I thought it was a good idea.

Your wife told you what you were doing wrong.




Parenting needs to be done by a team that is on the same page. Giving your kids these mixed/contradictory signals is setting yourselves up for trouble and isn't going to do much for your kid either.

Did you know at the time you told your daughter to do the presentation that your wife had already said "wait until Christmas?"

If so, you need to look at why you deliberately did that.

It was a good idea to have her create a presentation. The better way to have handled it would have been to speak with your wife about your idea before telling your kid about it.

Who does the budgeting of finances for your family? Maybe your wife was trying to save some money by postponing the purchase as a Christmas gift rather than giving it to your kid now and having to buy another gift at Christmas time.

I can't see any flaw or fault in your thinking. Not to sound like a jerk as I don't know anything about your wife but it sounds like an issue of control. Your wife wants to keep it (especially on this issue with your daughter) and I think its unfair for all parties involved.

The only issue is regarding how responsible is your daughter in keeping even the cheapest Kindle in working order? How tech savvy is she? Can she keep it clean, dry, not drop it, lose it at school, etc...?

I get why your wife is upset.

I also get your thinking, but you don't seem to have thought it through all of the way.

Some elements:

- You were reinforcing to your daughter that if her mom says no, she can go behind her mom's back and get a "yes" from you -- you need to present a united front.

- You set up a false choice. If your wife feels strongly about not giving the iPad until Christmas -- and I will go into possible reasons for that later -- then you're putting her in the position of either telling your daughter that her presentation was unconvincing (which I doubt she would want to do, especially if your daughter worked hard on it), or acknowledging that the presentation was good but the answer is still "no" (which your daughter will almost certainly find unfair and be mad at your wife about), or going ahead and saying "yes" when she'd already indicated to you and your daughter that the answer was "no" (until Christmas).

- You put your wife in the bad guy position instead of sharing the "blame" (for not getting the iPad before Christmas) equally.



Now, possible reasons why your wife would want to wait until Christmas:

- You have to get your daughter something for Christmas, and iPads are not cheap. Much easier to kill two birds with one stone, there. If you give the iPad now, you'd need to do something else for Christmas.

- It's part of growing up to a) delay gratification and b) not demand something shiny because someone else has something shiny! 9.5 is definitely old enough for that.

- Something is often valued more if there is a period of anticipation before actually getting it.

Overall, I think you really should have talked to your wife before offering your daughter that route to getting the iPad before Christmas.

One other thing:

Your daughter asked for a Kindle (I kept saying iPad, I meant Kindle, sorry) and your wife said yes. She said "Christmas," but that's still a yes.

Your daughter cried about that.

I'd be strongly disinclined to reward that behavior in general!

My kid's been asking for a Kindle for several years and the answer has been just plain no. If I said "Christmas" and she cried about it I'd likely rescind my offer. (She's 11 now.)

Good point on the following -



When my daughter does this and funny this is typical behavior of my 9 year old (soon to be 10). I say in response - then how about you don't get one at all. You either wait or you don't get it.

You don't want to enforce the crying to get something.

But at this point you already agreed. I'd suggest next time talking with your wife first so you can present in united front. What might happen next time your daughter asks her mom for something and it doesn't happen to her liking, she will then come to you and try to get without letting you know she already asked mom. What can also happen is she won't take your wife's no seriously if dad will say yes.

And I think your idea was good - but just not after your wife already said wait until Christmas.

Better would be to talk with your wife of your suggestion - maybe she would have agreed with then and you both could have presented - like saying we know mom said wait until Christmas, but if you can show us this, we may reconsider. That way you aren't stepping on mom's toes and/or making it seem that mom's rules don't matter.

Yep, I agree with all of that.

One of the hardest parts of parenting is knowing when it's important to say "no." It's easier short-term to say "yes" -- they're so happy! But context matters, and saying "yes" too quickly or easily can create more long-term problems.

did Mom discuss this with you before she said Christmas?

If not, then I don't think she's got anything to say about you undermining her.

Parenting as a team means the team discusses important things before either responds. It also means the team decides what things are team decisions and what are individual parent decisions.

That's a good point actually.

From context it sounded like the dad was fine with it and it was the mom who had her reservations. But if the mom didn't have good reason to think the dad was fine with it, that's true that getting on the same page goes both ways.

I do agree that overall you should discuss things first. However it also depends on the situation. If your child asks you and the other parent isn't around and seems to be a smaller thing then you aren't going to wait for the other parent to answer.

And to me it is worse to say something in conflict with the other parent afterwards. It makes it seem as if whatever that parent says can be overridden.

