Post-illness re-training

The stomach-virus-from-hell finally departed our poor child on Sunday, which was the first day that she felt like playing and being off the couch. Six straight days of nausea and whining demands from her couch position...it was exhausting for all of us. And now she's back to her normal self. The end.

The babysitting kids are all back this week, which has been good and bad. The boys are typically a delight. They have their moments, but for the most part they are instruct-able when they get out of line.

Olivia, of course, has her issues. She's a high maintenance kid and always has been, so I've always had to take a pretty hard line on discipline and make sure to remain consistent all the time. She knows what kind of behavior is tolerated and what is not, and when she misbehaves or gives me attitude, she can't go back to playing until she corrects the behavior...or the attitude. Pouting is not allowed.

We are doing a little re-training this week because of all the allowances made during sick week, where we catered to her every pitiful need. She's adjusting to re-training fairly well, if a little slowly.

And then there's the other little girl in my charge. She is only here two or three days a week, and when there's a weekend (or a sick week), sometimes she also requires a bit of re-training. Her issue is pouting or crying when she doesn't get her way. As with all pouting and crying, I demand that she has to remove herself from the group until she can give me a good attitude. For her, it is REALLY hard and usually requires at least a half hour of screaming at the top of her lungs before she settles down.

As you can imagine, such screaming is disruptive to the rest of the household and more than my nerves can take. So once she commences screaming, she is moved to the nap room where she must stay by herself until she calms down.

You'd think that, after a few such scream sessions, she'd figure out that all she has to do to return to playing is to stop screaming and apologize/play nicely/stop pouting. But it doesn't seem to be sinking in. It makes me wonder what she gets away with at home.

So. That is what we are dealing with today. Thank goodness the sun is out and we managed to get out in it for an hour. I needed the Vitamin D and mood boost.