Yep that’s him – you know him by Sam. We call him Sam, Sammy, Sammers, Bud, and when he is really bad Samuel Vandzura!
I have been having a really hard time with him – I thought the 2’s were bad but in his short time of being 3 he is worse than ever – I cry…a lot… these days. I also yell a lot which I hate – it makes me mad when I yell at Sam and he doesn’t listen so I yell more and he still doesn’t listen… see where this is going? No where…. Exactly!
The littlest things set him off – he doesn’t like a shirt that HE picked out or I helped him and he wants to do it all by himself. An ambulance goes by and he decides he doesn’t want to hear it. Shoes? No he doesn’t have to wear shoes…. And so on and so on….. he gets mad when I put him to bed and his mad when I wake him up.
The past week has been a nightmare – constant fighting – he is yelling at me, screaming at me, hitting me and biting me when he gets upset (I have teeth marks to show it). I am on my last straw. I.do.not.know.what.to.do!!!!
I was talking with a girl at work and she was telling me she took her daughter to anger management classes when she was 8, yep, 8! What they teach is how to breathe…. Take a breath before you react. Think about what you are about to say. Take a step back and leave the room if you have too. Have patience. PATIENCE? What’s that???
I admit I have never had patience….. and when you have kids it’s a must!!!
So yesterday I started over and I tried an experiment – it’s a new day – I am going to be patient and we are going to have a good day…. I hope so anyway.
The first thing I did was pick up Sam 45 minutes LATE from school. Why you ask? When I usually pick him up they are about to go outside and play and of course Sam isn’t happy that I am taking him home – he wants to stay at school and play with his friends, so by picking him up late he gets to have his afternoon play time with his friends. I get there and he still wants to stay at school but I manage to get him inside w/o a fight… yes! Score 1 for mommy!
We get to the car and he sits so nicely in his car seat while I buckle him – Score 2 for mommy!
I also tell him what a good job he did getting buckled in so nicely! We are on the road and he snaps “PUT YOUR WINDOW UP” My normal reaction would be to yell back “No, I won’t. You don’t yell at mommy”! Instead I calmly said “do you have manners Sam?” He says “put your window up please” I said “oh ok I will” and I do…. he says “Thank you mommy”! Score 3 for mommy!
We get home and we are playing inside with his new stamps from Aunt Becky (thank you!!) and he is loving it!!! Then he starts to stamp on the table. My reaction is to yell and I did …. “If you stamp one more time on the table I am taking them away!” Then I stop and breathe…….. then I say “Sam, we only stamp on the paper not the table” Sam says “ok mommy” Score 4 for mommy!
I find that Sam really feeds off of me – if I react and yell then he does too and when I am calm he is calm too. The whole night went great (almost, more on that in a minute). It was so nice to have a fun evening with Sam =) He even ate dinner nicely and was happy to see Mark, usually he screams “No daddy! Go away” when Mark gets home.
At bed time I broke out our new stoplight clock. Sam loves stoplights and when the light turns green he says “go mommy go, the light is green!”
I am trying to give Sam more control over his life – I think he needs it so this clock would perfect. I tell Sam that when the clock is red you stay in bed because red means STOP! But when the clock turns green you can get up because green means GO! He said “oh I like that mommy!” I tell him he doesn’t have to wait for me to come and get him anymore – he can get up all by himself when the light is green! I leave the room and of course he gets out of bed – even though the light is red…. Oh well. I can handle bedtime issues as long as the rest of the evening goes well =) Mark takes over and gets him to bed.
This morning I am in my room waiting for him to get up – I set the clock for 6:30 which is when I normally get him. Its 6:31….. Its 6:34…. Where is he? I check the monitor..he isn’t in bed… I go to his room and the light is green…. I go downstairs and he is walking around the living room I said “Hey Bud whatcha doing” He said “ The light was green and I got up all by myself” he was so proud of himself!! I asked why he went downstairs he said he was looking for Piper =)
I tried not to rush him getting ready for school but he wanted to play and I needed him dressed – so we compromised. I will do one puzzle then you have to get dressed then we can do the rest – he was ok with that – I got the car packed and was ready to go but Sam wanted to move all his checkers – I was frustrated but I calmly waited and then scooped him up and headed to the car – he was in a great mood and got buckled right up for me! Even drop off went well this morning!
Now I am just hoping this insn't a fluke and that our new system works….. wish us luck and me some patience =)
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