"Do Unto Others, Karma, What Comes around..." Children and Discipline

     I don't have a problem with the idea of Corporal Punishment. In fact, I LIKE it..... as long as it's administered only to adults who hit children. Before anyone gets adamant about their right to discipline their children through inflicting pain to the body, remember it was not too long ago here in the United States that it was common "love" for women to be "disciplined" in this way. Here's a common advertisement from the 1950's, before women's rights took hold. http://feministing.com/2008/11/13/vintage_sexism_heinz_soup_or_a/
     Ridiculous to most of us now, yet this is exactly how I grew up. I had to be in charge of all household duties from the age of nine, and if dinner or breakfast wasn't perfect, it got thrown at me, and I was beaten. This was  "Normal" for the subculture of a home I lived in, and not too far divorced from the times. So you don't hit your kids "that" hard. How hard would you like to be hit if it were called for? Can you hear this? The question was not, "Would you like to be hit?" or "Would you prefer not to be hit?" It's, "How hard?" Does this sound ridiculous or even humorous? Let's keep going.
     Most of us have heard of the concept of "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you." Most of us would agree with it, I think.
     Most of us adults would probably agree that if someone was upset with us, we'd have the right not to be hit in any way, further that if anyone even tried there should be laws in place to protect us, and maybe even get the aggressor off the streets where they couldn't do that again.
     We don't always extend these ideas to children. I'm shocked at the number of people who proudly talk of hitting kids, spanking, slapping or whatever you want to call it. It is a different area of the body, so maybe if we were out in public and someone was upset with you, it would be ok if they hit you, as long as it was "out of love" and on the right part of your body.
     Let me understand if I can. It's ok if the person is smaller, weaker and of a certain age to spank/hit/slap (on the right body part/s) if you don't like what they are doing and if it's "out of love," right? And only if it's a child, or maybe it's still women or perhaps people of a different color?
    I can't seem to think that way. What I can do is think ahead.
   Most people don't think ahead, rather they go retro with spanking with statements like, "My mom/dad tore my backside up, and I turned out just fine!" (They are entitled to that opinion, ofcourse. I'm sure by how they talk, it was a lovely experience. I just can't seem to identify.) They use their past experience as a way to justify hitting/spanking/slapping (the right body part, ofcourse) children today. I can understand using one's experience.
   I can see the logic, somewhat, but what if we apply, "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you?" That's right. Let's go *future* with this! Whatever you do to your kid today, expect them to do to you eventually. You may have a point. I'm getting on your side. This may work. I'm willing to have an open mind. Let's look at it.
  You're presently bigger and stronger, and if you don't like what children do, you *discipline* them with some form of a hit on a specific body part/s. It has an effect of changing behaviors sometimes and hey, It didn't mess you up as a kid, right? It's your responsibility to teach your kids, and that's what you're doing...More power to you!
    You are teaching them exactly how to treat you.
     Let's go far into the future. It's been a good life. You're old, not as strong as you used to be. You may even be weak and you may have shrunk some. You did a good job. You're kids are now big and strong.
     Now about spanking.
      What's going to happen when you grown child doesn't like what you do?
      Appaulling? Yes. Criminal? Yes. Heartless? Yes. (Unless they do it "out of love?" After all, you did it to them, "and they turned out just fine.") Besides, there is a big difference between a child and an elderly person. One is smaller and weaker, and ....wait. Nevermind.
       Maybe it's not all that bad.  I do try to see both sides of every situation. You'd never really want to hurt a kid. You're not that kind of person, afterall.  Maybe you're not five times bigger and stronger than your child. Maybe you're just twice as big and twice as strong. In that case, when you're say 94, we'd only appoint someone two times your size and strength to have a go at your backside...."because they love you."
      "Do unto others as you'd have them do unto you."
        Have a good laugh if you will, and enjoy your Karma. We always get back what we give.
        There's good news though. If you want patience, understanding and compassion when you're old and small, you have the opportunity to start stocking that account now. Give patience, understanding, and compassion the next time your kid messes up, and you'll teach them to give you the same. If your kids are grown, it's still not too late. Begin now showing them understanding, compassion and acceptance, and this will return to you.
   So the next time you hear someone say, "It didn't hurt me," ask yourself, "WILL it hurt me?"...and if you can, remember the disciplines of positive reinforcement, the times someone liked what you did and said so, remember the smiles, and a pat on the back that just maybe, had something to do with the good person you are today.
To my children: I'll let you go daily, and wait open arms for your return. I'll celebrate every achievement of yours, and I'll remind you that I'm proud of you if you feel you fail. I'll smile at the sticky hands, hair spray and grass stains, or play pat-a-cake with you for as long as you want. I'll listen to your stories, without judgement, and encourage your dreams, because one day I'll be small again, and you'll treat me as I've treated you, with love that doesn't hit people.
  Again, many defend their right to hit children (again, spank, slap, backhand, switch, etc.), and many still defend their right to hit women and people of other colors. As for today, neither I nor my children or grandchildren are property. No one is being hit, and to the dismay of avid hitters, no one has been imprisoned for lack of beatings. (Again, your word for hitting of choice may replace "beating," "hitting" etc.)
Below is a link to the "Children's Bill of Rights."

