Do you ever get so fed up with all the toys lying around? This is the inside story of my drastic decision to take my kids’ toys away.
As some of you already know, I’ve been on a mission this year to simplify my family’s life and rid ourselves of excess. Over the course of the past nine months I have probably given away about 75 percent of my girls’ toys, keeping only the items that I felt encouraged their imagination and that they actually played with. I thought I was doing pretty good.
Even so, there were warning signs that my kids still had too much stuff. In June, we took a field trip to Reptile World in Orlando. Afterwards we decided it would be fun to take the girls to dinner at a dinosaur-themed restaurant called T-Rex in Downtown Disney. While we were waiting to be seated my oldest daughter Maggie spotted the Build-a-Dino Workshop in the gift shop and although we immediately said “no way,” from that moment on she could think of nothing else.
All through our delicious dinner, surrounded by dramatic (fake) meteor showers and animatronic dinosaurs, she fixated on the one thing she couldn’t have rather than the cool sights we were actually experiencing.
On the three hour drive home, Husband and I–seriously concerned by our daughter’s inability to enjoy the moment–made a point to talk about all the neat stuff we had seen, what our favorite reptiles were, and how funny Trouble had been holding the snake. By the time we made it home the Build-a-Dino had been forgotten. At least by her. But we were worried.
The Breaking Point
In the weeks that followed, Chuck and I talked a lot about how we were going to handle this lack of contentment we were noticing. Then one morning near the end of July, after telling my kids to clean their room for the umpteenth time, I made the somewhat impulsive–albeit pre-warned–decision to take away ALL their stuff.
Just 2 days earlier I had spent half the day cleaning their room & re-organizing their toys and closet, which is something I do fairly regularly. I wasn’t asking them to clean some giant out-of-control mess, just to pick up a few items off the floor and put them away in the very clearly labeled baskets. Every time I came back to check on them, they had not only NOT picked up, they had made an even bigger mess.
Why I Took My Kids’ Toys Away (& Why They Won’t Get Them Back)
I finally gave up and took it all away. I wasn’t angry, just fed up. I calmly began packing up not just a toy or two, but every single thing. All their dress-up clothes, baby dolls, Polly Pockets, & stuffed animals, all their Barbies, building blocks, and toy trains, right down to the the furniture from their dollhouse and play food from their kitchen. I even took the pretty Pottery Barn Kids comforter from their bed. The girls watched me in stunned silence for a few minutes and then, when the shock wore off, they helped. And just like that, their room was clear.
The Paradigm Shift
I had no idea what a dramatic difference this one semi-impulsive decision would make in all our lives. I first started noticing a real change about 4 weeks later when we took a family trip to Key West.
In contrast to our last outing and for the first time ever, neither girl asked us to buy a single thing the entire weekend. Not a toy, not a cheesy souvenir, not a light-up necklace from a passing street vendor. Nothing. We passed hundreds of shops and they loved looking in the window, but they were content just to be. What was most amazing to me was that we didn’t talk to them about it ahead of time. Not once did we have to tell them not to ask, or explain that being together was what mattered.
Had I not experienced it with my own eyes, I would’ve never believed that an addiction to stuff could be broken that quickly. The truth is that when I took all their stuff away, I was terrified at what would happen. I worried that I was scarring them for life, depriving them of some essential developmental need, taking away their ability to self-entertain.
So…what happened??
In reality, the opposite has happened. Instead of being bored, they seem to have no shortage of things to do. Their attention span is much longer and they are able to mindfully focus on their task at hand. They color or read for hours at a time and happily spend the entire afternoon playing hide & seek or pretend.
They are far more content, able to appreciate the blessings that they do have, and able to truly enjoy the moment they are in without always having to move on to the next thing. They are more creative and patient, more willing to share, far more empathetic towards the plight of others, and, with little to fight over, they hardly fight at all.
When I do take down a toy for them to play with (no, I didn’t throw everything away), such as their Lego blocks or dress-up clothes or or their kitchen food & dishes, that one thing will entertain them for the entire day. (The rest has more or less been forgotten and will soon make it’s way from the attic to the Goodwill pile.)
What I love even more is that they are able to recognize excess on their own. Aside from a favorite stuffed animal and the comforter on their bed, (which they both earned back), neither of them actually want their toys back on a permanent basis. They like not being overwhelmed by stuff and not having to spend so much time cleaning their room. In fact, later that very same day, as we drove to gymnastics class, Maggie said it’s okay that we don’t have any more toys Mommy. We can just read and use our imaginations. And now we won’t have to clean up every day. She understood before I did that more stuff doesn’t make us happier.
No turning back
When I first became a mom I was so happy to have a chance to start over, to undo through my children all the wrong that was done to me, to give them everything I felt I had missed out on. I wanted our lives to be perfect, and my vision of perfection included a perfectly decorated bedroom filled with beautiful things, a life where they would want for nothing.
I equated giving them stuff with making them happy, a message that our consumer driven culture hammers into our psyches from the time we our born. Oh, what a lie!
I started this blog because I am a shopaholic, and there are so many times where I buy things when I am bored or unhappy, just to fill the void. My husband laughs at me (and sometimes throws up his hand in frustration) because although I talk a good game about wanting to downsize and get rid of stuff, in reality there are still many times where I just can’t help myself from buying more.
I justify it, telling myself it was on sale or a really good deal, or something we really needed, or that I deserve it because I work so hard. In reality it is just another thing I am trying to buy to solve a problem that runs much deeper.
Stuff isn’t evil in and of itself, but in a world where we are constantly told that what we have isn’t quite good enough, the love of things can so very easily consume us. It is the pursuit of it all–more toys, cuter clothes, a prettier house, a nicer car, a bigger computer, a fancier phone–that makes us forget all the things that actually matter.
