How to break a 6yr old from material things?

Question

my hubbys ex's son thinks hes daddy and we try to show him love anyway.and he lives with his ex's parents and they buy his love , whatever it is dont matter how much they even lost their house and got caught credit card fraud trying to buy his love. when he comes to our house he throws fits when he dont get what he wants or has to share w/other kids? if he gets in trouble at our house he doesnt want to stay or come back. how do we teach him material things are not as important as real love , grandparents have been advised to stop but didnt help they keep doing it.

Answer 1

How old is the child?

He needs some sort of influence from his parents. If he's had it easy up to now, he won't appreciate the difference between these two things, as he's had nothing to compare!

This is of course a tricky one. You say he's not your husband's real son, so in this situation I'd have to say it's really up to the parents to teach there child these important lessons. The way parents talk and act is the biggest influence of a child's early years, and If parents don't bother teaching their kids things like this it will result in the child growing up with the wrong viewpoint on responsibility, and eventually living like this themselves in later life.

What I'm trying to say is it's pretty much up to child's parent(s) to do this, you shouldn't have to step in. So maybe you could talk to them, and tactfully suggest that they give him the whole "love is more important" talk. And of course if the grandparents would take some responsibility, stop flooding him with gifts, and think about how their grandchild will grow up it would help, so you could maybe talk to them aswell or ask the parent(s) to.

I know it'll be scary to ask, but you shouldn't have to solve this problem, its the parents job. It sounds like a sign of bad parenting.

Answer 2

Its a tough one because everyone else is reinforcing it and if you don't comply the child will use emotional blackmail to get what he wants from you.

Unfortunately the only way to go is to reinforce that "At our house (make sure he understands that you include him in the our house part), we share" or "At our house we do activities rather than buy material items (obviously better wording as per the particular situation).

Children do understand that at different houses there are different rules and you will need to keep reinforcing these. It's tough because he may choose not to come back and play you off against the others who are buying his affection.

Another alternative would be to discuss this with the other parties, but I felt this was not an option. But obviously if it ever is an option, do take it because if all the parties work together things are more effective.

Answer 3

Maybe take him to a food bank or something and you can volunteer there.  Or have him come with you when you donate some old stuff.  Try showing him that there's other people out there less fortunate.  Other than that, make sure you spend lots of quality time with him.  As he gets older, he will appreciate that more.

Answer 4

its hard teaching that to a child especially oen that has been tought that love=things

you can tell him that love is a feeling and when people hug you and spend time and that lasts forever but toys are just things that break and get old

only get him things on holidays and special occasions