My son is being menaced by an encephalitic, dimwitted, maladjusted bully. Bear in mind, my son is only 14 months old and the bully is 19 months old. While the entire concept seems absurd, rest assured this is a real problem.
For the past couple months, it seems like every other day we pick up Alex from the nursery school, there is an incident report to sign. These are state-mandated forms that any accredited child care facility is responsible for administering when an “incident” has occurred in their care. An incident might be defined as any injury or accident where first aid steps were necessary. In Alex’s case, the incidents have been bites, bumps, scratches to the eye and the latest, a laceration of the face. Bleeding!! My baby boy came home with a scratch that was bleeding.
While I want so much to blame the child responsible for this behavior, I have to keep reminding myself that he is only 19 months old. He can’t talk, he just recently learned to walk, he shows no signs of being superior in any way other than the fact that he towers over the other children in this group. Basically he looks like a three year old and acts like a troglodyte. His outward behavior is EXTREMELY aggressive. From the moment he was mobile, he became a toy-hoarding, toy-stealing, pushing, grabbing, scratching, hitting, WWF wrestling maniac.
BUT, the real problem in this case is the parents. The Bully Dad is an arrogant man, the kind who brags about how much money he makes, how big their house is, and how his child is perfect. The Bully Mom is a bossy, snobbish, selfish person who spends more time attending to her clothes and makeup than her own child.
They drop Bully off the moment the center opens and rarely ever pick him up prior to the center closing – they essentially leave their son there for twelve hours a day. In fact, over the holidays the mom was off on vacation for two weeks and didn’t spend one of those days with her son. She was busy shopping, having manicures, working out or pursuing whatever selfish desire that struck her fancy. To make matters worse, when Frankenbully became sick and had explosive diarrhea during this vacation, she about blew a gasket that she had to come in and pick her little caveman up.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Mark Saleski
next time you sign Alex up for something, you and eric should more carefully read the sign....maybe the "Future Young Republicans Daycare" just isn't for you!
;-)
2 - Albanesse
I had the same thing with my oldest son. In Kindergarten a boy decided to spit on him... not a huge thing, but it seems it was a habit. The first I heard of it was when the boy was made to write an apology.. which made no sense since he was in friggin’ kindergarten. When I asked teach about the boy and that he be kept away from my son, well this is how it went.
Dad - so, how is it with that boy and the spitting, now?
Ms. G - it's fine... it should be okay.
Dad - I am just surprised that a child would do that...
Ms. G - well, you have to understand he is a very intelligent child.
Dad - what... ?
Ms. G - he is just bored and acts out.
Dad - so, he's not taught social skills and not to spit?
Ms G - no, he is just very, very smart.
Dad - my son is smart, doesn't spit
Ms G - well, this boy is…
Dad - when I think of spitting I think of not so smart. I don't want him near my son.
Ms G - he is just a smart boy and he wont do it again.
And here she went off to another subject.
See, my is not a lumbering twinkie fed, glazed over eyes sort of kid... just a sweet kid. But I guess he was not smart enough… if only he drooled a little...
3 - Eric Olsen
I know this is a very difficult situation for the school since they try to keep everyone happy, but I do not want to minimize this and I totally believe it's up to the teachers to do whatever they have to do to isolate the miscreant. And it isn't just our son, the blockhead interacts poorly with all the kids AND the teachers. I am told he is moving up to hte next class soon since he is considerably older and larger than the other kids in the baby class, and it is there that he will be rather abruptly socialized, with prejudice, as he finds himself the smallest rather than the largest, and his freakishly large noggin will not avail him there.
Based upon parental heritage, I am also quite confident that within the next few years Alex will surpass the young sociopath in both height and girth as well as determination and athleticism, and will be in the position of dictating terms of engagement, so to speak.
4 - Distorted Angel
While he clearly needs to be dealt with for the benefit of the other kids, I kinda feel sorry for the poor, unparented little dude. I saw plenty of kids like this when my son was in daycare -- the kids who are left there for 10 hours a day and more often than not are dropped off and picked up by an au pair or nanny. Always made me wonder why the parents bothered having kids in the first place.
5 - Aaman
For the tax benefits, perhaps
I joke, I joke! My joke is not working....
