The time has come. He's gotten away with all kinds of stuff because, in my mind, he's too young to know what he's doing. And I keep telling myself that, even when he's standing in a chair and giving me that look that dares me to tell him to sit down. I tell him to sit down. But I ask nicely, and he takes longer and longer to comply. So today, I demanded that he sit down, and he looked at me like I'd grown another head. But he sat down.
His Daddy actually spanked him for this a few days ago. I wasn't dialed in to the fact that we were actually going to spank him, ever, so it took me completely by surprise when it happened. Dennis cried two little 'waah's and was over it. I cried for an hour. It was 3 little taps on his bottom, but it rocked my world.
I know we agreed that we were pro-spanking (umm, not each other) before Dennis was born. But now he's here, and he's so sweet, and I can't stand the thought of ever spanking him. I always thought that it would depend on the child--some only respond to spanking, and it doesn't work for other kids. What about just using positive reinforcement? Does that actually work? I know spanking is very controversial, and I still have emotional scars from the very few spankings I myself received as a child. David thinks it's hilarious that he can snap a belt and watch me cringe in terror, a trick he performed even tonight. For years he's tried this, and I still cringe every time.
Refusing to sit on his bottom in a chair is the worst thing he's done in all his 18 months, and he'll sit if you tell him to like you mean it. But I'm realizing that the time is coming quickly when we'll have to get all our discipline ducks in a row and agree on a strategy. Do we punish him for throwing down his plate after a meal? For playing in the toilet? How do we distinguish what's simply toddler curiosity as opposed to deliberate bad behavior? Is he old enough for deliberate bad behavior? I really don't think so. And I really hope that in a couple of months, I won't be blogging about how he has completely run over me.
This is hard. I absolutely cannot stomach the idea of ever hurting him, even slightly, even for his own good. Not when he looks at me with those huge trusting blue eyes, and when I'm the one he runs to in distress, the one who makes it better. Crap. I might be raising a real Momma's boy. Or maybe I'm doing the right thing. How the heck do I know what's right? You can rest assured that I won't be spanking him myself, at least for now.
See the picture. He's climbed up a chair to turn on the lamp. Is this bad? Not really--he wanted to examine how the lamp worked. But he's not sitting down in the chair, is he? He got into this position when he was alone in his room, and I came in to find this. Instead of reprimanding him, I took a picture. Perhaps I really don't have a clue.
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