Now, I read a lot of parenting blogs. I particularly love Scary Mommy I love how blunt and easily relatable this one is, and The Bubblelush is a written by a lady who has her own very young children and is also a foster mum. I came across her when I was looking into becoming a foster carer. She is an absolute angel. One day I'd love to be like her.
Anyways, I came across this post from Fatherly http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/8248234
And it is pure genius, 100%. When I first began to read it..treat your child like an adult my initial thought was... Errrr you serious!? But it works! It so works. I really needed some help with Danny. And this was it!
A little background.. Danny is 4 next month (oh my god!?) and he is super freaky. Honestly, he is scarily intelligent. I'm not just saying this because I'm his Mum.
You can have full blown conversations with him, and have done for ages. He can recognise words and numbers, write his own name as well as Mummy, Daddy Connor and Jade (his key workers name). At his last parents evening at nursery she even said to me she is having to get work for him to do from the reception class because he can do everything they have in the nursery!?
He was walking by 10 months old. I can't remember him ever not talking, he was fully potty trained day and night by 2 years old. He can work a self timer on a camera. He dresses himself, gets himself ready every morning. His understanding of the world is ridiculous for his age and he hates anything that should be at his level programmes etc because he says they are boring! He loves documentaries about animals and dinosaurs and when I let him choose a dinosaur book to buy (he LOVES Dinosaurs) He was insistent on an encyclopaedia and loves looking at all the pictures and when I read it (I can barely pronounce half of it) to him. Stuff we have brought for him for his birthday / Christmas is meant for at least double his age. He's basically a 7 year old (okay, maybe not quite but just to try and explain him) in a 3 year olds body.
However, this does have a downside. He gets bored so quickly. When he's bored he reverts to what I call the Danny monster. He screams, shouts, pings about, he plays with one thing and quickly gets bored, he winds up Connor something rotton and that leads to fights. He tells Connor to do naughty things and starts getting really.....arseholey!! He's a lovely boy don't get me wrong, he's polite and very very sensitive but he needs and craves constant attention.
Back to the article. As I was reading this Danny was popping into my mind over. We have a few behavioural approaches. He has a sticker chart for eating his dinner (he's a sod for not eating his dinner, it's too hot, this bit looks funny blah blah.) He would rather talk about complete nonsense or something like "mummy why is the dogs poo orangey and mine is brown" at the dinner table.. Ergh. It's quite exhausting answering 1000,000 questions a day!
The chart only works because he wants to complete the picture. It's like a sticker jigsaw chart. If he is particularly awful he gets sat out on the step which he hates and just gets angry about...and will try to have a debate with me about how grossly unjustified it is. Seriously, he's exasperating!
At nursery they have a "black cloud" which is basically a traffic light system, but my word he's terrified of it. He is the best behaved little angel at nursery because I think he would be totally hysterical and refuse to ever go back if he ever got put on it. One of his friends got put on it last week for something totally unrelated from him and he was distraught about it! Burst into tears as if she had been put in the chokey or something!? (They don't have one of those at his nursery!) I think it's more the public embarrassment of being naughty than anything else.
Danny and I can clash, which leads to power struggles, which are silly really and just remind me of the I'm big you're small argument in Matilda (must have Matilda on the brain today!?) I just felt that the step at home was just frustrating him more. After reading the article that day I thought back on the entire day and really tried to think how I acted with the boys, Danny in particular. I wouldn't let him help me with chores, told him to be quiet and to wait a minute loads and loads of times even said oh why can't you just go and play with something for a minute and leave me in peace (argh bad Mummy). I cut his food up, picked his clothes and brushed his teeth. I pretty much chose everything for him. Wow, how annoying! How did I not realise what a total control freak I was being! Poor boy no wonder he was frustrated and playing up. He wanted my attention and I was snipping at him for no real reason. I felt a bit shit.
Today we were at home all day, so I saw it as my chance to try this treat him like an adult stuff out. He chose his outfit (although I did have to persuade him to get dressed at all because he said well why do I have to, I got dressed yesterday!? ) I let him help change and make the beds, yes it took longer and no it wasn't as neat as I do it but wow he was so excited and pleased with himself! He helped me wash up, Connor did too and water ended up everywhere but it was funny! I gave him the chance to choose what we all did this afternoon, a choice of something arty, a film or all playing buckaroo. He picked arty so I got out the clay and I made a leaf with Connor but let Danny do his own thing. He asked me to help him make a leaf too. We all made a pumpkin tea light holder and with the remaining clay he made a 'pumpkin face' it was hard not intervening but I'm glad I didn't because he did it and it was really good!
He helped me fold the washing and even though I had to re do the lot he loved sorting the socks. He even helped make me and Craig coffee! I had to hold back and not take over when he wasnt getting the right amount of coffee or sugar on a teaspoon. Seriously, I'm so controlling apparently!! He was so amazed when I said he can lift the kettle. Turns out he makes a pretty good cup of coffee!
Now I'm not going to just let him do whatever he wants or let him try out all kinds of dangerous activities. I'm his Mum not his buddy and I'm raising gentlemen not hoodlums! It could of been a fluke but by giving him some of the control he reacted by giving me the respect and attention he should. Respect is a two way street after all. I wing this parenting malarkey every day and I'm always willing to learn and take advice. All I can do is my best for them :) From this I've learnt that actually he is a fully fledged little person with his own thoughts, wants and feelings. That my little Danny diddles doesn't need me to do absolutely everything for him anymore. That I need to let go of him a little, loosen the apron strings, that he isn't a baby anymore. That my little boy is much more capable than I allow myself to believe
That my little boy..... Is growing up.
XxxxX
Fab thoughts as always xx
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