So it is no secret that with an additional child on hand this time, “Single parenthood” (or in actuality a married woman forced to live alone and live as a single woman, minus the ability to date because I am actually married- but my husband is in a more committed relationship with the Army) is not as easy as it used to be. I am older, not by much, but enough to make me feel as though I should keep a pack of depends on hand just in case. I am busier; not only am I in school, but I have a husband to remotely, personally assist, and play dates to schedule and… well you know. So as I find myself becoming more and more overwhelmed with my kids', oddly enough, age appropriate behaviors- I am desperately combing my arsenal of parenting techniques that I have picked up through various parenting classes and college classes that I have taken. The two most helpful are my Behavior Modification class and the Love & Logic classes that I have taken. ( http://www.loveandlogic.com/ I recommend that everyone with minor children at least check it out.) So I adore L&L because their techniques are so simple. They have the ‘Too Good to be true’ vibe, but when applied properly THEY WORK!!! Freaking awesome! The hardest part of L&L is that the parent has to change their behaviors, duhn duhn duhn!!! What??!!! You mean I can’t scream and yell and act like a nut job and have my kids behave that way??? And since I was raised in the screaming nut job manner, it is EXTREMELY difficult for me to gather my senses in those two seconds between the child drawing on the TV screen and me picking him up by his shoulders and barking at him about how naughty he is. I know better, but my brain turns to mush in those moments. Another cool thing about L&L is that one of the recommendations is that you just allow your brain to turn to mush… don’t even think about the situation. Go on a little vacation in your own head, so that way while you are lounging on the beach in Cancun being fanned by Julio the really hot, straight, single, towel boy, you have the time to gather yourself and figure out a logical and calm way to handle your child’s tendency to be a monster. Alas, I did not decide to write this gem to sell the product, go check out the website for yourself… but I could really talk about it’s effectiveness all day.
Any who… my real purpose, two paragraphs later, is to talk about the odd hilarity, and sense of overall peace that I actually got, from using a behavior modification technique. So I am in my Lady Lair, looking up Taylor Swift tickets for the princesses, and I hear something that I hear at least several times on a daily basis. “NO!” WHACK! “AHHHHHH!” Tears. “I’m sowy!” Ok, so in case you didn’t catch on to that scenario, Bub hit Sis, presumably with a toy or other blunt object. If you pay close attention to the end, he apologizes. He does this because he, even at two, knows he screwed up. He knows this because it is a daily occurrence. And for the past few months, the result has been me giving him a swat on his bottom, telling him how naughty he is (in my scariest voice, because you know that mommies have a hard time being scary) and putting him on his time out carpet. And being that he continues these behaviors on a daily basis, it is fair to say that my previous techniques have been a complete failure. So then what, I dipped into that arsenal of information that I have been ignoring all this time and thought, hmm why not? So in the last week the consequence has changed. When Bub hits sis, I say “Uh, oh!! Someone has to go to their room!” (In the L&L class it is called the Uh Oh song and you are supposed to say it in a sing songy fashion, but I am not much of a vocalist…) Then I whisk him away to his room.
A slight digression, I have never understood, from childhood, how being sent to ones room is a punishment. To me my room was my safe haven, I welcomed being sent to my room- but I was an odd child. For my kids, I don’t understand how sending them to their room could even possibly be a punishment because I have spent their entire lives showering them with the toys and trinkets that make their hearts flutter. But I was wrong…
Sending a child to any place against their will is extreme punishment. It doesn’t matter what toys are there. I would be willing to bet money that if you forced your child into Disney Land and he didn’t want and/or plan to be there, he would throw a fit.
So I carry bub, kicking and screaming, to his room full of toys and magic, place him on the bed, and walk out. Now here is where the punishment takes some effort from the parents. It is time consuming. Some suggest that you walk away and then continually return the child to his room when he inevitably tries to escape. Others would say that you enforce the closed status of the door by standing there (quietly, no interaction) and holding the door closed. Either way it is part of a classic behavior modification technique known as Extinction, where you enforce a consequence until the undesirable behavior disappears. Genius! Either choice requires a sacrifice of your time and patients because you still can’t be angry and vocal, you are simply enforcing. I chose the stand and hold the door knob technique, simply because I didn’t want to start and stop my activities, I would rather just see the punishment through. The final part of this punishment is you keep the child in their room until their ensuing tantrum ends and they have spent a long enough time (usually a minute for each year they are old) in a calm state, and then they are free to leave. The COOLEST part is that you don’t have to tell them they can leave. Once the tantrum stops, you can walk away and when they choose to leave, they can.
Okay, so I know that even though I said I wasn’t here to advertise or teach the technique, and I did anyway. But I felt it needed to be explained rather than saying ‘So there I was holding my son in his room against his will…’ But now you know.
So, there I was, holding my son in his room against his will, and at first it was hard not to be annoyed that I had to be there for the duration of his punishment. He was the naughty one, not me. I also had to pee… “I hope this doesn’t take too long.” And being that I was in non-responsive silent mode, I had to just stand there. I closed my eyes. That left only a few senses left to be involved in this dilemma. I was holding the door knob so that he couldn’t escape, and let me tell you I had to use force, because all of a sudden my son was not a 2 year old boy, but a full grown man with a surplus of strength jerking on the door knob. He gives up trying the door knob. Now my other sense, hearing, is in over drive. I am listening to the calamity that is occurring on the other side of the door. It sounds as if he is hurling his toys against the wall and door, as if to create a hole large enough to make an escape. I can’t tell which toys, and I really don’t care. I own this home, so while I would be mad if he dented the wall, I really don’t have anyone to answer to about it. And if these techniques help to get him to stop hitting, I know how to putty and paint. Next I hear him climbing… is he going to go through the vents? As he is doing all these obviously strenuous things, all the while my precious 2 year old boy is talking crap. He is using fairly clear words too. Now after all this story telling the exact phrases have escaped me, but I can tell you they were along the lines of : “You let me out” “Ahhhh! MOOOOMAAAA!” “Move” “Let Go!” Then he started mumbling, and I am sure that if properly translated he was swearing at me. Then out of nowhere, she starts to flick the springy door stopper. BOING! BOING! Still mumbling, less crying. And just as I am ready to let go of the door, he starts screaming and tugging at the door knob again. This goes on for no less than 15 minutes, which is extreme for a temper tantrum. He varied his techniques from tugging to hurling toys to scaling the walls and at one point I believe he was devising a plan to dig his way out under the door. After the first few minutes of the punishment I realized that I though this whole escapade was HILARIOUS! I didn’t like that he misbehaved, I didn’t like that his response to the consequence was an outright tantrum, but being that I had to sit there and listen and I could only visualize what was happening on the other side of the door, It turned out to be one of the more entertaining parts of my day.
To wrap it up, he eventually stopped and was distracted enough that he started playing with his toys and forgot all about his hatred for me and his room. When he emerged a short time later you couldn’t even tell that he had been crying. He was loving and in a good mood. Mission accomplished.
Now I am positive that he is going to hit his sister again tomorrow. And we will go through a similar state of affairs. But the end result *should* be that eventually the tantrums will not last as long. Eventually they will not happen at all. Eventually when I sing to him “Uh Oh!! Someone has to go to their room” he will not wait to be carried, thrashing to his room; he will run there and slam the door. And eventually, he will stop hitting his sister. Hopefully for Princess’ sake, that happens relatively quickly.
Well, I hope we all learned a lesson here: Colleen is as long winded in writing as she is in a face to face conversation. :-)
