Real date for this entry was Jan 24th. Apparently I left it in draft mode, and didn't realize it!
1 step forward, 2 back, as they say. Life is never boring, but I have to say that the last few months having been particularly taxing. So, Jerry is still on Lithium, plus a new "sister drug" to Seroquel, but still not seeming any better, from what I can tell. Lots of stress around parenting with him, including one argument that Dylan, unfortunately, overheard. Dylan has this giant elephant that he has had since he was a few months old. It used to have a song and move its trunk, and it could be sat on. Now, it is broken - it doesn't play music, move its trunk, and it's leg broke so it falls over all of the time. It also had gaping holes in a couple of places. So, since it takes up so much room and I've been working diligently to make more useable space around here, and to organize what we do have, I said that elephant needed to go to the garbage. Well, that was apparently foolish on my part - Dylan was distraught, and while I was quickly willing to reverse my decision he went for 0 to 60mph so quickly that it took him about 15 minutes just to calm down enough to finally hear me say (for the thousanth time) "ok, we'll come up with a different solution; you can keep the elephant." Dylan was able to tell me that he was very upset that I even suggested throwing out his elephant, because "he wouldn't be safe in the garbage!!!" He clung to the elephant the rest of the day and evening, and elephant took up his new place at the end of Dylan's bed.
Later that night Emily, who was just moved into her big girl bed in Dylan's room, wouldn't stop talking and making it impossible for Dylan to sleep, so as per our previous agreement I moved Dylan to my bed to fall asleep. Well, he would NOT leave without his elephant - he cried, argued, whined and put up a big fuss all-around. I had not eaten all day, I was tired, and Jerry was getting very frustrated, which tends to up my stress level by about a 1000%, so I quickly lost patience and resorted to empty threats in a vain attempt to make it all stop quickly. So, stupidly, I told Dylan that if he didn't settle down and go to sleep quietly I would have to throw out the elephant, because I wasn't about to go through this hassle every time I have to put him to sleep in my room. Well, Dylan was also very tired that day, and he did not listen to my threat, even when I said our key phrase "last chance." Normally, that's that - the last chance is the last chance and I follow through 99% of the time. Dylan knows this and usually complies about 85% of the time. Not tonight.
So then, of course, I'm trapped in the classic parent-trap: I've made a dumb-ass threat that I'm not willing to follow through on, and the kid isn't listening. To me, this would normally signal time for Mommy to have a time-out and think about how to fix the situation. To Jerry, this signalled that someone else clearly needed to step in and follow through to "teach" Dylan that there are "consequences." The likelihood of traumatizing a six-year-old who still magically believes that his beloved toy won't "be safe" in the garbage has no effect on Jerry, who threatened to go and do it himself. Luckily he stopped before he got upstairs, but he was MAD. He was so furious that Dylan was "getting away with" his behaviour, that I wasn't following through on what I said was going to happen, and was convinced that no matter how unfair the consequence, if it was threatened it must be followed through on.
No amount of talking to him about me being the grown-up and having to take responsibility for my own mistakes, fixing what I've done wrong, etc. could make him any less mad. He felt that Dylan needed to be "taught a lesson" and this wasn't it. I even told Dylan that I would be deciding what to do about the elephant in the morning, to buy us some time to talk, but even that pissed Jerry off. There was no getting through to him. My feeling was very strong: I follow through with a punishment that was clearly out-of-proportion to the situation and all that would be accomplished would be having a 6-year-old boy who is devastated and scared for his elephant, who feels like I am mean, and who would no longer be able to focus on his own behaviour, let alone learn to take responsibility for it.
So, Jerry finally stormed off, and I took my few minutes to put him out of my mind and focus on the situation. My solution was this: Dylan was told that if he didn't settle down, be quiet and go to sleep right away I would be moving elephant back downstairs, where he would be safely suspended from the ceiling - he'd still be here & he'd be safe (solving Dylan's problem with putting him in the garbage), he'd be out of the way (solving my space problem), and I wouldn't have to battle every night about moving the very heavy, akward elephant on and off the upper bunk (the more immediate problem solved). The only problem not addressed by this solution was Dylan's concern about not being able to hug or play with it anymore, but that would be a logical consequence of not going to sleep nicely without it, when necessary. Problem solved. Right? Not according to Jerry, but other people I spoke with felt it was fair, allowed me to model self-responsibility, and to provide reasonable consequences to Dylan's behavior. Jerry is still mad, weeks later. Dylan's interpretation of the part of the argument he overheard (before I got Jerry to come outside to finish discussing the issue): Daddy was being mean and doing the wrong thing; Mommy was being nice and doing a good choice. Not the kind of conclusion I want my kids to be coming to - that's not fair to them, and it doesn't make for a good "parenting team," either.
So, visits are still limited to a few hours on Fridays. The kids are actually doing really well, and have been told that Daddy is having to work a lot on weekends.
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