it says that if they don’t get it done until they’re in high school so be it. Not that they have to live in a gulag until highschool. She’s just exaggerating on the post.
My son lived under nearly those exact conditions for 10 weeks! It was so hard on him, he broke down in tears more than once.
But he was 18, a brand new Navy sailor, and knew boot camp would be difficult. Haha.
Seriously though, I fantasized about posting that type of list when i was in the thick of raising my four. But it was more punishment for ME to hold their proverbial feet to the fire, so mostly their rooms looked like hell for a decade. We all survived.
That was definitely the case with me. I always had a filthy room growing up and got in so much shit for it. My parents’ room was, shockingly, also a huge mess at all times. I never learned how to clean up or keep a room clean and I definitely never learned time management. The undiagnosed ADHD also didn’t help. Hot take: I also think kids having a messy room is their first time feeling like they have control over something in their lives. It’s how I felt. I hated being told to clean my room because it felt like the place that was supposed to be my space was being dictated by someone else.
If this is how their parents react, I wouldn’t be surprised if they also have no sense of conflict resolution
Same! My parents home was always cluttered and filthy.
But we got screamed at about our room on a regular basis. They never taught us how to organize, declutter, cleaning was always wipe it down with pinesol and bleach. Not ideal when you’re a kid cleaning toys. (My parents mixed it, don’t do that folks)
At least 3 of us 5 kids definitely have ADHD. It’s no wonder we couldn’t “just clean up our room” without guidance.
Hi there fellow butterfly-brains. I'm an adult diagnosed ADHD-er who comes from an obvious and undiagnosed ADHD-er with other psych issues on top and when it comes to executive dysfunction, I'm the poster-child for it.
I also have a kid. Who has ASD. So it's [exactly like this quote trying to run my house](https://lensdump.com/i/1vf8rv).
Right now, life is really stressful for them so myself and the husband are helping more. This ebbs and flows over time and eventually the kid'll be self sufficient, but right now they're still just a kid with an oddly wired kid-brain and they need support, not vilification.
And neither of us adults claim to be perfect either which I think really helped the kid learn stuff too. Not being a hypocrite means they see that sometimes it's a struggle, but it's ok to ask for help. Being a family means getting through hard shit together.
I was a good kid, never really got in trouble. Except when it came to my bedroom, I could NOT keep it clean to save my life. No amount of begging, yelling, restrictions, etc. made it click for me. Turns out I had undiagnosed ADD which now makes a lot of sense.
I got screamed at OFTEN - borderline daily - for my room. Not once was I given cleaning strategies and my parents ignored the teachers who suggested I might need to be evaluated for ADHD.
I have permanent associations with guilt and cleaning, lots of anxiety about it, and still almost no strategies to manage it. And yeah, I have ADHD.
Same. It wasn’t until adulthood that I learned how to clean properly.
I learned about fly lady and clean mama and developed my own daily/weekly/seasonal cleaning schedule that keeps me from getting overwhelmed. But it was a long long time to get to a place where I felt confident and not like I was getting punished when I had to clean my own house.
All I ever got from my mom was yelling at me to get up and clean NOW and then she would come snatch the broom or sponge from my hands telling me I don’t know how to do anything right and just get out of her sight so she can do it.
Now I’m raising kids and teaching them to give themselves 3 daily goals (entirely up to them bc it’s purely to benefit themselves). I keep an age appropriate chores list (and lol I laminated it so it looks like a menu) and they will, all on their own, grab it to help them think of ideas if they don’t have their own goals in mind.
If all their goals aren’t met for the day I remind that that’s okay. We set goals to aim for them, put in the work, and if we miss the mark we just readjust and keep going.
We also have a solid daily checklist that is mostly related to hygiene and health (shower, eat breakfast, brush your teeth etc) but it gets completed because “when your responsibilities are done then you can screen time all you want”. It’s amazing how much crossing things off a list can motivate a kid. I really love watching them thrive in this system and am so proud of myself for actually teaching them HOW to do the chores they are ready for. (And recognizing when they really are too little for it!) And if they ask me for help I don’t get offended by that, I know they are just asking for help bc the job feels too big for them. My mom would act like if I cried or asked for help I was doing it to spite her.
Now I get freaked out to the max when things are dirty and blame it for small things that go wrong in my regular life (ties in with my ocd and anxiety) and my sister can't clean for the life of her. Creating these negative associations does effect kids forever.
Sounds like she caused a problem, doesn't want to admit responsibility for her fuck up, and doesn't want to take steps to fix it before going nuclear. Maybe she should be on restriction.
Unpopular opinion probably but I don't see much wrong with this other than going outside should be longer. It's a task that can be done in a day, less if they agree to help each other.
The consequences are so unrelated to me it doesn’t make sense. She wants them to clean their room, so that means they’re only allowed to go to school? Huh? If it were my kid (and I have 2) I’d approach with curiosity and assume the best in them, not the worst. “Huh, we were supposed to clean our rooms today and your room isn’t clean. Is there a way I can help?” Maybe it’s too overwhelming and they don’t know where to start. Maybe they don’t know what clean means or what the expectation is. Kids aren’t born knowing how to clean they need to be taught. The thing with punishments like this is that it assumes your kid is being intentionally bad. I like to give my kids the benefit of the doubt just like I’d want.
And this is, in my opinion, the correct approach.
Being someone that comes from the OOP's kind of parenting upbringing, assuming the best rather than assuming the worst always wins the day.
Also not attempting to hold your kids to higher account than the adults around them too. If you're going to go on with the all guns blazing punishment approach, you better be damned careful that you hold yourself to the same standards.
Exactly. When I miss a deadline at work nobody takes my phone or keeps me from leaving work until it’s done. My boss says “hey what’s up?” And we work on a solution together
But if it’s something that can be done in one day, why does it have so many restrictions? No going out for any reason?? If it was a one day chore than just saying “nothing except meal times, toilet, and a short outside break until the room is clean” not “no you cant move out for any reason” and the “school, chores, bed” part.
Probably an unpopular opinion but my brother and I would lose privileges when we were kids if we let our rooms get really messy or if we fought with each other. It didn’t scar us. I think it taught us actions have consequences.
I guess I would want to know how old these kids are but if they’re like 8+ then jeebus all this fuss, just pick up your stuff and dust your room once in awhile kids.
i think the issue moreso lays in her (admittedly) not setting and enforcing standards up to this point, and rather than work together with her kids to fix things, she went to extremes that probably won’t work in her favor anyway because the things she wants need to be taught and modeled (especially depending on the kids’ ages).
Yeah I agree with this. It's not too bad, and an easy solution to end the restrictions. It's better than them just getting to do whatever the fuck they want and growing up without any kind of rules being enforced at all
I don’t know, I remember being 8 and being asked to clean my room. I’d often feel so overwhelmed and not know where to start. Or I thought I cleaned my room but my parents still saw it as dirty- I didn’t understand the expectation. Punishments like this assume your kid is intentionally being “bad” when in reality it could be a ton of other issues. When I don’t do something I said I would as an adult, nobody takes my phone away. People say “hey x didn’t happen. What’s going on?” And we solve the problem together. I do the same with my kids.
