Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Suspension

I don't know whether to laugh (the hysterical kind) or cry.  Today has been one of those days.

I was given the finger by a father dropping his kid off at the local elementary school because I was apparently driving to slow (it's 15 mph by the school, dude).  He was tailing me, then honked at me, then zoomed over to the drop off lane.  I then honked at him, stopped my car and rolled down the window to yell at him.  I yelled something like, "there's children walking everywhere and the speed limit is 15mph, buddy!!!"  And maybe I said it a few times because he was waving his fat middle finger around at me and gesturing for me to get out the car so we could brawl on the streets.  Nice.  Gotta love DC.

Then I get a call on my cell while driving home from music class with the little guy.  It's the director of the babe's school. Needless to say my heart sunk and I was expecting her to tell me the babe was having an allergic reaction and I needed to meet them at Children's Hospital.  But no.  The director informed me I had to come pick my daughter up as she had bitten her little class mate.  Apparently a rather nasty bite.

So we headed to school, picked her and came home for lunch.  There was screaming, hitting and general chaos for the whole ride home.  The next hour was painful as I tried to get her to lie down for a nap and not wake up her brother.  I finally succeeded and she's asleep now.

But I am not looking forward to the rest of our "punishment day."  I need to occupy both of them until bed time as there will be no fun things like TV and dessert.  It is still gray and rainy, and that is how I feel inside.

My 3.5 year old has been suspended and I am at a loss.  I need to get it through her head that she can never do this again. I can't even imagine handling an expulsion.  If she hadn't abused me yesterday I would feel more confident that we could get this back on track easily.  But after a tantrum while we were out running a quick errand after school, I am a tad concerned the babe has some serious anger management issues (she hit, kicked and slapped me and then pulled my hair as I was trying to get her in the car seat).  She lashes out quite frequently and it ends up hurting us all.  The little guy has witnessed enough of this behavior that he's starting to think it's normal and is copying some of it. 

I feel like I need Nanny 911.  And now I hear my little guy waking from his nap, so I will let you go.  Any tips are welcome.

5 comments:

Mamabeing said...

oops, i commented on the wrong post....see the comment on your last post!

Janaina said...

Hi,
My favorite time of the week is Friday at about 5:00 pm!!! Monday for me is a little crazy!
Now about this post, I read almost every book about Baby Behavior Concerns, but one that I loved is Secrets of the Baby Whisperer, it helped me a lot.
By the way, my sister-in-law works at at Children's Hospital in D.C.
Have a nice week.

Catherine Ryan said...

I have no suggestion but I can tell you I know how you feel. When Number 1 was little, I used to go off into fantasy land...I'd be on the Oprah show in 20 years and Oprah would be asking me "So tell me, when did you first realise your child was a psycopath?". We had some serious issues and she used to fly off the handle, big time. I found it a bit scary at times. She seems fine now, didn't kill a single child in the process.

You'll find a way through.

XC

BlessedMomof2 said...

First, I LOVE the comment from Catherine about being on Oprah in 20 years. LMAO!!

Second, I'm so with you right now. Our 6 yr old has lost his mind. In the past week, he's become a lying cleptomaniac (sp?) He's stolen numerous items from classmates and his teacher, lied about it, and pinched a child on the bus apparently out of shear meanness. Why? Who knows?? This is totally new behavior. I have no suggestions, just wanted you to know you are not alone. Maybe it's the impending summer and some sort of lunar phase or weird gravitational pull??

Anonymous said...

I read an article on Baby Center that talked about "correcting the behavior vs. finding out what is causing it (i.e. frustration, anger, jealousy, etc.), and how parents should side with their kids, even though it's really hard, so they can open to you and share their feelings. It was pretty interesting because a lot of times I tend to focus on eliminating the negative behavior, but not necessarily on getting to the root of it's cause. Hang in there girl! You are an awesome Mom!