tantrums

Tantrums.  The truth is, we all have 'em.  Its just at some ages, they are louder and we are less apologetic about them.  Ethan has discovered the power of his own voice and is practising exerting his will when he can.    He is super sweet about 95% of the time, but the tantrums are becoming a part of daily life.

His Opa and Oma (my parents) have been visiting over the past week, and Ethan has become used to the attention.  His favourite thing - Oma's iPad.  So much so, that he expects to be able to have peek at it whenever he sees it in use.  At first, really cute.  His little techno-fingers seem to be find new ways of getting things done on the touchscreen that our adult fingers can't figure out how to do.

But then there are times when an email has to be sent, or his fingers are covered in mashed banana and not very iPad friendly.  We have witnessed some amazing displays of anger and will when we try to keep him from tapping his way into Elmo's world on the gizmo.  Back arches, mouth wide in full scream, face red with anger.  Wow.

It easy to see how parents get tempted into giving in and setting patterns that become cemented.  He seems to have suddenly arrived at a stage where he thinks he can decide to do whatever he wants and there's nothing we should do to get in his way.  But then again, maybe that's childhood generally.  I'll ask the parents, but I imagine that these stages just keep cropping up and the ways we throw our weight about to get what we want changes.

Possibly even beyond childhood.  Adult tantrums, of sorts.  I can think of times when Thom doesn't do what I'd like and I exert my will by childish means like silence and strops.  I might have learned to control my desire to scream and cry, but not  getting what you want still burns.

So I try to be compassionate while he loses it, appreciating that we all hate to be kept from what we want.  His little will is his personality and has to be loved along with the sweet sides that are thankfully far more frequent.