In my life as a "professional," whether it was as a teacher, child life consultant, behavioral specialist, special ed diagnostician--whatever, I sat in numerous meetings with parents who were struggling with some aspect of their child's life, and I gave my "expert opinion" on what they should do about it.
I was an idiot.
I mean, not totally. I was sincere in my attempts to help. My advice was sound, based on everything I could know at the time. I had empathy for the families and tried very hard not to judge. I really wanted to help guide them to a solution, and many times, they told me that I did help them. So, I was not an intentional idiot, but an idiot all the same.
Once, when I was probably 20 or so, I had a practicum teacher who was telling me the story of how she came to adopt her son. And I remember her saying, "Don't think that just because you are a good teacher, you will be a good parent. Teaching skills come in handy, but it is a whole different ballgame." Sure, I thought. Whatever. She was a good mom. What was she talking about?
Its this: You can know all the behavior strategies in the world, have all the instructional skill sets, know educational psychology inside and out, be an expert in child development, and still not be able to pull all that knowledge together 24 hours a day 7 days a week 365 days a year while also doing your paying job, the housework, the laundry, the cooking, the finances, the transportation, and (if you are lucky) the social life. Life will break you down. Fatigue, exhaustion, just the never endingness of it will turn all of your best intentions into a crumbling pile of crappy parenting.
So often, after the parents would leave these meetings, we would sit around and judge them. Why didn't they implement the thing we told them to do at the last meeting? Why did they protest so hard about the thing we said they needed to do for their kid? Why did they sit through the whole meeting saying nothing and looking like the only thing on their minds was how fast they could bolt to the nearest drinking establishment. Oh, and their problems, how we commiserated over their problems. They were poor, uneducated, divorced, and provided no structure for the kid. Or they were rich, overeducated and arrogant, divorced, and too rigid with the kid.
Now to be fair to myself, I was always on the parents side much more than the vast majority of my colleagues. I would put my foot down when they would suggest mandatory Ritalin or complete segregation. I would defend the parents often. I would try my best to present myself as perhaps a person who knows a lot of strategies in general, but they were the expert on their kid so we were a team who needed each other to make things work. But I admit not fully understanding some of the resistance, and always in the back of my mind thinking, well if it were MY kid, I could pull this off.
Back then, I thought when I had kids I would be married with (I imagined) a nondisabled partner and we would have just one household to manage instead of two and we would start with just one kid and he would help with exactly 50% of the housework and childrearing and we would both be professionals with modest but comfortable incomes and the white picket fence and yadda all the way. The truth is, no one (or very few people) really ever have that. And if they do, perhaps they struggle with other challenges that impede on them reaching their potential as the perfect parent.
I am having to deal with my own limits. The skills and knowledge and intentions I have in my head and heart are limited by what I can physically and mentally accomplish in any given day. After spending essentially 15 years as a single person, I realize how much of that single life was unproductive, or at least how much time and energy there was to spare. SO GODDAMNED MUCH and so little responsibility it makes me laugh at its absurdity. That whole annoying phrase I used to hear when I worked with families, "Oh, you don't have kids? Well, no offense but you just DON'T know." That used to bug the hell out of me. I cared! I knew! What I didn't experience I could empathize with!
I didn't know. Not really.
Its the day in/day out of it. It has been over a year(??) since I have had a babysitter. I've had a bit of childcare here and there, but usually when I am at meetings for church or otherwise obligated. That whole "me time" shit? None. Zippo. Nada. It is the 24 hour-ness of it. It can make you a bit batty.
My sister and I used to laugh at these stay at home moms who would call their husbands up at work to come rescue them because the kids were driving them nuts or whatever. Although I do still think sometimes people can go overboard in not being able to solve a problem by themselves (a coworker's wife called her husband to fill the kiddie pool up because she couldn't figure out how to do it??? That one was a stretch for me), but I understand it more now. Especially when woman (both outside the home and SAH moms) are working 16 hour days when their husbands are pulling in way less hours, getting paid better for it, and are the only ones considered to be truly "working a real job". Yeah, every once in a while, that husband needs to get his ass home and help out. Every stay at home parent needs and deserves to be rescued now and again.
I need to be rescued. And there is no one. I'm having a mental block (or maybe just physical exhaustion of sorts) about Aaron. Maybe yous all can give me some assvice. A virtual rescue if you will. (Or at least a "there, there" would be nice, too.) Aaron and I have been having an issue for the last couple of months. And I think I may throw him out the window any day now.
