We’ve introduced a new parenting regime here this week. 1-2-3 Magic is a novel approach for us, in that it involves the parents being in charge (I know, right? Groundbreaking stuff!), and wielding their almighty power without nagging, raised voices, or cursing the day their offspring was born.
Basically, it’s a ‘three strikes’ system by which Boy-Child (and Baby Girl, once she’s old enough) will be ‘counted’ for inappropriate behaviours like arguing and disobedience. If the count reaches three, the kid is calmly sent to its room and must stay there for one minute per year of its life.
That’s it! It really seems like it should be a little more complicated than that, but we’re four days in and so far so good. We’ve seen a huge improvement in Boy-Child’s behaviour and responsiveness already; I’m actually worried I might run out of blogging material if he keeps this up!
However, my husband has suddenly become more argumentative than usual. It wasn’t until he started counting himself last night (‘Daddy, that’s one.’) that I realised – he’s hoping to be sent to his room for thirty-six minutes of quiet alone time. Wise guy.
Edited to add: I guess if I run out of child-related antics to blog about, I can always depend on my husband to come up with the goods. I could just change the title of the blog to ‘Wife’s Life of Strife’ or something. Good to know I have options.
Edited again to add: In a slightly hilarious turn of events, the child who has insisted that he is ‘nearly SIX’ since turning five last month was just heard furiously muttering in his room ‘I wish I was TWO YEARS OLD again, not stupid five. Stupid five minutes…’ (and so on).
Mummy Spits the Dummy 
That is a very cool idea. When my son was younger we used to do Time Out between 1-5 minutes. First two minutes seems effective but after that, he starts forgetting why he was timed out in the first place. Short attention span like me. Nowadays, no iPhone games does the trick which he really looks forward on weekends. Thanks for sharing your post. Have a fun weekend.
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Yes, we have had the same issue here. That, and he was getting so worked up and angry about being in timeout that it would take another thirty minutes or more (plus extra timeouts if he got physical!) to cool him off afterwards. This is working much better because the time out is more of a circuit-breaker than a punishment – he can play or read or whatever in his room for 5, then come out and we don’t mention the behaviour or make him apologise, just get on with our day.
If he refuses to go to his room, I give him the option of losing a privilege instead (No Wii?? A fate worse than DEATH!) – so far he’s chosen to take 5 every time!
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