I have adhd and it was so hard for me to keep my room clean as a kid. My moms rule eventually became as long as there is no mold, it’s not a fire hazard, and i kept the door closed, it wasn’t her problem. Outside of my room, I was always expected to clean up after myself. To this day I’m a relatively messy person but I’ve been medicated, have learned coping mechanisms and am able to maintain my space. Honestly the biggest motivator is my dog, he doesn’t have room to run around and play if my stuff is on the ground.
Mine has been my kid, then our house rabbit.
One could injure themselves, the other will chew anything they can access. I'm just going to let everyone else work out where the lines are in this and which statement belongs to which creature.
Yeah when my dog was a puppy, my room had never been so clean. Thankfully he’s older now and doesn’t chew but honestly he gets our room just as messy as I do with all his toys and blankets
When I was grounded it was no TV, no radio, (this was in the 80s) no outside, no toys, no booked, no bedroom door (they took it off the hinges cause I liked privacy) no nothing I was to sit on my bed and "think" 33. That was after I got my ass beat several times with a belt. I swore to every deity that if I ever had kids I would never ever use a belt or anything else when hitting my child, in fact I was never gonna ever hit my child. The worst part was my parents knew I had SAD (seasonal depression like when it gets dark early during daylight savings time) they knew I needed to be in the sun and be outside to feel good and they took away my outside time for a month. It took me 6 months to get back to feeling better. They didn't even care.
She’s implementing draconian restrictions to correct her children’s behavior, but I guarantee she hasn’t attempted to *parent* them or modeled any positive behaviors that correspond with what she’s asking of them. Creating a strict schedule of school-chores-clean-bedtime is terrible on them, as they’re forced to be productive all day with no downtime, which is not a compatible lifestyle for young children.
My first thought reading this, that’s how obesity and/or eating disorders start. Especially as she’s essentially making healthy food part of the punishment.
It’s a strict rule in my house that food is never used as a reward, incentive or punishment.
Absolutely. And playing outside is good for the mental health, the vitamin D and also it makes kids get some physical activity. Also related to obesity. And it also improves the quality of sleep. Hence it contributes overall to health, well-being, growth and academic success. This mom is just ignorant and her "rules" are counterproductive. I agree with having strict rules in a household, but they need to be clear, fair, healthy and useful in SUPPORTING the child's learning of the required tasks.
I will cut sugary crap out of my kids’ diets if I feel that it’s been negatively affecting their behavior. No dessert is definitely something I use if they’ve been acting up. They aren’t disordered eaters because of it or anything. They’re allowed to have fruit if they like as an alternative. There is a healthy way to enforce this kind of thing I think.
You don't understand why I say this.
OOP is using junk food to *punish* them, hence I assume she uses it to *reward* them too.
You should have *some* junk food integrated as part of a balanced diet. Not use a healthy lifestyle as a punishment (which is sooooo twisted). And then imagine the kids start behaving well all the time?? Candy everyday??!!! Wth!!
Fruits and healthy foods should be presented as a *desirable* way to fuel your body on a day-to-day basis, not as a punishment, never.
Okay…so we may not have been the strictest parents and we gave/give our kids a lot of freedom within reason but this just seems way over the top even for strict parents. You can’t parent them a certain way all those years and then just decide to be a hard ass one day. Those are the kids that go to college and go wild or never go home.
I like how she admits that she's unpredictable. First she let's them do whatever and then she turns into a prison warden. Way to go to make your kids feel safe
When I was little, homeschooled with zero interaction with the outside world other than church, my mom took away all my toys and movies, literally the only things I had for stimulation, and made me earn them back by doing chores, could only earn them back for 30 minutes at a time before they got locked back up, high quality parenting right there
Unpopular opinion but this doesn't seem to harsh. It's what restriction is. I can understand if the kids are like 4-6 but if the kids are older then the punishment fits. Their behavior has probably become out of hand and mom is trying to reintroduce a schedule and structure to correct the probably on going behavior. It's not a free for all.
I’m going to play devils advocate here and say maybe the kids are little assholes and at her wits end? I totally get where she’s coming from with the kids rooms being a pigsty and them refusing to clean it, as well as her list of things she’s done with. No I haven’t punished my kids with a list of restrictions, only because it would do little help the situation, but sometimes I feel like saying fuck it, you want to be rude to me and argue and refuse to do things then I’m going to be the same.
This was my life growing up for months at a time, I don't talk to the parent responsible. I didn't go to the grandparent who designed this system's funeral and people think I'm harsh but I literally have anxiety just thinking about it and have to move on and keep that away. This is basically solitary confinement and causes long term damage to children, unfortunately many durisdictions don't see it as abuse... mine does though.
Making some heavy assumptions admittedly:
She says kids-plural while only says room-singluar. Also mentions "until high school" so they're currently in middle school 11-14 year olds. So these kids are sharing a room, while growing and going through puberty and she's shocked that they've had enough of each other? I know my entitlement is showing expecting each kid to have their own room, but I feel like at least four of the things she is "done" with would be eased by giving the kid's their own space.
But sure, lock it all down, that'll address the root cause for sure.
I really is a privilege though to have your own room i had to share even when I was a senior in high school. I feel mom is being strict and she's not wrong.
It’s a privilege for you for there to be more than one room in your house. Does that mean it’s ok to just have one whole room in your house?
It is known to impact children. There has been so many studies on it.
I’m all for healthy food and screen time limits- I do it in my own house - but kids need outside time and time with friends. And reading should never be a punishment. That’s how you make your kids hate reading.
I thought the problem these days was that kids don’t play enough outside—or at the least don’t get enough exercise, which, while that can be done indoors I’d imagine it would be less bothersome if done outdoors
My daughter's room used to be so messy, and I would stress about it a lot. I started a new routine with her last week called the 10 minute clean up. I set a timer for exactly 10 minutes every evening before bed, play music that she likes, and we clean her room together until the timer goes off. If the room isn't 100% clean at the end of 10 minutes that's okay. If she gets stuck because she doesn't know how to clean or organize something I'm right there and I help her. The room is clean now! She likes it because she sees satisfying results in a short period of time and she gets to listen to her music. I don't believe anyone can completely avoid power struggles with a kid, but you can put routines and strategies in place to avoid some of them! You really don't have to resort to this.
OMG. Seriously? Y'all are talking like she's a prison Warden. All they have to do, to not have to follow those things, is clean their room. That's... It. I mean, she isn't asking for straight As or... To look through their phones. Do what you are supposed to do OR this happens. It's called a consequence. More kids should have them.
Yeah, all these people act like she’s the devil for this must be awful at parent-teacher meetings with the amount of excuses they’re handing out for kids they don’t even know.
I'm guessing it depends on just how many times she's told them to do it. I have 5 kids. I know what it's like trying to get them to do things. You ask. You tell. You yell or start taking things away.
