I am made of parenting win
I've been reading several books that I'm hoping will help me deal better with Gavin and be a more effective parent for him. These are "Taming Your Spirited Child", "Parenting Your Spirited Child", and "Parents, Kids, and Power Struggles".
Reading the first one (Taming Your Spirited Child) has made me recognize a LOT of Gavin in me, and in Frolic as well. And I've also realized that because I'm so frustrated and exhausted, I've become really disrespectful to Gavin. My tone of voice when talking with him is likely to be curt and abrupt, for example. My first instinct is to feel frustrated. And as a result, I treat him disrespectfully. Of course he doesn't like that - who would? - and being the determined, persistent kid that he is, he reacts with rebellion. So it turns into a power struggle between him and I where we both keep escalating it.
So today I tried some of the techniques in the book in dealing with a common situation. Normally it would go like this:
Me: It's time for quiet time*.
Moo: I don't like quiet time!
Me: Gavin, I said it's time for quiet time.
Moo: I DON'T WANT TO!
Me: Do you need a time out?
Moo: *sulks his way into his room*
Today this is how it went:
Me: It's time for quiet time.
Moo: I don't like quiet time!
Me: I know it's hard to switch to quiet time when you've been having fun playing Wii! Hey, do you want a hug? *gets down on knees, holds arms out*
Moo: *puzzled* *hugs me*
Me: Do you want to take the new I Spy book you got at the library with you so you can look at it during quiet time?
Moo: *retrieves I Spy book from backpack, goes for quiet time without further issue*
Me: O_o *waits for Moo to be out of earshot* Holy shit, that actually worked.
Frolic: What worked?
Me: The new techniques I'm learning. Did you see what just happened there?
Frolic: Yeah, he didn't freak out. *high-5's me*
* "Quiet time" is where he has to go be in his room for an hour. He can nap or play with his toys or read his books, and then he has to clean up any mess he's made afterwards. Note that we do give him a lot of warnings that QT is coming ("Quiet time is in 10 minutes! Quiet time is in 5 minutes!" and it's at the same time every day, so it's not like the QT announcement comes out of nowhere. He has plenty of time to transition from whatever activity he's doing.)
So that was Parenting Win #1. The second Parenting Win moment today was that his teacher sent home this month's Scholastic Book Club flyers. For those who are unfamiliar with the Scholastic Book Club, it's a company that markets to schools; each month children receive a several-page flyer advertising children's books at really good prices (like $2.99-$4.99, for a lot of them) and then the kids can order books that are shipped to the school for the children to pick up. In addition, the more books are ordered, the more free books Scholastic gives to the kid's classroom. So it's a win-win; the kid gets books at a really good price, and the school gets free books. I have really good memories of doing the Book Club as a kid; it was always so exciting on the day when the shipments came in each month.
So this month, instead of picking some books I know he'd like, I went through the flyers and cut out the ads for twelve books that I knew he might be interested in. Then I picked eight loonies (loonies are $1 coins) out of the jar we keep for laundry change, and sat Moo down. I showed him the eight loonies and had him count them, then explained that that's how much money he has for buying books. And then I set down the twelve ads and showed him how to find the prices on each one, and explained that he can buy whatever books he wants as long as he can afford them.
He picked out a $4 book and we took away 4 loonies from the 8 on the floor. He picked out a $3 book and we took away three more, and then he tried to pick out another book but didn't have enough. That seemed to click on the light for him and he put those two ads back with the others and spent some time poring over the ads, having me read the descriptions of all 12 to him (he could have read them himself, but hey, this is Mama-Moo time). Then he selected a different $4 book, handed me four of the loonies, picked another $4 book, and handed me the remaining 4 loonies. I said, "Are you sure these two are the ones you want?" He nodded and I filled out the order and then we taped those two ads to the side of his bookcase.
Learning moments FTW! Today we spent time together, and while we did that he learned about money, what things cost, decision-making, and math. WOO!
Reading the first one (Taming Your Spirited Child) has made me recognize a LOT of Gavin in me, and in Frolic as well. And I've also realized that because I'm so frustrated and exhausted, I've become really disrespectful to Gavin. My tone of voice when talking with him is likely to be curt and abrupt, for example. My first instinct is to feel frustrated. And as a result, I treat him disrespectfully. Of course he doesn't like that - who would? - and being the determined, persistent kid that he is, he reacts with rebellion. So it turns into a power struggle between him and I where we both keep escalating it.
So today I tried some of the techniques in the book in dealing with a common situation. Normally it would go like this:
Me: It's time for quiet time*.
Moo: I don't like quiet time!
Me: Gavin, I said it's time for quiet time.
Moo: I DON'T WANT TO!
Me: Do you need a time out?
Moo: *sulks his way into his room*
Today this is how it went:
Me: It's time for quiet time.
Moo: I don't like quiet time!
Me: I know it's hard to switch to quiet time when you've been having fun playing Wii! Hey, do you want a hug? *gets down on knees, holds arms out*
Moo: *puzzled* *hugs me*
Me: Do you want to take the new I Spy book you got at the library with you so you can look at it during quiet time?
Moo: *retrieves I Spy book from backpack, goes for quiet time without further issue*
Me: O_o *waits for Moo to be out of earshot* Holy shit, that actually worked.
Frolic: What worked?
Me: The new techniques I'm learning. Did you see what just happened there?
Frolic: Yeah, he didn't freak out. *high-5's me*
* "Quiet time" is where he has to go be in his room for an hour. He can nap or play with his toys or read his books, and then he has to clean up any mess he's made afterwards. Note that we do give him a lot of warnings that QT is coming ("Quiet time is in 10 minutes! Quiet time is in 5 minutes!" and it's at the same time every day, so it's not like the QT announcement comes out of nowhere. He has plenty of time to transition from whatever activity he's doing.)
So that was Parenting Win #1. The second Parenting Win moment today was that his teacher sent home this month's Scholastic Book Club flyers. For those who are unfamiliar with the Scholastic Book Club, it's a company that markets to schools; each month children receive a several-page flyer advertising children's books at really good prices (like $2.99-$4.99, for a lot of them) and then the kids can order books that are shipped to the school for the children to pick up. In addition, the more books are ordered, the more free books Scholastic gives to the kid's classroom. So it's a win-win; the kid gets books at a really good price, and the school gets free books. I have really good memories of doing the Book Club as a kid; it was always so exciting on the day when the shipments came in each month.
So this month, instead of picking some books I know he'd like, I went through the flyers and cut out the ads for twelve books that I knew he might be interested in. Then I picked eight loonies (loonies are $1 coins) out of the jar we keep for laundry change, and sat Moo down. I showed him the eight loonies and had him count them, then explained that that's how much money he has for buying books. And then I set down the twelve ads and showed him how to find the prices on each one, and explained that he can buy whatever books he wants as long as he can afford them.
He picked out a $4 book and we took away 4 loonies from the 8 on the floor. He picked out a $3 book and we took away three more, and then he tried to pick out another book but didn't have enough. That seemed to click on the light for him and he put those two ads back with the others and spent some time poring over the ads, having me read the descriptions of all 12 to him (he could have read them himself, but hey, this is Mama-Moo time). Then he selected a different $4 book, handed me four of the loonies, picked another $4 book, and handed me the remaining 4 loonies. I said, "Are you sure these two are the ones you want?" He nodded and I filled out the order and then we taped those two ads to the side of his bookcase.
Learning moments FTW! Today we spent time together, and while we did that he learned about money, what things cost, decision-making, and math. WOO!