When Will My Son Grow Out Of His Bad Habits...

I seemed to have abandoned my blog for quite awhile, didn't I? Truth be told... I am just too tired these days. Zen is 4 years and 4 months old and there is still no sign of him toning down. Instead, his terrible two continued into temperamental three and frightful four... sigh :-(

Almost every day, it's mayhem here in our house. He would refuse to do what he was told and after you had say it to him a millionth time, he would throw tantrum and say you are nagging him. And this is just the basic routine stuff like brush teeth, take shower, eat lunch / dinner, pick up clothes, do the dishes etc. Just kidding about the dishes. And he can be rude. When his daddy comes home from work, he would sometimes say nasty things like "don't come back" loudly, though I think he didn't mean it and was only trying to get attention (?). When I ask him why he said such things, he couldn't answer me and tried to divert attention to something else.

He is very active and could not stay still. Even in kindergarten, he would not sit still. According to his teacher, he would flap his arms and hit those or run around the classroom and disturb others. And during story time, he would not sit and listen to the teacher. But then again, I would not blame him for that because I have heard the teacher telling the story and she made it sooooo boring :-)

But what I wished he would stop doing is hitting others. He would hurt us both for fun and in frustration. Sometimes, he would use things to hit us eg a rolled up cardboard and sometimes, with his limbs. When my two kids are playing, Zen occasionally would use his legs to pin Kay down till she scream. And his kindergarten teacher told me that he was hitting his friends in kindergarten... and this was after just 1 week in kindergarten. During the 2nd week, a girl came up to me when I picked Zen up from kindergarten and said "Zen mummy, Zen hit me just now on my arm and then he stepped on my hair!" Stepped on her hair?!? Was she lying on the floor then? And if she was, what was she doing on the floor?!? Didn't ask her that but I did ask Zen if he hit her first and he said yes so I got him to say sorry to her... Did you ever had other kids complain to you that your kid hit them?

I tried to be positive and guide him but he is really testing my patience... I am not one who would get angry easily but these days, I find myself blowing my top almost every day. I tried reasoning with him, threatening him and even hitting him with the cane (yes, I admit I have hit him... which makes me feel so guilty after that as I believe that kids should be talked and listen to and not hit...) and yet, he does not change. Sometimes, I wonder if those parenting sites were written by parents... and if they were, perhaps they never had kids like mine...

NB: Just needed to get that out...