Showing posts with label preschooler. Show all posts
Showing posts with label preschooler. Show all posts

Thursday, December 9, 2010

Roses are red, Violets are pukey

I spent about half of my leisure hours (the 2 hours after the kids are in bed before I collapse) last night cleaning barf out of a toddler bed and the carpet.  As always, it was just lovely.  Violet has always had a hair trigger gag reflex - a cold with coughing leads to barfing; water going down the wrong way leads to coughing then barfing; extended crying leads to coughing, then barfing.  I've seen more barf than any one person should have to bear.  If you think about it, though - it's the perfect defense.  We tell her no about anything, she cries, she barfs.  She is conditioning us to avoid any sort of confrontation with her. 

Last night's barf wasn't a behavioral thing - just an old fashioned cold with cough. 

Thursday is ballet day, but last week Violet threw a fit and didn't want to go.  I bribed her with a trip to Touche Touchet afterward which worked well enough to get her to the studio, but not enough to actually go in.  "We're not going to the bakery if you don't dance."  "I don't care - I don't want to go to the bakery."  Damn!  I wanted a cupcake.

By Tuesday afternoon this week she was already campaigning against going to dance today.  Husband and I discussed it and decided I would force her to go in the hopes that once she was there and dancing she would remember how much she liked it.  Somehow, she went along with it (after some crying and a few gagging scares), but she said, "If I don't like it I don't have to go anymore." 

She tapped for about 90 seconds before running to me and declaring that she does not like it.  We sat together and watched her lone classmate tap (for some reason 3/5ths of the class was absent).  When it was time to switch to ballet slippers she would have nothing to do with it.  I finally just gave up and left.  Maybe I would've pushed a little harder if we weren't going to pick a friend up at the airport, but whatever.

What's going to happen next week?  I'm pretty sure there will be more fits, so how hard should I push my 3-year-old to participate in a dance class that she suddenly dislikes?  And how difficult is it to get vomit out of a tutu?