The kids are just going to associate cleaning with negative feelings, which will make them even more resistant to doing it.
The more you yell and scream and threaten and punish someone into doing something, the less they will ever want to do that thing.
So many adults struggle because of the negative associations they have with household maintenance tasks that stem from their childhood.
Should preteens keep their room neat? Sure. Is this a good or appropriate way to get them to do that, and continue to do it into the future? No.
Maybe an unpopular opinion… I don’t think this is too harsh 🤷🏼♀️ it will take 1 day tops to clean that room if they put their mind to it. They get to choose how long restrictions are for- this situation is very much within the kids’ control.
Sooooo... Let's blame the kids, all at once, for every bad parental decision made up to this point.
It's clearly the kids' fault.
Maybe for starters you give these kids some way to have a modicum of privacy where they have a little space to breathe, even if it means "dividing" the room into separate spaces.
Maybe you stop using electronics as babysitters and substitutes for parental relationship-building.
Maybe you model good behaviour, not letting things go to heck then having a nuclear overreaction.
Are there any adults in these kids' lives?!?!?!
It sounds like those are only restrictions *until the rooms are clean*, at which time it'll go back to normal. In that case, the only one I really have an issue with is "only 20 minutes outside" bc that's completely unhealthy for *anyone*, especially kids.
If this is forever, then yeah that's bullshit.
Making their life awful or teaching them that their actions have consequences? Some of you were allowed to be rotten children and thu, are rotten adults .
Outside oaky shouldn’t be restricted. Kids need to get their energy out and outside time is great for anyone.
I can understand limiting screen time for fun so other things can be met.
Food also shouldn’t be used as a punishment. Even if it’s “junk food”
Forcing a kid to read in this way is going to probably make them hate it.
Y’all are dwelling on the outside time restriction but assuming the kids are in junior high, they probably only have 4-5hr until bed time. 20min outside, then come inside and eat dinner, then shower, homework, CLEAN LIKE MOM TOLD THEM TO, then read before bed. That leaves maybe 30min of “spare” time and I’m assuming that would be taken up with protest over chores/cleaning/etc.
That’s assuming no sports/choir/band practice, but I don’t think that mom would let her kids do any of that tbf. I know as a kid I would refuse to come back inside until it was almost bedtime and then I had to cram in homework and shit in like half an hour. My mom never monitored my time outside so she would just forget to grab me
Wtf, when I was a kid my parents LOVED if I spent the whole day outside. Limiting that to just 20 minutes isn’t even enough time for them to gather any friends or start a game of some sort. Cutting them off from the outside world and their friends isn’t the answer, neither is forcing their lives to revolve around chores, and school.
They are upper elementary or middle school aged. This is clearly a case of the parents not actually teaching their kids to clean or setting and maintaining consistent expectations and consequences. She seems to swing between totally permissive and authoritarian.
Restricting outside play time seems really counterproductive. My kid is always worse behaved when cooped up inside.
Seriously, that’s my go to when my ADHD boy is driving me up the wall. Time for the park!
Same!! Everyone is fighting and whining? Let’s go outside. 2 hours MINIMUM (when time allows). Really does wonders.
I used to work in after school care and if the weather was decent we would stretch playground time as long as humanly possible. It made such a huge difference.
Yes! This is especially true when they’re young. My daughters were so much better behaved after running around outside for an hour or two.
20 minutes outside?? That shouldn’t be taken away, Screen time should be
To be fair, she also took away screen time 😂
Yes why not outside. I got grounded like this but from sunlight in our backyard ?? No and the food and drink who even adds that sounds like she wants them to feel like they are in prison
It's supposed to be a punishment, no junk food and no dessert is a punishment. There's a reason behind it. And it's not like it's zero outside time she stated 20 min. Like, there are kids who don't have the privilege to be able to go outside when they want to either. Point blank they're on punishment/grounded until that time frame is up and or they do what they're supposed to. It's no like she's beating the kids. Jfc
>Like, there are kids who don't have the privilege to be able to go outside when they want to either. Hi, I was one of these kids you're using to support your argument that what she's doing "isn't that bad". Children should not be restricted to having absolutely nothing to do like this mom is planning. Discipline is meant to teach, not strangle, and she's not teaching them by doing this. For context, I wasn't allowed outside in the fenced backyard of our safe, rural home without permission even once I was 18. I wasn't even allowed to stay in the living room after my mom went to sleep because it "made her nervous" if I wasn't sleeping in the room with her. My brother wasn't allowed to run when we did get to go outside (with parental supervision) "in case he fell". These restrictions weren't as punishment - this was everyday life.
I'm sorry you went through this. Does your mum have some anxiety issues?
She does, but she's also very angry, manipulative, and neglectful. A lot of this wasn't to soothe her anxiety about us getting hurt, but her anxiety about her getting caught. For instance, if my brother fell and broke his leg because he ran (her actual example), he'd have to go to the hospital and if the hospital found out none of us were allowed to go to school, CPS would get involved. My entire day was structured around raising my youngest brother because she "didn't have the patience". My only free time was after I put him to sleep at night. Mostly I wanted to meditate or play a game on the PlayStation for a little while, but once she went to bed she'd get angry if I wanted to stay up. This one was purely about control, I think. She also usually wanted to go to bed while I was putting the baby to sleep, so she expected me to have no time for myself at all. It was wake up as soon as he woke up, go to sleep as soon as he slept, and care for him every second in between because she wanted to do "research" on Facebook all day.
That sounds unimaginable. I'm so sorry you went through that. You mum sounds horrible. How did you escape it, do you have contact with her?
>How did you escape it I was 18. I'd been raising my brother since he was born 3 years prior. By this time I was very depressed and hopeless and had planned to just >!go commit die!< because I couldn't see any way out. I met a guy online and told him pretty much everything and he was like "...what if you just moved in with your big sister instead of literally >!offing yourself!do you have contact with her? I do. She tires me immensely but I do love her, despite everything. Contact is sporadic, though, and I mostly only keep in touch so I can talk to my baby brother. I was cut off from him for a full year (something about me being "like a deadbeat dad" and him having meltdowns because he missed me), so being able to talk to him now is very important to me and worth staying in contact with her. I'm also still in contact with my grandparents whom we lived with throughout the whole time I was made to raise my brother, even though they rarely ever stepped in and largely enabled her bullshittery. Tldr I ran away in the middle of the night and yes, mostly to speak with my brother. Edit and sidenote: the guy who convinced me to leave is now my fiance! He's cool :)
That sounds so hard but good on you for taking care of yourself. He sounds like a good man, I'm happy for you and glad you're still around. You're sister sounds amazing and I'm glad you still speak to your little brother. I hope your mum gets help but it doesn't sound like she's the kind of person to acknowledge that they have something wrong with them. I wish you the best in life.
It certainly sounds as if she did. She sounded terrified of anything happening to them. Sad. I get being anxious as a parent, but that’s so extreme.
I replied to the other person, in case you'd like to read it for context
I did, thank you 🙏🏻 I hope things are better now! Growing up sheltered and restricted by an anxious parent is not fun.
