Feb 26 2009
King of Tantrums
When I picked AJ up at school this afternoon, he gave me a hard time when I required him to put on either his sweatshirt or his coat. He finally agreed to put on his sweatshirt, but he was really hot. In the van, he asked for a snack but I told him we were getting Zoe and then going to have dinner and I said no. Then he wanted to know if he could have some gummy snack a friend gave him. I told him he could have it after dinner. He had a fit and started crying and whining and it quickly progressed to him hating me.
I turned the radio up and ignored him. Then, his backpack flew to the front seat. Next, a mitten. Finally, a wrestling shoe. I was ready to pull over but knew if I did I would spank his butt harder than I should. I debated trying to find a parking lot to make him run laps in, but didn’t really want to hold off longer on picking up Zoe.
I drove on to the Y to pick her up; when we got there, he said he wanted to come in with me but wouldn’t get out of the van. I closed the door and he screamed bloody murder. I opened it back up and told him to get moving, but he thought I was going to spank him (he knew he deserved it!) He followed closely behind me and kicked me in the ankles. I ignored him and pretended I didn’t notice. He wouldn’t go up the stairs ahead of me either.
We went in and got Zoe. He did help carry her things out but was back in his bad mood by the time he was in the van. He came home and stomped around the house and put himself on the naughty step—to his credit!—but he was telling Z to stay away and he threw his sneakers at the door.
I went over and told him to get his sneakers and sweatshirt back on, that he was going to go run around Nonna and Pop’s driveway loop 5 times. I had to put his sweatshirt on and put him out the door. He said he wasn’t going to run, he was going to sit on the porch. I told him that was fine, as long as he didn’t come back in until he was over his mad. As soon as the door shut, he kicked it. That ended the sitting on the porch—and he stomped off to run, insisting he wasn’t going to do it. He kicked the mailbox post, he kicked some remaining snow. He stomped up their driveway and skulked around a bit up there. He did finally run and the five laps was enough to get him back to normal. He came home and apologized.
I’m still feeling exhausted from it all though . . .
Tomorrow’s another day.
