My Child is giving me tons to blog about this week!
I’m sure this is all due to the lack of a nap today (him not me). It all started with the fact that my living room exploded with toys and I started to trip on things. At daycare they are only allowed to play with a few things at a time but here I don’t enforce that rule and within 30 mins there are toys *everywhere* so I figure it’s time to clean up.
Mason had opened up a little wooden box of dominoes which were now tracked all throughout the house. When he wouldn’t comply with my request to put them back in their little box, off to his room he went for a time out.
He didn’t take this punishment lightly and I could feel the wrath of his 2.5 year old little body from down the hall.
“Noooo Mommy. NO!” he repeats.
THUMP goes his little hands on the door
I go in there, tell him to stop hitting the door. I take away his stuffies and blankies so now he just has a bare mattress.
Bang, Mommmmy NO….
This goes on for about 5 minutes and then that familiar ‘THUD’.
This time I run to the door because I can’t believe he did it again…
YEP, his bed rail is yet again 4 feet from the bed. I’m still not sure how he even gets it off the bed as it’s plastic and ratcheted on the mattress! (super human toddler strength!). Okay maybe I didn’t expect it to happen once and then he’d ‘listen’ and not do it again. Besides, it *got* my attention which is what these tantrums are all about but I’m not about to let him trash the room at the same time.
Deep breath.
I have to change my tactic; these loud words aren’t doing much. I don’t feel angry enough to spank him, I start wondering what non spanky parents do. So I put in an email to Kyle & Erron. Surely they’ve dealt with this before. I decide that instead of the ignoring, shut the door, I’m going to throw him out of the window his comfort zone. So I pull him up, put him on my bed and hold his arms down and repeat ‘It is not nice to hit, it is not nice to throw’. He hates this, he HATES being held down. He hated being swaddled as an infant.
Now his temper is flaring, I’ve got his attention. I loosen my grip on his hands and hold his legs down which are flailing cause he wants to regain control. He continues to ‘cry’. I say in a calm tone, “I’m not buying it”. He looks at me and sniffles.
I ask him how his bed rail ‘happened’ to move across the floor.
Then a rapid fire toddler story comes out…
“….The monster…the monster…it came….(undecipherable)….bonked me on the head”
Soon monster was replaced with spider.
Then “…Monster…under the bed…bonk!”. He’s breathing fast and his eyes wild and I turn my head so I could stifle a giggle.
The imagination has been born. Apparently my room is full of monsters and spiders and they are angry.
I let him tell his story without interruptions and when he’s finally calm, he gets antsy.
He lowers himself off the bed and continues his story.
Now it’s my turn to talk. So I repeat the same story I told him the other night about throwing, hitting and removing his bed rail.
“I sorry” comes out.
I ask him what he did wrong.
“I frew”
….”Monster did it!”.
Sigh.
He runs around the room pointing out where the monster could be hiding and even tries to include a cow (that is on my Eilean Doonan picture from Scotland) into his shenanigans.
Once I’m certain he feels bad and somewhat understands what he did wrong, hugs and kisses and we are back into the living room.
To pick up the dominoes, which he does.
And all is well again.
I’m proud of myself for not losing my temper. I think one of the most frustrating things about disciplining and doing it effectively and not letting the situation get out of control which I know is SUPER hard for parents. Especially if you were spanked. I think it’s just a natural reaction to whump on the bum. I didn’t have that reaction which attests to the fact that as a Mother I really don’t want to spank him. It’s an easy solution (I think?) but not the one I want to use. So I’m going to have to keep tweaking how I speak to him, what words I use and whether I’ll continue the time out as it may not be working in the manner I’m using it in.
Never a dull moment in this house!