Many mothers worry about their child taking money from home or toys from stores when they’re out. They want to understand why their child does this and how to handle it.
My Child Is Stealing — How Should I Handle It?
Sometimes a mother comes complaining, saying, “My son is stealing? How could he do that? I don’t deny him anything, and he’s well raised.”
Here, the story changes depending on the child’s age.
For a young child in elementary school, it’s better not to call their behavior “stealing.”
They are used to everything in the house belonging to them and haven’t yet learned the concept of privacy or ownership. So, they take anything they like just as they’re used to doing at home.
Or maybe one of his friends at school asked him for money and told him to take it from home without anyone knowing.
Or maybe he doesn’t know how to make friends well, so he feels pressured to take money from home to treat his friends just to get them to play with him.
Or stealing might be a form of aggression toward the family because he’s upset with them and wants to upset them in return.
At an older age
Or it might be because he needs money to spend on his friends.
Or he wants to appear well-off in front of his friends — to show he has money and is not less than them.
Or he might be buying cigarettes or drugs
There is a type of stealing called compulsive stealing.
A person steals things they don’t actually need, but the disorder forces them to take the item, and then they might not use it and just throw it away.
It’s important to understand the cause of the behavior so we can treat it properly.
