Arnold Schwarzenegger was a 'strict' parent who threw his son’s mattress into swimming pool as punishment

You don't need to know Arnold Schwarzenegger personally to know he's probably not someone you should mess with, but apparently that's the case regardless of whether you're a stranger or his actual flesh and blood.

The 76-year-old is a dad to five kids; Katherine, Christina, Patrick and Christopher, who he shares with his ex-wife Maria Shriver, and Joseph Baena, who he shares with his housekeeper Mildred Patricia Baena.

The kids are now well into adulthood, but Schwarzenegger has admitted that he put them through the wringer when they were growing up.

In an interview with Jimmy Kimmel to promote his new self-help book, Schwarzenegger claimed that the question of whether he was a 'strict' father was dependent on 'what your definition is'.

"For I think the way I grew up, I was lenient," he said. "But I think for American standards probably strict."

Schwarzenegger was born in Austria, where his dad was the local chief of police.

When asked what he considered strict, Schwarzenegger recalled his frustrations on one occasion when one of his sons didn't make his bed.

Gisela Schober/Getty Images

Describing it as the incident his kids 'bring up most' nowadays, Schwarzenegger continued: "He had the nanny make the bed, which was not allowed. I said the kids have to make their own bed, they have to scrub their own showers, they have to clean their own toilets, and they have to wash their own clothes."

Schwarzenegger's rules earned him an applause from the audience, but he wasn't done yet.

"So I came in one time and the bed was made so immaculately, that I looked at Patrick and said, 'did you do that?'

"And he said, 'no I didn't'.

"So I opened up the doors, grabbed the mattress and threw it off the balcony, down into the swimming pool."

Patrick's son then had the challenge of dragging the sopping wet bed back out of the pool, pillows and all.

A couple of other examples of the father's 'strictness' that sprung to mind included when Schwarzenegger put his daughter's shoes in the fire after getting tired of repeatedly telling her to put them away, and unscrewing every lightbulb in his son's bedroom after he kept leaving the lights on.

"From that point on, he always turned off the lights," Schwarzenegger said.

It might be quite an extreme way to make your point, but the dad obviously gets results! Let's just hope he doesn't give our own parents any ideas...