Since Aaron has graduated from crib to "big boy bed" which happened around August, he has become a monster of destruction. The weird thing is, he could get in and out of his crib for months before that, and often did, but never did he whirl through my house in tornado fashion as he does now.
When I am in the room, he is a perfectly appropriate, average little kid. Yes, he clutters his toys around as two year olds do, but he plays with his puzzles like kids are supposed to play with puzzles. He builds with his blocks. He colors with his crayons--keeping the marks on the paper a good 95% of the time. He takes one or two books and looks through them or brings them to me. All things you expect from a two year old.
When I am not in the room, even for a few minutes, he destroys things. He pulls all the books out of the shelf, he rips pages, he yanks pictures off the wall. He pulls the pillow cases of the pillows. Tears the toilet paper up and decorates my bathroom with tampons. He takes tubs of blocks and throws them across the room, he throws puzzle pieces out of their puzzles at breakneck speed. He pulls every bit of clothing out of the dresser drawers. He pulls lamps down from the plug-ins and breaks them. He hurls furniture across the room. And god save us all if he gets to the kitchen. He will (within seconds) throw a whole box of crackers all over the couch and stomp on them until tiny crumbs are everywhere. He will take sippy cups half filled with juice and flings them around and becomes his own sprinkler system. You get the idea. He does this every. single. day. Sometimes several times a day.
I am with that kid nearly nonstop. But I have to work on the computer sometimes. I have to play with Naim sometimes. I have to fold the laundry sometimes. I have to pee sometimes. I have to sleep sometimes. I cannot physically watch that kid every waking moment. Now, just to eliminate some of the obvious suggestions, here is what I have tried:
I don't think this is separation anxiety. My guide dog, Mara, was with me 24/7 for the first probably 10 years I had her. Then when her health started declining, she stayed home more and more. She went nuts. She would get into the trash and tear everything up into itty bitty pieces. I don't think this is that. Why? Because I am not barring him from being with me. If he wants to follow me around everywhere, he can. And he purposefully makes sure I am not around. He figured out I could hear him on the baby monitor, so he very quietly unplugged it every morning. When they wake up in the morning, they are free to come into my room and get me. Naim comes in every morning and gets into bed with me and wakes me up. I have seen Aaron come into my room, turn on the light, see that I was sleeping (so he thought) turn off the light, shut the door (which I never shut) and run off on his merry way to destroy things. He looks for opportunities to do this when I'm not available. So I don't think that it is that.
My healthy start teacher suggested that I put things up high and babyproof. I about slapped her. She was trying to help but it was probably exactly the kind of stuff I used to say to parents that was no help and lacked a complete understanding of the situation. You can only put so much stuff up high. Up high now is around 5 feet and above. I have reserved "up high" for all the things that could kill him. Toxins, knives, medication, etc. As for baby proofing, he is at the age where he can figure out a lot of the baby proofing stuff. He knows how to unlock the kitchen cabinet baby proofing thingies. He can climb over the baby gates. Besides, it is just a matter of deciding which kind of mess you want to clean up. If I bar him in his room, it is a laundry/clothing disaster. If I allow him access to downstairs, their room and the bathroom may be spared but it is a kitchen disaster. I have ordered some new baby-proofing things for the kitchen, which may or may not work. But the worst is the kitchen, so if I could eliminate that, that would help significantly. But unless I am going to put him in a padded room, baby-proofing will only go so far.
I've tried tiring him out with activity. In the last week he has gone to the farm twice to pick pumpkins, has gone to two Halloween parties, gone to the gym to take his little gym class and then daycare two or three times, countless trips to the playground and dad's house, lots of arts and crafts and games at home, even a trip to office depot where I let him climb all over the office furniture for a good 45 minutes. It does tire him out and he falls right asleep for nap and bedtime. But I can't tell you how fast he can destroy things. I was in my room this afternoon and I heard them get up. By the time I got up and walked down the hall, he had torn the new growth chart I got them off the wall.
