Our 6 year old came home and told us this little boy came up to her and asked if she wanted to fight. She put her "dukes" and said, " Do you want to fight?" The boy walked away. She had been having trouble with a boy at school who was picking on her. She would cry and not want to go back to school. I finally got fed up and told her that if he does anything else to make a fist and throw it at his nose as hard as you can and then kick him in his privates. As long as you didn't start it you would not be in trouble by us. We've been round and round with the principal and the teacher. They send him to the office and then he returns to class, no lesson learned apparently.
While fighting is wrong, I do not consider defending yourself or your property to be fighting. It is self defense. Good for you. I also have taught my kids to stick up for themselves, walk away if you can, but if they touch you or your stuff, lay them out cold or give it your best shot to do so. If the bullys daddy or mommy has something to say, I will handle daddy and my wife will handle mommy. I will not even mess with my 5 foot tall 100 lb filipino wife and I am 6 foot and 215lbs. She has trained in 5 variations of martial arts since she could walk. We went out one night and this guy was hitting on her when I was over talking to a buddy. I finally looked over and this dude was all tryin to get up on her. She shoved him back and I stepped up in between them and was ready to lay down. She was behind me and I saw a foot come over my head and him fall. This guy was 6'5" if he was an inch and my little wife did a standing roundhouse kick over my head to connect with the side of this dudes head and knocked him out cold. I knew better then to upset her from that point on and if she is around during a brawl, I have no worries with her having my back.
I agree and I was tired of hearing about this little hoodlum A)being a bully and B)picking on a girl. Granted she's a Tom boy and likes to play boys stuff but doesn't mean some little thug can literally pull her down by her hair, or throw sand in her face, or kick her and get away with it.
Grab the little bastooge and do what his mommy and daddy should, spank his arse. Just wear a ski mask so he can't ID you, lol.
I wish I could. Family says I'm hard on my kids, but when they go out in public or to other family members homes, the manners are in full effect. There's a difference between being a child and being an unruly monster.
You're doing the right thing with your daughter. Just make sure that she keeps her adrenalin rush ('cool') in check. If that gets a hold, anything can happen. My own similar story. My family is of French Canadian descent. My dad taught my mother to speak, read and write english. My first schooling was in English Ontario. I am probably the only Canadian Engineer that failed kindergarden. Had to repeat to get enough english in my brain. I got teased and all the rest right up to about grade 5, when it got messy. Our house was about 3 blocks from the school. I was a short little puppy, and never did more that a few tussles with my dad or bugged my 3 sisters. A bunch of kids would wait for me to come out of school at 4:00 PM, form a circle, and take turns pushing me around, with the school bully prodding them on. I got crafty, and found other ways to get home, besides that bunch for about a week. They quit gathering out front. Except the bully. I ran like the wind and beat him to close to my house. Dad had just bought a brand new 1955 Ford sedan. I was busy looking back and ran right into the front fender of dad's new car, when he was pulling into the driveway. Dad got out of the car, grabbed me by the shoulders facing the bully, and told the kid to beat the snot out of me! My own dad!!! I was so pi$$ed, that I turned around and hit my dad in the jewels. He was bent over, laughing his head off, and calling my mother to come watch this battle. I thumped that kid almost to eternity. Nobody touched me again. And he and I became good friends. He never bullied anyone after that. But it doesn't end there. We move to French Quebec. I don't have an accent in English, and now I'm 13 or 14 years old. One groupie of a bunch of schoolyard toughies decides to start up the traditional 'maudit anglais' conflict again, only in reverse. Every Catholic grade school in Quebec had a Hockey rink on the boys' side and a skating rink on the girls side. No ice yet, but lots of snow, and he's sitting on the rink boards and ranting away, while I'm chatting with a new pal. Months of this BS! Grabs my toque and tells me to come get it. I start walking over to get it, and goes to take a shot. I downed the turd, and put a choke hold on him. I was so pi$$ed that I blacked out, but my muscles took over, and he started to turn blue. They called the Principal, who called an ambulance, and they couldn't separate me from the kid. They took us to the ER, where they injected a relaxant, while giving us both oxygen. I almost killed him. He came around in the summer with his pals to intimidate me some more, and I walked up to him and told him that he'd be the first and I wouldn't miss this time. I was 15. I'll tell you, its not something anyone wants to really know about themselves, that they could maim somebody or worse. I'm still a shorta$$, but after being in our infantry, I really don't scare easy. I know there's times when I should have been scared, instead of scarred, but I lost that natural sense of danger, and my pain threshold is more than most people. I've watched a surgeon cut my finger off and feel the tendon shrinking and throbbing. I've had wisdom teeth pulled out with no anaesthetics. I'm not tough, but I can take it, and give it far more than I want to know how. If you find she can be objective about defending herself, you're doing the right thing. It's one thing to have a 6 footer 200 lb dad, telling the other kid to clean your clock, as your first lesson in self defense. It's another to help her master her potential.