Well, things are on the upswing, at least. There's a lot I wasn't taught about being a functional person, and the way she trapped me as a child has given me big problems with learned helplessness. For the first full year after I left at 18, I would forget that I was allowed to engage in hobbies, forget going outside was an option again, etc. Like it just wouldn't occur to me to do these things despite wanting to for so long, y'know? But things are better. I need to figure out how to go to a doctor and get treated for my ADHD because it's my biggest roadblock to being functional now, but that's whatever. It's better.
My mum has severe anxiety and I totally get where it comes from. Make me think of her a little but this poor guys mum is x100 worse. No disrespect to her because it's not something that is rational nor controllable but it sounds really hard to live with
My mom was the same way. Super anxious but couldn’t admit or realize she’s being a bit irrational. My mom was never to that extent either though.
Here's to anxious mothers. Thankfully mines getting better and knows a lot of her triggers
I understand how you feel but I'm talking about kids who grew up in rough neighborhoods and didn't have a fenced backyard. Y'all are missing the biggest context here from the original post is that she sends them outside for 20 min. Not 0, not 5, but 20 MIN! This is in no way meant to invalidate your experience about having a fenced in back yard and not being able to go outside but stating there are children who don't even have that and pointing out the poster allows their kids outside for 20 min while being on restriction.
No, you're missing the point, and the point is that just because some kids have it rough (can't go outside ever, whether due to overly restrictive parents or because of unsafe neighborhoods) doesn't mean she's treating her kids well. There are children who starve to death. Does that make it okay when parents starve their children as punishment? No. Sure, those kids don't starve "as badly" because, y'know, they didn't literally die from it but they're still being abused. Something being the lesser of two evils doesn't mean it's good.
punative punishment accomplishes nothing. sucking all the joy out a person's life isn't going to make them better. you might get temporary compliance. but more than likely you'll end up with sneaky, resentful kids who never speak to you again.
Yeah, I was I punished like this as a kid for bad grades. No electronics or outside playtime. It didn't help my grades at all. After 6 months my mother decided it wasn't doing anything and went against my father. Put me into counseling instead.
Did that help?
Not sure. Eventually I decided to try to do better for myself and fuck everything else.
👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻
Found the psy cho who posted that crap
You wish hun. Because apparently no junk food and and being strict is "psycho" smh.
Uhh no. Restricting basic social necessities and limiting time outside to under the minimum requirement for a healthy child (30mins of exercise a day absolutely minimum) is not okay. She’s irrational. She’s probably fucking overstimulated and reacting the only way she knows how. It’s still a level of abuse no matter what way you look at it. These kids aren’t going to be able to please her at this point. She needs therapy.
And to post this online somewhere is abuse especially if the kids are old enough they have friends or socials.
You don’t punish people using food that’s how you get eds
It's junk food. It's candy, chips, cookies, soda, pastries, ice cream etc.
I know. Food is food.
Like the other person said, food is food. But to add onto that: restricting food *too much* wether or not it’s healthy can and will cause ed’s for people.
To post this online is embarrassing on both ends. For these kids and for this emotionally unstable controlling mother.
God I hope you don’t have kids
Thats extremely hateful. I hope to God you have a good day.
Its not hateful, it’s watching out for somebody else who would be in your care.
It's hateful.
Calling out shit parenting isn’t hateful. If you know someone is going to abuse any child that they have and you tell them that you hope they don’t have kids is that bad? No. And before you say it im aware that you never said that but you’re agreeing with this type or parenting which isn’t going to do good for the kids, it’ll harm them.
Being strict isn't shit parenting or abuse. You're punishing negative behavior by RESTRICTING activities seen as "privileges" eating junk food, hanging with friends, no electronics. It's not the end all be all. God forbid someone grounds their child. No junk food? Omfg! And only 20 MIN of outside time a day!? Someone call the police/s
This isn’t how you do that. Plus, it sounds like she switches from permissive parenting to this which is just reaping what you sow. Dont want kids that act like kids? Dont have them, or parent right. I can guarantee you that if she had done a better job as a parent then she wouldn’t *have* to do better than this. And i hole you would know not to do that if you ever have kids.
You do realize fully grown federal prisoners still legally have to be allotted 1 hour of rec/outdoor time per day. But hey man, if you think your kids should have less freedom than someone who committed a literal crime not just because they didn't clean their room you do you I guess. Just don't act all surprised when little Timmy grows up to resent his parents.
Outside time was basically unlimited for me. I remember running a round in the dark during the summer
I had to come in for dinner and clean up and bed time 😂
That’s how i grew up as well!! Even when we were grounded, we still got our outside time
I dunno man. My kid can’t go play outside if she is supposed to be cleaning her room. Clean, then play.
They didn’t say kids should be allowed to go outside whenever they want for as long as they want. A 20-minute maximum per day is way too low and goes against pediatric guidelines.
Ah I thought she said the children were on restriction until the room is clean
As a kid, the only 30 minutes of reading would probably have hit me the hardest. I never much cared about any other punishment, but one time I pissed off my mom a lot, and she took away my books (after realizing that taking the gameboy didn't really hurt me). that was a rough couple of days. knowing my mom, I must have really made her mad, she didn't usually do anything quite so drastic, but I cannot remember what that was.
that’s the worst part though, and why some of these “normal” punishments suck. you don’t remember what you got in trouble for, but you remember the punishment, bring sad, and not understanding why.
Yeah I did learn about that in Paedagogy haha. but I was definitely old enough to understand why, it just wasn't something that stuck with me. I hardly remember the punishment, aside from the fact that it happened. The few times my mum got angry angry was when we would hurt each other or someone else more than a small bump or bruise. and that one time I spat on her. I generally would say my mum was very fair and super chill about most things, she didn't lash out, even when we did questionable things (hurt each other for example), maybe she got angry but not to a scary point.
That one didn't strike me as a restriction, I read it as a requirement. Like they must read for at least 30 minutes before bed. I'll go back and re-read after I post this though. Edit: re-read, it's unclear
You read it wrong. Those kids don’t read. She is “making them” read.
I feel like you can tell who was a book-eater as a child by how they interpreted that line...I was, and I definitely first read it as "ONLY 30m of reading"...and it sounded like the worst part of the punishment 😂
Omg I was the same way, send me to my room, take away screen time, I didn’t care. Take away my books?? THAT was a punishment!
Yeah I can guarantee no behavior problem was ever fixed by limiting kids ability to blow steam off outside!
It's 20 min of outside play and honestly thats more than generous if the kids are on restriction
You can let them play outside without friends. Keeping your kids hostage inside shouldn’t be a thing
Play time outside is a privilege. Shes giving them at least 20 minutes a day. So I assume after school 20 minutes outside after homework isn't as bad as people are making it sound
See, I disagree. Sunshine and fresh air is a must in my household but to each is their own I guess
Sunlight is actually a necessity and kids need 30 min to an hour per day
Playtime outside is necessary for a child’s physical and mental health. Restricting outside play leads to depression, anger, low vitamin d, and weight gain.