Good ole, natural consequences? I have tried to make him clean up the mess. (Naim usually does most of the helping voluntarily because he thinks cleaning is fun. I almost am going to turn this whole matter over to Naim.) He pouts and refuses to help, so then I have him sit until I finish it. Part of this is my fault. There are times when I don't have the time or the energy to deal with this stuff right away. Some days we just have to get out of the house to catch a bus. Or, I'm just exhausted at the everyday relentlessness of it and I sorta can't deal with it and give up until later. I'm still working on this one. I've talked to him about it out the ass. How it makes me feel, blah blah blah. How it is wasteful. How the more I have to clean the less I have time to play with him. He is too young for much of this. Maybe there is some behavior pattern that I am missing here because I am too close to think objectively. Maybe I am positively reinforcing this with attention or something. If I am, I'm not really seeing it.
Also, to clarify, anyone will tell you that I am not a neat freak. I am not really bothered by the toy clutter. I expect that. And I know that sometimes kids will play rough and things will break. But it is the CONSTANT destroying of things. Some messes you can just let go, but when there is cracker crumbs smashed in the bed or milk all over the floor (if I leave the table for even a second to go get something from the kitchen) you just have to clean it up and deal with it. And when you have a major mess several times a day, it drives you a little--um, a LOT, BATSHIT INSANE.
So, if you are going to tell me that he is a boy and this is what boys do, I don't care. I can't live like this. If he is biologically wired to destroy things, then he needs to learn to control his biological tendencies. I don't do well at all in any circumstances with the "boys will be boys" excuse. I think accepting much of this boys will be boys behavior is a load of crap. I can deal with high energy boys and their trucks and cars and spaceships and need to climb on everything and hang upside down. I cannot deal with wastefulness, needless destruction and totally making my life a living hell.
Aaron is a good kid. He is funny and smart and I love talking to him and listening to his stories and pretending with him and bouncing him around and watching him play. In general, Aaron is a joy to be around. But we have gotten ourselves into a downward spiral. The more he destroys, the more I have to take time out to be away from him and get other work done. The more I am away from him, the more he destroys. The more he destroys, the more I feel like a helpless single mom with no backup that needs to call up, well, somebody's husband at work and have them come home and rescue me.
There is just no one to call.
Someone at least just tell me this is a (very short) phase and that your own son or daughter went through this and moved out of it in less time than it took you to have to check yourself in to a mental hospital.
And for any mom out there who I sat across the table from with my small case of smug professional expert disease and couldn't understand why you couldn't follow my extremely detailed behavior plan consistently 24 hours a day, I apologize. I was an idiot. And I always try very hard to learn from my idiot mistakes. Okay Internets, help me learn from whatever idiot mistake I'm making now.
My energetic (top right)...
...joyful...
...intelligent...
...loving...
...imaginative...
...independent...
...agonizing angelic second-born child.
Can you remind me exactly how old your boys are?
Posted by: Linda | October 31, 2007 at 06:15 AM
"there, there, dear. It's going to be okay. He will grow out of it...and probaby into something else." Wait...you wanted comfort! And ideas!
I am, by the way, a mom of two bioboys who started out tiny and a handful of foster boys who came to me full-size.
I don't think it is separation anxiety either. I don't think it is any sort of expression of any sort of anxiety. I think it is FUN!
Just listening to it sounds like fun. And when you got to unplugging the monitor, oh I laughed. What a smart, aggravating little boy!
I recommend a cage. A nice cage, but a cage.
Okay, not a real cage, but a place where you can confine him where he can't do this -- for long enough so that you can pee or long enough for him to sit and be really really bored and alone while you clean up the mess. He doesn't get to watch. He doesn't see you doing the work. He doesn't know exactly when you will be done. Someplace NOT FUN.
Do you still have the crib? Can you get one of those tent things for it?
I know this could be another impossible solution, but it is the only thing I can think of. You know, other than waiting for him not to be two anymore.
Well, that and getting him into day care or preschool or hiring a sitter...
Yeah, that was helpful.
By the way, I distinctly remembering telling my sister, who wanted to know what to give Brian for a present when he was two, "Oh, just a wooden spoon to carry around while he dismantles the house."
Posted by: Yondalla | October 31, 2007 at 06:25 AM
I have loads of sympathy and no helpful suggestions. I'm too worn out by the utter relentlessness of it all myself, and we have yet to hit the Destruction Phase.
I will say this: Those boys are cute as all heck. Oh my gosh.
Wish I had more to give you. I'll be back here looking for tips from your other readers :).
Posted by: snickollet | October 31, 2007 at 08:23 AM
Duct tape his hands to his body.
That's all I've got.
