its not so easy the second time around....

I haven't gone into the whole story here yet because there is so much to say and I don't know where to start. Logan has been demonstrating extreme frustration, tantrums and strong will, as well as a speech delay, for months. Honestly, since he was an infant, he's just been very hard to keep happy, he's never been easy going, and he has just cried a lot. More than what seems normal to us. He's so very different than Dylan ever was. The extremeness of Logan's behavior just grows worse and worse and has set off some red flags for us. As a result, we met with our wonderful pediatrician months ago and asked for her input on how much his frustration and tantrums may be related to his lack of verbal communication. And how much of it might be other behavioral issues. Some of this is clearly normal for his age, but some of it just seems excessive. We've done a lot of reading. And we have a much anticipated appointment tomorrow in Baltimore at Kennedy Krieger Institute, Dept of Behavior and Psychology. We've already been up there once in February and had a complete pediatric evaluation with another department. I will go into all of that another time. I just brought it up because I'm sure we'll learn more tomorrow at his appointment and I'll want to talk about it.

We go to Logan's playgroup on Tuesday mornings every week. I think its really important to have Logan in a consistent playgroup since he's not in daycare. It teaches him how to interact socially with other kids his age. The kids are usually pretty nice to each other, minus a few minor things now and then. But today, Logan was so aggressive towards the other children. Up until today, almost all of his hitting and pushing has been directed at me or Andrew, or Dylan. But today at playgroup, he was beating up on all the kids. Pushing them down, hitting them in the face.... I must have put him in time out five times in 1 1/2 hours. And he'd cry while in time out facing the wall in the corner, and then come out of time out and do it all over again. The time outs so far aren't teaching him that certain behavior is not acceptable. He's just too young to make that connection. And its so frustrating for me. I know I have to keep putting him in time out, and making him 'apologize' to the child he hit when he comes out. And someday he will 'get it'. But for now, its like banging my head against the wall. Dylan was never a hitter, biter or pusher. He had to learn to share. But he was never aggressive like this. I can't take Logan out of playgroup. We can't just stay home and keep him away from other kids until this passes. He has to learn he can't behave this way. Fortunately the other moms at playgroup are very nice and understanding and supportive. But if this continues week after week, I'm sure they are going to tire of their child being beaten up by my child.

I have never felt so challenged as a parent as I do right now.