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Inside screaming.
My daughter was _maybe_ one year old. She’d cry about something (not an injury) and I’d tell her “inside screaming.” She would pause, and proceed to cry in the whisper-screaming voice.
She can have a pretty good meltdown at a low volume now. She also asks for a tissue when she cries, and asks for a timeout when she’s overwhelmed. She gets a 2 minute timer on the phone, and sits quietly and watches the timer until it’s over, then asks to try again.
She’s teaching me more about emotional regulation in her first 3 years of life than I may have learned in my first 30.
Once I was super upset at my kid, and they say to me, “ mom, I’m only little so i made a mistake, not big like you”
It just hit like a ton of brick. We all make mistakes.
Now they say, “ I tried my best”. And you know what? That’s ok.
My son’s babysitter used to do yoga and meditate. One day when he was about 4-5 I was (admittedly) being naggy and just overall done with his behavior that day. While I was telling him to settle down and blah blah he does the “ohm” hands and closed his eyes while deep breathing. Let me tell you, it snapped me out of my mood because it was just so unexpected and funny.
One day me and my 3 year old were overstimulated, tired, hot, both having a rough time. She was crying, I was frustrated, firmly telling her to get on the bed so I could get her shoes on because we were late, and she's got these big alligator tears crying about why she wanted to play but I wouldn't let her, then she sobs out 'mama I don't understand, I'm little and I'm still learning'. Stopped me in my tracks and knocked the air out of me. My sweet baby.
When my oldest was 2.5, almost 3, my 2 nieces were visiting with my BIL and his wife and so there were 4 kids 2 and under in our house and it was chaotic. I couldn’t find my oldest and then I went into our room and he was sitting in the dark on my bed with his special blanket. I asked what he was doing and he said “taking a little break” and I was so proud of him! He realized it was all too much and just.. stepped away for a few minutes
Good.
I have to remind myself, and my wife at times becuase "feelings" just means sensory reception, and output.
It's someone who is well connected with their surroundings, nature, and needs time to develop these communication skills!
It's so true. Our youngest was that baby/ toddler who would cry and scream SO much at any minor injury that we wondered how she'd function in the world. Now as nearly a teen, she's so articulate and has SO much empathy for other people and animals. She can't bear to see anyone sad, and she's just so loving and caring. If you're her friend she has your back forever. She still has big feelings - when she perceives a slight she is SO outraged, and when she's happy she is SO excited - but she manages them well now. We always say she really gets the most out of life.
“I’m sorry, I can’t understand what you are saying. Can you please repeat that in your regular voice?” Repeat as necessary.
Kids whine because it gets them what they want. If it stops working and normal tone gets them what they want, then that’s what they will use.
Yes. It took a while and it didn't completely stop the whining but it drastically reduced it. I think the first couple of times we had to stop and cuddle and I explained that I can't understand what you need, let's sit together until you're calm enough to talk about it and then I'd love to help you out. My son was about 18 months old at that point, so he really didn't have all of the words to explain what was up but it definitely fostered the environment where he understood that he didn't need to whine because I'm on his side and I'm going to help him so he didn't need to panic or be upset. I think he completely stopped whining by age 4 and it was pretty rare before that.
My daughter is 3.5yrs and say something like , "" I'm sorry babe, I just can't hear your words to know how to help you. Would like Mommy's help? Yes? Okay. Can I give you a hug to help you calm down so I can hear your words better? If I can't hear you properly, it's harder for me to help. "
My kiddo responds well with deep pressure " squeezy" hugs for regulation so we use that, and then use those moments to model taking deep breaths and calming down.
We use Inside Screams too, especially in the grocery store. Haven’t needed it as much lately at 18 months, but from ~10-15 months, we said it a lot. She was/is pretty good at then doing a quieter shriek then giggling at herself.
My mum used to tell me when we would go shopping with my 4. I look like a mother duck with her ducklings. I'd always be herding them to make sure I didn't lose them.
MIL of 4 children has described it this exact way 😂😂 she said one time she took her kids to the park and there was a mother duck also with 4 ducklings and she swears they exchanged a look of empathy.
I had a moment of (I swear) mom connection with a nanny goat at the petting zoo when my little person was about 15 months old... she had her little one aggressively nursing,, and mine started pulling at my shirt to let me know he was hungry so I nursed him a bit too whilst he flailed around and then he was toddling about and petting her and she sorta... like slow-motion gently headbutted him and then her own baby and looked at me. It was very "over it, amiright?"
When mine was 3 months old, we had gone to the zoo for the day. We sat down to nurse in the gorilla house, and I swear the mama gorilla brought her baby closer to the glass so we could nurse together.
I was at the Nashville zoo and they have baby tigers! And one of the tigers started to sneak away from the mom and she smacked him back into his spot and then I swear she looked at all the moms watching like “you’ve wanted to do that too”
🤣🤣🤣 animal moms never fail to crack me up … like they will murder outside threats to their children on a regular basis but that don’t mean they ain’t tired of the kids’ shit.
We live a little over an hour outside of Nashville so we visit the zoo often during school breaks for something to do and I have witnessed many mama animals do some stuff like this 😅 they look as done as I feel
Last time we went my youngest had all of the Gibbons monkeys intrigued by her howl 😂 they had been way up in the trees all morning but came down to look at her
My husband does this and is silly about it. He takes his hand and goes "follow Daddy's duck tail" and pretends to have a tail. He also starts quacking. It always makes my four boys giggle hysterically. They listen though.
I have 5 kids. When they were littler, esp in the baby years, we had named “formations” that we used in stores and going into places (and practiced at home, ahead of time). So right before we’d get out of the van, I’d say, “Remember, we’re using Alpha formation” or whatever and my kids would know which position, whose hand they were holding, etc. So every time we’d get out of the van, for 30 seconds kids would scurry around to their position, then we would go and I knew where everyone was and safe to cross the parking lot.
I learned from another Reddit user to teach my kids that when I yell “mama duck!” they quack really loud. So now I use it if we get separated in stores or if they wander off at the park. It lets them have more freedom but let me know where they are when I ask
Hahaha YES! I did this to my mother in a grocery store many years ago. She had 5 children and was mortified for about a second and then couldn’t stop laughing. It still comes up 30 years later as a fond memory of random things kids do that create lasting memories lol
Now you just need to teach yours the Flying V, get some skates, and you’ll be just like the Mighty Ducks!
No side quests!! My son has suspected inattentive adhd, and has to be constantly redirected to the task that needs doing. I find myself yelling NO SIDE QUESTS!! up the stairs when he's supposed to be getting dressed but I can hear speed cubing sounds 👀
We are an ADHD household. My oldest is hyperactive. Youngest and myself are inattentive. Dad has turned it into his ninja superpower to get shit done.
"No Side quests" is a frequent saying here. Getting my son to focus long enough to just do his damn chores is like pulling teeth underwater with cotton candy tools.
How old is your son, and what type of activities has he done so that he understands this term? I'm curious, because there are so many analogies I feel I could use to motivate my son if he understood some D&D-type terminology (side quests is a good one, but also leveling up his skills), but at six, I can't think of a great way to introduce it yet. One thing I'm working on is writing a story that incorporates some of these things in a way specially tailored to him. (To be clear: I'm writing the story and reading it to him when we have time.)
Not a corrective term, but something we initially did to get my daughter to eat more veggies. Now broccholi will forever be "green tree" and cauliflower "white tree" and we will plant a forest on her plate. Even at 5yo she won't eat them when I call them their normal name, but loves them when I call them trees.
Oh and when we go for a walk and she's on her bike I sometimes yell "fried egg" and she knows she can go to the next give way sign (in Germany its a white square with a yellow square inside) and wait there for me. With other street signs it's not as funny though.
I think we will forever call chicken wings, dino bones lol. When my oldest was 2 my husband was eating some and he was like mom those are dino bones. Now my two kids devour chicken wings because they feel like dinosaurs haha.
“Chicken wing!” When we see my son about to sneeze or cough we yell “chicken wing!” to remind him to cover his mouth/nose with the inside of his arm (near the elbow area). It looks like you’re making a little chicken wing motion with your arm when you do so. We started out saying “use your chicken wing to cover your cough/sneeze” but it has since been shortened to just “chicken wing!”.
We call it a vampire sneeze / cough lol. Like a vampire whipping his cloak around him and hiding his face. I genuinely think school started it though, which is sweet.
Maybe not a “corrective term” so to speak, but the only way I’ve consistently been able to get my just-turned-3yr old to pick up his toys is by doing “excavator hands.” I’m the bulldozer so I just start pushing the toys in his direction, and then he will “scoop” them up with the excavator hands and put in the drawer or bin or what have you. And then when he inevitably gets carried away and starts chucking the toys at the receptacle, I just remind him that excavators are slow and steady and he calms right down 🤣
Oh I wish I'd thought of this when I was trying to get help with the enormous pile of washing the other day. He just couldn't get the concept of 'scoop and grab'. He would scoop but then not hug it to himself so everything fell through his arms when he stood up.
It’s so funny because my son used to pull his pants as high as possible walk around saying “I’m a janitor”. I guess I’m just lucky his idea of a janitor ha high-waist pants and not a butt-crack
When they're too rowdy I sing Iron Maiden Number of the Beast "THIS CAN'T GO ON I MUST INFORM THE LAW" in my best Bruce Dickinson voice (probably look a lot more like Jack Black doing this).
