Alright, my parent-child relationship with this boy of mine has been more of an uphill ride than anything else. Today, I am not going to talk about bad behaviour like being rude or lack of respect. This time my focus is on physical bad habits. These are his current bad habits that are driving Allan and I nuts!

1. He likes to stick out his tongue whenever he speaks. Almost very word he says has the ‘th-sound’ in it.

2. He often ask questions that none of us can understand and we need to probe many times before we finally understand what he is trying to ask. For example, “Mummy, why like that?” he asked pointing at something nowhere.

Me: “What like that?”
He: “Why not straight?”
Me: “What is not straight?!”
He: “That picture.”
Me: “Which picture?!!!”
He: “There! That picture on the lamp pole!”
Me: “That picture is straight! Why do you say its not straight?!”
He: “I mean the table in the picture is not straight, can’t you see?!”
*Super Eyes Rolled*

3. He likes to eat like a dog. He does not like to scoop up his food and put inside his mouth. He likes to scoop the food to the edge of the plate or bowl and bend his head down to eat from the edge of the plate or bowl.

4. He needs to pass motion in the middle of his meal. Either lunch or dinner time. This happens 98 times out of 100! Its especially irritating when we are eating at a coffeeshop whereby there is no toilet paper and obviously the Gents toilet seats are wet with urine. *eyes rolled*

To me, I think it is a health issue more than anything. This habit in particular does NOT drive me crazy, but it sure lit up the flame in his dad, who would scream at him whenever he says while he is still eating, “I want to go pass motion.” Because after accompanying my boy to the toilet, his dad has no more appetite to eat.

5. When you ask him to do something, eg. Wipe The Table. He would say cheerfully, “Ok!” And he would slap the wet cloth on the table, slide it across the table once to the left, once to the right and say “DONE!’ To him, so long as the table is wiped, it is done. He would argue, “You didn’t say it has to be every part of the table.” So everything that is instructed must be precise to the very last point! *faint*

6. Whenever Allan or I tell him to stop doing something, he would reply cheerfully, “Ok!” and would stop doing it. But in LESS THAN 10 seconds, he will do it again! No joke, its really less than 10 seconds!

7. Of ‘cos not forgetting his habitual farting which drives everyone in the family crazy?! At the dinner table, in the lift, in the car, in an air-conditioned place… you name it, he has done it in all possible places (almost). To me, I strongly believes that it is another health issue, so I am NOT angry but more of feeling helpless. His farting makes everyone else so pissed and lots of scolding and yelling at him will start, and THAT is not something that I like.

8. THIS IS HIS LATEST ADD-ON to his list of Bad Habits: He likes to rub his perspiration on his neck with his chin. He would bend his neck and RUBs meat over meat with his lower jaw slanted one side, mouth slightly open and tongue stuck out. I am sorry to say this, but whenever he does that, he has the retarded look and I REALLY do not like it. In fact, it is driving Allan MAD!

It has progressed from once in a few minutes to a few times in one minute. It IS getting from bad to worse and I do not know how to solve it. We told him to do it infront of the mirror, so that he could see how he looks, and he agreed that he looked ugly and did not like it; yet he choose to say that it is beyond his control. *scream*

Now it is no longer about perspiration. Even if he is NOT perspiring, he is still doing it! Can you imagine how awful it is when he keeps doing it as he speaks? He REALLY looks like a retarded person! *heartpain*

In the past, he used to have other bad habits too and they died over time. The less rooted bad habits were gone after rewards system was implemented. Others needed more time, more patience, more reminders before he could get rid of them.

But THIS LAST BAD HABIT on the list above is rather worrying because we noticed that it is affecting this posture, as one side of the shoulder is higher now because of the frequent tilting of the head and bending of the neck to one side.

So far, we have tried endless reminders. It is not working. He would say “Ok! I’ll stop.” cheerfully and do it again in less than 10seconds. *eyes rolled*

So now we are hoping that GOGO’s Crazy Bones can do the trick, since it is the thing that he wants most now. We said we would buy him a packet when he could stop doing it for one day, but the packet must remained unopened.

If he did not do that action for the second day, he can open the packet and take ONE Gogo out.

If he continues to control that bad habit on the third day, he can take the Second Gogo out.

And if he succeeds in ‘killing’ that bad habit on the fourth day, he can take the Last Gogo out from the packet.

And in all good faith, by not doing that ugly action in four straight days, we hope that it would be gone for good.

Ever since this agreement was made, two days have passed, and he has yet to achieve step one. Yes, he has NOT been able to control that action for one full day at all. Can you see how worried I am now?

Improvement has been minimal, but at least I can see that he IS really making a genuine effort to stop that bad habit. So long as his effort does not fade, my faith in him will not waver.

*fingers crossed*

Does Your Child have these Bad Habits

Today,
it was an accident.
Yes,
accidents are unexpected.
Yet,
why does the one that showed the love had to be the one who suffer?

Keatkeat’s teeth was not well-brushed.
I told him to re-brush them.
I have a rule that my kids have to abide,
that is:
‘Instructions are to be followed once its given’
I do not like to repeat, ‘cos it breeds nagging…
and hence,
if I need to repeat an instruction,
punishment will be served.
Punishment in the form of taking away rewards…

I said: “Keatkeat, brush your teeth again.”
He did not move.

