My Beautiful Boy

Hug Therapy

When Corey gets into one of his rages I really can’t stand to watch him like that.  Sometimes he just gets so upset that I think he’s going to explode if he doesn’t stop yelling and screaming like that.

For example, last night him and Ben just wouldn’t stop fighting.  My husband just got to the stage that he’d had enough and told them both to go and have a shower and go to bed – it was only around 7pm at the time.  Corey just went crazy and lost it completely, no way was he going to have a shower and go to bed that early.

Of course Corey isn’t going to give in but neither is my husband and my husband completely refused to leave Coreys room until Corey agreed to go and have a shower.  Which of course he wouldn’t and the longer my husband stood there the more Corey would scream.

I just couldn’t stand listening to him screaming like that and I know it isn’t good for him.  He always ends up with headaches after he screams and screams like that.  But, my husband was dealing with it and we know that even though we don’t always agree with one another on discipline, you can’t show that disagreement to your children, we need to be strong and back each other up, so I decided to just stay out of it.

However, after another 5 or so minutes of this constant screaming I couldn’t take it any longer.  As much as Corey makes me angry and when I’m so angry with him I really don’t feel like hugging him, but I knew that it was the only way to calm him down.  So I walked into his room, told my husband to leave and just sat next to him and hugged him.

I talked to him and told him to take some deep breathes and we just sat there like that for a while until he calmed down.  Once he was calm I told him that I wanted to talk to him but I didn’t want him to lose control and get angry, I just wanted him to listen.  Then I calmly asked him to go and have a shower and tried to explain to him that all this screaming doesn’t help the situation and certainly wont make Dad give in to him.

Corey got up and had a shower – he did make sure to point out that he still refused to go to bed after the shower, but I just ignored that and only worried at this stage about him having that shower.  Because he did then go calmly and have a shower and had completely calmed down by the time he got out the shower, we did let them stay up a little bit longer before going to bed.

I know that I have occasions where I just have had enough and I lose it with them, so I know how my husband felt.  I am trying hard lately though to try and not get to that stage and to try and stay as calm as I can.  It isn’t always possible, sometimes you just lose it and I think anyone that tells you they’ve never lost it with their child (especially if it is a child with behavior issues) is probably lying.  We’re only human and it is a difficult job to raise and deal with a child that has behavior issues and it’s normal to show cracks and lose it from time to time.

It was a nurse at the hospital a couple of weeks ago that told me that if anyone denies ever ‘losing it’ then they are lying.  That was when I did reach the point of not being able to take any more and I went to slap Corey on the arm.  We were doing dishes at the time and Corey was holding a metal spatula thing and when I went to slap him, he went to put his arm up in defense and my wrist came down onto the spatula and cut open my wrist.  I ended up with 7 stitches in my wrist.  When it is a cut across the wrist, it isn’t easy trying to explain to people what happened – a lot of people just assume that I tried to cut my own wrist being in that position.  I just tell everyone that I had an accident while doing the dishes – which it was, I know it was an accident and if anything it was my own fault for losing it.

But I guess it did teach me to try and be more calm and not to lose the plot so quickly.  I think since this happened I have really put an effort into being calmer with the kids which is a good thing.  I have brought in some new rules and they miss out on things for being naughty and I’m being tough in that sense and sticking to my guns when I tell them that they are banned or missing out on something.  For example, we have a rule that they only have friends over after school or go to a friends house on Mondays and Fridays.  Now, we’ve added to that rule that if they are constantly fighting and their behavior is really bad at home, then they don’t have anyone over at all.  Last week they had no-one over on Monday for bad behavior and so for the next few days they were quite good and so they had friends over on Friday.  They have been fighting constantly over the weekend so today I’ll be sticking to my guns and not letting them have anyone over.  I know they won’t be happy about it, but they learn quite quickly when you enforce rules like that.  Especially when their little brother does get to have someone over because he does behave.

Anyway, I’m raving again, I know that once I get started I usually rave on a bit.  So back to the hug therapy….. that was my point of this post, in my new quest to stay calmer with the kids I have used the hugging to calm Corey a couple of times and it has worked very well.  Sometimes I think that’s all he needs is a big hug.  I think he often feels so lost and like he doesn’t fit in.  Sometimes I think he gets quite jealous of his little brother who is a real affection kid and is always coming and giving me hugs.  Then with Corey who is always naughty I usually don’t feel like hugging him, so I know Lachlan does get more affection and I think that really does bother Corey.

So, as well as trying to stay calm, I think I really do need to put more effort into showing Corey more affection too.

Lots of hugs – you can never give your kids too many hugs!

Thanks for reading and I hope you and your kids have a lovely day
Sheryl
My-Beautiful-Boy.com