raisegoodkids

Sam has spotted some dinosaurs roaming our area recently. I have not seen them, daddy has not seen them, and great-grandma has not seen them. Actually, no one has seen these dinosaurs except for Sam.

I’m not sure where they are hiding, but I would guess they live in the woods behind our house. I need to find a way to trap these dinosaurs and then move them to a different area. They are wreaking havoc on our home!

I can’t do anything without disturbing the dinosaurs. I try picking rocks up from the front yard and I get this, “No, mom-mom, that dinosaur rock.” Okay, well, the dinosaurs need to keep the rocks out of the grass otherwise they are going to hear from daddy.

We drive down the road and any little bump we hit along the way Sam will cry out, “What that? That a dinosaur!” I’m not sure if I’m running the dinosaurs over or if they are bombing our car. I haven’t gotten the whole story of the dinosaurs on the road yet.

One of the funniest things the dinosaurs do is poop. Yep, they poop. My son has apparently been accepted into their dinosaur clan, too, because he can make dinosaur poop himself. He is so talented! It is very nice when he comes out of the bathroom and announces, in front of anyone, “I make dinosaur poop. Raaawwrrr!”

Now, though, the dinosaurs are over-stepping their bounds. Somehow they are getting into our home. They are now the culprits in the toy destruction business which has been going on at our house for several weeks already. I still have not seen these dinosaurs, so I’m guessing they are some mutant form of the previous dinosaur species. I can only figure that they are either microscopic in size or that they have some invisible super power. I guess it could also be that my mind and my eyes are just not as imaginative and creative as they used to be. Darn old age!

Recently, my two-year-old’s toys have been acting up. They have been downright evil and destructive. During the past few weeks, Sam has told us that some of his toys have thrown cushions off the couch, dumped puzzle pieces on the floor, scattered Lego blocks from one end of the house to the other, and even let the bunny out of it’s cage.

I’m not really sure how to go about disciplining plastic objects. They can completely destroy the house in a matter of minutes. This leads me to believe that they would not respond well to a time out. I don’t really know about a reward system either. What would motivate a plastic Army guy or a matchbox car? Goldfish crackers? Puppy stickers? Doesn’t quite seem right. I think we need some divine intervention. I can’t handle this on my own.

The last time the toys staged a protest against cleanliness and order, I told Sam that if they continued doing this I would just have to get rid of the one’s responsible.

Well, the next time I entered Sam’s room to discover every puzzle dumped on the floor and little cars and Legos scattered everywhere, I questioned him about how this happened again. His reply this time was “Gramps did it.” He is now blaming his grandfather, who was not in the house on the day in question. I guess he figures that I won’t get rid of Gramps if he makes a mess around the house. I’m not so sure, though. If I find out that Gramps really is the one dumping puzzle pieces everywhere - he’s outta here!! Until then, call the priest because we need to perform an exorcism on the toys.

We have been in a battle of wills with Sam. I’m not sure how or why it started, but we’ve had issues.

A little over a week ago, he just decided that he wasn’t going to poop anymore. At first, I thought he was actually constipated. Now, though, I believe that he had his mind set on just not doing it anymore. Why, you may ask. I’m chalking it up to Toddler Control.

Sam has been potty trained for a few months now and that was really about one of the easiest things I’ve ever done. He just got it and then we were done. I was amazed at how quickly he caught on. Since he’s been potty trained, however, we have had a few issues with constipation. So, last week, when he hadn’t went for a few days, I started treating him for constipation. We increase his juice and water. Took away his bananas and cheese. Then, when he started complaining of a belly ache and he still hadn’t pooped, we treated him with PediaLax laxatives. The directions on the box stated that it should produce a bowel movement in 1/2 to 6 hours. A day later he still didn’t have a bowel movement. The whining continued and we continued to try to get him to go. Another day went by and then, as the day was coming to an end, he finally had a BM. We cheered and relaxed and thought that all this drama was over.

Jump ahead four days and Sam has not pooped again. The whining continued. We tried fiber and bran. We gave him the laxatives again. Nothing. Another day started, still no poop. My mother found a PediaLax suppository. This was supposed to produce a bowel movement within one hour. We tried it. An hour later, no poop. We tried distracting him by taking him outside. We thought that maybe he could run it out. It works for our dogs. They start running and within a few minutes they all have to stop and poop. We ran. He would cry, “I poop. I poop.” We would go to the bathroom, sit on the toilet, cross our fingers and pray. “Nooooooo! I done.” No poop. We go back outside and soon discover that he is attracting flies, he stinks so bad. Why won’t he just poop? Finally, I call the doctor. There has to be something wrong with him. He wouldn’t be doing this on purpose …. would he? The doctor asks about his belly. Is it hard or swollen? No. Has he been vomitting? No. Let him go a little bit, just forget about it. Give him some Mylanta in the morning. Words of wisdom - he can’t hold it in forever! The next morning he gets a dose of Mylanta and we go back outside. We play and work. He continues the, what I’m now calling a game of, saying “I poop” and then everyone stops what they’re doing and run inside with him just to discover that he will not go. Grammy and Gramps come by to visit. They both try to get him to go. Grammy says that if and when he poops she will take him to the store to get a new dinosaur toy. He seems excited and upon her leaving, he announces, “I get dinosaur when I poop.” So, he seems to understand what he needs to do. Does he go, though? No. Finally, 4:30 yesterday afternoon, “I poop”. We take him to the bathroom, he has some in his underwear. He sits down on the toilet and he just couldn’t hold it in anymore. Out it came! Grammy comes and takes him to the store to get a new dinosaur toy. Thank goodness!

