I’ve always known that Joseph gets his grumpiest when he hasn’t eaten. He gets rude, cranky, mouthes off, everything. Then, pop a bit of food into his mouth and he’s a-ok. Tonight at dinner, he was doing exactly this. Ron got to the point of threatening to ground him if he spoke even just one more word (because it was nothing but rude one-off statements). Then, we sat down, had a piece of bread and it was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde — the good one this time (which is that??).
Joseph has always been like this. I need to remember to tell his teacher … I know I brought it up last year. If he doesn’t keep food in his system, he wigs out (that’s the best way I can describe it).
So during dinner, we did the patience and listening thing. We let Joseph tell us what he was feeling and such without poo-pooing his thoughts or disregarding them. He was the center of the conversation for most of dinner and at the end, he was so totally different than at the beginning!
As he went to bed tonight — which was NOT a fight at all, he said “Mom, I think I’ll try what you said and just be friends and see where it goes later.”
Wow. Maybe I am right after all. Nah. 🙂