Fabulous Fours

For all of you out there struggling with 2, 3 or early 4 year old bad behavior let me assure you there is a light at the end of the tunnel! It feels like it will never come, but it will!

Right before Drew turned 4 and lasting a few months, we were going through a phase with our little man. Granted, some kids have issues for years, but thankfully ours was only about 3-4 months. It was rough though.

Like rouuuuuugh.

He would throw tantrums all the time, wine or cry over nothing and we had to walk on egg shells around him. I would continually think about how life was all smiles and happy when Drew was a new baby and it was depressing knowing that Ady was watching all of this. I hated her seeing us raise our voices and arguing with Drew. I dreaded Drew's screaming fits as Ady would look confused and sad from the volume. I know she would never remember any of it, but I would cry at night thinking that it wasn't fair for her to be around all of that.

Drew had been getting timeouts at school almost every day and his behavior in general was unacceptable in our opinion. We began a 'no time out' chart in which he would get a sticker on a day when he didn't get one at school. Well that worked for maybe a week and then went the other direction. Time outs were escalating at school to 4 or even 5 a day. Upon the urging of Derek's mom, I began reading about time outs and how they really don't work for kids and that we had to get to the root of the issue. We did some soul searching and knew it was 100% attention. With having to spend so much time dealing with a fresh baby, Drew was missing out on attention from us. Our faces would light up when we saw Ady and we probably barely smiled at Drew much during those months. Sad, but true. When you're kid is never happy, it's hard to 'play' happy with your expressions toward them.

That's when we made the change.

I began to act super excited to see Drew every time he came near me. I would grab him and hug and kiss him despite his bad behavior and clawing to get away. I made a huge effort to 'tell Ady' how awesome Drew was at things and how he was 'wayyy cooler' than her because he could do stuff on his own. We also changed the no time-out chart to be a 'reward good behavior' chart. If Drew would set the table without being asked, boom a sticker. If he would put recycling in the bin without being asked, boom another sticker. If he went upstairs for a shower when asked without throwing a fit, boom a sticker. We tried hard to avoid time outs and made HUUUUUGE deals when he was good. Like HUUUUUGE. It crushed me to not spend much time at all with Ady, but she was only a few months old so she didn't mind hanging out on a blanket. :)

It was magic. Magic, I tell ya.

Within one week the kid had hardly any time outs and tantrums were drastically less. We're now about a month in the clear and I'm SO glad our kiddo is back. The other day I kissed him like 92 times within one evening and realized that I had probably kissed him only a few times a week during the rough patches. It broke my heart but he was just terrible to be around. Terrible. I'm beyond thankful we are over that phase as this new Drew is the BEST. The kid will go all the way upstairs and get a diaper for me. He loves doing his 'duties' and he really doesn't throw fits anymore about anything. He's back to my happy little guy who is currently loving learning math. I missed my happy Drew so much and am so glad he's back. We now finally get to enjoy the 'fabulous fours' we would often hear about!

I'm not saying time-outs don't work. They have their time and place, but for our family, we've made the shift to only rewarding the positive and it's turned our lives around. (And probably helped my liver since I don't feel the need for multiple drinks every evening!)

Just a regular 'ole stud muffin doing regular 'ole tooth brushing!