Brothers and Sisters

For the first two weeks of M's arrival, C was good with M though somewhat indifferent to her prescence. His meltdowns and accidents were much more frequent than usual, indicating that he was adjusting to his loss of status as unchallenged center of the universe. T's trip to the hospital surely didn't help him either as it gave him a second trauma to deal with in a short period of time.

The last two weeks, however, C has been back to his happy boy self. He is very affectionate and protective of M and shows the skills we saw him use with the babies in the care center in Vinh Long. When M gets restless or upset, he steps in to get her attention and she immediately calms down. (Of course, he likes the attention she gives him too. Her adoring stare would encourage anyone to hang out with her and provide entertainment.) In church this past Sunday, M was starting to get restless. C had been lying on the floor (presumably mediatating, right Opa?). When M started to fuss, he got up and put his forehead gently against her forehead and looked into her eyes. Problem solved! On Tuesday, the weather was gorgeous, so we were getting ready to go outside to play. I told him I needed to go upstairs to get a blanket for M to keep her warm. He said, "Use my green blanket, with the animals." That one is HIS blanket and no one else has EVER been allowed to use it. It was a WOW moment.



Having her in the bathroom during his bathtime also has done wonders for his bathroom demeanor. Taking a bath, getting on PJs and brushing teeth was usually the most trying part of the day. Now, with M to watch him and giggle at him, he has been on his best behavior and has become remarkably cooperative. Tonight, M was sitting in her baby tub while C was in the bath bub and was getting fusy. I asked C to wash himself while I held M. I was sitting on a stool next to the bathtub, so she could now see C playing in the tub from my lap. C was doing one of the nonsense games that preschoolers do but M's fusiness was over! She laughed and laughed. After bath, I set M back in her baby tub to help C dry off and get dressed. I put a pacifer in her mouth. C objected: "She can't hear me!" E: "She hears with her ears, not her mouth." C: "I can't hear her! Her baby talk." Indeed!



That said, C got his first time outs in preschool this morning. One was for running in the classroom and then laughing at the teacher when she told him to walk. The next was for tackling two other boys. When he got home and T and I had the talk with him, he was quite defensive and wasn't going to say that there was anything wrong with what he did. He was definitely not happy to be told that he would have to apologize to the teacher and the other boys (with Ba supervising) on Monday morning. But the rest of the day, he behaved very well and during prayers tonight he added unsolicited apologies to his teacher and to me for random other misdeeds that didn't occur today. I still had to coax an apology for the tackling incident.

That's life...ya get the good with the bad sometimes within minutes of one another. If only it were just an issue with preschoolers...

Time in...

Well, Mum-mum (aka Mommy) is recovering from an unexpected admission to the hospital and subsequent laparascopic appendectomy on September 29th. This the last few days of light duty and C can't be happier (no more Ba having to rock him at night).

The transition to being a big brother has had it's share of ups and downs. On the bright side, C loves and adores his baby sister M - in fact he is very protective of her, loves to make her laugh, and gives her gentle kisses on the forehead. However, it's been a bit difficult for big brother to adjust to sharing Ba and Mum-mum time, resulting in some interesting meltdowns.

So, thanks to Aunt Kiki (aka Super Auntie - in honor of Super Nanny), Opa, and Oma, we've gained some new strategies in dealing with the meltdowns and physical manifestations of regression:

1. Structure, structure, structure - C was placed on a strict schedule: dinner at 6pm, playtime (or TV) until 7pm, bath at 7pm, and quiet playtime (puzzles and books) until 8pm. At 8pm, it's time for bed. [It's been a week, and let me tell you, the change in our nighttime has vastly improved - C looks forward to his "playtime" before bed. We had one night in which we had a delay in getting to bath, so as a reward, even though it was almost 8pm, C received "10 minutes" of playtime before bed].

2. Time-in - Obviously, time out was NOT working for us. C was getting agitated with time outs and they did not improve his behavior. So, thanks to an article in our latest SPAFA newsletter, we decided to take a "time in".

What is time-in? With stressful situations, C was becoming dysregulated (out of control). He wasn't able to self-regulate his behavior and fell into a viscious cycle of stress/loss of control/then anger.

So what are we doing? Well, there are several ways in which time-ins can be achieved. For us, if C is starting to escalate, we FIRST and FOREMOST remain calm. We use a soothing tone of voice. When C was getting upset at Ba, I came to him and sat down (we were at the top of the stairs, so I was now at his eye level). I asked him to come sit with me. I faced C, and asked him to sit with me until he felt better. I told him that it was okay for him to feel upset (the word he used to describe how he was feeling). After a few minutes, he began to calm down and I offered to help him with bathtime.

Why is time-in beneficial? Well, children who have been adopted or with children who have experienced traumatic events emotionally can regress to infancy stage of cognitive development with triggers and perceived stress. The behaviors expressed are resultant of primal fears. (For parents of infants, think of when your infant son or daughter cries - it would be ridiculous for you to tell the baby to "calm down." If the baby cries, we attend to the immediate needs. For our toddlers and children, the time-in gives the child a sense of security. Time-in helps children learn to self-regulate and allows them to understand that Mum-mum and Ba will be there for them. It's believed that in time, the children will learn to achieve more effective self-regulation.

(Credit: Adapted/Edited from http://www.rainbowkids.com/ArticleDetails.aspx?id=648
Originally published at http://www.a4everfamily.org/)

So, we are gaining a new sense of normalcy for our family of 4. C decided to be "Darth Vader" for Halloween, complete with glowing light sabre (alas, no noise). C wanted to wear his costume this evening for Ba, so he was given permission to do so. Unfortunately, he thought this meant he would go trick or treating tonight (resulting in lots of tears and refusal to remove the costume). Problem? Yes. Solution? Thank goodness for creating parenting. I called our neighbor N (N & N's mom) and asked if C could come over to her house for "practice" trick or treating. She happily obliged - Voila...problem solved. C was able to trick or treat this evening and agreed to move from being Darth Vader back to his normal self.

All for now, no pictures to post. Will have some great ones soon from Halloween - Darth Vader and his sidekick, a very cute giraffe!

Until then...may the force be with you!