Yes, you have to learn self control and teach her to master it. My wife could kill me or just about anyone with 1 or 2 simple moves in a matter of a second. But she is the calmest, sweetest and most level headed person I have ever met. I love to pick on her and she is very tickelish, I go and start tickeling her and she can throw me across the room and I just go back for more. Its a contest and I always seem to loose. She has several times grabbed my wrist and twisted my hand, holding her finger tips into my palm and her thumb against my middle finger knuckle. One simple downward flex of my hand and I am on my knees begging her to let me go and promising to stop. She has another move that she grabs my pinky, forces my hand palm up and with her thumb against the very base, flexes it backwards. That one is a real killer. Never underestimate the vertically challenged people, they can screw us big guys up in a mere blink of an eye.
So far she's a very docile child whose feelings are easily hurt. For instance if I raise my voice to her, she'll tear up. My 10 year old who is very aggressive, almost to the point of bullying. Just not purposely picking on someone, but if she's provoked its straight to "kill".
My wife has never learned a thing about self-defense. She's likes to argue and rant her face off, but she even hates cutting up a roasted turkey. She knows I would never hurt her and that's all she needs from me. I love hero movies, which means all the stuff that comes with it, and she thinks of herself as a pretty good sleuth (solving the next segment, before the ads finish.) I'm still a Steven Segal fan, but the Bourne trilogy was more of a lesson flick for me. I learned a couple things. When you defend yourself you stay in the Eye of the hurricane and focus on the mission. If you don't have to finish off the enemy, get moving and keep going. The other was how subconscious the relationship is between pain, emotion and revenge. Somehow, the eastern martial arts are able to teach students to split that up. Defend yourself, and forget the other two. Those two are what put the person's life in ruin. No passports, no foreign travel, no decent careers, just one shut door after another. Why give up your own opportunities in this overcrowded and over-acheiving society for some idiot? Incapacitate and reduce the threat and live for another day. They ain't worth it. Keep emotions for sweet things and revenge for Monopoly (or some other family game, like tickling your better half!).
My mother was a mischief maker. She was also mean and brutal at times, but she had a comic streak. Except when it came to discipline. You knew that you knew nothing about what to expect. I think she had a very dark side. My dad was the big jolly giant, with an almost inaudible roar. The look was enough. Nobody except my mother would push him that far. He was never violent, but we all knew that even hell had nothing on what he could do. He was our superman, our greatest supporter, and one mean junkyard dog all in one. He was and although passed away, still my best pal and friend. I don't miss him because I enjoyed him as much as any one can. One day, my mother comes home after me waiting for almost 10 years for a brother. She's literally glowing. I'm 11 years old. I look at her, and tell her how especially radian she is. She looked at me, gave me a nasty look, and my dad wondered why. His nasty look took over, and she passed him my brother from her arms, and went for a walk. It was never spoken about or explained. My brother died two years ago, from pancreatic cancer, and nobody ever told me until 2 weeks ago. I never really knew him (I was off to the army or college, by the time he got interesting), but I often wondered if my mother really wanted another girl, instead of us two boys. Anyway, she was a fiery woman, french, passionate, often domineering, but never really happy in her own skin and vindictive. Many neighbours over the years felt her wrath, sometimes rightly so, but more often not. It's a sad day when a woman loses her ability to enfold and encompass the world she has. They bring so much to the table, that bonds a family together. Your daughters sound like neat persons, the 6 year old is open hearted, the 10 year old is testing her wings, without pruning her feathers. She needs to refine her objectives a bit. My kid sister was the smartest of us all. She started as a Chem-tech in a community college, hired by a big international pharma in Canada, and became Corporate VP and a Chemical Eng. within 8 years of starting as a labrat. My dad, who went and graduated in University with me in Engineering, told her she didn't have what it took. I challenged him and told her I would pay the tuition fees. He gave me that look and wiped it away, and took his responsibility. She made him proud. She's worth a couple lotteries in real estate in Montreal today, but she paid some big dues to get there. A fine marriage, exposed to chemicals that made her sterile, and so driven that she lost the rest of us in the jetstream to the peak. It's our tendency as men to fix everything, but somehow, your two daughters will balance each other off. Sweet and Tough!
These days, the PC freaks that run the government schools punish BOTH parties in a fight, regardless of who started the fight! Punish the instigator, NOT the target! My youngest got a week suspension for fighting back, when a kid clobbered him with a book! My kid turned and knocked the dogshiite out of him...and MY kid got in trouble for defending himself! That's why I pulled both my kids out of school that day and started homeschooling...and I've never regretted that decision.
I agree with everything. We're homeschooling our oldest now and will probably end up schooling all four before its over.
