Hard Day

Today was rough!! It was one of those days where there were times I wanted to just cry. But then I felt stupid, because who let's their 2 year old get under their skin enough to make them cry?! Well..I guess that would be me.

The speech barrier is really frusturating for Brent. The speech therapy he is getting once a week seems to be helping, although I can't be too sure. Part of me thinks that he is talking more just due to the fact that is he getting older and it's part of his natural progression. He says quite a few things now like "want milk", "want juice", "want bye bye", "outside", "bubbles", "please", "want night night" (he says this because he knows when he goes to bed he gets his binky and blankey...that dang binky- we need to break him from that soon), and he says several other things. He says enough to communicate the important stuff- you know, like watching mickey mouse and needing fruit snacks. The essentials. :)

Today was hard, though. I am putting my foot down with his TV watching. Are there any other moms that have young kids who would watch TV all day if you would let them? He just turned 2 a few weeks ago and is OBSESSED with Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. It seems like the only time he is truly happy lately is when he is watching that dang show. I let him watch it when I am getting ready in the mornings and then we turn off the TV. It seems like the rest of the day he is following me around crying asking to watch it. That is just insane to me! The other day we were at the park and he randomly walked away from the playground, headed towards the car, and yelled "Want Bye. Want Mime" - translation "I want to leave so I can go home and watch mickey mouse". I looked at him thinking "SERIOUSLY?!". That is when I knew we had a problem. What kid wants to leave the park to go watch tv? So, we are going through Mickey Mouse detox. Once a day while I am showering and
THAT
IS
IT!!!

Next thing on our list of troubles is his pickiness with food. It is getting out of control. He refuses to try anything new. He wouldn't even eat cake at his birthday party (not that that is a bad thing, but it shows how stubborn he is). The things he likes are good (with the exception of chicken nuggets). He eats cereal, yogurt, any type of fruit, fiber one bars, and a couple of other things but refuses to try anything that's not in his "rotation". He won't even taste a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich. We really want to get him out of this before Sophie is old enough to decide to follow his lead, so today we put our foot down. No goldfish. No fruitsnacks. No fruit. No fiber one bars. He had to eat a MEAL first. If he ate his food, then I'd give him a snack or fruit.

I had a big debate with his pediatrician at his 2 yr check up a couple of weeks ago. I told him that if he didn't eat what we gave him for dinner, I would give him a piece of fruit and a fiber one bar or something like that. I said "It's not like I'm giving him chips instead of dinner. There's nothing wrong with a piece of fruit!" His pediatrician told me that fruit is still calories and if he fills up on apples and milk, he has no need to eat dinner. And if he knows he will get an apple if he doesn't eat dinner, he has no incentive to eat.

So, today he got cereal for breakfast, which of course he ate. For lunch, I made him a PB&J which he refused to touch. I felt so bad- he just cried and cried. But I didn't cave and told him he didn't have to eat it if he didn't want to, but that was all he was getting. He ended up going down for a nap without lunch. I saved the sandwich and offered it to him again after his nap. He looked at me like I was crazy and refused to touch it again. I gave him some water and that was it. I figured he would probably eat dinner.

4:30 comes and we had quite the standoff. He was throwing himself at the pantry door asking for fruit snacks. "Want Nack. Want Nack". I told him he could have fruit snacks if he just took a bite of the sandwich. Negative. By 5:00, he was hysterical, banging on the pantry door. At one point, he got it open and came out with a HUGE SMILE on his face, holding the box of goldfish. I felt so bad, but I took the goldfish from him (he got all excited thinking I was getting him some), turned around, put it in the pantry and shut the door. Talk about a melt down! Holy moly. It was bad. We had dinner at 6:00. I made a chicken casserole with vegetables. I asked him if he wanted chicken and his face lit up and he got excited. He ran to the kitchen table and sat down. I knew he had to be starving- the bowl of cereal he ate at 7:30 couldn't be doing much by 6:00 p.m. Poor guy. When I said Chicken, he assumed I meant "chicken nuggets", so when we sat down to eat and he had baked chicken and vegetables on his plate, he FREAKED out. We tried to have dinner conversation and ignore him, but I wanted to cry too. I felt so bad because this is all our fault. If we would have put our foot down earlier, we wouldn't be going through this now with him. It's not his fault that we have been letting him eat yogurt for dinner when he refuses to eat what I make. So naturally, since we've allowed it, he doesn't know any better. And now we are dropping a bomb on him and he doesn't understand. I know this is for the best, but it is hard to see him so upset. Anyway, when he refused the chicken, I brought out the trusty sandwich that I had been lugging around since lunch and offered that to him. He screamed even more and pushed it away. Kids in Africa would kill for some chicken or a PB&J. :)

So, that was that. He went to bed with nothing. The last thing he ate was cheerios at 7:30 this morning. Tomorrow, I am going to hold my ground once more! I don't mind him eating some snacks like goldfish, but he can't do it until he starts eating regular meals. Once he has that down, I will reintroduce snacks. Otherwise, he'll be content eating a few goldfish and some raisins to tide him over for the day.

What a nightmare! I know some people have the mindset of "you've gotta pick your battles" and if your kid only wants to eat yogurt and waffles, then who cares?? Give them some vitamins and call it good. I have that mindset too (every other day), but then the other part of me reminds myself that it is crazy to let your 2 yr old dictate what his diet will consist of. It is my responsibility as his parent to give him good things to eat and by golly, he is not the boss! I am! We'll see which side of me wins tomorrow. His pediatrician told me he might refuse what I give him for about a day and a half, but eventually he will cave. He said "There are no 2 yr old anorexics. He will eventually get hungry." We'll see..I don't think he knows how stubborn Brent is! He might just be the first 2 yr old to develop anorexia out of pure stubborness!

We'll see what happens tomorrow...