8:26 a.m. - 2004-06-23
Parenting - all sorts.
Coulda sworn I posted yesterday. It was an incredibly busy day - got alot done, scored some points, and maybe I have won over my "enemy." We'll see. Monday night Andy had a sleepover with his cousins, so spouse and I had the night to ourselves. What did we do? Watch TV and have thai food. It was very nice and quiet.
Yesterday, Andy came home cranky and overtired. I know he loved being with his cousins, but we discussed two things that upset him.
First, he said that sometimes when he plays with his friend's g@meboy, when he doesn't win, he feels like he wishes he wasn't born. I'm torn as a mother and don't know what to tell him about it, so I said that it made me said to know that he felt frustrated to the point that he would think that, but he made me sad, that his daddy and I were overjoyed that he was born. I also explained to him that he is in fact, a very lucky privileged boy. He doesn't know that yet. How do I help him realize that and value that? Do I get him involved in activities for less privileged people? Am I protecting him too much so that he doesn't experience any adversity and learn that he can survive it? I have to think about this.
The other thing we discussed was that he knows we HATE sp0ngeb0b. I loathe it. When it comes on the tv, it makes my flesh crawl. consequently, we don't let him watch it. His cousins watched it yesterday when he was at their house, and he told me last night tht he knew he couldn't watch it, so he took his book and went into the other room to read. I was thrilled that he has such a self-directed moral compass. That was wonderful, and I told him how proud I was that he would do that, that he would KNOW to do that on his own, and that he told us, because we wouldn't have known, one way or the other, that he had watched the show.
What we didn't like was the 12 times afterward, that he told us how proud he was of himself in the following 3 minutes. I explained that he was really smart and mature to figure out what to do, but that after a few times, he should just let himself feel his own pride, rather than continuing to call attention to it. I just don't know if I did the right thing. I tend to be a bit too humble sometimes, to the point professionally where I let others take credit for my work. then they get promotions and raises. But I think this is a different issue. Anyway, he cried for a few minutes because he usually dissolves into tears when he is rebuked in any way. We didn't yell, we didn't speak harshly, he just hates to be seen in less than a perfect light. So I have to think about this too. I did say two more times before he went to sleep that I was so proud that he chose not to watch the show when he knew we wouldn't have let him do it. So I'm not sure if that balances the message. We shall see.
Where is that damned children's instruction manual?
Okay - time to go to work.
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