Arguing 101

I guess all parents make mistakes with their first-born children, but since Nick is my only one, I didn't get a chance to "fix" my mistakes on the next ones.

Arguing, talking back, sassing...call it what you will, but this is a big problem in our house.  I freely admit that I have allowed the problem to go on much longer than it should by not being consistent or firm enough when it first started becoming an issue, but in the beginning when it first began, I bought into all that crap about allowing kids to have choices and discussing your decisons with them instead of "telling" them what they were going to do.  And frankly,being both mom and dad all the time gets exhausting so there have been more than a few occasions when I simply gave in to get Nick to stop. 

Do other parents deal with this?  Nick has a particularly bad habit that I am working HARD to get rid of.  He will argue over and over and over without quitting when he doesn't get his way or if he is told something that he doesn't like.  Example: today in the grocery store, he wanted a pack of gum.  I told him no because we have a container of gum in the car.  When I've bought him gum in the past, he chews a piece for 5 minutes, throws it away and repeats with the next one.  This is repeated until all the gum in the pack is gone.  Waste of money and I simply wasn't in the mood to throw away 1.29 which is what this particular pack of gum cost.  All in all, it wasn't a big deal, but he proceeded to ask me over and over again, in a particularly whiny voice he has perfected over the years: "but why can't I?" and "pleeeeasse, Momma!!!!"   If he said it once, he said it 45 times.  I've been trying an experiment in which I tell him that I gave him my answer and as far as I am concerned, the subject is closed.  I refuse to discuss it with him again.  It is beginning to work, but not today...he didn't stop the whining and arguing until we finally left the store 10 minutes later.

I know that Nick began the habit of arguing with me years ago and because I didn't deal with it like I should have, it is at this point now.  My refusal to give in and refusing to argue with him is helping.  I am seeing an improvement and although he doesn't always like what I say, he isn't aways arguing about it.  Grrrr!  I try to imagine my sweet little baby boy when he acts this way, so I am less tempted to sell him to the traveling gypsies. (Are there even traveling gypsies around anymore?)

When we have these issues, I flash back to my days when I was married to Nick's dad.  He did the same thing...we'd have an argument or other problem, and he would hound me until he got his way or I conceded whatever point we were arguing about, in his favor.  One night, he followed me from room to room almost the whole night long, talking and talking until finally about 3:30 in the morning, I finally conceded the point to him. To this day, I have no idea what we were arguing about, but I remember him hounding me all night.  Nick is EXACTLY like his dad in this regard and that scares me because it is a particularly annoying trait.  I am trying to get this behavior to stop, and as I said I am seeing results, but it is slow and we certainly have backsliding like today at the grocery store.

I woul love to hear other points of view or ideas that have proven successful in addressing the arguing gene that my son seems to have inherited.  This blog is so new, no one is even reading it, but perhaps someday...