friday forte: macro moment

macro workshop, originally uploaded by ebbandflo_pomomama.

Today, I remembered that it's my turn to cook the festive meal so the Wee Guy and I cornered a roast at Thrifty Foods this morning. Plus eggs, dishwasher powder, and anchovies.

Then we went out for a short walk with mr ebb, and dealt with the Wee Guy's really tedious bad behaviour in which he pushes all of our buttons all of the time until one or other of us explodes. Fun times.

This week we're trying something a little different; we're trying to flood him with attention. It's exhausting. He's a really self reliant little guy who focuses 110% on his own activities and rarely announces boredom ... but he's really appalling when asked to make a transition or asked to do something he didn't think of himself or concede to parental rule ... which can be almost 100% of a child's life. So, we're wondering, with help from a Gordon Neufeld DVD, if there's something we can do to stop having our holidays and leisure time made so miserable by constantly having to walk on eggshells to avoid an outburst. So far, we've had various theories thrown our way, ranging from bad discipline (his doctor) through anxiety to an inability to accept futility. None of them come with any kind of practical advice for how to parent through this, and the more we hear, the more confused it makes the situation and the less we trust our own natural instincts.

He is a lovely kid. He's a feisty and opinionated kid. His reading skills are way ahead but his social skills are somewhat underdeveloped. He is imaginative, creative, and kind to animals. He gets easily overwhelmed and shouts. He has a strong sense of justice as it relates to himself. All of these easily describe his parents, which of course might be the root of the problem in the first place.

Fun times!