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Smiles were much more difficult that anticipated.

New Mama's picture

Our therapist asked me, on Wednesday, to smile at SS7 more this week. Which DH and I both made a point of doing.... err, at least we tried.

However, SS7 was in trouble at school all day Thursday. So DH punished him after school and smiling at him just seemed wrong after that.

Friday, I worked late and didn't make it home until the kids were in bed. DH said SS7 was "sick" (translates: I don't want to eat my veggies and if you make me I'll force myself to throw up on the plate and cry until you let me go to my room) at dinner so he sent him to bed early, like at 5pm.

Saturday, SS7 had a bug up his butt and was bad all morning. We asked him to do his chores and homework before going to his grandparent's house. He talked back, refused to do anything, whined, complained.... all the same old behavior. It was impossible to smile at him cause he was irritating the crap out of me.

DH took SS7 to his grandparents on Saturday afternoon because, despite SS7's poor behavior, he promised me a quiet and relaxing weekend. SS7 was supposed to be home tonight but his grandparents called and said SS7 wasn't feeling good so they were keeping him out of school today and would keep him tonight too. (This is actually because DH's mother is trying to force DH to let SS7 go to their Valentine dinner. But the issues with DH's parents are a whole other website forum!)

So, smiling has been difficult.

Comments

Rhyleighblue's picture

You guys seem to be all over the place with the negative feedback. You punished him for:

Getting into trouble at school
Not eating his veggies
Not doing his chores
Talking back
All within 24 hours.

Well, you know this kid better than I do, so I am not about to tell you how to raise him. I just wonder how this negative feedback campaign is working out for you. Do you or your DH feel like you are making any significant progress with modifying the kid's behavior? Does he respond positively and stay out of trouble at school? Does he eat more veggies?

Maybe you could try to focus your behavior modification goals. Perhaps you could talk to your DH about what are the most important behaviors that need to change and then pick out one or two of them to concentrate on over the next week or so. Then let the others slide until you have accomplished at least one of the target behaviors.

For example; if not getting into trouble at school is your target behavior then set a goal for him. Tell him that he will be rewarded if he can stay out of trouble for a certain time period. Remember that he is only 7 y.o., so your time period needs to be specific, attainable and realistic. Your reward must be something that he wants, too.

Once you have a target behavior then stop the negative feedback (yelling, sarcasm, frowning, punishing, etc.) for any other undesirable behavior that is not the target behavior. So, if he won't eat veggies then don't comment about it. Throw them away after dinner and say nothing about it. Of course, if he isn't hungry enough to eat his veggies then he can't be hungry enough for dessert. If he talks back just stay calm, keep your voice neutral, and refuse to let him bait you into an argument.

These are just suggestions. You are not obligated to follow thru on any of them.

Good luck.

New Mama's picture

We've tried that. The problem is, we focus on changing one behavior like getting in trouble at school. If he goes two days in a row without any trouble then he gets a reward. Then three days, then four, etc. He worked his way to 10 days in a row. Then we focused on a new behavior, like talking back. We do the same thing, if he goes two days in a row without talking back then he gets a reward. Then three, then four, etc. While we've fixed the talking back at home he begins to get in trouble at school again. So we go back to working on getting in trouble with school and get that fixed. Then we start focusing on something else, like teaching him nutrition and making sure he eats his veggies. We do the same thing, if he goes two days in a row without us having to nag him to eat his veggies, then he gets a reward. Then three, then four, etc. While we're fixing that then he starts talking back again.

Once we feel like we've got him in a good place then he starts something new. His newest behavior is throwing temper tantrums whenever he's asked to do something he doesn't like: doing homework, eating veggies, picking up his socks. He throws these temper tantrums and forces himself to throw up and then sits there and cries until we give in. And we always give in because he looks so pathetic and we're not entirely sure how else to handle it.

We are not on a negative campaign, although, that's what my post may sound like. Our therapist told us last week to make sure to point out all of the positives. So, after school, he gets a quick punishment for bad days, usually an extra chore like taking out the garbage, and then we drop it. And then we go thru his work and agenda and point out all of the good things he did for the day. We make a BIG BIG fuss about it. Then, at the end of the night I have a behavior chart at home where we go thru all of the positives for the day and he earns a sticker for each one. For example, if he's been talking back we don't point it out we just go straight to something else like he ate his dinner without complaining and we make a big fuss out of that.

We give him one on one time to ensure he gets enough attention from each of us. We put BD1 to bed and play games with him or just sit and talk with him for 30 minutes. Sometimes it's just DH and sometimes it's just me and sometimes we're both with him.

Willow2010's picture

Y: I don't want to eat my veggies and if you make me I'll force myself to throw up on the plate and cry until you let me go to my room) at dinner so he sent him to bed early, like at 5pm.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
POOR KID!! I have never understood the food battle. NEVER. If the kid does not eat veggies, (or atleast try them), then he gets no snack later. Why make a kid throw up at the table all because you want to MAKE him eat a veggie. That kid will really hate veggies when he grows up.

New mama…you have had some GREAT advice here. I really hope you use it.

New Mama's picture

This is DH's rule that I don't necessarily agree with. However, this kid would never eat anything healthy if we didn't force him to. And, when he was having serious behavior issues at school I changed his diet from all the crap he'd been eating to a healthy and nutritious diet and we saw positive results. I recently stopped DH from forcing SS7 to eat but as a compromise, he gets sent to bed immediately after dinner.