http://www.newciv.org/ncn/cbor.html
   How do you want to teach them to treat you when you are old?
tina jones

Autism: My story as a parent, My gift

The bully in my childhood was a parent. Jump ahead to when I was a parent. I thought myself dammaged goods. I'd look at my son and think, "How in the world could the universe give a child who needed so much to someone who was so incapable?"
 I had an attitude of martyrdom. I stayed awake for days and nights on end and was out of whatever mind I had. I am on the spectrum myself. I cried then stopped crying for years. I shut down and became whatever my children needed. My son was starting fires before age five. He'd excape the house middle of the night. I make the mistake of falling asleep, and he got the locked, and chained door open enough at the bottom that he got out. A neighbor found him sitting in the highway playing. Images of my baby as roadkill horrified me. I knew another autiistic kid who'd gone to an institution where he was abused. My son was at his father's two days on the weekends when I worked the only time I could doing two 16 shour shifts, and those weekends where when I had the most sleep. Otherwise I had only respit care for 2 hours twice a week, so I could go to the grocery store. My life was protecting him. I took pills to keep me awake, pills to make me sleep when I  had to. I was a nutcase.
   My job downsized, the money ran out in a few months that I'd saved and I fell asleep one night. My son started a fire that took our home, and nearly took our lives. I woke to hear my daughter screaming from where she stood in front of a wall of black and red fire, and I could hear my son, emotionally innappropriatly expressing as always, laughing in fear on the other side of the blackness. I know to get low to the floor, I know to run from fire, but that was my child. I ran blind into the flames, and physically ran into him. I grabbed him, and ran toward my daughter's voice, where I grabbed her arm, carried him and pulled her opening the back door and shoving her out, no steps to the ground. I ran with my 80 pound five year old son and my daughter in tow. When we got past the end of the trailor the ac exploded.
   We should, by all laws of nature have died, all of us. I gave up, and I agreed to send him to the institution to save his life and my daughter's as I no longer cared about mine. It was then his father stepped in, and gave my children a home. I had no insurance, so I stayed with a friend then lived in my car a few weeks until I went to stay with my mother. I missed my children so badly, but at their father's there was family who helped taked care of them. Services were available in their state from Easter Seals, Social Services and MHMR that were not available for Autism in my state at the time. My son was also able to start school early there. In short time I realized that my absolute pride at insisting I take care of my children, and unwavering rule that a mother must do this no matter what, they must live with her, nearly killed the children I wanted so much to take care of, and cruelty of all cruelties those children had been watching me die slowy for a very long time.
   As my son began to grow and flourish in his new environment of support, and as my daughter grew to know more peace, and as the time I spent with them was time when we all were better rested and safe, I began to see that the Universe was right. My son was the perfect child for me, and I wasn't given him because he needed me. It was because I needed him. I had been abused for many autistic traits. One of them was when I'd go off in my own world at over stimulation and stare at nothingness.
    My son and I were sitting outside one day, and I saw him staring at a tree. Long past trying to get him into my world and having developed the compassion, curiosity and wonder of getting into his world, I decided to join him and stare too. It was a nice mental break. I found he was watching a trail of ants. It was so, so ,so peaceful. Nothing to do, just being. My son taught me how to meditate in this way. He taught this frantic, desperate mom that stillness is an absolute need for me and all of us. He taught me that play is not negotiable. We die without it. He taught me that social rules like how to act in public or when to sleep are of no importance. He taught me that happiness is what we're here for!
    I started stopping the pats on the back when people would call me a hero, because pedestals are hard for me. They set up expectations that no human can live up to. The hero was my son. In starting that fire, he saved my life. I got off all of the pills. I stopped trying to be superhuman, and I was forced to let him go to grow. He saved all of our lives.
    Since then, he teaches me that we are adequate and the perfect family for eachother all of us. We're still learning, but I am so grateful for the children I have, adults now. smiles. We have all grown up together through this. Now, when I remember those times when I thought of taking my own life, so someone, anyone would help my children, I am still humbled that help came from the last person I'd have expected it from....the five year old son of mine who loved us all enough to end the illusion that I had to try to do it on my own. He says he owes me his life, but no...That's not it. I owe him mine. 17 years have passed since then. Every heartbeat, joy and tear, everything I know about being a mom, all comes from my children.  I have been gifted beyond measure!
   If you think I had courage, step into my children's shoes. Their courage and strength and insistance on joy and peace in life gave me courage enough to go for an evaluation early this year. My children teach me to take care of their Mom.  They give me the courage to live and live life fully every day of it.
   There is hope for all. It's not hope that our children will one day be like us. I'd have been sadistic to hope my children would have been like me,  the nonsleeping, sorrowful, self absorbed, self pitying, martyr of a woman I was back then, not to mention self medicated. What kind of monster would want that for their children?
    No, there is hope that Autism will be seen as a way of being that while challenging can have it's own beauty and peace, that no parent is perfect, that we are not alone, and that we might see that sometimes the answers we look for everywhere else are right in front of us. Take time to be still, ask for help everywhere and accept it no matter where it comes from.
   What sometimes looks like the source of the problem, just may be the light at the end of the tunnel.
tina jones.