It's my last day of vacation and hubs and I picked up kiddo from school together. It was obvious she was in a mood and something had happened. We were trying to find out and she was telling us a little bit, but holding back part of it and getting agitated with our questions, so we decided to let her calm down first.
We talked about dinner plans. We said we planned on hotdogs and she said she wasn't going to eat them because she had hotdogs for lunch today (not normally an issue even if she had had the same thing earlier). I let it slide, but I knew she wasn't telling the truth.
About 1/2 hour later, I said "I thought you all had choice of pizza or brunswick stew today". (letting her know without accusing that we knew she had lied and just went on with what I was doing)
A few minutes later she confessed the girl had called her fat and that's why she said she wasn't going to eat. THEN we were finally able to have a good dialogue and she said just now "What times dinner? I do want hotdogs"
I also let her know after she had calmed down that it's disappointing when she's not truthful and that we always have her back.
Crisis over in record time!! Woot woot!!
Showing posts with label behavior. Show all posts
Showing posts with label behavior. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
Saturday, February 22, 2014
The Need Behind The Behaviors
Sometimes behaviors seem so weird and random and/or seem like something totally different than what it is.
This morning was a prime example and then another this afternoon, oddly enough.
C has a BAD habit of getting out of the shower, and bringing 90% of her clothes into the room we're in before dressing and also has a bad habit of leaving the car door open if she runs back inside to grab something for her or us when we're getting ready to leave.
We got to the bottom of BOTH of those this week.
Car door, honestly, we thought was laziness. It turns out she does that because it makes it less likely we can leave her before she gets back outside. We'd have to get out of the car, shut the door, get back in and by that time, normally she'd be back. This was she feels safer, knowing we can't leave her.
Dressing, not sure what we thought, our thoughts change from time to time on that. We continue to tell her it's not appropriate to be partially (or fully of course, although that's not an issue) in front of people and trying to get her to dress by herself. It's not about the dressing. Today it clicked.
She said "Daddy, it doesn't matter if you see my bra, you're my daddy, you wouldn't do anything to me".
I get it now. It's safety. She finally confessed after a few questions once I got it. By doing this in front of us and she continues to see nothing happens, it builds her safety net, and builds her confidence. It's control and she controls the lack of abuse by proving it doesn't happen and somehow these weird things are just helping her feel safe.
This morning was a prime example and then another this afternoon, oddly enough.
C has a BAD habit of getting out of the shower, and bringing 90% of her clothes into the room we're in before dressing and also has a bad habit of leaving the car door open if she runs back inside to grab something for her or us when we're getting ready to leave.
We got to the bottom of BOTH of those this week.
Car door, honestly, we thought was laziness. It turns out she does that because it makes it less likely we can leave her before she gets back outside. We'd have to get out of the car, shut the door, get back in and by that time, normally she'd be back. This was she feels safer, knowing we can't leave her.
Dressing, not sure what we thought, our thoughts change from time to time on that. We continue to tell her it's not appropriate to be partially (or fully of course, although that's not an issue) in front of people and trying to get her to dress by herself. It's not about the dressing. Today it clicked.
She said "Daddy, it doesn't matter if you see my bra, you're my daddy, you wouldn't do anything to me".
I get it now. It's safety. She finally confessed after a few questions once I got it. By doing this in front of us and she continues to see nothing happens, it builds her safety net, and builds her confidence. It's control and she controls the lack of abuse by proving it doesn't happen and somehow these weird things are just helping her feel safe.
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