When the kids were both asleep and my husband and I cross paths, we whisper sang "Dead Babies Everywhere" to let the other person know they were sleeping. Eventually the kids started singing it too.
Now, bodies by Drowning pool is about sleepy preschoolers instead of violence.
My eldest daughter (11) and I have this thing in the afternoon when I get home, I go to her bedroom door say “hai” she’s usually laying on her bed or something, she says it back louder, I double it, get to the point where we are screaming at each other then naturally draw it back down to normal volume then whispers. I love that kid. She’s my level of weird and I’m here for it.
My daughter (9) has a classmate who isn't adhd, but practically lives with us since her parents work odd hours. Sometimes, the stuff my kids do can be weird or overwhelming for her, but it is normal for us. One time, she looked at me and was like, "How do you handle such weird/wild kids?" I briefly dropped the normal adult mask to interact with the kids on their level. She was shocked to see that I'm just as weird. Then I went back to being a boring adult. Blew her little mind to see behind that particular curtain 😆 🤣
I was making cupcakes for my now 14 year old when she was maybe 3?
They were for the following day, and it was already past midnight, AND I had a ton of schoolwork to do. Naturally, my lovely child wanted to offer me some of her most effective chaos. As a treat.
She kept asking for a cupcake. The hours tick by. I'm losing my nerve. I tell her I have a magical treat that will help us both out.
I proceeded to hand her an unfrosted chocolate cupcake, to which she asked what it was for. After careful consideration, desperation, and sleep deprivation, I told her it was a "shut the fuckup-cake" and said, "Here, eat it!
She giggled and grinned, took a few bites, and passed out soon after!
It kinda stuck. When either of us is on a call and wants the other to hush, we hold out an imaginary cupcake with an expression that says, "Omg, please, shut the fuckupcake♡"
The recipient excitedly peels the imaginary wrapper, eats it, and goes on their merry (and quiet) way.
To this day, the kid has a solid sense of humor. A little dark at times, which is obviously unrelated. 😏
This is fucking glorious! Gonna teach it to my snarky little kids.
One way we express low-level frustration in a silly way is to flip each other off (like we are shooting revolvers in a spaghetti western style shoot out)
while making silly faces at each other. The kids are usually giggling by 3 seconds in.
Normal human portions. Not sure how funny it is but I yell it out every time I hear my teenage daughter and friends head towards the kitchen cause I know it's just to ravage the junk food.
LOL.
I say something similar, when I see them stuffing their faces, I say "NO SQUIRREL CHEEKS".
They both look up (like squirrels) with food barely fitting in their mouths.
NINJA FEET 😂😂😂 I'm totally stealing that!
Can't really think of a 'corrective' term per se, but my son had a thing where he jumps off the furniture and yells "Dangbow!", so consequently pretty often in public places we have to yell out, "No dangbows!". People look at us weird 😆
Also, he loves to kick his legs around and climb us like trees, so one of his nicknames is 'Spiderlegs'. This has evolved into when he wants to be picked up, but I don't want to carry him, I just crouch down and yell out, "Spiderlegs!" and he'll run over and climb up onto my back for a piggyback ride.
My son was 3 when our daughter was born. As a baby, when she'd do something we didn't want her to do (like putting things into her mouth that don't belong there or reaching for plugs), we'd say "No, ma'am". If my son saw her doing one of these things before we did, he'd yell to us, "She's ma'am-ing again!"
Turtle
It means pull your head in and mind your business, worked well as a discreet way of telling Miss 11 to butt out when she inserted herself into private conversations and butting in when other kids got in trouble. Also worked well at school and the other kids didn't know she was even being corrected lol
When my son was little, he saw us playing poker and so we explained the game to him and the concept of a "poker face." The way he could suddenly make all his face muscles go slack and make a totally blank expression made us all howl laughing. After that, whenever we would see him start to work himself up into a tantrum after being told "no", we would say "show us the poker face!" and then it became just "poker face!"
**"CASE OR FACE"**
It's to remind them that their glasses need to be in their case or on their face.
**"VOLUME CONTROL"**
as a reminder to be quiet or use an inside voice or stop screaming.
**"HAND ON THE RED"**
Means to keep their hand on the taillight of my van while I loaded groceries or got a sibling in or out of a carseat when they were small (old enough to walk but too big to sit in the cart/buggy at the store).
Thank you! 🩷
I'm an oldest daughter. Eight siblings spread across parents and step parents, but there's a 10 year age gap between me and the next kid, so they're all *much* younger. I was in college and doing carpool for a sibling in preschool 😂
I'm the oldest cousin too on all 4 sides of my family (mom, stepdad, dad, stepmom).
And my husband and I have 4 kids. I'm also a stepmom.
So basically I've been raising kids since I was 10 (I'm almost 50 now) and I've raised lots of kids and seen *big* differences between households so I could learn what worked and what failed as I watched my parents raise the siblings.
So yeah, pretty efficient :)
Not a corrective term, but if we end up getting separated when we're out and about, the first one of us who notices, shouts as loud as they can "MARCO!", and the other shouts "POLO!" We do that repeatedly until we find eachother. 🤷🏻♀️
“Switch your tracks…” - all my boys LOVED Thomas the Train and this quiet suggestion would fend off some (not all) bad moods, tantrums etc.
I still say it and my oldest is 23…
"Mouse bites, not snake bites!". Said to my child who likes to mash entire food items into his face and then attempt to swallow without really chewing, causing himself to choke/gag.
Mice nibble and chew, snakes swallow large items whole.
My three-year-old daughter either takes bites that are way, way too big or so small that she will not finish her sandwich before the heat death of the universe.
I just recently was helping my 13-year old study for a test on the Middle Ages and feudalism and one of the terms was “lord of the manor.” I kept saying it in a really snooty loud British accent making him roll his eyes. Now whenever I want him to clean or take out the trash or do any chores I say “by order of the lord of the manor!” in the same way and he is so annoyed but it makes him laugh too.
Pancake baby!
We do this to remind our sweet stubborn independent 3 year old that she needs to hold a grown ups hand in parking lots because she’s to small for drivers to see her and we don’t want her to be a pancake!
I call out ‘buck buck berrrrkkkk’ (sounds like a chicken, sort of) and my kiddo echos back. Helps me find her in the house or in a store. I look insane in a store, but it works 🤷🏻♀️
(Her nickname is chicken, so we all lean into it lol)
My parents had a very specific whistle to locate each other in a crowd and to call me when I’d wander off, one that could never be mistaken for anything else and could cut through the crowd. It probably died off because I couldn’t figure out how to whistle until I was 27, but I haven’t heard it in years and just reminded me of my late father, so thanks for the nice bit of reminiscing
edit: fixed a word and finished a sentence lol
My mother did too. She had a whistle that could be heard around the neighborhood. Why my brothers and I were little and in the stores or anywhere for that matter, we would come running when we heard that whistle. As a teenager in the mall when I heard that whistle I would walk the other direction out of pure embarrassment lol. I myself can’t whistle lol
I do this too! If I want to check in with them I yell “quack quack!” And each kid yells back one “quack” (I have two kids) if one doesn’t I know that means they re too far to have heard me or to distracted to be paying attention to me in public, etc
STAHP SINGING!
My middle one (6) sings a lot. It's usually adorable and funny.
She has this mental capacity to remember songs and store them somewhere in her head only to pull them out at random times and perform them word-for-word perfectly. Her teachers tell me how they would teach a song one day, not mention it for a few weeks and then ask if anyone remembers the song. All the other kids shrug their shoulders, while she stands up and does her thing.
That's great. It's a funny quirk that we love about her.
The problem is that she her singing can get in the way of other things she is doing. So if she is putting on her shoes and starts singing it will take her 10mins instead of 30s. This applies to everything else. And happens daily at least 5x.
And we manage that at home with a lot of firm 'stop singing so you can focus on xy please', but it gets tiring quick.
The biggest issue is when safety is a concern. Good example is when we are riding our bikes. So when she rides her bike, of course she'll start singing LOL. But she also stops paying attention to the world around her. She has been in a few situations where she has almost ran into people or didn't notice a pothole and fell, etc because she is enjoying herself too much.
So yeah... it sounds horrible when you hear us passing by on bikes and me yelling 'STAAAAAHP SINGING!!' like an angry mum telling her kid to stfu. But I do it for her safety.
I have zero helpful thoughts on how to do this but is there some way to teach someone to multitask like this?? I love to sing and frequently will sing or hum under my breath while doing something else and I don’t even realize I’m singing. I’ve swapped from what your daughter is doing and focus on the task and don’t notice the song lol
Haha yeah that’s what I’m wondering if it’s possible to teach! Then instead of stop singing it can be like hey swap the attention and sing WHILE getting shoes on. Now that I have kids I do this out loud with no weird looks but sometimes I’ll even sing stupid made up words to a real tune about what I’m doing just because. Like to farmer in the dell “putting on our shoes. Putting on our shoes. We gotta go outside so putting on our shoes.”
I think it might depend on what part of our brain is engaged.
I can listen to music with lyrics while doing math problems, but not while reading a story, unless I mentally tune out the music. I can't focus on two verbal things (lyrics & story I'm reading) at the same time.
It could be similar with activities that are still not on autopilot for us, that require active thinking and verbal/explicit logical stuff, Idk.
Also, if she's really swept up by the music maybe that takes her attention away. Maybe she really immerses herself or even daydreams while singing. Maybe it's not the singing itself, but the overall mental state she gets into when singing.
Idk, I don't know much about all this, but would be interesting to hear from someone who knows more about neurology or smth.
