Battle of Wills
Tonight's dinner was leftover pot roast. Jacob took one look at it, declared it "yucky" and pushed it away. Thus began a long evening of battling wills.
This was probably about 6:50pm. (I work until 6:30, so we eat late as a family.) Alicia had suggested a nice family walk after dinner, although she also mentioned we were out of milk for Jacob so we may need to go buy some.
Anyway, Jacob was reminded that calling food "yucky" and pushing it away was being disrespectful to mommy. If he continued to do that, he'd end up on the naughty step. He managed to refrain from any further direct insults to the food... for a while.
One amusing thing that he does is after saying "no" a bunch of times, he'll say things like "I told you three times I'm not going to do it" and "I'm pressing the big red 'no' button." We're not even sure why he would think to say the latter one other than his computer usage.
About midway through our meal, Alicia remembered we had leftover biscuits. She warmed up three, but we told Jacob he could only have his biscuit if he ate half his meal. Still no progress.
After the rest of us finished, I set the kitchen timer for 5 minutes and said if he doesn't eat half his meal by the time the timer goes off, we're eating his biscuit. That REALLY got him upset. Upset enough to throw his fork down. This landed him on the naughty step for three minutes.
He started spitting at us from the naughty step... oops, that restarts the clock.
And, by the way, it's really hard not to laugh a child who's sobbing every time you move at the dinner table... "nooo.... don't eat my biscuit!"
So around 7:15, he finally gets off the naughty step and returns to the table. Since he spent 4 of his 5 minutes on the naughty step, we give him a break and restart the kitchen timer.
The timer still managed to go off before he ate more than 1-2 bites. Oh well, no... well, ok, we'll just give a few bites of the biscuit to Dorothea this time and give him one more chance to salvage the rest.
Dorothea and I enjoy some yogurt. Jacob would normally be having yogurt for dessert, too. I was hoping he'd eat so he could get his. But no, he's just worried about the safety of his biscuit.
He's still not eating, so Alicia starts to feed him. He likes "spider food", so I remark that the pot roast looks like spiders. At least that cheers him up. Alicia manages to feed him half his meal and he gets to start eating his biscuit.
Eventually, he loses the rest of said biscuit for not eating any more of his meal.
We all leave him at the table and try ignoring him for a while. It's sort of cruel flat out ignoring a child, but we didn't want to give his bad behavior attention. Not that it really changed other than sounding more pitiful and confused.
Dorothea and I headed upstairs. He really wanted to go upstairs to use his computer. He even remarked that when he's done with his meal, he'll come up and join us.
Not that he ate anything. When 8pm rolled around, I'd had it. Alicia has asked me not to swoop in when she's in control and I accidentally timed my coming downstairs with when she was laying out new time limit. But I was committed at that point. I didn't like losing the whole evening's family time to his antics. I went downstairs, took him to the naughty step and told him everything we missed out on - the walk, buying his milk. I told him he was now getting in his pajamas and going to bed without stories (or a song) - things he really enjoys. I also told him that if he acted out while we were doing this he would get a spanking. That's something we almost never do.
That got him crying almost to the point of puking. I eventually got him to take some deep breaths and count to ten. Good, because I did NOT want to cap this evening off with cleaning up pukey.
Jacob was ok about getting ready for bed and cleaning his toys. Although, he did miss out on his sticker for good potty skills because he took forever washing his hands again (he gets a 10 and a 5 count if it looks like he's not doing anything). He seems to loose track of what he's doing when he sees the mirror.
And now, it's 9:15 and he's up again... when he's not allowed to stay up he knows there's a loophole that if he says he has to go potty that he's allowed to sit there. This is the child that has figured out when he has to go #2 maybe twice in his life. Still, it's not the kind of thing where you want to take a chance that he's actually right for once. In like 15-20 minutes, we'll get him off of there and get him off to bed. Again.
When I read this, I think I sound like a militant jerk. He's really a good kid most of the time. He sometimes fusses over dinner a bit, but almost always gives in to the promise of dessert or another opportunity. Today he was a little whiney, but we've been decent about dealing with that. The problems mostly come up when we're dead tired and are fuses are short.
Not that we aren't always dead tired lately.
3yo Aries children = fun. Thank God the other one is a Virgo.
