One day not long ago, I was at home with the kids. Mark was somewhere else, the boys were being noisy, the girls were fighting, Karis was crying, and I’d had it up to my eyebrows with household drama. No one in my house but me seemed to care that I had work to do. Important work! For money! So I said something: a sentence my parents used to say to me and that I swore I’d never speak to my own kids, because it’s just so, so ridiculous. “If you don’t stop crying, I’ll give you something to cry about.” We’ve all said dumb things as parents. Threats and warnings and laughable statements that we have no business saying. Not because they’re needlessly violent or graphic or mean, but because they are stupid. And completely untrue. And in violation of all of our parenting values. 
Over at Babble I’ve of the stupid parenting threats I hear…or have said . . . or had said to me as a child. What are yours? You can read all 15 ridiculous parenting threats here.
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