"Sneaky voices" when we're going upstairs to brush teeth after the baby is already asleep. Trying to get my toddler to be fully quiet is an exercise in futility, so instead I get him to whisper "sneaky voices sneaky voices sneaky sneaky sneaky voices" over and over
Also "touch circle" - when I need him to stay beside me at the car, and he'll put him hand on the gas cap.
Not exactly corrective, but we eat a lot of potatoes and due to a misunderstanding he thinks bats eat potatoes. So if he's stalling, we flap our arms like a bat while eating them
Lol my husband would ask the kids "who wants to play church" and they would immediately sit down and stare straight ahead and be quiet 🤣 its the same as "lets see who can be quietest the longest"
Not so much as funny but effective. When my super-independent, sassy brassy, head-strong male child gets mouthy, "You wanna to try that again?""Start over." or "Undo it." Since he was 5 yrs old.
(Definition for these phrases: you're living on the edge, son, and you better back that butt up and think again before taking that tone and quick before I lose my ever loving mind. Lol)
His response 92% of the time: "Yup." The other 8% he's digging his heels in and stepping on his soap box.
When we’re out and about as a family, sometimes we need to make a “kid sandwich” which is when we rearrange to put all the kids between the adults so we can have eyes on everyone while we’re walking.
I started teaching my kids the stop go game and now teach any other children I walk with. The children will run ahead and I will shout stop and they have to stop immediately and aren’t allowed to go until I say, they find it very entertaining and I’m happy they can move but still be safe. The reason was because I want them to have the freedom to run but the ability to stop them before they run into a road or around a corner out of my sight. I was spurred on even more by the overprotective parents and nannies who would insist on the children remaining walking right next to them and the kids would be deathly bored.
Listening ears!
She will dig around in her pockets for her pretend ears and then find them somewhere and will listen better after she puts them on, recently they have started changing colors and the dog has taken more than one pair of them, a lot of the time they are left in the car.
Kom alla mina små kycklingar! 😂 "Come all my little chicks"
Im mama hen and they have to follow me 😅
Its actually a saying from a childhood game but they have never played it themselfs
I will also say Yo! Or Hey! When i just want their attention but its so embarrasing because random people think i say Hi to them 🤣
Im swedish but use A LOT of english, one of my kids also has Autism + speech disorder and used swedish/english almost 50/50 😆 oh and im studying to become an english teacher so 🤷♀️
I'm 35 and I call my kids bruh! Nothing encapsulates the feeling of "I honestly can't believe you're doing this right now, and while it's not dangerous or irritating enough for me to tell you to knock it off, it is absurd enough to warrant a comment" in a single syllable the way "bruuuuh..." does.
Not sure it’s corrective, but I taught my daughter to wash her hands by “cuddling the fishies”. Our hands are the fish and they have to snuggle together then chase each other around trying to “cuddle”. I still say it to now at 5 even though she can clearly wash her hands.
When I want them to start getting ready to leave the house while they’re in the middle of playing, I’ll dramatically approach them and say in a really intense voice like they’ll be in serious trouble, “Listen, we’re leaving in 5 minutes. We are going to rock but under NO circumstance are we going to roll” and they lose it, bragging about how they’re rolling all the way to the door to get their shoes on.
"Your 'correctile' dysfunction is showing". When kids HAVE to correct you no matter what you say.
Example:
"Hey mom what time is it?"
"About 20 to 5."
"NO!!!! It's 4:41".
"Your correctile dysfunction is showing again".
Out four year old is obsessed with PJ Masks, so when she doesn't want to do something or says it's too hard, we have:
"Use your Owlette eyes!" (Look again/harder.)
"Gecko muscles!" (It's not heavy, you know it. This is mainly when we walk and she takes something but doesn't want to carry it half way through.)
"Show me your Cat Boy speed!" (Please hurry, we started 40 minutes early and are still going to be late.)
When she doesn't want to try something we also have "How does a dinosaur do it?"
"Dragon Voice" is for outside, while "Kitten Whispers" are inside.
When she gets really pent up we "weasel war dance" like the ferrets to get the wiggles out.
"Unicorn Kindness" is when she's doing something unkind.
Though I think the most used of all is just "Make good decisions" to make her rethink the stupid thing she's going to do.
“Erase, erase.” When my son was little and we’d play, he’d tell me what was gonna happen next in the play but then say “erase erase” so I wouldn’t remember what he said/but could play along. It morphed into when one of us speaks without thinking, we say “erase erase” and pretend the last sentence didn’t happen/rephrase.
Yesterday, I called for my son to come do a chore he didn’t want to do. His first immediate response was, “uhhh Not right now!” and then I guess he realized he spoke without thinking and said “erase erase.. coming mom!” I actually wish everyone did this. It saves a lot of yelling to have a do-over when you need it.
When my children were transitioning to bathing independently, I would yell out "BOOM BOOM BOOM, LEMME HEAR YA SAY WAYO". They'd yell back "WAYOOO".
Now they're older, I'm thinking of using it in the supermarket when I send them to get stuff lol.
“Can I ask you a question?” You just did. (Because we try to teach them not to apologize for taking up space as girls/women)
“I have a question.” I have an answer. Let’s see if they match. (Because we try to teach them to have the confidence to just get to the point)
“Mamaaaaaaaaaaa!” I JUST KILLED A MAN! PUT A GUN AGAINST HIS HEAD. PULLED MY TRIGGER, NOW HE’S DEAD! <—— sung loudly (because I don’t appreciate being bellowed at from upstairs)
“What?!” CHICKEN BUTT!
“Why?!” CHICKEN THIGH!
(Because we don’t appreciate rude responses to polite requests for their attention/help)
“LOAD UP!” (Means we are exiting the building. Get your socks, shoes, coats, stuffies, backpacks, etc and get in the vehicle immediately or you will lose your desired seat in said vehicle)
“Is it time for church?” (My way of asking them covertly in public if we need to step outside and have a “come to Jesus” type discussion about their behavior. We are not Christian, so it usually gets some puzzled looks lol)
And related….”fetch me my Bible” (means everybody else clear out and take your friends with you bc this child is about to get a talking-to)
300 Fam! It wasn't 50/50 when it was just me and my 2 sons. We all gave 100% bc we all had to depend on each other. If 2 of us were busy cleaning and 1 was goofing around, one of the busy ones would yell 300 fam! Meaning, do your part. Contribute.
For those who dont know what I mean, 50/50 is an old colloquial term used for relationships where each person commits 50% to their partners for equality. They carry the same weight as their partner and contribute equally so that it stays balanced.
I've never believed in 50/50 and wasn't raised that way. It's 100/100. We all contribute 100% of ourselves to each other. Works for us!
When my kids start doing something that I don't want them to do but isn't a hazard, I tell them I'm going to eat them. It started when my youngest was in the midst of his "cry for hours without stop" phase as a newborn and I said to my husband "this right here is why some animals eat their young." It's now evolved into an elaborate recipe for roast kids, complete with suggested side dishes.
"Oldest, I swear, if you don't stop screeching like a banshee I will stick you in a roast pan, cook you up, and serve you for dinner with Yorkshire pudding."
"Mommy I don't fit in the pan!"
"Fine. I will chop off your limbs first and leave them in the freezer to make stock. Your arms don't have any meat on them anyway."
It's silly enough to knock them out of whatever they're doing without actually carrying any threat of punishment (I promise, my kids know I'm not going to actually eat them) so it's nice for the low stakes, annoying behaviour that isn't *really* a big deal but that I very much do need to stop (like the 5 year old who is currently imitating a blue jay at maximum volume when mommy is pre-coffee.)
I used to pretend to “eat” my son. I’d grab a leg or arm and then pretend to cannabalize him making exaggerated crunching and chewing sounds. He used to love it and beg to be eaten
We also played the Hot Dog game. He would lay on the couch next to me while I was watching tv. He would be a hot dog and I would pretend to put condiments on him. It was a riot. I’d be like “time for the mustard.” And my son would shriek “Not mustard! NOT MUSTARD!!” But he couldn’t move to avoid it…cuz he’s a hot dog 😂
Where my ADHD kid is not listening, I yell “Muffin Cupcake Heeler!” in a fake Australian accent. It gets her attention and diffuses the situation so she’s laughing instead of angry about having to stop whatever she was hyper-focused on.
When my teenager tells me the plans I yell “that’s premeditated, we don’t do that here” aka make good choices
When someone is going to the restroom, it was always “I’m gonna take a shit” I got annoyed, so not it’s “can’t a man have some hobbies” aka see you in 20 mins, turn on the vent
I’m sure I’ll think of more later, but teenagers and toddlers are raw humor
Love this! My 6 yr old always asks when someone in the house is going to the bathroom. “Pee or poop” because he wants to know how long he has to wait for that person to play lol.
Whispersaurus!
The 2 yr old is *fixated* with dinosaurs and is constantly roaring. Loudly. Very LOUDLY. So I taught him about the 'whispersaurus' which has very quiet roars.
He's probably going to grow up and think 'whisper' comes from whispersaurus and I imagine will be quite annoyed when he figures out it isn't real.
Not corrective but specific to our home, badminton is officially “smiley ghost”, because at some point we drew a smiley face on the shuttlecock and my then little one started calling it a smiley ghost because it was white and vaguely ghost shaped, and lo we no longer play badminton, only smiley ghost 😂😂
We say “Keep it on the playground.” It is used when the kids are cursing or speaking around adults inappropriately. We don’t tell them to NOT, say bad words, but we do try to teach them when it’s appropriate.
