I got slapped by my son three times yesterday.
Lucas has always struggled with … wait, no … I have always struggled with Lucas feeling a bit too big for his britches. Walking that fine line of helping him own and express his power while keeping in check his sense of entitlement to the world has probably been one of my biggest parenting challenges. It has heightened with his latest independent leap into preschool. He’s a big boy, and so he’s apparently ready to call all the shots now.
Yes, we have firm and consistent boundaries. And every time he butts up against one of them these days, all hell breaks loose. I can honestly say that I have never, ever, ever, given in to him when he has pitched a fit about something. Ever! I fully understand the implications of caving in to this kind of behavior, and so, no matter how inconvenient, I’ve never allowed a tantrum to gain him any ground. And yet … he continues to try this strategy to see if it will one day work. I suppose tenacity has its merits.
It occurs to me that, in addition to grappling for a peaceful resolution, I am also wrestling down some self-judgment that stems from common myths about parenting. This job is never easy. It doesn’t help to layer on the guilt. In my experience, the best way to deal with guilt is to face it head-on, so here are some of the myths behind my guilt, and my real-life experiences to counter them.
Myth: Kids who throw tantrums are used to getting their way when they do it.
Reality Check: Apparently not. Sometimes it’s just a natural expression of having their power thwarted.
Myth: Kids who hit do so because they’ve been exposed to hitting.
Reality Check: Also, apparently not. See Reality Check for the first myth.
Myth: Kids act entitled because they always get their way.
Reality Check: As evidenced by the number of tantrums in our house, I’d say Lucas is definitely not getting his way all the time, and yet … entitlement oozes from his pores. I’m finding this to be very common among crystal children, by the way, so if you have one, you will totally identify with this. If you haven’t seen it evidenced yet, be forewarned.
While I was under the assumption that these myths were true, I was at a loss to explain Lucas’ behavior. According to the myths, he shouldn’t be throwing tantrums, hitting or acting so entitled. He just shouldn’t be!
Refusing reality is rather counterproductive, don’t you think?
By removing these misconceptions about how my son should be behaving, I could look at his current actions more clearly. He’s testing boundaries again because there has been a huge change in his life since starting preschool. It’s a whole new world for him there, and now he wonders what else has changed. Are boundaries different from home to school? Now that he’s a “big boy” does he get to decide more things? Does he get to decide everything? Why not try it out? Perhaps his expectations were such that he thought he’d get way more freedom with this change, and when that was thwarted again and again, he was terribly disappointed.
This is not to say that we just went along with the hitting and screaming and said, “Oh, we understand why you’re abusing Mommy. It’s okay.” Uh, no.
My immediate response was to restrain his arms so he couldn’t continue to hit, tell him as calmly as I could, (doing my best to not grit my teeth) “We don’t hit. Hitting hurts. We don’t hurt others,” and then remove him from whatever situation we were in; from the living room to the bedroom, or from the café to my car, whatever. We then had some quiet cool-down time together. At home, this lasted about five minutes. When we were in the car, it lasted the whole ride home – about ten minutes. After the cool-down time, I reiterated that we don’t hit, that we are gentle with our hands. I affirmed that I noticed he was frustrated about x, y, z. Since he’s very verbal, I gave him some things he could say to express his anger or frustration instead of using his hands.
I’ve never asked him to say he was sorry about anything. He shows his remorse or reconciliation attempts in his own way. At the end of this exchange, I asked him if there was anything else he wanted to say to me about this. He said, “I want to give you a hug.”
Apology accepted.
I love Alfie Kohn and his unconditional parenting approach. We don’t use rewards or punishment in our home. It’s a much trickier road to navigate, with far fewer role models, to be sure, but I deeply believe in the benefits of this kind of respectful parenting. With that in mind, I was a bit at a loss for what else to do if the hitting continued.
Therefore, I decided to make an exception. I don’t know if it’s the right thing to do or not. It’s just something I’m willing to try. I really want to nip this hitting thing in the bud. Lucas has a very strong personality and a quick fuse, and I don’t want to take the chance of him hitting other children. Therefore, at the end of our conversation together, I told him that I was so serious about the hitting, that if he did it even one more time, his precious guitar would be placed out of reach for a whole day, and he would have no access to the stereo. This is like forever in toddler time, and his eyes widened in understanding.
We’ll see how it goes. I don’t feel 100% great about this decision, but I also don’t want the hitting to escalate.
Another idea I have is to create some new routines at home, now that school has started, so he can predict more of what will happen in his day – maybe even down to which snacks he gets, when. While it seems restrictive, I think at this age, the routine is soothing, and it allows him to flow from one thing to the next without me needing to direct him. The greater structure actually allows him to take more responsibility for himself.
What ideas do you all have for dealing with these issues? How have you handled hitting and tantrums? As always, I dearly appreciate your comments!
Stumble It!