Posted on 10/02/2019 5:44:05 AM PDT by eccentric
My 8-year-old grandson plays with fire.
A half an ounce of common sense would cure that in half a minute, Gramps.
When my friend and I got caught playing with matches in their hay bales, my college educated mother got a huge box of kitchen matches, sat me in the dirt and made me light every single match and put it out. It took forever and was boring.
Exhausted the desire. Lesson learned.
That sounds like it worked. Once something that seemed mysterious and fun is assigned as a task that you have to complete, it no longer seems fun.
His dad needs to sternly talk to him, then beat his ass.
If his dad is not around, grandpa needs to take the chore upon himself.
Do not give DIL a vote. Let her rage and call the cops.
True, but some places even a light swat will get people in trouble.
Take him to the burn ward and your local hospital.
You don’t mention his father. Is he trying to get attention because he lacks a male role model?
If that’s the case, find someone to fill the role. You might even find a fireman that would be willing to visit once a week or something, if you have no male relatives that can do it.
Spend more time with extended family that has males.
Well, boys like fire. It’s not an unusual thing, so I wouldn’t freak out too much about it, but yeah, maybe just give him a healthy outlet for it, like let him help out with the bbq grill or take him camping and show him how to safely make and tend a campfire.
My 2 year older sister got me into the fire thing as a kid:-)
“Lots of the bad guys started fires or abused animals as kids.”
Yeah, and pretty much every normal male also played with fire as a kid and didn’t wind up as a psychopath. Abusing animals is a bit more troubling.
"Lock him in the basement for a few days. Tell his teachers he went to Disneyland."
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ROFL!
My wife and I watch a lot of "Law and Order" ... a well produced show.
We haven't seen that scenario yet on a show ..... but there's always hope.
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I just can’t take this siht seriously :)
I was hoping to find some kind of video on YouTube where someone who 'learned his lesson the hard way' would warn children. Yes, I am considering a tour of a burn ward.
Does he not know that playing with fire makes you pee the bed? [:-)
I’ve noticed most of the time it’s fascinating to kids because it’s either a taboo or they just haven’t any experience with what harm fire can do. Girls are fascinated by fire too, but are naturally more cautious. I played with matches not because I was that interested in fire but because I was afraid of it when I was little and had seen my brothers put out candles with a pinch at the dining room table. I wanted to be able to do that too but didn’t want to risk embarrassing myself in front of others by trying it in public until I knew I could pull it off. So I’d go in the bathroom and practice lighting matches and putting them out in the sink, with a little water in it to put out anything I dropped. A boy my age would probably not bother with any kind of backup plan like that, which is why boys are more associated with interest in fire. Dad and mom made building fires work soon after I hit that age and took the mystery and ‘privilege’ and power out of it pretty quick, so I lost interest.
Tell the kid you understand the interest in fire but make him promise that if he gets an idea in his head about starting one to get you so you can do it together - in a way that won’t get his ass whipped, and won’t risk burning anyone’s valuable property or endanger life.
Go through the house, garage and yard pointing out to him what playing with fire in any of these places can do, and why, and how difficult or impossible it would be to undo a mistake, to stop it with no water, fire extinguishers, etc, so he at least is aware of what can make a tiny fire get out of control fast. Flammable clothing, spray cans, dusts and powders, dryer lint, flammable liquids, paper, dry wood, grass, wind, grease, electrical fires, etc.
Get a 35 buck fire ring and find a good location to show him how quick things burn by building a fire in the safe area and adding dry palm leaves or dry brush so the fire leaps high and awesome, and he can feel enough heat to make him back off... enough to put enough fear in him to create caution to temper his curiousity. Burn some different materials, even an old theoretically ‘flameproof’ item so he can see it and see that even that stuff can be burned. Let him know that since you demonstrated all this there’s no way he can plead ignorance for sympathy or give an excuse that he was just curious, because he now knows he has the ability to satisfy his curiousity about fire with you as a family.
If he’s still stuck on it see if your local fire department has ideas on how to hammer it home. Read news articles about stupidity with fire, make a big deal about how stupid the perp was.
I’d say your son needs to have a serious discussion and explain how a fire can get out of control and take out houses and kill people.
You can also hide all the lighters and matches as should be done with young children in the house anyway.
I played with matches at that age and accidentally set the woods on fire behind our house - or accidentally let it get out of control at least.
Between my mother cussing me out for the first time ever, the fire dept dragging hoses through our yard, my worries about burning people’s houses down before they got their and worrying what my dad was going to do to me, I never did it again.
I don’t remember if any of the firemen talked to me. I’m sure I got some hard looks from them. Dad just lectured me for an hour.
I think the big one was the way my mom acted. I came in, walked around for a few seconds and then looked out the back window and said “Fire”. She said “what’d you do?” I said, “Nothing”, she said “Bullshit” and went right for my pockets and found matches. Then she called 911. First time I’d ever heard her cuss and I felt like a pos they way I got caught and they way she looked at me.
That and I had to look at ugly woods for a long time and that was my hangout.
I’m sure my mom made sure there were no matches to be found in the house for quite a while afterwards too.
The first time I saw a burn victim in person I was in high school and long past the age of curiosity of fire, but that was a wakeup call even though the victim had partially healed. Up to then the true horror of fire was just the fear of dying in one. This was a wakeup call on the awfulness even if you survive it.
A classmate had been out mowing for his folks when something happened while he was refueling the mower. His clothes caught fire and he was too surprised to drop and roll -which may not have worked with all the gas- but he had the presence of mind to run like a torch to the creek and dive in, and his mom or whoever found him had the sense to leave him in it until help arrived so the cool water kept the burned flesh from continuing to cook from residual heat as many burns will. He was undergoing skin grafts in stages, when we were in school with him, and the poor guy had to wear these flesh colored ugly, tight Jobes’ suits to keep the scarring down. He had a good sense of humor and did open up and talk about it all which hopefully helped some people think about the consequences of an ill-thought fire as well as be cautious in general.
Even so, when my Dad was burned in a horrific accident caused by a man trying to commit suicide, the nurses tried to warn me before I entered the room but there really wasn’t any way to express to someone what a loved one looks like when they are unrecognizably melted and swollen and discolored and charred. I went in and even under full medication he would beg to die. Sitting there looking at the strongest man in your world begging to die is something I would not wish on anyone. Sitting there while he is shivering with cold - bare nerve endings and the like in a cold room to prevent bacterial growth- and you can’t get him a blanket, you can’t touch them, and you’ve got nothing to do but try to rebuild his will to live by using everything you know about him to find and nurture his sense of humor and his appatite in an environment of pure torture where a patient has to eat more calories than they have ever had before to survive but it hurts to eat. I wish they could show kids what it looks like in person but burn patients without skin are so vulnerable to infection that it isn’t practical unless glass was in the way. They could have kids listen to what a person sounds like while the debris and charred flesh is being removed...but that might give them other problems. All I can say is the nurses who treat burned patients, especially children or disabled patients, should receive medals of honor and massive pensions.
A talk with a burn nurse might give him some sense.
Not talking about that
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