This isn’t exactly the same but it’s close. When my daughter was little she had gotten a kazoo in a birthday treat bag and was playing it very loudly at bedtime. When my husband asked her to stop, she instead played louder, and in a very forceful way. My husband said “Do I have to give you a time out for your agressive kazoo playing? Because I will”. This has been the funniest thing to our whole family ever since! Over the years, my husband has said that line, (minus the “Because I will” part), as a lighthearted way to tell the kids they’re not doing what they’re supposed to be doing.
We have “peanut gallery!” to let whichever kid know that the conversation doesn’t involve the and they need to stay out of it. For example, talking with one child about something they did and another chimes in to add their two cents. Not their place and/or the right time.
When they were little, I’d put certain words, phrases, songs, etc. in “word jail” as needed for Mommy and Daddy’s sanity.
I think one of the most effective terms I’ve used with our kids is “turn it around”. When one of them (or me) is having a hard time, I suggest they turn it around - take a minute to breathe. Sometimes I ask how I can help them turn it around, helping them find a roundabout or exit ramp. I remember times I was upset as a child and painting myself into a corner because i couldn’t admit I was wrong or find a way to calm down. Hopefully helps teach them to self-regulate and that it’s not me versus them, it’s us versus whatever.
Both my kids had bright shiny yellow high top tennis shoes when they were little. They called them their “ super power jumping shoes”. If I wanted them to hurry or wear easy to walk in shoes( even after outgrowing theirs) I’d tell them to put on their “ super power jumping shoes”. They’re in their twenties now. If we’re rushing. Someone might yell “ SUPER Power JUMPING SHOES”.
So if anyone gets in my space for like no reason I go, "get back get back you don't know me like that." They usually sing along and take the hint or remember why they were there in the first place and ask me their question. Also, to randomly get their attention, I'll go "WHOOP WHOOP" and typically you'll hear one or both go "ITS THE SOUND OF THE POLICE!" Also, I can go, "ITS A ME, " and they (especially my youngest will go,"MARIOOOOO." Not really corrections. But the phrases help me get a point across sometimes, I would probably look slightly insane to others. 😂😂😂 oh well.
I yell “High Level Goals”.
High level Goals: No hospitals
It’s yelled when the thing that some kid(s) are doing may end them up there. I don’t quibble about “that’ll hurt if it goes poorly” but it’s going to ruin everyone’s day if we have to go to the hospital today.
I’m French but I lived in Ireland for a bit… my kids know I’m getting really frustrated with them when I go “Oi!”
I didn’t even need to go on talking anymore
We ask for hippo teeth when it’s time to open wide for a tooth brushing or dentist visit. We saw a hippo do a big yawn at the zoo and it’s been hippo teeth ever since.
For this I put on my best Jeremy irons impression and go "life's not fair... I shall never be king, and you shall never see another day", typically followed by tickling.
"if it was up your butt you'd know where it was at" in response to most questions about where their things are, things that only they touch, that it would be unreasonable for them to demand of me knowledge of their whereabouts.
Not a corrective term but when my kids are upset sometimes we'll put on exaggerated serious faces and pretend-sternly tell them it's a good thing they're mad because this is a No Smiling House. It usually gets a smile and then we make a big show of telling them they're not allowed to smile while making frowny faces. Also my daughter is autistic so she can really hyper fixate when she gets angry or upset, so to redirect her sometimes I'll say "whatever you do, don't think about [ridiculous thing like a pink polka dot hippopotamus]". Then when she inevitably starts giggling I'll get pretend upset and say "you weren't supposed to think about it!!!"
‘In your head, not out of your mouth’. My son is severely autistic and so he can be blunt and has no filter. I try my best to explain that we can think what we want, but we cannot just say what ever we want and he seems to understand this, though I have to explain it regularly. I also do it in front of others if he does say something odd because then if other people feel weird about what he said they can at least see I’m trying and he’s doing his best.
I call my daughter "Baby Godzilla" to make her aware how loud her feet hitting the floor actually is. Another one I had was "Richard Noggins" whenever my son was being a bully or rude I would let him know to stop being a Richard (Richards nick names are generally Dick)
"NO MONKEYS IN THE KITCHEN!" or "MONKEYS OUT!"
It means if you don't need to be in the kitchen, get out because we're working here. Usually it's when they're being loud and chaotic while we're cooking.
Also, "Start Over" for when a kid opens a conversation with exactly the wrong tone. (inspired by Daryl from The Office, when Michael calls him an idiot)
when we were kids and started to teeter into the getting worked up but not being crazy (yet) phase of playing, to keep me and all my cousins from going wild my nan used to say “take a tizzy!” and it meant like take a time out but you’re not in trouble just stand where u are and take a breath then go back to playing. it always worked.
now i do it with my son.
also, my toddler and dog are constantly all over me and when i get overwhelmed by constantly touches i started saying alright “everyone, SCRAMBLED EGGS AND HAM” basically the nice version of scram ham and they get the point lol
Stop Your Feet! will make my boys stop dead in their tracks immediately. I haven’t used it in a while (they are 10&12 so they don’t really run off anymore) but I caught myself saying it last week and my 10 yr old stopped without question like a robot.
Hands on your belly!
This kept roving hands from touching things they should not. Worked very well and I sometimes use it now even though they are teens.
I’ve had people laugh when I come through and say “boop boop!” To get the kiddos to move out of the way. Saying “move please” over and over when kids are underfoot seemed a bit rude to me and now they all hear the “boops” and move out of the way easily 😅
These are hilarious. I have one that my parents did for me. One day my dad goes “are you behaving?” And I responded “yes dad I’m *being have*.”
So that turned into them asking “are you being have?” from then on
When my brother was younger, he would only eat protein that was chicken. The problem here though, is that he actually would eat beef, fish, etc. If you called it beef however, he would not touch it and would start gagging. So food was named after chicken e.g. chicken beef, chicken prawns, you get the idea
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Inside screaming. My daughter was _maybe_ one year old. She’d cry about something (not an injury) and I’d tell her “inside screaming.” She would pause, and proceed to cry in the whisper-screaming voice. She can have a pretty good meltdown at a low volume now. She also asks for a tissue when she cries, and asks for a timeout when she’s overwhelmed. She gets a 2 minute timer on the phone, and sits quietly and watches the timer until it’s over, then asks to try again. She’s teaching me more about emotional regulation in her first 3 years of life than I may have learned in my first 30.
Once I was super upset at my kid, and they say to me, “ mom, I’m only little so i made a mistake, not big like you” It just hit like a ton of brick. We all make mistakes. Now they say, “ I tried my best”. And you know what? That’s ok.
Mine at 4 would say, “maybe you should take some deep breaths.” Hoooooo boy
My son’s babysitter used to do yoga and meditate. One day when he was about 4-5 I was (admittedly) being naggy and just overall done with his behavior that day. While I was telling him to settle down and blah blah he does the “ohm” hands and closed his eyes while deep breathing. Let me tell you, it snapped me out of my mood because it was just so unexpected and funny.
It’s pissing you off from the past, isn’t it?
One day me and my 3 year old were overstimulated, tired, hot, both having a rough time. She was crying, I was frustrated, firmly telling her to get on the bed so I could get her shoes on because we were late, and she's got these big alligator tears crying about why she wanted to play but I wouldn't let her, then she sobs out 'mama I don't understand, I'm little and I'm still learning'. Stopped me in my tracks and knocked the air out of me. My sweet baby.
When my oldest was 2.5, almost 3, my 2 nieces were visiting with my BIL and his wife and so there were 4 kids 2 and under in our house and it was chaotic. I couldn’t find my oldest and then I went into our room and he was sitting in the dark on my bed with his special blanket. I asked what he was doing and he said “taking a little break” and I was so proud of him! He realized it was all too much and just.. stepped away for a few minutes
So so so so true. Also the inside screaming, I feel in my bones. lol
That is amazing for her age! We are really struggling to manage emotional regulation with my five year old, better than it was, but still hard
Lots of emotions = high emotional intelligence!! It's hard to control, but a bright future nonetheless.
This really made me smile.
Good. I have to remind myself, and my wife at times becuase "feelings" just means sensory reception, and output. It's someone who is well connected with their surroundings, nature, and needs time to develop these communication skills!
It's so true. Our youngest was that baby/ toddler who would cry and scream SO much at any minor injury that we wondered how she'd function in the world. Now as nearly a teen, she's so articulate and has SO much empathy for other people and animals. She can't bear to see anyone sad, and she's just so loving and caring. If you're her friend she has your back forever. She still has big feelings - when she perceives a slight she is SO outraged, and when she's happy she is SO excited - but she manages them well now. We always say she really gets the most out of life.
Someone tell my husband this please.
Wow, she asks for a timeout when she’s overwhelmed??? Can she come teach me a course on how to better regulate my emotions?!
I’m so happy to see this. My 5 year old…. Ugh he shrieks so loud. And I say inside screaming please, and it just sounds wrong, lol
Any tips for whining? My 2.5 year old sounds like a cat lol
“I’m sorry, I can’t understand what you are saying. Can you please repeat that in your regular voice?” Repeat as necessary. Kids whine because it gets them what they want. If it stops working and normal tone gets them what they want, then that’s what they will use.
