Hello from Fort Worth, Texas

[Jaeger]

Hello FDR,

 

My name is Paul and a father of eight children with one wife.  This week we will be celebrating our 18th wedding anniversary.   I'm excited about the concept of peaceful parenting.  I have reflected a lot about how I have parented the last 16 1/2 years and am excited to learn more.  I'm 45 and my wife is 38 and we have 3 boys and 5 girls ranging in age from 16 yrs. to 4 mo.

 

I was raised for the most part by peaceful parents.  I can count on one hand the number of times I was spanked as child.  The punishment that was given most was a time-out and spanking was given usually for something really bad like where another person was hurt or destruction of property.  My mom was raise by a verbally abusive father and she was always looking for other ways of parenting so as not to parent us the way she was.  As I got older into my preteen and teenage years It was my dad who did the disciplining.  His favorite was using reason with us.  At the time I hated it and wished he just tell us what to do or use "real discipline".  It was not until I started watching some of Stefan's videos did I realize how lucky I was.  I have an ACE score of 0 (1 if you want to count the spanking, even if they didn't hurt.)

 

My parents were and are devout Mormons but never pushed us into going to church if we didn't want to as teenagers.  Most of my teenage years I never really went to church.  Now I'm married to a devout Mormon and I now go to church fairly often so I guess the religious gene wins in the end.  I was never told If I don't go to church I would go to Hell or anything stupid like that.  I would never say that to my kids. 

 

My problem as a parent came after going to boot camp in 2000.  I now catch myself wanting to yell like my drill instructor instead of using reason like my father.  I can't say I yell all the time but enough to make me cringe.  It seems like I'm always having to apologize to my wife and kids for yelling like a sailor.  I also wonder if genetically I take after my maternal grandfather who was verbally abusive.  That scares the daylight out of me.

 

My father was my go to mentor on parenting but unfortunately he passed away in 2008 at the age of 79.  While I love my mom she is not a father so can not give me a male perspective.  I do remember my father telling me before he died that my job as a parent was to be a better father than he was of me.  He left me a bar so high I always wonder if I will make it.  I have read various books on parenting but never really got excited about it.  Something just clicked in my head when listening to Stefan that the way to a stateless society was through peaceful parenting.  Now I'm motivated to make a better world.

 

I was first exposed to Stefan and FDR last September when searching anarchism.  I have always been libertarian in my views and was fascinated with the concept of no state verses limited state.  When I was in high school in the 80's I listen to punk rock and thought of myself as an anarchist but never got my head wrapped around the socialism most of the anarchy movement talked about at the time.  I could never understand how there could be no government and that the wealth would magically be redistributed.  So when I heard of anarcho-capitalism this last September I said now that's me.

 

Stefan and FDR, you are doing a great service.  I will pledge $20 dollars a month.   I wish I could give more but I have ten mouths to feed,  More if I count the three pet ferrets, but they don't eat very much

 

[algernon]

Welcome Paul!

 

I'm also from North Texas, just north of Denton actually.

 

That's great you have so many kids, if every anarchist could have 8 kids freedom would be just on the horizon!

 

I hate to break it to you, but going to church doesn't really mean the religious gene won, there is still hope

 

The yelling part is unfortunate, at least you are aware of it and can work towards correcting that. I know some things with me, when my daughter does something my instinctual reaction is to treat her how I was treated, I remember growing up being told "Don't you tell me 'No'!". No is a pretty important word, a child is expressing their wishes amd my daughter being almost 2 says no a lot, I still have this urge to tell her not to tell me no, completely institutionally. Same thing with spankings, my parents would really get upset if we did something dangerous, and if we did something that we had been told not to do, such as play with a electrical outlet we would get spanked. Of course my daughter wants to stick things into the outlet, it does look like a lot of fun, I had this strong instinctual urge to spank her after telling her several times not to do it. Luckily I became aware of peaceful parenting before having children, and have done a lot of research so neither I nor my wife has ever spanked or hit her, but I still feel the urge appearing, especially in frustrating dangerous situations.

 

Of course logically it doesn't make sense, why would you hurt your child who you are trying to prevent from getting hurt? Well the apologist would say your spanking is going to hurt them less than the possible electrocution of sticking something in the outlet, but at the end of the day the dangerous situation with a 2 year old is just a failure on the parent, and perhaps that is also why it's so frustrating.

 

I wonder if your urge to yell is similar.

 

I wouldn't worry too much about the genes, genetically at some point we were all probably savage warriors, you being aware of the shortcomings will allow you to change that - you can control your genes through epigenetics. Even if there was a "yelling" gene, you focus on cessation of yelling and the gene is turned off.

[Jaeger]

Welcome Paul!

 

I'm also from North Texas, just north of Denton actually.

 

That's great you have so many kids, if every anarchist could have 8 kids freedom would be just on the horizon!

 

I hate to break it to you, but going to church doesn't really mean the religious gene won, there is still hope

 

The yelling part is unfortunate, at least you are aware of it and can work towards correcting that. I know some things with me, when my daughter does something my instinctual reaction is to treat her how I was treated, I remember growing up being told "Don't you tell me 'No'!". No is a pretty important word, a child is expressing their wishes amd my daughter being almost 2 says no a lot, I still have this urge to tell her not to tell me no, completely institutionally. Same thing with spankings, my parents would really get upset if we did something dangerous, and if we did something that we had been told not to do, such as play with a electrical outlet we would get spanked. Of course my daughter wants to stick things into the outlet, it does look like a lot of fun, I had this strong instinctual urge to spank her after telling her several times not to do it. Luckily I became aware of peaceful parenting before having children, and have done a lot of research so neither I nor my wife has ever spanked or hit her, but I still feel the urge appearing, especially in frustrating dangerous situations.

 

Of course logically it doesn't make sense, why would you hurt your child who you are trying to prevent from getting hurt? Well the apologist would say your spanking is going to hurt them less than the possible electrocution of sticking something in the outlet, but at the end of the day the dangerous situation with a 2 year old is just a failure on the parent, and perhaps that is also why it's so frustrating.

 

I wonder if your urge to yell is similar.

 

I wouldn't worry too much about the genes, genetically at some point we were all probably savage warriors, you being aware of the shortcomings will allow you to change that - you can control your genes through epigenetics. Even if there was a "yelling" gene, you focus on cessation of yelling and the gene is turned off.

 

Thank you for the welcome algernon.

 

Since finding out about peaceful parenting I have been working on my yelling.

 

The thing that has been working the best for me is to think before I speak when I'm angry.  I find if I pause and reflect on what is the best way to handle the situation first then I do not yell but instead speak in a calmer voice.  My first instinct is to voice my opinion in a very loud voice.

 

I think you are right I just have to change my mode thinking and the yelling gene will turn off.