I had a ROUGH day with Carson.
I don’t know if this was some kind of toddler pay-back for this past weekend when he was so clingy, fussy and insecure with all the new people and places, but he was just downright horrible all day. He was highly aggressive, mad, defiant, tantrumy (yes, it’s my new word), and at times mean. He has never had a day like this before.
Strangely enough, he didn’t take it out on Kate. He saved it all for his unsuspecting mama!
Let’s see…he threw his breakfast and lunch on the floor and when I told him to stop he screamed “NO!” and then dumped it all. (I made Mark handle dinner because I wasn’t up for another fight with him.) He shut me out of my own office, and screamed “NO!” at me while banging on the glass French doors. He turned off the satellite box at least ten times today, and each time I got on to him about it he screamed “NO!” Two of those times he also hit our flat screen TV — once with his hands and then with a large plastic toy. He got into the kitchen trash can more times than I can remember. When I would catch him, he would scream at me and then take off through the house with whatever prize he had gotten out of the can. He figured out how to open the back door (which, by the way, we have the kind of handles that cannot be child-proofed) and explored the patio while I frantically searched the house for him. He has never before opened a door before, and I had just let the dogs go outside which is why I had not locked the door.
But the big highlight of the day was when he started to get into a mini fight with Kate over by the toy bin. She refused to let him have a toy he was trying to steal from her. So he started angrily screaming and then crawled as fast as he could to me and started hitting me! I was sitting on the floor looking at a magazine and thought he was coming to me for comfort. Nope. If he could get Kate, I guess he would get me. When I stopped him from hitting me, he had a melt down. Once I thought he had calmed down, I reached out and picked him up and hugged him while he sat in my lap. He suddenly turned and started hitting me in the face and grunting/screaming at me. So I walked away from him and let him throw his fit on the floor. Kate just looked on with this ‘what’s going on?’ expression on her face.
Sigh.
Bad day with Mr. Carson.
The good part is that he slept until 7:30 AM and then took a 2 1/2 hour nap this afternoon — both of these things have never happened before. He has never slept that much like this. He usually takes one hour naps, and wakes up before 6 AM. I don’t know if that had anything to do with his behavior today.
I have my fingers crossed that he wakes up in better spirits tomorrow.
Oh, and Miss Kate had a wonderful day. She talked my ear off.
The Adventures of Kate & Carson 
Oh no! Poor Carson. I wonder if it’s teething. It sounds so out of character for him.
Sounds like you had a great trip!
Wow! It sounds like “rough” barely begins to describe it. I struggle with keeping the kids away from our tv too, no advice there. I second the thought that he may be teething. Nathan is working on his fourth molar and his first canine and it is making him miserable. I try to give him Tylenol if I notice the crankiness starting to ramp up. I find it so hard at this age to see how little impulse control the kids have. They know that hitting will get them put in the pack’n’play (our timeout spot) but they seem incapable of stopping themselves. I just try to stay a step ahead of them and redirect them as needed. It makes for exhausting days but I hope this phase passes quickly.