Sisterly advice re-discipline
 

My husband has asked me to come to my "people" for advice. Our 2 year old is driving us up the wall. She doesn't take us seriously when we try to discipline her. Currently we are using the time-out method. When we tell her no, or tell her to stop doing it she will just laugh at us and keep doing it even more. When given a time out she will laugh at us and refuse to follow directions.

We are at our wits end and are open to hearing any suggestions.

liep

I don't have any advice but I am giggling at your hubby's suggestion to "talk to your people", lol:D :D

Pardon the non-sisterly advice, but I'm a big fan of the "strip her room of anything fun and make her time outs in there" method. You physically pick her up and put her in there instead of trying to explain to her why she's in time out. Cause she knows.

And if she can open doors put one of those plastic doorknob covers on there so she can't get out on her own. (My mom used them to keep us out of the linen closet with the cleaning supplies and medicine in it, I assume they're still around somewhere)

That way time-out means something and isn't just time where she a)gets to play in her room or b) gets attention... she's left alone and can't watch/interact with you until her time is up.

Yeah sorry for the crash-- but I agree with Drolefille. My "spot" was the bathroom and my best friend makes her kids put their nose to the fireplace. She is doing this because you let her--and because she gets attention. If she has to go away somewhere where she can't get attention, then I think you'll see her attitude change. She may only be two but they are SMART at that age.

It helps to use a timer also. The second she leaves her time out spot, you start the timer over. Make sure you are using a VERY firm voice. My son was similar at that age and a few times, it did take a swat on a diapered bottom to get him to realize that we were serious. I realize that some people think this is wrong, but it really got his attention more than anything. Kind of like hitting your hand with a rolled up newspaper to get the dog's attention when he/she is misbehaving.

I've always thought the swat on the bottom is effective at this age. So often kids just want the attention they get when they get in trouble. A swat makes them realize that hey, this isn't fun time with mommy, this is Time Out.

Give her plenty of positive attention, but don't let her get it by misbehaving. She'll learn that when she's good she gets hugs and smiles and fun and when she's bad she gets nothing. Operant conditioning really works :D

/psych geek

I have a 3 year old girl and a 2 year old boy, so I feel your pain. :)

We are slowly learning that you have to be absolutely consistent - whatever method of punishment you're using, if you let her out of it even just one time, you'll have to start from scratch again. (They are darn stubborn little buggers at that age. :mad: :D )

I'd also agree that making the time out area devoid of anything that could be remotely entertaining for her helps. (Some people send their kids to their room, where they still have all their toys, DVDs, etc.) When we put my daughter misbehaves, she has to sit on our loveseat (which is in a corner) - it drives her nuts to have to sit there and not have any toys or interaction with the rest of us. They can still be pretty stubborn, but for the most part manage to listen to us.

Thanks for those who have responded so far. We use the steps as our time out location so it is already void of "fun" stuff.

Hmmn...well, if time out isn't working for her, perhaps you should look into a different form of punishment? :confused: I'm a believer that there is no one universal form of punishment that works best - different kids are going to respond differently to any method. (Even siblings in the same household might need different types of punishment.)

Have you tried anything other than the timeout so far? (Its hard to decide, I know - there are only so many different things that might work with a 2 year old!)

Part of the reason I suggest the room is you say that she just laughs. Does she stay in time out on the steps or does she get up from there too? When she misbehaves how do you react?

She's a little young for the "bad behavior takes away privileges, good behavior gets it" I think, but you know her better than I do. For example, a ticket system of some sort where she loses them when bad but when she gets X she gets a treat.