Battle of Wits - with Grandparents

United States
August 23, 2009 12:01pm CST
I responding to a discussion earlier, that reminded me of a situation I had, about rules and grandparents maintaining certain rules with your kids... I teach my son not to throw or kick balls in the house. For extremely obvious reasons! He knows the term "that's an outdoor toy" and we very seldom have issues with him in this area... Until he went to his gramma & papa's house. His papa and him began kicking a ball in the house. I began making comments like, "balls are for outside play" and "you know, you're not supposed to be playing ball in the house." These comments were made out loud and addressed to my son. But Papa just kept right on going, kicking the ball back to my son, and as a 4 year old, he would kick it back... Can you believe, at one point, Papa actually said, "Who's house is this anyways?" I mean, how completely asinine is that?? So I'm sitting there, torn between a reaction of "Well, he's MY son and the RULE is NO BALL IN THE HOUSE!" or "OH, OKAY, KNUCKLEHEAD. LET HIM WHIP THE BALL AND BREAK SOMETHING! What do I care? IT's YOUR SH*T!!" I ended up being saved by Gramma, who was there the whole time too when she finally said, "she's right, take it outside." I was completely floored... it was like he (papa)was ignoring the most basic, the most common, and the most innocent RULE because he wanted to make a point of showing me that he could make the decision himself. It was almost like he RESENTED the fact that I called him on doing something stupid and he was going to do it anyway because it was his house! I can laugh at it now, but I wanted to share it with you. We've managed to teach my son the meaning of "there's a time and a place" and I'm okay with letting certain things go when he's with his Gramma and Papa, but this was so stupid! Anyone ever had a battle like this? REAL but LAUGHABLE??
1 person likes this
3 responses
@mommaj (23112)
• United States
23 Aug 09
I think everyone goes through that with the grandparents. My biggest peeve was when my daughter was young and nanny kept breakables out not only where my daughter COULD reach them but purposely placed TOBE reached. I would get pissed. Oh, let her play with them was the grandparents reaction. It won't matter if she breaks them. My response was I didn't care if she broke them, I didn't want to take her to the hospital explaining how she got glass in herself. Needless to say they were put up when we came over.
• United States
26 Aug 09
Hi, thanks for the response... Yeah, I guess it's just one of those things we all have to grin and bear... I just wish it wasn't always such a battle... why can't they just see it as the simple thing that it is - a request... instead of feeling like they have to challenge you all the time??!!
@mommaj (23112)
• United States
26 Aug 09
If it's your parents, you are a child to them. If it's the in-laws then no one is good enough for their son or daughter and they need to be told how to do things. LOL
@Babymycah (166)
• Philippines
24 Aug 09
well grandparents will always be there to spoil our kids and its our duty to discipline our kids as it was our parents duty to discipline us. I do not agree with your approach. You are in your parents house and you should respect their rules. actually you embarassed your father in front of your son when you told off your son against playing ball inside in front of your father. you implied in your action that your father does not know these simple rule inside the house and I can understand why your father continued playing ball with your son. You should have told your father about your rule and how strongly you feel about it but not in front of your son. maybe you could even ask him to support you on that matter instead of raising negative feelings between you and your father. Try to understand your father's feelings. Grandpas and grandmas tend to be a bit sensitive about these things.
• United States
26 Aug 09
Hi, thanks for the response... See, if it wasn't such a dumb, petty, no-brainer thing, normally, I would speak to my FIL in private, but this particular example is more common sense than anything. In no way did I ever think something so small, something so rediculous, something so STUPID - would in any way, shape or form cause my FIL to CHALLENGE me on !!!! WHY would anyone WANT a 4 year old to kick a soccer ball in their home?? DO they want something to get broken? Do they want to replace a window?? In my mind, it's MY responsibility to teach my son the proper place and time to kick balls... so if I had NOT said anything, it would have been MY fault - as the parent - if something had been broken, not the 4 year old's fault for being a child. It's the parent's place to teach boundaries and everyone should respect those boundaries - even grandparents. I guess I will have to 'pick my battles' so to speak with the grandparents... but while I respect your opinion, I can say that if I'm going to be expected to NOT be a parent just because we are at thier home, then we will not be visiting them very often any more. Thanks again for the response.
@Hatley (163781)
• Garden Grove, California
24 Aug 09
hi raven mine was different in that I do not or rather did not'spank my son as I did not believe in it.but my own mom decided she' knew better than me and gave my son several hard whackson the' butt for letting her sneaky cat in.I did not appreciate this'at allas she knew I did not want her p;unishing my child.He was really' 'a wellbehAved kid and the cat thing was really all her fault as she never fed the poor cat until it wass ravenous. we finally 'decided she would not spank my child and I would not scold her,.