April 24, 2005 - Sunday
When the boys go over the top fooling around during or after bath/bed time, our usual threat is to ask whether they "want to go to bed with no stories." If I think about it, that's not a threat that we've actually needed to follow through on too many times, although there have certainly been a few times. More importantly, I think, whenever we have issued a threat of punishment "if," we have always followed through if the "if" actually happens. Call me a hard ass father, but I think this sort of 'don't say it unless you mean it' parenting is one of the smartest things we've done with the boys. They know where they stand and I think that makes all of us more comfortable. And, we can often cut through a lot of the whiny kid stuff pretty quickly.

Case in point: this evening Jeremy got mad about some silly thing and launched into a rather typical three-year-old howl. I don't know what the problem was because I wasn't in the bathroom at the time, but I think it had something to do with who got out of the bath tub first and who, Harry or he, would get to be first on the step stool to brush his teeth (if it wasn't that it might have well have been, because that posturing happens often, albeit usually not with such vigor). I was in the next room and heard the situation escalating and went to stick my head into the bathroom. Jeremy was standing there on the bath mat crying hysterically with his mother kneeling beside him, none too pleased.

I suppose it's important to realize that Jeremy has always been very good at drawing on his emotions to serve his own needs and we've gotten pretty attuned to what might be a serious emotional crisis and what might not and tonight it seemed like not. He'd had something of an attitude leading up to bath time and this seemed like an extension of that, regardless of how shrilled and pitiful his cry sounded. So, as I stuck my head in the door I heard his mother issuing the 'no story' threat. It didn't register at first, so she put things a little stronger: "Jeremy, you're about to go to bed with no stories."

Alas, he is in his own world and still didn't flinch. "Jeremy, I'm going to count to five and if you want to have stories you'll stop. 5..."
Jeremy keeps crying.
"4..."
Jeremy knows "chicken."
"3..."
Is that a hint of abatement?
"2..."
Is certainly is. He is about half as loud now and the wheels in his head are spinning. You can tell.
"1..."
There's a final blubber that comes out just about the time she says "1," but not much after that. Indeed, he's trying to be serious, but there's a twinkle in those eyes and a smile trying to burst through. It doesn't come, however, because his mother is still kneeling right in front of him and not smiling and I think he intuitively knows that this would not be a good time to turn on the charm.

Bed time, after this, is very smooth.


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