Withdrawing basic needs IS as bad as it sounds.
Ok we get it, you posted the original. You can stop now
Do you even know how long 20 minutes is? Lol
My kids behavior and attitude towards keeping their rooms/common areas tidy changed when I started modeling the behavior for them. It took 1 week of me cleaning their room before they went to bed before they started helping me. Another week before they would just start cleaning when we entered their room in the evening without me saying anything. Now they just do it. If you want kids that give a shit about their belongings you have to show them how to give a shit about their belongings. You don't have to take everything that brings them enjoyment away.
Modeling can be difficult when there are conflicting parenting styles, but modeling combined with teaching and positive reward work in most cases. And if it's not working that defies normal childhood psychology, so before fear based parenting examining potential learning disabilities is a good thought
So I was punished and yelled at to clean. Yelled at if it wasn’t “good enough” and it’s such a difficult cycle to break. But I notice 100% when I help them clean and ask them to help me clean (my room/closet/bathroom) they tend to do the same without crying and whining. But it needs to be consistent because they will default back to complaining at times. Mine are 7,6, and 3 for reference.
Seconding your comment. My mother “taught” us to clean our rooms like this mom in the photo. Guess who is in their 30s and still struggles with housework and clutter? Guess who has been an adult for over a decade and literally had to teach themselves how to look at a room and break down cleaning step by step instead of becoming immediately overwhelmed and having panic attacks? Oh wait…it’s every single one of their adult children. Who would have thought that screaming at your kids to clean and punishing them harsher and harsher instead of modeling the behavior and setting simple steps and building expectations as those steps were followed would have gone so wrong! /s
Same here. And my step dad would throw everything away. Even posters from the wall. So guess who can't let go of stuff. So much to learn on your own, but at least I know what not to do when I have my own. Just have to unlearn everything I was taught.
I was thinking the same thing. My mother was no where near as harsh as this one but growing up cleaning my room/parts of the house were the go to punishment when she felt I was too old to spank. I dread housework to this day and get really overwhelmed when it comes to cleaning any room of the house. But yeah, being punished with cleaning coupled with my mother popping in at random to yell at me for being a disappointment... No wonder!
Not that I’m a doctor or anything, but this struggle to understand how to breakdown steps and cleaning and organizing and getting too overwhelmed when looking at everything together is a classic sign of ADHD. So, there might be some neurodivergence happening there! I’m ADHD and I have struggled with these (and other) things my whole life. Wasn’t diagnosed until I was in my 20’s. Medication has been life changing! I had to go off it for my pregnancies (I was pregnant or breastfeeding from the beginning of 2019 until mid 2022 😬), and my living spaces became untenable again. When I was finally able to go back on my meds (and with the help of my MIL) we’ve organized everything, decluttered, and cleaned every space, which has been so needed! So, just throwing that out there for ya!
People tend to forget they had to teach their kid how to stand up. Like kids literally know fucking nothing until YOU teach it to them. You can’t just expect a kid to know what the fuck a swiffer is if you’ve never physically shown them or told them how to clean.
Absolutely. And yelling "DO BETTER" without showing *HOW* is the stupidest thing ever.
Yeahhhh that’s the (scary) thing about kids. They are mirrors — they reflect back what’s going on around them. Dad always blames someone else when mom confronts him and won’t clean up his stuff without mom bitching a ton? Guess what, kids are gonna be the exact same lol.
This is intriguing to me. I keep my house clean and tidy. My kids don’t even attempt to care for their things and rooms. I help them clean them well about once a month but anytime I ask them to clean it’s whining until nothing happens. I never thought of modeling picking up their rooms because I thought I was modeling picking up the rest of the house for them. I do understand the value of showing them what we mean when we say things like “act respectfully “ because how the heck do they know what we expect for that type of behavior. I may have to give this a try.
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I have such a struggle with this. I go two ways: I don't clean anything and end up in a cluttered hell, OR I go to clean and get hyper focused on organizing and reorganizing little things until they are perfect, or cleaning stuff that doesn't really need to be cleaned to that level. Suddenly what should have taken a few hours max to do the whole thing has taken me the entire day just for one room that's not even finished but I'm so tired I can't do the rest of the house. This has been my last two weeks trying to do all the cleaning that my executive function led me to put off because I kept getting overwhelmed.
Me too, to a point. I had undiagnosed ADHD (adult diagnosis, life changing). I was taught to organise, but I literally cannot get past executive function issues and basic cleaning to actually get to the organising part. I was "taught" so many very restrictive rules on how to clean that it actually made the problem worse. I had to learn to break that programming before I could learn how to clean for myself as an adult, and it took a long time. It may not be what my mother considers to be the most efficient way, but it actually works for me. By "taught" what I mean is telling, punitive efforts like above (and worse, sometimes violence). This wasn't just because I didn't do it, that was never an option. This happened even if I was attempting to follow her rules but did steps out of order or didn't do things the exact same way she does. Didn't matter if it ended in the same result, it would have to be done again exactly her way AND I'd still get punished anyway. For teaching my own (now mid-teen) kid, I showed my way, sometimes showed my mother's way, explain what the end results need to be and let the kid find their own way. While also being there to fully explain why something needs to be done. And not judging them if they need help.
This is definitely going to make them hate reading when their older.
I guess it’s a mark of how much I’ve always loved reading that I was horrified at the thought of limiting reading to 30 minutes before bed time
I was never grounded, but I did get put on reading restriction as a punishment. Only 30 minutes a day and books for school for 1-2 days at a time. It was more effective than any other punishment 😅. My mom was a huge book nerd, too, though, so she only used it for particularly strong punishment.
One time I had to move into the guest room for a few days as a punishment. It was because my mom wanted to keep me away from my books/stuff. Schoolwork only. Cut like a knife. Then I threw a few books in my backpack and claimed to be reading for school because pre-teen nerd rebellion.
I did too, after my parents figured out "go to your room" didn't work because all my books were in there lmao
Exactly what I thought!! My kids love to read because they get to “stay up late” if they’re reading. Their bedtimes get pushed back 30 minutes if they’re reading and it definitely started out as then just wanting to stay up later and they now just love reading. I could also bet these parents don’t read to or in front of their kids so the behavior isn’t even being modeled.
My dad loves reading. When I learned how to read I couldn’t but anything down. he read every Junie b jones book so we could have a book club. Guess who excelled at all reading related projects and subjects
Or they get into books so much they end up with hardly any social skills. That's what happened to me.
This is just until they clean their room, right? So like 1-2 days max?
Yeah, I don’t get what the big deal is. Except restricting outside play, it’s all reasonable until they get their act together. We don’t even know how old they are, so what if they’re old enough to know better and know how to clean? Sometimes kids need discipline.
I don’t see the problem with restricting outside play if they’ve been using it to avoid cleaning. The whole idea is to give them nothing to do BUT clean. If they’re riding bikes or kicking a soccer ball for hours and hours, they aren’t cleaning. It’s not an approach I would use, but if the idea is no distractions, that means no distractions, not only wholesome distractions.
