Notice how easy it is for a child to pick up a bad habit?
By SwtJenlove
@SwtJenlove (1090)
United States
July 3, 2008 10:30pm CST
Kids pick up things really quick, weather it may be a bad word, a certain way of walking, a certain way of talking, a bad habit that a parent has, etc. My son has picked up quite a bit lately, i guess he is at that stage to where he wants to say everything we say or do everything we do. We have a habit of saying bad words from time to time and so do peolpe we are around, most of the time it is because we slip and then all of the sudden we hear an echo in a child voice. My fiance smokes and lately my son has been taking his cigerette packs and running with them, he has taken them out and broke them, bit the filters off and put one in his mouth and said "smokin". It has gotten worst because he has taken cotton swabs that you clean your ears with and put one in his mouth and would climb on the couch and reach to the counter and grab daddys lighter and put it to the cotton swab and says "smokin" he will put a pen or pencil or anything resembling a cigerette in his mouth and will say "smokin".
With knowing all of that my fiance says to me today "I am thinking about quitting, Watching justin pretending to smoke all the time is really getting to me." That is great! I hope he would quit because not only does that save us money its better for his health and all of ours. I started smoking at 15/16 years old and i quit when i got pregnant with my 2nd son.(which is the one we are having these "smokin" problems with.) i feel alot healthier and im sure if he quits he will too but that will also hopefully get the "smokin" off our sons mind.
1 person likes this
6 responses
@SwtJenlove (1090)
• United States
4 Jul 08
yea i think thats the age when it all starts. my son is 2 and he is a pro at repeating and picking stuff up. i hope my daugheter isnt that bad when she gets this age. she's only 3 months old right now so i have a while till she gets to this stage.
@Rzelikman (141)
• United States
4 Jul 08
Its "monkey see monkey do" and that is how kids are. They watch parents very carefully and pick up on everything. I suppose they look up to us and learn from us as well. It is very important to watch our selves since we don't want our kids to pick up bad habits. Its like we have to teach our selves new tricks in order for our kids not to learn our old ones. Good luck! I think you made a wonderful decision regarding quiting smoking
@SwtJenlove (1090)
• United States
4 Jul 08
Yea its definately "monkey see monkey do" because he knows what end is up on the lighter and everything so yea i hope he quits also. not only for our children but for himself as well. We taught my son to say KaKa when he puts something icky in his mouth so when he bit the cigerette filter off i heard him say "eww kaka" and he hands me the cigerette in 2 pieces lol. He used to break them and throw them in the trash.
@foxyfire33 (10005)
• United States
5 Jul 08
My 3 year old has been swearing like a sailor lately....and then my 5 year old tells on him but yelling to me the bad word! I don't really swear...only once in a while and not around the kids but they hear it from s/o constantly. So I have days like today...5 year old comes running to me and says "Evy just said F*** to Nicky! And he called him a f***ing dumb@ss!" Or like last night when Evy swore about his tricycle...and Ryan proceeded to ask which bad word he said. I told him I was not going to repeat it..."well was it s***? dumb@ss? what the h*ll?" Grrr...Ryan stop swearing! "I just wanted to know what Evy said!" Ugh kids! But s/o won't stop swearing, so I have to keep being the bad guy telling the kids to knock it off.
@Crimson888 (72)
• Singapore
22 Jul 08
I agree with what you say because for me, I think that children will tend to imitate whatever they saw and they will also try whatever they saw because they are still too young to see what is right and also what is wrong...
Hence, it would be better to show the right things in front of the child and also, children will also tend to say the words he/she heard the most and it is very important not to say the wrong words in front of the child..
I am also very glad that you are willing to put in the effort to quit smoking for your child and I am sure your child will be very happy to know that he has such a caring parent....
@forance (151)
• China
5 Jul 08
Wonderful!you're really a good parents.my father had smoken for so a long time until his getting illness.before that,although any of my complaining or persuasion,but always scolded back.
I feel so pain of the second smoke and hate it.but I've a clever nephew,his grandma also a smoker,and thus he took her to a place and showed a paper pasted on the walls,it's written by him -"smoking"
and a strange idea from my mind,it may be a chance to pratise a person's sensible ability.ha-ha!
@lazeebee (5461)
• Malaysia
4 Jul 08
Yup, you are right. If they are very young, like 3-6 years old, they like to mimic the adults around them. I once saw my eldest nephew (he was 5 then) scolding his little brother of 2 years old. The language, the body posture, was exactly like my sister's, when she scolded him for being naughty. So we were very careful, especially with our words, when we are near the kids - they pick up faster than a sponge.
@SwtJenlove (1090)
• United States
4 Jul 08
I thought picking the pack of cigerettes up was just a phase because he stopped for a little while but then it started back up but its getting worst instead of better and we try to tell him that smoking is bad, but its kind of hard to say that when daddy is smoking and we dont say daddy is bad. so if he quits i think it will be easier to say its bad.
