Learning To Face The Consequences

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Usually they get along so well.

Sometimes it can be hard when one kid says something at odds with the other and you’ve got to try figure out who’s telling the truth and who’s lying harder than a seventeen year old at the entrance to a dance club.

And sometimes it isn’t such a but challenge.

“Aggh!” came the scream from the backseat. It was Miss6 so I assumed Miss3 had done something awful. A pain-filled scream can be anything from won’t hand over a ‘precious’ to ripping hair out by the roots. I waited for some more information, although he hardest thing about that is not ripping a fart up whoever just shouted and scared the crapper out of me while I was driving. “She punched me in the face!”

I’m not saying our kids don’t get out of hand occasionally, but they quickly find out where we stand on it. Getting physical is an absolute no-no.

“What?” I called back to them, genuinely surprised. Smacks to the head are extremely rare at our place. Our kids tend to favour shouldering each other as they walk past and digging in nails. “She didn’t, did she?”

“No, I didn’t,” Miss3 quickly clarified.

“Yes, she did,” Miss6 corrected. “She hit me in the face.”

“Absolutely no hitting,” I told them.

“No, I didn’t!” insisted Miss3. “I didn’t hit her in the face.”

“You did!” squealed Miss6 between sobs.

We try to teach our kids to own up to their wrongdoings and cop their punishment on the chin, but they like to try it on. Especially when it’s the word of one against the other. Like every other parent out there I prefer the flow of things when they’re honest and own up instead of having to play inquisitor.

Despite their stories being at odds with each other, I was inclined to believe Miss6, because as cunning as she can be I thought it unlikely she’d come up with a plan to clutch at her face, scream like a banshee and make up a story like this. Still, you want to be fair so you’ve got to go through the motions.

Unless…

… they refuse to come clean but accidentally dob themselves in.

“Did you,” I said over my shoulder to Miss3, “punch your sister in the face? Be honest. You know I’ll find out.”

“I didn’t,” said Miss3, playing hardball. She was as cool and calm as any lead actor playing a professional crook in any Hollywood blockbuster, perhaps sensing if she just stuck with her story she might get away with arranging the face of her big sister. But the thing is, real crooks rarely know when to keep their mouths shut. “I didn’t punch her in the face, Dad. I hit her in the lips.”

We arrived home about then and she quickly found herself in the time out corner trying to figure out exactly where she went wrong.

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“Raising a family on little more than laughs.”

3 Comments

  • I find the best way to figure it out is to ask them WHAT HAPPENED. See, when you ask ‘Did you punch her in the face”, you are asking for a yes or no answer. When you ask “What happened”, you are leaving it up to them. Usually the one who ‘got hurt’ has their turn first. Then the other. Someone always slips up. And we sometimes get a good laugh along the way too 🙂

  • Sounds exactly like my little girls, Miss 4 and Miss 6….Miss 6 will tell her sister that she can’t play with her barbies and “POW” Miss 4 will let fly with a punch to the face sending Miss 6 into meltdown mode (and maybe a few exaggerations about the extent of her injury. Unfortunately all 3 of our kids are strong willed and usually last longer than us through the interrogations so we also resort to lying (I know it is bad but so much easier to extract confessions). According to us, our car and house has a full camera system linked to our ipads so we “see” every incident and if they doubt the validity of the camera system then we were “watching what happened in the rear view mirror” or “were standing in the hall and saw it all” while we give them the chance to own up and be lectured for lying or be severely punished (eg..no choice of movie on family movie night, which would leave my son watching Barbie and the dancing princesses or the girls watching Star Wars..lol) The guilty one always owns up when presented with the “evidence”. Sadly, I don’t think the camera lie will last us through their teenage years so heaven knows what we will do then. 🙁

  • If anyone claims my ‘Miss 4’ has hit them, I tend to believe them she seems to be going through an ‘obnoxious shit’ stage in her development! 😉

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