We don't make him eat until he throws up! But I can see how you read it like that. SS7 will have hese temper tantrums and force himself to throw up over anything: doing homework, chores, or anything else he doesn't want.

beyond pissed-off's picture

This kind of reminds me of the marital therapy suggestion books that tell you to make the relationship better by having sex more. Exactly HOW do you work up the warm fuzzies and want to roll around naked with someone that you really would rather punch in the nose?????

Rhyleighblue's picture

Yeah okay, I hear you. I get your point.

Here is the ugly truth about that: sex isn't about love. It isn't even about LIKE.

Sex for a man happens in his neither regions. Consequently, it's all about biology. Have you ever heard a man say that he had an orgasm with a woman that he really didn't like, or perhaps didn't even KNOW?! Yeah. So. For a man, sex happens.

Sex for a woman happens in her head. Consequently, it's all about emotions. Have you ever had an orgasm in your SLEEP? With absolutely NO physical stimulation down yonder? Yeah, that happens to many women, sometimes it starts as early as the start of their menses.

So, how does a woman have sex with a man that is pissing her off? By imagining that she having sex with a different man. Sex is a biological behavior. So, you USE it or you LOSE it. The more often that you engage in sex the more you WANT to have sex. The more often that you have sex with the same person the more you will begin to develop an emotional bond with him - even if you start out pretending to yourself that it's NOT him that you are having sex with. Ultimately, the orgasm reinforces positive associations with the sex partner that was there when the orgasm happened. Those positive associations in a woman's mind release endorphins that make it easier to have an orgasm the next time she has sex with him. This is called a positive feedback loop.

That same positive feedback loop works with building an emotional bond with a kid that is not biologically related to you. In the adoption community they have an expression; FAKE it until you can MAKE it. That means to keep your negative feelings to yourself. Don't let the child know that you find them annoying and frustrating. It's like Ripley was saying, you must mirror positive emotional responses to the child if you want to get a positive emotional response in return.

We aren't making this crap up out of thin air, you know. There is a huge body of research to support these types of interventions... For both sex (yes, and the research on women's sexuality was :jawdrop: ) and disciplining children.

Just a thought.

Tartsy's picture

I could not have sex with one man while pretending it was another. That would be insulting as a suggestion if I ever received it. Minimizing for some of us...so no matter who we are who are not making it up...simply does not work for everyone.

Rhyleighblue's picture

Ok

Tartsy's picture

I feel bad for you! Seems no matter what you do is just not quite good enough LOL! I give you major credit for all of these efforts and taking it seriously. I could never take lotion or smile therapy seriously for someone else's kid. As if this is all up to you? And where is your support?

Auteur's picture

I agree! It's like SM has to suck it up and keep on smiling no matter what. Oh??!! skid just crapped in SM's face and told her it was a mudslide? Just keep smiling away, SM!! WTF??!!

NO WAY!!

New Mama's picture

DH is supportive. He's just as frustrated as I am but he's got that bio connection. Or maybe it's just a higher tolerance for pain! Lol!

Thanks for the support. I thought these smiles would be much easier cause smiling is easy, right?! But it's not easy at all. How can it possibly be easy for a SM to ask in my nicest voice a billion times for SS7 to clean his room and when I'm finally fed up and red in the face and ask him, in a nice voice, why he hasn't cleaned his room for the last 2 hours he says "I'm not going to because I don't feel like it" rolls his eyes and shuts his door in my face. And then I'm supposed to put a big happy smile on my face? Are you fucking kidding me?!

Luckily, DH interevenes when crap like that happens. He understands and appreciates that I'm trying.

Kilgore SMom's picture

i have to share something with you. that i think is funny in a sad kind of way. My mother is a VERY negative person. So I was brought up hearing my mother gossip and talk bad about people all the time, she was really bad about pitting my brother and sisters against eaching other. I was 28 yrs old when my parents divorce.(my mother met a new man and left) so we didn't speek to her for 8 months, mostly because we didn't know where she was at. My sister and I realized that for the first time in our lives we were getting along. and it became clear to us that is was because our mother was not there to stir things. So I went to work one day and told my co-worker that I was going to fine nice things to say about every customer that came in. You would think that would be easy right? Wrong! It was so in me to think negative things automatically, that I had to work at it. I still have to work at it and I'm 45 now. Its not that I Want to be negative, I don't. I really have to try hard not to be daily. I told you all that to say this. Help your ss loose the negative behavior. We did this with my SS7 and it is working. Start with one thing at a time. You may have 5 things on your list but do just one at a time. always pick your battle wisely. I think you will get no where fighting over the food issue. Let it go. Let him eat what he likes that you fix and don't worry about what he doesn't eat. However, don't cook a nice meal and then make him something different thats not what i'm saying. We started with my SS behavior at school, they have a color chart. Remember this is a time when their just learening to follow rules in a group. We do 10 minutes nose in the corner for the small stuff and no tv all night for the big stuff and its working great. I'm going to try the surprise bag idea that was posted by someone on here for trying to make ss cleaning his room without being told over and over. besure to always praise him for a good job. Good Luck.

New Mama's picture

I'm generally not a negative person. And neither is DH. We always play around and joke and have a good time. But SS7 is so difficult. We have specific times we're nothing but positive with him and make sure he gets attention (see reply above). But it's not enough. SS7 gets rewarded for good behavior. But we can't look past the terrible behavior that he's exhibiting on a regular basis.

Thanks for your feed back.

New Mama's picture

Yes! Quiet often I find myself hiding in our room or going out for coffee alone or taking BD1 to the library just to get a minute to breathe. It usually works. But there are those days that I can't get enough time alone!

New Mama's picture

I don't think that's against the rules, so, yes that's what I did. If SS7 was doing something I couldn't smile about then I'd ignore it and talk and laugh with DH and BD1.