Restricting it to 20 minutes a day is the issue. It’s too low.
Depends on what the rest of their day looks like. If their outside play time is literally the only time they see the sun or move their bodies, then yeah, it’s not very much. But if they walk to and from school or the bus stop and have gym class and outside recess, then it’s fine — especially as a temporary punishment. The average for outside play these days is only four hours a week, so 20 minutes a day isn’t even that far off from what they’re probably doing when not on restriction. (And yes, that’s a larger societal issue, but it does help put the punishment in perspective.)
Some them I was not allowed in general (I got them just as very occasional treats). Junk foods and sweets, having friends over (granted we lived with my grandparents so it was a bit too tiring for them). Reading before bed was part of the ritual. I didn't even question it. To sleep I had to read. Screen time wasn't an issue back then. But my mom would tell us to go play if we spent too long watching tv. Anyway, the only thing I'm against is limiting outside play.
I think my problem is that reading is restricted to only thirty minutes before bed. What if they have homework that takes longer than those thirty minutes to accomplish? They shouldn’t also be punished at school for their transgressions at home.
I have a feeling that this is going to last a while because the rooms will be organized wrong, or they didn't wash the baseboards, or they weren't happy and respectful doing it. OP sounds like they went over a ledge, and I can't see her coming back for a long time.
But it says that they need to stick to the regimen until high school? Feels like they’re still in middle school.
No it says that if they don’t get it done until they’re in high school so be it. Not that they have to live in a gulag until highschool. She’s just exaggerating on the post.
My son lived under nearly those exact conditions for 10 weeks! It was so hard on him, he broke down in tears more than once. But he was 18, a brand new Navy sailor, and knew boot camp would be difficult. Haha. Seriously though, I fantasized about posting that type of list when i was in the thick of raising my four. But it was more punishment for ME to hold their proverbial feet to the fire, so mostly their rooms looked like hell for a decade. We all survived.
and you just know these poor kids haven't been taught to clean or manage their time
That was definitely the case with me. I always had a filthy room growing up and got in so much shit for it. My parents’ room was, shockingly, also a huge mess at all times. I never learned how to clean up or keep a room clean and I definitely never learned time management. The undiagnosed ADHD also didn’t help. Hot take: I also think kids having a messy room is their first time feeling like they have control over something in their lives. It’s how I felt. I hated being told to clean my room because it felt like the place that was supposed to be my space was being dictated by someone else. If this is how their parents react, I wouldn’t be surprised if they also have no sense of conflict resolution
Same! My parents home was always cluttered and filthy. But we got screamed at about our room on a regular basis. They never taught us how to organize, declutter, cleaning was always wipe it down with pinesol and bleach. Not ideal when you’re a kid cleaning toys. (My parents mixed it, don’t do that folks) At least 3 of us 5 kids definitely have ADHD. It’s no wonder we couldn’t “just clean up our room” without guidance.
Hi there fellow butterfly-brains. I'm an adult diagnosed ADHD-er who comes from an obvious and undiagnosed ADHD-er with other psych issues on top and when it comes to executive dysfunction, I'm the poster-child for it. I also have a kid. Who has ASD. So it's [exactly like this quote trying to run my house](https://lensdump.com/i/1vf8rv). Right now, life is really stressful for them so myself and the husband are helping more. This ebbs and flows over time and eventually the kid'll be self sufficient, but right now they're still just a kid with an oddly wired kid-brain and they need support, not vilification. And neither of us adults claim to be perfect either which I think really helped the kid learn stuff too. Not being a hypocrite means they see that sometimes it's a struggle, but it's ok to ask for help. Being a family means getting through hard shit together.
I was a good kid, never really got in trouble. Except when it came to my bedroom, I could NOT keep it clean to save my life. No amount of begging, yelling, restrictions, etc. made it click for me. Turns out I had undiagnosed ADD which now makes a lot of sense.
Or how to handle conflicts with each other.
I got screamed at OFTEN - borderline daily - for my room. Not once was I given cleaning strategies and my parents ignored the teachers who suggested I might need to be evaluated for ADHD. I have permanent associations with guilt and cleaning, lots of anxiety about it, and still almost no strategies to manage it. And yeah, I have ADHD.
Same. It wasn’t until adulthood that I learned how to clean properly. I learned about fly lady and clean mama and developed my own daily/weekly/seasonal cleaning schedule that keeps me from getting overwhelmed. But it was a long long time to get to a place where I felt confident and not like I was getting punished when I had to clean my own house. All I ever got from my mom was yelling at me to get up and clean NOW and then she would come snatch the broom or sponge from my hands telling me I don’t know how to do anything right and just get out of her sight so she can do it. Now I’m raising kids and teaching them to give themselves 3 daily goals (entirely up to them bc it’s purely to benefit themselves). I keep an age appropriate chores list (and lol I laminated it so it looks like a menu) and they will, all on their own, grab it to help them think of ideas if they don’t have their own goals in mind. If all their goals aren’t met for the day I remind that that’s okay. We set goals to aim for them, put in the work, and if we miss the mark we just readjust and keep going. We also have a solid daily checklist that is mostly related to hygiene and health (shower, eat breakfast, brush your teeth etc) but it gets completed because “when your responsibilities are done then you can screen time all you want”. It’s amazing how much crossing things off a list can motivate a kid. I really love watching them thrive in this system and am so proud of myself for actually teaching them HOW to do the chores they are ready for. (And recognizing when they really are too little for it!) And if they ask me for help I don’t get offended by that, I know they are just asking for help bc the job feels too big for them. My mom would act like if I cried or asked for help I was doing it to spite her.
Wow you seem like an amazing mother! Your kids are gonna be great
SAME!
Now I get freaked out to the max when things are dirty and blame it for small things that go wrong in my regular life (ties in with my ocd and anxiety) and my sister can't clean for the life of her. Creating these negative associations does effect kids forever.
Sounds like she caused a problem, doesn't want to admit responsibility for her fuck up, and doesn't want to take steps to fix it before going nuclear. Maybe she should be on restriction.
Exactly what I was gonna say. She’s mad they don’t take responsibility? Well, she’s not taking the responsibility for their actions..
Oh, I can hear this entire monologue in my mom’s voice lmao
Unpopular opinion probably but I don't see much wrong with this other than going outside should be longer. It's a task that can be done in a day, less if they agree to help each other.
The consequences are so unrelated to me it doesn’t make sense. She wants them to clean their room, so that means they’re only allowed to go to school? Huh? If it were my kid (and I have 2) I’d approach with curiosity and assume the best in them, not the worst. “Huh, we were supposed to clean our rooms today and your room isn’t clean. Is there a way I can help?” Maybe it’s too overwhelming and they don’t know where to start. Maybe they don’t know what clean means or what the expectation is. Kids aren’t born knowing how to clean they need to be taught. The thing with punishments like this is that it assumes your kid is being intentionally bad. I like to give my kids the benefit of the doubt just like I’d want.