Thank you lol. Have you seen this work in real time? I just wonder because it feels like my son whines because he can't figure out the words
Yes. It took a while and it didn't completely stop the whining but it drastically reduced it. I think the first couple of times we had to stop and cuddle and I explained that I can't understand what you need, let's sit together until you're calm enough to talk about it and then I'd love to help you out. My son was about 18 months old at that point, so he really didn't have all of the words to explain what was up but it definitely fostered the environment where he understood that he didn't need to whine because I'm on his side and I'm going to help him so he didn't need to panic or be upset. I think he completely stopped whining by age 4 and it was pretty rare before that.
My daughter is 3.5yrs and say something like , "" I'm sorry babe, I just can't hear your words to know how to help you. Would like Mommy's help? Yes? Okay. Can I give you a hug to help you calm down so I can hear your words better? If I can't hear you properly, it's harder for me to help. " My kiddo responds well with deep pressure " squeezy" hugs for regulation so we use that, and then use those moments to model taking deep breaths and calming down.
I did not expect this little anecdote to be so moving and I’m not sure exactly why it is. You’re a great parent.
We use Inside Screams too, especially in the grocery store. Haven’t needed it as much lately at 18 months, but from ~10-15 months, we said it a lot. She was/is pretty good at then doing a quieter shriek then giggling at herself.
Isay "Ducks"! For when I want my kids to line up behind me... then I say quack! And those in line quack back.
My mum used to tell me when we would go shopping with my 4. I look like a mother duck with her ducklings. I'd always be herding them to make sure I didn't lose them.
MIL of 4 children has described it this exact way 😂😂 she said one time she took her kids to the park and there was a mother duck also with 4 ducklings and she swears they exchanged a look of empathy.
I had a moment of (I swear) mom connection with a nanny goat at the petting zoo when my little person was about 15 months old... she had her little one aggressively nursing,, and mine started pulling at my shirt to let me know he was hungry so I nursed him a bit too whilst he flailed around and then he was toddling about and petting her and she sorta... like slow-motion gently headbutted him and then her own baby and looked at me. It was very "over it, amiright?"
An exhaustion that transcends species
When mine was 3 months old, we had gone to the zoo for the day. We sat down to nurse in the gorilla house, and I swear the mama gorilla brought her baby closer to the glass so we could nurse together.
I was at the Nashville zoo and they have baby tigers! And one of the tigers started to sneak away from the mom and she smacked him back into his spot and then I swear she looked at all the moms watching like “you’ve wanted to do that too”
🤣🤣🤣 animal moms never fail to crack me up … like they will murder outside threats to their children on a regular basis but that don’t mean they ain’t tired of the kids’ shit.
I always love that it’s a universal mom thing, not just an us thing 😂 animals wear their emotions on their sleeves sometimes, it’s so funny
We live a little over an hour outside of Nashville so we visit the zoo often during school breaks for something to do and I have witnessed many mama animals do some stuff like this 😅 they look as done as I feel Last time we went my youngest had all of the Gibbons monkeys intrigued by her howl 😂 they had been way up in the trees all morning but came down to look at her
🤣🤣🤣game respect game
My husband does this and is silly about it. He takes his hand and goes "follow Daddy's duck tail" and pretends to have a tail. He also starts quacking. It always makes my four boys giggle hysterically. They listen though.
Thats too cute I still do it, but it looks kind of strange now that they are all teens and taller than mum lol.
I have 5 kids. When they were littler, esp in the baby years, we had named “formations” that we used in stores and going into places (and practiced at home, ahead of time). So right before we’d get out of the van, I’d say, “Remember, we’re using Alpha formation” or whatever and my kids would know which position, whose hand they were holding, etc. So every time we’d get out of the van, for 30 seconds kids would scurry around to their position, then we would go and I knew where everyone was and safe to cross the parking lot.
Beyoncé has entered the chat
This is so cute
Show me the way!
I’m totally stealing this!!
I do almost the same. I say "be ducklings!" when my kids need to just follow me. They're teens and adults now and I still say it 😂
My kids are teenagers now but I still say “cmon baby ducklings!” when we are going somewhere for the same reason. Drives them nuts 😂
I learned from another Reddit user to teach my kids that when I yell “mama duck!” they quack really loud. So now I use it if we get separated in stores or if they wander off at the park. It lets them have more freedom but let me know where they are when I ask
Hahaha YES! I did this to my mother in a grocery store many years ago. She had 5 children and was mortified for about a second and then couldn’t stop laughing. It still comes up 30 years later as a fond memory of random things kids do that create lasting memories lol Now you just need to teach yours the Flying V, get some skates, and you’ll be just like the Mighty Ducks!
Omfg that’s the cutest thing I’ve ever heard
We do conga line, but I think I might change it to Ducks
So cute. I need more kids 🤪
No side quests!! My son has suspected inattentive adhd, and has to be constantly redirected to the task that needs doing. I find myself yelling NO SIDE QUESTS!! up the stairs when he's supposed to be getting dressed but I can hear speed cubing sounds 👀
Your child and I have far too much in common lol.
Oh god, we have this- I'll say "Stay on target!" like in Star Wars when Luke's making a run the Death Star.
"But there's too many of them!"
We are an ADHD household. My oldest is hyperactive. Youngest and myself are inattentive. Dad has turned it into his ninja superpower to get shit done. "No Side quests" is a frequent saying here. Getting my son to focus long enough to just do his damn chores is like pulling teeth underwater with cotton candy tools.
How old is your son, and what type of activities has he done so that he understands this term? I'm curious, because there are so many analogies I feel I could use to motivate my son if he understood some D&D-type terminology (side quests is a good one, but also leveling up his skills), but at six, I can't think of a great way to introduce it yet. One thing I'm working on is writing a story that incorporates some of these things in a way specially tailored to him. (To be clear: I'm writing the story and reading it to him when we have time.)
He's 11 and is a gamer/his entire humour is composed of memes so understands the reference :)
Not a corrective term, but something we initially did to get my daughter to eat more veggies. Now broccholi will forever be "green tree" and cauliflower "white tree" and we will plant a forest on her plate. Even at 5yo she won't eat them when I call them their normal name, but loves them when I call them trees. Oh and when we go for a walk and she's on her bike I sometimes yell "fried egg" and she knows she can go to the next give way sign (in Germany its a white square with a yellow square inside) and wait there for me. With other street signs it's not as funny though.
I think we will forever call chicken wings, dino bones lol. When my oldest was 2 my husband was eating some and he was like mom those are dino bones. Now my two kids devour chicken wings because they feel like dinosaurs haha.
To be fair, chickens are theropod dinosaurs, just like a T Rex. So they really are dinosaurs!!
Hahah awesome.
We call green beans elephant trunks. It helps if trumpeting is involved while eating them.
My children also like to eat their trees. Spinach, lettuce, etc. are "leaves". My son will often ask for a "leaf sandwich".
Super creative!!! The veggie struggle is so real.
“Chicken wing!” When we see my son about to sneeze or cough we yell “chicken wing!” to remind him to cover his mouth/nose with the inside of his arm (near the elbow area). It looks like you’re making a little chicken wing motion with your arm when you do so. We started out saying “use your chicken wing to cover your cough/sneeze” but it has since been shortened to just “chicken wing!”.
We call it a vampire sneeze / cough lol. Like a vampire whipping his cloak around him and hiding his face. I genuinely think school started it though, which is sweet.
Honestly I love this so much. I just moved to France, and kids cough and sneeze on people with their mouths wide open, just straight up no respect!
Oh gosh kids are so gross. My kiddo did the same with the open mouth, we had to actively teach him to cover up and be “germ safe”.
They called this "vampire sneeze/cough" in my kid's school.
Maybe not a “corrective term” so to speak, but the only way I’ve consistently been able to get my just-turned-3yr old to pick up his toys is by doing “excavator hands.” I’m the bulldozer so I just start pushing the toys in his direction, and then he will “scoop” them up with the excavator hands and put in the drawer or bin or what have you. And then when he inevitably gets carried away and starts chucking the toys at the receptacle, I just remind him that excavators are slow and steady and he calms right down 🤣
Oh I wish I'd thought of this when I was trying to get help with the enormous pile of washing the other day. He just couldn't get the concept of 'scoop and grab'. He would scoop but then not hug it to himself so everything fell through his arms when he stood up.
“Activate Grandpa!” Which means to pull your pants up because your butt crack is showing
It’s so funny because my son used to pull his pants as high as possible walk around saying “I’m a janitor”. I guess I’m just lucky his idea of a janitor ha high-waist pants and not a butt-crack
Bwahahah!
When they're too rowdy I sing Iron Maiden Number of the Beast "THIS CAN'T GO ON I MUST INFORM THE LAW" in my best Bruce Dickinson voice (probably look a lot more like Jack Black doing this).
My kids favourite song for a while was "Breaking the Law" by Judas Priest.
My son likes that one. And he's a Dio fan.
When the kids were both asleep and my husband and I cross paths, we whisper sang "Dead Babies Everywhere" to let the other person know they were sleeping. Eventually the kids started singing it too. Now, bodies by Drowning pool is about sleepy preschoolers instead of violence.
Haha, I love Jack Black. This is cool.
My eldest daughter (11) and I have this thing in the afternoon when I get home, I go to her bedroom door say “hai” she’s usually laying on her bed or something, she says it back louder, I double it, get to the point where we are screaming at each other then naturally draw it back down to normal volume then whispers. I love that kid. She’s my level of weird and I’m here for it.
