Lori Alexander learning less than ever- Part 7

[molecule]

I just looked at Lori's mother and baby "flow chart" again to see if there are any other comments and realized that she previews it with a quotation from a woman...who has a PhD...and is a psychologist and author. Lori, if you're going to be telling women they don't need to go to college or have jobs, don't try to bully them with quotations from women who have done those things.

[happy atheist]

 Lori must have been jealous that Jill Rodrigues recently inspired a shit load of new post count titles, so she stepped up her craziness game.

 

High Priestess of the Flowchart Ministry

and

The Very Face of Braless Modesty

are our newest post count titles. Congrats, Lori! Ken must be so proud!

[quiversR4hunting]

8 hours ago, molecule said:

I would have taken them away and said, "We keep the raisins on the table. No more raisins today because you threw them on the floor." After a few days of this, and depending on the kids age, I would ask the kid if they remembered  where raisins belonged and what would happen if they were thrown on the floor. Or, if the kid just didn't seem to like raisins (one of mine didn't), I would serve something else as a snack.

@refugee to build on what @molecule said I have done something similar. My almost 4 year old is usually good in church but sometimes she plays "take a nose" game and when she starts being loud she is put down (she likes to be held so she can see) and we will pick her up when she is good and immediately put her back down when she is naughty again. We have been doing this since she was old enough to sit up on her own and now the punishment of putting her down is used infrequently. When she has gotten really loud in church, I take her out, we have a talk and she doesn't get a donut after church (but her sisters can) but then I take her back into church. I didn't want her to learn, I am naughty, I get to leave. (She has only had to watch her sisters eat a donut without her once.) The key consistency and persistence. It takes time to change behavior without violence.

[salsa]

Quote

 

Rather than focusing on "what works," how about we focus on developing a relationship with each particular kid?

[2xx1xy1JD]

13 hours ago, refugee said:

Here's an honest question, please don't jump on me. I raised my kids while mentored by people spouting this stuff. Though I didn't have the heart to apply their teachings to such an extreme, I do remember wondering what an alternative would be to spanking the defiant kid who throws down the raisins and refuses to pick them up.

I think my solution would have been something like a cheerful, "Okay, no more raisins today, then!" But I don't even know if that was the right thing to do. Because a two-year-old probably isn't going to connect throwing the raisins on the floor with not being able to have raisins until tomorrow. But if you just "break down" and pick up the raisins for the child, what then? What lesson are they learning? Aren't you teaching them that they can do whatever they want, and you'll just cover for them?

I knew a couple families with teens who terrorized their parents. Or maybe I should say I knew the parents. These were frightening situations. In retrospect, maybe untreated mental illness was involved.

My mom was a rage-aholic and the perfect martyr, rolled into one. I didn't want to follow her lead. These people offered structure and what looked like safety. You follow a formula and you won't ever spank a child in anger, or go overboard. (At least, following their formula, I didn't spank in anger. Sometimes after I'd calmed down and went to my waiting child, I didn't spank at all, just sat down and talked things over.)

They fill you with this fear that if you don't deal with disobedience, you'll raise spoiled, self-centered brats.

I wish I'd stumbled into a nest of gentle-parenting mentors instead of these Ezzos- and Pearls-guided vipers, early on.

 But honestly, how would you handle the raisin flinging situation, for example?

First, you need to understand a bit about the mind of a 2 yr old, and what makes them tick.  Each kid is unique, but there are some common features:

1.  They learn from routine and repetition.

2.  They respond to songs and videos.

3.  They experiment.

4.  They learn from consistency (see point 1)

5.  They are sensitive to parental reactions.

6.  They don't have a whole lot of emotional control.

So, what does that mean on a practical level?

You can start singing tidy up songs and having a tidy up routine as soon as they can toddle around and understand simple instructions.  That's what I saw daycares and nursery school do, and the kids all pitched in on cue to help clean up.

Kids experiment.  What happens if I drop raisins?  The answer would be "raisins are swiftly removed".  That ends the experiment and the fun.  If that is the consistent result, child learns to stop dropping raisins if they want to keep them.

Most kids crave attention.  If you give attention to picking up the raisin, like clapping and saying "wow, you found all the raisins!", kids are happy and will keep playing the pick everything up game.

If a kid is very deliberately dropping raisins and refusing to pick them up, what else is going on?  Is the child in a mood because they are in need of a nap?  If so, put them to bed ASAP.  Is something else wrong?  Try to figure it out, and try asking a child what they want.  (Girl 2 had a bit of a defiant streak at 2.  She was basically frustrated about being an intelligent human being in the body of a toddler, but it took a while to figure that out.  The surprisingly simple thing that work when discipline for defiance didn't was simply asking her to tell us what was wrong.  At 13, she's actually amazingly calm and disciplined and caring and awesome.)

