10 Smart Kids Who Said “Not Today!” to Their Parents’ Sneaky Tactics

Parents have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. But sometimes, those little humans really surprise us. With bold confidence, they turn the tables and leave their folks absolutely speechless.

• My wife and I were outsmarted by my son when he was 4. We would always allow him to have a small dessert. Usually a small chocolate (like a Hershey kiss or something). One day, I was home alone with him, and after dinner and his dessert, he said, “Okay. Time for my surprise dessert!” I ask what that is, and he explains it’s a smaller dessert that he should get for doing something good. This sounds very specific, so I assumed my wife made it up with him, so I got him like 3 M&Ms or something. He’s happy, and I think nothing of it.
  Some time later, my wife asks when I created the ’surprise dessert’. I tell her I didn’t, and she gives me a story very similar to the one I just explained above.
  That’s how my son got ’surprise desserts’ for like 3 months without either of his parents ever thinking twice about it. © Rhinosaur24 / Reddit
• My not-quite-4-year-old doesn’t trick me with words. She gets me to tidy her toys by putting each little one away individually at a snail’s pace until I lose patience and “help,” aka do most of it. The absolute malicious compliance of this child, she’s recently started replying to “I said no” with “And I said yes!” So, I can see her trying something like this in about a year or so, tbh. © AmuHav / Reddit
• My mom shouted, “You’re making me mad!” to which my brother responded equally as angrily, “You’re making ME mad!”
  We still laugh about it years later, so just you wait; it’s only gonna get funnier. © mahava / Reddit

• My mom always tells the story of when I was young and was angry, so I said, “Your pwecious doesn’t love you anymore!”
  I’ll never live that down. © wheatable / Reddit
• My oldest girl, when she was 3 or so, came up with.“You’re the only one that doesn’t love me!” I had to remember to make sure that didn’t work. © Joe_theone / Reddit
• I was once outsmarted by my child one night. We usually let him have dessert after dinner, but this specific day, he had already had a small dessert prior to dinner. As usual, he requests that he be allowed to have some ice cream. I reply with “Only a spoonful.”
  I had no idea what I had just unleashed.
  As soon as I finished my sentence, a devious grin spread across his face as he produced a comically large spoon seemingly from thin air. I watched, hornswoggled, as he plunged the oversized scooping implement into the tub of ice cream, decimating the remainder of the container. © Unknown author / Reddit

• So, I (34F) have a 6-year-old daughter, Lily, who’s discovered the power of saying no. And wow, is she committed. She refuses to brush her teeth, throws a fit when it’s time to get dressed for school, and has decided vegetables are “evil.” I try to be patient, but sometimes I feel like I’m negotiating with a tiny, dramatic lawyer.
  One day I said, “Brush your teeth and we’ll go to the park tomorrow.” She goes, “Are you bribing me?” But she did it anyway. I was going to have a little talk about what a bribe means. To my shock, she grabbed a piece of paper where she’d been practicing writing her name, picked up a pen, and handed it to me.
  She said, “So if I brush my teeth every night this week, I should get seven parks, right? Write it all down on this paper like a contract, and we’ve got a deal.” I told her that’s not exactly how it works, and she immediately accused me of “changing the deal.” My 6-year-old tried to renegotiate with the intensity of a contract lawyer. I didn’t know whether to be impressed or terrified.
  Now my husband says I started all this by “bribing her” and that I’m setting a bad precedent. But honestly? I was just trying to get her to brush her teeth without a 30-minute meltdown. I don’t give her candy or toys, just stuff like, “Let’s do something fun tomorrow.”

• I told really obvious lies, so my mother thought I was a terrible liar. © Jux_ / Reddit
• I had realized that most people have a tell when they lie, so I invented one that I use when I lie to my parents. © Unknown author / Reddit
• My daughter outsmarted my husband at almost 4.
  She was determined to eat a snack of Pringles, but both of my kids know they can only eat them in the kitchen.
  She wanted to go into the bedroom to watch her cartoons, so she tried to sneak the can with her.
  Dad says, “Leave the can in the kitchen.”
  A few seconds later, she walks past us with a stack of chips in her hands, with a mischievous grin, and says, “Bye, Daddy,” as she heads for the bedroom.
  I laughed and said, “You only said she couldn’t take the can.”
  We couldn’t fault her and let her have her win for the day.
  We got a little more specific with our words after that, even though we knew she was just having fun with the whole thing. © Kara-El / Reddit

These real stories prove that little voices can pack a big punch, especially when parents least expect it.