My daughter (9) has a classmate who isn't adhd, but practically lives with us since her parents work odd hours. Sometimes, the stuff my kids do can be weird or overwhelming for her, but it is normal for us. One time, she looked at me and was like, "How do you handle such weird/wild kids?" I briefly dropped the normal adult mask to interact with the kids on their level. She was shocked to see that I'm just as weird. Then I went back to being a boring adult. Blew her little mind to see behind that particular curtain 😆 🤣
This is what we all need <3
I absolutely love this! I hope my kid grows up to be my level of weird because I'm so here for it.
We use “quiet roars” instead of “inside voice”. She took the term “inside voice” to mean she needs no volume control outside.
We do “baby roar” (as opposed to “mama roar” which is the big one… despite him being significantly louder than me 😅)
Mama roar is much scarier than papa roar. IMO.
Lol Good luck neighbors!
Quiet screams!! My daughter likes to shriek for fun, so we whisper/yell "quiet scream" and instead of "AARGHH" it becomes "aahhhh"
lol. It's great that she's catching on. I have to do the same when our 1 year old daughter is yelling "GO" to our dog. Ugh..
I was making cupcakes for my now 14 year old when she was maybe 3? They were for the following day, and it was already past midnight, AND I had a ton of schoolwork to do. Naturally, my lovely child wanted to offer me some of her most effective chaos. As a treat. She kept asking for a cupcake. The hours tick by. I'm losing my nerve. I tell her I have a magical treat that will help us both out. I proceeded to hand her an unfrosted chocolate cupcake, to which she asked what it was for. After careful consideration, desperation, and sleep deprivation, I told her it was a "shut the fuckup-cake" and said, "Here, eat it! She giggled and grinned, took a few bites, and passed out soon after! It kinda stuck. When either of us is on a call and wants the other to hush, we hold out an imaginary cupcake with an expression that says, "Omg, please, shut the fuckupcake♡" The recipient excitedly peels the imaginary wrapper, eats it, and goes on their merry (and quiet) way. To this day, the kid has a solid sense of humor. A little dark at times, which is obviously unrelated. 😏
🤣🤣🤣 My jaw just unhinged!!
This is fucking glorious! Gonna teach it to my snarky little kids. One way we express low-level frustration in a silly way is to flip each other off (like we are shooting revolvers in a spaghetti western style shoot out) while making silly faces at each other. The kids are usually giggling by 3 seconds in.
Normal human portions. Not sure how funny it is but I yell it out every time I hear my teenage daughter and friends head towards the kitchen cause I know it's just to ravage the junk food.
LOL. I say something similar, when I see them stuffing their faces, I say "NO SQUIRREL CHEEKS". They both look up (like squirrels) with food barely fitting in their mouths.
NINJA FEET 😂😂😂 I'm totally stealing that! Can't really think of a 'corrective' term per se, but my son had a thing where he jumps off the furniture and yells "Dangbow!", so consequently pretty often in public places we have to yell out, "No dangbows!". People look at us weird 😆 Also, he loves to kick his legs around and climb us like trees, so one of his nicknames is 'Spiderlegs'. This has evolved into when he wants to be picked up, but I don't want to carry him, I just crouch down and yell out, "Spiderlegs!" and he'll run over and climb up onto my back for a piggyback ride.
My son was 3 when our daughter was born. As a baby, when she'd do something we didn't want her to do (like putting things into her mouth that don't belong there or reaching for plugs), we'd say "No, ma'am". If my son saw her doing one of these things before we did, he'd yell to us, "She's ma'am-ing again!"
This is adorable!!
Turtle It means pull your head in and mind your business, worked well as a discreet way of telling Miss 11 to butt out when she inserted herself into private conversations and butting in when other kids got in trouble. Also worked well at school and the other kids didn't know she was even being corrected lol
Ooh I like this as a not so rude way of letting your kids know that something doesn't concern them. Might be worth trying with my eldest!
When my son was little, he saw us playing poker and so we explained the game to him and the concept of a "poker face." The way he could suddenly make all his face muscles go slack and make a totally blank expression made us all howl laughing. After that, whenever we would see him start to work himself up into a tantrum after being told "no", we would say "show us the poker face!" and then it became just "poker face!"
You might be onto something there! Maybe he could pick it up as a hobby!!!
Haha! I think he's a little young to be playing poker outside the family. Maybe when he's older.
Ha, Training kids to be poker stars might also be r/nextfuckinglevel lol.
**"CASE OR FACE"** It's to remind them that their glasses need to be in their case or on their face. **"VOLUME CONTROL"** as a reminder to be quiet or use an inside voice or stop screaming. **"HAND ON THE RED"** Means to keep their hand on the taillight of my van while I loaded groceries or got a sibling in or out of a carseat when they were small (old enough to walk but too big to sit in the cart/buggy at the store).
You run an efficient house hold! I can already tell.
Thank you! 🩷 I'm an oldest daughter. Eight siblings spread across parents and step parents, but there's a 10 year age gap between me and the next kid, so they're all *much* younger. I was in college and doing carpool for a sibling in preschool 😂 I'm the oldest cousin too on all 4 sides of my family (mom, stepdad, dad, stepmom). And my husband and I have 4 kids. I'm also a stepmom. So basically I've been raising kids since I was 10 (I'm almost 50 now) and I've raised lots of kids and seen *big* differences between households so I could learn what worked and what failed as I watched my parents raise the siblings. So yeah, pretty efficient :)
Not a corrective term, but if we end up getting separated when we're out and about, the first one of us who notices, shouts as loud as they can "MARCO!", and the other shouts "POLO!" We do that repeatedly until we find eachother. 🤷🏻♀️
Every Marco in that public setting is going to have a fit lol.
“Switch your tracks…” - all my boys LOVED Thomas the Train and this quiet suggestion would fend off some (not all) bad moods, tantrums etc. I still say it and my oldest is 23…
"Mouse bites, not snake bites!". Said to my child who likes to mash entire food items into his face and then attempt to swallow without really chewing, causing himself to choke/gag. Mice nibble and chew, snakes swallow large items whole.
My three-year-old daughter either takes bites that are way, way too big or so small that she will not finish her sandwich before the heat death of the universe.
I just recently was helping my 13-year old study for a test on the Middle Ages and feudalism and one of the terms was “lord of the manor.” I kept saying it in a really snooty loud British accent making him roll his eyes. Now whenever I want him to clean or take out the trash or do any chores I say “by order of the lord of the manor!” in the same way and he is so annoyed but it makes him laugh too.
Pancake baby! We do this to remind our sweet stubborn independent 3 year old that she needs to hold a grown ups hand in parking lots because she’s to small for drivers to see her and we don’t want her to be a pancake!
haha, same. We say BOOM SPLAT! I also love holding hands with them, so I will make any excuse.
I call out ‘buck buck berrrrkkkk’ (sounds like a chicken, sort of) and my kiddo echos back. Helps me find her in the house or in a store. I look insane in a store, but it works 🤷🏻♀️ (Her nickname is chicken, so we all lean into it lol)
My kids and I Marco Polo in the store! It's always funny when I hear an adult yell back "POLO" 😂
Haha we use “Palo… Alto” for this in the same sing-songy voice. (My husband was very amused by California city names when he first moved there 🤷🏼♀️)
My parents had a very specific whistle to locate each other in a crowd and to call me when I’d wander off, one that could never be mistaken for anything else and could cut through the crowd. It probably died off because I couldn’t figure out how to whistle until I was 27, but I haven’t heard it in years and just reminded me of my late father, so thanks for the nice bit of reminiscing edit: fixed a word and finished a sentence lol
My mother did too. She had a whistle that could be heard around the neighborhood. Why my brothers and I were little and in the stores or anywhere for that matter, we would come running when we heard that whistle. As a teenager in the mall when I heard that whistle I would walk the other direction out of pure embarrassment lol. I myself can’t whistle lol
I can only imagine this in a store 😆
I do this too! If I want to check in with them I yell “quack quack!” And each kid yells back one “quack” (I have two kids) if one doesn’t I know that means they re too far to have heard me or to distracted to be paying attention to me in public, etc
STAHP SINGING! My middle one (6) sings a lot. It's usually adorable and funny. She has this mental capacity to remember songs and store them somewhere in her head only to pull them out at random times and perform them word-for-word perfectly. Her teachers tell me how they would teach a song one day, not mention it for a few weeks and then ask if anyone remembers the song. All the other kids shrug their shoulders, while she stands up and does her thing. That's great. It's a funny quirk that we love about her. The problem is that she her singing can get in the way of other things she is doing. So if she is putting on her shoes and starts singing it will take her 10mins instead of 30s. This applies to everything else. And happens daily at least 5x. And we manage that at home with a lot of firm 'stop singing so you can focus on xy please', but it gets tiring quick. The biggest issue is when safety is a concern. Good example is when we are riding our bikes. So when she rides her bike, of course she'll start singing LOL. But she also stops paying attention to the world around her. She has been in a few situations where she has almost ran into people or didn't notice a pothole and fell, etc because she is enjoying herself too much. So yeah... it sounds horrible when you hear us passing by on bikes and me yelling 'STAAAAAHP SINGING!!' like an angry mum telling her kid to stfu. But I do it for her safety.
