I am not sure where I needed to go, but it was probably just another day where I was late getting T to school. Late is not good when it comes to T. There is no special reasoning with him in that situation. I can't simply say,"T we are late we need to hurry up." That approach had been tried and found to be lacking. It leads to less cooperation, not more. Because of this, when some simple solution presents itself it would be foolish not to take advantage of it.
I was trying to change T out of his pajamas and into his clothes for school. He was being particularly difficult. He would not put his clothes on himself. I was having no luck in attempting to convince him verbally, so I went ahead and tried to assist him. That lead to the kicking spell that almost was so bad I would have had to name it like a tropical storm. Legs were flying in all directions and getting a foot though a leg hole in the underwear, not working for me. Grab a foot, put the foot in the hole, grab another foot, too late the first one is out of the hole already. It went this way for a few minutes before I gave up and paused. That is when it happened.
He said, "I want to put my underwear on over there." I looked over to where he was pointing and it was at the end of his bed. Hey, if that is going to move this along, I am all for it. "OK, that's a good idea." I said. We both got up and walked over to the area and he stood there with his foot up waiting for me to slide it into the underwear. I put his foot through, and then he raised the other one. Those went on easily, and after that battle I was not going to start over with the pants. "That's a good place to put on underwear", I commented. "Where would you think a good place would be to put on your pants on?"
"Over there!", he said, pointing to the opposite corner of the room. We moved over to the other corner, and put on his pants.
"What about your shirt?", I asked smiling at him. He was no longer upset, and now laughing at the opportunity to pick places to get his clothes on.
"Over by the bear.", he said,pointing to the big over-sized stuffed bear sitting on the floor under his window.
Soon all his clothes were on, he was happy, and we were ready to go to school.
The next day, we were about to go through the battle again, when I remembered this magic solution. I think if you were looking at me you could actually see the little light bulb light up over my head like in cartoons. "T, Where do we put on under wear? Is it over there?," I said that pointing to the bear. T loves the game of me being wrong, so he can tell me the right answer. Plus, I figure it will pay off for me when he is older and I really don't know the answer. I will be able to pretend I am just playing the game. Anyway, T catches on to this right away and says,"Noooo, it is over there." He points to the end of the bed and runs over there. I follow and we start the process of getting dressed, and with the new system of magic clothes changing places he is dressed in record time.
So, I have been using these places frequently, and for some reason I never mentioned it to my wife L. Tonight however, Q was having some trouble falling asleep and L was looking like she needed a break from trying, so I volunteered to rock her for a while if she would give T a bath and put him in bed. So, we swapped duties for the night. She took care of T and got him all settled into bed, and I was lucky enough to get Q to drink her bottle and she actually fell asleep for me. It may have been that my lullabies were so out of key she decided to fake sleep to make me stop singing, but I'll just say she fell asleep. L and I met in the living room to talk about how it went for both of us. I told her Q was sleeping, and she told me T was in bed and looking like he was about to fall into sleep soon. Then she asked me,"Did you know he has to change his shirt over by the bear?"
I laughed out loud and thought I should tell her the story. Now you all know.
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