I confess, I was never always against the idea of corporal punishment.  At one stage, I even believed that if you “spare the rod”, you “spoil the child”.  My only defense lies in the fact that I believed it back in days before I became a parent.  I used to think that juvenile deliquents existed because their parents failed to discipline (read: smack, because back then discipline to me meant smacking, spanking, hitting or whatever name it goes by under the umbrella term of corporal punishment) them adequately when they were younger, and that was why I was all for corporal punishment. 

And then I became a mother.

And the maternal instincts kicked in.

Okay, okay, perhaps it started a little before that.  I was pregnant and the dog was misbehaving and while I was threatening to smack him for being “bad” that was about as far as I could go.  I couldn’t bring myself to inflict harm upon him.

Even as I look at my son, I don’t think I could lay a hand upon him and justify it under the term of “discipline”.

I decided “to each his own”.  Corporal punishment may be the way for some parents but it wasn’t going to be for me.

That was when I started reading to educate myself on what other options existed besides corporal punishment.  How else could I raise a well-behaved, confident and socially well-adjusted child?

Reading led to the discovery of the mounting evidence against corporal punishment and the ill-effects of corporal punishment on the developing brain of a child.  I was alarmed.  If my decision not to discipline my son with corporal punishment was born from an instinct, my conviction for that decision had been cemented by the evidence.  Where I once told the hubby that he could discipline our son as he saw fit and I would do as I saw fit, I now felt compelled to convince him of the dangers of corporal punishment.

Why is corporal punishment so damanging to a child?

Because corporal punishment causes stress in a child that is no different to the stress a child experiences when being bullied or suffering from child abuse.  Brain scans show structural and biochemical changes that affect social behaviour. 

Cell death in the anterior cingulate gyrus affects a child’s ability to moderate fear and to empathise.  Changes in the brain’s pathways affect a child’s ability to manage stress and being more prone to being impulsive, agressive and/or anxious.  Long term changes to the adrenaline systems in the brain affect the ability to think clearly.  Impairment in the brain stem has been linked to ADHD, depression and impaired attention.  It also leads to more aggression and irritability.

Other changes to the brain have also been observed:

• decrease in size of the corpus callosum causing manic shifts in mood states
• reduced amygdala and hippocampus resulting in depression, irritability and hostility; and poor memory function
• affects the GABA system making a child feel unsafe and constantly living in a state of alarm

Violent methods of discipline also been linked to children with anti-social behaviour and increased prevalence of psychiatric disorders, while non-violent methods of discipline is linked to higher cognitive function.

A common argument for the corporal punishment camp is one that goes something along the lines of, “I was spanked as a child and I turned out okay.”

A couple of other arguments stem from this point as well.  Firstly, what is okay?  Could it be that if we weren’t smacked we might have more deeper and meaningful friendships?  Better relationships?  Lasting marriages?  Feel less depressed?  Perform better at work?  Have a better outlook and attitude towards life?

Secondly, children who have been hit by misguided well-intentioned parents are later able to reach a well adjusted adulthood, it is because of the love, nurturance and appropriate limit-setting not because of the physical violence they received.

Jordan Riak cites an excellent example that articulates the fallacy of this belief rather aptly (incidentally, each and every one of these examples apply to my own childhood, too):

Let’s test the I-turned-out-okay argument by examining a few real-life examples from my own childhood. See if they apply to you.

1. There were ashtrays in every room of our house. My parents smoked, as did most adult visitors to our home. The aroma of cigarette, cigar and pipe smoke was always present. Nobody minded. In fact, not one day passed in my early life when I was not exposed to tobacco smoke. I was even exposed in the womb because my mother smoked when she was pregnant with me. And I turned out okay. 
2. The first family car I remember was a 1937 Chevrolet sedan. It had no seat belts. When we traveled, I was merely plunked down on the back seat with the expectation that gravity would keep me there. It did. And I turned out okay. 
3. All the places in which I lived as a child were painted with lead-based paint. And I turned out okay. 
4. I used a bicycle throughout my childhood and teen years, but never wore any kind of protective headgear. And I turned out okay.