Surely it will pass. If not, he has a happy career in demolitions ahead of him.
I'd send you some tranquilizers if I could, and let you decide who in your house should take them.
Posted by: Moxie | October 31, 2007 at 09:20 AM
I am so sorry that he has to be so tough! I agree with Yondalla about the cage but on the side of a playpen or room. Do you have a room that you can place him in that he can't get out of when he destroys things? A room with nothing in it? How about a playpen (I suppose he could climb out of it though). How about making him go with you wherever you are (although I agree this will be a pain for a while). Something as a punishment for what he is doing. I agree also that he is thinking this is fun. Somehow that has to be stopped - I just wish I could think of how too.
I also understand your parental advice before having your own kids - I think we have all done it and have all looked back and apologized to those we did it too. Don't beat yourself up too hard. Keep your chin up and perserve as much as you can to let him know that you do NOT appreciate him destroying things. Does he do this when you are at D's house?
Hugs to you and I hope something kicks in and subsides soon! =)
Posted by: Jules | October 31, 2007 at 09:24 AM
I'm pregnant with a (surprise but so, so welcome) boy, and you are scaring me.
I have no advice, but this sounds really hard. I think Yondalla's advice is good, someplace that really is not fun while you clean up.
I hope it gets better. Soon.
Posted by: cherylc | October 31, 2007 at 11:51 AM
What if you gave him a box of stuff that he could destroy? Or got a big cardboard box that he could crawl into and tear apart? Part redirecting, part recognizing the need to destroy? My son does this when he's been in his room alone too long. I put him in his room with a baby gate across the doorway when he needs to nap but doesn't want to. If he's in there past an hour without sleeping, he starts ripping up books, tearing things off the wall, etc. So with him, it's boredom, I guess. Maybe if you gave him a box full of things that were easily crushed or torn -- dixie cups, egg cartons -- he might focus on that instead of your house. Not much of an idea, but it's all I've got.
Posted by: vmc | October 31, 2007 at 12:19 PM
Far be it from me to contradict Moxie, so I expect she's right. It's a phase, it will pass. And I can relate all too well to the feeling of being too tired to deal with a particular behavior and letting it slide.
FWIW, when my kids refuse to help clean up, they have to sit in a chair. BUT. I don't clean up for them. They sit in a chair until they're ready to help. It's a battle of wills, but I'm fine letting a mess sit and letting them sit until they clean it up. There have been a few times that I've had to walk them around the room, "helping" them pick stuff up and return it to its place because it's been bedtime. If we have to leave the house, I WILL leave the mess until we return and then say, "Oh, I'm so sorry you didn't pick this up earlier. Would you like to sit in a chair or pick it up now?" and resume battle of wills. I've never lost this battle and they're pretty accepting that I will never give in.
What I find amusing about Aaron is that he's so sneaky. I have a sneaky one, too, and I worry about when she's 15. If she was deliberately causing messes, I would do the confining thing like was suggested above. Hauling him with you is also a good idea, but not great for your sanity.
My husband talks about when he was little (3 or 4) and loved to read. Unfortunately for his mom, he didn't just like to read a book and then return it to the shelf. He had to haul all the books off the shelves and read while buried beneath them. He was bewildered by her despair. I think many toddlers just enjoy clutter~and destructiveness is fun, too.
Posted by: Linda | October 31, 2007 at 12:23 PM
No ideas at all, especially since I've got none of the little buggers myself, but oh, Linda, there, there. You deserve at least that! How aggravating! If I lived in Oregon I'd come over and give you a break though.
Posted by: Pronoia | October 31, 2007 at 01:54 PM
I'm not a parent, just a babysitter with a good background in child development, etc. So, I cant begin to imagine what it must be like for you. Sorry Aaron is being difficult. If I lived near you Id come babysit for free!
Maybe its just a stage. The only thing I can think of is to manage the enviroment, but it sounds like you've already done that quite a bit and that you don't want to put more things up high, etc.
My only other suggestion would be to give him an area that he can mess up--a bunch of soft blocks or whatever, paper he can tear to bits, etc--in some corner and define it with duct tape or something. Then tell him he can do whatever he wants in there, but not in the rest of the house.
Might be worth a try?
He will stop, though. At some point, it will definitely be over!
