mother help: why wont my kids listen to there mother - Help.com

because kids have a mind of their own and think they know better

yeah, very true. They always think they know better! Just think back to when you were there age. You were probably the same….oh, just saw your reply. I take it then that you are the father??? In my experience, the mother can tend to be the bad cop all the time and the father is the good cop, hence when the father actually reinforces something, the kids think ‘oh right, I better actually do this as Dad says so as well.’ Or they just need to be told a second time, and it is usually the case that the mum says it and they don’t listen and then dad says it and they do. Even just the fact that someone else says it as well as their mum makes them see that they should listen. In my experience anyway!

they are probably more terrified of you. No offense! I mean that in a good way. Like, god, when I was a kid, I was terrified of my dad. He was totally lovely, but boy if he got mad, he got mad. So I ALWAYS listened to him, but never to my mum. And as a last resort she’d threaten to tell my dad and then I’d listen. I just knew that when he said something, he actually meant business.

check out this tv show.

The kids have learned that you wife is a push over. She has not taken ownership of her parental authoritsy.

Watch Nanny 911 … they have pretty darn good suggetions and seem to be able to teach parents how to regain the respect and control over the children.

The sooner she regains control the better.

She is not a ‘bad’ mother. She loves her children and she is torn.

oh i hate it when i typo. sorry.

I am so confused! You wrote one post asking how to find out if your wife was cheating, then you wrote a post saying you wanted to leave her and you could afford to take the kids with you and not have her battling for custody, yet now you are worried about the fact that she feels like a bad mother????

Either way, I would say that you both need to present a united front more often, so that it is not that they obey mum, not you, or they obey you, not mum, but that they obey both of you together. And that they know that there is no picking and choosing who they listen to. They have to listen to both of you. And if they really did listen to you, all you’d have to do is say ‘listen to your mother’ and it would be sorted!!!

http://fep.abc.go.com/fep/player?src=…

super nany

No offense taken. But, they have good advice. I raised my children by myself from the time they were 1 and 3. The respected me and they are now responsible, healthy young adults.

Good luck with regaining control of your family. Obviously my advice is a joke.

If there mom is feeling down it upsets the kids and they act less respectfull.

but maybe they sense that you don’t? Obviously I don’t know you AT ALL and maybe this is totally untrue, but from teaching kids, I know how observant they are. Obviously you have some issues as seen from the previous two posts, and maybe they pick up on this and are siding with you? Or pick up on the fact that you don’t listen to her. I had one kid of age 4 telling me about how his mummy and daddy fought, and detailing what went on at home. Yet the parents had no clue the child knew. They can even hear stuff when you think they aren’t there. No joke

If you don’t seem to respect her they will take a cue from that too.

do you hit her?
do you act aggressively toward her?
maybe your children are frightened of you.
there is a difference between respect and fear.

there you go again. You are completely focused on you, and how you are behaving perfectly, and she is the one who isn’t. You say she doesn’t respect you. Whether she does or she doesn’t, I can GUARANTEE you have not respected her at some stage in the past. You are human for god’s sake. You can’t put all the blame on her. You just can’t. Even if you are convinced 99% of the blame is on her, there is always that 1%. Look, if you really are the perfect dad as you make out, and they ALWAYS listen to you as you say, then just talk to them, explain that their mum is a very special person, and she loves them and wants the best for them. She deserves to be respected from them and from you, and that you should all listen to her as she only wants the best from them. If what you say is true and they do listen to you, problem solved.

I know you never said it, but you seem to imply it. Either way, if they do listen to you, that solution will solve the whole problem and there you go!

Nope, I don’t have kids! I just work with them day in day out. I was making the point that you make out that they ALWAYS listen you and act perfect for you. that’s inhumanly possible, and if it was true, then all you would have to do is tell them what I said, and they would behave well all the time.

Either way, you should say that. You should let them know that you totally dissaprove of how they behave to their mother, and if they behave like that, you should make sure they know they are in your bad books. Don’t just tell them it’s wrong and go back to having a great time with them. Tell them it’s wrong and treat them as if they are being punished for a while. Set some ground rules at home and have a poster up which the whole family sat down and wrote TOGETHER and agreed upon. And have sanctions for what happens when the rules are broken (one being about listening). Have them suggest sanctions and what they think would be appropriate and incorporate their ideas. You;ll be surprised. Getting kids to come up with sanctions really works because you make them feel like you really respect their opinion and that you are taking them seriously.

ok fine. If you don’t appreciate my help, that’s grand. I know when I am not wanted. But just to let you know, it definitely is not the same. It means you have an inpartial, unbiased view which can be better to have in situations like this. Having studied child psychology for four years can also help. We are trained exactly how to handle particular situations without being clouded by love and bad judgement and personal opinions and past experiences. As a parent, you can find it hard to discipline children in the correct way. You can often never follow through on your punishments, or only do so half heartedly as they win you over in the end. Or else you don’t punish them correctly. A sanction should be something which makes them realise WHY what they did was wrong, so that they don’t do it again. It shouldn’t be something which makes them think ‘I can’t do this cus Dad said so.’ It should be ‘I can’t do this because _________’ and they should be able to have a good reason which they understand and agree with. I personally think all parents could benefit with studying child psychology. They think that being a parent makes them all knowing about stuff like this. And it isn’t. They are still human and they still makes mistakes. Anyone is capable of having kids. It doesn’t automatically make you parent of the year or extra knowledgeable.

And I am sure you are an incredible Father, I never ever meant to second guess that. All I meant was that you could actually do with following the example of some time tested theories

And I can proudly say I do know a lot about kids! I have spent long enough studying about them and teaching them and working with them and doing research projects on how they think and behave in certain situations!!!!!

I am with them in the real world every day. In fairness, people like you put your trust in me every day and constantly come talk to me to ask advice and to see how their little darlings are doing. You can tell me you don’t want my advice, fine. But you don’t need to disregard what I have spent my life trying to achieve, and one of the biggest things I am proud of to this date.

Have to agree with Cecilia..

Your previous posts are confusing.

Are you trying to justify getting custody by saying they do as you say and she’s unable to deal with them or something?