[Morrigoon]

My parents only had to spank me maybe 3 times.

They used the "Go get the wooden spoon" thing, as well as describing in rather vivid detail how much the spanking was going to hurt (it never hurt like they described it, of course), and typically, by the time they were done describing it, you were promising to be good, or devising some way NOT to go to the kitchen for that spoon.

Frankly, I think they did a great job of rarely having to employ corporal punishment, while still leaving the understanding that there could be real consequences to our actions.

I was only ever slapped in the face once, and I totally earned it. I was a mouthy teen and called my mom a b!tch. Bad idea. Only one slap, but the point was made.

My mom could get her point across in other ways, however. Being the youngest and only girl, I never got it like the legendary stories of my brothers. One failed to do the dishes so long that he awoke one morning to them being broken against the wall by his bed, another came home from school one day to find the un-emptied kitchen trash dumped on his bed. I neglected to do the dishes for too long and found.... everything unplugged from the back of my CPU (yawn... but I knew what she was saying!)

While things may have been less than perfect for my brothers, I think my own disciplinary-upbringing was just fine. Admirable, in some ways. In our house, "there are no rules until you break them", which forced us to think ahead about the consequences of our behavior and what is and is not responsible. So in high school, I could stay out till 3 or 4 am going to Rocky Horror and Denny's, but I had to make sure my parents knew where I was and when I'd be home. If I'd taken off without telling anyone where I was, I probably would have earned a curfew.