So, why did he do this? Upon hearing other people’s stories I have found that about half of all parents experience this with their toddlers. Toddler Control. You can tell him to do this, but you absolutely cannot make him go. He has discovered that this is something he can control. Our mistake, I believe, was to make too big of a deal out of it. It became a game and unfortunately we played along. He had us right there in the palm of his hand. But what were we going to do? Is it really wise to just let it go and not try to make him poop? It isn’t healthy to hold it in and it just makes it harder to go, too. We’d appreciate any advise on what to do if he continues to demonstrate these control issues. Do we play along or just let it go?

My 2 year old’s current favorite phrase is “I want that.”

He wants everything and anything that he sees, whether it be in the house, outside, or on TV. “I want that.”

Sam wants the bird that he sees at the bird feeder. He wants the can opener on the counter. He wants the pillow on the chair. He wants the airplane high up in the sky. He wants the toy he sees on TV. He wants Dora and Diego to come to his house. He wants the baby’s dirty diaper. He wants the dog in the backyard. Anything he sees he wants.

Answering him has become difficult. You cannot have the bird because you scare it when you run towards it. The can opener is not a toy, even though it appears that I “play” with it often. The pillow is one of my pretty’s, it is not for your little fingers! The airplane, well, I guess if you can reach it up in the sky, then you can have it. The toys on TV, maybe for your birthday. Dora and Diego? I really don’t know how to answer that at all! The dirty diaper is gross and it goes in the trash, you may take it to the trash can and throw it away, but DO NOT play with it. The dog in the backyard is yours already and you may go play with him. That one was easy.

I want, I want, I want. Talking about everything that he wants can be very exhausting, especially when that’s about all that we talk about throughout the day. Does all of this “I want” talk mean that we cannot take him shopping with us anymore? Will we have to dodge the toy and candy aisles? Will we leave shopping carts full of items when we have to remove him to stop a temper tantrum?

I hope that he ends this stage of his language development as quickly as he entered into it. It’s almost worse than, “What’s that, mom-mom?”

My son will not be three years old until July, but I worry constantly about his speech development. I believe that most of this comes from my background as a former Early Childhood Special Education teacher. Deep down I know that he is still very young and he has many years to go before he needs to be completely and accurately articulate, but I can’t get these nagging thoughts out of my head. I fear that he won’t be accepted in groups or that he will be made fun of all because he may not be understood all of the time. Some of these new fears are the result of something that happened this past Sunday. He attended Sunday School at church for only the second time, the first time I attended with him. Each Sunday has new and different teacher volunteers and this Sunday’s teachers did not know his name. When they asked him what his name was, he did answer with “My name is Sam.” However, the teachers could not make out what he had said. After church, I sought out the teachers to make sure he was okay. He is the youngest to attend and this was only his second time attending. They said that he was perfect and participated in all the activities, but they couldn’t make out his name when he gave it to them. The fear sets in, again.

So, today, I am on a mission to make an alphabet and sounds book for him. I have cut out pictures of objects from magazines. I will glue them onto construction paper and make it into a book. Then, we can read the book, name the objects, and practice our sounds together. I also have the idea to make the book a fun book by rewarding him with stickers each time we practice our words.

I know that I may be over-reacting, but I feel that I need to do something to assist him in his speech development. Like I said, it’s the teacher coming out in me. I would do anything to keep him out of special education or just the public school in general.

We awoke this morning to find a beautiful day waiting for us. Sam got dressed and was outside to play at 8:00 this morning. He did not return inside until I called him for lunch.

He ran in the yard, dug in the dirt, and pointed out the birds in the sky. One of his favorite activities, though, was doggie torture. He would start at the top driveway, call the dogs, and pet them a little bit. Then, he would run around the front of the house to the lower driveway and call the dogs down there. He would pet them a bit and then run back to the top driveway. He repeated this activity off and on all morning long. I call this doggie torture because they actually had to move and couldn’t just lay in the yard sunning themselves. Sam also enjoyed going down to the basement entrance, where my Grandmother lives, knocking on her door and then hiding in hopes of trying to scare her when she opened the door. He really found this rather hilarious! I’m not sure if she was as amused, though.

