In the last 24 hours he's left about 18 dents with a hammer in the door to the garage from the house.
While I was attending to another child in my yard, X-man opened the backdoor and sprayed down the inside of my house.
And yesterday, while I was getting out the groceries, he climbed from his carseat to the driver's seat, pulled out the tape adapter that runs my iPod, thus breaking my tape player in my car.
In each of these incidents, I was within sight of him. In each of these incidents, I yelled stop at least 5 times in the steps it took me to get to him.
In each of these incidents, he looked at me, smiled and laughed as he continued what I was asking him not to do.
I feel so inept, but at the same time I feel angry that I'm now going to have to stand over him every moment of the day. Not 5 feet away. Not 10 feet away. But over him. I can no longer take him out of his carseat until I've emptied the car. Then I'll have to walk him into the house. When before the last few days, he was so interested in helping me, so interested in doing what I was doing... gardening, shopping, cleaning...
Now, he just wants to make me react. And I will admit, I reacted like someone lit my pants on fire each time. Instead, I need to calm down. Other than taking some drugs -- anyone got any idea on how to keep cool when you want to tear your hair out?
7 comments:
No ideas, but I'm dealing with the same types of situations- although, instead of destroying stuff it's mostly directed at Eli. I am having a very hard time staying calm! Maybe a leash? ;)
I'm right there with you, and similarly feeling inept and generally like a shitty parent. At the same time, though, I feel like I've tried every approach . . . talking, acknowledging, rewarding, threatening, time-outs, ignoring, and nothing has worked.
So, sorry I don't have any valuable suggestions, other than to assure you that it's not just X-Man, and it's not just you.
A glass of wine is always soothing for me, and I like to think consequently a positive thing for Owen. Maybe I should share with him so we can both be chill :-).
I read the book "ScreamFree Parenting" and really got a lot out of it to use with James.
more hands. you need more hands. and more eyes.
I wish I had the answer...man do I wish I had the answer...
It's frustrating and totally terrifying. Cayla fell into a koi pond yesterday seconds after I told her to wait for me and while I was literally four feet from her. I'm still freaked out by it. Hang in there.
We are still struggling with stop when I say stop. I've been making the consequences far more draconian lately for disobeying. And Henry is getting slippery with his words and so I'm using disobey to convey that he can't slip around consequences by re-framing the misdeed. I am concerned about the new baby and how Henry gets physically out of control when playing with me.
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