Isaac has been a bit over the top these past days - lots of yelling and pointing and general unreasonableness. Mondo Tantrums. And yet he also maintains a lot of sweetness - it's VERY clear that he's in the middle of some brain development and is having some trouble adjusting. This morning, he climbed into bed with us (after sleeping through the night....?) and systematically ran through is favorite words: Mamma, Dadda, Bella, Airplane, Wawa, Baba, Dis, moremore, dar (car), duk (truck), WOOF, Meow... and so on. It was sort of an internal checklist he was going through.
As we were downstairs getting ready to go to school, I was helping Bella with her pants when he snuck up and BIT MY ARM. He actually chomped my bicep, and broke the skin. I yelled "NO BITE" and he stumbled back and started to cry. After a minute of letting him realize he had done wrong, I did comfort him, but man did my arm hurt.
But what I must confess is that being bitten sends unique signals to the most primitive centers of the brain, and the ancient primate comes alive "YOU UNDER ATTACK - YOU FIGHT NOW". There was an overwhelming urge to retaliate in kind... against this little kid who I love with all my heart. It was very strange to have that override kick in, and I'm very glad that I have enough control to simply sit it through and assess the situation. Anyway - i'm no fan of biting, and we'll just have to watch this!
Isaac is sloooowwwllly starting to make food a part of his diet: Tonight he ate two pieces of spicy sausage and red bell pepper pizza, the night before was 1.5 pieces of pizza and 2 green beans, and the night before that was a piece of buttered bread and around 20 ziti noodles in spicy red sauce. I think the boy likes a little flavor in his food. He also loves chips and salsa, and likes medium hot salsa! You know, whatever it takes for this guy to start replacing bottles with solids.
Bella was under the weather again this week: Big puking Monday, no appetite Tuesday, but by Wednesday, she was back in form. Mid-afternoon today, she was complaning of an earache, so we took her to a minute clinic, where the "short" test showed no Strep (but clearly swollen nodules in her throat), and we won't get her full culture until Monday.
Our yard is complete chaos: We're having a brick walkway put in to replace the shattered concrete up to the front of the house, and we had that nasty rock-filled asphalt "Basketball court" taken out of the backyard. We also had that rocky asphalt scraped off of the concrete driveway in the back, so that the kids won't scrape themselves up as they have every summer. Finally, big planter boxes are going in behind the garage, so we'll have veggies this summer!
At work, I'm having one of those good weeks where some concepts I've had cooking in my brain are finally ready for paper: Yesterday I did a huge rewrite of that article I had ghostwritten last week: I think only one sentence was left untouched. Now it's really MY article now. And today I got some good brainstorming on the top secret "project boondoggle": This may never fly, but it is a pet project of the big CEO of our parent company, and he's interested in MY ideas on this, so I'm going to run with it. And my proposal for the new business line finally took shape and I got some diagrams put together...
I just love it when I have a creative couple of days - when the whiteboards have squiggles, pictures have been drawn, and pages have been written.
Looking forward to the weekend
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General Thoughts from Jimmy B
1 comment:
Ouch. Hope Bella is feeling better. Hope she gets to see her trees this wknd.
About biting: it feels good to the biter. Now that he is eating he is experiencing all those toothy itches and tingles. Joey Emerson's mom used to take the kids and say "Animals bite! You are not an animal." It worked with them because there was a general sense in the family that they didn't want to be chained or have to spend the night in the yard. Or eat dog food - and I believe Lavonne might have carried the threat to the next level if forced to.
Disengagement and strong disapproval works better. He needs to know he can't do it.
Good job - and my sympathies. A storyteller who has just had a son has changed a story she used to tell about shoplifting and hating her dad for making her stop. She now ends it by looking at the audience and saying "I hold my son and realize that I am willing to be the face he hates - to keep him safe." It breaks our hearts.
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