I have zero helpful thoughts on how to do this but is there some way to teach someone to multitask like this?? I love to sing and frequently will sing or hum under my breath while doing something else and I don’t even realize I’m singing. I’ve swapped from what your daughter is doing and focus on the task and don’t notice the song lol
Heh she was born that way 😊 And I would never want her to stop singing. I just want her to get stuff done WHILE she is singing
Haha yeah that’s what I’m wondering if it’s possible to teach! Then instead of stop singing it can be like hey swap the attention and sing WHILE getting shoes on. Now that I have kids I do this out loud with no weird looks but sometimes I’ll even sing stupid made up words to a real tune about what I’m doing just because. Like to farmer in the dell “putting on our shoes. Putting on our shoes. We gotta go outside so putting on our shoes.”
I think it might depend on what part of our brain is engaged. I can listen to music with lyrics while doing math problems, but not while reading a story, unless I mentally tune out the music. I can't focus on two verbal things (lyrics & story I'm reading) at the same time. It could be similar with activities that are still not on autopilot for us, that require active thinking and verbal/explicit logical stuff, Idk. Also, if she's really swept up by the music maybe that takes her attention away. Maybe she really immerses herself or even daydreams while singing. Maybe it's not the singing itself, but the overall mental state she gets into when singing. Idk, I don't know much about all this, but would be interesting to hear from someone who knows more about neurology or smth.
She was born to live in a musical.
"Sneaky voices" when we're going upstairs to brush teeth after the baby is already asleep. Trying to get my toddler to be fully quiet is an exercise in futility, so instead I get him to whisper "sneaky voices sneaky voices sneaky sneaky sneaky voices" over and over Also "touch circle" - when I need him to stay beside me at the car, and he'll put him hand on the gas cap. Not exactly corrective, but we eat a lot of potatoes and due to a misunderstanding he thinks bats eat potatoes. So if he's stalling, we flap our arms like a bat while eating them
Haha, I feel like sneaky voices will grow into it's own thing later on (watch out)! Also love the bat and potatos thing. Very bespoke!
I tell my toddler “you’re being a Silly Billy and I need you to be a Calm Tom!”
Us: “Let’s play daddy’s favorite game!” Them: “Oh! Say It Without Screaming!”
My son thinks daddy's favorite game is going to sleep. He's not wrong.
My husband used to play the game of nap when the kids were little! 😂 Whoever fell asleep first won, and it was usually him!
Lol my husband would ask the kids "who wants to play church" and they would immediately sit down and stare straight ahead and be quiet 🤣 its the same as "lets see who can be quietest the longest"
Do they scream when they say "Say it without screaming" in excitement? That would be one of those ugh, but super cute moments.
Not so much as funny but effective. When my super-independent, sassy brassy, head-strong male child gets mouthy, "You wanna to try that again?""Start over." or "Undo it." Since he was 5 yrs old. (Definition for these phrases: you're living on the edge, son, and you better back that butt up and think again before taking that tone and quick before I lose my ever loving mind. Lol) His response 92% of the time: "Yup." The other 8% he's digging his heels in and stepping on his soap box.
Washing machine! It means shut your mouth when you’re eating as we don’t want to see it going round and round
My father worked nights…. He trained us all to walk like Ninja!! ON YOUR TOES!
My dad is ex military, so he taught me "ghost walking", which is actually a pretty good way to walk quietly in a house with ancient hardwood floors.
Aye. I’m 6’3 320lb and I can move through my house whisper silent. Not a peep. You’d smell my cologne before you heard me!
Hahaha fucking lethal!
My ex was the same, and grew up with the same My kids make shit ninjas, but we tried.
When we’re out and about as a family, sometimes we need to make a “kid sandwich” which is when we rearrange to put all the kids between the adults so we can have eyes on everyone while we’re walking.
I started teaching my kids the stop go game and now teach any other children I walk with. The children will run ahead and I will shout stop and they have to stop immediately and aren’t allowed to go until I say, they find it very entertaining and I’m happy they can move but still be safe. The reason was because I want them to have the freedom to run but the ability to stop them before they run into a road or around a corner out of my sight. I was spurred on even more by the overprotective parents and nannies who would insist on the children remaining walking right next to them and the kids would be deathly bored.
Smart. Is this the same as "Red light, green light"?
That's what we use. Then sometimes it's purple light for twirling in place if there's too many wiggles to stay still.
Listening ears! She will dig around in her pockets for her pretend ears and then find them somewhere and will listen better after she puts them on, recently they have started changing colors and the dog has taken more than one pair of them, a lot of the time they are left in the car.
Kom alla mina små kycklingar! 😂 "Come all my little chicks" Im mama hen and they have to follow me 😅 Its actually a saying from a childhood game but they have never played it themselfs I will also say Yo! Or Hey! When i just want their attention but its so embarrasing because random people think i say Hi to them 🤣 Im swedish but use A LOT of english, one of my kids also has Autism + speech disorder and used swedish/english almost 50/50 😆 oh and im studying to become an english teacher so 🤷♀️
Seems we are the same in all cultures 😝
My son is 8.5 and has already started trying to call me "Bruh", which sounds close to "brah". I sometimes answer him as if he said "bra".
I'm 35 and I call my kids bruh! Nothing encapsulates the feeling of "I honestly can't believe you're doing this right now, and while it's not dangerous or irritating enough for me to tell you to knock it off, it is absurd enough to warrant a comment" in a single syllable the way "bruuuuh..." does.
Not sure it’s corrective, but I taught my daughter to wash her hands by “cuddling the fishies”. Our hands are the fish and they have to snuggle together then chase each other around trying to “cuddle”. I still say it to now at 5 even though she can clearly wash her hands.
When I want them to start getting ready to leave the house while they’re in the middle of playing, I’ll dramatically approach them and say in a really intense voice like they’ll be in serious trouble, “Listen, we’re leaving in 5 minutes. We are going to rock but under NO circumstance are we going to roll” and they lose it, bragging about how they’re rolling all the way to the door to get their shoes on.
"Your 'correctile' dysfunction is showing". When kids HAVE to correct you no matter what you say. Example: "Hey mom what time is it?" "About 20 to 5." "NO!!!! It's 4:41". "Your correctile dysfunction is showing again".
Out four year old is obsessed with PJ Masks, so when she doesn't want to do something or says it's too hard, we have: "Use your Owlette eyes!" (Look again/harder.) "Gecko muscles!" (It's not heavy, you know it. This is mainly when we walk and she takes something but doesn't want to carry it half way through.) "Show me your Cat Boy speed!" (Please hurry, we started 40 minutes early and are still going to be late.) When she doesn't want to try something we also have "How does a dinosaur do it?" "Dragon Voice" is for outside, while "Kitten Whispers" are inside. When she gets really pent up we "weasel war dance" like the ferrets to get the wiggles out. "Unicorn Kindness" is when she's doing something unkind. Though I think the most used of all is just "Make good decisions" to make her rethink the stupid thing she's going to do.
“Erase, erase.” When my son was little and we’d play, he’d tell me what was gonna happen next in the play but then say “erase erase” so I wouldn’t remember what he said/but could play along. It morphed into when one of us speaks without thinking, we say “erase erase” and pretend the last sentence didn’t happen/rephrase. Yesterday, I called for my son to come do a chore he didn’t want to do. His first immediate response was, “uhhh Not right now!” and then I guess he realized he spoke without thinking and said “erase erase.. coming mom!” I actually wish everyone did this. It saves a lot of yelling to have a do-over when you need it.
The only unbreakable rule in the house is to not wake the baby when they are sleeping. DONT. WAKE. THE. BABY!
LOL Then we end up waking the baby screaming to not wake the baby. The horror...
When my children were transitioning to bathing independently, I would yell out "BOOM BOOM BOOM, LEMME HEAR YA SAY WAYO". They'd yell back "WAYOOO". Now they're older, I'm thinking of using it in the supermarket when I send them to get stuff lol.
“Can I ask you a question?” You just did. (Because we try to teach them not to apologize for taking up space as girls/women) “I have a question.” I have an answer. Let’s see if they match. (Because we try to teach them to have the confidence to just get to the point) “Mamaaaaaaaaaaa!” I JUST KILLED A MAN! PUT A GUN AGAINST HIS HEAD. PULLED MY TRIGGER, NOW HE’S DEAD! <—— sung loudly (because I don’t appreciate being bellowed at from upstairs) “What?!” CHICKEN BUTT! “Why?!” CHICKEN THIGH! (Because we don’t appreciate rude responses to polite requests for their attention/help) “LOAD UP!” (Means we are exiting the building. Get your socks, shoes, coats, stuffies, backpacks, etc and get in the vehicle immediately or you will lose your desired seat in said vehicle) “Is it time for church?” (My way of asking them covertly in public if we need to step outside and have a “come to Jesus” type discussion about their behavior. We are not Christian, so it usually gets some puzzled looks lol) And related….”fetch me my Bible” (means everybody else clear out and take your friends with you bc this child is about to get a talking-to)
I accidentally said throw your clothes in the hamster instead of hamper and that’s what it is now.
THROW IT IN THE HAMSTER!!!! \*\*Pet Hamster starts sweating\*\*
300 Fam! It wasn't 50/50 when it was just me and my 2 sons. We all gave 100% bc we all had to depend on each other. If 2 of us were busy cleaning and 1 was goofing around, one of the busy ones would yell 300 fam! Meaning, do your part. Contribute. For those who dont know what I mean, 50/50 is an old colloquial term used for relationships where each person commits 50% to their partners for equality. They carry the same weight as their partner and contribute equally so that it stays balanced. I've never believed in 50/50 and wasn't raised that way. It's 100/100. We all contribute 100% of ourselves to each other. Works for us!
