Where to start... we'll start with my poor brother-in-law who was in a car accident this morning. A 17-year-old driver ran through a stop sign and into the driver's side door of the car my BIL was driving for work. It's also a very small car he was driving. They had to cut him out of the car. He has a broken pelvis and his left arm is broken in two places. He's supposed to have surgery for the arm, but he's now on his way to the third hospital in order to have this surgery. The first was a local, rural hospital, had to transfer him to larger hospital for surgery. Found out at the second hospital that the only surgeon is on vacation and he has to go several hours away to another bigger hospital. Did I mention he lives in the middle of nowhere in Wisconsin? I know I sound like such an East Coast girl. I am. Poor guy. He's going to be on a rough road to recovery. It'll probably take months.
Then I'm on my way home from work. Tom was working at home and left to pick up Phoebe from school for me. I'm almost home and my cell phone rings. It's the security system company. They said our smoke detector on the second floor is in an alarm status and they've dispatched the fire company. I told them I was five minutes from home and would be there soon. I said a few Hail Marys (We should go into another time how saying Hail Marys reminds me of Dune "Fear is the mind killer...I will let my fear pass around me and over me" Yup, I'm not wound up too tight.) As I'm driving and muttering prayers, I'm smelling smoke. Well someone must've been burning leaves to scare me because as I pull up to the house it looks fine. Someone in a truck is there and says he's with the fire department. We go in the house and everything is fine. We check every room and every floor. All fine. Then the fire truck shows up. Eight volunteer firemen all dressed up and no fire to put out. It's a shame Phoebe missed it. I thanked them all and told them I was glad we didn't need them today. Got on the phone with the security system people and they finally explained to my husband that maybe there is some dust in the smoke detector and to blow some cool air from a hair dryer into it and reset everything. If it goes off again a technician can come out on Monday.
Last but not least... Phoebe is continuing to have hitting issues with her classmates at the YMCA morning program before Kindergarten. I don't know if she's having any issues in Kindergarten itself. No notes sent home so far. We'll see what happens on normal PT conferences. According to the morning teacher, her issue is when others don't want to do things her way. She's hitting someone at least once a day, if not more. AAAAAAHHHHH!!!!! Anyway, she's been skating on thin ice with us for the past week or so. The attitude has gotten unbearable. Well we cracked down today. She hit someone at the Y again this morning. She's officially grounded. No TV, no playing with friends for the rest of the week. No TV in the morning, when she comes home from school, she's to do her homework, help with dinner, get ready for bed and that's it. We also had a long discussion about if you hit as a grownup you go to jail. And also how they have prisons for kids called juvenile detention centers and we don't want her to end up there. She cried a lot even before we talked to her and grounded her, as we sent her to her room when she came home from school, so DH and I could discuss how to handle. I also talked to her some more while I was making dinner. She has a habit of saying she wishes she was three years old again. She asked me during this conversation if I knew why she wanted to be three. Then she said cause when she was three she didn't get in trouble. These two other boys did. They were always hitting and they were bullies. I explained to her how she was now being the bully. I don't think she saw it in that light before. When putting her to bed tonight I had her take two deep breaths and count to ten. I told her the next time she got angry at someone at school I wanted her to take these deep breaths and count to ten in order to calm herself down. Please, please, please, I hope this works!
Oh and after we finished dinner I made a comment, "I could use a drink!" Then I realized little ears were listening and I don't want her to think alcohol is a way to cure your troubles, so I said I was just joking I didn't mean that. Phoebe handed me my water bottle and said, "Here, Mommy. You have a drink already!"
Then I'm on my way home from work. Tom was working at home and left to pick up Phoebe from school for me. I'm almost home and my cell phone rings. It's the security system company. They said our smoke detector on the second floor is in an alarm status and they've dispatched the fire company. I told them I was five minutes from home and would be there soon. I said a few Hail Marys (We should go into another time how saying Hail Marys reminds me of Dune "Fear is the mind killer...I will let my fear pass around me and over me" Yup, I'm not wound up too tight.) As I'm driving and muttering prayers, I'm smelling smoke. Well someone must've been burning leaves to scare me because as I pull up to the house it looks fine. Someone in a truck is there and says he's with the fire department. We go in the house and everything is fine. We check every room and every floor. All fine. Then the fire truck shows up. Eight volunteer firemen all dressed up and no fire to put out. It's a shame Phoebe missed it. I thanked them all and told them I was glad we didn't need them today. Got on the phone with the security system people and they finally explained to my husband that maybe there is some dust in the smoke detector and to blow some cool air from a hair dryer into it and reset everything. If it goes off again a technician can come out on Monday.
Last but not least... Phoebe is continuing to have hitting issues with her classmates at the YMCA morning program before Kindergarten. I don't know if she's having any issues in Kindergarten itself. No notes sent home so far. We'll see what happens on normal PT conferences. According to the morning teacher, her issue is when others don't want to do things her way. She's hitting someone at least once a day, if not more. AAAAAAHHHHH!!!!! Anyway, she's been skating on thin ice with us for the past week or so. The attitude has gotten unbearable. Well we cracked down today. She hit someone at the Y again this morning. She's officially grounded. No TV, no playing with friends for the rest of the week. No TV in the morning, when she comes home from school, she's to do her homework, help with dinner, get ready for bed and that's it. We also had a long discussion about if you hit as a grownup you go to jail. And also how they have prisons for kids called juvenile detention centers and we don't want her to end up there. She cried a lot even before we talked to her and grounded her, as we sent her to her room when she came home from school, so DH and I could discuss how to handle. I also talked to her some more while I was making dinner. She has a habit of saying she wishes she was three years old again. She asked me during this conversation if I knew why she wanted to be three. Then she said cause when she was three she didn't get in trouble. These two other boys did. They were always hitting and they were bullies. I explained to her how she was now being the bully. I don't think she saw it in that light before. When putting her to bed tonight I had her take two deep breaths and count to ten. I told her the next time she got angry at someone at school I wanted her to take these deep breaths and count to ten in order to calm herself down. Please, please, please, I hope this works!
Oh and after we finished dinner I made a comment, "I could use a drink!" Then I realized little ears were listening and I don't want her to think alcohol is a way to cure your troubles, so I said I was just joking I didn't mean that. Phoebe handed me my water bottle and said, "Here, Mommy. You have a drink already!"
Comments
Oh and that is exactly the reason my 17 year old doesn't have his drivers license yet... I hope your BIL will be fine.
My son went through a biting stage when he was about Phoebe's age. I honestly had forgotten about it until recently when I was looking through a scrapbook and I found a note I had saved from his teacher. The note said "The-Boy bit another child today in school because the child took away The-Boy's toy vacuum cleaner." It cracks me up now, but at the time I was convinced it meant he was going to become a felon.
You might also want to ask her if there is anyone if there is anyone that she is not getting along with. Sometimes when a kid is picking on others it's because there is someone else that is picking on them.