It wasn’t until after observing first hand the real and immediate changes in my children after taking their toys away that I truly began to understand. And now instead of me teaching them, they have taught me the lesson I wish I would’ve have learned a long time ago.
For our family, there’s no turning back.
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Ruth Soukup
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Another lovely and drastic decluttering post to make more women feel insecure about parenting. Lovely. Yes, it’s not healthy to revolve your life around materialism, but treating children like robots to be programmed results to resentment and therapy (and damaged relationships with them into their adulthood). If you don’t want your kids’ lives to revolve around toys and clutter, be thoughtful about how much you give them. However, be prepared to do the same for yourself (that means you have less “fun things” taking up space in your house) and also respect that your children may have different personalities than you. Never throw out something that is special to a child. That’s selfish and models a lack of empathy. I see parents who do such things regularly and their kids are frequently regularly bullies or victims—not balanced human beings.
I’m sorry, but what mother takes away her children’s things and then says they’re happier? All you’re doing is making them scared to be themselves, to do anything because they’re scared of having everything they love taken away from them. I may not have kids of my own as of yet, but having been from an abusive home that was one of the first things my parents did to control me. You’re a control freak and a tyrant, and I feel sorry for your children.
You are a tyrant and a child abuser.
So, judging from this article, and the other information I could find, and the fact that I work with both children and adults with horrible pasts, and issues, I will say this; Ruth, this isn’t the solution. I understand your anger, and I know children can be hard to control, but they’re KIDS. Taking away their material possessions stunts their creativity, which directly impacts their ability to have a stable life, and this ‘solution’ will no doubt cause issues later on. For instance, they will develop anxiety, depression, an inability to trust anyone, and many other mental issues. Children wanting a toy isn’t anything new, and expecting them to function at the same level of maturity as an adult is ridiculous! Trust me, this will not only ruin their lives, but yours too, as when they’re becoming teens, you will most definitely need to send them to therapy, and trust me, as someone who is a therapist, that is EXPENCIVE. Far more, FAR MORE, than a simple toy. Maybe, instead, you could try a reward based system for your oldest (Giving them a set amount of play time, if they achieve a simple goal, and yes, start small, such as, cleaning up their room, and getting to do something THEY enjoy, or getting a new toy!) and as for your youngest, (Three years old, I believe) let them be a child. The well behaved children you are seeing are AFRAID of your reaction to anything. They saw asking for something meant a very bad punishment, and as such, acted upon it, and stopped acting like human beings. At the end of the day, kids are kids, and you chose to have them. You have to accept them for who they are, flaws and all. It doesn’t mean you should let them do whatever, but this… it’s way too far for ANYTHING.
As for other people who I’ve seen in the comments;
Yes, children have tech addictions. Again, reward based system does wonders. Achieve something, get a reward!
Although, if any of you are planning on doing something like this, maybe just give your kids up to foster care, or child protective services? Because this actually counts as abuse! (Again, I work in the field. I know I’m saying I work in this a lot, but I need you all to know that I know what I’m talking about!)
-Sincerely,
Someone who actually cares about these children! (Because, quite honestly, it does NOT seem like you do!)
This mother is a straight-up psychopath. Kids NEED toys. They NEED stimulating things to do. Children use these objects to imagine and grow and have fun. Play is ESSENTIAL to the psychological development of kids and you are robbing them of a crucial part of that. You all need to stop acting like toys take away a child’s ability to ‘imagine’ and ‘be creative’ – I had plenty of toys as a kid and today I draw, write, sculpt, do all kinds of creative activities. In fact, I started writing by writing stories about my Beanie Babies.
Toys did not stifle my imagination, they ENCOURAGED it and acted as a vehicle through which I could exercise my creativity and will. Kids don’t have a ton of control over their lives, but they do have a lot of control over their toys, and learning how to be independent and make decisions and act alone is kind of important to being a functional human being.
You’re also teaching your kids to not tell you about anything they enjoy, because it’ll be taken away if you don’t ‘like’ it. Your kids aren’t ‘living in the moment’ in your trips now; they’re afraid to interact with you or upset you with their actions, so they stay quiet and do nothing in the hopes that you won’t do something terrible to them. (And, really – ‘living in the moment’? They’re six and three, they are not REMOTELY in a cognitive place to appreciate all the little things in life or think about how life is short or how they haven’t spent enough time with their loved ones or anything like that. Those are things for us ADULTS to contemplate. Go read a child psychology book and stop expecting your kids to think and act like adults. Jesus Christ.)
Do you all look back on your childhood and bemoan the fact that you had toys? Do you think your lives would have been significantly better without them? Are you going to talk to your parents and tell them “wow, I sure wish you hadn’t bought me any toys because it really screwed me up!”? I highly doubt it.
You, Ruth, are simply treating your kids as objects to control. You get a sick gratification out of forcing your kids to do exactly as they tell you whenever you tell them to. Ironically, you’re treating them like toys.
The shocking thing is, they’re not toys, and you are not a child, you’re a grown woman. They’re your children. They’re HUMAN BEINGS. They have their own wishes and desires and interests. They are not going to be your perfect little robots all the time and you should not expect them to be. They need the freedom to just exist and be kids, and it sounds like you are denying them that in several ways. That is an excellent way to raise a kid into an adult with anxiety, depression, low self-esteem, and any other number of issues – and guarantees your kids will cut you out of their lives as much as possible once they can be independent adults (and frankly, you’ll deserve it).
I sincerely hope child services takes your kids away so they can go to a family who will love and care for them the way they should (and need to) be – go to a family who will provide them will an actual childhood. And after that, maybe you can go see a therapist to unravel why you’ve been so cruel and controlling and outright abusive to them. In fact, all of you praising this article and planning to follow in Ruth’s footsteps should do the same. You clearly need it.