Grandparents Spoiling Too Much? Where to Draw the Line?

Get a couple of totes and divide her toys into them. Put one in the garage or basement and the other can be left out for to have toys to play with. Exchange them every two months.

Once you are able to move "forget" one of the totes at grandma's house. this way she will have toys to play with when you visit.

As you go through her things toss out any incomplete games or broken toys.

Your situation is complex. However, I have a suggestion for part of it. Stop taking away things as discipline. Taking away a toy that is unrelated to the wrong behavior doesn't teach her to correct way to behave. It just makes her angry, as you've learned. Make the consequence related to the offense.

My daughter uses a form of time out that works for many offenses related to getting along with parents. For example,when a child back talks, they go to their room until they can come back out and apologize.
When they refuse to do something, they go to their room until they agree to do it. They can then come out to do it.

So, when she's disrespectful, tell her that she's being disrespectful and send her to her room and tell her she can come out when she apologizes. Do this after you've at first spent time with her when all is calm and have explained the plan.

Calmly discuss what actions/words are respectful and what are disrespectful. Include her in the conversation by asking her what she thinks is respectful and what is disrespectful. Make it an open and friendly discussion over several days.

As to the situation with your father, have a calm friendly discussion about what is happening with the numerous toys and gifts with the goal to come up with a plan that is acceptable to both of you. Be willing to compromise. Suggest that both of you will have to compromise. An example of a compromise could be to agree that he can buy her something once/week or that he can spend a set amount of money per month.

I'm a grandma and I had difficulty with buying too much. It is such fun to have a little one who is so pleased with gifts. And......as a grandparent, we are now more settled, may have more money, and want to provide more than we had as kids or were able to give our kids. Also, it really is a grandparent's job to spoil their grandkids to a certain extent. Did you have a close grandparent growing up? Mine thought the world of me and were able to pay more attention to me than my parents much of the time. I thrived under their unconditional love that did include things my parents couldn't buy me. They were much more reserved about it than I was with my grandkids because they lived in another state and didn't have much money.

When you live with your parents I suggest you have more going on than just gifts and spoiling. Your parents are also parenting your child. You need to find a way to agree on how to parent your daughter. Spend time, over time, talking about parenting roles. Together, make rules and decide upon consequences for misbehavior that everyone can agree to be consistent about.

Talking together needs to go on every day as you work out a plan that everyone can agree upon. Only talk when everyone is calm and nothing is going on. Perhaps have a set time each week when the adults get together and talk about the week and decide what worked well and what you want to change.

It is very very important to be calm and consistent in discipline. Always send her to her room when she's disrespectful. Tell her she's being disrespectful and to go to her room. You may have to guide her there at first. When she does come out and apologize, repeat why she was sent to her room, ask her what would be appropriate way for her to act, and give her a hug.

Which reminds me. Focusing on what she does right more than what she does wrong makes a big difference in behavior. Give her lots of legitimate praise. Experts say we should tell a child when they're being good 5 times more often than telling them when they've misbehaved. Watch and catch her being good. Children want to please their parents. Work on making your relationship with your daughter a positive, loving and friendly one. When you have to discipline be sure to remain calm and use a neutral tone of voice.

I found Love and Logic by Foster Cline especially helpful both when I was raising my daughter and now with my grandchildren. I think you can find it in the library or look it up online for a summary.

Get your mom and dad to go see the ped with you. Tell the ped's office when you make the appointment that it's for "behavioral concerns". This way they will book you for longer than a regular appointment. Don't take your daughter with you.

Explain to the ped in front of your parents what is happening with your daughter. Don't mince words. Say it straight out. Then let the doctor tell your parents that they are going to turn your daughter into an awful teenager if they don't stop.

Btw, I'd choose a male doctor because I think your father will listen to a man better than a woman.

If your dad wants to spend money on his granddaughter, he should be contributing to a college fund.

You are not overreacting. If you don't get your parents to stop diminishing your role as a mother, you'll have a terrible time with her when you do move out on your own.

Dawn

I have to disagree with the poster who advised sending her to her room and no longer taking things away as discipline.

Her room is her own special place and full of toys and other things to amuse her. Sending a child to her own room as a form of discipline teaches her nothing at all -- other than she gets to have a forced "vacation" in a space full of her fun stuff when she misbehaves. "Go in your room and come out when you can apologize" is basically saying "Go have fun with your stuff and come out when you feel like it."

Taking away things she values can indeed help if you take the right things at the right time. Don't say that doing X today will lose her thing Y tomorrow; the loss needs to be immediate. And be sure you take what she really, really values. If she loves TV time, then if she talks back, be clear that she will lose TV time that day and next as well. (She is old enough that the discipline should be tougher, so I'd do the next day too if she really gets mouthy with you.) If she loves computer game time, take that. But before you do any of it, when things are going well and she is calm and you and she are not in conflict, sit down with her and have a talk. Script your part beforehand so you don't get flustered if she pulls the entitled act. Tell her that you are starting a new type of consequences in your home and lay out for her what happens when she does certain behaviors. Don't get into "when you did this last week" things -- that is the past. Just say that it's time for new rules. If she says, "But taking away my DS doesn't have anything to do with me talking back to you!" tell her honestly that talking back (or whatever the offense is) is the behavior, and the object you choose to take away is one she values. She makes a bad choice for behavior, she loses something she values. The connection is that you do not get to have extra things you like and value if you cannot make good choices.

