Thursday, January 19th, 2012

The secret of dealing successfully with a child is not to be its parent. ~Mell Lazarus


A note from Mommy:
 
Although I never expected parenting to be a walk in the park, I don't think I was prepared for how quickly Peyton could figure out what "buttons" to push and how often she would choose to push them!  Looking back age 2 seemed like a minor blip in the grand parenting scale and then age 3 started to really test out our parenting abilities.  Age 4 has been a 1 step forward 2 step back type of experience.  The number one biggest issue we struggle with is Peyton's constant acting out towards the dogs.  For some reason, this is a button she has been pushing since she was 2.  There have been moments in the last few months that she has demonstrated how sweetly she can treat the dogs (that would be the one step forward) but then moments later she will come up and hit at them for no apparent reason (and that would be the two steps back).  At times, it even seems like she is doing it without even thinking - a body memory that is so ingrained it's as if her hand or foot has a mind of it's own!  There are certainly other undesirable behaviors, but this is the one we correct more than any other and for the longest amount of time. 
 
So when the local school district was offering an 8 week parenting class for $30 a person and it happened to fall on the same night we had already scheduled respite hours each week I figured it was meant to be.  Tonight was the first night but our respite nurse called out sick so a heartbroken thrilled Travis had to stay home with P so I could attend.  There were 4 other parents in the class.  The three other women had husbands that were all supposed to attend but magically there was an excuse for everyone of them ; ).  All four of us had children in the 4-7 range with three of us specifically wanting to address issues with their 4 year olds.  The last parent to arrive was the father of an adult child, 14 year old son and 8 year old daughter.  His concerns were in regards to the 14 year old.  The instructor is a LCSW who worked at PCMC for a number of years specifically interacting with children who had been abused.  She also spent about a decade in the schools on a program for teachers.  It's hard to tell where the next 7 weeks will take us but if nothing else I can tell I will find some kindred spirits in the mom's of these other 4 year olds!