Dear Miss Macdonald,

Even though I admire and enjoy your publication I must confess to having had doubts about the methods employed to discipline errant boys. Imagine my surprise when I discovered for myself that your recommendations could be deployed successfully.

My nephew is fifteen, and typically lacking in manners and respect for his elders. One evening after a heated debate about staying out late, I decided to try a little experiment. While he was taking a bath I locked his bedroom door. I selected a pair of my pyjamas; yellow floral ones made of robust flannelette and returned to the sitting room to wait for him.

Soon he was standing in front of me holding a wet skimpy towel to cover his modesty. He demanded access to his clothes but I calmly told him that I had decided he was staying in tonight and pointed to the pyjamas warming on the radiator. I told him he could wear the pyjamas or he could stay naked - the choice was his. Of course he blustered about his 'rights' and such nonsense that he had picked up at school, until I told him that he was still a child and under my jurisdiction.

He reminded me that I was expecting visitors, as if that would sway me. I told him it was up to him if he wanted them to see him naked, or modestly attired in pyjamas. Much calmer now he looked at the pyjamas on the radiator then down at the useless towel. I watched as he pulled on the pyjama bottoms and slipped on the jacket.

They were far too big for him, so I helped him by turning up the sleeves of the jacket and pulling the bottoms up high to shorten the length of the bottoms. He struggled with the unfamiliar button arrangement and I happily fastened them for him. The effect on him was staggering, almost immediately after putting on my pyjamas he was a different person. He politely requested that he be allowed to go to bed, but I informed him he had to stay up to say hello to my guests. When he asked me how we would explain his appearance he called me 'Aunty', something he had not done for weeks.

We would say he was recovering from flu and that he had run out of clean pyjamas, I told him reassuringly. When my guests arrived he was politeness personified, sitting quietly and speaking when spoken to. Everyone accepted our explanation of his unusual attire, some even commenting on how girlish he looked in the feminine pyjamas. Only when one of them produced her camera, saying she must have a picture of such a delightfully polite little boy, did he murmur an objection. I felt sufficiently confident to give his bottom a little smack and he posed, admittedly somewhat shyly, sitting coquettishly on my lap - a picture that stands framed on my mantelpiece as I write.

At eight he said goodnight to everyone and I tucked him into bed in my daughter's old room. He did not look out of place amongst the girlish knick-knacks that defined it as a truly feminine bedroom.

The next day I kept him dressed in my pyjamas to reinforce my newfound discipline and after school on Monday I took him shopping and bought him some female pyjamas of his very own. His pyjamas are primrose and pink; soft winceyette ones with a frilly lace Peter Pan collar, and with teddy bear and - very appropriate for winter - snowmen, motifs.

Since then, if I feel he has misbehaved I only have to say ‘pyjamas on please’ and no sooner have I spoke the words then he is cuddled up beside me dressed for bed in his new girls' pyjamas.

Thank you for promoting this truly effective style of petticoat discipline.
Yours truly,

Margaret

Fleecy bedtime discipline is very effective, and I get quite a few letters about it. A teddy bear or bunny is often added, as well as a baby's dummy at the time of actually being taken to bed, but I can see that this would not really be possible with guests present. Please write again Margaret, and tell us all how he is progressing.
Susan