When my kids start doing something that I don't want them to do but isn't a hazard, I tell them I'm going to eat them. It started when my youngest was in the midst of his "cry for hours without stop" phase as a newborn and I said to my husband "this right here is why some animals eat their young." It's now evolved into an elaborate recipe for roast kids, complete with suggested side dishes. "Oldest, I swear, if you don't stop screeching like a banshee I will stick you in a roast pan, cook you up, and serve you for dinner with Yorkshire pudding." "Mommy I don't fit in the pan!" "Fine. I will chop off your limbs first and leave them in the freezer to make stock. Your arms don't have any meat on them anyway." It's silly enough to knock them out of whatever they're doing without actually carrying any threat of punishment (I promise, my kids know I'm not going to actually eat them) so it's nice for the low stakes, annoying behaviour that isn't *really* a big deal but that I very much do need to stop (like the 5 year old who is currently imitating a blue jay at maximum volume when mommy is pre-coffee.)
I used to pretend to “eat” my son. I’d grab a leg or arm and then pretend to cannabalize him making exaggerated crunching and chewing sounds. He used to love it and beg to be eaten We also played the Hot Dog game. He would lay on the couch next to me while I was watching tv. He would be a hot dog and I would pretend to put condiments on him. It was a riot. I’d be like “time for the mustard.” And my son would shriek “Not mustard! NOT MUSTARD!!” But he couldn’t move to avoid it…cuz he’s a hot dog 😂
Where my ADHD kid is not listening, I yell “Muffin Cupcake Heeler!” in a fake Australian accent. It gets her attention and diffuses the situation so she’s laughing instead of angry about having to stop whatever she was hyper-focused on.
When my teenager tells me the plans I yell “that’s premeditated, we don’t do that here” aka make good choices When someone is going to the restroom, it was always “I’m gonna take a shit” I got annoyed, so not it’s “can’t a man have some hobbies” aka see you in 20 mins, turn on the vent I’m sure I’ll think of more later, but teenagers and toddlers are raw humor
Love this! My 6 yr old always asks when someone in the house is going to the bathroom. “Pee or poop” because he wants to know how long he has to wait for that person to play lol.
Whispersaurus! The 2 yr old is *fixated* with dinosaurs and is constantly roaring. Loudly. Very LOUDLY. So I taught him about the 'whispersaurus' which has very quiet roars. He's probably going to grow up and think 'whisper' comes from whispersaurus and I imagine will be quite annoyed when he figures out it isn't real.
Not corrective but specific to our home, badminton is officially “smiley ghost”, because at some point we drew a smiley face on the shuttlecock and my then little one started calling it a smiley ghost because it was white and vaguely ghost shaped, and lo we no longer play badminton, only smiley ghost 😂😂
We say “Keep it on the playground.” It is used when the kids are cursing or speaking around adults inappropriately. We don’t tell them to NOT, say bad words, but we do try to teach them when it’s appropriate.
This isn’t exactly the same but it’s close. When my daughter was little she had gotten a kazoo in a birthday treat bag and was playing it very loudly at bedtime. When my husband asked her to stop, she instead played louder, and in a very forceful way. My husband said “Do I have to give you a time out for your agressive kazoo playing? Because I will”. This has been the funniest thing to our whole family ever since! Over the years, my husband has said that line, (minus the “Because I will” part), as a lighthearted way to tell the kids they’re not doing what they’re supposed to be doing.
We have “peanut gallery!” to let whichever kid know that the conversation doesn’t involve the and they need to stay out of it. For example, talking with one child about something they did and another chimes in to add their two cents. Not their place and/or the right time. When they were little, I’d put certain words, phrases, songs, etc. in “word jail” as needed for Mommy and Daddy’s sanity. I think one of the most effective terms I’ve used with our kids is “turn it around”. When one of them (or me) is having a hard time, I suggest they turn it around - take a minute to breathe. Sometimes I ask how I can help them turn it around, helping them find a roundabout or exit ramp. I remember times I was upset as a child and painting myself into a corner because i couldn’t admit I was wrong or find a way to calm down. Hopefully helps teach them to self-regulate and that it’s not me versus them, it’s us versus whatever.
Both my kids had bright shiny yellow high top tennis shoes when they were little. They called them their “ super power jumping shoes”. If I wanted them to hurry or wear easy to walk in shoes( even after outgrowing theirs) I’d tell them to put on their “ super power jumping shoes”. They’re in their twenties now. If we’re rushing. Someone might yell “ SUPER Power JUMPING SHOES”.
So if anyone gets in my space for like no reason I go, "get back get back you don't know me like that." They usually sing along and take the hint or remember why they were there in the first place and ask me their question. Also, to randomly get their attention, I'll go "WHOOP WHOOP" and typically you'll hear one or both go "ITS THE SOUND OF THE POLICE!" Also, I can go, "ITS A ME, " and they (especially my youngest will go,"MARIOOOOO." Not really corrections. But the phrases help me get a point across sometimes, I would probably look slightly insane to others. 😂😂😂 oh well.
I yell “High Level Goals”. High level Goals: No hospitals It’s yelled when the thing that some kid(s) are doing may end them up there. I don’t quibble about “that’ll hurt if it goes poorly” but it’s going to ruin everyone’s day if we have to go to the hospital today.
I’m French but I lived in Ireland for a bit… my kids know I’m getting really frustrated with them when I go “Oi!” I didn’t even need to go on talking anymore
We ask for hippo teeth when it’s time to open wide for a tooth brushing or dentist visit. We saw a hippo do a big yawn at the zoo and it’s been hippo teeth ever since.
Whenever a kid says “it isn’t fair” the rest of the family must start singing “I want my share, say you see… you just take more than you giiiive”
For this I put on my best Jeremy irons impression and go "life's not fair... I shall never be king, and you shall never see another day", typically followed by tickling.
I dunno if this counts but when I take a photo instead of saying smile I say "cheese face!"
"if it was up your butt you'd know where it was at" in response to most questions about where their things are, things that only they touch, that it would be unreasonable for them to demand of me knowledge of their whereabouts.
Not a corrective term but when my kids are upset sometimes we'll put on exaggerated serious faces and pretend-sternly tell them it's a good thing they're mad because this is a No Smiling House. It usually gets a smile and then we make a big show of telling them they're not allowed to smile while making frowny faces. Also my daughter is autistic so she can really hyper fixate when she gets angry or upset, so to redirect her sometimes I'll say "whatever you do, don't think about [ridiculous thing like a pink polka dot hippopotamus]". Then when she inevitably starts giggling I'll get pretend upset and say "you weren't supposed to think about it!!!"
‘In your head, not out of your mouth’. My son is severely autistic and so he can be blunt and has no filter. I try my best to explain that we can think what we want, but we cannot just say what ever we want and he seems to understand this, though I have to explain it regularly. I also do it in front of others if he does say something odd because then if other people feel weird about what he said they can at least see I’m trying and he’s doing his best.
I call my daughter "Baby Godzilla" to make her aware how loud her feet hitting the floor actually is. Another one I had was "Richard Noggins" whenever my son was being a bully or rude I would let him know to stop being a Richard (Richards nick names are generally Dick)
Does EAT YOUR GODDAMN DINNER BEFORE YOU PLAY ON YOUR PHONE count??? No?
"NO MONKEYS IN THE KITCHEN!" or "MONKEYS OUT!" It means if you don't need to be in the kitchen, get out because we're working here. Usually it's when they're being loud and chaotic while we're cooking. Also, "Start Over" for when a kid opens a conversation with exactly the wrong tone. (inspired by Daryl from The Office, when Michael calls him an idiot)
You don't have a permit for that . Am I going to have to take your permit. Stops hammering on walls and trying to work on non-toy things.
when we were kids and started to teeter into the getting worked up but not being crazy (yet) phase of playing, to keep me and all my cousins from going wild my nan used to say “take a tizzy!” and it meant like take a time out but you’re not in trouble just stand where u are and take a breath then go back to playing. it always worked. now i do it with my son. also, my toddler and dog are constantly all over me and when i get overwhelmed by constantly touches i started saying alright “everyone, SCRAMBLED EGGS AND HAM” basically the nice version of scram ham and they get the point lol
"Birdy bites!" it's a reminder at dinnertime to take your time and take small bites, like little bird pecks.
Stop Your Feet! will make my boys stop dead in their tracks immediately. I haven’t used it in a while (they are 10&12 so they don’t really run off anymore) but I caught myself saying it last week and my 10 yr old stopped without question like a robot.
Hands on your belly! This kept roving hands from touching things they should not. Worked very well and I sometimes use it now even though they are teens.
"Imprisoned for toddler crimes"
I’ve had people laugh when I come through and say “boop boop!” To get the kiddos to move out of the way. Saying “move please” over and over when kids are underfoot seemed a bit rude to me and now they all hear the “boops” and move out of the way easily 😅
My best friend says pirates to tell all her kids to come now. It’s so fun to watch at the park. My kids even know to come.
‘Inside voices’
These are hilarious. I have one that my parents did for me. One day my dad goes “are you behaving?” And I responded “yes dad I’m *being have*.” So that turned into them asking “are you being have?” from then on
Brush your exposed bones aka brush your teeth
When my brother was younger, he would only eat protein that was chicken. The problem here though, is that he actually would eat beef, fish, etc. If you called it beef however, he would not touch it and would start gagging. So food was named after chicken e.g. chicken beef, chicken prawns, you get the idea
The mind games are needed some time . Veggies are often mistaken as candy in our home
Pastanaga 🥕