 

[Sera's Arrow]

The major problem with Lori's style of parenting (among other things) is that she seems to see it as a battle of the wills and her will be done. Or else. You know what being a behavioral science tech turned ECE has taught me? Avoid these battles at all cost and physical discipline doesn't address the important bit of behavioral modification at all. See, the important thing about modifying behaviors is creating a behavior to replace the one that is "undesirable" with another that serves the same purpose that is "desirable". I don't see this at all in the 'hit 'em and they'll stop!' method, I see a behavior being taken away with pain and fear and any replacement to suit the same purpose is never taught. This does nothing but limit people as they continue to develop and evolve. 

When I get mouthy snerk in reply from a preschooler or just "nope, nope, nope", I narrow down the choices they currently have to two. The available options are: 1) please do what I'm asking you to do or 2) please let me help you do what I'm asking you to do. That leaves them able to choose. I -hate- the "YOU DON'T HAVE A CHOICE!" disciplining I've seen in the past. I'm of the philosophy that there should always be a choice. I like having choices, yeah? I think everyone does.

Toddlers? Eh. If the fun 'n' games sell isn't working, then the hand-over-hand style of modelling is appropriate for young children to learn (and I've used it for things like holding utensils (forks, paintbrushes, kiddy scissors) and drinking out of cups and things like that). "Let me show you how I do it."   

I also use music for clean-up time - sometimes I sing the tidy-up song, sometimes I resort to my favorite tune to use at work which gets a good reception from kids and co-workers, heh, it cheers up people - no matter the age. Besides, when the cleaning is done, it turns into a dance party and those are much more fun. 

[Koala]

From today's post:

Quote

Many young women are so messed up today. They have no mother to bond to when they are a baby since they are passed around while their mothers chase a career. Their mothers aren't around much to influence them as they are growing up so they are left to fend for themselves. They learn to be a woman by watching the culture instead of having a godly mother in their life teaching them the feminine and godly ways of womanhood. Thus, they have eating disorders, shame, immodesty, and many other ways of trying to get attention instead of the security and mental stability that they should have gotten from their mother and father. 

She has got to be kidding. Her gripe for today is that young women have eating disorders and are immodest??? How does she explain her daughters?

Self awareness: She doesn't haz it. 

Oh, and all that bullshit about gray hair?  She's said several times that she dyes hers!

[Loveday]

4 minutes ago, Koala said:

 

 

Quote

She has got to be kidding. Her gripe for today is that young women having eating disorders and are immodest??? How does she explain her daughters?

Self awareness: She doesn't haz it. 

I was just coming over here to post about this. My jaw quite literally dropped. Just when I think she's outdone herself in the hypocrisy department, she does it again.

[Koala]

4 minutes ago, Loveday said:

 

I was just coming over here to post about this. My jaw quite literally dropped. Just when I think she's outdone herself in the hypocrisy department, she does it again.

Well you know if she'd raised them they wouldn't have had eating disorders and been so immodest.

Oh wait....

[molecule]

Another dropped jaw here, although she would probably put the blame for the hair dye on Ken. She would point out that he likes it when she wears it that way, just like he likes the low-cut top.

I also got a chuckle out of this:

Quote

Don't even pick up the worldly magazines in doctor's offices. When I have done this, I felt dirty afterwards and I don't like this feeling. 

After all the times she's pointed out how women shouldn't let their feelings guide them, she uses her feelings to determine whether she should read magazines at the doctor's office.

[Hisey]

If I recall correctly, Lori was trying to force Alyssa to eat her raisins and that's why the kid threw them down.

[Loveday]

32 minutes ago, molecule said:

Another dropped jaw here, although she would probably put the blame for the hair dye on Ken. She would point out that he likes it when she wears it that way, just like he likes the low-cut top.

I also got a chuckle out of this:

After all the times she's pointed out how women shouldn't let their feelings guide them, she uses her feelings to determine whether she should read magazines at the doctor's office.

Yeah, the only worldly magazines at my doc's office are Time and Good Housekeeping. I don't read either, so I bring my own magazine. Early American Life, say, or Country Living. I have to admit, however, that lusting after the antiques and home makeovers does make me feel a bit unclean... 

[SweetFellowshipper]

Eating disorders are a WAY OF GETTING ATTENTION?!

Excuse me while I rage in the corner.

[Petrel]

3 hours ago, Koala said:

Well you know if she'd raised them they wouldn't have had eating disorders and been so immodest.

Oh wait....

Didn't the nanny raise them?  

[lilwriter85]

2 hours ago, Petrel said:

Didn't the nanny raise them?  

Lori will never full address the nanny part. She pissed off me in today's posting with the below quote.  Yeah, many women turn to babysitters, nannies, or others for help when they are working, but that doesn't mean they aren't bonding with their children.  Lori herself admitted somewhere online that her nanny frequently held and calmed down Cassi. I guess Cassi was bonding with the nanny.

I've said this before but fuck Lori. Fuck her on the part about young women not having mothers because of careers.

Quote

Many young women are so messed up today. They have no mother to bond to when they are a baby since they are passed around while their mothers chase a career. Their mothers aren't around much to influence them as they are growing up so they are left to fend for themselves. They learn to be a woman by watching the culture instead of having a godly mother in their life teaching them the feminine and godly ways of womanhood.