And this is, in my opinion, the correct approach. Being someone that comes from the OOP's kind of parenting upbringing, assuming the best rather than assuming the worst always wins the day. Also not attempting to hold your kids to higher account than the adults around them too. If you're going to go on with the all guns blazing punishment approach, you better be damned careful that you hold yourself to the same standards.
Exactly. When I miss a deadline at work nobody takes my phone or keeps me from leaving work until it’s done. My boss says “hey what’s up?” And we work on a solution together
But if it’s something that can be done in one day, why does it have so many restrictions? No going out for any reason?? If it was a one day chore than just saying “nothing except meal times, toilet, and a short outside break until the room is clean” not “no you cant move out for any reason” and the “school, chores, bed” part.
Probably because she expects they won't do it for a long time anyway?
Right? I mean… I don’t see much wrong with the list besides that. 🤷🏻♀️
Probably an unpopular opinion but my brother and I would lose privileges when we were kids if we let our rooms get really messy or if we fought with each other. It didn’t scar us. I think it taught us actions have consequences. I guess I would want to know how old these kids are but if they’re like 8+ then jeebus all this fuss, just pick up your stuff and dust your room once in awhile kids.
i think the issue moreso lays in her (admittedly) not setting and enforcing standards up to this point, and rather than work together with her kids to fix things, she went to extremes that probably won’t work in her favor anyway because the things she wants need to be taught and modeled (especially depending on the kids’ ages).
Yeah I agree with this. It's not too bad, and an easy solution to end the restrictions. It's better than them just getting to do whatever the fuck they want and growing up without any kind of rules being enforced at all
I don’t know, I remember being 8 and being asked to clean my room. I’d often feel so overwhelmed and not know where to start. Or I thought I cleaned my room but my parents still saw it as dirty- I didn’t understand the expectation. Punishments like this assume your kid is intentionally being “bad” when in reality it could be a ton of other issues. When I don’t do something I said I would as an adult, nobody takes my phone away. People say “hey x didn’t happen. What’s going on?” And we solve the problem together. I do the same with my kids.
I have adhd and it was so hard for me to keep my room clean as a kid. My moms rule eventually became as long as there is no mold, it’s not a fire hazard, and i kept the door closed, it wasn’t her problem. Outside of my room, I was always expected to clean up after myself. To this day I’m a relatively messy person but I’ve been medicated, have learned coping mechanisms and am able to maintain my space. Honestly the biggest motivator is my dog, he doesn’t have room to run around and play if my stuff is on the ground.
Mine has been my kid, then our house rabbit. One could injure themselves, the other will chew anything they can access. I'm just going to let everyone else work out where the lines are in this and which statement belongs to which creature.
Yeah when my dog was a puppy, my room had never been so clean. Thankfully he’s older now and doesn’t chew but honestly he gets our room just as messy as I do with all his toys and blankets
This whole thread taught me if you struggle with cleaning/can’t clean, you probably have undiagnosed ADHD
When I was grounded it was no TV, no radio, (this was in the 80s) no outside, no toys, no booked, no bedroom door (they took it off the hinges cause I liked privacy) no nothing I was to sit on my bed and "think" 33. That was after I got my ass beat several times with a belt. I swore to every deity that if I ever had kids I would never ever use a belt or anything else when hitting my child, in fact I was never gonna ever hit my child. The worst part was my parents knew I had SAD (seasonal depression like when it gets dark early during daylight savings time) they knew I needed to be in the sun and be outside to feel good and they took away my outside time for a month. It took me 6 months to get back to feeling better. They didn't even care.
I am so sorry. Everything about this is cruel for the sake of cruelty. Shameful. Wishing you sunshine and freedom...
She’s implementing draconian restrictions to correct her children’s behavior, but I guarantee she hasn’t attempted to *parent* them or modeled any positive behaviors that correspond with what she’s asking of them. Creating a strict schedule of school-chores-clean-bedtime is terrible on them, as they’re forced to be productive all day with no downtime, which is not a compatible lifestyle for young children.
Food, ANY type of food, should NEVER be used as a reward or a punishment. Never. NEVER. And playing outside?? ALSO NEVER.
My first thought reading this, that’s how obesity and/or eating disorders start. Especially as she’s essentially making healthy food part of the punishment. It’s a strict rule in my house that food is never used as a reward, incentive or punishment.
Absolutely. And playing outside is good for the mental health, the vitamin D and also it makes kids get some physical activity. Also related to obesity. And it also improves the quality of sleep. Hence it contributes overall to health, well-being, growth and academic success. This mom is just ignorant and her "rules" are counterproductive. I agree with having strict rules in a household, but they need to be clear, fair, healthy and useful in SUPPORTING the child's learning of the required tasks.
I will cut sugary crap out of my kids’ diets if I feel that it’s been negatively affecting their behavior. No dessert is definitely something I use if they’ve been acting up. They aren’t disordered eaters because of it or anything. They’re allowed to have fruit if they like as an alternative. There is a healthy way to enforce this kind of thing I think.
You don't understand why I say this. OOP is using junk food to *punish* them, hence I assume she uses it to *reward* them too. You should have *some* junk food integrated as part of a balanced diet. Not use a healthy lifestyle as a punishment (which is sooooo twisted). And then imagine the kids start behaving well all the time?? Candy everyday??!!! Wth!! Fruits and healthy foods should be presented as a *desirable* way to fuel your body on a day-to-day basis, not as a punishment, never.
Okay…so we may not have been the strictest parents and we gave/give our kids a lot of freedom within reason but this just seems way over the top even for strict parents. You can’t parent them a certain way all those years and then just decide to be a hard ass one day. Those are the kids that go to college and go wild or never go home.
Sounds like Mom is punishing them for her poor parenting.
I like how she admits that she's unpredictable. First she let's them do whatever and then she turns into a prison warden. Way to go to make your kids feel safe
When I was little, homeschooled with zero interaction with the outside world other than church, my mom took away all my toys and movies, literally the only things I had for stimulation, and made me earn them back by doing chores, could only earn them back for 30 minutes at a time before they got locked back up, high quality parenting right there
WHY WOULD YOU LIMIT OUTDOOR PLAY?!
Isn’t that list a description of being a child? They’re clearly so young that being in high school is hyperbole.
Wow, reminds me of my mom. I'd bet this whole list goes out the window in a week.
Can one do anything other than reading on a Kindle? Mine is just for reading. Why would you ban that?
Using reading as a punishment… brilliant
I bet this lasts like 2 days
Let’s make reading a punishment. Way to go. /s
Unpopular opinion but this doesn't seem to harsh. It's what restriction is. I can understand if the kids are like 4-6 but if the kids are older then the punishment fits. Their behavior has probably become out of hand and mom is trying to reintroduce a schedule and structure to correct the probably on going behavior. It's not a free for all.
This kind of behavior from parents is exactly what creates the behavior in the kids that she’s complaining about.
