Topic : We Disagree On Punishment

My 13 yr old daughter brought home a bad report card. It had a 50 in math a57 in language and a 69 in science. the rest were A's and B's. She was grounded all last year( yes the entire year) for C's. She shows pigs and we raise them she has learned alot from this. And she has won many things. This is something she is very good at and something that she loves. She is in extra  help for math. My husband is very strict on her. He has taken all the pigs away from her I mean sold all of them, he has grounded her, and now he thinks we should just be mean to her everyday. He spanked her 3 times last night because she did not have the amount of math problems done in the time that he allows. I think this is alittle extreme. He has only been her father for 4 years.( her real father doesn't care. He stated that he would sign away his rights to her so my husband can adopt her. which he does want to do.) He thinks because he can feel as if she  was his own she should automaticaly feel the same. I mean she loves him. but now she has made the statement she does not want him to adopt her. How can I explain to him he is hurting the situation? 

I think that he is extreme and that he still need to make sure she knows he loves her. 

He told her last night he did not want her to say anything to him about school because she was a lier. because she lied to us. I think that he should still offer for her to talk to him, then we can check it out to find out if she is lying. 

Any advice will help. 

My 13 yr old daughter brought home a bad report card. It had a 50 in math a57 in language and a 69 in science. the rest were A's and B's. She was grounded all last year( yes the entire year) for C's. She shows pigs and we raise them she has learned alot from this. And she has won many things. This is something she is very good at and something that she loves. She is in extra  help for math. My husband is very strict on her. He has taken all the pigs away from her I mean sold all of them, he has grounded her, and now he thinks we should just be mean to her everyday. He spanked her 3 times last night because she did not have the amount of math problems done in the time that he allows. I think this is alittle extreme. He has only been her father for 4 years.( her real father doesn't care. He stated that he would sign away his rights to her so my husband can adopt her. which he does want to do.) He thinks because he can feel as if she  was his own she should automaticaly feel the same. I mean she loves him. but now she has made the statement she does not want him to adopt her. How can I explain to him he is hurting the situation? 

I think that he is extreme and that he still need to make sure she knows he loves her. 

He told her last night he did not want her to say anything to him about school because she was a lier. because she lied to us. I think that he should still offer for her to talk to him, then we can check it out to find out if she is lying. 

Any advice will help. 

My 15 yr old daughter has been going thru some emotion issues latley. She was gone from home for a week staying with her older sister. She came home Saturday. No sooner than she got home her father was jumping all over her yelling and cursing. Over her room being a mess witch was cleaned up before she left. Her siblings are the ones who messed it up who are 12 and 9 yrs old. I said they had to clean it but....... Well anyway,, she got so upset she jumped up out of her chair and went to run outside away from her father. He started yelling at her to come back in the kitchen so she sat down in a chair by the door. I went to her to talk to her to calm her down and he started yelling again pulling his belt off. He tryed pushing thru me and I looked at him and told him he is not hitting her with no belt. He cursed at all of us and left. Was I right or was I in the wrong???  

             Kathy  

It seems to me that the father is choosing to be the bully in the family. Was he abused as a child? How did he react to it?  Children regardless of what age understand what you are asking of them and what you expect from them. Pulling out a belt on a child only causes resentment and anger and possibly a runaway teenager. 

I raised 3 children and my husband was away all week except for weekends. Sure there were time outs, items taken away but a belt...no way.  I find that now that my children have grown they do the same as I did with them. Every once in a while they had to put their hands out and I would smack them, or a smack on the behind, but never to injure. If I got upset with them or hubby did we would explain why but always told them that we loved them. They now know and I'm sure they did growing up, that our love for them was unconditional. We told them not to lie or they would be in more trouble and they seemed to accept that. Hubby is the problem, not the child. Therapy would help all of the family, it seems that hubby has some hidden issues from the past and is following through in the future. How will he react when grandchildren come along and one of his children want to strap them? Life carries what we teach.