What Spanking Really Teaches, From a Former Spanked Childs Point of View

I decided long before I had children that spanking wouldn't be a parenting option.
There are tons of articles out there claiming that spanking lowers IQ, creates low self esteem, leads to bad choices in life, and overall makes a not so well adjusted child.

I do agree with a lot of the above, but the biggest reason I decided not to spank was remembering what spanking made me think about, and do as a child.

Mt parents were spankers, not the abusive, beat you down style, just the spanking as a tool style. I can still remember vividly bunches of times I did something that was considered bad, and got a spanking. My parents tried to teach me not to lie, steal, or cheat, and to be a good person.

The problem is spanking didn't teach me anything about being a good person, it taught me to not get caught if I was going to lie, cheat or steal. The only thing I had to worry about if I did any of those things were my parents, and the punishment. It also confused me, as they were telling me hitting doesn't solve problems, and that I shouldn't hit others, they were hitting me.

They weren't creating a moral code in me, they were just hitting. It doesn't matter what words come out of your mouth if your spanking, your children will hear none of it. Children have a unique defensive mechanism that makes them shut off during spankings, I remember this too. I heard nothing while I was hit, I just remember wanting it to be over so I could go back to my room, and be left alone.

Another memory I have that is vivid, is the way I felt about my parents when this spanking would happen. Simply put, it made me not like them. I mean each time I got a spanking It made me love my parents a little less. No...I'm not kidding.

What I felt was angry, angry that someone who was supposed to love me was hitting me, angry that I felt like less then a person when it happened. As an adult I really have no feelings towards either of them now. I don't think I have spoken to either of them in around 10 years. Not because I hold anger and resentment now, no that's been gone for quite awhile, No the reason is that the parent child bond was killed long ago with the spanking and I just have nothing left for them,

This is just a psychological fact, if someone is hitting you, after awhile you just are not going to love them anymore. It might take a long time, maybe years as in the cases of verbally, and physically abused wives, but it will happen. That moment where you realize that you absolutely do not like, or have no feelings at all towards the person or people who hit you is inevitable. No one will continue loving an attacker, and that is essentially how I saw my parents for a long time after.

I have never told either of them this. In reality I see them as very flawed human beings who took the easy path to child rearing instead of actually trying to learn about their children.

When I had my first child at a very young age, she is the one who taught me morality. I knew I wanted a better way to do things..for her. God, the universe, a higher power, whatever you want to call it, sent her to me so I could learn a loving way to view the world. So I could re invent myself as a human being with love and understanding.

I would not be the same person if it weren't for each one my children and my husband, the true teachers of love, compassion, understanding, and morality.

I truly wish parents who favor spanking would re think the whole matter. Your children will never tell you this, but your teaching them nothing, and creating some very hard feelings that may play out as they become adults.