10 year old constantly lying and loosing things!!!

[katrus78]

I will give one example. My son's only regular chore at home is to take the garbage out. The garbage is not far, it is just behind our building near the parking lot. He is not scared to go there or anything. Yet, nearly every single time, he leaves the garbage either in the elevator or in the middle of the parking lot. Than the same stuff happens: my son come home, and if I ask him, whether he took the garbage out all the way, he lies and says he did, than our maintenance guy finds the garbage, calls me or comes over complaining. I have tried talking to my son in all kinds of ways, yesterday I was nearly crying, and he was too. He just says that he is just being lazy and that every time he hopes that the maintenance guy will not find the garbage and that some other nice person will take it the rest of the way. I don't understand how taking a chance of me being upset AGAIN seems worth the chance for him.

The other thing is, he looses things constantly!!!! I can't even count the number of hats and gloves he lost!!! I now only buy really cheap ones, like $2, a lot of them, because I know they will only last a few days at the most! How can he be so irresponsible?? I just can't seem to get it across to him how to be more responsible...

What would you do? Please help.

 

[seoj]

Honestly, every kid is so different, you might just have to keep trying till you find what motivates your child. For my SD (when she had issues doing things without being asked 50 times a day!)- we found that text messages motivated her. So, I put together a calendar, and when she didn't need to be asked more than once to do something- she got a "point"- and each point added up over the month for extra text messages. I tried not to get on her if I did have to ask her more than once- I didn't just let that go, but we more so encouraged the good bahavior (if that makes sense). When she was smaller- i.e. no phone... she could earn stickers for sleep overs or other fun activties. She still has consequences if she didn't follow through with things- but we didn't call them punishments. And it seemed, in time, the more we encouraged and validated an rewarded the good behavior (not the bad) she tended to do better on her own. For her, it was a matter of A) following through on the consequence. Always. We had to be tough at times... and B) rewarding the good behavior and praising her for it often. We also had trial and error finding what worked for her. We couldn't give her 2nd chances- but she was that kid that would push HARD to get what she wanted and argued all the time... and we found ourselves getting sucked into argueing with a 9yr old! LOL. Once we layed down the law- and stuck to it... it got much better. I would simply say- when she'd argue, this is not a debate- you can do this or that (giving her options I felt appropriate) or this is the consequence... and if she argued again... then she got the consequence. She learned REAL quick I meant business Just some thoughts... Best of luck!

Usually her consequence was something small- but mattered to her. LIke taking away her phone, when she was older, or going to her room (cause she liked being social and active not alone in her room)... something she understood and didn't like on her level. But got our point across.

 

[MoonLove]

Hmm it's a tricky one! I was going to suggest something along the lines of involving the other siblings in each others chores, but then I saw your ticker and how little your twins are hehe

Whilst I'm not a mother of an older child myself, your post reminded me of myself when I was around your sons age. I remember when my mom started assigning me chores and I didn't understand why my sister (4 years younger than me) didn't have to do anything, so I got 'lazy' on purpose. I didn't wanna do my own washing up if my mom still did my sisters etc. I'd often get chores given to me, and yet I'd recieve no praise for doing them- my mom would yell at me to tidy my room til she was blue in the face yet she wouldn't even notice if I DID tidy it! I'm not comparing this to you, please don't read it like that! Just simply thinking of ways your son may be encouraged to do the bins

I had a good understanding of the value -money and sentimental- of the things I owned, yet, I'd often lose things, and my parents would find them under a heap of dirty clothes in my room and they'd be so mad and ask 'don't you appreciate anything?' It was upsetting as I didn't mean to be careless, I suppose I wasn't really encouraged to keep things tidy!

I imagine for your son, he feels that putting the garbage out is the most boring thing everrrr and it's an easy excuse to assume someone else will do it. I think what I would try to do is not encourage the attitude of 'it's only putting the rubbish out' but make out like it's really a good thing he is doing, let him know that you've noticed and that it's a big help- because ultimatly it is! In time, he will hopefully understand the importance of small chores, and his role is important too, it doesn't matter if some other guy does it lol! As far as it making you really upset goes, I often saw my mom getting all mad at me for being lazy, but I kinda just shut off from it. I thought 'yeah my rooms a mess, moms gonna get cross... sigh' but it didn't give me motivation to do it (like I said, she wouldn't have noticed if I had). I think positive praise and encouragement is always the way to go even though i do know it's easier said than done!

Sorry I know I've not got the best advice to offer but I hope it helped just a Little.

 

[MorganEvans]

Well, i'll tell you the extreme version of what could be going on. 1. He might be bullied. Things taken away because at school, someone finds that humorous. I don't think he'd cry with you without a reason to push him into it. I think he's under a lot of stress, so try to look into that and give him the support he needs.
2. He might be selling them. Kids do just about anything these days, knowing "eeh, my mom will buy me new ones."

Not trying to be mean or anything, but i read this pattern out of that. Of course, it could be something else as well. But if it really is the bullying, then make sure what approach on the topic you will have. :/

 

[katrus78]

Thank you, guys. I have talked to him about the love and care among the family members, and I have seen him trying a bit more lately. He hasn't lost anything in a past few days. I think it might be a way for him to get attention, even if it is negative attention, because most of my attention is now on my newborn twin girls. I am going to try to involve him more with his sisters as he actually enjoys taking care of them.

 

[MoonLove]

D'aww, brilliant stuff! All the best! x

 

[puddles]

Sounds like a similar problem i was having with my son..... He would lie about eating food, forget things all the time and dont even start on the losing things!!! I eventually took him to a psychiatrist the middle of last yer and we strted im ona low dose of anti anxiety meds. He has improved so much since! we head back to the psych on Monday to see how everything is going, but he is so much mroe centred now