She does also need to learn from you what respectful speech is. So if she says something that's not respectful, let everything stop, turn to her and say, "I don't think you meant to say that in that way. Would you like to apologize and try again?" If she's smart she'll do just that even if it's to avoid losing her TV time/DS/whatever. The key is that she needs to know in advance what will happen if she sasses, and she needs to have that chance to apologize and correct herself. Be sure to thank her for correcting herself and praise her when she's gone a while without talking back.

The hard part will be getting grandad to follow those rules too. You and he need a serious, sit-down talk where you are the adult and parent talking, not his child who is living in his home again. The fact you're his kid in his house is making him feel he can do what he likes, but he needs to see and hear you as an adult woman who is in charge of her own child. Do approach him with love and gratitude, lots of it, but try to enlist his help -- rather than criticize his actions. "Dad, I know your gifts to Sally come from loving her. But I am seeing attitudes that, if they start at this age, are going to be real problems for all of us by the time she's 10 or 12. I really need your help here, talking parent to parent...."

If he balks, keep saying no to his gifts and work to get out of his household all the sooner. You don't want to wreck things with him but he is undermining you. He does not realize that eight is a tough age and kids who learn to feel entitled and manipulative (she is manipulating you both by going to him when you say no!) are going to keep that lesson for a long time and use it.

Finally, tell her that you and she are going to start donating clothes and toys of hers AND YOURS to charity every month; talk about kids who need the most basic things like food and clothing. Then do it. Donate. Collect a few cans of food and put them in the charity bin at the grocery store (many do have them). Emphasize that she is blessed, fortunate, and it's time you and she started giving back even a little bit, even though you are saving up for your own place. She needs to learn that she is not the center of the universe, which is something grandpa is letting her be right now.

i think you are a sensible mama. your parents are awesome but need to listen to you. surely you can have a quiet, mature conversation with your dad that opens with you expressing gratitude for the help they've given you, and for their loving relationship with your daughter, and then moves onto your concerns and how to meet in the middle.
it's a difficult position to be in, but your intuitive parenting and sense of boundaries had to come from somewhere! enlist your parents' help and get them on your side.
good luck, mama!
khairete
S.

You cant make him stop, trust me Ive tried with my inlaws. Just throw away or donate what you dont want. I would try encouraging him to treat her to an experience instead of more stuff. For example, he could take her to a movie or a trip to chuckie cheese instead of buying something she already has a ton of. If you put it that way, like what she wants is time with him instead of stuff, maybe it will help.

Your dad can buy as much as he wants, but as her mother, you are free to take away as much as you want. If your daughter misbehaves she'll lose her things, your dad can always buy her new things but if she's bad, she can lose those as well. You are free to par down things no matter who bought them, just as if you were in your own home. When your child receives gifts, you are free to go through her old things and find them new homes. If you don't you'll end up drowning in stuff.

It's true that grandparents are allowed to spoil their grandkids, but that's usually assuming the grandkids don't get to see their grandparents all that often. When the spoiler and the spoilee live in the same house and see each other every day, moderation must be enforced or you'll end up with a tiny monster who grows up to put a licence plate on her car that says "Daddy bought it but I got it!"

You can't control what your dad spends his money on. You CAN control what you bag up and take to goodwill. Let him moan about it. Tell him if he stops buying, you'll stop bagging. <3

I agree that he needs to make it an experience when he buys, like a zoo membership. If you could get him to start a college fund or you could open her one that he could contribute to, that would be good. Maybe a fund for a car. Something where he could see it grow because he really likes the way it makes him feel to see her happy.

You and her need to bond over something. Read together.
Get Laura Ingles Wilder's "The Long Winter" and read a few pages together every night. It will open eyes to gratitude and inequities.

No, you are not over reacting!!!! I was in a similar situation and I live in my own house!!!! DH had to make it very clear to his mom that just bc she has the $ to buy whatever the girls want, doesn't mean they need it. We want them to understand that somethings must be earned and won't always be given to them. And we also to prevent his mom from making us to look like the "bad guy".

Anyway, in my opinion, you may have 2 options here. 1) Put your foot down (respectfully of course) with your dad. 2) Perhaps move.

i agree with momof1andahalf.. he may feel insulted if you tell him he needs to stop buying her things. but i think it will go over alot better if you tell him that shed rather do thing with him than get things from him.. remind him that he is what she loves, not the things he buys her.. it will mean alot more to him if you say it that way
-- also take notice of what things she doesnt ever use/play with and just get rid of them
--and yes you are her mom you are in charge, you determine when shes misbehaving and she needs to have a toy taken away.. talk to her, shes 8 shell understand, tell her that she should consider herself lucky that her grandpa buys her so many things and that she shouldnt just expect that from him.. let her know how many little kids there are out there who dont get any toys.. maybe that will change her attitude

move out. You should be living on your own. You can not expect other people to change. You need to step up and be the parent.
When my husband was killed in a car wreck when I was six weeks pregnant. I only stayed with my parents 3 weeks after the baby was born and then moved into my own place.