I spanked Cosette yesterday.
I'm not proud of it, and this is not a discipline technique that I use often. In fact, I never spank my girls. I've become good at walking away and counting to ten. But sometimes...
She was running with scissors. I tried telling her calmly to stop before she hurt herself. I tried telling her sternly. I tried yelling to her. I even gave her the "Cosette Emily..." She just kept laughing and running; she wanted me to chase her but that was the last thing I wanted to do. Finally, she ran right past me so I grabbed her, took away the scissors, and spanked her twice on her butt.
I didn't really plan to do it, but I did think about in that split second before I actually did it. It all happened so quickly. I needed her to understand the gravity of the situation. Since it was bedtime and she was in her pj's, she had a pull up on, and the extra padding cushioned the impact, so although it did get her attention, it wasn't painful. She stopped, cried alligator tears for a few seconds. I hugged her and explained calmly that she should never run with scissors, and she should listen to Mommy when mommy is trying to tell her something. Then she looked at me, and cried "Books! I want books!" and ran to her room to wait for me to read a bedtime story.
The worst part of this whole event was actually Juliette's reaction to it. She stood there cheering me on, saying "Yeah mommy, you go."
Is that a normal reaction? When did my four year old become so fascinated with violence? Recently, she picked up her toy golf club and held it out like a shotgun, exclaiming "Bang bang, I'm shooting you." That is definitely something she picked up from the kids at school- or from watching TV with Greg, who never changes the channel if Juliette comes in, no matter how inappropriate the show is. I told her that I don't like that kind of play, because people can really get hurt, and she did stop... for the time being. But she has done it since then.
I remember years and years ago watching a news show about children and guns. All these parents insisted that they had taught their children that guns were bad, that guns were dangerous, and that they should never touch guns; and the kids would repeat that mantra when asked. But within minutes of being left alone in a room full of toys, they would find the gun that had been planted there. Most of those kids picked it up and pretended to shoot it while their parents watched in horror from the other side of the one way glass.
So this violent streak of Juliette's may be normal, but it does make me watch my own behavior more closely. No temper tantrums of my own, no flashes of anger, no matter how tired or frustrated or angry I am. Which is why I am still wondering if I did the right thing by spanking Cosette. I don't know how else I could have handled it. Yes, maybe calmly grabbing the scissors away from her once I caught her might have worked; in hindsight I could have tried that, but at the time it seemed that we were past that point. It is any better because it wasn't done in anger, or uncontrollable rage?
Or does that make it worse?