Somewhere in these last few weeks my sweet, mild mannered little boy was replaced with an equally cute little boy who just happens to hit and throw things and cry. I am not sure exactly when this happened. It kind of slapped us in the face. Along with Milo slapping us in the face. Ha, ha! It is funny... but then again, it is not.
Milo has been acting out more and more. When it happens it is inevitably due to his frustration. If he gets mad about something he swings and usually Mark or I or Lanita are in the way. If he wants something that he can't have, he finds something else and throws it. I know that this is normal but I will not have "that kid." I want more than anything to help him get his emotions in check. We have tried a variety of "no" techniques to varying degrees of success. He can usually remember in the short term that he is not supposed to hit us in the face but he has a hard time with that long term memory.
Yesterday I felt like we actually had a little bit of success. Yes, despite the relatively frustrating day overall there was a little glimmer of progress. Scratch, one of our dogs, has actually not been running from Milo the last few days. Milo has apparently taken that as approval on Scratch's part that he can practice his version of petting on her (which is more like hitting with both hands). I was trying to show him how to pet her by moving his hands gently from side to side rather than roughly up and down. He actually picked up pretty quickly. Later in the day we went to the grocery store. He was frustrated and did not feel good and he kept trying to hit me on the chest. Instead, I took his hands and moved them up and down while saying softly, "No Milo, gentle hands." For the rest of the day, if he hit I would say "gentle hands" and he would immediately start petting me. It was really pretty cute.
It was a great lesson for me too. I got further in using soft words and demonstrating an alternate course of action than all the "No Sirs!" combined.
No comments:
Post a Comment