What About Cancelling Christmas?
I remember a conversation I had with a friend, which happened many years ago, very clearly to this day. We were talking about how some parents “kill Santa” for their kids. This memory was brought to mind afresh just minutes ago as I was reading an article written by Lorraine Sommerfeld. Titled “Tough love parenting: Parents who cancelled Christmas,” the article talks about “extreme” measures that some parents take in order to straighten out unmanageable kids.
She talked about some stories of parents “cancelling Christmas:”
I wonder how many would feature tales like the year my mother cancelled Christmas.
Mournful little girls had to wait until noon to get their stockings, which had indeed been taken down and hidden. Mom was bigger than Santa Claus.
But a reader topped that one, too. Michael told me that the week before Christmas, his father went outside, shot twice into the air with a .22 rifle, then came back in and told two rowdy lads he’d killed Santa. My mother, apparently, had only delayed him.
This got me thinking…would I ever take on the tough love parenting stance to the extreme and do something such as cancelling Christmas? I cannot imagine myself telling our little ones that I have asked Santa not to drop by because they are behaving inappropriately, much less tell them I killed him. I suppose though, that cancelling Christmas can take on various forms.
Our Christmas plans are already set for the year, and the kids are not proving to be more trouble than they normally are, so I doubt that I will have the need to practice this kind of tough love this season. The article did give me some ideas on how we can give Christmas a little twist.
Perhaps, instead of getting all those presents from us on Christmas, we can ask them to pick out all the things they want to give away and then organize a little party for the less fortunate kids. That’s not exactly cancelling Christmas but teaches the kids a life lesson.
Anyhow, going back to tough love parenting…I find it particularly interesting that “frightening” children has a psychological and behavioral basis. Sommerfeld wrote that this is “the chance for kids to develop a behavioural conscience. What they see is that their actions have pushed Mom past a reasonable point. They will read past the content to the deeper meaning – there will be consequences for those actions.”
Reflecting on that more, I am beginning to see her point. Remember my 4-year-old rebel? Should I go out on a limb and try this out?
December 21st, 2009 at 8:04 pm
These are some great ideas for raising children who are more “others” concious and teaching them valuable life lessons! I added a Toddler Parenting community on my website, shareWIK (share What I Know) and would love your input! ShareWIK is an online community bringing together people of all areas of expertise so that they can share what they know. Keep up the great work, and we would love to hear from you!
December 21st, 2009 at 8:12 pm
The end of the article about doing stuff for less fortunate kids are the great ideas, not killing Santa hahaha
December 22nd, 2009 at 3:09 pm
Craziness. Christmas is a great opportunity to teach children valuable life lessons. Graciousness, manners, the pleasure of giving, patience, how to handle disappointment and the list goes on. As usual the most useful tool a parent has is to remember how they felt when they were young. If you must do something to remind your child that they had some less than perfect moments over the year throw a small potato in the bottom of the stocking. It says, “yes, you have presents to open because you’re basically good but don’t forget the time you got out of bed fifty times”. I can still picture my son’s face when he got to the bottom and discovered the spud, priceless! “Hey! What’s goin on around here…”
December 22nd, 2009 at 4:04 pm
This post provoked me to write in my blog about canceling Christmas : ) Here’s the link if you’re interested.
http://campbellscoup.blogspot.com/2009/12/hey-whats-goin-on-around-here.html
December 24th, 2009 at 9:20 am
shareWIK.com: I sure am glad it’s the other idea you thought was great and not killing Santa! Ha ha.
Campbell: heading to your blog now.
Merry Christmas to you all!