THE SLAP

I haven't done it yet.
A friend of mine confessed to me that she has spanked her children a few times. She has parenting skills that I respect a lot. She is accomplished and has very well behaved children. She is also a stay at home mom, so it kind of goes with the territory. I can see how it would get to the point every so often of so much frustration that it manifests physically.
Irina was throwing one of her notorious tantrums after school and I embarrassingly looked at my babysitter who has an eight year old and asked if her daughter eventually got over that stuff to become a poised young woman. She assured me that it never happened because once, when her daughter was two she gave her THE SLAP and she never misbehaved again.
Another friend who has wonderful grown children said she attributes their great behavior to THE SLAP and recalled for me the incident with each of her three children. I remember THE SLAP for each of us children, but we were fairly old and I think we talked back. I hate to think that it is so simple as THE SLAP. I also hate to think of the day that I am so frustrated that the only solution that I can come up with is THE SLAP.
Here is a story told to me by one of the parents that I worked with.
One of the memorable stories from teaching parenting skills to inner city parents came from a Dominican dad who told the story of his conflict with child welfare services. He came from a family who, although they didn't beat their children, they did use spanking when necessary. His son was attending school in New York and had gone through the awareness raising seminars that Child Welfare conducts in the schools. His son had told him that if he ever raised a hand against him that he would land in jail. His son proceeded to cut school, engage in illicit activities and fully compromise his dad who was forced to bail him out in school repeatedly and feel that there was no way to really discipline his child.

Things had gotten way out of hand and the father's hands were tied, his son was out of control and he felt there was no more talking that would change the way things were going. They planned a trip to the Dominican Republic together for spring break and the moment they landed on Dominican soil, the father lashed out at the boy and gave him a 'spanking he would never forget'.