He's Mine

Yup! He's mine.
I'm the mother of a six-year-old. I don't feel great about it, but occasionally, I wonder what the hell I was thinking. I have never exactly emulated the skills of great parents: patience, understanding, picking a battle...and amazingly, my sweet little boy has inherited most of my finer personality traits.

Just a quick anecdote to define our relationship...
A few weeks before his third birthday, he asked if he could go potty in the potty. We got very excited and encouraged him and went and bought big boy underwear and bought a Sesame Street potty seat. We didn't push. We held back and helped him when he seemed interested. Something clicked in that little brain, though...he knew we really, REALLY wanted him to get potty trained. Flash forward to a year and a half later. By the time he was 4 1/2 he still was not reliably potty trained. He had developed the attitude that if we really wanted him to use the potty, we could be responsible for taking him to the bathroom. I finally gave up. I had a little conversation with myself that if he could become potty trained by virtue of my sheer will and desire for it to be so, it would have been done. Seeing as he didn't care, why should we. I took a step back, deep breath, and we stopped reacting and even responding, and the battle wasn't fun for him anymore. Poof. He was reliable.

Now, I find myself in a parallel situation. My sweet, sensitive boy is in trouble with a capital T at school. He has not learned how to express frustration, sadness, anger, shock, etc. with any reaction other than his hands. His first impulse, and he almost always gives in to it, is to strike out. Now he's starting to be viewed as a bully. It's shocking to us, because he has a sweet, sweet heart, and not only that but he's very articulate and completely remorseful after he lashes out.

Anyway, we have our first meeting with his school on Friday. I'm not sure what to expect or how to deal with my emotions, so I'm turning to my standby...I thought maybe writing about our adventures and experiences might give me a chance to process things and gain a little perspective...

At the least, it will give me a chance to look back over our days with a sigh and realize: Yup. He's mine.