Was my family wise or just lucky? Today, we don’t do those things anymore. We don’t take such risks, and we don’t expose our children to such risks – not if we know the facts.

Quite possibly, one of the uncomfortable notions about bashing corporal punishment is that many of us (at least in the circle of people that I know) were smacked at some stage when we were children.  The idea that our parents did wrong against us can be a rather uncomfortable one to face.  I’m not bashing the way we were raised by our parents.  They did what they felt was right at the time because they lacked the awareness of the possible side effects.  All the examples listed above are other ways our parents did “wrong” against us but they were accepted practices in their day.

I could cite a few more…

When I was a kid, I was treated by dentists who never wore gloves.  Would you allow a dentist to put her hands into your mouth now without gloves?

As a child, I was weaned by my mother because that was the recommended practice of the day but I don’t blame my mother for it, nor do I complain that I am intellectually weaker than my peers who were lucky enough to be breastfed as a result.

The Efficacy of Corporal Punishment

One might argue that corporal punishment is effective in conveying the message across to a child that they did wrong and that nothing else works quite as well.  Longitudinal studies have shown that, in fact, the converse is true.  In fact, schools that had the highest rates of corporal punishment also had “the lowest graduation rates, the highest rates of teen pregnancy, the highest incarceration rates and the highest murder rates“.

From: The Influence of Corporal Punishment on Crime
By Adah Maurer, Ph.D. and James S. Wallerstein (1987)

You will find that adults who were hit as kids, while believing that it did them “no harm” can seldom articulate any way in which it helped them.  Let’s be honest, if you were smacked at a kid and you behaved after that, why did you behave?  Was it because you knew it was wrong?  Because you were afraid of getting smacked again?  Or because you didn’t want to disappoint your parents? 

Exactly what are the lessons learned from being hit?  Often it leads to bullying and the acceptance that it is okay to hit others.  What happened to the moral of the story?  Your child might behave in front of you but how will you know what goes on behind your back?  Discipline should be about raising morally-aware children with a social conscience, and not creating fear-inspired behaviours in a child that don’t last once the child is out of sight. 

There are Other Ways to Discipline

It also seems to me that a common misconception is that if I choose not to discipline my child by smacking him, I’m choosing not to discipline him at all (forgive me if I’m making a generalisation here as this is based on a comment made on a recent post I wrote about Choosing a Parenting Style).  Perhaps such thoughts are only limited to those near-sighted enough to believe that the only way to discipline a child is through violence.

There are other ways to discipline a child.  They are generally more time consuming and they also require more effort.  Let’s face it - it’s definitely a lot easier to just yell at your child or smack him for misbehaving.  It doesn’t require much thought and I’m sure the action alone will help you let off some steam from the anger buttons your child has just pushed.

This is a long and lengthy topic, but if you’re convinced that non-violent discipline is the way to go, then might I recommend these resources:

• AskDrSears
• The Discipline Book
• The Successful Child
• The Science of Parenting

Or at the very least read the evidence or dig deeper yourself:

• Plain Talk About Spanking
• Spanking by Parents and Subsequent Antisocial Behavior of Children
• CORPORAL PUNISHMENT BY MOTHERS AND COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT OF CHILDREN: A LONGITUDINAL STUDY
• Slapping and spanking in childhood and its association with lifetime prevalence of psychiatric disorders
• The Influence of Corporal Punishment on Crime
• The Science of Parenting

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When the hubby first suggested we move in with his parents, I admit I had great reservations.  Firstly, let’s set the record straight - I would have had great reservations moving back in with MY parents had it been my parents in question.

Knowing how capable my MIL is and how determined I was to raise Gavin my way, I was sure I was going to end up bumbling along and feel like a complete idiot in my MIL’s eyes.  Then again, after reading Harvey Karp’s recommendation that more parents break away from the nuclear family style of living and expose their children to the extended family on a regular basis, I thought perhaps moving in with my in laws would not be such a bad thing (especially since my parents are living on another continent). 

