This morning my kid woke up on the wrong side of the universe. Usually a delightful morning person, this morning he whined and grumped and insisted on being held....while I did my hair, while I brushed my teeth, while I got dressed. The thing was, when I was holding him, he was STILL being a pill.
The only thing that made him happy was wearing one of his bibs (or bob, as it is called in his world), specifically a dirty bib he found. I let him wear it around for a while and decided to allow him to wear it in the car on the way to school after his head almost exploded when I tried to take it off to put his coat on. He seemed mildly pleased to be wearing it in the car...until I tried to take it off him before we got out.
Long story short, he wore the bob into school.
I thought for sure I could get it off him at school while he was distracted. Instead, he took his little hands and held it close to his body, cooing "bob, bob, bob." Finally, because I was mortified that it was dirty, 15 minutes late for work, and rapidly being surrounded by other kids who wanted to wear bibs and eat food, I yanked it off him and promised he could wear another bib soon. I shoved it into my fist, kissed the top of his spinning head, and literally ran out the door.
He's probably still on the ground screaming.....
What was I to do? On one hand, I try to go with the flow. If he wants to wear a bib into school, heck, why not? On the other hand, it was dirty, and the other kids would have gone hysterical en-mass all wanting to wear bibs and eat. The teachers would have loved that. I think a compromise is reasonable.
Perhaps on a day when my bob-loving kid wakes up in his right mind, he will agree.
Isn't there such a fine line between "this is so stupid, I will let him do it" and "this is so stupid, I'm not putting up with it"?
ReplyDeleteI try to remember what my pediatrician told me when he said, "choose your battles. BUT the ones you choose, you better always win those." So once I do decide to put my foot down, I never give in. I don't care how ridiculous the tantrums are or ridiculous the thing we are fighting about it. That being said, there are some things I have to ignore or throw my hands up about, like the fact that matthew will only wear one pair of (old, nasty) shoes. I have not chosen that battle.
But I totally agree, if it is something that is going to then upset a whole room full of kids, my kids has to get over it. Period.
Oh man. I have to admit though that this gave me a little chuckle :)
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