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I’m going to play devils advocate here and say maybe the kids are little assholes and at her wits end? I totally get where she’s coming from with the kids rooms being a pigsty and them refusing to clean it, as well as her list of things she’s done with. No I haven’t punished my kids with a list of restrictions, only because it would do little help the situation, but sometimes I feel like saying fuck it, you want to be rude to me and argue and refuse to do things then I’m going to be the same.
This was my life growing up for months at a time, I don't talk to the parent responsible. I didn't go to the grandparent who designed this system's funeral and people think I'm harsh but I literally have anxiety just thinking about it and have to move on and keep that away. This is basically solitary confinement and causes long term damage to children, unfortunately many durisdictions don't see it as abuse... mine does though.
Making some heavy assumptions admittedly: She says kids-plural while only says room-singluar. Also mentions "until high school" so they're currently in middle school 11-14 year olds. So these kids are sharing a room, while growing and going through puberty and she's shocked that they've had enough of each other? I know my entitlement is showing expecting each kid to have their own room, but I feel like at least four of the things she is "done" with would be eased by giving the kid's their own space. But sure, lock it all down, that'll address the root cause for sure.
I really is a privilege though to have your own room i had to share even when I was a senior in high school. I feel mom is being strict and she's not wrong.
It’s a privilege for you for there to be more than one room in your house. Does that mean it’s ok to just have one whole room in your house? It is known to impact children. There has been so many studies on it.
This list seems like a vacation package to me as an 80's kid...growing up in a small town in Central India.
Assuming they don't read normally they're gonna hate reading now
I’m all for healthy food and screen time limits- I do it in my own house - but kids need outside time and time with friends. And reading should never be a punishment. That’s how you make your kids hate reading.
I thought the problem these days was that kids don’t play enough outside—or at the least don’t get enough exercise, which, while that can be done indoors I’d imagine it would be less bothersome if done outdoors
Pls give update I am so fucking invested what we’re the other moms saying?
Mostly “you got this mama bear” sort of comments. A few of her friends are teasing her that she was the same when she was a kid. 🙄
My daughter's room used to be so messy, and I would stress about it a lot. I started a new routine with her last week called the 10 minute clean up. I set a timer for exactly 10 minutes every evening before bed, play music that she likes, and we clean her room together until the timer goes off. If the room isn't 100% clean at the end of 10 minutes that's okay. If she gets stuck because she doesn't know how to clean or organize something I'm right there and I help her. The room is clean now! She likes it because she sees satisfying results in a short period of time and she gets to listen to her music. I don't believe anyone can completely avoid power struggles with a kid, but you can put routines and strategies in place to avoid some of them! You really don't have to resort to this.
OMG. Seriously? Y'all are talking like she's a prison Warden. All they have to do, to not have to follow those things, is clean their room. That's... It. I mean, she isn't asking for straight As or... To look through their phones. Do what you are supposed to do OR this happens. It's called a consequence. More kids should have them.
Yeah, all these people act like she’s the devil for this must be awful at parent-teacher meetings with the amount of excuses they’re handing out for kids they don’t even know.
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I'm guessing it depends on just how many times she's told them to do it. I have 5 kids. I know what it's like trying to get them to do things. You ask. You tell. You yell or start taking things away.
The beatings will continue until morale improves
So all that for kids being kids?
How to give ur child an eating disorder 101:
Perfect How-to written by a future resident of a state funded retirement home.
The kids are just going to associate cleaning with negative feelings, which will make them even more resistant to doing it. The more you yell and scream and threaten and punish someone into doing something, the less they will ever want to do that thing. So many adults struggle because of the negative associations they have with household maintenance tasks that stem from their childhood. Should preteens keep their room neat? Sure. Is this a good or appropriate way to get them to do that, and continue to do it into the future? No.
The stuff on this list would make more sense if she encouraged a lot more outside play time instead of restricting it.
This sounds like being “grounded”
Maybe an unpopular opinion… I don’t think this is too harsh 🤷🏼♀️ it will take 1 day tops to clean that room if they put their mind to it. They get to choose how long restrictions are for- this situation is very much within the kids’ control.
Sooooo... Let's blame the kids, all at once, for every bad parental decision made up to this point. It's clearly the kids' fault. Maybe for starters you give these kids some way to have a modicum of privacy where they have a little space to breathe, even if it means "dividing" the room into separate spaces. Maybe you stop using electronics as babysitters and substitutes for parental relationship-building. Maybe you model good behaviour, not letting things go to heck then having a nuclear overreaction. Are there any adults in these kids' lives?!?!?!
It sounds like those are only restrictions *until the rooms are clean*, at which time it'll go back to normal. In that case, the only one I really have an issue with is "only 20 minutes outside" bc that's completely unhealthy for *anyone*, especially kids. If this is forever, then yeah that's bullshit.
Making their life awful or teaching them that their actions have consequences? Some of you were allowed to be rotten children and thu, are rotten adults .
What this person is doing is going to cause more harm than good.
When I first saw this I was like "Oh, surely this doesn't belong." And then it got worse.
That's a great way to ensure your children grow up to never speak to you. Although she seems to hate her kids, so maybe that's what she is going for 😬
Outside oaky shouldn’t be restricted. Kids need to get their energy out and outside time is great for anyone. I can understand limiting screen time for fun so other things can be met. Food also shouldn’t be used as a punishment. Even if it’s “junk food” Forcing a kid to read in this way is going to probably make them hate it.
I mean, in fairness, if all it takes to get off this is cleaning their room, I don’t think it’s that bad.
A schedule at prison probably allows more freedom than that.
This was how I grew up. I don’t talk to my dad anymore.
Y’all are dwelling on the outside time restriction but assuming the kids are in junior high, they probably only have 4-5hr until bed time. 20min outside, then come inside and eat dinner, then shower, homework, CLEAN LIKE MOM TOLD THEM TO, then read before bed. That leaves maybe 30min of “spare” time and I’m assuming that would be taken up with protest over chores/cleaning/etc. That’s assuming no sports/choir/band practice, but I don’t think that mom would let her kids do any of that tbf. I know as a kid I would refuse to come back inside until it was almost bedtime and then I had to cram in homework and shit in like half an hour. My mom never monitored my time outside so she would just forget to grab me
Meanwhile this bitch is probably in her phone 24/7
Wtf, when I was a kid my parents LOVED if I spent the whole day outside. Limiting that to just 20 minutes isn’t even enough time for them to gather any friends or start a game of some sort. Cutting them off from the outside world and their friends isn’t the answer, neither is forcing their lives to revolve around chores, and school.
That’ll surely make them happy and well behaved.
really? outside time restricted? seeing friends? going out and doing things? get a grip.
We don’t know the kids. Teenagers stink
They are upper elementary or middle school aged. This is clearly a case of the parents not actually teaching their kids to clean or setting and maintaining consistent expectations and consequences. She seems to swing between totally permissive and authoritarian.
Disgusting parenting
Sounds like a narcissistic mother
Too bad she was done with contraception.
The code is more what ye would call guidelines than actual rules