Binbin: “Gor (Bro), go brush your teeth.”
Keatkeat tried to run away from the toilet.
Binbin: “Gor, Mommy told you to brush your teeth! Go!” and tried to stop his elder brother from escaping…
Binbin understands the consequences of not following instructions,
so he tried his best to prevent his 7year old brother from being punished….

Yet,
the older
but less sensible brother
thought it was fun to run away from his younger brother’s clutches.

So Keatkeat tried to escape further.
Binbin stretched out his leg against the sliding door wardrobe.
Keatkeat pushed his way through.

The sliding door fell off its rollers,
landed straight onto Binbin’s toeS.

My heart was thinking, “Not Again!?!” after what happened previously.
(read blog post: ‘Learn it the ‘Wham’ Way‘)

And I was right.
It was not that bad.
IT WAS WORSE!!!!
Two Toes were injured!

I could imagine the force onto his toes when I saw the dent at the bottom of the fallen door:

I tried so hard to hold my tears.
My Heart Hurt So Much when I saw blood all over his fingers,
which were grabbing his bleeding toe…

I told myself,
I must not cry…
I took a wet hankie,
wrapped it round his toe,
added pressure on it to stop the bleeding…
the blood soaked through the hankie and onto my fingers…

“I must not cry, I must not cry…” I chanted to myself.
It seemed like forever trying to stop the blood,
and my heart pounded faster and faster…

The toe swelled
the skin sliced
the flesh bruised
the blood clotted

My super-pain-tolerant-boy could not fight the pain this time.
He wailed.
So loudly.
For so long.
Till he fell asleep in my arms.

When I heard his breathing deepens,
that’s when I could hold no more.
I cried.
My heart hurts so much, so much….

In my memory, I think yesterday was one of the most challenging day I had with my two boys or should I say…. with Keatkeat.

Yes, siblings do fight and its a common sight.

But my boys had never had a ‘real’ fight before. Yet, for the very first time, they fought in Public!!! *faint* I am a parent who does not like to put up a drama for public viewing. I prefer to give a stare, pull them away or literally walked off with them following my tail. I prefer to deal with the nonsense at home, behind closed doors.

But not for Allan. He yelled at them! Scolded them loudly and we became the family of superstars in that split second. *eyes rolled*

Not Once.

They physically fought with each other THREE TIMES TODAY at different places!!! *Super Faint*

The two boys were REALLY at each other’s throat’s today:

1. Fighting over who sits where…
2. Fighting over who is the first to hold my hand…
3. Fighting over who is the first to press the lift button…
4. Fighting over who gets to play what…
5. Fighting over who can stand closest to me… so much so that they kept making me tripped in the shopping centre!!!! *Aaarrggghhh*

Keatkeat has always been a boy I had to give more attention to. His unloving attitude towards his younger brother has been getting from bad to worse. Yet, Binbin continues to let his 7 year old brother have his way…. It would be another long post just to list the details.

So, since I know Keatkeat is at his ‘worst of worst’ state, I chose to show him more love. So while I was preparing the Christmas decorations, he offered to help and I nodded. Because he loved doing it so much, I gave him a task to count how many decorations we have.
He refused.
Fine.
No big deal.
I will just give the ‘privilege’ to Binbin.

So I asked Binbin to count. The moment I did that, Keatkeat snatched the items away from his 5 year old brother and the FOURTH round of fight nearly went off again at almost 11pm! Its been more than 12hours of nonsense! Enough!

I put a quick stop to it and Keatkeat STOMPED OFF! Man! That was my last line of patience! What kind of attitude is that!?!

Me: “COME BACK HERE!”

Keatkeat came back with unwillingness cum fear.

Me: “Because you did not want to do it, so I asked Binbin to do. I gave you the chance to be first, since you like being first. But you gave up that chance. Why then did you not let your brother count?”

Keatkeat: “Don’t know.” (His usual first answer to whatever question)

Totally pissed with how things went the whole day, I ended the decoration fun and declared Bed Time.

I do not like my children to have negative feelings just before they sleep. So we had a heart to heart talk with Keatkeat. Since Allan was a more fiery dragon than me, I kept quiet, sat listening and let the men do the talking.

During the long talk, Keatkeat said he feel that we love Binbin more than him….. (to be continued)

I succeeded!!!
This craze began with this post “Dare Take Up The Challenge”

I succeeded…..But that is not the end. Its the beginning of a life-long commitment that I have for my kids. Nothing that they do is going to make me burst my lungs and deafen their ears.

A stare, yes.
An angry front, yes.
A deafening silence in disagreement, yes.
A walk-away form of retaliation, yes.
A lecture in a stern voice, yes.
But no more shall I scream at them at the top of my lungs.
No more!

The 3 Days Challenge marked the turning point of the end of the fiery dragon.

I have tasted enough of what anger of a parent can do to a child when I was a kid. I shall NOT pass this down to my next generation. It has to stop with me.

Letting Anger get in the way of effective parenting is so easy. I must not let anger grow bigger than me. Anger can become uncontrollable when its not handled well. Its a scary monster when that happens….

I am not trying to be super human, I am just acknowledging that one’s mind is BIGGER than anger and not the other way round. *wink*

Have a super parenting day, Mommies! *smile*