 

2 hours ago, SweetFellowshipper said:

Eating disorders are a WAY OF GETTING ATTENTION?!

Excuse me while I rage in the corner.

She was a bitch on that part. From reading and knowing a couple of people who dealt with eating disorders, they usually found ways to hide their disorders from loved ones.

[polecat]

I just recently started getting gray hair. What's funny about that is that I am sure I must have had them before, but I've only just started noticing them, and they came in kind of streaky -- so I almost have gray highlights. And I absoFREAKING-lutely love them. I'm horribly vain about them. I have ash blonde hair, and they look like I did it on purpose. Dye them? HECK no. I'm keeping my gray! It looks smoking hot! 

 

 

On 4/7/2016 at 11:47 AM, refugee said:

So true! I did use physical restraint for a time, with one of ours (I suspect the kid is on the autism spectrum, though never officially diagnosed, and now so high-functioning that the therapist says if autism is involved, the kid is one of the highest functioning they've ever seen but they kind of doubt it's autism -- and all I can say to that is, the therapist didn't know the kid at younger ages). The kid would throw these frightening tantrums, totally out of control. I read a parenting book (not faith-based) that suggested physical restraint... I was desperate enough to try it. I would just hold the kid, lying on the floor together, repeating in a calm voice that as long as the kid was out of control, I'd maintain control *for* the kid... and then I'd let go as soon as the kid stopped kicking and screaming, and either let them pull away, or hug (a breakable hug, if that makes sense) for as long as they needed it.

It worked much better than any other discipline I tried, and eventually the kid learned to use words.

The kid has told me since that they hated being controlled, and yet hated the feeling of being out of control. Maybe it was the best solution? They thought maybe being isolated in their room might have been better, alone and unstimulated until they could calm down, but couldn't rule out throwing stuff and breaking stuff -- which to my mind made the "holding" a better option.

1

bbm: This makes sense. I was thinking of people using hugs AS a time out, but this seems somehow different. More like helping a kid regain control during a meltdown.

[Koala]

@polecat I am getting it too...gray that is.  A ton of it.  I have almost jet black hair, so it really shows.  My husband loves it, but I at still at the "glare at it in the mirror" stage

[lilwriter85]

I got my first grey hair at 17. I didn't notice it until a friend at school mentioned it. I'm 31 now and have several grey hairs and I'll admit it bothers me.

[molecule]

I also have tinsel decorating my hair, and it's lovely.

I was rereading Ken's initial post here, in which he explains that there were many times when Ken and the nanny were the only ones caring for the children because Lori was incapacitated. Talking about the negative effects of that on her kids could actually be a strong support for everything she says--but instead, she just complains about all the other moms who do what she did. The hypocrisy boggles the mind.

[Luvmyskinnyjeanz]

23 minutes ago, molecule said:

I also have tinsel decorating my hair, and it's lovely.

I was rereading Ken's initial post here, in which he explains that there were many times when Ken and the nanny were the only ones caring for the children because Lori was incapacitated. Talking about the negative effects of that on her kids could actually be a strong support for everything she says--but instead, she just complains about all the other moms who do what she did. The hypocrisy boggles the mind.

I wonder what the nanny thinks of them after working for them? I bet she ( am comfortable to say she coz I doubt Ken would allow a manny in the house) would know a few truths... Lol. 

Oh and then I nearly had a stroke from anger after reading this little gem;

"When women rule they lead others into error and destroy the paths of the Lord. Instead of women being in the home, loving and obeying their husbands, loving their children, being keepers in the home, chaste and discreet, they have left the Lord's path and listened to the lies of females in leadership positions."

[polecat]

51 minutes ago, Koala said:

@polecat I am getting it too...gray that is.  A ton of it.  I have almost jet black hair, so it really shows.  My husband loves it, but I at still at the "glare at it in the mirror" stage

I bet you look gorgeous -- like Stacey from What Not To Wear. That is one woman who is graying beautifully.

[iweartanktops]

It really angers me that Lori says eating disorders are attention seeking! That's so fucked up and terrible for her daughter who struggles in this area. My own mother has similar feelings about my anorexia, and it brought me great harm when I first started treatment.

@lilwriter85, you're correct, most people with eating disorders go to great lengths to hide it from everyone around them. 

[Luvmyskinnyjeanz]

Now now people, if Lori says it's attention seeking then that's what it is.. After all she is an expert in that particular matter. Better consult her instead of trained professionals. 

[Hisey]

I really think that Lori (who sits in her house all day) knows more than silly professionals who actually work with people.

[violynn]

2 hours ago, iweartanktops said:

It really angers me that Lori says eating disorders are attention seeking! That's so fucked up and terrible for her daughter who struggles in this area. My own mother has similar feelings about my anorexia, and it brought me great harm when I first started treatment.

@lilwriter85, you're correct, most people with eating disorders go to great lengths to hide it from everyone around them. 

Just wanted to give you a hug, my friend