My son is driving me crazy. Either the twos have come early, or he has lost the will to live. We have a meltdown an hour, he wakes up every half hours, he has all but given up naps and he pretty much has a blood grudge against his daddy.Last night, he just about drowned himself by throwing himself down into a full bathtub during a tantrum. I know this is frustration, but when I am so tired, and so frustrated myself that I can't even see straight.
I think CT thinks I am either crazy or sick, because every single night for a week, I have been going to bed at 6pm. I just can't take it any more, I hold and coddle and console this child all. day. long. At the end of the day, my ears are ringing with his cries, and I can't even keep my eyes open any longer.
Finally, yesterday, he got a taste of what Oliver has been like lately. He knows now that at least I am not the crazy one. I took advantage of having CT home and ordered every single gentle parenting book written this weekend, I plan on reading them all immediately. Starting tomorrow morning I am also going to start talking to Oliver more. I think half the frustration comes from him not knowing that we are interrupting his play because we have to go to church, or the store, or cleaning up the trains means that he can have a book read to him, etc.
I also plan on giving him boundaries for the first time in his tiny life. Part of the issue has to be we will give him anything to stop the tantrums, which is frustrating him more because he doesn't know where the walls are. So, rules are going to be enforced. Another HUGE thing that we are going to be doing is putting the baby down earlier for nighttime. I believe he is getting too hungry by waiting until 6 or 6:30 to eat, causing him not to eat, throwing a fit instead and wake up at night being too hungry still. So, dinner time is now at 5:30pm, bath at 6pm, bedtime is at 7pm.
Shout out to all my chicas on Natural Parents who are full of awesome advice, and the friends at church who have offered me books to help!
1 comment:
I think you have hit the nail on the head! Oliver spent the night with us last night. At 4:30 he ate a whole banana. At 5:30 he ate all his chicken and mashed potatoes, but not the mixed veggies, about a quarter of an apple and a cup of frozen blueberries.
Then his Aunt Liz came over and made a huge salad and aged beef steaks for the adults. Oliver would not stop mooching steak from the 3 of us! He went from one to the other opening his mouth wide leaning forward and saying aaahhhh until we filled it with that juicy tender meat.
He went to sleep right before 8 and slept all night! Not a peep! I started worrying at 6:30 this morning. I went in and rearranged his covers until he stirred, then continued - sleeping like a baby.
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