Parenting 101...

There is nothing quite like a boost to your parenting self esteem. You wonder if you are doing it right, if you are giving too many options to your toddler, or if you are gently steering them the way they need to go. It's the hope every parent has, that you are guiding them properly and molding them into behaved young people.

It's definitely challenging with a two point five year old.

Every morning before I drop off Camden at school he gets to play on my phone for five minutes before I leave him. He's the most popular kid around, his friends get excited when he arrives and they crowd around to either watch him play Mickey, game, or do a puzzle.

The other day he was a bit of a mess. He wanted to sit on my lap to watch, which was a little out of the norm. I obliged, and he seemed to get whinier from there. He is normally really good about obeying and turning the phone off when it's time for Mommy to go. But that day he wanted to throw a fit, flailing his body around and hollering, pushing his peers and causing a ruckus. I had to pick him up and hold him so he would look me in the eye. As he lay there with tears running out of the corners of his eyes, begging to watch Mickey Mouse, I had to be firm with making him turn it off. I told him that he was not allowed to play on the phone with that kind of behavior. He did turn it off, but continued to cry and fuss. I had to hold him and discuss how he needed to obey to play on the 'puters (his favorite thing at school) and if he didn't obey he wasn't going to get to play. He slowed his crying to hear me tell him he would lose a privilege, and then I told him he needed to tell me "sorry". So he says in his adorably pitiful voice, "I sorry Momma". So to make sure he's comprehending what I am asking him to apologize for, I ask him to tell me what he's sorry for. He responds with an equally as pitiful, "for throwing fits".

At that point he had slowed on his crying but then started to fuss again about "not wanting to play with his friends". At that point he had to option to sit on the couch by himself without the phone, or to go play with his friends. He chose to lay on the couch. I promised him that if he obeyed his teachers and helped clean up breakfast at school he could play on the computer. (After all, those are the rules of the room). He was able to be reasoned with at this point, less tearful and seemed to understand what I was saying. He answered me in a tearful and higher pitched tone with an inflection at the end of his one word answer, "okayyy". I told him I loved him and asked for a kiss.

As I was preparing to walk out the door, one of the teachers at school said, "Courtney, do you want to teach a parenting class? We've got some parents that could use that sort of information. Or some kids that just need to be parented in the first place".

Whoa. Holy compliment!

Did that really just happen? Its definitely a boost to my parenting self esteem when I hear a comment like that. After having all of the morning staff members sit and watch me parent my kid, it's good to know that they felt that I had handled it appropriately.

I left daycare that morning with a confident feeling about my abilities. Not only from that compliment, but from the way I was able to calm C, to get him to listen and apologize, and the way he seemed like he was able to hear what I was saying. He still wasn't completely done being upset or fussing, but we made some baby steps of progress.

Now, if these little lessons in obeying would start to sink in for good...

;)

Parenting.

You know that feeling of the unknown, the uncertainty you feel about so many things when pregnant? Pondering questions about feeding, sleeping, daycare. Questions like, "where is the instruction manual?", or "how am I supposed to set a routine?".  I remember all of those questions running through my mind. I also remember pondering how the husband and I were going to be at parenting. There are so many unknowns and you honestly have no idea how your significant other is going to change or react to a little one. My husby has really shown me that he is sensitive to Camden's needs, and is receptive to any instruction or suggestions I think of. I hope the same goes for me as well. I found it shocking initially, how he just stepped into the role almost effortlessly. I think I had expected to have to take on the role of disciplinarian why Husband played the role of "good cop", so to speak.

The other day Husband and I were in the kitchen with C. After repeatedly telling little C 'no, he wasn't allowed to pull a tray off of the counter', he succeeded.  This resulted in the spreading of leftovers that made Pearl googly-eyed. Husband swooped in before I could react, took little C's arm and got down on his level. He followed my instructions of making sure little C was looking us in the eye when giving reprimands, and told him that we had already told him 'no' and that he wasn't supposed to disobey us. He patiently walked Camden to timeout, sat him down and told him to sit there. By that time Pearl and I had cleaned up most of the mess, so I stepped in and enforced the sitting in time out until ready to get up. Before I knew it, Camden was ready to get up. Husband stopped what he was doing and rejoined us, and told little C to apologize before getting up. Camden looked at us and signed 'sorry' and then he was on his way, tearless the entire time, but absorbing.

I was just amazed at how well we worked as a team. We took turns enforcing and setting the limits and C seemed to really be taking in how we were on the same page and tag-teaming with our directs. It really felt good, you know? High-Five Parenting! 

 

Overall, I'd say I was pretty nervous about how things would shake out initially. But as Camden has grown older we have had to set more boundaries and limits. So far it has been great to have my Husband parallel to me in the role of enforcer. Go team!!