Let me rephrase that. Thank God the other one is not 3 yet. I'll reserve judgement on the Virgo part, even though I am one.
This was probably about 6:50pm. (I work until 6:30, so we eat late as a family.) Alicia had suggested a nice family walk after dinner, although she also mentioned we were out of milk for Jacob so we may need to go buy some.
Anyway, Jacob was reminded that calling food "yucky" and pushing it away was being disrespectful to mommy. If he continued to do that, he'd end up on the naughty step. He managed to refrain from any further direct insults to the food... for a while.
One amusing thing that he does is after saying "no" a bunch of times, he'll say things like "I told you three times I'm not going to do it" and "I'm pressing the big red 'no' button." We're not even sure why he would think to say the latter one other than his computer usage.
About midway through our meal, Alicia remembered we had leftover biscuits. She warmed up three, but we told Jacob he could only have his biscuit if he ate half his meal. Still no progress.
After the rest of us finished, I set the kitchen timer for 5 minutes and said if he doesn't eat half his meal by the time the timer goes off, we're eating his biscuit. That REALLY got him upset. Upset enough to throw his fork down. This landed him on the naughty step for three minutes.
He started spitting at us from the naughty step... oops, that restarts the clock.
And, by the way, it's really hard not to laugh a child who's sobbing every time you move at the dinner table... "nooo.... don't eat my biscuit!"
So around 7:15, he finally gets off the naughty step and returns to the table. Since he spent 4 of his 5 minutes on the naughty step, we give him a break and restart the kitchen timer.
The timer still managed to go off before he ate more than 1-2 bites. Oh well, no... well, ok, we'll just give a few bites of the biscuit to Dorothea this time and give him one more chance to salvage the rest.
Dorothea and I enjoy some yogurt. Jacob would normally be having yogurt for dessert, too. I was hoping he'd eat so he could get his. But no, he's just worried about the safety of his biscuit.
He's still not eating, so Alicia starts to feed him. He likes "spider food", so I remark that the pot roast looks like spiders. At least that cheers him up. Alicia manages to feed him half his meal and he gets to start eating his biscuit.
Eventually, he loses the rest of said biscuit for not eating any more of his meal.
We all leave him at the table and try ignoring him for a while. It's sort of cruel flat out ignoring a child, but we didn't want to give his bad behavior attention. Not that it really changed other than sounding more pitiful and confused.
Dorothea and I headed upstairs. He really wanted to go upstairs to use his computer. He even remarked that when he's done with his meal, he'll come up and join us.
Not that he ate anything. When 8pm rolled around, I'd had it. Alicia has asked me not to swoop in when she's in control and I accidentally timed my coming downstairs with when she was laying out new time limit. But I was committed at that point. I didn't like losing the whole evening's family time to his antics. I went downstairs, took him to the naughty step and told him everything we missed out on - the walk, buying his milk. I told him he was now getting in his pajamas and going to bed without stories (or a song) - things he really enjoys. I also told him that if he acted out while we were doing this he would get a spanking. That's something we almost never do.
That got him crying almost to the point of puking. I eventually got him to take some deep breaths and count to ten. Good, because I did NOT want to cap this evening off with cleaning up pukey.
Jacob was ok about getting ready for bed and cleaning his toys. Although, he did miss out on his sticker for good potty skills because he took forever washing his hands again (he gets a 10 and a 5 count if it looks like he's not doing anything). He seems to loose track of what he's doing when he sees the mirror.
And now, it's 9:15 and he's up again... when he's not allowed to stay up he knows there's a loophole that if he says he has to go potty that he's allowed to sit there. This is the child that has figured out when he has to go #2 maybe twice in his life. Still, it's not the kind of thing where you want to take a chance that he's actually right for once. In like 15-20 minutes, we'll get him off of there and get him off to bed. Again.
When I read this, I think I sound like a militant jerk. He's really a good kid most of the time. He sometimes fusses over dinner a bit, but almost always gives in to the promise of dessert or another opportunity. Today he was a little whiney, but we've been decent about dealing with that. The problems mostly come up when we're dead tired and are fuses are short.
Not that we aren't always dead tired lately.
3yo Aries children = fun. Thank God the other one is a Virgo.
Let me rephrase that. Thank God the other one is not 3 yet. I'll reserve judgement on the Virgo part, even though I am one.