I had to call Sam in for lunch and then we fought over taking a nap. He cried. He said, “No, I sit on couch.” I responded by saying that he really needed to take a nap. He responded with, “No, I get up.” I tried explaining to him that he could not get up when he never went to sleep. He didn’t understand that concept. I finally did get him into his bed and he’s now having a good rest. I wonder what sorts of fun he has in store for us this afternoon.

Last night’s Ash Wednesday service began around the same time we would have eaten dinner and lasted through all of the normal bedtime rituals and preparation. I offered my two-year-old dinner before we left, but he just wasn’t hungry. Plus, we had been playing outside and he wasn’t ready to be done with his outdoor adventures. So, I gave up on dinner and concentrated on getting him to use the potty before we left. It was a struggle to get him inside and to the bathroom. He is a boy, maybe I should have just let him pee on a bush. We probably would not have had all the drama and conflict! Finally, he did go to the bathroom and then we were off to mass.

We entered the church plenty early and within just a few minutes Sam started acting up. Now, he is normally very well-behaved in church. He enjoys looking at the song books and around at all the people and pictures. But this evening, whether it be from hunger and low blood sugar or just out of being tired, he was horrible. He started jumping on the kneeler and for some reason decided that he was a monkey. He would laugh and make the monkey “ooh-ooh, ahh-ahh” sound and then laugh some more. Verbal reminders to be quiet and threatening to remove him from church did not work. The little-boy-turned-monkey behavior continued until people in front of us started to turn around to see who was the culprit of the strange noises. My husband finally removed him from church, took him outside, and reminded him to sit and listen and be quiet. After a few minutes, they returned and so did the monkey. Again, he was reminded to be quiet. Did he listen? Of course not. My husband whispered in his ear that if he didn’t sit quietly and listen he was just going to take him home. The monkey continued and, once again, Sam was removed from church. This time my husband actually took him to the car and proceeded to strap him into the car seat. Afterall, he was told that he had to go home and go to bed if he continued to act up. Sam screamed and screamed, “No, mom-mom. No, I want mom-mom.” After a few minutes, he settled down and once again it was explained to him that if he went back into the building he would sit quietly, listen, and behave. They returned. I could tell that Sam had been crying - his eyes and cheeks were red and watery. However, he sat in the pew and did not move. He stood when everyone else stood. He sang when the music played. It was a miracle! I witnessed a miracle! The monkey had been removed from my son’s body and his sweet personality returned. The rest of the service was uneventful, but as we walked out we had several people ask us about the monkey which had taken over my son’s body. It was kind of embarassing, but at least the possession was over!

I know, you’re probably thinking, “Idiot. Of course your son is a boy. What else would he be?” So, let me explain.

Today we participated in a playgroup sponsored by our Parents As Teachers organization. Sam is one of the few boys in the playgroup, I think there may have been two other boys, among a sea of girls. Well, let me say, he loves girls. Not just any girl, but older girls. Oh my, what troubles this may bring in the future! Now, I personally think that my son is adorable and one of the most handsome boys around, plus he is oozing charm. He has the ability to wrap anyone around his little finger and he knows this, too. I guess being one of the only boys in the group assists him on his mission to melt women’s hearts. It’s funny how I can see him as being a complete terrorizer while other women and girls see him as a cute and humorous little boy.

Sam started out by “assisting” the girls while they cooked in the play kitchen. Sam’s idea of help is really about the complete opposite of what the actual definition of help is. He helped by taking the food and dishes and banging them together - typical boy style. After he was bored with this and the girls quit squealing and laughing at him he moved onto better things. An older girl was writing her ABC’s on the chalkboard and, once again, Sam decided he would “assist” her in her writing. He grabbed a piece of chalk and started drawing lines and circles around her letters and the more that she protested to him being there, the more drawing he did until he had actually pretty much taken over the entire chalkboard. His closing act, which I must say that he saved the best for last, involved a piece of pretend bacon from the kitchen. You’re probably wondering what he could possibly do with a piece of bacon. Well, he turned one simple and innocent piece of bacon into a Bacon Monster. He started chasing girls with this piece of bacon, all the while making a growly monster noise. He soon discovered that he could also do this to moms. He would shake his Bacon Monster in front of their faces, growl, and then laugh. The other moms couldn’t get enough. They would gasp and say, “Oh, my” and this would just make Sam laugh more and more.

Like I said, I saw a terrorizer, but everyone else just laughed and played along with these little boy games he had created. I’ve seen this boy come out before, and I continue to catch more and more glimpses of exactly what I’m in store for in the future. It scares me a little. What am I going to do? Especially when his little brother gets a little bit bigger and his boyness comes out, too. I will be outnumbered and very well could lose complete control. Is it too soon to call for help? HELP!!