A Guilt Trip Used Successfully

A grandmother has the prerogative to use whatever means possible when helping a grandkid make the right choice. At least that is my thought.

Two weeks ago we took our 3 littles skiing. These 3 grandkids are 6, 7 and 8.

The 8 year old skis like a champ and took off as soon as he could get his skis on. The 6 and 7 year olds were a different story.

My 7 year old granddaughter was able to get up on skis and move without falling. The 6 year old grandson was a different story, he couldn’t even stand on his skis without falling and crying. Since there was only one of me I told him to go back to the warming hut and then I’d come back for him. When I came back to help him he wouldn’t come ski.

My technique to help kids go on their own is to let them hang onto the end of my ski pole while I’m holding the other end. We snow plow (pizza) together but I keep them from going too fast, at least until they cross over on my skis or something like that. We ski like that on the easy hill until they can ski on their own.

Yesterday we took the 2 grandsons skiing as our granddaughter has returned to her home so could not come along.

Morning View

As before, the older boy took off skiing as soon as the lifts opened. The younger took the early morning ski lesson. Our thinking was that if he had a lesson then he would be able to transition to skiing on his own. Boy, were we ever wrong.

We came down the hill to see our grandson walking up the hill to the warming hut without his skis on. There was the instructor without our grandson. I skied up to the instructor who reported that our grandson would only cry and finally walked away, refusing to ski another foot.

I went on down the hill and on my return took off my skis and told my grandson, who was now throwing snowballs at people, to come. He started out by telling me he’d ski next time. I started out with the perfect guilt trip: “I paid nearly $100 last week and now nearly $100 today for your skiing. That is a lot of money”. Then I went on to lay out the scare tactic: “This is your last chance. There is no next trip. If you do not ski today, then you will not go. We will bring your brother and your cousins but you will stay at home. I will not care. You decide what you will do with your fear”. Then the last tactic: “Are you a Jedi?” He said “yes”. I then said, “Well, like Yoda told the Jedi; ‘you do, there is no try’”.

Grandpa and Grandson

Oh, success is sweet!!! My grandson said he wanted to back to his lesson and wouldn’t cry. And he didn’t cry, and he did stay for the rest of his lesson.

And by the end of our ski day he was skiing

Skiing down the bigger hill

on his own, on even the biggest of the hills. On our last run he turned to me and said “Grandma, this is fun, I’m having fun”.