6 - Eric Olsen
At 19 months you have to feel sorry for the little lumbering blockhead, it's true; but from small sociopaths do large sociopaths grow. Dawn may have exaggerated and emphasized a point here and there for the benefit of the rant, but she is dead on when it comes to what staggering assplows the parents are. Surely at this point it isn't too late, but if they don't pull their outrageously self-absorbed heads out of their asses, they will have a real problem on their hands
7 - Distorted Angel
My experience with such parents, Eric, is that they usually don't recognize the problem until it's too big to deal with easily. The little guy is going to have a very difficult time of it, I'm guessing.
8 - Eric Olsen
and those around him, which is even more unfair
9 - dietdoc
D.A. writes:
"My experience with such parents, Eric, is that they usually don't recognize the problem until it's too big to deal with easily. The little guy is going to have a very difficult time of it, I'm guessing."
Reply: I am guessing so as well. Hopefully, but I am almost certain I am wrong, this is the couple's first (and last) child. Parenting, I observe, has become a hobby to the current childbearing generation, not a job.
10 - Dawn
Well, in case this isn't disturbing enough, they are expecting twins. What galls me the most about all of this is that there are good-hearted people out there who would love to dote on and otherwise love this child or any child for that matter, but due to circumstances out of their control, they can't have kids.
Then you have these two fuppies who can't be bothered to even spend time with the one they have and they are choosing to procreate AGAIN.
I would love to have lots of kids in theory, as I find them as much fun as a basket of kittens, but they are also a hell of a lot of work and the job of parenting is not to be taken lightly.
As the director told me today when discussing this situation, "Unfortunately Dawn, you aren't like most parents." To that I say, "Geez, that's sad, because I am not really all that great of a parent."
But, as is evident, there are worse.
11 - Eric Olsen
"it's not a job, it's an adventure,"
or in this case, a chore best pawned off on others
12 - Aaman
Your point "I ask the same question about our legal system. Why do we bother to rehabilitate when the rate of recidivism is proof positive that most violent criminals can’t be retrained to not act like murdering savages.. While people who contravene the social contract are and should be punished, the approach of 'locking the door and throwing away the key' has had far too many abuses in human history for it to be a viable solution to the problem.
Recidivism, relapse, etc are controlled by involvement in social causes. Individualized and non-punitive treatment is more effective than 'spare the rod' approaches.
Also, it is a bit early to write the kid off - he's only 19 months. Then again, I would probably do the same if I saw a kid like that.
Growing up, we were used to physical punishment (caning) as a form of control/education - hasn't hurt us in the long run. Juvenile delinquency is also signficantly less in the Indian school system.
Hope you work this out - that kid needs a tight whack!
13 - Dave Nalle
The transitional age between 18 months and 3 years can be very difficult for a lot of kids if they are in a group environment like a daycare. We put our daughter in daycare part time starting at 18 months and she almost immediately became the target of a bully who resented the fact that he was 2 and yet our 18 month old could talk to the teachers in complete sentences and he couldn't. So his response was to bite her whenever possible. He would literally head for her, teeth out, as she came in the door, prepared to bite any bits that stuck out. Their solution was to move our daughter in with older, more verbal kids and it seemed to work. The inarticulate biter seems to behave allright among his own kind.
I guess the point is that kids at that age develop in radically different ways, and the chronological age means much less than things like physical size and verbal and communications skills. Daycares should stay away from dividing kids up based on chronological age and should try to put those with similar skills together instead. It's probably more work for them, but the result is a more harmonious environment.
Of course, the bully of the original post may just be a rotten apple from a bad tree, but if they get him in with kids of similar size and level of physicality he won't be able to get away with bullying and might get straightened out despite his parents.
Dave
14 - Aaman
Every tree needs its rotten apple, methinks
15 - Eric Olsen
every rose has a thorn
16 - bhw
Thank you, THANK YOU, Eric, for planting that friggin' tune in my head, where it will remain for the rest of the day.
You suck.
17 - Eric Olsen
ear worm
18 - Dawn
It's never too early to write someone off. In fact 19 months is a great place to start.
19 - Brian
Two word sfor you son to learn:
Diaper Wedgies
20 - Dawn
You know, I was thinking about the choice between having a son who was a mouth-breathing, knuckle-cracking bully and a namby-pamby sissy - I will take the sissy any day. As good looking as my son is, he can work that sensitive geek thing and score bigtime with the ladies.
