Raising My Spirited Child

When Big J wasn’t quite so big, I was scouring bookshelves everywhere for help with raising such a strong-willed child. I came across “Raising Your Spirited Child” by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka on my mother-in-law’s shelf and asked to borrow it. The irony was that she had been wanting to give it to me for some time but didn’t know how to without interfering or making me feel badly about my parenting skills or Big J. This book saved me. It helped me feel less alone and had some fabulous ideas to put into use. It was the kind of book I could pick up and read for a few minutes and come away feeling better, with renewed understanding of my daughter’s “spirit” and more positive about working with her. There are still several ideas from that book that we use with Big J.

With Mr. T I haven’t really needed to consult ANY parenting books! Not that I’m a pro by any means, but mostly because he is just such an easy-going “normal” child! He has been mellow from the beginning and rarely causes me to worry about his behavior – he is a genuinely nice kid and I’m grateful.

Little E has been a challenge from the beginning. We call him our bi-polar child, as he is either utterly happy or completely angry – just so extreme – and he moves from one spectrum to the other in a matter of mili-seconds! In my attempt to not sell him on ebay (sorry Mom!), I’ve been reading all my books and especially the spirited child bible once again. While he is different in many ways from Big J, this book has once again given me what I need to parent my child. It has definitely lightened my load and even brought a few humorous moments into our home.

Little E will often ignore anything we may be saying or asking him to do. He simply looks away and refuses to acknowledge our presence. The “Book” recommends doing all you can to help your child make eye contact (yes, hello, I know this) but then gives encouragement and silly ways to gain that eye contact and ultimately acknowledgement and obedience from your child. Apparently young children truly believe that if they can’t see you, you can’t see them. So the goal is to convince your child that though they are choosing not to see you, you can still see them and they can still hear you. One suggestion is to go up behind them and tickle their ears saying that while you can’t see their eyes, you can see their ears and so you know they can hear you. This worked once, and then Little E would simply cover his ears. So I tried with his other senses and body parts and now I can easily get him laughing enough to look at me, at which time he is CAUGHT and has to listen! But we’ve also created a crazy monster who is obsessed with the fact that even though he can’t see us, we can see him – it is a game for him, and I think he is truly amazed! He will lay on the floor covering his eyes while I describe what the rest of his body is doing and he is shocked! I really can’t put into words how funny he is and how hysterical his laughter gets when I magically announce that his legs are crossed or that he is smiling! At any rate I’m learning to enjoy more of the problems and perks of raising a spirited child!