Last year around this time, our son was spending his evenings, after being put to bed, re-arranging his room or running around like a maniac and bouncing off the walls. Re-arranging his room consisted not just of moving a few things around, but of dragging furniture to opposite corners, pulling drawers out of his dresser, and pulling the mattress off of the box spring and shoving it in front of his door. There were other activities that accompanied his 2.5 year old period of disequilibrium. Luckily as a parent, the memory of those outbursts and misbehavior tend to fade over time leaving you with just a sweet vision of a loving son. He still is loving. He still is kind. Yet there are times that I would like to slam my head into a wall these days due to his obstinance and emotional break downs over the smallest event or occurrence. It doesn't take much to send him over the edge into a fit of tears and wailing. I could simply go outside to start the charcoal on the grill without telling him only to hear him start crying and wailing inside over the fact that I didn't tell him. Yes, I didn't tell him because he was in the midst of playing with his toys and looked like he was having a grand old time. How was I supposed to know. Well, obviously as a parent, these things should be automatically known (at least according to our son). That is just one example of many that happened just yesterday afternoon in the span from when he got home around 430 till he went to bed around 7. There is one more that I will share with you, just because I find it mildly humorous. It involves pretzels, a large container of pretzels from Costco. He wanted some for a snack yesterday so we took the container (about 1.5 feet tall) from the cupboard, took the cover off, and put some pretzels on the over turned cover for him. My wife also took some for herself which turned out to be a bad idea. You see, our son had it in his head that he was going to eat the whole container of pretzels. The fact that my wife wanted some did not fit into our son's view of the world. It just couldn't happen. So he had a break down and started profusely crying. It got to the point where I took all the pretzels away until he stopped crying and told him he could have the over turned cover filled with pretzels, and when he finished those, he could have more. About three minutes of crying and going back and forth before he finally acquiesced. Turns out he really only wanted to eat about five pretzels, not the whole container.
And that is just half the fun. His little tantrums I can handle for they merely take a little understanding of him, a calm demeanor, and steadfastness. The part that is extremely difficult for me to handle is his seeming inability to listen. Not to hear (although sometimes it feels like that is the issue), but to truly listen to what his parents are saying. He has this habit of touching everything, even if we tell him not to and it takes about three repetitions of saying "Don't touch this because...(pick a reason, normally safety oriented)" before he finally decides to listen. We have had discussions about it, talked about the importance of not touching before asking, but it hasn't sunk in yet. His absence of listening carries into not even responding when we call his name. There are times when I will call his name because I either want to stop him from running to the front of the house, or doing something that could hurt himself, and there will be absolutely no response. I will repeat his name louder and louder until he finally responds, "WHAT" or "Stop yelling at me Daddy." If I get the response, "Stop yelling at me Daddy", I tell him I was only yelling because he wasn't responding and if he doesn't want me yelling, he should probably respond not on the fifth time I call his name, but on the first. In all seriousness, that is the only time I yell, when I am trying to get his attention. Either he gets so engrossed in what he is doing that he puts up a wall that won't let any sound in (or at least the sound of his parents voices), or he just truly is ignoring us. I'll go with the putting up the wall just to make myself feel better. Its not easy sometimes to keep ourselves on an even keel and deal with him, but we make it happen. For all his not listening (which he is starting to do at daycare as well), crying, and emotional break downs, he is still a very kind and loving big brother.
Just the other day, his little sister was walking around crying (either her molars or extreme tiredness, I don't remember which), and he went up to her, gave her a hug and a kiss on the forehead and told her, "Its OK, its OK." It was perhaps the sweetest thing I have seen him do yet. They play really well together for the most part, and he is always excited to see his sister, always. Its moments like those that get me through the tough ones where I have to deal with a manic, over tired, cranky, obstinate, three and a half year old. He is even helpful around the house, desiring to vacuum, put things away, clean up, and take care of chores around the house. The only thing I would like is for him to listen a little better and I can handle everything else. That is the one thing that gets on my nerves. His break downs are simple for me. And as almost every seasoned parent will probably tell me, be prepared for the not listening to continue. I know, he probably will never listen very well, but I can still hope and dream for the day when it improves at least somewhat. Oh well, for now, I will just keep the image of him giving his sister a hug and kiss in my mind. That and the picture of him feeding her eggs in the morning. That is also incredibly cute and adorable to watch.
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