Anthony, the kids and I went to Saturday Market today. It was what I wanted to do for Mother's Day - go look around and pick out some gifts. :)
We weren't there long. We did look at most of what I wanted to look at and I did find a few shirts I really like, but we left suddenly before I might have chosen to leave otherwise.
Anthony had been standing outside a stall where Davan and I were looking with Max. I called Anthony in and Max opted to go hide behind a tree. We found him quickly, luckily, but, even after I explained that it was unsafe behavior - he could get lost especially if we tore off to look for him and he lost track of us - he kept telling me that he didn't understand. Finally, I told him to think about it for a while and let me know when he could explain why it wasn't safe.
Anthony asked to hold his hand to keep him by his side and Max passively aggressively wouldn't. I grabbed his wrist and went to walk off. Max fell down, making it look like I was dragging him. Great. So, then I held his hand up above so I could pull him up if he tried to fall again and he fought me, trying to get my hand off him while I was trying to move him to the car. It was lovely.
I felt inadequate as a parent, yet again. I was so mad at him. But was it that huge a deal? Should I have just let it go? Did I have to really drag him out of there? I question my parenting every single day now. I used to just question it a couple times a week, BM (before Max).
When it's a safety issue, it has to be absolutely non-negotiable.
ReplyDeleteHe has to comply, and you definitely should not have let it go. You did the right thing.
See, not only are you having to teach him what's right, you're having to overcome his lifetime of conditioning. The few decisions he's been allowed to make for himself have been bad ones, and he has to learn to make the good ones.
Alyssa used to hide from me when we went shopping. We had a thousand discussions about it, and she acted like she had no idea what I was talking about. It was a real pain in the ass and I was very worried that eventually, something bad would happen to her.She was four years old when I finally broke her of it.
She hid in a rack of clothing in a store, and I sneaked up behind her, put my hand over her mouth, and dragged her out of there backwards. She was struggling wildly and in a total panic before I let her go and she realized it was me.
She never did it again.
Horrible? I don't know. But it worked. Seems to me that grabbing him by the wrist and walking with him is pretty mild compared to my lunacy.