No one wants to date a jerky blockheaded Frankenstein freak. Excluding his mother obviously.
21 - Sydney
Speaking as a teacher, I can offer my perspective on the matter of bullying.
Firstly, let me say that teachers see it All the time in high school and if we see it in the class room we should all be dealing with the bully in the most severe manner. Most teachers try to do this. On the other hand I've noticed a lot of teachers just don't think it's their job to assist in socializing kids. Personally I think schools primary function is to help develop good citizens, so I tend to use every opportunity to reinforce this ideal.
However, part of the problem is that many teachers have been 'burned' many times by parents who give them shit for scolding their kid etc. Many, many, parents are totally unreasonable with teachers and jump at the opportunity to really tell them off. Often the parent has no rational thought behind their argument except that they've been led to believe your an idiot and they have an ax to grind.
In the majority cases parents come in to the discussion under the impression that this is a teacher vs. child battle. On top of this, many parents have painful associations with high school of their own and are predisposed to dislike teachers. Anyway it only takes a few of these confrontations and some teachers (admittedly lazy, or weak ones) get really cynical and just give up on trying to teach kids ethical values etc. As such this sort of teacher is more likely to ignore the bullying behaviour and just focus on teaching content. Sounds horrible I know, but the practical reality is that this is very tempting since in the high school setting, bullying is around you ALL THE TIME. AS a teacher you have to pick your battles and focus on the incidents that seem most damaging. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be able to walk from the classroom to the staff room with out disciplining 10 kids. Moreover, you’d ruin your rapport with the students. Anyway believe in doing as much of it as is reasonable possible.
Parents have most control over these matters and they have to pre-empt the development of bad conduct in their children. Within the school context, the best way to do this is to communicate with your child’s teachers. Call them at the beginning of the semester and once or twice in between. Give the teacher your support, ask how your child is doing, ask where they could improve both academically and socially. Teachers often know a side of children that their parents don’t see, namely, how they socialize with their peers. Also, I have to say that there is nothing that motivates a teacher to really work with a child more than the knowledge that they have concerned parents. This way we don’t feel are efforts are in vain. Parents are the key to their children’s education, teachers are merely the catalyst.
In my opinion there needs to be a program which educates parents on how to work with the education system to achieve there child’s goals. To me, the center of this program would be communication between parent and teacher.
22 - Eric Olsen
excellent and important thoughts Sydney, thanks, you're one of the good ones
23 - sydney
"Growing up, we were used to physical punishment (caning) as a form of control/education - hasn't hurt us in the long run. Juvenile delinquency is also signficantly less in the Indian school system."
Nonsense, the research overwhelmingly suggests physical discipline does NOTHING to reform bad behavior. Sure, the bad kid won't act up in class again, but he'll internalize that aggression and take it out two-fold on someone else later (either on his friends, his girlfriend, other kids in the school yard, or even his own children years down the road).
Their are techniques to use on bullies that involve coaching and anger control. Their is a lot of success with them, however, most teachers don't have the time to implement them. Schools will occasionally use an anti-bullying program and focus on two or three really bad apples and help coach them out of the behavior. It takes a lot of time and patience though, something most teachers have little of under the current system (not whining... just calling it as I see it)
24 - sydney
Thanks Eric..
got to work on my spelling and grammar though..
there, not their.
25 - sadi
in the piece i wrote on bullying in the workplace among adults/esp. womena and some of the same issues may apply, if you want to check it out.
on the other hand, wanting to just smash this other kid is also understandable or more likely, the parents who sound like real terrors and the the origin of the problem.
Bullies are everywhere and sadly the only way to win, if such anthing is possible, is to be stronger and to stand up for yourself and be tough. there's no reasoning or logic to it; one hates to stoop and we're talking about kids here too, so it's even harder, but basically, it's between you and the parents of the other kid -- you'll do the right thing; just stay strong and check out some of the UK bullying sites. In Europe, bullying is a punishable offense by law, which is a truly refreshing thing to see, i think. it's taken as seriously as sexual harassment or asssault because ten percent of the victims of bullies attempt suicide, studies show and an alarming number suffer from depression...
check out the links posted in my article above. They should be at the end. IF not, let me know and i'll find them for you.
Hang tough and thinking of you...It sucks when you have to be a thug just to get through the day...
sadi