There was a reason for Karp’s recommendation, but I won’t go into it in detail in this post.  The gist of it was that nuclear family-living tended to be quite tough on the parents who didn’t have a chance to take a break from parenting.  While extended family living meant that more people should share the responsibility of looking after the children, giving Mum and Dad a chance to take a break and get a little “me” time.

To be fair, it hasn’t been as bad as I had envisaged.  For instance, it is always nice to be able to “drop the kids off at the pool” (read: take a dump, do the no. 2, defecate) in peace without your toddler grabbing onto your knees and wailing because you can’t carry him while you’re on the toilet.  The times when I’ve had to do the latter put a significant amount of strain and pressure on a sphincter that has already been traumatised quite extensively during the episode of childbirth.

Then of course, there are the times when my MIL helps to mind Gavin when I’m having breakfast or when I’m sick and need to rest, or even lately, when I need an hour off to exercise.  These are the times when I’m really grateful to have someone trustworthy to watch over Gavin so that I have peace of mind when I have other things to do.

That said, there are also times when it has been quite trying.  For instance, when Gavin shows a distinct lack of interest in food, it is a cause for alarm for his grandparents.  Let’s face it - in any Chinese family, there’s no such thing as not being interested in eating.  To a Chinese family, food is love, so I guess you could say that a rejection of food is like a rejection of love. 

At other times, there is the unwitting attempts to help which have made things more difficult.  For instance, recently, I was trying to take Gavin to Kizsports so he could have another play at Playland.  At the same time, my MIL was leaving the house to go to the factory.  Because my car was behind hers, she had to wait for me to leave before she could go out. 

Patience isn’t exactly a virtue of my MIL’s so when Gavin decided he was going to be difficult about getting into the carseat, she decided to “help” by suggesting he sit in her car while we reverse the cars.

In case you haven’t spotted the problem with that, let me paint a clearer picture to illustrate:

Gavin sits in grandma’s car without having to sit in a carseat or wear a seatbelt (albeit for the whole of a minute or however long it takes to reverse the cars), and then he has to get back into Mummy’s car where he has to sit in that nasty carseat and put on that restraining belt. 

Now here’s my question:

How likely is it that he is going to cooperate and sit in Mummy’s car?

Yep, you guessed it - not likely at all.

Suffice to say we didn’t go out that day.

Then there was the time (which was honestly not my MIL’s fault as she was really trying to be helpful) when she put Gavin into the car and buckled him in without telling me.  There I was lounging over the newspapers and enjoying my cup of Milo thinking my MIL had taken Gavin for a walk in the garden.

Okay, let me explain again.  When Gavin gets into the carseat, there is a timer that goes off and starts counting down.  If you don’t get into the car and start driving before the timer runs out, Gavin will start going ballistic.  When I realised that Gavin was in the carseat, I had to rush like mad to get going.  It didn’t help that there were two cars behind me that needed to be moved before we could get out. 

In my haste to get out, I also rolled over the chickens’ house because the maid (for reasons unknown to any of us) decided to leave it behind the wheel of my car.  You can imagine my alarm and shock when I ran out of the car to see the box smashed to smithereens and no chickens in sight!  Thankfully the chickens weren’t in the box but that was one very eventful morning!

Living with the extended family obviously has its pros and cons.  While it does have its benefits, I do know it isn’t for everyone.  If do you decide to try it, here is my advice:

Expect to get lots of advice on how things should be done.  Listen with a selective ear and put to practice the advice that makes sense to you.  As for the rest, you can conveniently “forget” about them.  Occasionally, try to humour the grandparents with things that won’t compromise your parenting philosophies.

Disclaimer: I do realise that living with the extended family is different for everyone.  For some it certainly isn’t as easy as I’ve made it sound.  While for others, it can be a breeze.  So take this advice on a case by case basis.