A better tacit if dad was there was to pull her aside and say could we decide this together, I hve this other point of view and then approach the child and say we reconsidered together.

And then discuss what parameters you are willing to have a parent make a decision without discussion with the other.

thanks guys

I think all of you are right.

Mom made the decision while I was in the shower. Then she told me what her decision was.

Mom has control issues to the max. Many little rules that we dont know about until we break them.

Dad is a pushover. I try to get to a decision that everyone can be happy with. I have done this with my daughter and my wife. Wife unhappy in the house we are in, we buy a new house. When she gets unhappy with that, dad buys a new house. Kid crys, I want to cure all of her pain.

Wife swears that I am trying to get daughter to like me more. Not the case. It pleases me to no end when they are gettign along. So my real motivation is to try to FIX everything. It seems that that is not what they want.

Many times wife makes a decision that seems trivial to me to even have a decision made. If i say somethign it is wrong. If I say nothing, it is wrong. So whatever.


I think I will have a discussion with both of them at the same time tonight. I will discuss, my enabling behavior. I will discuss team decisions vs individual decisions. I will also discuss daughter using our love for her as a tool to play us. then I will state that since the presention, and working to make money has been decided, this will be the last that we will all play against each other. I will also end it with the next time mom says no and daughter crys, the decision will be not at all and I expect the same from wife.

I will let that sink in and wait for the rebuttal and set my daughter in motion with her presentation and plan for making the money. I will probably make her go back to the drawing board with a critique on her presentation and seek a better job and help her decide what she can do to make money..

thanks for all of your input guys I value it greatly.

How should I tweak my plan.

I would have said that the next time mom says no without discussing with dad, it will be determined that no decision has been made.

perhaps you could emphasize that 1) daughter should present the question to both, and understand parents will discuss, 2) parents will both be careful to not say yes or no independently on major issues, 3) parents will spend time discussing now what major/minor decisions are AND let daughter/children now

Looks to me like it's gonna be Christmas.
Pull the plug on the presentation NOW.
The presentation is a big no-win.

I think that seems reasonable. It isn't fair if one parent makes all the decisions and it makes that parent seem "meaner" in a sense so I think discussing with your wife that you don't her to be viewed as the mean person and you as the nice. You want both to be equal viewing. Maybe that will take the sting out in a sense and make it more appealing to your wife.

One other thing if she does slip and makes a major decision (the type you both agree is major), pull her aside and discuss - maybe depending on the decision you can re-vamp.

I think this is important. At the same time that the children shouldn't play one parent off against another, the children should also know that there is a 'dispute resolution mechanism'.

In the olden days <cough cough>, those were called family meetings.

Eek, it sounds like your daughter has learned "cry and dad will give in" from her mom, then. That's definitely something to address, probably privately with your wife first.



That's the short term/ long term thing. It can be what they "want" in the short term but not what they actually "want" in terms of healthy relationships.



This might be a bit heavy for a 9.5 year-old. I think maybe go into the bulk of it privately with your wife.

Then, as a team, present it to your daughter that no major decision is final until both parents have signed off on it; and that for decisions that are still hanging in the balance, crying and a general attitude of entitlement will be more likely to earn her a "no."

You can say that this Kindle thing is what made you realize the above and talk to her mom to come to an agreement about how to handle this sort of thing in the future. That you don't want to reward either the fact that disregarded her mother's stated response or that rather than being grateful for the yes, she just complained about it not being on her timetable.

You can say (after discussing it with your wife first, if she agrees) that for that reason your daughter may or may not get the Kindle for Christmas. She's not getting it now, period. Take responsibility for jumping the gun and offering your daughter the path to the Kindle earlier -- she'll be mad at you, just kind of accept that. Say that you thought about it and talked to her mom and this is where things are now. And that she has a chance to get the Kindle at Christmas -- but she can blow that chance with her behavior (if she's too whiny about it).

Then separately (maybe not the same conversation) you can talk about how she can make money and rules surrounding that. Again figure this out with your wife ahead of time. (If your daughter somehow earns enough money to buy a Kindle, is she allowed to do that? Does she need to run any purchase past you guys first? Etc.)

Next time this happens (wife makes decision you disagree with), I suggest you approach your wife and propose your solution. In this case, if you told your wife your thought that a well done proposal might be worth a Kindle and she told you her reason for saying no, you might have come to a joint solution. If the answer was allow a proposal, she could have presented that to your daughter since she was the person who nixed it in the first place. If she brought you over to her side, no harm done.

You AND your wife need to learn that you don't have to respond to every "want"' expressed by your child.

People can want what they want, but really, no response was even needed.

Just a smile - and what my parents used to say, "We'll see."