Hell is other people

It's funny how much support you get from others when you are being a hardarse with your kids, and how little you get when you are trying to be more gentle, more discursive or whatever. I tend to the more gentle side of parenting, to talking things out with Atti, to offering him choice (and consequences). And I thought I had a pretty normal 4 year old boy. Not great at listening, wants to be the leader all the time, wants more tv and later bedtimes, doesn't want to pick up the toys. Will pick up the toys thought.

I do lose it and yell though, but our biggest problem is that the Wook and I are not on the same page about parenting and don't seem to be getting on the same page any time soon.

But this week I had two friends who indicated in different ways that they thought Atti was a pretty badly behaved kid. Which threw me. I talked to a few more friends and got feedback that a) he isn't. And yes, my perception that if he was I would already know from daycare workers is correct. Also that b) I am parenting a little outside the mainstream, and am quite deliberately not parenting for obedience. So, you are going to get a kid that can be perceived as a bit naughty. c) I am not someone for whom please and thank you and excuse me are the only way of indicating gratitude and so on, so I don't really demand that kind of 'manners' - and that can be read as rude by those to whom that matters.

So I felt a little better.  Someone else had had Atti for a few hours over the weekend and was telling me how delightfully he behaved. Which was nice. Then of course we went to a friend's for dinner and he was a horror. Not a smearing-food-on-walls horror, but not sitting at the table, not eating, over tired kid horror. And it all went a bit awful.

So this morning I decided a few things have to change. Am I changing because of other people's perceptions? I'm not sure. I had intended over the holidays to toughen up some consequences, which I do tend to do each year as he gets older. It tends to happen in Dec/Jan because that is when I am on holidays. This year it was complicated by the broken arm though.

We instituted a couple of new standing rules and consequences today. First is that if Atti doesn't get himself in the shower with either me or his Dad in the mornings there will be no tv with breakfast. And there is no second chance - I'm not getting back into the shower. We will both give you a few minutes warning before we get out - but miss the shower and that is it til the next day.

And a new rule that if you call anyone an 'idiot' you will leave wherever we are right away. No more second chances, we leave as soon as you say it. (This is going to suck. He will definitely say it the next time we are out and I will have to leave before dinner or whatever. Boo).

So we shall see how those two go down. Then there are likely to be a few more.

We are having a bit of a win in getting him back in his own bed though. I went and bought a bunch of second hand cars that he wants, and he is earning one a night by staying in his own bed. Third night running tonight *woot woot*.

My other child's birthday

Valentine's day is a bit different for the Wook and I as our Angel was born and died on Valentines day in 2009. We were never big on the V-day BS anyway, but it is now much more meaningful anniversary for us.

There isn't a set thing that we do or anything. But this year will be a bit different, as we will be having Rio for a sleepover to allow her parents to have a romantic night. This was not planned but the reason that is particularly interesting is that Rio would have been about 3 months younger than Angel, had she lived and been born when expected.

I honestly hadn't considered that when we first became friends with her mother and formed a family-like relationship with her. It was actually my Mum who made me aware that my pseudo-daughter was pretty much the same age and would even have looked quite like my actual daughter. Not that she said anything, but she sometimes gets a bit teary when Atti and my niece are ever just the two of them, because she is only a few months older than Angel would have been.

So tonight, on her birthday, we will kind of have a night of the family we might have had.

Which is a nonsense really. No way would we live here with two kids. I wouldn't have gone to law school. We might never have had Atti. Or he might be older. Or whatever. But still, it is interesting.