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When you’re a parent, one of the things you quickly learn is how to be creative.  For instance, when Gavin decided he much preferred to stay in the bath long after he was done bathing rather than to get dressed, I decided to make his changing station more interesting by sticking up pictures from his VCDs onto the walls:

It worked a treat because he stopped fussing the moment he saw the pictures.  In fact, it worked so well that he seems to want to bypass the bathing part and get right to the changing part.  Last night, he went into the shower, dumped a few scoops of water over the lower half of his body (because it’s too heavy for him to lift any higher), came back out and pointed to his changing station.  He garbled a few words in toddler language that must have meant, “Okay, I’m done, let’s get dressed.”

He was so cooperative to get out of the shower that it seemed almost cruel to drag him back in for a proper bath.  This is what happens when your creativity works too well.  Sigh…

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When my friend C sent me a second congratulatory note about Gavin winning another Parenthood magazine competition, I thought she was referring to him winning the June edition “Candid Camera” competition sponsored by Pigeon.  Little did I realise that he had won the July edition “Mini Me” Contest sponsored by Sweet Cherry.

To think that when I first submitted Gavin’s photos I was dreadfully disappointed that he didn’t win anything.  What a surprise it was to discover that he won not one but two prizes! 

Here’s the winning shot:

My caption: “My friends and family members said that I’m a “chunk” off the old block, but I reckon I have Mummy’s eyes!”

Now it will really make my day if he can win a place in the Johnson and Johnson’s Baby of the Year Competition…

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For all the difficult times we go through with our toddlers, inevitably, there will be some good days that make us feel proud to be the parent of our child.  During such instances, I think it is a parent’s duty to stop and celebrate our child’s achievements so we don’t lose sight of the good things in our children when the trying times threaten to overwhelm us.

Yesterday, I took Gavin out to meet a friend of mine who is back from Russia for her Summer holidays.  We arrived early at 1Utama, so Gavin and I went browsing through the stores.  Fairly early on, Gavin spotted Starbucks and started pointing to indicate he wanted a hot chocolate.  I obliged and when I was getting the straw, he wanted one. 

After giving him the straw, I prompted him with, “What must you say?”

He immediately signed, “Thank you.”

Previously, whenever I wanted him to sign, “Please” or “Thank you” I would have to ask him to sign the words.  This was the first time he signed without being asked directly to sign the word.

I told him we were going to have lunch with my friend, V, and though he initially balked at the highchair, he later volunteered to sit in it on his own when V arrived.  During our entire lunch, Gavin sat patiently in his chair, feeding himself and entertaining himself.  He didn’t fuss and he didn’t interrupt our conversation.  It wasn’t until I finished eating that he wanted to get out of the chair to walk, to which he said, “Walk walk,” although it sounded more like “wok wok”.  He later signed “walk” as we were walking to the bathroom.

I was also pleased with his display of manners towards V.  When she was holding his water bottle, he signed, “please”.  V asked me what he was doing and I told her he was saying, “Please can I have my bottle back?” After she handed the bottle back to him, he signed, “Thank you.”  He did it all on his own without me having to prompt him.

As usual, he caught the attention of the waitresses who all remembered him from the days when my parents and I used to have lunch there.  And as usual, he was his charming self - smiling, waving, shaking hands, giving high 5s and blowing kisses.

I couldn’t have been prouder of how admirably he behaved.

Above: V, Gavin and me.

Above: Gavin, V’s friend and V.

Above: V and Gavin.

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Since becoming a parent, I have discovered two very important lessons:

1. What goes around comes around.

2. Never say “never”.

It was the hubby that learned the first lesson the hard way.  Before Gavin was born, he used to criticise children who screamed in restaurants.  He even made himself a promise that no child of his would scream in a restaurant.

Now, he is the abashed father of a little screamer.

