- Saw a bright eight year old girl child in Child guidance clinic with complaints of school refusal. The child had hyperactivity and a stubborn temperament. The energy she had was just too much to contain. It seemed that the environment around her wasn't stimulating and engaging enough for her enormous energy level.
- Mother who also had to take care of 3 other children, countered the child's stubborn behaviour and temper tantrum by hitting her hard, mostly slaps, sometimes with cane or locking her up in a dark bathroom for hours (amongst other gross way of punishing). As mother had expected the punishment didnt work. The child become all the more a rebel, aggressive refusing to go to the school. She mocked her mother that the most the mother could do is hit, and that doesn't scare her anymore.
- Keeping aside the child's psychiatric issue of ADHD and temperamental problem which obviously requires medical attention, what was bothersome was hitting the child. Hitting children is long considered normal way to tame them and make them behave as one wants. The old saying also goes like " Chadi lage cham cham, vidya yeyi gham ghan" . Hitting children is almost normalized. But one thing is worth pondering , its very easy to deal with children who obey, but patience is tested when faced with the hurdle of a difficult child .
- When an apparantly healthy adult of at least 30 years can't control the anger impulse to hit a child, how do we expect a child of 8 years to control.
- High time we stop normalizing any form of aggression toward children, which will leave permanant mark on their minds and brain which makes them unable to trust anyone in future and form healthy attachments. #children #parenting #ADHD #DontHitChildren
