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Parents, would you believe me if I told you your children are thankful for discipline? I have to admit it’s not the first thing that would have come to my mind, but I had an enlightening discussion with a young man last week whom most would say has taken the wrong path in life and is working hard to make new choices. He commented on how disappointed he was when his mother stopped spanking him at 12 because he took that to mean that she had given up on him. Interesting. And a professor of mine in graduate school loved to relay the story of his nearly teenage daughter begging him to allow her to attend a forbidden overnight at her friend’s home. He firmly held his ground and was shocked when his daughter thanked him as soon as she got off phone with her friend for holding firm. She needed him to be the “no” that she wasn’t yet ready to say for herself. Now I feel sure no child wants to be disciplined, but a clear indication of what is right and wrong (with appropriate consequences attached) is a vital gift to our children.

I’m certainly not holding myself up as some paragon of discipline. I struggle all the time with whether I am being too hard or too soft on baby J, with being consistent in my dealings with him, and with figuring out the nuances of appropriate consequences based on his age and the infraction. It’s important enough to be worth the effort to try to get better at it – better in the sense of more appropriate, more effective, and more consistent. I find myself asking other parents all the time what they do to discipline their child(ren). Do they spank? Do they use time outs? Where do they stick the kid during time out? For what offenses and for how long is the child isolated? What about the difference between intentional and unintentional offenses? How exactly do they spank their child – with their hand or a paddle of some sort? How hard do they spank and how do you know how hard you are spanking? What about other ideas beyond these two standard approaches?

Discipline takes far more work and thoughtfulness than I ever anticipated. As a child, I remember my parents disciplining me (and yes, they did spank me - I don’t think time outs were in vogue in the early ‘70s), but I can’t say that I thought about it from a parent’s perspective until I became a mother myself. Deciding what offenses require a response can be tricky and then being consistent in my discipline measures even when I’m tired or distracted or just don’t want to takes a good measure of self-discipline too. There’s also the learning curve of not being terribly sure what will work with your child. I remember smacking baby J’s hands sometime around 14 months for some offense because I had read somewhere that this would be effective. Well, perhaps it works for some children, but not for mine. He looked at me quizzically and then laughed. This went on for maybe two weeks before I moved on to other methods.

In this season of Thanksgiving, discipline is a strange thing to count among our blessings, but it is a gift we can give our children that will bring dividends to them and all they encounter for their entire lives. So if you’re tired, distracted, or feeling too lazy to cope, hang in there. Someday your children may surprise you with thanks for your guidance and faithfulness in this area. And if you’ve got some ideas about what has worked for you and what has not worked too, I’d love to hear them.