As for the second lesson…  I feel I know it all too well.  I was never going to let my child watch TV before the age of two.  I was never going to give my child sweets and treats before the age of two.  I was never going to bribe my child into good behaviour.  Ah… the list could fill a whole page, but I think you get the picture.

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When your baby or toddler gets hurt, especially with your first child, there’s often a lot of finger pointing regarding who is to blame.  Most often, it is the person who was supposed to be keeping an eye on the baby who is the one that cops the blame.  Heated accusations are often heard above the baby’s loud wails, “Why weren’t you watching the baby?”

And that is the point of my post.

Sometimes, when baby gets hurt, it isn’t due to the negligence of the “watcher”.  Sometimes baby gets hurt even though the “watcher” was watching.

Even if the watcher had been momentarily distracted, pointing fingers and making everyone feel crummy isn’t going to help baby.

What is important is to make sure that baby is okay and does not require medical attention.  After that has been ascertained, giving baby the due attention and comfort necessary to halt the tears is important for baby’s emotional well-being.  After all, if you got hurt, would you like it if everyone was too busy arguing about whose fault it was instead of paying any attention to you?  I didn’t think so.

Toddlers will be toddlers.  Bumps and scrapes are a natural part of their lives just as breathing is.  Bumps and scrapes are the results of the mistakes a toddler makes while on the journey toward mastery of certain tasks and actions.  They are an inevitable part of the process of learning.

For instance, today, Gavin learned how to feed himself liquids from a cup without my aid to help him control the angle of the cup.  Initially he over-tipped the cup and spilled water down his front.  In his subsequent attempts, he was able to self-feed without spilling.

Mistakes are a necessary part of learning.  Our job as parents is to make sure they aren’t dangerous mistakes and to be there to provide help and comfort in the wake of a mistake. 

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After failing to clinch the Johnson and Johnson Baby of the Year competition, I decided to enter Gavin into some smaller competitions.  Well, mothers have been known to be quite blind when it comes to the subject of how gorgeous and adorable their babies are, so I guess my eyes have also been affected by the motherhood syndrome.  Every mother thinks her baby is the most Beautiful baby she has ever seen and it would seem I am no different.

I used to think myself quite impartial.  When other people were busy “oohing” over how adorable a particular newborn baby was, I would be standing back wondering what on earth they were talking about because the baby in question looked anything but cute and adorable to me.  And then I had Gavin.  Need I say more?

My mother, on the other hand, is about as impartial as they come.  She certainly had no qualms telling me that I was an ugly baby, so I guess not all mothers are blinded by the motherhood syndrome…

But I digress…  Not willing to believe that my son was not “cute” enough to win a prize, I sent some of his photos into the Parenthood magazine competitions. 

When I didn’t hear back from them, I was certainly starting to wonder if my eyes were playing tricks on me.  How could this face be passed over?  
 

I was sure some of the pictures of the other babies that won weren’t half as cute as my son.  The hubby just told me not to be “sour grapes” and forget about it.  Which I did, until my friend C messaged me today to tell me she saw Gavin’s picture in Parenthood. 

Apparently they didn’t pass over his picture after all.  He won the Pigeon competition, although they didn’t list exactly what the prizes were - just Pigeon products.  Anyway, this is the winning photo:

After winning this competition, I’ve been inspired to enter Gavin’s photo into more competitions.  Look of the Year (http://www.lookoftheyear.com) is an online Beauty contest for ordinary people who aspire to become a Model.  Although I’m not sure if I want Gavin to become a model, I thought it might be fun to enter.  Then again, he might be too Young for this particular competition.  Perhaps in a few more years…

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It’s funny how having a kid can make you start thinking about a lot of things that never even crossed your mind previously.  Or perhaps they did, but you always thought you had plenty of time to work on stuff like that.  For instance I was never really into the whole financial planning, writing a will and setting up a trust fund until I had Gavin.  I was always more of a “let’s be happy today and worry about tomorrow when it comes” sort of a person.