Posted by: vanessa | November 01, 2007 at 07:17 AM
I've been thinking about this, and I asked my child therapist husband, and all we come up with is that he's pretty young to remember consequences or even connect them to his actions. So, I agree with people who say give him some area or stuff he can destroy, but also keep him with you as much as possible, and make the cleaning up part very matter of fact and not fun. Linda's suggestion about the chair is good, and I think it would be good to make the clean up low key. (Which would be very hard, because I would yell, honestly.)
Posted by: cherylc | November 01, 2007 at 09:24 AM
You are a really nice mom. If Aaron was MY mother's child, that would have been a swift spanking, make no mistake. I can't believe he crushed stuff into the couch! On purpose! Take pictures to remind him of your sainthood when he's older.
Posted by: Kate | November 01, 2007 at 04:49 PM
Like Kate, if I had done this as a child, I would have been spanked. It's things like this that leave me--with all my own professional kid toolkit--flumoxed, too.
Nat isn't this bad, but she comes the closest to this kind of behavior when I'm attending to Selina. It is obvious to me that in her case, she is trying to get attention. So I usually park her, wordlessly, in time-out and refrain from any other attention for a while. I have managed to make her clean up a few times but it was like pulling teeth. (I mean clean up these rage-type messes, not every day cleaning up--she's okay about that.)
I just don't know. We use a baby gate now, over her bedroom door and she can't get past it. So in the morning, she plays in her room but can't get to the kitchen, for example. We also put little hook-and-eye type fasteners on the top of the bathroom door and a closet door to keep her out of those in general. I guess whatever form of corralling you can come up with is my only advice.
Here's hoping he outgrows it soon.
Oh, and get a frickin' baby sitter. Really. Get one. Just a couple hours a week keep me from losing my mind.
Posted by: Shannon | November 03, 2007 at 08:32 PM
I just started working outside of the home. Between being a stay at home mom and a working mom being a stay at home mom is much harder.
I have to block my son out of everything or he will pull everything out and make a huge mess.
Hoping things will get better soon.
Posted by: Angela | November 04, 2007 at 04:15 PM
I have no advice, but as the mother of a child who does not ever destroy or mess anything due to her many emotional problems and insecurities (no object permanence at 3, things breaking and messes make her anxious, cannot be alone for any amount of time), I can advice you that everytime he pulls one of these things you remind yourself that he is a self-assured, healthy child and this, too, will pass.
As for me time, you definitively need it. Can't you find some kind of volunteer to babysit for you through any organization (church, community center, association of people with disabilities)? I have a home based bussiness and I have now two interns from a college. They earn credits for their work. Maybe your local college has a child care or child psy mayor that offers interns? And, since you are home schooling, maybe an education mayor would be interested.
Good luck
Lucia
Posted by: Lucía Moreno Velo | November 05, 2007 at 12:57 AM
Delurking...
This will sound stupid, but if your kid's hair isn't really long, try him out on a big wad of sticky tape. Often, our kid was looking for tactile stimulation and the passing of a tape ball hand to hand (with that slight stickage hesitation) and the schwocking it to the furniture and peeling it off and the picking up of carpet fuzz...well, it was big fun. We used a tape wad about twice as big as her palm (and half as big as her head). It's low tech.
Yes, she was a destructor. I would counsel against the deconstruction kit as it is very hard for kids his age to distinguish between "what mom allows me to tear up" and "treasured family photos." Don't ask me how I know this.
Posted by: bridgett | November 05, 2007 at 07:22 PM
I hear you. Oh, the ideals we have BEFORE we have children. I had this perception that if I provided plenty of love, structure, and mental stimulation; I would produce a "the perfect human being". I was sooo naive about having children. Little did I know that she would come out with a personality of her own. And that I couldn't possibly be supermom 24/7.
My daughter and I have reoccurring phases where we butt heads. She's very stubborn and smart. What's worse, she's on to some of my strategies.
If you haven't already tried it, here's a suggestion: totally and completely ignore when he has done something. Don't even clean it up until he's forgotten what he's done. Of course, unless it's hazardous to leave it unclean. If you're not willing to leave a mess, talk to him about something else totally different while you're cleaning it. Try it for a couple of days, and if doesn't work; it will probably fade on it's own.
I've been reading your blog for a while now and I know you are a very good, conscience parent and his motivation is probably just the little added extra attention he gets. He's probably also testing his powers of manipulation. Good luck!
Posted by: Jamie | November 05, 2007 at 08:31 PM