I guess certain events that happened recently were also somewhat of a wake up call - at least, it certainly was for my parents.  You see, my aunt passed away from cancer of the colon.  It took us all by surprise because of how aggressive the cancer had been and how quickly her health deteriorated.  When we first knew about the cancer, I don’t think any of us (the family) doubted for a moment that she would be cured and go on to live for many more years.  I guess it was harder to accept especially because she was my favourite aunt who was like second mother to me.

I digress…  When you add the fact that I’m a stay-at-home mother whose current income-generating projects aren’t sufficient to cover myself and Gavin should anything happen to the breadwinner in our family, I guess this sort of news shocks you into action.  It makes you start thinking about wills and trust funds and a need to protect Gavin financially since he will be a dependent for at least another eighteen to twenty-one years (I don’t know about other parents, but I’ve always thought it was a parent’s duty to see their kids through to at least their first University degree).

While exploring my options, I found a private bank called Northern Trust that provides useful services such as Financial Planning, Trust and Estate Services, and Wealth Protection and Preservation, among others.  I was particularly interested in their trust and estate services, which I feel would be important in planning for Gavin’s future in the event that something were to happen to the hubby and me.  I found the website useful because they tell you about all the different sorts of trust arrangements you can plan for.  In fact, when you start digging into all of this, there really is a lot to think about.  Looks like the hubby and I had better get off our behinds and start getting the paperwork done…

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I started blogging in 2005 when I was about to get married and I wanted to share the details of my wedding preparations with family and I figured the easiest way to do that was through a blog.  I signed up for a free hosted blog which was as easy as signing up for an email account with google or yahoo.  Posting was as easy as writing an email and clicking the “send” button.  It was all rather straight forward.

When I discovered I was pregnant, I felt I started a new blog about my journey into motherhood.  It seemed only appropriate to do so since my first blog was all about getting married.  At the back of my mind, I have always wanted to host my own website but I was a little scared since I didn’t really know much about the technical aspects of running a website.  When I finally took the plunge and blundered my way through, I went to a site called “Go Daddy”, where I read you could buy really cheap domain names, and bought myself a new domain name. 

The process of acquiring a domain name was really simple.  The problem began after that.  I didn’t know what to do with my domain name.  I didn’t even know I had to look for someone to host my domain until after I bought my domain name.  If only I had found some web hosting tutorials like the ones available on Web Hosting Rating.  Even after I knew I needed a host, I didn’t know where to get one!  So I shelved the idea for a while and continued my hosting my blogs on Blogger until I took a course on blogging and discovered how to set up my self-hosted blog.

There are two main reasons why I think it’s great blogging about my progress through motherhood.  Firstly, I get a reference I can look over and reminisce how things were when I first had Gavin.  He grows far to rapidly and sometimes I feel as though I need only blink and another whole month has flown by.  Even when I look back at his old photos and videos, I find myself smiling and thinking how adorable he looks and marvelling at how quickly he’s growing up.  It won’t be long before I’ll be the parent of a rebellious teenager wondering what happened to that gorgeous little boy who used to melt my heart with his winsome little smile. From the stories I keep hearing from parents about their dreadful teenagers, I think I’m going to need to stock up on wonderful Gavin memories to keep me sane when he tests my limits.

The other reason why I blog about parenthood is because I find it helps me remember what I read about parenting and I can organise the information in my head more easily when I write.  My brain is like a storage room that starts to get messy and congested after throwing too much information in there.  Writing about the things I learn is like the process of spring cleaning and tidying up the information I keep in there.

Regardless of my reasons for blogging, I think it’s a great way for any parent to record the progress of their child - something they can return to in their later years, or something their child can read when he or she is older.  I think it helps our children understand us better and greater understanding leads to a stronger relationship.  And if you intend to keep your blog for that long, I think it is wise to host your own blog rather than relying on one of those free hosted blogs from Blogger or elsewhere.

If you’re like me and you don’t know the first thing about web hosting, you can check out the helpful articles at Web Hosting Rating.  That way you won’t waste time blundering around like I did.

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